Game Under Podcast 148

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0:00:00 Intro

0:00:25 News

0:13:00 First Impressions - Palworld

0:21:08 Resident Evil 7 & 8

1:18:35 Trademark Banter & Gran Turismo Movie Impressions

1:32:47 Tom's Questions for Phil From Other People's Podcasts

Transcript
WEBVTT

Tom: Hello and welcome to Episode of The Game Under Podcast.

Tom: I'm your host Tom Towers, and I'm joined yet again by Phil Fogg.

Phil: Hello, I'm Phil Fogg.

Phil: Thank you for joining us on The Game Under Podcast.

Phil: We've got plenty to talk about, starting with the news.

Phil: It's been an eventful couple of weeks.

Phil: In that time that we've been gone, obviously everyone's aware that Microsoft had a huge buildup to talk about how they're going to release games on other platforms, and then said that we've already been releasing games on other platforms.

Phil: I think the big press conference was really just...

Phil: it wasn't a press conference, it was a podcast...

Phil: was really just to placate all of the rumors that were out there about them basically pulling a Dreamcast and exiting the gaming world after they've just spent $billion in one of the largest business acquisitions of all time.

Phil: So really it's a non-story that they haven't announced which games are coming, but by all guesses it's Pentament and Hi-Fi Rush coming to Switch and PlayStation

Phil: And a couple of games that I've forgotten are Sea of Thieves, and another game that I don't know about is coming as well.

Phil: And as predicted, they basically said they want to put their games in front of as many people as possible.

Phil: Game Pass is still going to be a thing, and people who subscribe will still get Microsoft's games day one for free.

Phil: And these games will be delayed in terms of their delivery framework, at least for now.

Phil: That was one of the softer commitments.

Phil: The only other news that came out of it was they said they're ready to make the biggest generational leap ever when they design their next console, but they are bringing out something else in the interim towards the end of the year.

Phil: So that's the summary of the event.

Phil: Did I miss anything there, or was anything there surprising to you?

Tom: Was the wording on the generational console leap there ready to?

Phil: No, that they are in the process of designing it, and it's going to be the biggest generational leap.

Phil: So most people would say that the biggest generational leap was when we went from D to D.

Phil: So that would be the Super Nintendo Sega Genesis Master slash Master System to PlayStation Sega Saturn.

Phil: They're saying this is going to be bigger than that.

Phil: So I guess they're going to D.

Tom: Maybe even D.

Phil: Yeah, I mean, why just skip it?

Tom: It's got to be bigger.

Tom: So if we went from D to D, that's one dimensional leap.

Tom: If we're going from D to D, that's the same.

Tom: So they've got to go to D.

Phil: A hyperdimensional console.

Phil: Maybe it's just going to include Excel or something, something that's never been done before.

Phil: So yeah, really not much news there.

Phil: I mean, I'm happy that they're releasing more of their games on other platforms.

Phil: I mean, Pentaman was by all accounts a very good game, and by limiting it to the Xbox, it only got exposed to a limited number of people.

Phil: So if they can get their games in front of more people, they make more money.

Phil: It makes them more stable.

Phil: And as a consumer, I no longer have to buy an Xbox if I want to play games like Pentaman or Sea of Thieves.

Phil: Now, of course, you know, you can always...

Phil: you've always had that option through the PC.

Phil: But now if I wanted to reduce the number of consoles, I don't think there's any such thing as third-party exclusives anymore, not really much to speak of.

Phil: So you're really only buying a console for its first-party product.

Tom: Do you think we might see Game Pass on other consoles?

Phil: I would love to see Game Pass on Nintendo consoles, but I'm not sure.

Phil: Nintendo typically doesn't keep up in terms of technology, in terms of hardware, for that to work fully.

Phil: I'd love to see it on PlayStation, but PlayStation is in the business of selling software.

Phil: And if you've got something like Game Pass on the PlayStation, it's going to have an impact on their software sales.

Tom: That is true.

Phil: The only way to get around it would be if Microsoft were to give them a percentage of the subscription.

Phil: I think they said they have million or something like that subscribers.

Phil: So they could make a ridiculous offer to PlayStation and say, in return for us getting out of the console market, we want to put Game Pass on PlayStation and we'll give you a ridiculous percentage for every user that downloads a game on your console.

Phil: Now, given that publishing formats typically give away %, they typically take % of the total sale.

Phil: I mean, that's what Apple does.

Phil: That's what Steam does, I guess.

Phil: The Microsoft Store, you know, all of these publishers charge developers to put their games on the platform.

Phil: So if Microsoft is already owning most of the products that are being released on Game Pass, you know, if they're not really...

Phil: Like, it could work economically, but it would never work for the third-party games that are on the platform.

Tom: Yep.

Phil: In short, I don't think it's viable.

Tom: Maybe that could be the dimensional leap they're talking about.

Phil: It could be.

Phil: It could be.

Phil: So speaking of only buying a console for its first-party exclusives, in our second news story, Sony announced that they will not be releasing any new major titles in

Phil: So that's...

Phil: They've got...

Phil: I forget, they've got something like different studios.

Phil: Now, they're not all working on, quote, major titles and never have been.

Phil: I don't think anyone would consider Dreams by Media Molecule a major title.

Phil: But it still does open the door that some of these other studios could be releasing new material.

Phil: Sucker Punch did...

Phil: What was the name of that...

Phil: What was the name of the game that they released?

Phil: The Japanese Ninja one that was like...

Phil: You know the one.

Dave: The Samurai one.

Phil: You can't love the one just letting me...

Tom: I think it wasn't the Samurai one, not Ninja?

Phil: Yes, the Samurai one.

Phil: You know, that's been four years now.

Phil: So you think if they were going to bring out another...

Phil: Another sequel in that franchise, that they would have done it in four years.

Phil: Bend brought out that biker game.

Phil: Bend Studios, they've done nothing since.

Tom: Samurai game, the biker game.

Phil: Lost and Damned, no, no, that's a different game.

Phil: Play along at home.

Tom: And you guess the game.

Phil: Guess the game.

Phil: But we haven't heard anything from Team Asobo, Blue Point Games, Media Molecule, since they shut down Dreams and Housemarque.

Phil: I mean, that's just a handful of studios that are under the Sony stable that we haven't heard anything from.

Tom: What about Naughty Dog?

Phil: Naughty Dog, well, we talked about them last time, you know.

Phil: I have since learned that they are working on a new product that's not Last of Us, and that Last of Us is not under active development, so we can put that one to rest.

Phil: So at least they're working on something new, but you have to imagine that's a good five to seven years off.

Tom: A few years off at least, maybe not five to seven.

Phil: So a lot of people are hand-wringing about whether or not AAA game development is viable, any more of these big games?

Phil: Are they able to be landed?

Tom: Well, I think we sort of talked about this a bit in the last episode as well, the whole nostalgia angle.

Tom: This sort of applies to this as well.

Tom: Again, if we actually look at what the big titles are, a lot of them aren't necessarily from first-party developers.

Tom: Of all the companies you listed, the only one that would stand out to a game from software or the like would be Naughty Dog, which you actually didn't mention.

Tom: So I don't know if any of them, which you were alluding to at the beginning, would actually be developing a major title, per se.

Phil: Right, right.

Phil: Well, we haven't heard anything coming from Naughty Dog this year.

Phil: Studio Japan's been shut down.

Phil: Nothing from Polyphony, which I guess would be normal, right?

Phil: They've released their game, they're just going to keep updating it at this point.

Tom: Yep, that's to be expected.

Phil: Who's the Ratchet and Clank guys?

Phil: Insomniac?

Phil: So nothing from Insomniac?

Phil: You know, so it's not just their small teams, it's their big teams.

Phil: Studio Santa Monica, nothing from them, which we wouldn't have expected.

Phil: We'd expect that they're only working on the next God of War.

Phil: But certainly, yeah, it is something different.

Phil: You talked about nostalgia.

Phil: I mean, the Grand Theft Auto Vice City, and San Andreas all came out within four years of each other.

Phil: The Naughty Dog games came out every two years.

Phil: The Uncharted games came out every two years.

Phil: And you know, you do see studios like the Yakuza Studio or like a Dragon Studio, you know, they continue to churn out product, but mostly that's been remakes and things of that.

Phil: But they're still getting a brand new game through the Lost Eyes and the Yakuza.

Phil: They're still getting a new game out like every single year.

Phil: And then that leads into the next story.

Phil: Nintendo just continues to churn out a game like every month, every month and a half.

Phil: And they get, you know, four out of five.

Phil: It's like the latest Mario vs.

Phil: Donkey Kong review.

Phil: And the reviewer said it's a perfect template for what Nintendo does really well.

Phil: So we talked about sustainable development.

Phil: I just, I think there's some studios that are getting it, which are obviously in Japan.

Phil: And there's some studios here in the West that just, I think they've kind of lost their way in terms of what's important.

Phil: I'd much rather get a GTA game like every two years as opposed to once a decade.

Tom: I don't know if they're not getting it.

Tom: I think maybe it's a different business model where the focus is on Western games to draw out how long you can make money off the individual game for as long as possible.

Phil: Which, so the tail of the game is longer.

Phil: So if you look at the tail of Lost Eyes or Yakuza, it's like you buy the $game, and then you play the game, and then you don't play it anymore.

Phil: Whereas GTA is still the number one best-selling game every year, and making tens of millions, if not hundreds of millions of dollars every year with online.

Tom: Exactly.

Phil: Yeah, but then you've got the other games in Sony's portfolio like God of War and The Last of Us, and Uncharted, and the Spider-Man games, which are really, they don't fit that long tail.

Tom: Maybe that's why we're not seeing any this year.

Phil: Yeah, because they're committed to changing that probably.

Phil: Yeah.

Phil: You're a very smart man.

Phil: Speaking of a game with a long tail, but perhaps not, Pal World is our final news story.

Phil: It's lost two-thirds of its players in two weeks.

Phil: So it looks like, now, a lot of this has to do with it being available on Game Pass, I would suggest.

Phil: In that people coming in, trying it, getting their yucks, either liking it or not, and then moving on.

Phil: So I don't think that that's cataclysmic for the future of Pal World, but then I haven't played it.

Tom: So rather than two-thirds of the players leaving, there was an increase, perhaps, of two-thirds, and then those two-thirds left after trying it out.

Phil: Exactly right.

Phil: And because, I think, because of the hype, there was a lot of hype, and Game Pass certainly seems to build hype or generate a lot of hype just by its nature.

Phil: It's giving you a full free game you can try.

Phil: If it gets any sort of buzz, then it's going to have an audience.

