Game Scoop! 847: PlayStation Takes Its Toys & Goes Home

What's up, everybody? Welcome to IGN Game Scoop. I'm your host, Damon Hatfield, and joining me this week are Mark Medina. I'm here, baby. Nick's not here. What? Sam Clayborn. Hey, it's fantastic to be here. And Justin Davis. We've got a great show for you this week. So much going on. There's a Capcom spotlight happening right now that we can react to in real time. I know they already announced that Pragmata is being moved up a week. That's interesting. There's also good news about Resident Evil Requiem doing very well right out the gate. Five million dollars or five million copies sold at launch. So that's everything's coming up in the house for Resident Evil Requiem. But first, breaking news just today that coincides with what our headline topic was going to be anyway. Asha Sharma, new CEO of Xbox, confirmed today that the next generation Xbox is going to also play PC games. She also revealed it has the codename Project Helix. so it's true it's it's it's finally it's real nothing that the umbrella corporation couldn't have come up with it's crazy i mean like i had such a busy day today and i stepped away from my computer for 12 minutes to go eat the world's fastest saddest lunch and i came back and sat down on my computer to new xbox console he's never leaving his desk again and and there's some details with this right i mean not really kind of well just that it plays pc games right yeah so so what you're telling me is that this entire time we could have just made consoles that make that play pc games this whole time yeah that's what i'm gonna say like i i've said it many times on this show i'm gonna say it again the xbox series x is my favorite console of this generation i like xbox i like the franchises but this announcement it's so they're so clever with how they like yeah we're making a new game console, a new Xbox, and by the way, it plays PC games. And I'm like, wait a second. Wait a second. If it plays PC games, then it's a PC, right? This is a PC that plays Xbox games. No, Justin, it's a console that plays PC games. So all of that PC Master Race stuff, all the neo-Nazis out there that are just blind PCs. Somehow, we didn't have to go through any of that. Just from the very start, they could have been like, oh, would you like MS-DOS word processing on your Super Nintendo, we could have done that. Yep, understood. That clears it all up for me. They did put a couple PC games on the Nintendo 64. They did? Starcraft 64? It is funny to think about... First of all, they have their own games for Windows, so it's like they don't mean that the easiest thing to think about here would be like, oh, it just boots up... We could play Steam games on it. But it's not going to do that. No, I think it will. I think it will. There's Epic Game Stores, obviously. We've been talking about that for a while. I think it'll be Epic Steam. I think it'll be their Windows full screen experience. Good old games? Good old games on there? Yep. Get Gog on there? Any of them. Humble? Hey, Humble. What about a mouse and keyboard? Mouse and or keyboard. Yeah, you can do one or the other. You can't do both. Yeah, I think this long confirms what we've all known, right? Is that they're kind of going the hybrid way. I question the word console. I've long thought that I'm not entirely sure that there is going to be next Xbox console games. Okay, well, all joking aside, and I have a lot more jokes. Just a lot more. A console is a freaking PC. They're just computers. That's all they are, right? Yeah, but they're closed. What makes it play PC? Well, they're not, though, right? You can just put Netflix on your Xbox and all this stuff, too. But those are approved apps, right? They're not like... But if you're saying that, a PC is closed, too. It's closed to whatever works on Windows or Mac. That's nonsense. It's a nonsense difference between them. No, I don't... Let's get my point out. The point is that consoles are a lot freaking cheaper than a PC, and they plug into it television that's what it is going to be this thing's supposed to be 1300 they've already they've even said like this is going to be a high quality experience they know that this thing is going to be what if it's not over i think it will be i don't think there's any prayer that it's not anywhere from 12 to 1500 there's also likely going to be multiple versions of it yeah i mean i'm gonna buy it i like it you know i like xbox i like pc gaming i'm into it and this is i mean look this is a thin announcement so we don't have a ton to talk about but not for nothing like i think that the code name and the font and the little logo are pretty slick like it passes that kind of like first like oh that looks cool like you know so yeah i like all that stuff but like it just it's very you know i'm just very tickled by like yes we're announcing our next generation console and it plays pc games that means it's windows like this is a windows machine. And nobody likes Windows. Somebody must like it. Nobody likes Copilot. When it says console and it says Xbox