Stranger Than Heaven Hands-On & The End of BioWare | Between Levels Podcast Ep. 17

WheelieAverage: Hello everyone, welcome back to Between Levels. This is episode seventeen. I am of course Wheelie Average. I am joined at the moment by Fighting Cowboy, but hopefully Sarth should jump in later. He is in the process of setting up his PC, I believe. how are you, Cowboy?

FightinCowboy: I am I'm good. I've returned from the coldest wedding ever and I'm just ready for a about two months of just just gaming, lots of gaming.

WheelieAverage: Yeah, I mean it's gonna be a fun time. You must be cold. You must still be cold because you've got no vest on today, so

FightinCowboy: Well the so so Nashville weather is is odd. It's like fall doesn't like it wants to come, but it doesn't. so the day we're still the daytime we're still in the high seventies. And then when we get into the evenings we're dropping down into the forties. So quite

WheelieAverage: Yeah.

FightinCowboy: a a bit of of variability.

WheelieAverage: That's a bit that's a big drop and that's similar to what we have in the UK right now. During the day it's still reasonable temperatures, but at night it's starting to get very cold.

FightinCowboy: Here you go. Not non freedom units. We're looking at twenty four Celsius and then nights that are at like seven Celsius. So it's like it's fucking weird because it's like you'll you I'll wear the tank top, I'll be fine. Then it's like, hey, it's time to be fucking cold. And I'm like, okay, can y'all just pick? Can we just I need to just move somewhere where year round. It's like perpetually sixty five. Just that's that's that. That's all I need.

WheelieAverage: Yeah. I mean I think you'll find it hard to find a place like that, but I don't know, maybe.

FightinCowboy: Yeah.

WheelieAverage: But we've got a fun one today, because I was teasing that I had hands-on with something recently. That game is Stranger Than Heaven, which we have spoken about briefly in the past. Yes, it's the game that has Tupac in it.

FightinCowboy: Little little bit. A little bit, a little bit of speaking.

WheelieAverage: Yeah. And we're also gonna talk more about some Valor Mortis and I actually think that's where we should start today because I know you've been playing a bit more of it, cowboy. So

FightinCowboy: I I have. I still got I think I'm around the halfway point. Interestingly enough, the where I wrapped up stream yesterday, the bridge I was at was the same bridge that I did in a preview event. So I'm like, I kinda know where this this is a little bit. but some people were saying I'm only about halfway. I looked online and chapter wise I'm at chapter seven out of eleven, so a little bit past

WheelieAverage: Yes.

FightinCowboy: half, but it's Taking it's taking longer than I thought, for sure.

WheelieAverage: Yeah, it's certainly is I think that was one of the things that surprised me when I played is it's not as short as I expected it to be. And that's not a bad thing necessarily, but it's when we're so packed with games, you know, it's it's kind of you know, but it's it's it's been fun. I've I've seen you play a little bit on your streams. I was I was watching you I think just the first time you streamed it a few like a few days ago and you were fighting like the the the treehouse effectively and you were just like, How the hell do I do this? I don't see any weak points.

FightinCowboy: Yeah. Well I was what sucked is there the weak point was there, but just visibly the way it was, I had to like run up to the front and then all the way to the left, and then you could see the waypoint like the little weak spot peeking out around the corner. And so like I got to there and I'm like, Okay, there I mean clearly there's a way to kill this. Why like what am I missing? What am I not seeing here? And then when I finally did see it, I was like, god, there it is.

WheelieAverage: Yeah. It was so funny though, because up until that point, you're you're kind of like they're they're fairly normal enemies you encounter, right?

FightinCowboy: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Hum humanoid type stuff, you know, like, you're gonna swing weapons, I get it, you know, and then all of a sudden it's I am a slaughter mill and you're like, Okay, that's it's a new new

WheelieAverage: Yeah, yeah.

FightinCowboy: design for sure.

WheelieAverage: I mean, I quite liked that enemy. Like it I had a similar experience where it did take me a minute just to figure out like I knew the weak points were there, but again, there is that one that's slightly hidden, as you said. So so I had a similar experience there. But obviously, as I said previously, I enjoy this game for what it is, but I'm still in the space where I'm like, I'm not sure that I can wholeheartedly recommend this to people. If I was to ask you right now based on what you've played, would would you recommend it? How where would you sit right now?

FightinCowboy: right now I I I would probably put it at a I I I've I've been saying four out of five is where I would currently put it. just because based on that I I feel like you know it's there's a solid game here. at the the same time. I also feel like there's a lot of bugs. There's a lot of there's a lot of bugs still.

WheelieAverage: Yes.

FightinCowboy: and You know, obviously that's just something you gotta be aware of. But like the core gameplay loop I enjoy a lot. the the weapons have been really cool. I just got the claymore. I like that there's a fair amount of like, do you want to go weapons? Do you want to go guns? Do you want to lean more into the transmutations, which is like the magic system? So there's a lot of different things that I am enjoying. but the the bugginess and then at the same time, I think it's it's worth noting that this is a it's a first person action adventure. First and it's a soul's like second, which isn't a bad

WheelieAverage: Yes.

FightinCowboy: thing. But if if you know, there there was a lot of marketing about like, you know, first person souls like first person souls like and it and it is, but there are adjustments that have been made, that essentially make it just more more more user friendly, you know. Like if you fall off a ledge and a soul's like, that's a death sentence. Here, that's not a death sentence. So like little things like that, I do think they they make a difference. But you know, it's it's worth worth calling out stuff like that.

WheelieAverage: Yeah. It's more what I would say is, and you you explained it quite well there, but it's they've basically balanced it to make it a souls like that is more approachable to the casual player, effectively. I again I want to be clear, I don't dislike the game. In my review, which I finally published yesterday, on analog stickgaming.com, which is my own website, please go and check it out. I gave it a seven out of ten. And to me, I kind of stand by that. Like this is a good game, but if you fix all the technical issues, this could have been a great game. So if you wait a little bit for a few patches, then I would say at that point I could recommend it more highly. Right now I am very much in the space of like if you can get it on a slight sell. Even as a game that is cheaper, I think it's forty dollars. If you can get it on a slight sale or if you can play it on Game Pass because it's it was day one on that service, then I would recommend checking it out. Other than that, I think like you know, there's there are the way I'd summarise it is there are better options out there, but that doesn't mean this game is a bad game. That's that's kind of where I am with it. Outside of Valormortis, have you been playing anything else recently that you'd like to talk?

FightinCowboy: messing around with a with a bit of dogma still, of course. And then besides that, kind of just I think I think I think we're just kinda chilling. We're really just waiting for Family Zero at this point, you know.

WheelieAverage: Yeah, of course, of course. I mean that I saw they released the launch trailer for that the other day and that's like another another stunning trailer. Looks looks brilliant and yeah, very excited to check that one out for sure. I did actually finally jump into Dogma a little bit. I was saying to you before that you know I tried it at launch and then I kind of left it behind because technical issues. But My word, what a video game. Like, there is there really is nothing quite like it. And it can be super punishing if you're not prepared for it. But it can also be very, very rewarding. And yet it's a you know, it's a character action RPG. This isn't this isn't that souls-like type of reward. It's that it's that thing of like you'll stumble on something and you'll end up fighting like an abominable snowman, you know, and and other crazy creatures out there. Or I had it the other day that I was just walking along somewhere and a and like a wolf came out of nowhere and just jumped on me and started attacking me.