Phil: So, yeah, I guess unless you've got any other new stories or anything else to say about that story, we could go into what we've been playing, which...

Tom: I did give Pal World a brief try on Game Pass, so we may as well move right into Pal World.

Tom: So the game Pal World has most been compared to is, of course, Pokemon, but it is clearly more of a survival game.

Tom: So you start off basically with no items, including no Pokeballs or, as they're called in Pal World, Pal-spheres, and you're dropped into this hilly area or cliffside area where there are some Pokemon-like creatures wandering around, and you've got to collect wood and stone, either that has fallen randomly on the ground for some unknown reason or by punching rocks, more like boulders actually, or punching trees to harvest wood and stone.

Tom: And you then craft a workbench and other things which you will start building your base with until you're able to get to craft or you can also explore and find a pal-sphere, at which point the actual Pokemon part of the game begins where you punch Pokemon-like creatures until they're weak enough for you to capture them, at which point you then can use them to fight other Pokemon-like creatures so that you can then weaken them enough to capture them as well.

Tom: And I didn't play it a huge amount, so I may be missing something, but early on anyway, there's a slightly frustrating mechanic.

Tom: Over time, both your health and the pal-creature's health gradually recovers over time.

Tom: So when you're bashing up these creatures before you capture them, you end up with a creature that is very low on health.

Tom: So before they're actually useful in combat, you've got to wait around for their health to recover.

Tom: There's also a hunger mechanic and sleep mechanic and all of those sort of survival-related mechanics, but the game actually reminded me the most of, given how important crafting is early on, and this might change later when you have got a good array of tools, will actually runescape, but without other people.

Tom: So I believe you can play with other players, and on a few occasions, it says someone had joined or left my world, but I never actually ran into any other humans in the game, which was a little disappointing.

Tom: But the moment-to-moment gameplay of just mining, crafting materials felt very runescape-esque in its simplicity.

Tom: And the combat is, I don't know if you could call it more complicated than runescape, in terms of interacting with the world, it sort of is, in terms of mechanics, maybe not so much.

Tom: But it's an interesting combination of different genres and different games, predominantly being survival.

Tom: But in terms of the gameplay, from my experience with Pokemon games, it actually didn't really feel like a Pokemon game at all.

Phil: No, I mean, are you raising them?

Phil: Do the animals evolve into different levels, or are they just what they are when you find them?

Tom: Well, it's too early for me to know whether they evolve or not.

Tom: But at this stage, they're all very basic animals.

Tom: And the designs are sort of cute.

Tom: An example of the combat is, and so far it is all extremely easy, the different pals have slightly different attacks.

Tom: One of them is a sheep, and it rolls itself up into a ball and rolls towards you, but it's very easy to just step out of the way of.

Tom: And when it comes to a hold, it's stunned.

Tom: Others will just simply attack you.

Tom: So there is some slight variety of combat, but it's all very, very basic.

Tom: I think it's the sort of game that would be greatly improved with other players.

Phil: Yeah, it sounds like it.

Phil: So it's got a base building element, it's got crafting, it does sound like a mashup of a whole bunch of different things.

Phil: It even sounds a little Harvest Moony to some extent.

Phil: You know.

Phil: Possibly, yeah.

Phil: But unless you're working with other people or working against other people, I think it has to have that element.

Phil: Maybe it's just the time of day that you're playing.

Tom: Could be.

Tom: And I think there were...

Tom: that you can make an online game, I think, as well, specifically to invite other people.

Tom: So maybe it's more designed to be played with friends rather than random people.

Phil: So it's too early.

Phil: Now, the other thing is, do you think they might be gating you with bots until you get to a certain part of the game?

Phil: Even past what would be considered the tutorial?

Tom: I think I'm still technically in the tutorial.

Phil: Okay, so they might be gating off other people's experiences from you just yet so that you don't leave the experience with a negative experience.

Tom: Quite possibly.

Phil: Yeah, I'd say that would have to be it.

Phil: So, okay, are you going to persevere with it?

Tom: Potentially.

Tom: The one other thing that I should mention is the sense of humor in the game is probably the most appealing thing so far.

Tom: Not that it is particularly predominant in the experience, but you meet an NPC who is the last survivor of their group of people who came to this island you're on, and everyone else has been eaten by the local wildlife, the Pals.

Tom: And there's a nice sense of slapstick to it, what with the punching rocks and trees to harvest resources.

Tom: So that's probably the most, I think, appealing and interesting part of the game so far.

Tom: The gameplay maybe has potential later on if it becomes a bit more complex, but definitely the hook appears to be the aesthetic and comedy and sense of humor.

Phil: And is it any voice acting in it whatsoever, or is it all animal sounds?

Tom: Well, there's some sounds for when you're punching things and things like that, but there's no spoken dialogue.

Phil: Yep, yep.

Phil: Okay, well maybe you'd like Minecraft, like if you like punching things for resources.

Tom: Maybe.

Tom: But I'm boycotting Minecraft, not for...

Tom: I haven't really ever heard of people boycotting Minecraft despite some of the creators of Minecraft's views, which is interesting.

Tom: I don't think he's really been cancelled, has he?

Phil: No, I think he hasn't...

Phil: He's not relevant enough to be cancelled.

Phil: I mean, he hasn't had anything to do with it for such a long time.

Tom: Maybe.

Tom: But I'm boycotting it because I swear that I purchased Minecraft before it blew up.

Phil: You did?

Tom: And never received a copy of Minecraft.

Phil: Oh, man.

Phil: You were in when it was like $or something like that, right?

Tom: Exactly.

Phil: Yeah, I remember that.

Tom: But I never got my copy.

Tom: Maybe that is probably how Notch made his billions.

Phil: Yeah.

Phil: Okay, now, so your initial impressions of Power World, it's not bad.

Tom: Yeah, pretty much.

Phil: Yeah, and I think once you get online, that's definitely going to make a big difference.

Phil: Okay, so for our next game in what we've been playing, we promised that D-Vader would be back to talk about Resident Evil and and he's just sauntered into the studio.

Phil: Hi, D-Vader.

Dave: Hello, everybody.

Tom: Welcome back.

Phil: Yeah, welcome back.

Phil: Well, now, Resident Evil and was where we were up to.

Phil: You want to take it from here, Tom?

Tom: I'd love that, Phil.

Tom: So here's another instance of where I wished I had taken notes, but I think it makes sense to begin with Resident Evil

Tom: I remember that much at least.

Tom: And I went into Resident Evil relatively blind.

Tom: I didn't really read many impressions of it at the time.

Tom: I read Artie's review of it, of course, but he took the review in, I think, slightly more abstract direction for a lot of people.

Tom: So I was going into it pretty blind, which made for a very interesting experience.

Tom: I knew, of course, that it was in first person, so it was a new direction for the series.

Tom: And obviously I'd seen the original trailers with the family eating dinner and all that sort of stuff, which was also a little bit different for the series as well.

Tom: And when I started the game, it didn't really have the best first impression because it felt like it was very much riffing on Silent Hill.

Tom: It began in a much more sort of poetic way compared to other Resident Evils with this, I think, long shot of someone driving along the Bayou and some slightly pretentious, but in a good way, sort of narration introducing the scene.

Tom: And you then end up in this very slow sort of cinematic walking sort of experience, which again feels much more like Silent Hill than Resident Evil.

Tom: But once the shit hit the fan, I was very relieved.

Tom: And it made for, I think, when I was thinking it was going to be a very derivative experience, it ended up being a very original experience that managed to actually go in an interesting, a new direction for Resident Evil, while still keeping its aesthetic.

Tom: Because once, sorry, keeping its narrative style.

Tom: Because once the shit did hit the fan, you go from this more serious tone to a combination of body horror and slapstick comedy.

Tom: The series is well known for, and it managed to put in what is a much more cramped and intimate sort of environment, ridiculously over the top Resident Evil characters, which I thought was a pretty impressive achievement.

Tom: So narratively, I ended up being very impressed by it, and it really could have gone very badly for the series, but I thought it was a great new direction.

Tom: What did you think, Vader?

Dave: Yeah, I thought it was a very cool, kind of almost rebirth of the series.

Dave: Like, Resident Evil is very important in that, in a way, it kind of saved the franchise after did so much damage, and there was like a lull in between, and kind of brought it back a little bit fresher, a little bit newer.

Dave: I think the release of it, I think it was partly that one came out on PC, and all of them, that would have been the first Resident Evil game to come out on PC immediately, maybe did too.

Dave: But on launch, I think it opened it up to a new audience.

Dave: It was more into that kind of first person, kind of hiding, because something is stalking you kind of thing.

Dave: That's how the first section of the game plays out.

Dave: And it was a cool way to bring back the franchise, a strong way.

Dave: It's a very well made game.

Dave: And it's still, like you said, it had this new tone.

Dave: But then as you went on, it's like, oh yeah, there's Resident Evil.

Dave: It started becoming fun again.

Dave: The characters were cheesy.

Dave: That perfect line between they're cheesy, they're dangerous, everyone's kind of having fun, and it's bloody, and they nailed it.

Dave: It's such a good game.

Dave: And for me, as a fan of the originals, for it to come back to the item boxes, you had to manage your inventory, the limited inventory.

Dave: That was so cool to see after and went in a completely different direction.

Dave: This one brought it all the way back to the original, and it was a cool little hybrid where you had all the inventory stuff.

Dave: It wasn't as intricate as Resident Evil Remake, which to me, that's the best of the old style.

Dave: But it was kind of nice to see it come back in any form, and it was just cool even in first person.

Dave: So it was a really cool game, and I think all fans need to appreciate how important that was for ushering in this new era of Resident Evil games that we've been in and have been extremely successful.

Dave: Because for a while there, it looked like the franchise did not know what to do.

Dave: And Resident Evil kind of righted the ship, and we've been good ever since.

Phil: I've got to admire the developer's ability to just take a completely new turn.

Phil: And the way that you just described it, they needed to do something, because the prior game was not well received at all.

Phil: But switching to the first person, I mean, that takes a lot of balls to do that with Resident Evil.

Phil: First person games are not traditionally well received in Japan.

Phil: The game, we cannot look past the fact that the game is developed in Japan by a Japanese company and Japanese people.

Phil: And you might go, they've taken some steps in the past.

Phil: Did they release that first person action game or was that Capcom?

Phil: No, that was Namco.

Phil: In the original Xbox, it was called Breakdown.

Phil: Yeah, Breakdown.

Phil: Which, in that sense, they were trying to appeal to the Western audience.

