Should We Have Any Trust in Xbox? Are Xbox Game Pass Days Numbered # 397

You are listening to Video Games to the Max. Hello, and welcome to another edition of Video Games to the Max. I am your host, Sean Garmer, here with me as usual, mister Mark Morrison hid and well we I didn't purposely delay this show for any reason. Just have a lot of things going on. But obviously I've been looking forward to having to talk about this Microsoft treachery, terribleness, whatever you want to call it, closing down

for but does the studios. We're gonna get into all that, the Sarabon mess of an interview that happened afterwards, which I'm sure was scheduled way before they were supposed to do that, all of the things that go on with this whole Xbox thing. Mark, we'll probably talk about some more Stellar Blade and Nintendo actually has good news, so we'll get into that too, I guess. So let's get on with it, all right, So just Happy Mother's Day, everybody. Everybody's mom's out there, your mom, Mark this.

Yeah, we started a little bit later because I had to call my grandma that left at the Arkansas and all that, and I was like, oh, let me make a friend's toasts and all that this morning. So it's like, Okay, well, I guess we're we're doing that right now because that already given her all the stuff last night, like you know, when it turned twelve or whatever. So but let's go ahead and get into

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just get into the big news of the entire week. Is this has been the week really and honestly, when you have earth shattering news like this with the Xbox, it kind of just h that. It made me not want to really think about playing something else for a while, because to me, it's just it's absolutely ridiculous. You buy all these studios, then you go and shut a bunch of them down. It feels like once again you're not

having messaging that you should. You tell us one thing earlier when you have that big, old, that thing that you weren't supposed to have that everybody got mad because you were going to do the putting four games on PlayStation, and then you come out and just do this out of the blue, out of nowhere. It feels like, obviously y'all had to take time behind closed doors to make this decision, but you just announced it like that and have

it leaked like that. It's just absolutely terrible for these studios involved. So let me just break a lot of this stuff down and then we can just talk about it instead of like going point by point whatever. So the studios that got shut down Arcane Austin, which is Redfall. Basically that's the last game that they made. You know, they also made pray Tail Game Works, which High Fi Rush, the most stellar game that they've had that's not

named four Za in a while. And you know you can throw a Pentamin or some other ones in there right well, high profile or yeah, it's the one one that that won all the awards right. The one game that they've been able to outside of like Force Horizon five maybe winning something Alpha Dog, which they're the ones that did the the Mighty Doom and that kind of got Doom into like you know, younger players hands or whatever. It's a

smaller thing, but still they were doing something. And then Roundhouse that was kind of like a support studio. Roundhouse is actually getting uh they're getting like assimilated into Zenemax Online. So they're gonna go and do the like but does the Elder Scrolls Online thing all that. Yeah, so they're not losing their jobs, but they're can consolidated. Whatever they were doing is is not what they were going to be doing originally. So still it sucks to to have

to see them, you know, go through that. Uh not to mention, it's like you just hit it like a ton of bricks. So you have these figureheads from these studios, like the figurehead from Arcane Leone just being like, oh, this is just a gut staff because the way you did this. And then you have Matt Booty. He he's the one that wrote this whole letter, right, That's that tells them, Okay, well this

is why we're doing it. Oh, the typical bs about, oh, well, we got to think about growth, and we got to think about the what's best for business basically, and focus our games on priority games and invest in other parts of because the and invest in other parts of our studios. And then he comes on and goes but we need smaller games that win awards, that's what we need. Uh. Do you guys like not pay

attention to what you say before you say it? Did Matt Booty not run this through somebody because you just contradicted I mean, and they contradict themselves all the time, but he contented me Okay. Then Sarabon goes on, Now, let's be honest. This Bloomberg Tech Summit thing. I'm pretty sure that originally when this was made for her to show up, or for Microsoft to be on here and Xbox to be a part of it, originally they weren't going to talk about this. I imagine that this was made months ago.

Right, But Sarabon, whoever it is that runs the pr like, y'all got to know this question is gonna get asked, right, it just happened. Everybody in gaming is talking about it. Anybody that goes on any social media seeing it, and her response is it's always extraordinarily hard when you have to make decisions like that, you know, being flat last year, the

whole industry. I'll go back to what I was saying about it. When we look at those fundamental trends, we feel a deep responsibility to ensure that the games we make, the advice they build, the services we offer are there through moments even when the industry isn't growing and you're through a time of transition, and we gotta do this for the health of the long term. Says nothing, absolutely, absolutely nothing. And you know she goes on to

talk about other stuff. They're gonna make the Microsoft Store for for and mobile and it's gonna show up on web at some point. That's all fine and Danny. Then you have Mike mikey Bara coming in and being like, oh man, we gotta feel sorry for still Spencer because he's taking this part of

everybody else's thought. And the guy that left before we even had any integration between the Activision, Blizzard King or whatever, the guy that decided to take his ball and go home, is the one sitting here talking about how everybody's gonna feel. I'm gonna feel bad and we should all feel bad for Phil Spencer. I'm sorry, man, I don't feel bad for Phil Spencer. I don't feel bad for you. I don't feel bad for any of the

executives at all. We'll talk about them in a second. You know, they R Kane Austin was apparently going to be doing an offline mode for Redfall, like this was the next thing along with working on that DLC. Now that DLC is not happening, the offline mode is not happening. They're supposedly going to keep it going for the people that are still playing this game, but who knows how long that's going to happen, because now you still have to be online online. Yeah, so you don't get the big update that

they wanted. You just close it before you get the final thing. And the only good thing besides that, I guess maybe the Microsoft Store happening for the mobile is that Fallout four's next gen update is going to be available as we're recording this tomorrow. So no, it's already available. But when they released it originally, they fucked it all up, right, They're like re

releasing it on Monday. So I'll let you go ahead because I'm about to like go off this whole thing as somebody that's been the big Xbox beforter in the room. I'm just I'm just pissed. Go on, I think I think the shows. I mean, I don't. You won't like when I say this, but kind of an abject failure of Game Pass. No, you're not wrong. If that was doing well, you know, they'd keep the studio, you know, some of the studios. I mean, I

could see a case for them shutting down the one Mobile studio. It's like who cares or you know, that's support studio. But but I mean it helps. It's still people. They're at least not losing their jobs or whatever. But the other three were doing stuff and Tengo was already pitching another game. That's the weird thing to me. Actually the Tango won because okay, High Fi Rush is good. It is a smaller game, but it's still

good. Shouldn't they have been working on something else? Like they're pitching something. But it's like that, it's not like, okay, we released we released Hi Fi Rush. Now we can sit on an answer for the next year or six months or I mean, you know, they were working on it for a while maybe they had you know, it's not like they just go from one thing another. They got to pitch it to the Microsoft people because that that game they were working on, that was it for the acquisition.

Yeah, so you know, this this was something that Microsoft inherited, just like Red Fall, and it turned out that this one was actually good. You know. I'm like, I'm like, yeah, so you know, uh go, I mean, what do you what do you think about this whole mess? Like, just is do you there's no point of this, right, You're Microsoft. You make a bunch of money. Of all the people that should not be laying off studios and closing studios, it should

be them, right Yeah. But it's like, well why doesn't It's almost the Micael Borrow quote, like what, yes, they're making a bunch of money. But then once someone think of the poor Scott, the poor shareholder because the studio is open, they way to lose lose a point on that. No, I mean, that's that's the thing. Is his whole thing about the shareholders, the shareholders. Phil. Look, I'm tired. I'm

tired of Phil at this point. I'm tired of of the figureheads, the executives coming on and talking all wax poetic about oh, this is the best place to make games and we let people do what they want, go ahead.