FightinCowboy: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Shit like that is is fairly common in that game. It'll it's very

WheelieAverage: So

FightinCowboy: it I think the thing I love so much about Dogma though is just like the the overall feeling of adventure you get playing that game. I really think there's nothing that really comes close. Like it's just it's so unique the way that Like you know, you're you're going through you have your pawns and you're just you're you're picking up new party members. It feels like you know, like a fantasy anime or something that's been turned into a game. Cause you're you're you're

WheelieAverage: Yeah.

FightinCowboy: you have this vague, you know, hey, you're the chosen one. Go do your your go do your chosen one stuff. and then you know, you got your pawns and you're just you're going on an adventure. That's that's all the game really is, is you're going on this this big adventure, you know, doing your thing. And I think that's just that's really, really cool.

WheelieAverage: And you also have the freedom to do it your way as well, right? Which which makes the adventure that much more rewarding and and it's very clear to me, even only having played a bit of it so far,

FightinCowboy: Yeah.

WheelieAverage: that this is a game where everybody could have a vastly different experience, depending on what kind of class they choose to play, the the pawns that they have, th things. mm choices that they make, different things that they choose to do or not do, and stuff like that. You know, like I it's it's very, very rewarding and I can't wait to get more time with it. Obviously, as you know, we are we are always busy at the moment, it seems. Like

FightinCowboy: Yeah. Yeah.

WheelieAverage: you know, we were saying before that there's two months of gaming coming up where we're just gonna be Yeah, it's just gaming like Wow Forever is on the horizon now. Getting getting closer, not too far away. Obviously Phantom Blade Zero as well. Ocarina of Time, which I know you're interested in, cowboy, having never played it before. So

FightinCowboy: Yeah. Yeah, we got a lot. We got a lot coming for sure.

WheelieAverage: very, very busy time. However, do you know one thing that we won't have coming in the future? Another Mass Effect game.

FightinCowboy: I I know. That's well, actually there's there's discussions that they might sell off they might sell off IPs.

WheelieAverage: I mean that would be interesting if they do, but of course if you don't know, we're basically talking about the fact that EA has decided to close down BioWare, the the team, the studio that has been around for thirty years behind the likes of Kotor and the Mass Effect games and even the original Bouldersgate, I believe, they were they had some involvement in. like yeah, the these guys What a legacy from this studio. And and of course there's no doubt that perhaps they've had some missteps along the way, but what studio do you know that's never had a misstep in their life? You know? Is it

FightinCowboy: Well and I I think at the end of the day it's it's you had so I I primarily blame EA because there's there's tons and tons of reports about all the shit that went down with you know EA forcing direction changes and and and shit like that. And you know, stuff like that is really it's just it's it's a pointing. It's disappointing. There's no other way to really describe it. You know, but They did have three back to back failures. You know, you had Anthem that Anthem shit its britches. And then we obviously had what was it? Mass Effect Andromeda, which did not

WheelieAverage: Andromeda. Yeah.

FightinCowboy: really get the the best reception. And then Yeah,

WheelieAverage: That's that's putting it lightly.

FightinCowboy: yeah. Yeah. And you know, it's just there's there's there's only what which Vel Velgarde also didn't didn't really get,

WheelieAverage: And then we had Velgarde, which I think you know, it wa I would say Velgarde's an interesting one because it was controversial, but the people who liked it seemed to really like it. It it was that kind of thing where I think there were some promising signs there with Velgarde in terms of Bioware returning to some form of success.

FightinCowboy: Mm-hmm.

WheelieAverage: And You know, that's all out of the window now. And what I think annoys me most of all is like the industry is just in such a terrible place right now. You know? And we we've sort of discussed it before, but I just saw the a few days ago that the developer behind that game, Samson, has closed down and they were a brand new studio that made a brand new IP. They just released their game onto consoles after having previously released it on PC and yet they they ran out of money and they're forced to close down, you know? And it's like, and now we've got this bioware thing, and I think one of the most important things to say as well is whatever you think of the studio or you think of their work. This closure of bioware means that four hundred human beings are are losing their jobs.

FightinCowboy: Yeah, well, I I think the thing that that sucks, I've I've met a not Matt, but I've seen a lot of people that are are arguing like, they haven't done a you know, they haven't done anything super good in ages, which like, yeah, I got it. But like there's still a legacy there, you know, like i you know, Elton John hasn't made any bangers in the last twenty years, but when he dies, I'm still gonna be like I'm still gonna be like,

WheelieAverage: Still an icon. Yeah.

FightinCowboy: Fuck, man, I can't believe Elton John's finally gone, dude. He was he was iconic. You know, and and I think it's it's you know, I'm I there's no other way to describe it but shameful. You know, seeing people that are like, yeah, they deserved

WheelieAverage: Absolutely.

FightinCowboy: it. Their their last games weren't weren't that good. Like, yeah, I get it. That's that's capitalism. But I think it's I I think seeing people celebrate the downfall of a studio, it's just disgusting behavior. you know, it's it's it's a lack

WheelieAverage: I agree. I agree because at the

FightinCowboy: of empathy for your for your your fellow man, it's a lack of empathy for the legacy of what Bioware was for the games they brought us for the memories that you made from those games. And I get it. Like, you know, Anthem, it it fell flat on its face. Andromeda didn't do well. Veilguard didn't do well. And obviously a lot of these problems are rooted in I mean, God, the the development of of Veilguard alone. Veilguard started off I want to say initially it was supposed to be a single player and then EA was like, no, you're making this multiplayer. We want to sell multiplayer And then Jedi Survivor came out and they were like, look, single player games are popular. Let us do this. And then so they let them pivot back. But I mean, that game got jerked six ways to Sunday back and forth in its development cycle. Which is is is exactly it's always gonna affect it. I mean, Anthem

WheelieAverage: Which is always gonna affect it's always gonna affect equality. Yeah.

FightinCowboy: was the same thing. They had, I remember reading interviews about how they they showed off like a snippet of Anthem, and then some EA suit was like, That's what you're making, do that. And they were like, this was just a proof of concept. And he was like, we want this on the show floor in like two weeks. Like, and and I think it it really does speak to a a problem with venture capitalism when it comes into gaming, because gaming is despite being the the highest grossing form of entertainment in the world, gaming is not a moneymaker in the same traditional sense that say something like sports is, you know. Like if you're you're you're having a football match, you're gonna sell

WheelieAverage: Yeah. It Yeah.

FightinCowboy: merch, you're gonna sell food, you're gonna sell tickets, you're gonna sell sell tons stuff. Whereas the game

WheelieAverage: Yeah. A g a game isn't guaranteed money, right? That's that's effectively what you're saying.

FightinCowboy: It's it's not. It's not. Yeah. A game is not guaranteed money. It's a long, it's a long development cycle. It's a lot of money investment. And really, there's no guarantee on that investment. There never is, you know. From soft could put out Elden Ring too. And if it just misses the mark somehow, you know, people would be like, damn, what happened? From soft washed. But my point is there are no

WheelieAverage: Absolutely.

FightinCowboy: guarantees in gaming. And so, yes, it's extremely unfortunate that that Bioware's going down. I I understand why it happened. but at the end of the day I think once again anybody that's celebrating the closure of a studio, I think you're a piece of shit. I'm just gonna call it how it is. You're a piece of shit if you're celebrating a studio shutting down. Just is what it is. You know.