Phil: So maybe again, they were trying to say, well, Westerners like first person experiences, maybe we'll do that.

Phil: But it was a bold move.

Phil: And I've got to say, when I went into it, I didn't have the same reaction as Tom in terms of, you know, seeing it as a bucolic, poetic type start to the game.

Phil: Because I felt I got to the action quite quickly.

Phil: And then I immediately recalled a game series called Condemned, which came out on the original Xbox.

Phil: Do you remember that game, Dave?

Phil: Yeah, and I was someone who up to that point couldn't really stand gory horror games, but those games were just so good.

Phil: And that's what this game reminded me of the most, at least in that introductory setting.

Phil: My question is, what did they leave out of it?

Phil: What did hardcore fans of Resident Evil take away from REwith like, oh, they've changed this and it's for the worst?

Dave: I would say, for me, the structure, well, there's kind of split.

Dave: That first part of the game, a lot of people say is the best part, where you're in the house, Jack is like chasing you, where you're kind of defenseless.

Dave: To me, that's more like Amnesia.

Dave: I'm not a fan of those horror games, the hide and seek horror games.

Dave: I do not like them.

Dave: Even Alien Isolation, which people love.

Dave: I do not like hiding around.

Dave: I don't find it interesting to hide in a corner and wait for something to just go away.

Dave: I don't find that compelling gameplay.

Dave: I want to be able to face whatever is coming at me and shoot it down and escape if I have to.

Dave: So that first part of the game where it's kind of like hide and seek, it's well designed.

Dave: The house is very well designed.

Dave: It's got some cool sections.

Dave: But I found that to be a little bit kind of weak.

Dave: And I found the later parts of the game where it became more action-oriented, more the classic thing where you're managing your items, you got things around every corner, there are monsters around, you're trying to find which door, which room to go to.

Dave: That's what I like.

Dave: So I found the game to be pretty well-paced.

Dave: Boss fights were amazing.

Dave: I think the Marguerite boss fight is one of the best in the series.

Dave: But it never reached the highs of, let's say, Resident Evil Remake, which is where you have that perfect design of an entire police department.

Dave: You're looking for keys, you're going in and out, Mr.

Dave: X is chasing you.

Dave: That's a beautifully designed game from start to finish.

Dave: And I felt this one had little sections.

Dave: Here's hide and seek part.

Dave: Marguerite is also kind of like that.

Dave: She's walking around with a light in the second part.

Dave: You have to hide from her in different rooms.

Dave: And then there was the birthday segment, which is like a puzzle thing.

Dave: So it was little sections of different things.

Dave: And Resident Evil is also a lot like that.

Dave: And some of them are stronger than others, so it's not as cohesive, but it's still a very well made game.

Tom: I think that structurally, where it is not as good as Resident Evil is not so much in like the level of detail of the environment, but there are times in the game later on, where it locks you out from earlier areas in a way that feels not all organic, which I think lets it down a bit, because one of the things that I enjoyed about it most up until those points was just going back looking for things and the classic Resident Evil style backtracking.

Tom: So when they're randomly, not randomly, when they're seemingly arbitrarily putting a brake on that, that felt a little bit unnecessary and frustrating to me.

Dave: Right, right.

Dave: Yeah, it does lock you out.

Dave: Because it is, like I said, kind of like section by section.

Dave: It didn't feel as elaborate as, say, the mansion in Resident Evil the police department in

Dave: Yeah, it never gets to that level.

Dave: One other thing, the enemy variety in Resident Evil is very poor.

Dave: There's a lot of just gooey blacklings, and that's kind of it.

Dave: So that gets kind of fixed in Resident Evil but it is one of the worst in terms of enemy variety.

Tom: I think the reason for that perhaps is the focus on the family members.

Tom: So the battles between them are just sort of filler between the important parts, but it definitely could have been handled a lot better.

Dave: For sure.

Dave: Did you ever play in VR?

Tom: No, I didn't.

Dave: Well, that's a big thing of why it went first person.

Dave: This was a VR made game from the start, and it is one hell of an experience in VR, I can tell you that.

Dave: And I played it first regular, and then later I got the VR headset for the PlayStation, because it was exclusive VR for PlayStation.

Dave: That was a weird deal that Kafka made, where it was exclusive only for the PlayStation.

Dave: PC owners couldn't play it in VR.

Tom: I think you can with mods, though.

Dave: Yes, you can with mods.

Dave: But yes, it's intense.

Dave: It's a really cool experience.

Dave: In terms of VR games, the Resident Evil games are my favorite VR titles.

Dave: They're just so much fun to play, especially the later ones, the and that are so much fun with the gunplay that you can just kind of mess around.

Dave: It is great.

Dave: It's in your face.

Dave: It's so much scarier.

Dave: So I could see where they were going for it, and in that way the first person was pretty effective.

Phil: I had no idea that that...

Phil: So it was a VR first game by design.

Dave: Yes.

Phil: Wow.

Phil: So how long is it?

Phil: How long does it take to beat the game?

Dave: Nine, ten hours.

Phil: It's a long time for a VR game.

Dave: Yeah, I guess.

Dave: Yeah, it is.

Phil: That has to be on the upper end.

Phil: Well, I can't think of anything worse than playing a horror game in VR.

Phil: Sorry.

Phil: It is terrifying.

Phil: I can't believe it.

Phil: So that is how you prefer to play REand REand RE?

Dave: I played them all first, regular.

Dave: And then I played VR versions.

Dave: And especially, well, REdid not have the motion controls because the original PlayStation VR was very basic.

Dave: So you had to use a controller.

Dave: It was just an experience of you're in it visually.

Dave: So I'm in it inside my head, but I'm still playing the game with controllers.

Dave: So it kind of breaks the immersion.

Dave: and added the hand motion controllers so you could actually shoot any way you want.

Dave: You pick up a gun, you pick up a virtual gun, you shoot it, you could use one gun in each hand, which you can't really do in the game.

Dave: You can only do it in VR.

Dave: You can shoot at different targets like that becomes like a shooting gallery.

Dave: It is amazing.

Dave: You can do all sorts of crazy stuff with those.

Dave: And then you have to actually manually reload, and that adds a whole layer.

Dave: Fishing a button to reload and actually having to pull out the clip, grabbing another clip from your chest, putting it in, cocking the gun, and then shooting as if something's coming at you, that adds a lot of tension.

Phil: Tom, have you played any first person shooters on the Quest?

Tom: First person shooters?

Tom: I think Boneworks, it's called.

Tom: Or do you mean first person horror games?

Phil: Oh, either.

Tom: Well, Boneworks is a first person shooter.

Tom: I played a little bit of Half-Life Alex as well.

Tom: I need to finish that.

Tom: Played Resident Evil VR a little bit.

Tom: I played Superhot of course.

Phil: Wow, yeah, that would be incredible.

Phil: That I want to do.

Tom: Superhot VR is amazing.

Tom: But it makes...

Tom: I was going to say it makes normal Superhot disappointing, but then I just remembered I was thinking of the sequel.

Tom: The original Superhot is still exceptional, even without VR.

Tom: And I played...

Tom: I forgot what it's called, but it's a cell-shaded horror game.

Phil: Okay, so maybe you're walking dead.

Phil: Did you get to kill Clementine?

Phil: Okay.

Phil: So it's a proven platform for you for first-person shooting?

Tom: Depends on how mobile the first-person shooting is, and in what way it's mobile.

Tom: So for a traditional first-person shooter, like I've also tried playing Doom and Half-Life, the original on it, in VR, and my acclimatization to VR is not such that I can play them yet.

Phil: Yeah, I wouldn't think on those older games it would be much fun.

Dave: No, those games move at like a hundred miles an hour.

Dave: Just try going backwards in one of those games while you're standing still, and your brain just wants to explode.

Dave: Like it doesn't understand what's happening.

Dave: I almost fell.

Dave: I think I was playing the original Doom, I was able to put it in VR.

Dave: That was a mistake.

Dave: Like the going backwards, the sensation your body gets, I don't know what happened.

Dave: I'm like, what is happening?

Dave: I'm like, nope.

Tom: Stop.

Tom: I have that problem with reversing in a racing game as well.

Dave: Yeah, yeah.

Dave: There's something about going backwards and your body's not moving, your brain is like, what's happening?

Dave: I can go forward just fine.

Dave: I'm good from going forward.

Dave: But running backwards like that, not good.

Dave: At least that quick, because in Doom, you go and Doom is just so fast.

Phil: So is that all of what we could say about Resident Evil ?

Tom: No.

Tom: Well, Vader mentioned the boss battles.

Phil: Uh-huh.

Tom: Yep.

Tom: And I thought they were mixed because some of them were really good, like the Marguerite one you mentioned.

Tom: And I think, but I think some of them were just like the both Jack boss battles, the setting of them, or Jack boss battles actually, including the final one, the setting of the first ones is great.

Tom: And in one of them, he's driving a car, and trying to run you over, which is absolutely hilarious.

Tom: But the actual gameplay is, I don't know, feels pretty rudimentary compared to the Marguerite boss battle, for example, where you're really just sort of doing basic dodging and hitting him now and then.

Tom: It feels like most of the challenge on the harder default setting is just based around on the fact that he's got a lot of health, rather than requiring you to do anything other than just survive the required length of time.

Tom: And the big finale boss battles, I think, also left a lot to be desired and were similarly very rudimentary, which is, I think, an issue in most Resident Evils.

Tom: When you get to the final bosses in Resident Evil, they're usually just because of the scale of the enemy.

Tom: The actual gameplay ends up being some of the least interesting of any of the boss battles in the game.

Tom: But I think in Resident Evil though it was on a large scale, it wasn't really impressive or interesting in the way some other Resident Evil final bosses are, so that they make up for what ends up being a little bit of a disappointing experience in terms of gameplay.

Dave: Yeah, I could see that for sure.

Dave: But back to Jack's first two boss battles.

Dave: I found it interesting because there were actually multiple ways to do it, and most Resident Evil games don't even have that.

Dave: Especially the car one, you could run them over.

Dave: If you get in the car first or something, you could find a way to stop them before he gets in.

Dave: There are multiple ways to do it.

Dave: In the chainsaw one in that room, you could use the chainsaw, you could skip it, you could use the things in the room.

Dave: I think you could trap them or something.

Dave: There's almost a little level of metal gear where there's optional ways to battle him.

Dave: And I just found that interesting.

Dave: Most Resident Evil games are not that.

Dave: They are just shoot the thing until it dies.

Dave: And then Marguerite was an amazing hide-and-seek, just a horror house.

Dave: It was awesome.

Dave: I still think that's one of the best Resident Evil bosses around.

