Yo Videogames

Ever see a trailer or read a quick blurb on a game and think "This sounds incredible!" but then when you got the game it just... wasn't? It has everything you want in a game, it checks all the boxes but somehow it came together in a way that left you wanting. Or maybe it promised the world and then didn't even try to deliver those things. This episode is about those games.

Today you have just a few options and so it is hard to go wrong. Whether you choose Sony, Nintendo, PC/Xbox - you'll have good gaming experiences. While we love to argue who is best or if it even matters anymore: there was a time where that decision could actually ruin you, if you chose wrong. The year is 1994, there are 7-ish consoles out, all competing for your dollars with their own exclusives and peripherals. Who do you choose?

Might be better to say "our favorite type of villains" because we talk more about villain make up than naming actual favorite villains (though we do name our favorite). What makes a juicy villain? Tragic, love to hate or just fun to watch? Jump in with us as we discuss!

We've speculated in the past that maybe everyone should standardize to the same engine. That maybe that'd be good for the industry. At the time we looked at the hype around Unreal 5 and thought - this could be it. Everyone will go to this. And a lot of people have. However, as the industry has changed so much in the last couple years - let's reexamine the idea. Should everyone be switching to Unreal 5? And does U5 live up to its hype?

  Tokyo Game Show doesn't usually have HUGE reveals, but there is always something interesting there. For me that something interesting was Nightmare Operator, an action/horror indie title coming to PC. The biggest piece of news out this past week is probably that Ubisoft is in dire straits because Star Wars Outlaws didn't do very well.

State of Play 2024 was a mixed bag for me. Matt rates it as overall pretty good - a win - even before he got what he wanted: Ghost of Yotei. I rate it as so-so, even though there were a couple things that did genuinely excite me. Let's dive in and talk the state of play 2024/25

Square Enix released its earnings and we saw in plain numbers that Final Fantasy 16 and Rebirth did not hit target earnings. In fact the company missed its target by billions of yen. So, is this the death of Final Fantasy!? Okay, probably not, but this could be a wake up call to publishers that it's time to build new franchises. Plus we address some of the PS5 Pro cope floating around, as well as Switch 2 rumors and leaks... Oh and Matt explains Yaoi to me. So... Come for the earnings and stay for the hot man on man action I guess.

Starting on a positive note: Astrobot has really landed with us. Granted, Matt thinks there's places to improve, but even then - it's a 9 or 9.5 at least. Sony is going to take the wrong lessons from this win I'm sure, but for now let's bask in a great exclusive for the PS5... Annnnnnd it's gone. The PS5 Pro was announced and as far as we can tell it is an 800 dollar nominal upgrade. (800 because it's an extra 80 bucks for a disk drive). Frankly this generation has been a mess and has proven only one thing: Nintendo - who is still in LAST gen - might be the only company that even sort of understands the market.

Not the record it wanted... But a record nonetheless. In a shock move, just 10 days after it released, Sony announced that Concord is being pulled offline, and the dozens who bought it will get refunds. Does this mean that it is dead forever? There's some debate. It could come back as F2P - but then it may also just get totally shelved. This is probably very bad news for Sony's next big Live Services game, Marathon. Will Sony, and the industry at large learn a lesson from this? Yes. Will it be the right lesson? No.

In a twist, Nintendo dropped a double-direct earlier this week. Combining a Partner Direct with an always fun Indie Direct for a show that had some stunners in it. A few people seem to have run away with it, though. Imagining that this direct double feature portends a Switch 2 announcement soon. We don't think that's happening. At least not in the remainder of this year. In this episode we talk about the direct, what we think Nintendo plans for the next six months, and how they continue to win when it comes to game presentations in general. Oh we also talk about the great Robert Muldoon. And we rank Indiana Jones movies on a tangent. Man, it's too bad Bob Peck died so tragically soon after Muldoon was born because I would have loved a Muldoon game warden movie in Kenya. Anyway...

Positive up front: there was some cool stuff announced here. Not much gameplay, yeah, but still cool things coming. We don't go game by game. Rather we talk generally about the showing and then go into some loves and hates specifically. Tiny bit of cynicism: Everything was very safe. Which adds to our fears that the next year or two will be rough for the industry and this is only the beginning. Much like the film industry, gaming is going into a downsizing and that means "safer" ideas will be the only ones pursued. That doesn't mean cheaper, though. It means less games, and more budget for the blockbusters they think will make big money. It means more shovelware and big companies trying to bottle the magic captured by indie darlings.

In case you had a hard time following the two-ish hour Xenoblade One Lorecast featuring Nico B - we have gone ahead and recorded a bonus DEFINITIVE EDITION episode. We got it to just over an hour and still fit in several inappropriate jokes along the way. Plus I make an obscure reference to the latest Planet of the Apes trilogy. What could possibly be the context for that in this episode? Listen and find out.  

Taking a wee break from lore-castin to talk about some of the latest news. Definitive edition episode of the Xenoblade lorecast is coming later this week. For now: let's talk about Switch 2 news, Tango getting bought, where Phil Spencer really dropped the ball and other stories!

This is it! We're at the final, and arguably most difficult, part to explain.   Klaus is dead. The conduit is gone. The two worlds are at peace. For now. 12 years after the conduit has disappeared it seems the two universes are no longer stable and can't be held apart. They are crashing back together and annihilation is on the horizon! But Melia and Nia have a plan to back everyone up onto an Ark that can survive the collapse. A powerful genetic hard drive that uses the last of their ether to instantaneously transfer all beings from their old world to the new one, in new bodies. It is a miracle of technology, and the heroes of both worlds will lead the way. However, there is a ghost in the machine...

This week we are tackling Xenoblade Chronicles 2! We're back in our universe, on our Earth, with what remains of Klaus and the Trinity processor. The planet has been killed, and the conduit has gone quiet. Klaus is overcome with guilt and seeks redemption... Can he build a better world then the one he destroyed?

In Act One we covered the ancient history, now in Act Two we jump to the new universe where half-man Klaus, and Galea are the only living beings to make the jump. One of the Trinity processors makes the jump with them and because Klaus and Galea are administrators to its system it serves them here; giving these two the powers of gods...

Oh shiiii-- Did you see this coming? Did you know we were gonna try and explain one of the most dense and convoluted games entailing 25 years of writing and rewriting? Yes! Yes? Oh. Well okay, I guess it's no surprise. We've wanted to do this for a bit, but now... We begin our tale with ancient history. The discovery of The Conduit. An impossible machine, long buried on earth, and with its discovery the birth of a utopia... Or so it seems.

To celebrate American Independence Day, we're doing a fun one this week: just chatting about the American games industry over the years. We also find out that I know maybe more about Rollerblading than any of us ever knew (even me).

We're back! I moved across the country and had to catch up on Nintendo's presentation, so what's the verdict? To me: pretty good. Maybe even great really. I swing back and forth on it. Matt likes it too, though he points out that clearly Nintendo isn't "firing on all cylinders". What does this mean for the back half of 2024? While not a banner year, it looks like 2024 will be far from the desert I feared it would be... Well, except for Sony.

While we wait on Nintendo's upcoming Direct - let's talk about the rest of showcase season. Did Xbox pull off a victory? Did Sony make a strategic decision to hold back their biggest announcements? Did Ubisoft show they still make big games besides Assassin's Creed? I was able to attend the Xbox Games Showcase in person and Matt was able to attend Summer Games Fest in person. And that let us form an opinion about whether they better in person than in a direct?