That's the thing is it's only Xbox that does that. Like Sony has Jim or they had Jim Ryan, but he never really did that like he did like on occasion, but it was, you know, he wasn't like the evangelized figure that Phil has you know, has been and Nintendo, Damnfier doesn't do that like they have the CEO come out like maybe occasionally, but

not, you know, very rarely, let's say. So, you know, I think Microsoft one they had that like culture personality around you know, Phil, but they've also done it before like Major Nelson or even disastrously Don Mattrick and yeah, yeah no, but I mean look Major Nelson that was because he so the podcast he had that, I mean yeah. But the thing with Phil and then by extension Matt Booty and Sarah bon Now especially Phil

is he talks out of both sides of his mouth. He says one thing, it seems like Microsoft, the figureheads at Microsoft telling him one thing, and then he goes and says something completely different. After he talks to somebody else from Microsoft has an interview with The Verge and says something completely different there. It's like, it's never consistent. This is the entire problem with Microsoft.

They are so contradictory. Phil is so contradictory to everything he says, you know, and this is this is the the fruit of all of it. It's it's I'm done, I'm done trusting them. I have no trust. I have no trust in Xbox. I fear. I fear for hell Blade too, because that game is not going to do Yeah, no offense indust theory, but within six months they're gonna be toasted. I hope,

you know. I mean, this game could win awards and maybe that break that, maybe that that now that Matt Booty has set it out in the open, right because apparently apparently whatever uh Tango game works and High Fri Rush one doesn't count, right, Yeah he said it. They only won a Dice Award and a Game Award, and you know, they won an award. It pretty much everything. Maybe it's not Game of the Year, but it's an award, damn it. You get you could put that on the

look. I know Xbox doesn't sell game boxes anymore. They want to sell everything digital, but you can put that on the the front of the when you go try to find that game on your online store. You could put it all over the PlayStation store when when you try to find that game. Now, because that game is a lot PlayStation like, this is stuff that

can get people to play this game. I get it that it's not the system seller, but you're saying it's one of your smaller games, and you're contradicting yourself and saying, oh, we need smaller games that win awards. Bro, that game just won awards. It is your one Japanese studio, one Japanese studio, and you throw it away. Why would any Japanese If I'm at liss right now, unless Xbox is just going to continue to back up the truck, which I guess maybe they will because they can get that

deal for Persona six to come day and date on Xbox. Okay, cool, whatever. I don't have much money they got to spend for that to happen. But if I'm atless, if I'm sega, I'm looking at and going wow, they could have They could have chosen other studios, but they chose a Japanese right. I don't remember her name right now, but the person that they chose to be like the person that talks to Japanese studios.

You just lost one of your a pillar that you had to be able to say, hey, we have a Japanese studio and they made the best game that we had for a while. So this it makes no sense, no sense whatsoever to get like, was there not another studio that you could have

chosen? Was there not something that you could have done to keep them along, even put them in as a support studio while they try to figure out what game they were gonna do next that you actually approve of, because apparently they were pitching a game that was gonna take like three or four years to make. I don't know what it was. They don't they're not probably never gonna tell us, and they didn't want to deal with that. They want

stuff made like faster, I guess, or I don't like. They want stuff that they can be made faster, and it doesn't work like that. We all see that how these big games, even the mid size games, they take three four years to make, you know, and I don't know unless you have even high front rush is he it was a modest hit.

But now I'm starting to believe the stuff that Jeff Grubb put out like not too long ago, where he says, you know, as far as you I've talked to, High five Rush was a failure, right, And it sucks to see that because it makes no sense. Hey, Crafty, you know it's it's it's ridiculous exactly. They are just a tone deaf, solace company. They honestly ought to just call it the Microsoft Box at this point,

just call it the Microsoft Box. It's no longer Xbox. Phil Spencer is just somebody that takes orders from Satian Adela and gets told, Okay, this is what is the big deal now, and that's that's what we're doing. Everything else. If it ain't gonna make money, we're not doing it. They've now become just another company inside of Microsoft. This whole thing about they're so creative and they're so whatever. How long before they start pulling the

plug on the ID at Xbox stuff? How long until until they pull the plug on game pass? Let me ask you a question, mark, where where do you stand on the whole call of duty? Because I feel like they're in a they're in a stuck in a situation where it's you pick one you pick the other you lose. Do you put it on game Pass? Do you not what happens? I would say you put it on game pass because van will show that like, oh everyone's playing it or made from up

some business on game Pass. But you know, game Pass isn't growing or you know, if it is, it's you know, one percent or whatever, or you know, very small, like and it'll grow game Pass a little, but not to what they wanted to and because like they're they have the insane beliefs that like, oh, one hundred and fifty percent of the gaming population should be in game pass or you know, you know whatever, everyone should be in game Pass. It's like that's not feasible for a lot

of people either because they don't want it like me like physical gaming, or they don't can't afford it, or you know, the game selection isn't there. And it's not even about cant afford it's it's the same thing that's happening with all streaming. Do you use it enough to justify paying seventeen dollars more for something that you do not use if you don't play a game on it at all, why are you buying? Why are you paying for it.

Yeah. I mean actually I talked with the ends about it because he has game Pass, but he has it for like Balder's Gate three, which he already owns. So yeah, but brotherers Kate's not on there. Like it's like you're whether you have it for like let's say you have it because okay, hell Blade's coming, right, so you you need the prescripe the description because okay, hell Blades two is a game that I want to play. Cool, But that's fine. Then then what after that? All right?

But what if you don't? So here's the thing, Like, let we know we've talked about this bunch of times. Call of Duty is a game that people that do not play games by to play with their friends. Okay, cool, I can now get my friends, I can get more friends

to play without having to pay seventy dollars. But the follow is, now you're getting a lot of people that are not going to pay the seventy dollars at all and just play it off game pass, and you lose the one not one, they have some other ones, but the one game that you know you can put it out there and it's gonna people are gonna go bite

and droves. So you're gonna get people that are gonna subscribe a game Pass, right, this is the one game that you have that's gonna get people to sit there and and and Okay, I'm gonna subscribe, right, But then, like every other service, they're gonna unsubscribe and then what did you really gain? You know, right, months of high numbers and that's about it. Yeah, exactly what press are you gonna get? Is it worth it for you to lose the number one game that sells every year in all

of gaming to put it on game Pass? Or do you want to have that one game that you know consistently will sell. And that's the problem is if you don't put it on game Pass, I'll tell you right now the doom and gloom that's gonna happen. Because we've all been I as a game Pass subscriber for the longest time. I've had it for like three years or more. We've all been told every single first party game goes on game Pass

day one. So if you take that off and you start saying, ah, but this game's too big, right, Okay, so what what's the now the barometer of what's too big, what's too small? Like that is that that's a bad situation. You know that you're gonna put yourself on Uh yeah, why, I'm gonna tell you why. Because they don't want to. They do not want Diablo, I think, is one that like, okay, it's persistent online, like it's it's one that's like made for people

to play co op. You want to revive that game with season that's coming. The other games, they don't want to put too much stuff on on on game pass. I feel like until they're completely done with the FTC. When they're completely done with the FTC, I think we're gonna start seeing a rollout of Activision stuf U on game Pass. Uh. They don't want to draw anybody's attention from the FTC at all to be like, hey, look

they're making money off this act division and stuff. Let's start, you know, trying to actually use our brain and find a reason why they shouldn't have this deal go through. Because I feel like the FTC is still not using their brain as to why they're fighting at all. But you know, to go to go beyond this. I feel like also it's just I get it.