WheelieAverage: Yeah. I agree with that. I agree completely with that. One thing I will say that, you know, we alluded to there about about kind of the risk of making video games these days and how there's a huge financial risk and that financial risk is only getting bigger, right? Which is why I think we see not just EA but all of these other companies closing a lot of things down as well. Because if you look at the companies that are closing things down right now, the things they're choosing to close down are the things that they can't guarantee will make them money. Whereas they're they're kind of there's this consolidation around let's make sure we invest in our most popular IPs and the IPs that are proven hits and have a proven track record. You know, and it's like I just saw today There's a report, and it's not confirmed, of course, but there's been several reports around like Gears of War, Gears of War E Day, which highest rated Gears of War since the original trilogy, and yet apparently on a budget of roughly four to five hundred million dollars, they've only made like fifty million back right now. So

FightinCowboy: Mm-hmm.

WheelieAverage: you know it's it's

FightinCowboy: See, and it's I will say it is weird though seeing budgets because like the a ton of people obviously were playing on Game Pass. And that's like I don't know how you know I I don't know exactly how how Xbox quantifies that, but like that

WheelieAverage: Yeah, how they attribute that to a specific game or not, right? Yeah. Yeah. But it it's that thing of, you know, was it Wolverine that costs something like 300 million and Spider-Man was a high 200 million as well? And and it's just we're in this place with games where it's crazy, right? There's a report it hasn't been confirmed about GTA 6 potentially being up to two billion. by the time they've done

FightinCowboy: Yeah, yeah, I heard that too.

WheelieAverage: like all their by the time they've done the development and then the marketing on top, it's like that's crazy. I mean, they're the one game that can get away with probably spending that much money. You know, I like they're probably gonna make around half of their budget back in one day, I would imagine, if I was if I was to guess. But you know, it's it's absolutely crazy. But I think most of all As you said, cowboy, we shouldn't be we shouldn't be celebrating things like this. You can say, yes, okay, this studio hasn't made anything good. You can say, hey, I hated their last game, or I I really didn't like this, or I really didn't like that. But you're effectively celebrating 400 people losing their jobs. Would you like people to celebrate you losing your job? You know? It's

FightinCowboy: Yeah. I I I think it and it it's not just gaming in general. I mean, we really do see this on a wider scale. there there's I mean, I remember Musk was saying some shit about it and it's like it to me it's it's psychopath type behavior, but like there's this weird modern ideology where people they they treat empathy like it's a weakness, which is extremely odd to me. 'Cause like at the end of the day, if you if you can't even have empathy for your fellow man, then you know Who's to say anyone's gonna have empathy for you when you're in the same context? Like you should, we should I I feel like as just as species, as humanity, we should be aiming to lift each other up and assisting each other. Like people people didn't survive thousands of years in getting through the Stone Age by being like, Hey, look, Jeff's fire over there went out. Fuck Jeff. I hope he starves this winter. Like people helped each

WheelieAverage: Yeah.

FightinCowboy: other get by. And now all of a sudden it's it's just it's a different fucking mentality. And it's so

WheelieAverage: It really is.

FightinCowboy: weird to me that like people they they celebrate the downfall of others constantly and it it I mean it's honestly it's just really does make you lose lose faith a little bit in in humanity and where it's heading overall, I think.

WheelieAverage: Yeah, absolutely, absolutely agree with that. You know, it's it's it's an interesting, interesting time, but I want to talk more positively about the games industry because we've had lots of great releases recently and we've got lots more coming up. If you look at the s next six months, we're still absolutely stacked. Like we've said it before, but February is crazy, right?

FightinCowboy: fair, February's disgusting. There's so many fucking games coming out in February.

WheelieAverage: Yeah. And then in January, of course, we have Stranger Than Heaven, which is the new RGG Studios game, the the studio behind the Yakuza franchise. And I got to play three hours of it recently, and let me tell you, it's very, very interesting because I've never seen a combat system quite like this. It's it's it's really, really weird. So you basically You control each of your arms and each of your legs separately in the game. but only during combat. So you're not doing it this isn't like a walking simulator having to w

FightinCowboy: Yeah, that would that would be that would be way too jank, yeah.

WheelieAverage: But but during combat you're basically using left trigger and right trigger on an Xbox controller to attack with your legs or right bumper, right left bumper for the arms. However, on top of the attacking side, you're also holding one of the face buttons and timing a press of the corresponding limb to block attacks as well. But what this means is you can block an attack with one arm and simultaneously attack with the other arm. So it's like it's actually a really cool system that enables you to fight multiple foes and like you can be blocking an attack. behind you while hitting somebody in front of you. And it's very it's it's it's interesting from a you know with the with the martial arts style that these games tend to have in in their combat this does feel like the next evolution of it and and giving you more control over what your character does. But my god I will say Y needing to use so many buttons simultaneously at times in combat.

FightinCowboy: Yeah. Yeah, I was thinking it sound it sounds like button confusion would would be happening.

WheelieAverage: Yeah. And for the first I would say roughly for the first thirty minutes I was terrible at combat when I when I was in this preview. It was j I just couldn't get it. I just couldn't understand what it was trying to do. But when it clicks it was so fun. And then we got taken to a later part of the game. and this was where you can start using weapons. So you've like katanas, sledgehammers, axes, knives, all these different things. And they each have different stats. And they do different things as well. So like some of them might be better at stunning an enemy, some of them might cause bleed, that kind of thing, right? So there's there's gonna be some builds here. And you can have in your inventory, you can have, I think, four or five weapons equipped. to your weapon wheel at a time and then you basically tap the you hold the Y button during combat and you tap the D-pad and then let go to select the weapon that you want.

FightinCowboy: Hm.

WheelieAverage: and then and then your weapon

FightinCowboy: Like just the way you're describing it, I'm like, this sounds this sounds so fucking confusing. As many people are getting

WheelieAverage: Yeah.

FightinCowboy: in fights they're gonna be like ch The arms are just shooting in in in fucking every direction and you just

WheelieAverage: And then what is interesting, so when you've got a weapon, you can still p if your weapon's a one-handed weapon, you can still punch with your other hand. So it's like so you'll be punching an enemy to push them back, or you'll be kicking them to push them back, but then if you time attacks right, you can swing from this side and then swing from this side. So it's almost like you can actually get into a rhythm with your button presses as long as you're pressing the right buttons where the weapon combat has this flow to it that that is kind of unlike any other game. I'm not saying it's better or worse, but it allows more control because you're able to basically continue attacking without an animation ever fully ending. So you're not locked into I have to wait for him to bring the weapon back down this way. No, you can swing and as the weapon goes that way you just press swing with the other hand. So it's it there's some really cool stuff you can do there. they also have this the typical kind of execution thing. Where once you stun an enemy, they'll have they'll have like a round circle above their head that is white, which is their health, and then it will build up to have like a red haze around it, and as this builds up enough, eventually you'll stun them, and when they're stunned, you can execute them by pressing both triggers at the same time. and then some enemies that have more health who can't be executed when you do this execution. command you will actually tackle them to the floor instead and you'll start like ground pounding them almost like you're a UFC fighter like you'll just be you know punching them in the face. you can also get stunned and during your period of being stunned you're not completely vulnerable because what happens is you'll be knocked to the floor And then you basically have to roll left or right or in different directions to avoid the enemy's attacks until you

FightinCowboy: Yeah.

WheelieAverage: can get back up. So it's like even in being stunned, you're not completely vulnerable. my god, I'm gonna get killed now. You do have some You do have some manner of defense still, which I appreciated. But all of this is to say this combat is not. going to click with everybody because it is super confusing and

FightinCowboy: Yeah.