Dave: And then as you get to the final ones, like you said, all Resident Evil games end with a giant blob thing that's huge, and you just shoot weak points, and that's kind of how it goes.

Dave: You just unload until you run out of ammo.

Dave: And yeah, I would say it got worse as it went on.

Dave: Like those final few were not as good as the earlier ones.

Tom: But overall, I think considering it comes after even if it didn't come after I think it's a very, very impressive achievement that they were willing to take the series in such a new and original direction.

Tom: And I think they also deserve huge credit for doing so while staying true to Resident Evil's roots without relying on sheep nostalgia.

Tom: I think that's probably the most impressive thing in the modern era of gaming, that they were able to have a series that had gone in a direction that most people did not like and found a way to reinvent itself, which wasn't just let's go back to doing everything exactly as how we did in the past.

Tom: Instead, they said let's work out how to translate what we think is important and authentic and enjoyable about a Resident Evil experience in a new direction.

Tom: I think that's a pretty incredible achievement.

Dave: That is absolutely true.

Dave: First, just to switch to first person is big, because a lot of...

Dave: If you've read comments about the Anna Jones game, you know how a lot of the players are with first person and third person gaming.

Dave: There's a kind of a war where a lot of people feel like action adventure games should stick to third person.

Dave: And anytime a franchise goes to first person, that's not traditionally a shooter, there's some pushback.

Dave: And so Capcom, to go that direction, I was one of those when I first saw it.

Dave: I'm like, oh, I'm not too much of a fan of this.

Dave: So once I saw this for VR, it kind of eased it up a bit.

Dave: But I am a traditionally, I love third person.

Dave: So that was just a big gamble just on its own.

Dave: And then to also scrap away every character we know and just come up with Ethan and a totally different environment and a totally new story.

Dave: Yeah, they tied it in later, but that was bold, very bold, and it worked.

Dave: So I applaud them.

Phil: And it's incredible that it's incredible to me that this game was released in

Phil: It does not seem like it was that long ago at all.

Phil: Yeah.

Phil: We were just talking about how, you know, these AAA games are taking a long time to develop, but Resident Evil reasonably came out in

Phil: So, you know, a four-year development, I think that's a fantastic turnaround.

Phil: Are we ready to talk about Resident Evil ?

Tom: I am.

Phil: So, now, I have had no experience with Resident Evil

Phil: So, have they used a lot of the same assets, or is it a completely new take?

Phil: What have they done with Resident Evil ?

Dave: Well, no, it's totally new environments, but it is Ethan's model, so it's continuation of Ethan's story.

Dave: So they took the same engine, obviously.

Dave: Oh, that's another thing.

Dave: They created a brand new engine just for these games, which was the RE engine.

Dave: And then that engine allowed them to make these...

Dave: It started as their first-person engine to do in VR, and they've since obviously added third-person with Resident Evil and but it's their way of creating all these games pretty fast for PC, for PlayStation.

Dave: So with that engine comes...

Dave: I don't want to say reusing of assets.

Dave: You will see some items are identical, like this bolt cutter that was in like three or four Resident Evil games in a row.

Dave: Like the gun models are some of the same, but the environment is totally new.

Dave: Totally new enemies.

Dave: Resident Evil is pretty fresh in terms of...

Dave: compared to besides that it's the same guy and it's the same perspective, it seems pretty fresh to me, and it even has different combat.

Dave: The item system is different.

Dave: So they added quite a bit.

Phil: And a different director too.

Phil: He was a writer on Resident Evil and then directed Resident Evil

Phil: So I think that's a healthy thing, changing the director to keep things fresh.

Phil: And also it's good for Capcom because they're developing more talent within their studio by promoting people up and letting them, if they're passionate about something, lead a project.

Tom: Absolutely, yeah.

Dave: And that's something Capcom has always done since the beginning.

Dave: Mikami created the series, and then he let Kamiya do part two.

Dave: And now Kamiya has become his own legendary director.

Dave: And they kept allowing the next person to come up and do the next game.

Dave: Every once in a while, Mikami came back to kind of do his thing with Resident Evil and Resident Evil Remake.

Dave: But yeah, most of them were new directors each time.

Phil: Yeah, this one was directed by Muramasa Sato.

Phil: I know nothing about him at all.

Phil: Do you know if he's directing the next one?

Dave: He might.

Dave: Yeah, usually.

Dave: So there's obviously a few teams working at the same time.

Dave: So the Resident Evil team did Resident Evil and they're going to do Resident Evil I believe.

Dave: And then the Resident Evil team did and they're working on their next remake, whatever that will be.

Phil: So what about the setting?

Phil: Tom, what about the setting for this game?

Phil: I should have asked.

Phil: Have you finished Resident Evil ?

Tom: Yes, I have.

Tom: I finished it quite some time ago.

Tom: It's set in an unnamed village in Romania, and the setting is definitely one of the most interesting parts of the game.

Phil: Since we don't know the name of the village, do we just refer to its inhabitants as the village people?

Tom: Yes.

Phil: Excellent.

Tom: But it starts off actually sort of like Resident Evil with a more narrative-heavy prologue.

Tom: In a...

Tom: This time we could use the word Bucolic House with Ethan and...

Tom: I don't know if we could say they're spoilers from Resident Evil given it's a direct sequel, but with the girl he was looking for in Resident Evil and their child, their brief bucolic bliss is interrupted and he ends up wandering through the snow, looking for them once again under even more dire circumstances and ends up in this titular village.

Tom: And everything is snow-swept, and at the beginning you're encountering villagers, and they're talking about a witch, I think, who is a religious figure who they're all both worshipping and afraid of, and they're warning you about werewolves and things like this.

Tom: It's very interesting.

Tom: Again, a sort of new direction for Resident Evil, but also sort of not, where they're making references to folklore and myth in a interesting for Resident Evil setting, which is a very immediately engrossing setting.

Tom: But there is one thing that immediately stood out to me, which made the opening a little bit more difficult to appreciate, was this is probably the first Resident Evil I've played that has any sort of survival element to the survival horror, at least on the hard setting.

Tom: At the beginning, before you have upgraded your equipment, the amount of health the enemies have is just completely ridiculous.

Tom: It takes like seven headshots to kill the enemies at the beginning of the game.

Tom: It's completely and utterly ridiculous.

Tom: And until you do get a few upgrades, just really draws out sequences far, far more than they should be drawn out.

Tom: And it's not a particularly enjoying challenge either, because the challenge purely comes from just the ridiculous amount of health the enemies have as opposed to the way they attack you, which is a slightly misleading start to the game as well, because one of the things that Vader is actually alluding to in the Resident Evil impressions is, as the game goes on and you get better equipment, is the variety in enemies is really, really good.

Tom: And the way enemies attack you and how you need to take advantage of their weak points is all really varied and create some pretty interesting combat scenarios.

Tom: But at the beginning, it's just, here's some enemies that you have to spend two minutes killing because we couldn't really, I don't know, balance the opening of the game for some reason or figure out a way of making the opening areas challenging in a more creative sort of way.

Tom: It's a really weird sort of opening if you're playing it on hard.

Tom: Was that your experience at all?

Dave: Yeah, well, I think I played, I don't know about hard, well, yes, there's a hard and then I think you unlock like super hard or something like that.

Dave: But yeah, the beginning of that game is so, it's probably the hardest part of the game.

Tom: It is, absolutely.

Dave: It is really crazy.

Dave: Like they start you off with like nothing and you get bombarded with like werewolves coming out of everywhere.

Dave: And there's this big dude that chasing you and you do not have enough ammo to at all.

Dave: Like you just, and it is on a timer, but I don't think it like tells you it's on a timer.

Dave: So you're just kind of like left wondering, like am I supposed to, like where am I supposed to go?

Dave: And you're just supposed to kind of hold out for like a certain amount of time.

Tom: I think you also have to kill a certain amount of enemies as well.

Dave: You're right.

Dave: I think you have to kill first a certain amount, then you spawn like this guy, and then you have to wait like a few minutes.

Dave: And that is, it's hard.

Dave: And especially when you get into like the really hard, the harder like difficulty levels, it is.

Dave: That's the hardest part.

Dave: There are entire YouTube videos like teaching you like, this is what you have to do.

Dave: You have to like hide in the corner, maybe.

Dave: You have to find like a little corner upstairs in this barn.

Dave: Like maybe that's like the best spot, because then you can shoot things if they come upstairs.

Dave: And you just have to kind of cheese it almost in a way.

Dave: And that's kind of not good.

Dave: You compare that to, let's say, Resident Evil which the opening section is one of the greatest designed, I say levels in video game history.

Dave: And it teaches you everything you need to know, and it's well balanced, and you learn all your stuff in that little village attack.

Dave: This tries to do that, but fails in this execution where it's teaching you.

Dave: I just felt panicked, and I didn't know what the hell was happening the whole time.

Phil: Maybe they put that narrative ahead of you learning what you should be doing, that maybe they just wanted to create that atmosphere at the start of the game.

Dave: Maybe, I don't know.

Dave: But yeah, a lot of Resident Evil games can ease you into things, and this one was like, nope, nope, we're just gonna throw that shit at you.

Dave: And then it slows down, which is funny.

Dave: So it goes crazy.

Dave: And then it's like, okay, now we're gonna slow down, and I would ease you into it.

Dave: I'm like, what was that?

Phil: So it did get some criticism for later on in the game from what I've read here that for being too action-oriented with too much run and gun, sort of returning back to some elements of REis that right?

Dave: Absolutely.

Dave: So where Resident Evil was like the version of the old Resident Evil, like, hey, let's bring back item boxes, let's bring back limited inventory.

Dave: Resident Evil was like, okay, let's just bring back Resident Evil let's kind of do it our own way.

Dave: And so this one is a lot more Resident Evil -ish.

Dave: I don't know, it never reaches the heights of Resident Evil but it still does a pretty good job.

Tom: I think it's also Resident Evil -ish, a bit to its detriment as well, because with Resident Evil the way they approached returning to their roots was in a very different way.

Tom: It was, let's take these elements that we think are good from the early Resident Evil and do them in a new way in a completely new setting, whereas there are very obvious similarities between many, many settings in Resident Evil and Resident Evil

Tom: It's really, really riffing on elements from Resident Evil and at no point does it in any way come across as doing any of those things better than Resident Evil which is obviously a big ask, but it also...

Tom: I don't know if you want to reference something like that in such an on-the-nose way.

Tom: If you can't reach the same heights.

Dave: Exactly.

Dave: And that's why Resident Evil to me...