As a figurehead, you're not going to say like, oh, man, Uh, we really didn't want to do this, but we're we we closed these studios because, uh, you know whatever the actual real reason was. You're not going to say that, because that's the first yeah, you know. Like the funny thing is you're attributing all this like to Phil Spencer, but it's like he he's like high at the totem pole, but he ain't the leader of the you know, of Microsoft in general. Like,

well he's not. But the reason why I'm saying is because Phil's one of the talks right, one that that opens his mouth and says things and then ends up contradicting himself. And that's why they shouldn't talk. That's why they should just go be like you said, be luck Nintendo, be like Sony, stop talking and start doing. And that's the thing. They talk way

too much. They talk and talk and tell you they're gonna do this and then do this this, and it's like, now this thing that they're gonna have in June, I'm not that hyped for it anymore because how many of these games are gonna actually like still be existing, uh in six months or

whatever. Because I'm really worried about what's gonna happen in Ninja theory. I'm really worried about what's gonna happen to Obsidian because about is probably not gonna light the world on fire, right, I mean, there's a chance it could, right, but I don't think it's going to And you know, Indiana Jones. I'm sure it will get people to maybe give it a give it pay attention that. Yeah, that's what Sarah Vaughn remembers playing watching as a

kid. So yeah, I mean, it's just like that's the thing is, like Indiana Jones already, the movie didn't do well, Like that franchise is not in the best state. It's possible that like Fallout the game could cause a revival for it maybe but maybe maybe, But it's just there's nothing

coming in that Xbox slate right now, at least for this year. That makes me go, Okay, I think those studios are secure right now, right, I mean, I feel like it is fine because you know, you've probably got the next Doom going on, like whatever that is, You're you're probably fine. We know that playgrounds fine because they're still in New Fable. But I think it's like the Mircosoft actually had the balls to shut on id like the internet would riot because oh yeah, oh yeah, you can

make the argument like Tango. I mean they made High Fight, High Fi Rush and people within one and two, but they weren't like a story developer with like you know, essentially starting the first person genre. But it's still important because it was your one Japanese studio. It was the one studio that had made anything of note that wasn't a franchise. You already had big things.

Tango a little is also like you know, uh on Akami left, Yeah, it didn't have that like lineage that it used to or you know that, right, and so whatever you make afterwards is not going to have his name attached to it. So if they wanted to make an evil within three now, you're not going to have that creative force with him there of

saying okay, this is where we're going with that, you know. And the and the thing too with with Tango, I feel like is they we we all love the shadow Drop, right, I don't think the shadow Drop does does it any favors when you're talking about outside of the the box that we all live in here with with with social media and everything with gaming, when you're trying to push that out to the people that don't use their console

every day and aren't on the internet constantly looking at gaming stuff. I think they have no idea that that game exists because there's no marketing behind it. There's no nothing out there putting commercials for it and stuff like that. It's just it's just hey, it's there, cool, you know, and and maybe you find that if you happen to use game pass that day. But

they didn't do that game any favors with that either, you know. Yeah, I was joking on Twitter about because I think they said they're going to make good. They have a make make good for the Red Fall, Yeah,

and it's like, what are they gonna do. They're either going to offer like, oh, you get a month or two game pass for free, or you know, they'll be like, oh we can give you, you know, star Field for free or something, you know, some o the crappy game or you know, something that we already own, as opposed

to actually making you know, just having them finish the DAN. Yeah, Like I didn't understand that either, Like why not just let them finish out the DLC at least let that game kind of glow out in a vase of glory or something. You know, you said you were gonna I mean, obviously this is Pete Hines before he left, but you know this is him saying like, hey, we're gonna try to have this game still still last, you know, and whatever. Yeah, that's that's the thing is.

It's just like, I think a little bit of transparency, a little bit of honesty would go kind of a certain way in that, Hey, it's cool that Phil went out and just basically, you know, said what he needed to say on that that kind of funny s cast or whatever. But it's like again, every time you get one of them saying something, they they contradict themselves again because then Microsoft comes and pulls the plug on it or

whatever or says, hey, we're not doing that anymore. And I feel like this has all come down to that activision Blizzard thing that it took way too long to close. So gaming was in a different spot in twenty twenty one, right when this this whole thing happened with this is almost three years ago. At this point, gaming was in a boom period, right, So they're thinking about all the money they're gonna make, all the the stuff they're gonna be able to do with all these studios, and then it takes

them almost three years. They're still dealing with it, three years of trying to close this fricking deal. Right, they're not even fully integrated. But that's not even fully integrated with Xbox yet. If they're doing that at all, you know, it's just I ain't. I ain't that. Besides, the one is because they didn't want to be or like, yeah, they could have done it a lot quicker, but they're like, we'll just keep it hands off for Yeah, well look how look how well that worked out

for you. But it's not even the hands out. It's the whole point of like, okay, well now we made seventy billion dollars of money. So somebody in Microsoft goes, oh, okay, uh, you're letting this company that doesn't really make that much money spend seventy billion dollars on this game

publisher, excuse me, let me start running the numbers. Right, you start getting attention from other places at Microsoft that you weren't getting attention for, and so now they start running the numbers and they go, oh my god, look how much we're spending on this, on this, on this well, you know, let's start cutting. We're gonna start cutting because this is not making money. This is not making money. Game Passes is freaking costing

us. I don't know how much money like Bill can go around saying it's profitable. But there's a reason why they started getting down to the bottom, bottom bottom of games that they put on that thing. Now you know they can they can make these deals with these indies, and I'm sure they make deals with that id at xboss games that they put on there and stuff like that, and that's great. I love those indies. I love playing I was playing Animal well before we started. That game is really cool. Like

I love those kind of things. But the problem is those are like nice things to have on your service. They're like little things that you can go, Okay, it makes me as a gamer, it makes me want to keep game pass. You'll you never know when you're gonna get surprised with a little game like that that you didn't chronicle. Thing. That was great too, but that's the problem. Like, I mean, I'm sorry Animal was on PS Plus, but my whole point was that you get games like that,

and those are really outside of the Xbox like Day one stuff. Those are the only games that are really like making that service worth it for people, unless you just do not play games at all and you go on there, like let's say you bought it for your you know, younger kid that's like getting into gaming and they see this big old library of stuff and then it's like, oh, yeah, cool, I get to play all this

stuff. It's like that's rare. Most of the people that are buying that thing already play games that already played a bunch of the big older games. So when they're looking at the new stuff that comes out, and it's very like it's very scarce. Now what comes out that's actually new, Like it's not helping you, it's only showing that there's less and less value for that thing. And if they go as far as taking the now you're stuck with

the You can't do what PlayStation does right. You can't go decide. It's like you sink or swim with it. With game Pass, it's either you completely game pass is gone and it becomes PS plus and it's oh, it's only old games and maybe we'll throw on one of our games like every six months or so, and you don't have the day one stuff at all or you keep going with that. And that's the problem is that is a money sink that at some point I feel like somebody at Microsoft's gonna go, you

know, we tried. It's a nice idea, but yeah, it's it's another it's another failed the Windows phone. It's another thing that they they had that worked. It's the thing that touts them apart. But that's the problem is that, Like, and then you can say that like our vision was too forward thinking, and well, I mean that's always their problem, right, is that they're too forward thinking. They think like way out and I mean PlayStation was probably the one that did it correctly. They made it as

an additive. They didn't make it as the only way for you to It's not the only way you can buy your games. But who's gonna buy a game when you can just subscribe for seventeen dollars and have the same game and then guess what happens. They'll tell you when it goes off and you can go buy it on the selle if you really want it. If not, it's always there. You can just buy it whenever the hell you want.

So, like, that's the problem is you know, you you gave people too much, and then now when you try to shut the door, you can't do it, and you put yourself in a hole where it's great that you can tell people that you have all these numbers about Oh man, look at all these players on for Diablo four on Xbox game pas. Oh that's cool, except for does this really do anything for our bottom line at all

outside of just getting to vote the fact that we sold? Because when when when health divers two gets to talk about all these numbers that they do on seam and and they and they have everybody get pissed off because they we're gonna do that PSN integration. I'd be pissed too, because that means I can't

play a game that I bought, that I paid forty bucks for. Right when Xbox tells you they're just gonna take a game off game pass or whatever, it's it's not that big a thing, I feel like, and it's it's it doesn't mean that much to people because you get so used to not buying your game, and and that's an issue that Microsoft and selfs Microsoft and Xbox created with this, and so now you're trying to tell people to go spend the seventy dollars or the fifty dollars or I think he'll play twos fifty

dollars right, because it doesn't have the physical dial, Like, are you really gonna get those people to spend the fifty dollars now when they can spend seventeen dollars and just play the game, Like, I don't know how that is a metric, you know, because Aaron Greenberg talked about how Hi Fi Rush met all the metrics last year, right, and then somehow they're closing

this studio. But what's gonna happen with Ninja theory is that is help A two gonna meet all the metrics, and then micro Soft's gonna go, oh, yeah, but it didn't meet the metric that matters the moment and that yeah, even if it did, like shifting the goalposts like met it so far. But exactly on the line is Phil gonna have to come out again and say, oh, well, you know it didn't. The business is not you know, gaming is still not growing, so we had to close.