WheelieAverage: and it will take people a long time to get used to. And I think that I can just about manage it, okay? But I'm also in the privileged position from a physical standpoint that I can still play with a standard controller. And yeah, okay, my reactions are slightly slower than than your average person, but. I I still have the capability, I still have the dexterity to be able to press the buttons, right? People who can't do that are probably not gonna be able to play this game.

FightinCowboy: I mean, just based on time alone, I'm not sure if I'm gonna be able to play this game.

WheelieAverage: I mean it's coming out in mid January, January fifteenth. what I

FightinCowboy: Yeah. Well we I was I was looking at it the other day, the not not that necessarily, but just the release schedule.

WheelieAverage: Yeah.

FightinCowboy: and yeah, it's it's well for for me at least, the big stuff in January I'd be looking forward to would be until dawn.

WheelieAverage: completely forgot about until dawn. my god.

FightinCowboy: Yeah. un until dawn right at the end of of January. and

WheelieAverage: Nice.

FightinCowboy: and this one obviously is mid January fifteenth, but the question

WheelieAverage: Yes.

FightinCowboy: is will I be wrapped up? 'Cause you know, there's Phantom Blade and then there's gonna be Zelda and then there might be walkthroughs, so I don't even know if I'm gonna get to Stranger Than Heaven. And then once we get into February,

WheelieAverage: Yeah, true, true.

FightinCowboy: it's just like fucking Metro on the fourth, and then Tomb Raider on the twelfth, and then Loffy on the sixteenth, and then Fable on the twenty third. Yeah.

WheelieAverage: Yeah. February is basically the next October, right? Like that's that's where we are. But to give people a little bit more about the rest of this game, because I've talked about the combat, the the rest of the game is very RGG. It's broken up into open world segments, so it's not fully open world. You'll basically have a city that you can go around and do different activities and side quests, etc. But what's interesting is the story plays out over five different decades. And at least from the preview I played, in each decade you seem to be in a different location. Because you're basically following this character throughout his life. At least that's how it appears. I don't know if that means there are five different locations, because obviously some of these decades could have you traveling back to other locations later. But it was interesting that like it's not like a Yakuza game where, hey, you go to one location and then you can fast travel back to the other location because that wouldn't make sense because you are in a completely different year, you know? My concern as someone who does like the stories that RGG Tells normally. I think they they're a studio that has a really good balance of being able to tell an emotionally impactful, serious main story and having fun, engaging side content. My concern is that having the story based over five different decades is gonna make it a little bit of a mess and a little bit like. How the hell do you tell a story over five decades? Do you know what I

FightinCowboy: Yeah.

WheelieAverage: mean?

FightinCowboy: Yeah. Well, I think the the big thing is so like are are we gonna be following cause I'd assume, you know, across decades. I mean, I think about the people I I hung out with between ten to twenty compared to the people at twenty to thirty, the thirty to now. And it's you know, there's there's a couple people that have been persistent, but otherwise it's been you know, very different as I've gone through life. And so I I feel like having that sort of time frame Yeah, it's gonna it it's gonna be an interesting sell. Like, look everyone's in their their fifties now. How's the gang holding, you know?

WheelieAverage: Yeah, for sure. Although one cool thing, depending on who you are, is Snoop Dogg will teach you how to how to roll.

FightinCowboy: How to roll a blunt, yeah.

WheelieAverage: Yeah. So there is that. I mean I can't believe they made that into a mechanic, but they did. So you know.

FightinCowboy: Yeah, I I saw that. I was like o okay, this is yeah, this is a thing now, I guess. It's just it's so it's so ridiculous, dude. I was like this is this is so dumb to me.

WheelieAverage: Yeah. Yeah, it is. It is. What I will say what gave me what gave me kind of hope and and did increase my anticipation for this one a bit is one of the game directors was there because it's being co-directed between two people. And one of the things he said is this project within RGG Is basically the studio taking some of the younger talent at RGG and saying, Go and do your thing, you know? Go and do your thing, have a blank slate, because you're not connected to this other franchise and have fun. And he seems so passionate about the game. And I just think that when you're making a game with that level of passion, i it it's kind of Especially when you've got the resources they've got with Sega backing them and and things like that. I it's gonna be interesting to see what this new generation can bring to RGG because we know what the we know what the older heads over there can do, right? They've been doing it for 20 years. So so yeah, I'm very excited but definitely have some apprehensive parts of this game. Who knows? We'll we'll find out in January, I guess. But now we should probably since since Sarth is not here yet

FightinCowboy: he did. He said he's he's almost. He's al he's he's almost.

WheelieAverage: He's almost here. Almost here. Okay. Well, I'm gonna bring up a couple of community comments and and we will we'll talk about some more later, but there's been some interesting ones. you'll remember last week we were talking about open world games, right? And and what our favorite open world games were and

FightinCowboy: Yes. Yeah, open world fatigue and open world games and

WheelieAverage: and things like that. there's a comment here where somebody says Where someone says, What happened to the next Elder Scrolls? Wasn't that thing announced like ten years ago? And I just found that

FightinCowboy: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it it was.

WheelieAverage: really funny. It it's crazy that we've got to the stage where games are announced over a decade before they come out in some in some cases. You know, it's it's it's like Yeah, it's absolutely crazy. This one I think could provoke an interesting conversation because I know that you're not necessarily the biggest fan of this game, Cowboy, but th someone here says I'm just gonna call them Pete says I think Breath of the Wild has to be one of the best open worlds for me.

FightinCowboy: I mean, if they if people like it that much, sure. I'm not it's not for me, clearly, but you know, I I get it. I I understand. I'm not I'm I am very much of the opinion that not everything needs to be for everybody. and I think more people need to adopt that as opposed to like people these days love to like I I guess a a simple way to describe it is yuck other people's yums. You know? You'll be like, man, like a perfect example is wow forever, you know. Wow, forever is coming out. And I already know there's gonna be some random douchebag that shows up. It's like, I can't believe you're playing WoW. This game's bad. Like, why the fuck are you here then, idiot? Why did you click the stream that says World of Warcraft to come into the chat room and bitch and moan? But like

WheelieAverage: I mean, I might now do that just for a laugh.

FightinCowboy: it's it honestly, it's fucking it's so pervasive. I feel like fucking every you can't,

WheelieAverage: Yeah.

FightinCowboy: you can't, you're not allowed to enjoy anything on social media without some brain dead, knuckle drag, and dickhead coming out of the comments and being like, actually let me tell you why this is bad and you're wrong. Like fuck, why are you here? I don't get all I get it. People have have hate boners these days for everything. So I don't I don't like Breath of the Wild. If somebody else likes it though, great, man. Enjoy it. I'm glad

WheelieAverage: Yeah.

FightinCowboy: you found something you enjoy.

WheelieAverage: Someone else here, someone who's actually who won one of our previous giveaways on the channel, Mr. Onion Bro, says my favourite open world game is Fallout New Vegas. However, Elder Scrolls Oblivion is also up there. Oblivion's an interesting one because I've always been of the impression that Skyrim is the most popular sort of Elder Scrolls game. But this isn't the only comment to bring up Oblivion as the potential best open world game. So that's that's quite interesting. Have you have you played have you played Oblivion?