games, I think they mean Xbox Series X games. Because their whole Play Anywhere initiative, I think, has been a way for people to start building up their Xbox PC library to soften the blow that the next console is just a PC. And that is where you'll play the game. So a game, you know, I can't you know, whatever. That year's Call of Duty will be for PS6 and PC, and that PC version will run on the Helix. I think that's what it is. Yeah, I think I probably agree with that. I mean, obviously, we'll find out more in the months and years to come. I like, look, this is marketing speak. It's a two sentence announcement. But even just the commitment, the claim, like they say in their announcement, we will lead on performance. And, you know, look, don't take them at face value. watch IGN, watch other people to sort of do the benchmarks and see how these different games run, but like, even planting the flag of like, Nintendo does never claim they're going to lead on performance, right? So I like kind of the bold... No, they brag about not leading on performance. But Xbox always does that, right? They've done that since the 1x. I like that they're, you know, look, and again, I say this as a fan, but Xbox is on the back foot, undeniably, right? I like that they're not giving up on their swagger, right? That they're like, I like the statement, we're going to lead on performance. It's console war bullshit, but I'm here for it. Yeah, I think the device is going to be cool. I think it's going to be super powerful. The device. I think it's going to be super expensive. I refuse to call it a PC or a console. It can't be both. I don't know. I really do think console implies they're going to get a bunch of stuff to be running at really high power for a cheap price. I think that's what that means. And the reason why a console is not a PC is that a PC you can open up, change a bunch of parts in it, make it a better PC. A console, there is an advantage to not doing that because you actually build a thing around these, you know, the set of parts that you can, as a group, save a bunch of money on. That's why when you buy like a, you know, in 2001, when you bought a gateway PC, it was cheaper than building your own PC because they like figured out all these ways to cut corners and cram everything in the box. That's what a console has always been. So if you cram everything in the box, make it really powerful, make it have some kind of ecosystem where you can play Steam Game stuff, I don't think it'll be that expensive because I don't think anything's going to be expensive if we ever solve the basics here, which is like, you know, either everything's going to be expensive on Earth because inflation's insane, tariffs are insane, AI is making everything expensive, or like we solve all those things and another console comes out. Like it's not going to be because they want to make it the most powerful console. This thing's going to be $1,300, and it's going to play PC games, and the PS6 is going to be $1,000. That's exactly what I was going to say. I think it's going to be expensive, but compared to the competition, it'll probably seem kind of normal because by then – We're talking about Big Macs, which will be $25, right? I'm sorry. What's the new one? The Big Arch or something. I don't know. I saw the video of the CEO eating it, and it was the worst thing I've ever seen. See, that's when you have to be thankful of your new Xbox CEO when you see something like that happen. If you haven't watched that, everybody, go and watch the new CEO of McDonald's. Introduce the new, you know, what did he call it? Consumer product. Yeah, the new consumer product. The product like ten times. Yeah. I love this product. I think that being the CEO of a video game, you know, of Xbox or a PlayStation, it's an incredibly hard job. It's an impossible job. But what is not hard is saying, like, saying the right stuff is so easy. Just say, we're going to have the most powerful console, and we're going to have exclusive games that you all love, and then that's it. He says, I'm going to eat this for lunch later. It's just a double quarter pounder. It's all it is. With the Big Mac sauce. You know, according to fractions, it's a half pounder. I feel bad that Justin tried to keep it on the rails there. It's fine. I like the – yeah, I like the – oh, my mouse bite. Wow. What a good mouse bite. Have you seen that picture of RFK on the plane with Trump and they're all like – they have all that McDonald's and he just looks like – he just looks miserable. That's what this is invoking, but this guy is actually trying to sell the product. As soon as the camera turns off, I'm going to eat the whole thing. it's like even though this went viral for being unappetizing and sad it still made me want mcdonald's for the first time in 25 years i even thought about mcdonald's till now yeah i also love his quote and of course the pickles you see that the box for it looks a lot like a series x oh i didn't know i feel like you could add that anywhere you're listing things like the new xbox will play xbox