And that's the thing is there's reports for Bloomberg already put it out there that they're not done. There is gonna be more stuff happening. There's gonna be more cost cutting hollymore lay. I'll say, already laid off like almost two thousand people earlier in the year. Then we don't even know how many people are getting laid off from all these studios that are re enclosed, like Microsoft and Xbox are just a mess. It's a mess right now. I had to say it, but I don't think, uh, Double Find it's

long for this world either. Yeah, I was gonna respond to your tweet that please don't wish that on people, but it's like, you know, I feel I really don't. I love Double fund Yeah, I don't want Double Find to go away. Yeah, Like I love the fact, yeah they haven't made anything since Technods too, and like, but that's the problem is, like would they green light anything because the psycoats three for them,

right, Like where are we at with this creativity? The you know, the sad part is like you know, at least maybe not the last generation per se, but like the three sixty generation, like Double Fine is put on a game, multiple games every year, right, Like they put out from twenty eleven to two thousand and fourteen, they put out four to five games a year, right, that's kind of a lot for like what they call you know what they would say smallest developer or you know, yeah,

but they also had like funding for like Majesco's no, no, not yet legend right that's nine yeah, but but yeah, they had a lot of games right and then. But if you watch that that documentary is amazing. By the way, if you haven't watched that Psychotasy documentary about how they made Psychonats, do you definitely should. It's long, but if you really want to know like how it is for a game dev like that is amazing,

go watch it. But honestly, that's that's my worry too with thela Fine is like you've already remastered all your old classics, You've you put out Psychonauts to the game people have been waiting on if you're making it, unless they already have a game of development, which I'm sure they probably do this, you know, not announcing it because somebody finally got smart many years ago about

like let's not announce things that are like five years away. But could they possibly cancel some of this stuff because this is happening right like where they're Titan to go. Oh wn, we gotta slash here. We've gotta slash here, we gotta cut here because they gotta they gotta somehow make back that seventy billion dollars, right, Paul, duty can't do it by itself, So like where are you called it? You can do a nice chunk of it. And that's the problem with putting it on game pass is how much of

that chunk is going to go away now because you do so? And like Crafty said, they're just they're just hoping, like you'd be soft said at the beginning of the year that people just subscribe and forget about and they just keep paying. But the problem is people have so many subscriptions now they do start paying attention, yeah, and they do start going, Okay, I'm

gonna cut this off and cut this off and cut this off. And then game Pass, I mean, you can't do the thing we're you used to start stacking up the dollar sugs for game Pass and then have it there for three years or whatever. I pay out of my pocket out of the seventeen and then I pay this the seventeen for PS plus premium, which I really shouldn't because you know, premium is sometimes such a waste of whatever it's two dollars. But the fact is that's we're we're you know, on the hard

core side of gaming. The people that are not that are just picking it up for like the one game here and there or whatever. It's not really doing a lot. And so like when you look forward to like let's say we're looking at this thing in June, they're probably going to announce stuff that we don't we haven't seen, right, It's probably there's gonna be new stuff. I'm sure we'll probably get something Fable. Yeah, I'm sure we'll probably

get something Fable related. Since it's been long enough, I feel like I'll show another CD tailor. But yeah, like Perfect Dark at some point that somebody has got to tell you what's going. Like, that's another studio right there, right like we've seen nothing nothing from Perfect Dark. That thing is apparently in horrible shape. Yeah that was pretty funny. Yeah, like what are what are Here's like, Matt Booty, you're talking again, you're talking,

You're sending these letters out? What are you doing? What what's going on with like all these I feel like Xbox obviously they have other people,

but they centered around these three people. They're the figureheads. And then it's like they grow, they grew way too big and they don't have enough people to watch over everything, so like do like mad body's supposed to be in charge of all this stuff, and it's like that seems like way too much stuff for one person, Like shouldn't you have like other people at Xbox also like delineating, like Okay, you're working on this, like you know,

go and go and figure out what's going on with with all these games and and like what is the process? Like what's the tail light here? What's what's the like future going on? I mean, okay, we're gonna get

Gear six. But that's what I worry about with with microlfic is like you're you're so worried about, Oh, all these games are not making what you need to make, Like how many franchises do you have that are really gonna outside of Gears and outside of Call of Duty and whatever Blizzard is doing that really like resonate with people, like the broad spectrum of of gaming that's really

gonna push your your systems and everything else. You know, That's what I were about, Like these are all cool, Like I love the fact that a vow exists, you know, maybe anti zones, but like I feel like a lot of the stuff that gets made by them is this is great from a gaming perspective, But you're talking about, oh, we want to consolidate our franchise, we want to focus on the big stuff, like Crafty mentioned, what big stuff is there really for you to focus on? Yeah,

I mean that's what I'm saying. Like this generation and even the last one, like the big big stuff quote unquote didn't hit well or you know, like Halo five or Gears five or Halo Incenter rather Yeah, the uh, you know, all they got is Forza. Yeah, it's it's Forza. You gotta hope Fable actually knocks out of the park whenever it does come out. Now, well, I mean I think that thing's been in development

so long. If that doesn't come out by like twenty twenty five, I think we've we've hit something here where there's there's a failure on somebody's end. Like at some point, you got to stop blaming the pandemic. You got to stop blaming this thing or that thing or we inherited this and it's not our problem. Like, okay, so you didn't let Tango make the next

game that would have been your problem. Right, you didn't let Arkane Austin make the next game they wanted to go back into like the immersive sim uh stuff apparently, so I don't know it. Just this is all a mess. I have no trust in xbos right now. You can tell me that thing. In June, you can announce a bunch of awesome shit. I'm gonna get hiped, but I'm also not gonna get two hipes because I don't

know if any of that shit's coming out. Yeah, I must say, said, you know, here's Gear six so to be out November fourteenth. They give an actual firmal ease date. Yeah, that's the only way you could kind of trust him. Maybe, But right they've shown time and time again they announce stuff way too early and then they just kind of dilly dally

about, well, it'll eventually come out like that dark thing. I'm also waiting for the how many more games are gonna win up on PlayStation because I feel like the end of Deella's words were not him talking about how much he loved the fact that that that they took over the entire PlayStation store with a bunch of old games, and then you know, games that they they just

released on there. I feel like that's a bit of foreshadowing, like Starfield is coming, there's other games coming, Like this is this is not gonna finish. You know, they took over the PlayStation store for like a month or for a few weeks, but it's like it's not like a year long

thing. No it's not. But I'm saying that matters to him, right, yeah, right, Like you're making money somewhere that you weren't making money before, so let's do it more of it, right, And I don't think that's gonna I mean maybe PlayStation moves the needle or something on one of these like live service things that they they could have cooking or whatever. But

other than that, they're not gonna do things the other way. So this is this is Xbox and only Xbox deciding to go down this route because they don't have another route to go. If you close up shop on everything that you've done consumer friendly and you decide, okay, we're gonna be like the other two guys, or I'm sorry, the other two, the other two console make I don't think you can do that. I don't think Xbox has

the gravitas to be able to do that. I don't think they have the franchises the ability to you have Call of Duty, but again, call d is one game. You could buy Call of Duty and then you don't buy nothing else the entire year, and you're you're happy, You're good, you know. Uh That's that's my issue with it, is like Xbox is stuck and like the only thing they can do is hope to god one of these games that they make absolutely explodes. Because other than that, I don't know,

man, it just the way things are going. It feels like Microsoft is just not that interest in like, let's be the cool gaming thing. Is not it? This is a business then it always was a business, but they're not this whole like we're going to be mister nice people again, you know, and be the Hey we're we're you know, all the bad stuff Sony and Nintendo. Dude, we're not doing that. They're going to become just like the other two. Go ahead and sorry, uh, this

wasn't an this wasn't a Microsoft thing. But you see that, Like I think it was Vicarious Visions or whoever all made that. Tony Hank went into if they pitched twenty Hank three and four as the vision shut them down. Yeah, they should reverse that as your decision today or as as soon as they can. They should go back to the studio and go, hey, get to work on that thing instead, Like not every studio, how many

of those back Carriss business people are actually still there? And then do you have the ability to unfurl them from Blizzard into Backcara's business again to be able to do that, right, Like, I don't know how integrated they are at this point at whatever they do is they do with Blizzard. So have the fest to just put out Tony Hawk three and four instead? Yeah, that would be insane, But you have throw all skateboarding along with Tony Hawk.