FightinCowboy: I I I have. I played Oblivion back in the day and then I played it recently for the the the re release of it. And I I don't know, I had enough fun with it, but there there was a point in that playthrough where I was like, Yep, this is done. I'm ready to move on. Like, I think it's you I mean, honestly, I would argue Marrowind is a better Elder Ring or Elder Ring is a better Elder Scrolls game than Oblivion. I think. But Morrowind, we had so like Morrowind, the magic system of Morrowind was amazing. Just literally make your own spells. and you could do I remember a lot of like really goofy shit in Marrowin. Like I remember you could you would cast the my my my fast travel method back in the day. You would cast like a levitation spell and then you would put on the the boots of blinding speed and then you would do something. There was something else you would do. You would put on like a cloak and it gave you like sixty percent debilitation resist. And so you manage to maintain the like super speed boost from the boots, but your vision was only partially darkened. So you you could see just enough that you would you would float up into the sky and then you would sprint across the sky to where you wanted to go. And like goofy shit like that, I I feel like we don't we don't see that kind of inventive gameplay in a lot of more modern RPGs. They tend to keep you more on the rails.

WheelieAverage: Yeah, I'd agree with that. I mean, there's certainly I I mean, I actually think it extends beyond RPGs. I think games these days tend to be a lot more grounded in some sort of reality. Do you know what I mean? They don't they don't want you to go out there and just do whatever you want to do in most cases, you know?

FightinCowboy: Yeah. Well that's that's why I like dogma so much. Dogma very much it it's you know it's just this goofy adventure that you go on and it's like, do you want like perfect example is is to to get into the second region of the game. You can follow along the main quest and you can get a writ that will give you passage. You can also get somebody to create you a fake writ and try to get through with the the the counterfeit and that counterfeit can get discovered. You can instead wait until a cart is gonna go through the gate and hide inside the cart. You can look for a dungeon that happens to go underneath the ocean and then you pop out on the other side. And it's just I I love when when there's like yeah there's like a bunch of different fucking ways. Just do do whatever you want. Do what do whatever makes sense

WheelieAverage: Yeah.

FightinCowboy: to you. Like that's that's fun to me. That's what I crave in games.

WheelieAverage: Absolutely, absolutely. We've got a few more fun comments here. Someone mentions Red Faction, as we as we brought it up previously, and

FightinCowboy: That's what we were talking about. Yeah.

WheelieAverage: they were just talking about how it's it was a franchise that was from the developers of the Saints Row games, Voilition developers, and obviously the last Saints Row was a huge flop, and it caused them to go under. Yes.

FightinCowboy: I don't even remember the the last one getting released, to be honest. I remember like all the talk leading up to it. What did it even do like did it score? Like win let me see.

WheelieAverage: I think it scored badly. I I wanna say it was in the sixties. I th I th I think it might have changed by now, obviously, but at I'm pretty sure it was somewhere in the sixties.

FightinCowboy: Saint Row 2022 reboot. Yeah, it had a six out of ten.

WheelieAverage: Yeah.

FightinCowboy: six out of ten on average.

WheelieAverage: Yeah, yeah. and then we had This is a good comment actually, one that is is kind of connected to the Bioware stuff in some ways and and a lot of other industry troubles right now. Chowder says, Hey guys, there have been so many games, so many great games to come out the last few months, and there's no way that I can afford them all, which has forced me to wait for a sell. My question is how much does it affect a developer? if you don't buy their game at launch. Do you wanna take that one first, Cowboy?

FightinCowboy: I mean I'm I am not really privy to the inner workings of of game sales and value, but I I don't know. I don't know how how important launch metrics are to the dev team. I think I think so this is this is very much just an educated guess. but if it's anything like most businesses, they would probably function on quarterly returns. So, you know, at the at the end of the fiscal quarter. They're gonna look and they're gonna say, what did sales look like? They're not gonna look, you know, like, yeah, obviously that they're gonna be like, hey, early reports showed week one sales were strong. That's good to know. you know, we're we are going to get stuff like that, but I think a I think a majority of it is is gonna be you know, like like we just discussed, is gonna be the quarter. And so I think whether something is bought right at launch or two months down the line or even even four months down the line, especially at an individual sales level. I don't think it's really gonna like make or break the the the bank that much.

WheelieAverage: Yeah. I I don't disagree with you. I think what is interesting about this question is I think what chowder really means is not necessarily does it affect a developer if you don't buy the game at launch. It's more does it affect the developer if you don't buy the game at full price?

FightinCowboy: Yeah.

WheelieAverage: And and that is definitely the case. I think that's something we can say with certainty. For example, I remember with Ubisoft, right, and Division 2, and at one point because they had the DLC coming out for it, they put the base game on sale for like five dollars or something. But the reason they did that was because they knew that if people bought the game and then liked it, they would probably buy this DLC that was coming really soon, right? So they were able to make some of the money back. But imagine if they had been in a situation where the game didn't sell at launch, which it did sell quite well at launch, and then everybody bought it for five dollars twelve months later. You know? It's like the So it's it there's a lot of things that go into it, and it depends on budgets and it depends on all these different things, right? What I will say is that. The more copies that a game can sell earlier on, the better it is for the stability of the studio. Especially with the rising costs of development, as we alluded to earlier. Because at the end of the day, if you've spent, let's say, even a hundred million dollars on a video game, right? You're having to sell probably a few million copies. just to break even, you know? And it's and it's like that's crazy. Like I saw recently it was announced that Control Resonant has sold one million copies already. And it's and it's you know, and that's not a lot in the grand scheme. Like you might think, that's actually quite a low number. But to put that into context, Alan Wake Two took about three months to reach that same number. And and the previous control took way longer than that. So they are selling better, and I guarantee you that will be financially better for their business, which ultimately is better for the developers, because it's gonna increase the chances of them being able to make the next thing, right? Like that's the simple that's the simple answer to it. I'm just scanning through the comments here. we did have a fun one actually, which I can't find right off the top of my head right now. I'm looking for it because it was on one of the shorts. We we had a couple of fun ones, but one of them was Cowboy Needs to Promote This Podcast More. I only found it by watching one of his streams where he casually mentioned it.

FightinCowboy: What do you mean? I literally we I we last week we did we sh I streamed

WheelieAverage: Yeah. Did it live?

FightinCowboy: the podcast. I streamed the podcast. this is it shows up what what what are they? The what are they called? The fucking Yeah, what is this this narrative about me not promoting? I fucking enable all the clips on YouTube. I have all the clips on Instagram. I'm I'm gonna I'm gonna make a conceded statement. It sounds, sir, like you just aren't following my socials enough. because

WheelieAverage: It does, it does.

FightinCowboy: I am posting this shit. the only thing I'm not doing is is like on my weekly update, make sure to tune in. Like it's it's it's on my channel, it's on my Instagram that I don't fucking use. Like it's in the places.

WheelieAverage: Yeah. And I mean and I mean and I mean Yeah, and I'm and I mean Yes, okay, you know, there is that running joke that I sometimes I sometimes make with cowboy cause once upon a time he he says to he said to me, I never miss anything, don't worry. And then that time will come where he hasn't accepted the thing for like three days and then he's like, shit, I forgot Like so So yes, there is that. He won't always the collab might not always show up immediately on his page. But I would argue that that's also part of the reason that if you want to see the between levels stuff, you should be following our pages, right? Like, is isn't that the thing, you know? Like, yeah, and I I guess you could say if you wanted to be really petty about it, like all these online people, you could say Yeah, Cowboy doesn't put it in his weekly update, but that's about his content on his channel. This is a separate channel. And yes, he doesn't tweet about it too often, but he has done. It's not like he's never tweeted about it.

FightinCowboy: I mean my I I I think a if I was to look at my Instagram right now, I think there are more there's more between

WheelieAverage: There's more yeah, yeah.

FightinCowboy: levels on the Insta than there is fighting cowboy stuff.