Dave: There are parts of Resident Evil where I'll say it's better than Resident Evil

Dave: It has way better enemy variety.

Dave: The combat is obviously better.

Dave: I find it's funny because it's like a roller coaster, and I'll get into how they designed the game.

Dave: It's just a crazy game.

Dave: But Resident Evil is more consistently, like, tonally and more gameplay-wise more consistent as a whole game.

Dave: Resident Evil has these weird ups and downs.

Dave: It's a little bit all over the place, and you could tell it wants to be Resident Evil but it never gets, really doesn't get there.

Dave: To me, like, the closest area in that game that felt like a Resident Evil level was the, what was it called, the hideout, where the werewolves live, like their compound.

Dave: And there's, like, this attack where you're, they start coming off about other sides, and there are red barrels of explosive here, and there's, like, zip lines that you could use to go to one place to another.

Dave: It's this really elaborate, like, level where you could, you could actually maneuver yourself up and down ladders, and they're coming at all sides, and I felt like, okay, that's how Resident Evil is.

Dave: Like, each level was really well designed to allow you to have multiple ways to attack.

Dave: But most of the game of Resident Evil is not that.

Dave: Most of it is, like, still cramped hallways, and, like, kind of old-school Resident Evil design, but with a lot more action.

Dave: It doesn't work as well.

Dave: Especially the way Ethan moves, and how he's kind of slower than, let's say, Leon in Resident Evil

Dave: And the enemies are a lot more tanky.

Dave: They take a lot more hits.

Dave: So it never feels as visceral as when you shoot someone in Resident Evil and they react, like, immediately.

Dave: I think those things combined kind of hurt the action style they're going for in

Tom: Definitely.

Tom: One thing I would say is, I think if you look at the structure of the game, it's really not like Resident Evil

Tom: I think the one thing you can say that I think they, I think nailed, like, some parts maybe are not so intricately designed, like the factory section, where it's, I think, too much of a shooter without having environments that make the shooting particularly interesting.

Tom: But structurally, I really liked that they took it in a, I think again, a new direction for the series, because they're, the way they both have an open world where you're moving in a way that sort of feels organically area to area, yet at the same time, the areas often have totally different gameplay styles.

Tom: So there'll be one area, for example, which is a highlight of the game for me, where there is basically no combat whatsoever, and it's entirely a puzzle-solving and horror survival section.

Tom: So I think that is where it really excels.

Tom: The other area is also the characters and the story.

Tom: I think it's, in terms of the characters and the story, easily one of the best Resident Evils.

Tom: It manages to take ridiculously over-the-top characters in terms of the villains, and combine them with the slightly more down-to-earth protagonists in a way where they complement each other very well.

Tom: And the story, I think, is one of the most personal and most emotionally interesting stories in any Resident Evil.

Tom: And the other thing that I think was very, very well done is the boss battles as well.

Phil: Before you get under that, though, the fact that the guy was the head writer for obviously is why that was a strength for Resident Evil if you've got a writer as the director.

Tom: Absolutely.

Phil: Now, back to the boss battles you were saying.

Tom: Yep.

Tom: The boss battles, I think, are also a highlight as well.

Tom: And the way they're integrated into the game.

Tom: There's the Lady Dimitrescu.

Tom: I think they're her daughters, right?

Tom: So she has these three daughters who will be attacking you at various points throughout the story, sort of like Mr.

Tom: X in a way.

Tom: And at some points, you've just got to run away from them, and you eventually end up with boss battles where you're fighting them.

Tom: And although the battles themselves are basically the same, or very similar anyway, they take place in very different environments.

Tom: So they end up being, each of them, pretty unique experiences.

Tom: And I think also has some of the best large scale boss battles.

Tom: One of them, the final boss battle, I think it's the final one anyway, is just so aesthetically engaging.

Tom: It looks like something out of Metal Gear Solid, even if it's still pretty simple in terms of gameplay.

Tom: I think they really managed to make it a very exciting and interesting experience compared to what they managed to do in Resident Evil

Tom: I think, to me, the boss battles, Marguerite is a highlight of the whole series, but I think the general quality of a lot of boss battles in is also up there with a lot of the series.

Dave: Yeah, I would agree with that as well.

Dave: This one has some really fun, like you said, just really creative boss battles, and how they use the environments and especially, I think, the one you're talking about, which is like a mech fight.

Dave: It's awesome.

Dave: I mean, it's so cool.

Dave: Yeah, they go all out.

Dave: And I would say, for a final boss, this has one of the better final bosses because it's not a giant blob.

Dave: It's like this woman, and she had all these powers, and it's like a really actually, you know, intense kind of skill-based fight.

Dave: You got to learn her pattern, dodge.

Dave: She's really well done.

Dave: So it's a really great boss.

Dave: I love the fish thing.

Dave: Like, there's just so many different styles of bosses in this game.

Dave: Overall, yes, the boss is an eight.

Dave: If you count them all, they're better than seven.

Dave: But as a two-game little duology kind of thing, yeah, they have some of the best bosses of the entire series, I would say.

Dave: Like, these two games really push the bosses to a different level.

Dave: I would say Resident Evil is still probably my favorite, but then these two probably come right after.

Dave: And then with the locations, well, I want to say, like, when they were designing this game, they wanted to make this game like an amusement park.

Dave: That's what their goal was.

Dave: So if you see the map, it looks like a Disney World kind of thing.

Dave: You got Main Street with the village, and then you got the castles, like, up here.

Dave: That's like fantasy land or whatever.

Dave: You got, like, your different lands, and they wanted to make each section different.

Dave: So you go to the castle, and that's like its own gameplay, like, section.

Dave: Then you have what you mentioned, which was the house of the puppet guy, or what was his name?

Dave: So you go there, and that is one of the creepiest...

Dave: That's the scariest thing that Resident Evil's ever done.

Dave: That is stuff, stuff of nightmares.

Dave: And then DR, whoo!

Dave: That section, yeet!

Dave: The scariest thing.

Dave: The problem with that, though, because it is a puzzle-heavy, non-combat section, on replays, it is pretty boring.

Dave: And if a lot of Resident Evil players, like me, like to replay the game and kind of speed run through them, that's kind of a slog when you already know what to do, when you're just kind of going through the motions.

Dave: But as a first-time experience, brilliant, brilliant.

Dave: But yeah, each section has its own little style and kind of theme to it.

Dave: And that regard is really cool.

Dave: It's a bit disjointed, but it's still really, really fun how they designed the game.

Dave: And Resident Evil is just a fun ride.

Dave: It's just...

Dave: Yeah, it's fun.

Dave: Where is a lot more creepy.

Dave: It's a lot more...

Dave: If you're into the whole...

Dave: It's almost like...

Dave: Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Resident Evil style.

Dave: You're in the swamp the whole time.

Dave: This is like you're...

Dave: You're all over the place.

Dave: You're fighting different kinds of monsters.

Dave: It goes from the hallways searching for stuff to all out action.

Dave: There's a lot to it.

Dave: I like variety in my games.

Dave: Resident Evil is a ton of fun.

Dave: And the story is very interesting.

Dave: This is where Ethan to me became an interesting character.

Dave: Because in he was very boring to me.

Dave: I don't think he had much to do.

Dave: I think it was pretty one note.

Dave: He didn't say much.

Dave: And in he kind of has a personality.

Dave: And he kind of starts having like a sort of...

Dave: He has confidence in himself.

Dave: Where in he didn't know what was going on.

Dave: Here, you could believe that this guy could handle himself.

Dave: And he starts making fun of everybody.

Dave: And it kind of has those cheesy one liners like Resident Evil does.

Tom: Did you have much more else to add?

Dave: I wanted to ask you about what you think of Chris Redfield's involvement in these kind of like two games.

Tom: I thought it was interesting.

Tom: I like him being presented as an ambiguous character.

Tom: I think he works well in that role, I thought.

Dave: Yeah, yeah, it was.

Dave: Well, in he's there just kind of at the end, just to be like, hey, it is Resident Evil.

Dave: Look at me, even though he has a new face.

Dave: That face, I don't know.

Dave: Have you gone into why the face was different, or did that surprise you at all in Resident Evil ?

Tom: Well, what was the last one he appeared in?

Tom: Was it ?

Dave: Before that was, no, he was in

Tom: okay.

Tom: Well, I haven't played

Tom: So the way I was thinking of it was, it's a generation later, he's probably going to look a bit different.

Dave: Yeah, well, I mean, that was, to me, that wasn't even him.

Dave: I was confused.

Dave: They said he's Chris, and I'm like, that's not Chris.

Dave: I don't know who that is.

Dave: So this is an imposter, that's not Chris.

Dave: But then they said, oh, yeah, we just kind of like changed the face, and we're like, whoa.

Dave: And then they fixed it completely in because he looks like Chris again.

Tom: Yeah.

Dave: Resident Evil is this weird, strange version of Chris that it just stands out.

Dave: It's very strange.

Dave: But yeah, he's in just to be kind of like, hey, we're going to connect this to Resident Evil.

Dave: It's still, you know, we still have the old cast that's somewhere around there.

Dave: And he'll still kind of like hero Chris.

Dave: He comes and saves the day, whatever.

Dave: is interesting, what they do with him.

Dave: But it's kind of that story where they do things where it's annoying that they just don't talk to each other.

Dave: And that's why things get complicated.

Dave: And it's stupid because any normal person would explain the situation immediately, and that would solve all the mystery and everything.

Dave: But no, because this is a story that they want to keep the player intrigued and all that.

Dave: People just don't talk to each other.

Dave: So Chris does some horrible things that are easily explained, but he does not explain it.

Dave: So it leaves Ethan very confused and the audience very confused on purpose.

Dave: And that is...

Dave: I do like the story.

Dave: It's a fun story, but that part is pretty lazy to me.

Dave: Like lazy storytelling.

Dave: That is just complicating the story for no reason when any normal person would just explain the situation.

Tom: The way I took it though was that's like classic Resident Evil stupidity.

Dave: Yes, yes, it is.

Dave: So in that regard, again, Resident Evil was like a return to all the fun and stupidity of the series.

Dave: Resident Evil was taking itself a little bit more serious.

Dave: It still felt like Resident Evil, but it was a little bit scarier, like horror, very horror Resident Evil.

Dave: And Resident Evil is back to kind of just over-the-top action, explosion, boom.

Dave: There's a Chris section where you're basically an army.

Dave: You're one guy and you go like mow down the entire village by yourself.

Dave: So it has all those moments of action and horror, and it's fun.

Dave: But yeah, it's interesting.