Yeah. Like, to me, it's just this whole I get the idea that Phil has always had about we don't want to just tell people you're gonna make this. We want people to have passion behind whatever it is they're making. I feel like that's going to start not being the case either.

I mean, you know, you Phil can say that, but that's that's a lot of crap, you know, because they directly tell people, They directly tell the studios what they should and shouldn't make, And like that's a problem that the Coalition ran into with Gears six, Like they were like, oh, after Gears five, who want to branch off, who want to do something else? It's like, well that didn't that didn't work out, right. They can't say, man, look at look at what happened to

look at say to the Gears franchise. Now, yeah, it's been for a very long time, So you got to hope now that people get hyped again with Gear six. I feel like there's there's a remasters of whatever coming for the other games. Uh, you know, one got that remaster a long time ago, but I feel like the other ones are coming as well. It's not just gonna be Gear six. You got to get something that it cannot get out there faster for people to kind of get their hands.

I mean unless Gear six, like you said, it's going to come out this year or early next year, then maybe you don't need to do that, but you know, you got to do something. It's like, it's like the Fallout situation that we've talked about a few times, that whole thing about Seposley Todd Howard's talking about external studios to do something with Fallout. If

you're Microsoft you got to make that happen. You got to get a Fallout game out faster than whatever it's like ten years from now because they're doing all the scrolls. Yeah, that sounds that clearly coming down the pipeline anytime soon. Like that'll probably be twenty seventeen or something like that'll for twenty twenty seven rather hopefully, I mean. And that's the thing is like you let Towrs to Bob go, right, They're gonna do their own thing. Don't know

if what that is quite yet, right, And that's fine. You got a partnership with them, so I guess you technically don't have to be like paying underneath them all these employees. I guess to save you some money there as well. But like that again, everybody wanted them to be working on a banjo kazuli, right, and now they're probably not. So you have that franchise sitting around. That's another example of like why wouldn't you get people

what they want? Because according to Phil, they have to win to make it right. He's he's not gonna just tell them, Okay, you know how to do this, so you're doing this right? Yeah, I feel like Microsoft is going to wind up coming around and going, oh, we have this franchise and they make this and they have this like oh, somebody better get on that, right, Like, I don't know who's around, so I mean, we know Bobby Kotek's not there. We know Macki Barr

is not there. Like, are they gonna actually let the activision people that are there actually like make some decisions and keep doing what they do or are we like, you know, it's all going to pill in Matt Booty and Sarabhan and I get that, but it's just like, man, some of these decisions, all these decisions that they decide to make, have come to this point where we're at where people are losing their jobs that shouldn't be. This is a big company, they shouldn't be having to be do that.

But somebody, you know, it's like, oh, we can blame it on the industry at large, and yes, this is an industry problem. There's an indie studio that closed, Palette and Studios. You know, they had forty five people in the Netherlands and they've been operating for twenty years. They closed. We've had a lot of studios closed. We've had some people get laid off this is not it's not just a Microsoft thing. But it's

a shock because these are studios that you barely just bought. This is not I mean, yeah, what it's like five six years at this point. But still they've released one game, one game from Arcane Austin. Uh, you know, the one game from Alpha Dog, and you didn't let them make something else. You just that's it gone, right? And these games that that I mean, Ninja theory, this is the second Hole Blade.

They spent all this time doing this game. Man, I don't know, I just you know, maybe they can catch on with the God of War people or people that that that think it's that kind of game and you can market it that way or whatever. But it's just like, okay, no, But I'm just saying, like I'm trying, I'm trying to look at this in a big picture way of like that game was an indie game that caught fire within the game industry. It was lauded for all this stuff.

I'm sure help A two will as well, and that might save it somewhat. But I feel like, are we just looking at that because this is now a Triple A game studio right, Like, oh, supposedly we only we made this in the same way that we made the other game. We just made it like bigger and grander, right with the Microsoft money, It's still the same kind of game that it was. The first one was how much is Microsoft looking at that and going, well, it's not hitting that

metric? Like, are we gonna start dropping people from hell Blade? Same thing when a Vowed comes out? Does a Vowed have any expectations on it? And how much is Obsidian gonna suffer from that as well? It's like, I don't have any trust in this company to tell me that these studios are not going to continue to lose people, that these games that they're making

games that are not going to mistigate canceled. I have no trust, no belief in anything the xtbox does at this point other than I really love hell Blade. I might actually go think about just buying it just to support instead of just playing it off game Pass. I don't have that affinity for ahead. A point about I fire Rush is I would never get it on game

Pass or digitally because they're eventually going to like remove it. Well, I mean high Fi Russian until you know, we until Limited Run came out with their thing, we had no idea that it was going to have a physical version, So you know, you can't go based on help. LED's not going to help. LED two is not going to have one at all, So you know that's the thing is Microsoft's going in that direction. We're we're trying to do everything digitally, but like no, I meant like High Fi

Rush while having a lot of licensing problems in the future music. That's why they have the X the tracks that are not they're not licensed right, that you can just turn on if you're streaming or whatever. So that helps them where they can just turn those off and they can keep having the game or whatnot. But yeah, it's just it's one of these things where obviously a lot to come, but I feel like it's more bad news, more bad

news. You had a great developer direct that people were excited about, and then after that, once again they just somehow continue to just step in mud and ruin the pr that they make with these showcases, with this stuff. When you have the back room decisions the company above them that just decides to Okay, now we got to start paying attention and making all these acquisitions is great, but I feel like you're running into the problem of it's too much.

It's too much and you don't know how to like deal with all of it. And I feel like we're gonna get more of that as time goes on. But moving on here, Yeah, how do I think the employees feel? Yeah, if I'm honestly, this industry itself right now is so volatile, so terrible. Like, but I think it says a lot that should you Becamedy said he was leaving the industry and then he comes back and he's going to do something with like I think Kanami or something, and it's

like, Wow, you did all that, you left Xbox. You're not even thinking about coming back there they have the ips that you work with. And then yeah, if I'm anybody else at those studios, I'm sitting there going, uh, do I need to start looking up for myself and start finding a way out the door before I'm the person next right, And man, it's like you thought that, Okay, Xbox buying these studios means they have security, right, Microsoft has this money. They want these studios because

they want to make games. They want to fill game past content, and it shows you that none of that matters. It's still capitalism at the end of the day, the number has to continue to go up, even though at some point it can't go up anymore. They got to make it go will go up, and that sucks. I feel so terrible for all these people, the ones that are there and the ones that are gone or will be gone at some point. It's it's terrible for this entire industry to be

this way. It's gonna keep being this way for a while. It's got to reset itself. But it's like when Microsoft is doing it, that's that's yeah, it's not like small company or you know, right, It's like when Tony announced that the you know, the studios that they closed, It's like they really hadn't been doing much right. It's like you said, it's like, okay, Ronhouse was a support studio whatever, Alpha Dog, Okay, you can say what you want, even ark in Austin, like you

could. You could sort of be like, okay, Redfall was bad for us, so bad, we can't how can we we resurrect this studio at all? Like there's not much we can do. But like the Tango game works, one makes absolutely no sense. I have no idea how this was the idea, Like this was the other studio that we had to choose to cancel. Oh, we don't wanna, we don't okay, we don't want to pitch. We don't wanna green light the next pitch game. Like you

can't tell them go pitch something else so you could do faster. I don't know, man, It's just like that is the one that leaves a bad taste of your mouth. They make decisions that are bad all the time, and then they this happens to them and we're talking bad about Xbox again. I'm saying, we're talking about an hour. That's enough. We talked about it for an hour. But you did mention Vicarious Business earlier. You know

what vac Curious Business was also doing. They were making a Donkey Kong game on Switch, not something else I would have thought of at that point. So they were at some point making the Donkey Kong game. Then that got canceled or didn't go forward after a while, and even me and Moto was working with them on it, and he was giving ideas and everything else.