WheelieAverage: Yeah. Yeah. So so it is there. So I I you know, but I did think that was a funny comment when I saw it because I was like, where's this coming from? Like you know, it's a if you want more of this, subscribe to our channel. You know? We're we're we're what are we? Two less than two hundred subs away from the next giveaway now. We're less than two hundred subs away from two thousand. Which is gonna be when the next giveaway happens. And depending on when we hit that, that giveaway might be Phantom Blade or it might be something else. So you know, look look forward to that. But it's it it's an interesting one because we also had another comment and I don't know I don't know how to take this one. So you tell me, Cowboy, because as you know, I'm newer to this space. But I did I did the short. where I talked about how I didn't like Ghost Recon Breakpoint because the map was just a chore to get around, right? And somebody here, Sixth String, says I actually think this dude is what keeps me coming back to the show. People might be dismissive of him, but he has some grade A takes. And he that and and His laugh is great, very infectious. And I'm just like, how do I even take that? Like

FightinCowboy: That's that's that you you take that as a win. That is a win.

WheelieAverage: Like are they taking the piss? Do you know I mean it was like

FightinCowboy: No, that's that's a that's a win right there. I take that you take that as a win.

WheelieAverage: and then it's funny actually, while I'm on the comments for this short, there's that typical stupid one down below that says, Bro, cowboy seems kind of like an ass to me. Like, and I I was so tempted to reply with what? Because he's outspoken and will tell you what he thinks.

FightinCowboy: I a lot of people just don't like we we had this talk the other day when I was so I went up to my sister got married and we were up in Boston. and the the vast majority of people that are are at this wedding are from New Jersey. And

WheelieAverage: Yes.

FightinCowboy: I think what what a lot of people don't get is what like we're just we're just out like we don't nobody beats around the bush. for if they're from up north. Like if somebody is acting dumb, someone from New Jersey won't hesitate to be like, you know, you're being you're being a bit of a fucking idiot right now. But down down here, down in the south, you know, no no, that's that's no no no you don't say mean things like that. And so even even on streams, I'll get it, people like somebody'll do something dumb. I'll be like, man, you're you're a fucking moron. And they're like, why are you so angry? And that's not being angry. That's just naturally how We talk from New Jersey. Like it's it's just it's a northerner thing.

WheelieAverage: Yeah. Yeah. And and what I would say, quite frankly, is you're outspoken. I think there's no denying that. But outspoken isn't a bad thing. I personally this is why I get on with Cowboy, right? I'd rather have somebody that tells me how things are and and what they really think. And I know that Cowboy appreciates that back as well, right? Like You would rather that someone just tells you up front what they think than beats around the bush and is trying to be polite, you know? Like that's that's I I don't know. Maybe maybe it's I don't know. People are people are weird and that's okay. But the the the general message is you know, I don't really wanna see those comments anymore, please. Because we Our audience is making fun of you. We've got to that point already where our audience is making fun of people who come in here with negative comments. There's a guy there's a guy who commented on my Ghost Recon clip who says, No one cares, bro. And there's like six replies and they're like, I care. And there's another one who says, No one cares that you don't care, bro.

FightinCowboy: This

WheelieAverage: So we appreciate the audience. We appreciate you all. I will go into some more of your comments later on. but as we wait for Sarth, who will hopefully show up here before the end, let's do a a little catch up on fantasy critics, shall we? Because things are getting very, very

FightinCowboy: Things are heating up.

WheelieAverage: interesting. They are, they really are. I will share my screen right now, so if you're watching the video version, you will be able to see that. So give me one second while I get it up for you. So we're we're in a situation where Cowboy right now is on 125, but he is about to get minus seven points for Call of Duty Modern Warfare. So that is 118. But you've still got conceivably one two three at least three games to release. Tides of Annihilation's definitely not coming. Dust Bloods might. So you could have up to you could have up to four games still to release, okay? and you've got World of Warcraft forever. So actually. Up to five games still to release on let's say 118 points. Then we have me, who as you can see here, all of my games except for GTA 6 have now released. So that leaves me currently, without my Call of Duty points having gone on yet, at 161. So with the Call of Duty points, I'll be on 168. So it'll be 168 against 118, and Cowboy will potentially have five games still to release. So to beat me, Cowboy will have to not only get at least an average of ten points per game remaining that might release, but

FightinCowboy: I mean, well, so so let's let's be honest. Zelda Dust Bloods

WheelieAverage: Yeah.

FightinCowboy: PBZ. Those are those are gonna be in the nine out of ten category. I feel strongly about that. dawn

WheelieAverage: Probably. Probably.

FightinCowboy: of war, not sure where it's gonna land. Tides isn't coming anymore. Forever. I mean, I'm I'm honest, I'm probably

WheelieAverage: Yeah. Fr forever should be quite high, right?

FightinCowboy: gonna lose this just based on numbers. Like my picks are good picks.

WheelieAverage: I mean we ac I mean we actually have the same number of games now because you added a few the other week.

FightinCowboy: Well it says you have fourteen released. It says I have eight.

WheelieAverage: You have eight currently released, but you have six that still haven't released. So

FightinCowboy: No, but I mean I I have so I have I have the three that are com well four I have four that are c five, I guess, 'cause I added forever in. But one, two Yeah. So that'll put me

WheelieAverage: Yeah. Yeah, you have five that are coming. So you w so you would end up potentially with one game less than me having released.

FightinCowboy: Alright, better let me let me let me go to let me go make a bit. Let me see what else is coming out. what else is coming out?

WheelieAverage: he's trying, he's trying to Cause this is 'cause I'm cause I'm done now. So my so my thing is basically hinging on have I got enough of a lead when I add whatever GTA six scores to stay ahead of Cowboy. That's because of course Sarth unfortunately is nowhere near us, although he has done better than he might have expected because he's on one hundred and two. If you take out his minus points from Mortal Shell, because that was a terrible counterpick, he would have been on 115, which you know, so he he isn't doing too badly. What is rather interesting, and something I didn't expect potentially at the time, is that I seem to have made the best counterpick. Because Minecraft Dungeons 2 only got me minus 4 points, and you are

FightinCowboy: What is how and how has how has has Call of Duty been scored yet?

WheelieAverage: It has been scored, but the score doesn't go into the thing until the game releases, so the score is currently seventy seven. So you will get minus seven points from Call of Duty.

FightinCowboy: Wait, it's Modern Warfare 4, right?

WheelieAverage: Yeah, yeah.

FightinCowboy: I'm not even seeing anything on Metacritic for that.

WheelieAverage: That's very weird. That's very weird. But yeah, it's got a it's got a seventy seven. Witcher was such a great pickup by you though, the remaster, 'cause that scored ninety one. So you

FightinCowboy: Yeah.

WheelieAverage: got twenty one points from that, which is crazy. What is what is quite interesting is it is to some degree gonna come down to a numbers game, but I think it's gonna be close.

FightinCowboy: Yeah, well this this is what I was talking about the other day. I feel like per personally, I I feel like if we're looking at at picks, I think it makes more sense to like keep the counter picks and then like the eight highest or the ten highest or whatever whatever the lowest common denominator is. Cause like right right now, I'm

WheelieAverage: Yeah, yeah, you basically.

FightinCowboy: like I'm not gonna have enough points. So I just went make a bid, sorted by release date, and just started clicking games that I'd heard of. I was like, okay, I'll add

WheelieAverage: Yeah.

FightinCowboy: I'll add you, I'll add you, I'll add you, I'll add you. Which I think is a stupid way to to do the dri you know, it's like if we did a like I cause so I've done, you know, obviously football drafts before, but like I

WheelieAverage: Yes.