Dave: Chris was a lot more involved in

Dave: They could have done a little bit better, I felt, with that part where he could have just talked to Ethan, and they could have been more as a team, rather than this fake animosity that they created between them.

Dave: But it still works out.

Tom: The other thing actually, I can't remember what the details were that led me to think this about REbut I feel like the sort of very, very deeply buried sub-themes that are more prevalent in Revelations and maybe other Resident Evil spin-offs about the power of corporations and government conspiracies, they felt like they were a bit more prevalent in both REbut particularly REbut I can't recall why exactly I thought that, because I didn't keep any notes, unfortunately.

Tom: Was that your experience at all?

Tom: It left me feeling like REwas almost Metal Gear Solid-like at times.

Dave: That's eight.

Dave: Seven more, because seven was about the discovery that a company was doing experiments on a boat outside the Louisiana town, and everything leaked into the water, and that's why all the family got transformed, and they ruined an entire town, or whatever.

Dave: The experiment had gone wrong, which is a Resident Evil story, usually.

Dave: But eight was more about that.

Dave: Eight was weird, because what they were trying to do was try to tie this into the origins of Umbrella.

Dave: And this is the village where they originally found the virus, or something.

Dave: So you kind of get into that, but there wasn't like no...

Dave: I don't feel like there was an evil corporation running eight.

Dave: It was mostly just the creatures that lived in this village were trying to take it back, or something like that.

Dave: And then Chris kind of has involvement, and I don't know why his unit is called...

Dave: Well, he has his own unit now, but then there's another umbrella, and whatever.

Dave: They keep bringing back umbrella for whatever reason.

Dave: But yeah, it was...

Dave: Eight is more its own thing about, like, this is just the origins of where all the gooey, just evil virus stuff kind of begins.

Tom: One other thing I have to bring up is...

Tom: What did you think of the obsession with Lady Dimitrescu?

Tom: Were you one of the adherents to that?

Dave: She has a certain look to her, and she's, you know, she's a well...

Dave: She's a voluptuous woman.

Dave: But no, I was not like...

Dave: I'm not crazy about her.

Dave: She's an evil, crazy vampire lady, and she's gigantic.

Dave: So I don't know.

Dave: That would be kind of weird.

Dave: But I think that is genius marketing.

Dave: I think once they realized they had something there, they went all in, and then they just, they just, you know, kind of said, hey, we see we got a fandom, and let's just dive into it.

Dave: And they put her everywhere.

Dave: They made sure to highlight her assets.

Dave: And yeah, very, very smart on their part, because, you know, going viral for anything helps a game out tremendously.

Phil: Is she big in VR?

Phil: Like in VR?

Dave: That's where I think, yes, the size difference.

Dave: When you look up, you're like, oh, OK, oh, crap.

Dave: Yeah, that's the everything.

Dave: VR, the scale of location and of the sizes of things is the most impressive in VR.

Tom: One other thing in terms of gameplay, I want to mention was the while the difficult at the beginning is just silly, later on, though, things get a lot easier the further you get in, basically, as you get more and more upgrades.

Tom: I think there's a midpoint in the game where there's this great balance of really challenging combat that is up there with maybe not the best moments of Resident Evil but are similarly enjoyable for different reasons because here it's more about the challenge.

Tom: And I remember moments in Village where I'd be like, oh shit, here's this number of enemies and this giant enemy that I have to deal with and finding it a really imposing experience, which is not really the case in previous Resident Evil.

Tom: So they do manage to leverage the difficulty really well later on if at the beginning it's a bit ham-fisted.

Tom: So they definitely deserve a lot of credit for that.

Dave: Yeah, they do, yeah.

Dave: Yeah, it's a pretty well-balanced game.

Dave: I think that part is the stronghold, which is, that was the name I was looking for.

Dave: That's the area where all the werewolves are.

Dave: That's where most of the main action takes place.

Dave: I think that's brilliantly designed area.

Dave: I think that's where the action hits its peak, and it's really good.

Dave: It's very well designed.

Tom: That was definitely one of the highlights, yep.

Tom: The last thing I had to say was, the game is set in Romania.

Tom: So why the fuck does Lady Dimitrescu refer to herself as Dimitrescu?

Tom: Because it's not a French name and she's not French.

Tom: It should be something like Dimitrescu or something along those lines.

Tom: Was this some sort of intelligent writing where she was being presented as this pretentious, high class lady in this country bumpkin village, or was it just incompetence on the writer's part where they thought that a Romanian name somehow became Dimitrescu?

Dave: I'm just going to go with the theory of whatever sounds better is what they went with, and I don't think they gave any thought to it.

Phil: The pronunciation, was that how it was pronounced in the game?

Tom: Dimitrescu.

Phil: Yeah, see, because it's spelled like a Romanian name.

Phil: It's more like...

Tom: It is a Romanian name.

Phil: Exactly.

Phil: So just the pronunciation of it was wrong, but it's an authentic Romanian name.

Tom: Yes, just a very inauthentic pronunciation.

Phil: It was a critical and commercial success.

Phil: Looking at the lifetime sales of Resident Evil games as of December

Phil: Now, David, you're going to know the answer, so don't spoil it.

Phil: Number one best-selling Resident Evil game, million units moved.

Phil: You want to guess, Tom?

Tom: Resident Evil or ?

Phil: Resident Evil

Phil: So what you've got to remember is just the size of the user base is so much larger now that it's easy for these lighter generation games to conquer the earlier ones.

Dave: And let's not forget the PC.

Dave: I've got to give Captain Credit for expanding the market because Resident Evil was a console, pretty much console only series.

Dave: And I think it's found new life being very much in PC and they have a pretty good balance of buys on Steam.

Phil: So with that in mind, the top three best-selling games, million is Resident Evil

Phil: Number two is Resident Evil with million sold.

Phil: And then number three is this game, Resident Evil Village with million games sold.

Dave: Well, you're looking at the list that does not have the combined sales of the older games.

Dave: So it's going to split Resident Evil like five different ways, it's going to split Resident Evil a few ways.

Dave: Resident Evil is still the second best.

Dave: So Resident Evil just overtook as the second best Resident Evil game in sales.

Dave: And then I would think is about to.

Dave: I think Resident Evil if you combine it, it's at or

Dave: And then is right behind it.

Dave: So should pass shortly.

Tom: And then there's

Phil: Even so, for these games in their single versions, to be towards the top of the list is impressive.

Dave: Yeah, it's only been a few years.

Phil: And if you just look at that, Tom, you were quite right, like just looking at it strictly as singular releases, and do come in at and which is what you would imagine.

Phil: On the basis of every great game, the sequel always sells better, because everyone is expecting the next game to be better, and there's more people invested in it and all the rest of it.

Phil: And critically, really well received as well.

Phil: Anything else for Resident Evil guys?

Tom: That's all I had?

Dave: Just I want to ask Tom, just between these two games, which one would you say is better than the other?

Dave: Or do you have a preference?

Tom: I think I'd probably have to go with Resident Evil overall, just because I think it's a lot more creative than was.

Tom: But at the same time, there's moments in that stick in my memory more than moments in

Dave: Yeah, that's good.

Dave: I view them as a pair.

Dave: It's the Ethan trilogy or duology, whether it's the Ethan part of the story.

Dave: The first person really sets them apart from the rest of the series, and they both do different things.

Dave: But I find that in the end, I score them almost the same.

Dave: I think they're both fantastic games, but I kind of go back and forth between which one I like better.

Dave: I much rather replay because it's an action game.

Dave: But then I replay and I'm like, this game is pretty brilliant in its design.

Dave: So I kind of respect as a full game, and especially as a one-time experience, probably more than

Dave: So I just go back and forth.

Dave: To me, they're almost tied.

Dave: I might as well just stick them together.

Dave: and are always going to go next to each other in my rankings of the series.

Phil: Kind of like a Super Mario Galaxy and scenario where the second game is better and has more polish, but it would not have existed without the first.

Dave: In a way, yeah.

Tom: There's one other thing we should mention.

Tom: The Resident Evil DLC is such a missed opportunity.

Dave: Oh, yeah.

Dave: It's one of the worst DLCs I've ever played in the series.

Dave: Yeah, it's bad.

Tom: It felt like they put in so much effort for so little return.

Dave: And they set it up with the end of stories like, I don't want to spoil it, but yeah, it's like a big deal.

Dave: This is going to be really interesting.

Dave: What are they going to do?

Dave: And you get that?

Dave: Really?

Dave: That's what we waited for?

Dave: Basically nothing.

Tom: Yeah, exactly.

Dave: Yeah, and it's funny because Resident Evil I think, had some of the best DLC ever.

Dave: Like that was...

Dave: Did you play any of the DLC of Resident Evil ?

Tom: Yep, I did.

Dave: And it was like a potpourri of just random stuff.

Tom: It was amazing.

Dave: It was like a card game.

Dave: There was like an escape room puzzle one.

Dave: There was a narrative really creepy one.

Dave: There was all kinds of those rogue-like survival game.

Dave: And then the two big expansions, which was the Chris one, and then one where you get to play as like Jack's brother or something like that and punch people in the face.

Dave: And it was like awesome.

Phil: It was fun.

Dave: So like had so much going for it.

Dave: And then really died.

Phil: This does seem like a lost opportunity.

Phil: I wonder if it was handed off to another team.

Phil: But you wouldn't think so.

Dave: That's a good question.

Dave: I should look into that.

Phil: Look into it, report back.

Tom: Yeah, we'll do.

Phil: Okay, Dvada, thank you very much for joining us.

Phil: Two shows in a row.

Phil: We've really appreciated it.

Phil: Hope to have you back again some other time.

Dave: Absolutely.

Dave: It's always a pleasure to talk to you guys, and especially about Resident Evil.

Dave: So yeah, I'll be around.

Dave: Just let me know.

Phil: We won't wait for the next Resident Evil numbered game to have you back on.

Dave: Gotcha.

Dave: Alright guys, have a good night.

Phil: Well, that was great to hear from Dvada.

Phil: So with that, we'll end up our What We've Been Playing section and go on to Phil's questions for Tom from other people's podcasts.

Phil: But before we do that, I want to give you an opportunity to at least let our long-term listeners have a little bit of trademark banner.

Phil: Have you been up to anything?

Phil: Have you got any interesting stories or anecdotes?

Tom: I have another car-related story slash anecdote.

Phil: Okay, sounds good.

Tom: So, normally, once you've been hooning a certain amount in this car, you will need to top up the oil.

Tom: And this has been a relatively consistent thing.

Tom: But the last time I did that, it turned out that I did not need to top up the oil after all.