Would you have wanted to see, like what Vicarious Business does with the Donkey Kong game, Like that seems interesting, Like have another different studio well, probably wouldn't have been like traditional two D you know what they've been doing. Well, it was a three D platformer, suppose, Yeah, it would have been like Donkey before two or you know, like a a reversion of that. Yeah, as long as as long as we had yeah, right,

like that's I think that that's cool. I wish we could have seen like actually, like I guess, see a trailer or see what the concept would have been for that. That would have been awesome to Finally, well, even if they were at that stage, I right, or it could have been something that they were they were kind of thinking of or or like getting there, but they just weren't there yet, and and then for whatever

reason, it got canceled. But that means to to kind of bring that in because I guess we're going to move over to Nintendo U. Nintendo finally, thanks to their president kind of opened the door to like what they're gonna

be doing in the near future. H They also announced some game sales which were surprising to me, and they also announced like a cool game that they're releasing on July eighteenth, Nintendo World Championships any s tion Now this exists as like a prize that they gave the people that were at that nineteen ninety World Championship actually competing in it. They have that cartridge that you got and it's

like one of the rarest things available. But now they're like, yeah, go ahead, just a great cartridge, and then the gold cartridge and that's even the more rare ones. Yeah, so they're actually doing it's going to cost thirty bucks, but it's like a speed running thing. There's one hundred and fifty speed running challenges that it's divided across thirteen games, all the Super Mario Brothers games, both the first two Legend of Zelda's Kirby's Adventure, Metroid,

like a lot of the big hits from the nes era. This is also you can also consider it like an nes remix three if you call it that as well. Look, I'm not a speed running guy, but I like those ns remix games. I actually really think about this. This looks like it could be a lot of fun, and that's really cool that Nintendo's doing this. And they're also doing like a special edition that has that gold cart of replica gold cartridge as well. Yeah, I thought that's funny if

people were that like gives them the pictures. A gold cartridge is not a functional you know, cartridge, and it's a display piece that it's like, are you fucking high? Like, of course it's not. You can't put it in any as in play, you idiots, like like, yeah, how much money? We were paying way more for that special edition if it was an actual cartridge that you had to you know buy, yeah and put in the system or whatever, like no, of course not. It's cool.

I think it's cool that the Japanese verre can get to control that the two joy cons. Yeah, I rather have that personally, but I'm surprised, but like how much they they try to make money off the joy Cons. They're not bringing that like worldwide or whatever. Yeah, but yeah, I mean it's it's really cool that Nintendo's doing something like this, Like it's funny how you go, oh man, they don't really have a lot coming out, like what could they really really and they supposed to have a direct

in June. They release smaller projects like you know, you can see Sony releasing this or Microsoft obviously, although like a Microsoft one went be kind of interesting because it's like how fast can you run through the Halo one first level? You know or something like that. Yeah, but neither of those companies has like the kind of the lineage of Nintendo. Yeah, that's the thing is I think about this is like nineteen ninety. I was like three or

four at that point. Like, so you can go back to that far and be able to put out a game that is taking all of those old classics and like turning it on their head and let's do a speed run thing with it, and like that's that's cool that they can do that and just say, hey, we're just releasing this thing, you can give us another

thing that sells a million copies. Right, It's incredible to me that I know it's like the only new games really that they put out a note from Nintendo itself, but it's still it's awesome that Mario versus DK a million copies. Princess pre Showtime over a million copies as well. Like, it's incredible the switches like elasticity with games, like the the attached rate with games is absolutely ridiculous. Not to mention it's they Princes's peach also just it appeals to

kids. It's easy for kids to get into. You know, girls can can you pick that up for your daughter, and it's something they can play without much fuss, you know. So yeah, I mean Randy did that for his daughter to play with play with him. So yeah, man, I think that's that's cool. But as far as what's coming next for Nintendo, you know, big picture was I didn't mention they're going with that direct in June. They're gonna have announcements they did, you know, say,

okay, we still had the two big games. It's the paper Mario on thousand year Door remake that comes out this month. Actually what next week? And then uh Luigi's Mansion which comes Luis mantioned two HD which comes out next month. But yeah, we kind of don't know anything past that. Uh so, and now I guess they they revealed the I guess they're big ticket thing for July, which is this Nintendent World Championship thing. But still like there's the rest of the year that they got to fill out, So I

wonder what that is going to be. Did we finally get the big announcement of Metro Prime four coming You think that they'll they'll pull that out as like the last Switch game, or you think that's a long switch to game. I would say launch Switch two game. That's a big if if it even ever comes out, And I think they just kind of they could just announce like, hey, it's going to be canceled or you know, like we

tried but it didn't work out. Yeah, I mean, I definitely see it as more of like, Okay, this is like the swan song of the Switch, Like here's Metro Prime fore we promised it to you all these years ago. Here we go. I'm pretty sure they could have it come out pretty quick on switch To, like after the launch window if they want. You know, we still don't know about the is it gonna be backwards compatible or not, or are they going to be doing all these you know,

ten dollars upgrade kind of things. We'll definitely see about that. But the Nintendo's president did announce officially now that the Switch will be like a the switch To will be a next edition of the Switch. It will not you know, some people were speculating whether they're going to try to make something new.

He did officially say this is sort of like a next edition of what the Switch is, you know, and it will be at some point announced by the fiscal year, so between now and March twenty twenty five, we're going to get the official announcement of the switch to officially they call it the Switch Next Model, So pretty much like what's all been rumored and speculated about is that it's a switch to with BF your hardware and the DLSS. You

know they should do. Yeah, they should rebrand this the current switch as the bottom switch, and then next switch would be the top switch. No, I'd say the Super Nintendo The Super Nintendo Switch would be cool if they named it that. I doubt they would, but I still think that that would be an awesome name if they could go with that. But I feel like they're they're going to go in the same window as the Switch one, Like I think we're getting some kind of a trailer drop or announcement in like

October November and then get ready for March April. The Switch too comes out of next year. I mean, I guess they could wait until March to announce of next year and then have it come out in the fall. But I feel like Switch one coming out not in the fall help them right? Or do you think it needs to come out in that like October November.

No, I don't think it should because it'll create too much of a bottleneck for production and like sales, you know, I mean they made like the press of like oh, the Switch Too is told out, but it's like yeah, but or hey this holiday season, go get your Switched Too, you know, right, but having you know, the April or release date or whatever, you give them a lot more runway because it'll sell out that year anyway, right, So why not have it, you know, so

more if you can. I feel like they need just the Switch ones launch here is so one of the greatest fricking years. I mean that year in general was a great year for gaming, but that year for Nintendo was amazing, and I feel like, if you have the ability to repeat that again, do that, man, because that sells your system more than anything else. You tell me you were going to have an awesome game every month to

go buy for that system, I'm buying it, right. You give me a big launch window of saying, Okay, well here's your launch games, and then here's like what could be coming in the next six months until the holiday of twenty twenty five or whenever June, and then you know what they normally do in June, where they release the rest of it, Like yeah, I'm there. I'm there day one. Look, I get it. It's it's Nintendo. I'm pretty sure you don't have to tell anybody anything.