FightinCowboy: mean, I've never heard of an NFL fantasy draft where it's like, I'm down on points, let me just snatch up thirty more players who no one else grabbed it. Maybe they'll maybe they'll give me enough points to

WheelieAverage: Yeah. Yeah yeah yeah.

FightinCowboy: put me at the top of the league. You know, it's like

WheelieAverage: Yeah. And I I think it's that thing of I get the system they have here, but it is a flawed system as you say. I think

FightinCowboy: It's flawed.

WheelieAverage: I think what we need to do is next time we'll probably have it so that we draft a a bigger number of games and then we just stick with those and we only replace them with bidded games if we're if we drop something out. I think that's the w that's the way to do it. what's interesting is based on the system's projections, we are there's going to be less than a point between me and you.

FightinCowboy: That's what it the that's what it shows. It's coming down to the wire.

WheelieAverage: Which is crazy. So so I said it was gonna be close. I said it was gonna be close.

FightinCowboy: Coming down to the wire.

WheelieAverage: And then Sarth will be about twenty points to forty points behind. But that's okay. But yeah, that's that's you know, that's a fun that's a fun little update there. It's it's been a fun one to do. It would have been what would have been fun is if we had had this entire year. Because there would have been so many more games to choose from, but obviously starting halfway

FightinCowboy: my god, it would have been been forever.

WheelieAverage: through the year, we were just like, we were just, yeah. But so there you have it. I am currently winning. I am expected to win, but it's going to be very, very tight. So we'll see what happens in that regard. I will now move that one out the way. And I do want to say as well to people, you may have seen the other day, but I actually we released a bonus a bonus episode of Between Levels, which which is, you know, interesting. We had we had Dom join us and also Dan Reb from SmashPad and myself while Cowboy and Sarth were off doing other things. And we were talking about Final Fantasy Resonance

FightinCowboy: I I started playing

WheelieAverage: And

FightinCowboy: the demo of that and then fell asleep. Because there's just not enough

WheelieAverage: Yeah.

FightinCowboy: time. There's not enough time for anything. Same with like how how far am I? Let me see. I started playing Castlevania as well. I am Well, that's not accurate. I guess Steam Deck hasn't updated, but I'm like two hours in to that.

WheelieAverage: Okay. Okay. but yeah, I really like Final Fantasy. I you know, I said it in that I said it in that episode and I do recommend you go and watch it or listen to it if you haven't already. But but it's it's to me, it's not only a return to the the 2D art style and and pixel art style and also the turn based combat. But it's it feels like a celebration of the entire franchise. So if you're a longtime fan of Final Fantasy, this is a game you're going to enjoy. Like, I I would be shocked if you didn't enjoy this game. You know, if you're a newer fan who who has only played the more action-based ones, maybe you won't enjoy it. But

FightinCowboy: Yeah.

WheelieAverage: You have to make that decision for yourself.

FightinCowboy: I I just I can't like like f I just can't do turn based anymore, man. I just I don't know. I get it. I played so much of it growing up.

WheelieAverage: That's fair. Any any particular reason?

FightinCowboy: I think it's just too slow for me these days. I think I think there's not like Expedition thirty three managed to get my attention 'cause, you know, the the the you have to parry in the middle of combat. It's very involved. but like going back, like I started playing through what was it, Final Fantasy ten And I was like three hours in and I'm like, man, this is just so much slower than I remember. And and ultimately I just get, I'm like. Meh. I just I just fall I just f I fall asleep.

WheelieAverage: Yeah. and I'm assuming that, you know, as a and now that you're older than when you played it originally and you've got a family, there is that element of you now have less free time to spend on a game, you know?

FightinCowboy: Yeah. Yeah.

WheelieAverage: So it's it's that does affect the games you will choose to play or not play. I'm I'm quite fortunate that not only do I do this for my day job, but not having young children, I I'm able to still have quite a bit of free time even with everything that I do. And and that allows me to, you know, take some time with these longer games. But yeah, if you are a fan of turn-based games and you're a fan of the older school Final Fantasy games.

FightinCowboy: I mean the the opening looked really cool. Once I'm just flying

WheelieAverage: Yeah. Yeah.

FightinCowboy: around on Bahamut fucking shit up. I was like, damn, okay.

WheelieAverage: Yeah. Yeah. So I really, really would recommend it. It's not one that I expected to recommend as highly as I do. But what I can say is if I was to give you my top ten of the year right now, Final Fantasy Resonance would absolutely be in my top ten. That's that's how good of a video game I think it is. So y you know, there is there is that. There is that. Like I said, go and check out the episode for a more full discussion with with Dom from Dom's Round Table and Dan Reb from SmashPad. We we all had varying opinions, but it w it was a good it was a good discussion. Now I want to before we end this episode since Sarth decided not to not to show up. I want to go back to a few community comments which I'm going to look for right now because there was a there was a couple of interesting ones here. that I left off with the with the idea of coming to them once Sarth was around, but he decided not to show up, so that's okay.

FightinCowboy: he is he's moving. I mean as soon as he said as

WheelieAverage: He he's he's moving.

FightinCowboy: soon as he said as soon as I saw you said I just gotta get my stuff up four flights of stairs and set it up, I'm like, You're not making it. Like why are you walking? What are you what are you doing?

WheelieAverage: I know, I know. I know, it's crazy. So I

FightinCowboy: There's no chance of you making this.

WheelieAverage: So let's let so I w I have to show this before we end this episode, okay? You'll remember that last week we were talking about how Cowboy finds it a bit disappointing in some games where you'll commit a crime and you'll change your disguise but they

FightinCowboy: yeah, they just they didn't know they know, yeah.

WheelieAverage: know who you are. And he mentioned that if he was to commit a crime in real life, he would fully shave the beard and sh and and shave

FightinCowboy: God, you're you you're pulling up pull pulling this shit up. Jesus Christ.

WheelieAverage: his head. And one of our commenters, both on YouTube and on Instagram, has created the bold cowboy, which we will which

FightinCowboy: She's

WheelieAverage: we will share here. I mean, look at this. Look

FightinCowboy: Mm-hmm.

WheelieAverage: at this absolute masterpiece of an image Yes, honestly if you're if you're listening on audio right now, please go and check the video out because

FightinCowboy: I I mean, I'm gonna be honest, I kinda look like Johnny Sins a a little bit. I think you

WheelieAverage: You you do.

FightinCowboy: know.

WheelieAverage: You do. So yeah, thank you for that, dissonant ways. it gave me a good laugh when I saw it in the Instagram comments. I was like, my god, someone's actually done it. and you know, we we couldn't get away with not showing that, right? That's that's the people people wanted to see it, cowboy. But I wanna end by reading some nice comments here because We get some bad ones, but we get some nice ones as well. There's a person here Feathers Feathers McGraw who says I first stumbled upon Cowboy's channel when they saw your walkthrough of Far Cry III. Man it was goated.

FightinCowboy: It's classics.

WheelieAverage: That game was incredible, and I'll never get bored of Cowboy calling Jason a little bitch.

FightinCowboy: I have a I really funny antidote about that game. so for anyone that's never played Far Cry three, very adult oriented game. I mean, there's sex trafficking, there's rape, obvious murder, lots of of foul language. You know, it's it's a mature rated game through and through. and I remember I had somebody in the comments that was like, I really like these videos, but I don't appreciate the profanity. I can't let my child watch this type of content with the profanity and I'm like, are you out of your fucking mind? The profanity? That's where we're drawing the line. Not the not the sex trafficking or the murder. No, no, the the fuck shit and tits. That's the okay. I'll n I'll never forget. It was it's to this day it's one of the dumbest things I've ever encountered as a content creator.