Tom: So I ended up with too much oil in the engine.

Phil: They have a stick that goes into the engine to tell you how you get too much, too little, full, low.

Phil: So you just go by the glug.

Phil: You just open up the cap and just glug, glug, glug.

Tom: I go by how much oil I've smelled burning.

Phil: And do you do this when the engine is hot?

Tom: Checking the oil?

Phil: No, putting new oil in.

Tom: I put the new oil in usually when it's cold.

Phil: Okay, that's good.

Phil: That's for listeners at home.

Phil: Do not put oil into an engine while it is hot.

Tom: Unless you want the oil to go everywhere.

Phil: Yeah, oil to go everywhere.

Phil: It just doesn't work.

Phil: It doesn't work.

Tom: Okay, so the engine temperature was actually what led to this issue, because I discovered that leaving the engine off for or minutes is not long enough to get a consistent reading of how high the oil is.

Tom: It needs to have been off for at least minutes, or you end up with vastly inconsistent oil level readings, which is what led to this issue.

Phil: I see.

Tom: Yes.

Tom: But so I ended up with definitely too much oil in the engine, and it was not just based on the dipstick, but also the performance of the engine as well.

Tom: So this led me to a quest on how to figure out how to remove oil from the engine without jack stands.

Tom: And a few...

Phil: Okay, I can see where this is heading.

Phil: Keeping in mind my experience between petrol sniffing and diesel sniffing, because I didn't know whether I had diesel or petrol in two containers.

Phil: And the comical result of me not passing out, but picking up a brand new hobby.

Phil: Okay, so now...

Tom: Were you able to successfully identify which was which?

Phil: I can now.

Phil: It's committed to memory.

Phil: No, I couldn't then.

Phil: So, okay, so you've got too much oil.

Phil: Now the obvious thing to do would be to climb under and take out that little sump oil plug and drop it out onto the ground into a container.

Tom: Yes.

Phil: Right, so you didn't do that because is a car too close to the ground that you can't get under it without jacking it up?

Tom: I think my skull can just barely fit under it, but it's a very difficult thing to do.

Phil: Okay, so your car is skull height.

Phil: Yes.

Phil: Yeah, and you shouldn't get under a car when it's on a jack anyway.

Phil: You've got to use proper stands.

Tom: That's right.

Tom: Yep.

Tom: If I were to jack up the car, I would also use the stands as well.

Tom: Excellent.

Phil: Okay, but you were busy or otherwise distracted.

Phil: And so how did you solve this problem?

Tom: So the first thing I attempted to use was a plunger and a plastic pipe.

Tom: But oil is very viscous.

Phil: Yes, it is.

Tom: Yes.

Tom: You know this from your oil use you sniff petrol and you sniff diesel, but I assume that you drink oil.

Tom: Is that correct?

Phil: No, I do not drink oil.

Phil: I've been exposed to a lot of oil.

Phil: I'm around oil a fair bit.

Phil: I was using oil yesterday, in fact.

Phil: But yeah, it's got a lot of viscosity.

Tom: Yes.

Tom: So other than the difficulty in getting this plastic tube through the end of the whole passage that leads to the sump from the dipstick, which took a long time, the solution I had to come up with was wiring the tube to the dipstick and then sticking both the dipstick and the tube in that way.

Tom: The oil was, of course, too viscous for at least my level of strength to be able to draw into the plunger.

Tom: So that plan did not work.

Tom: But having had the idea of removing the oil from the dipstick hole, I was determined to try and find a way to do this, rather than the obvious solution, because I do know some people with jack stands, and jacks as well.

Phil: I don't want to spoil the story, but does this involve a vacuum cleaner?

Tom: No, it doesn't.

Phil: Does it involve some sort of sex toy?

Tom: No.

Phil: Okay, then continue.

Tom: You've just ruined the whole story, because now people know that this could have gone in a much more interesting direction.

Phil: Okay, so you're sucking the oil out of this little dipstick hole?

Tom: Yep.

Phil: But it's not coming?

Tom: No, correct.

Tom: So the plunger failed, because it required too much strength.

Tom: So I looked around on the internet, and apparently people make pumps precisely for this purpose.

Tom: Wow.

Tom: So I bought from Amazon an electric pump that you connect to the car battery by, I don't know if it's a brand or just a label that some generic Chinese part maker uses, called a RhinoMate.

Tom: And in the various things that it pumps, in the Amazon description with those very long names, one of the things it pumped was edible oil, which is why I thought you may have been consuming engine oil.

Phil: No, no, not at all.

Phil: So the, okay, so you're using the RhinoMate.

Phil: Did you try and siphon it?

Tom: Well, actually, my sister tried to siphon it.

Tom: I'm not going to try and suck oil out of the sump.

Tom: But my sister did.

Phil: That's what I thought.

Phil: That's where I thought this was heading with you trying to siphon it out.

Phil: Okay, thank God.

Phil: Okay, you didn't at least.

Tom: My sister attempted it.

Tom: She was actually able to suck oil into the tube, but we could not get a siphon successfully working.

Tom: So siphoning also failed.

Tom: And she also, I do not believe, ingested any of this supposedly edible oil.

Phil: I'm leaving this all alone.

Phil: Okay, so the oil pump, it's actually made to move around vegetable oil, is it?

Tom: It's designed for engine oils, transmission oils, various automotive related oils, but incongruously, among all of these automotive fluids is listed edible oil.

Phil: Yeah, like vegetable oil.

Tom: Yeah.

Phil: Yeah, yeah.

Phil: So with the RhinoMate, I'm going to guess it cost you $

Tom: We're in Australia, so it was $

Phil: $?

Phil: That's including postage?

Tom: Yep, including postage.

Phil: Okay, then there you go.

Phil: I was good at my estimating.

Phil: So, and then it's battery operated.

Phil: You got to hook it up to your car battery.

Tom: That's right.

Phil: What are you going to use this thing for?

Phil: Because you're never going to do this again, are you?

Tom: Hopefully not.

Phil: So what are you going to do with it?

Tom: I don't know what we use it for in the future.

Tom: Maybe for pumping edible oil.

Tom: That's all I can think of.

Phil: I've got a similar type thing for pumping the water that gathers in the top of my tank next to the house.

Phil: So yeah, so what do you think?

Phil: Is it good?

Phil: Would you recommend The Rhino Mate?

Tom: Well, so I connect it to the battery, or rather I stick the tube down into the sump, then I connect it to the battery.

Tom: And what do you think happens?

Phil: You had it the wrong way, and it started sucking air into the oil stick dipstick hole.

Tom: I had it around the correct way, and it started sucking air into the oil stick dipstick hole.

Phil: So what did this do?

Phil: Just make a huge mess?

Tom: It didn't make a huge mess, it just resulted in some bubbling.

Phil: Well, just be glad you weren't using this thing to get blood in or out of your vein, because otherwise you'd be pumping oxygen into your blood system.

Tom: So, and it only can work one way to be useful, because there's a small tube, which can fit into the dipstick hole, and there's a large tube, which you use to evacuate the fluid.

Tom: So it can only work one way, reasonably.

Tom: But so then I think, well, this is just a basic motor.

Tom: So logically, if I put it on around the wrong way, maybe it will work in reverse.

Phil: The way you should have done it the first time around.

Phil: I'm not putting this on RhinoMate.

Tom: I am, because it says in the instructions, right, the positive needs to be connected to the positive, and the negative to the negative.

Phil: Makes sense.

Phil: Oh, okay, so you're swapping around the polarities, yep.

Tom: Yeah, so if you connect the positive to the positive, the suck end blows and the blow end sucks.

Tom: Right?

Phil: Yep.

Tom: If you connect the negative to the positive, and the positive to the negative, then the sucking end sucks, and the blowing end blows.

Phil: Sounds like our show, okay?

Phil: It both sucks and blows.

Tom: Exactly.

Tom: So the error was not mine.

Tom: The error was purely Rhinomates, because either they labeled the polarities wrong, or they connected the wires backwards.

Phil: Yeah.

Phil: Was one of them red, and the other one just white or black?

Tom: One was red, one was black, and they were both labeled with positive and negative signs as well.

Tom: Yeah.

Tom: So I can confirm that most definitely the polarity was incorrectly labeled or connected.

Phil: Okay.

Phil: So to finish this story, did you get your oil level to the correct level?

Tom: Yes, I did get the oil level to the correct level.

Phil: Very good.

Phil: Are you going to give it a score?

Tom: I'm going to give it a, I think, a out of because ultimately it did what it was meant to do.

Phil: Yes.

Tom: So it deserves a positive score.

Phil: Very good.

Phil: While we're on an automotive topic, before we go on to Phil's questions for Tom from other people's podcasts, I did watch the Gran Turismo movie.

Phil: Have you seen it?

Tom: No, I have not.

Phil: It's available on Amazon Prime or Disney Plus, I think, one of those here in Australia.

Phil: And it's loosely based somewhat on a real event where Nissan had a contest for Gran Turismo players, and they selected the world's best Gran Turismo players, put them into a training camp so that they could compete in Formula One.

Phil: So, yeah, it was...

Phil: I'm going to say it was OK.

Phil: I'd probably give it a out of

Phil: Maybe that's a bit too charitable.

Phil: Yeah, I'll give it a out of

Phil: You don't have to play every...

Phil: have played every Gran Turismo to understand it.

Tom: Do you have to fight any Gran Turismo to understand it?

Phil: You don't, you don't.

Phil: It's just basically about a gruff coach who doesn't think these video game nerds should be doing this stuff.

Phil: And then they all, in the end, come together to believe in each other.

Phil: And I won't spoil it.

Phil: I didn't look into the guy who it was based on, but apparently they have moved the events of his life around so it's better for the movie as opposed to what happened in his real life.

Phil: But as a piece of entertainment...

Tom: He's now, I believe, a professional racing car driver, but not in Formula One.

Phil: Yeah, yeah.

Phil: But there's some major spoilers along the way that are in the movie that didn't happen in the sequence, that happened in real life, that was moved around so that he could be inspired by those events that never actually happened until much later.

Phil: So, yeah, I mean, it's not offensive.

Phil: I mean, it's certainly something to watch while you're doing something else.

Tom: Well, depending on what those events were, it sounds like it may be offensive.

Phil: Yeah.

Phil: I know, I mean, the game itself wasn't offensive.

Phil: The movie itself wasn't offensive.

Phil: But like I said, it's not something you'd sit down and watch by itself.

Phil: You definitely want to be doing something else while it's on.

Tom: I'm just saying, moving the death of his grandmother to become a formative movement is pretty offensive.