They're gonna buy it. I would buy it anyway. But that helps. That helps a lot of people that are like thinking about, oh, well, do we need to buy it right now? There's not really not a lot. You know, I still got a huge library on my switch. So look, we still got to find out a lot of things about the switch too. But the fact that they've already revealed it's gonna be basically a next gen edition model switch and then that it is going to get announced at

some point between now marsh Place twenty five, that's already a plus. They're already announcing things. That's good. We can feel that that next Jennifer Nintendo is coming, and it feels like we really needs to happen because this year's kind of been like that Bridge year maybe those surprises with a couple of things. But yeah, man, like this, it's good. It's glad. It's good that we can finally like start saying, Okay, it's coming,

it's coming for sure. Also interesting that, like it's crazy some of these numbers for some of these games and how they've sold is absolutely like ridiculous, like Mario Kart selling close to like sixty two Mario Kart eight Deluxe sixty two million, Animal Crossing, the New Horizons game like forty five absolutely nuts man Breath of the While obviously that was the launch Zelda up there at like thirty

one, you know, Smash thirty four like insane, insane numbers. And the fact that scar on Violid is almost that close to Sword and Shield and sort of Shield are still kept selling. It tells you a lot about Pokemon stuff. But still Nintendo has those franchises. That doesn't matter. They just keep selling. People want to buy the console. Taking out Microsoft that stuff matters. Don't worry. Once Microsoft releases Links to Time Sweeper three, they'll

be right back on track exactly. That's what everybody is waiting on. But they want that review. I mean, can you imagine that's revealed it in June, Like, hey, we brought Blinks to try and Sleeper back, wait till we hear like Crickets, well, hey, Future Friensidy was good. Don't be hating on Future Friends you now, I love that game. But yeah, I mean we kind of already talked about the PlayStation thing,

but it's good that they reverse course on hold ivers to uh them. Yeah, It's actually kind of funny though, because last week or last weekend, it was you know, the big Tony screwed up of like announcing this thing and then Microsoft was like holding my beer. Oh definitely, Micstoft is like hold my beer. Like it's like, how can we step on a rake? Even more than PlayStation did. It's like at least PlayStation was able to

reverse course really quickly. Also funny that the devs were like trying to push for that too. They're like, hey, hey, keep for keeper view bombing the game so that well not death It was like one community manager for it. But even like the deaths were happy about it, like they were happy the diverse course because obviously they're still locked out, Like there's one hundred fifty countries that are locked out of the game right now because they have to

reput it back on Steam because the they don't have access to PSN. So I don't know. Yeah, I say what they should have done with this thing if they should have kept it an optional thing, but they should have also said like if you sign up, if you sign into a PSN account, you know, we'll give you a new cape and a new helmet or you know, some type of branded you know, special helmet or something, because then that would have got people way more into it. But a lot

of countries just don't have it at all. Yeah, yeah, right, then they would have gone to some v VPN or you know, they the sentence dosn't take account. And that's the thing with game Pass as well, is like people don't realize there are so many countries that do not have game Pass at all, and they make it seem like game Pass is just everywhere and available on everything, and it's not. But that going going back to this for a second, like just it sucks for those people that lost access

to the game. Hopefully they get it back really fast. I'm good to see that Sony like reverse course on it, because Sony's always been the one that like they they didn't want to do cross play for a long time because oh, security reasons and whatever. And this is the reason that they're going about this as well. It's saying that they need it to be able to

protect you and all this stuff. Like I think they kind of just got to understand that PC gaming is different, and you're gonna have to just kind of let that stuff go at least with these, uh with these multiplayer games.

I mean I know that that that also means like Ghoes to Tsushima on PC is like locked out for people too, which that sucks, But like, is it worth it to do this if you're gonna limit the amount of people that can play your game that only want to buy it on PC, that don't want to go buy the big PlayStation thing to buy it because it might be triple the cost in their country and they already have a PC to

play the game on. Like, you know, I think Sony needs to be more aware of those kind of things, right, But even then, like look at the difference they just have somebody come out and make a pr statement We're sorry, we change it. We don't have to have Phil or Aaron Greenberg or Matt Booty come on and do some podcasts where they have to talk about why they did it and all this stuff, Like we don't need some big ass explanation, just hey, we changed it. Sorry, we're

not going to do it. Move on. Yeah, Right, And that's where Xbox needs to get to, is I don't I feature the transparency. But when when y'all are like lying out your your ass half the time, I'm not saying they're lying, but I was saying, like, when y'all are contradicting yourself constantly, I just don't want to hear any But good on, good on PlayStation UH for for doing that, and hopefully these people that

have have access at one point of the game can get it again. Speaking of having access to things, Persona five, the Phantom X, which is the mobile game the Persona spinoff game that's on iOS, Android and PC UH in selected Asian countries. Uh Sega is considering making that a bit available more globally going forward. Obviously, the power Persona, especially with you know, Persona three hitting that million selling number really fast, which is the highest the

quickest any Atless game has ever done. That. Would you play it they put a Persona game on on you, No, because Atlas is a pretty bad track record. At least they used to of dicheating their online game pretty quickly. Like I don't know if you know this, they used to TV, shouldn't. I'm intense MML like years ago. Really I played it. It was bad, I mean I played it. I mean it came out in America. Yeah, it wasn't something like Japanese thing or anything. But

I think it lasted like a year if that. And then they're like this is not turning out. Well yeah, definitely not. I mean it looks cool from the the pictures and stuff I've seen, Like, I think a lot of people it being persona. I think it would get people to play. Yeah, the MMO is called Intense Imagine. Oh, I guess it did last a little longer than I thought, but like it barely. It wasn't good and it was like this is bad and weird, and yeah,

I mean this isn't made by the P five or the PTA. This is made by the Perfect Ball Games. But they're they're pretty well known for doing PC stuff. So if they didn't release it, I think it would do well for them. How much is gonna cost to do all that and the translation and everything else. Well, see, yeah, if they actually end

up doing it or not. Uh from Software Uh. Miyazaki was was doing an interview with a Chinese site, UH talking about that there are no plans for for DLC beyond the Shadow of the R Tree that's you know, coming out next month actually, but they're not ruling out an Elder Ring two. Uh, they don't want to like shut the door on doing more with it, just like he says he didn't want to do with Dark Souls either. They just kind of wanted to kind of close the chapter on that point and

then leave it open for other stuff. You think we are eventually going to get an Old Ring two or I mean it's it's one of the most successful games in the past five years. Yeah, I think we're Elden Ring two, But I feel like they're gonna make something else and then there's gonna be an Older Ring two. I don't think they're gonna just go from this expansion

to Elder Ring two or you yeah, they'll finally make Kuan too. I mean, I guess they could go do Dark Souls for or something maybe, but then that's sort of like I don't think so, because you know, I think the Elder Ring far eclipses Dark you know, Dark Souls as the franchise, or you know, at least it is far as like name recognission

and the gameplay mechanics so well. Plus you got like it's not this thing where people got to feel like, oh man, I got to play the other Dark Souls games to be able to understand what's going on with this game, whereas like elden Ring is like, oh, it's the first one, so I don't have to just play elden Ring. Yeah, I think you

got that that stigma on it too. I mean, there there's always a Bloodborne too for those peopul that they don't they don't know that completely, well they don't, but I'm pretty sure Sony is not gonna you know, Sony own parts of uh from SAFF so they're not going to say no to that either, you know, all right, but it'd be good if we if we see it. But you know, obviously we've got to see how the shutow of the Red Tree Dead, which I'm sure it will do amazing numbers