WheelieAverage: Yeah, that's that's crazy.

FightinCowboy: Yeah. Yeah. Good times.

WheelieAverage: That is crazy. and then we've got we've got Off Coast here, who obviously frequent commenter on the show, and they basically said that they managed to hit open world fatigue with their very first open world game, which was

FightinCowboy: Well

WheelieAverage: which was Skyrim and which they tr

FightinCowboy: it's too much shit to do. Fuck this game.

WheelieAverage: which they which they apparently tried to play on three separate occasions and always dropped out within about fifteen hours.

FightinCowboy: Damn.

WheelieAverage: They just don't enjoy a single open world game and yes, that even includes Elden Ring.

FightinCowboy: It's

WheelieAverage: Which is I mean, crazy, but respect, you know, respect.

FightinCowboy: Yeah, you like you like what you like, you know.

WheelieAverage: I I actually went on to ask them why they they think that this is, why they think they struggle with open world games. And what they basically said is for them they think it's this feeling of emptiness and and aimlessness when it's open world. Which yeah.

FightinCowboy: I mean I c I get it. It it can't I mean well that's that's what ultimately not that exactly, but I I do feel like the extremely open ended aspect of Breath of the Wild is a large part of why I just kind of bounced off Breath of the Wild. Like, you know, I I understand the appeal of it. but for me it was Yeah, yeah.

WheelieAverage: That's like player freedom to the max though, isn't it?

FightinCowboy: And I'm like I need you know, I need just I need a little more direction. I need some structure,

WheelieAverage: Some structure. Yeah.

FightinCowboy: you know.

WheelieAverage: Yeah, for sure, for sure. and then we've got an interesting one here, which, you know, could be viewed as a positive comment depending on who you are. But there's someone here who says i this person's it's just camplays who says sports games have just gotten lazy with their development. They opted for more realism when they could add more stylization abilities, etc., into their games. like NBA Street. I mean, yeah, I get the point. I get the point. There were I think when we were younger there were more fun variations of sports games, right? Like one they bring up here is like Blitz.

FightinCowboy: Yeah. Well I d yeah, NFL Blitz, NBA Jam, dude, those were like and anytime I think about sports games, like you talk to any millennials, bring up NBA Jam and someone's like, I remember that getting on fire. And I Blitz is still like there we used to we used to go to this. There was this barcade in downtown Nashville we used to go to and they had a NFL Blitz machine in the bar and it was the fucking best. Like you would you would just sit in there. He was just pounding beers, just you know, NFL blitzin, having a good old time.

WheelieAverage: That's that yeah, that's that's yeah. I I mean I I certainly remember days like that for sure. there's there's an interesting comment here with a with a content idea for for us, and this is one that I'm going to steal for a future episode at some point. What they basically said is when news is slow or when we don't have much to talk about one week, we should do something like a spin a wheel effectively, not a real wheel will obviously, and have two games go head to head and then vote which game is better until we have an ultimate winner. So almost like have a bracket of like 16 games and then

FightinCowboy: Yeah.

WheelieAverage: you know, which I think could be an interesting an interesting little idea. then we've got Joe here who's also a frequent commenter who says Shout out to you guys for working hard during this season. Which I appreciate that. I'm sure Cowboy does as well. Uh-huh. Veteran Soldier says, because we asked about games that have had refunds similar to Cyberpunk. And Veteran Soldier says, that mind's eye game, the one that looked like GTA. It's like, yeah, sure. But that also never got redeemed. And I think that's the problem. It's like that game never had its redemption arc, you know. So

FightinCowboy: We got that the anime GTA game coming up too. I'll be curious if that that lands or if it's another I feel like I mean we see we

WheelieAverage: Yeah, I mean

FightinCowboy: see a lot of games that try to like, you know, X and Y was popular. I wanna do X and Y without realizing how much goes into doing X and Y.

WheelieAverage: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I agree with that. someone mentions here that Valor Mortis is in a rough state on the Series X console. that doesn't surprise me because even on our very high end PCs we're we're having issues occasionally with it. So so there's certainly issues there. And then the comment I wanted to end with just because it's a nice, kinda good feeling one, let's say. It was on our one of our community posts. Give me a second just to pull it up, because I want to get the person's name right. It's What's the Score? Who basically said this was where I because people asked me to share the link to my solo channel, which is coming. I actually recorded the first sort of intro video to the channel today. and then hopefully content will start either next week or the week after. And what's the score says, it's awesome that you guys seem very supportive of each other. And I think that's true. You know, we we we we help each other out, we have a good laugh. I jump in cowboys streams all the time now, and the chat's always happy to see me over there and they they they always laugh of like, w wheelie's on another account again.

FightinCowboy: You know speak speaking of, I have I've had like four requests across the last two days. Specifically going when is the when is the beatdown wheelie stream gonna happen?

WheelieAverage: I mean

FightinCowboy: They're calling it the I just want you to know. They're calling it the beat down wheelie stream. We're gonna select a

WheelieAverage: Okay. Okay.

FightinCowboy: a variety of games to edit.

WheelieAverage: Okay, I mean we can do that, we can do that, but I think what we should do if that if that's something we're gonna do, is we should have a number of games where some of those games are games that I choose and some of those games are games that you choose. And

FightinCowboy: yeah, I'm not just gonna I'm not gonna ma be like, okay, first Wheelie's gonna play me in Magic the Gathering and get fucked up. Then he's gonna play me in Elden Ring duels and get fucked up, then Armor Core and get No, you can you can pick some of your own games too.

WheelieAverage: Yeah. That that could be that could be quite good fun actually. I mean when we have more time towards the end of the year, that's probably something we can fit in, right? So so definitely look out for that.

FightinCowboy: Yeah, I honestly I'm looking like I I feel I'm honestly relaxed now. Like I feel like September and October were so hectic. And now people

WheelieAverage: Yeah.

FightinCowboy: are like, How how are you doing now? I'm like, no, I'm chilling. The rest of the year is is basically like episodes is Phantom Blade Zero. Streams is gonna be lots of wow. I'll get to to Zelda when I can. Like I'm you know, the stressful part of the year is done. We're into well, I'm I'm into holiday mode already.

WheelieAverage: That's nice I mean that's nice for you. I'll be I'll be into holiday mode probably towards the end of November. and you know we did that actually gives me a good point. I wanted to say this. we got a comment asking us about the Game Awards. We'll talk more about the game awards once the official nominations are out and we'll go through those and things like that. And that comment also asked us to do our own game of the year. That is something we're going to do, but that is probably going to be the last episode we have before Christmas, because then for Christmas we'll have a couple of weeks break and we'll come back in in early January.

FightinCowboy: Yeah. Bit bit hard to do the podcast when you are on a boat.

WheelieAverage: Yes, yeah. So, you know. But as ever, this has been episode seventeen. The first ever with only me and cowboy. So if you've enjoyed it, you know, let us know in the comments. Let us know what are you looking forward to playing next? Is it gonna be Phantom Blade Zero? Are you waiting for Ocarina of Time? You know, what's it gonna be? Or are you one of these people that's waiting for GTA, which weirdly is like just over three weeks away now, which is crazy to say, after all these years of waiting, you know? but yeah, let us know. What are you gonna be playing next? What's the game you're looking forward to? And we will shout out those comments on the next episode. But for now, thank you for joining us and goodbye.