Phil: If that's what happened, which I'm not going to say did or didn't.

Phil: So with that, we'll jump into Phil's questions for Tom from other people's podcasts, and then close out episode

Phil: I'll give you an easy one here.

Phil: David from Texas writes in, would Halo or Gears, which were once generation-defining, but are now practically dead, be reinvigorated by coming to and finding a new audience on PlayStation?

Phil: So this was obviously written before the big announcement.

Phil: Would Halo and Gears, which were once generation-defining, would they be reinvigorated by finding a new audience on PlayStation?

Tom: Maybe.

Tom: Halo was sort of reinvigorated moving to PC.

Tom: So I think it could work.

Phil: It couldn't hurt, and that's for sure.

Phil: Though I've got to think that if someone was drawn to Halo, let's just keep Gears off to the side for now.

Phil: If someone was drawn to Halo, by now they surely would have gone over to the PC or the Xbox and given it a try.

Phil: I don't know how many casual PlayStation gamers who only play games on the PlayStation would be drawn to Halo.

Phil: I guess it would be a little bit like Power World.

Phil: They might be drawn initially, and then they'll hang on to some, but then they'll lose a fair amount as well.

Tom: I think you don't necessarily need to be previously drawn to it, but now becoming available to you could make it interesting in and of itself.

Phil: Yeah, possibly.

Phil: I don't know that it would be enough to reinvigorate the whole franchise, though.

Tom: That might be a step too far.

Phil: Yeah, it needs more than just more people at this point, I think.

Phil: Randy in Portland has a simple one.

Phil: Does one need to play the original to fully enjoy a remake?

Tom: I don't think so.

Phil: I certainly don't think so.

Phil: I think if you were to play Resident Evil now on PlayStation or PlayStation or PC, or whatever else, if you'd never played it in the past, you're going to fully enjoy it probably even more so than the people that played the original.

Tom: Definitely.

Phil: Books doesn't work quite as easy as that, I would say.

Phil: But for games that are remade in their entirety, yeah, I agree.

Tom: Book remakes, are they?

Phil: Well, no, I'm saying it's more about the...

Phil: In that case, it's more about the sequel.

Phil: So, you know, I think in a book series, you certainly are losing something if you haven't read the earlier books in the series.

Phil: If you went into Harry Potter as your first time you're reading it, there is no way you're going to fully enjoy that book as if you had read the preceding six games, or even books, or even the preceding three books.

Tom: I think there's a big difference between sequels and remakes, though.

Phil: Oh, big time, yeah, big time.

Tom: But that does also apply to games.

Tom: I think many game series, if not pretty much all of them, you don't need to have played previous games in the series anyway.

Phil: No, and if you were to pick up The New Testament, I don't, you know, that's a remake of The Old Testament, you know, I think you don't, you don't need to read the original.

Tom: I think you don't need to read the remake there.

Phil: Oh, yeah.

Phil: Eric in Ontario says, have AA games disappeared, or has what we considered a AA game changed?

Tom: Didn't we ask this question in a previous episode?

Phil: Yes, we have.

Phil: So Eric, you're a naughty man.

Phil: You should have listened to the last episode.

Phil: So we'll go on to another one.

Phil: Ben in Boston writes, in talking about Saints Row, which was released in an effort to emulate the success of Grand Theft Auto there were also many other also ran games aiming to bring around their own perspective to the open world driving walking crime games.

Phil: What are some of your favorites?

Phil: What variations on Grand Theft Auto or underappreciated games come to mind?

Phil: And I've written down a couple here if you don't have any, but in show notes, I've written down a few examples.

Tom: I don't think I've actually played many of the other ones, but one I've always wanted to play is Sleeping Dogs.

Phil: I've tried to play Sleeping Dogs four different times on PC, PlayStation and Xbox, and I just can't get past the first hour and a half.

Phil: It's a beautiful game, a really vivid game set in Hong Kong, I believe.

Phil: Yeah, you've never tried it?

Tom: No.

Phil: For me, well, we played the Mafia game series.

Tom: Can we call them GTA-like?

Tom: I mean, Mafia precedes Grand Theft Auto

Phil: It does, but certainly Mafia and took more from GTA than they did from the original Mafia.

Tom: Greatly to their detriment, at least in the case of

Phil: Yep.

Phil: You ever played Getaway, Sony's London-based?

Tom: Yes, I did.

Tom: Yep.

Tom: That's more so a driver game than a Grand Theft Auto game, though.

Phil: I'd agree.

Phil: I didn't much care for it.

Phil: Crackdown and yeah, kind of, sort of.

Phil: I love Crackdown, through

Phil: Saints Row, of course, I love those.

Phil: Simpsons Hit and Run was a great one, very limited.

Phil: Probably the best Simpsons game, I'd say.

Tom: There's one I actually did play a little bit of.

Phil: Yeah, and then, but my favorite of all time, it would be Scarface, which was the licensed game that was really much closer to Grand Theft Auto San Andreas in terms of its depth.

Phil: But I absolutely love that game and recommend it to anyone.

Phil: It was fantastic.

Phil: And then they trolled the universe by bringing out a Scarface game for the PlayStation Portable and made it a real-time strategy game.

Phil: And as a result, I think it was one of the worst reviewed games by consumers ever.

Phil: Because everyone just bought it thinking they're going to be playing Scarface, and then they get told that this is a real-time strategy game.

Tom: How was it reviewed by critics?

Phil: I don't remember.

Phil: I did also pick it up, and it was OK.

Phil: It was basically a winning territories, you know, on a top-down map.

Phil: But it really had nothing to do with Scarface, and was not a good use of the license.

Phil: Do you want another question?

Tom: Why not?

Phil: Ben from Boston writes, PlayStation has been victim to their own hubris in the past.

Phil: Since the PlayStation is enjoying so much success, despite its horrible industrial design, are they setting themselves up for another self-inflicted wound?

Tom: When has the PlayStation been a victim of hubris?

Phil: I'd say PlayStation to PlayStation most people would point to.

Phil: You'll get two jobs to buy one of these.

Phil: We're not going to follow PC architecture.

Phil: They, yeah, basically, after coming off of their biggest success, they stumbled around with PlayStation and opened the door for Microsoft to get in with for several years.

Tom: I don't think you can call the PlayStation in any way a victim of anything but success.

Phil: No, the PlayStation was tremendous success, but coming off of that, the writers suggesting that Sony had so much hubris that they destroyed a lot of consumer and developer goodwill with the PlayStation

Phil: Now, ultimately, the PlayStation went on globally to have huge success.

Tom: Which is why I think the questioner is wrong.

Phil: It's certainly a very North American centric perspective, because the did outsell the PlayStation in that market.

Phil: Yeah, so I guess...

Tom: The other thing I would take issue with is, I don't know how you can describe the PlayStation 's design as industrial.

Phil: No, it's sort of organic, isn't it?

Phil: It's got an organic industrial design.

Phil: It is an ugly thing.

Phil: Don't tell me you don't think it's ugly.

Tom: You could call it ugly, but it's in no way industrial.

Phil: Well, industrial design is the phrase given to anything, any consumer good design.

Phil: So, which I'm a big fan of, not the PlayStation, but just industrial design in general.

Tom: So by industrial design, they merely mean that it is designed to be manufactured in an industry, do they?

Phil: That is correct, yes.

Tom: So in that case, the question is even more bizarre in its premise, because they're suggesting that the next PlayStation should not be following a mass manufacture process.

Phil: No, I think it's just a throwaway comment.

Tom: That's the only way I can interpret it.

Phil: I think it's just a throwaway comment, saying it's had great success despite its design.

Tom: So it's had great success despite its mass production.

Phil: Its hideous appearance, how about that?

Tom: I think it could only have great success by being mass produced.

Phil: Very well.

Phil: Okay, last question, then we'll close out the show.

Phil: Join us next time, we'll be talking roadblocks.

Phil: Joe in Seattle writes, looking at the long history of the unending console wars, why do you think people align with brands so closely, almost as if the brand is tied to their personality?

Tom: I think instead of going down any psychological route here, just simply because it's fun.

Phil: Yeah, I think it has to do with money.

Phil: You know, you've made an investment in a product, Nike versus Adidas, Ford versus Chevrolet.

Phil: It's just going to be, people want to think that they made the right purchasing decision.

Phil: Now, I've up until the last generation bought every console in each generation.

Phil: And the pendulum tends to swing towards which console is technically superior.

Phil: And I don't think that that's as important anymore.

Phil: I think a lot of indie games have sort of negated the need to put an emphasis on that.

Phil: Clearly, the PC is the most technically capable gaming platform, and if that's what you want, that's where you can go.

Phil: So these days, my loyalties tend to be around things that are important to me, which is low download size and accessibility for me to play it.

Phil: So that generally means something that I can play portably, which is where I've been mostly a Switch proponent over the last generation.

Phil: Though now I have a Super Duper TV.

Phil: I really enjoy having a look at the PlayStation and hopefully soon a PlayStation on that.

Phil: Should my internet situation change?

Tom: Should or will?

Phil: Should it change?

Tom: Okay, so in other words, it's never going to happen?

Phil: Yeah, maybe.

Phil: Maybe I'll move.

Phil: Who knows?

Tom: You got to move for better internet.

Phil: So I can get a PlayStation

Phil: It's a totally logical plan.

Tom: And then we're just going to hear about why PlayStation is the best.

Phil: That's it.

Phil: And Switch is even better.

Phil: So no major games coming from Sony.

Phil: The rumor mill is saying that the Switch has now been pushed into where everyone was expecting it to come fourth quarter of

Phil: It's kind of a downer start to the year, man.

Tom: Certainly not.

Tom: Well, it depends on how you look at it, because I think we're now finally getting out of the Baldur's Gate hype.

Tom: So I think that's the vacuum that we're waiting to be filled, because until now, if you were depressed, you just look at the greatest RPG ever being released.

Tom: But following that, we haven't really had anything to be excited about other than Power World, have we?

Phil: No, and Roblox.

Phil: But have you played much more of Baldur's Gate ?

Tom: I can't remember where I was up to since we last spoke about it, but I'm still gradually progressing in it.

Phil: Excellent.

Phil: Excellent.

Phil: Okay, well, with that, I think we'll end episode unless you've got anything else you want to raise.

Tom: Not really.

Tom: That's pretty much it.

Phil: Excellent.

Phil: Well, thanks for joining us, everyone, and hope you enjoyed the show.

Phil: I am Phil Fogg.

Tom: I'm Tom Towers.

Phil: And this was The Game Under Podcast.

Phil: Visit us at gameunder.net.