just like the original game. Plus it helps that it's like twenty dollars cheaper or thirty dollars from what games come out now. Oh, plus plus like once the Tree DLC comes out like later in the year, they can announce like, well, I don't think it's later. I think they already announced like the Elder Ring Game of the Year edition or whatever that has the deal right, So I'm sure they will do that. They will have a bundle you can buy digitally all that stuff, I'm sure as well, so get

ready for that. And I guess, uh, lastly, just to show where gaming is at this quarter of the year, New Zoo, who we've taught out before is you know, likes to do like market tracking and like tracking like revenue for games and stuff, and they kind of use the United States and then like Europeans like best you know, top five markets, UK, Germany, France, Spain, Italy to kind of like show where kind

of what's tracking as like the big things in gaming. No surprise, Fortnite is number one, with EA Sports being FC twenty four being right there at number two, but Hell Divers two is number three above everything, Call of Duty, NBA two, K Madden Dragons Dogma two is number six, so that's a pretty good indicator like how well Dragon's Dogma two has been received. Power World right there and Valoriant as well, with like Rainbow six Siege and

stuff like that in there. Surprise that like Dragon's Dogma two is not really I mean, it's kind of a nice title, but people have been wanting Dragon's Dogma two for a while now, so yeah, it shows that like the hype wasn't just even though I mean there was a hype cycle and then it kind of feels like it it died a bit. People are still playing

it, right, People really got into it very much. It wasn't consistent like Hell Divers two has been or Power World was for like that month or so month half, but it shows that it made a big enough impact to like be up there and those those I mean, it helps that it's on all the consoles, right, Like I wonder if you know Rebirth had had been on other places besides PlayStation five, that it'd be on there too. But it does show hey, again, multiplayer games, games that that draw

on audience, this is what's big. And you can see why all these companies are chasing that stuff and they want to be you know, the big trackers, big big number getters. And again that's why Microsoft's being very presentive of Call of Duty because it's still up there at number four, even though you know, Hall Diverge two has gotten more press Fortnite obviously, it's just that's just a game for everyone in EA Sports FC. It is is what

it is. So yeah, you can see why microsofts is guarded about that, but we'll see what they finally do with it. At the end. I forgot to mention Sarah Baond did note that that again the whole oh all these games is gonna go in a game pass game past not going anywhere, but we'll see, we'll see what ends up actually happening with it. You know, there's only more months in the year to find out more things marcslf's

gonna wind up doing. But yeah, anything else, I mean, do you want to, I guess talk about your Adventure with the Knuckles TV show? No, I only watched it the first two and a half or like I just got to like the episode that is pretty right widely reviled as like Knuckles is barely in it where it's a good I haven't watched that yet. I like the British lady, the evil British lady in the show. He's

pretty cute and it's I guess it's a I don't. The problem is I don't think that main guy, Adam Palley is like good in large doses. It's not James Morrison right, like he works as the Sonic movies as like you know, five minute character or you know if that right, not twenty long, twenty minutes long, anything like that. I got it funny and show. I mean, in the Knuckle show, if like ITRI's elbow was actually in it as like himself, that would have been good to me,

like that surprise that they thought about that. But I wonder how much more it costs them to hem him physically in it right his voice. That's probably one of the decisions that got made there. Right. But it's okay,

I mean, I guess it's okay. Yeah, Like it's funny because I thought that the Tatakutus released a thing out like the top worst to best Sonic adaptations and like live action in cartoons and knuckles just like numbers like dead Last, and it's like, no, have you seen that Sonic Boom cartoon, Like the Sonic Boom cartoon. They ranked that like really high. It was a baffling because I'm like, what the hell, you guy? What I know we're watching the I watched that cartoon as a kid, Sonny Boom.

Yeah, that was like that's pretty recent, Like that was like yeah, I remember like watching watching that and then I remember watching the Sonic X. Yeah they ranked that they ranked ranked at the best. Really yeah, wow over the two movies or the old cartoons. They ranked Sonic Boom number three by the way, Wow yeah says a lot yep. Uh. One thing I'll mention I beat cele Berlade, so I'm happy about that, and I got two of the three. I means, what do you think about it

now that you you beat it? Uh? It's good. Uh. The last two bosses are actually really hard. I had to bump down too, like easy mode, Like I don't want to keep banging my head against this. Uh. I wish there are gameplay deficiencies in that game a little because some of the areas don't have maps, so it really sucks. And then was made for that, like why do you have maps at certain areas? And then well, because it's like those areas are more like linear okay,

so it kind of makes sense a little. But also like if you can't like it's like, oh, I'm trying to find this one document, but it's like I don't know where this is because I can't it's like fast travel

to the nearest map or whatever. It's like I get I gotta like watch this dumb video on YouTube and figure out who this thing is and hope hope I can get there, and then there's no for a game that really does pride itself on collecting, like collecting shit, it doesn't have a great collection like system, like tracking system, like it has it for some stuff like documents and memory sticks and the cans, but it's like, I'm it's like

one of the trophies is like open tundred boxes. Okay, why don't you tell me how many boxes are in his own and then I can start clicking this off, or like one of the trophies is like, oh, max out your health and magic meter basically, but it's like not a good way to like see even like what it is, or like you know, ware if any of the collectibles are in a location or not. Yeah, thankfully I was able to do all that shit in my first run. I drove

myself nuts doing it, but I did it. So the second run and you have to do a new game plus to get the Yeah, it's not just continue, which is fine because the second run is a lot easier. Yeah, you already know how to but you have to go through everything again, right, but you're not having to like really explore all that because you already got it, right. Yeah. Yeah, So that's cool, but I like to get quite a bit. Ah, yeah, I'll get back

do it here. Probably it's not like my game of the year or anything, but it'll probably make a top ten list so far, at least for me. Yeah it might for me me too. I'm gonna try to get back to it more this week. I haven't been playing much again this week, but next week I will definitely get to that. But speaking of next week, let's look at what is going to be out in the week. He said, Hello, Valo, how are you doing? Oh that's key.

Yes, let's get on with what is coming out here. So basically, if you haven't played gos Tushima yet and you want to get it on PC and you're not one of the countries that it's locked out in, you can go by that next week on the sixteenth. I'd be curious playing it on PC if I could, or you know, like, I'm trying to look a lot better than I'm like, well a little better than PS five.

I mean it look great on PS five, so but yeah, I imagine getting all the the nice frame rates and great graphics will look good there. Uh. The Neptunia game maker of our evolution comes to the PlayStation and Switch there, so you know, if you we'll see whatle that like these games, you already know when that's coming. Like you know, we have assist Scott that's been on here for and he watches the show sometimes live.

He's like the big guy that like reviews it all the time for Outer Haven, so I'm sure he's already probably like playing this game if I'm right about that. He also got aside from that the ghostu Shima and I mentioned, Yeah, really Memories Neurodiver it's also coming out the sixteenth as well. More Neptunia stuff is coming, I think before we do the show again, like a bunch a bunch of like all the Hyperdimension games are coming to Switch and

then the Sister Sisters game is also coming to Xbox. So yeah, and System Shock it's it's not gonna be long we're going to be talking about like not actually but the week after or uh we'll be getting to play help Blade too and the System Chack remake. So in Homer three, you think out now or like out next week or something. Yeah, Paper Mario, the Paper Mario games out that week too, So I was wrong. It was that same week that hel Blade two and System Shock Room may come out.

But still some things coming towards the end of the up. We gotta, you know, let's see if Gosushima wants something. Well, oh the over Lie and the laser eyes I forgot that comes out the next and a Perna joint that looks all freaking crazy. It's coming to switch and PC. But yeah, so that's pretty much it for this week. Thank you everybody that watched live. Thank you Crafty. He says that you have a cute cat, yep, mark and oh yeah, he is. I don't have mine

in the room. My dog is over here, but she will not I'd rather not wake her up. So we'll see you guys next week, yep, and have Until then, I haven't been a fight.