games and pc games and of course, the pickles. Okay, get back on track. So, next Xbox plays PC games. There's a Steam machine that's going to sit under your TV and can play a bunch of Xbox games and a bunch of PlayStation games that have already been released, whereas PlayStation, this was going to be our lead story today, is sort of walking back their strategy of bringing their games to PC after some period of exclusivity on PS5. They're returning to console exclusivity, at least for their single-player games, it seems. So this comes from a report from Bloomberg. It says, while Sony will continue to release online games on PC, single-player games will now remain console-exclusive. This is a significant strategy shift. Bloomberg suggested poor recent sales of PlayStation games on PC, and the risk to the PlayStation brand were to blame for the policy shift. And in case anyone has forgotten, they have actually put out a lot of games on PC in recent years. In the last few years, PlayStation has allowed PC gamers access to Spider-Man 1 and 2 and Miles Morales, Horizon Zero Dawn and Forbidden West, Returnal, Beyond Two Souls, Ghost of Tsushima, The Last of Us Parts 1 and 2, Days Gone, God of War 2018, and Ragnarok, Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart, Sackboy, A Big Adventure, Uncharted, Legacy of Thieves Collection, Stellar Blade, and Until Dawn. So they've been doing this a lot. and if they're changing Mark, what do you think would be causing the change of heart? Well, I mean the article says poor sales which is of course I think it's very short-sighted for them to put games on PC and be like okay, we got however many sales, $500,000, $1 million whatever the number is there are much smarter bean counters looking and being like, hey, less people are buying the PS5 because they think that the games will just come to Steam. And so, instead of chasing the short-term win, we need to force people to buy our console. Because every game sold on their console, they get a cut-off, right? So it's like you buy Horizon on Steam, and PlayStation gets 70% of that while Gabe Newell gets the other 30%. So it's like, it's just much more beneficial for them to have people in their ecosystem. But if someone buys Resident Evil Requiem on PC, PlayStation sees none of that. Whereas if they bought it on PS5, they get 30%. The games were, you know, single-player action adventure games, and they were years and years and years old. Buy this game that is four years old, you know, full price, we put it on a new platform. It's nice, like, it's nice if you're only a pc gamer and you have a high-end pc like it's great to have the option but like it's not like they shouldn't be all like surprised pikachu face when the games didn't sell very well like you know they were old like it was all old news by the time they released almost all of them the ports were also kind of famously bad well some of them like like like spider-man 2 last of us they they came out and they weren't great i think horizon was pretty good though that's what i was gonna say so hell divers 2 was a huge it was a bigger hit on pc than on PS5. Yeah, which in this scenario would have still went to PC. Because that's a live service game. They're saying live service games. Yes, yes, yes. And it was also day one. It wasn't a port of an old game. And I think the first single player games that the initial wave were big hits on Steam. I think it was Horizon Zero Dawn and God of War 2018. And even Days Gone was a surprisingly huge hit on Steam. But I think since then, I think they've seen diminishing returns because I think the novelty of playing PlayStation games on your PC has worn off. Plus, is the PC audience just waiting on Ratchet & Clank, Rift Apart? Right, right. Probably not. So if they're not selling that many copies on Steam, and they are devaluing the PlayStation brand, because every time you put a game there, that's one game you don't have to buy a PS5 for. Yeah, maybe if they just looked in the long run, it made more sense to keep games exclusive. Putting their games on Steam. I mean, Xbox can claim all they want. Like, oh, we just want as many people playing our games as possible. But no, putting all your games on PC, it's coming from a position of weakness in the console market, right? That's the only reason you would do it. You would much, much rather be selling millions and millions of consoles and having everybody in your console ecosystem. It's really not that much more complicated than that, in my opinion. PS5 is number one, and so they don't need to support the PC market. The PC market's a threat. it's a competitor to them, right? I was going to say the same thing. Like, like, even if it's not a financial thing, they let Xbox run the test on what this does for your brand. And I don't care how much people love Xbox, whatever. We know that that brand is diminished given the fact that their games are everywhere. Right. And so PlayStation might've looked at that and said, that's our future. If we keep going down this path that people won't, everyone will just get a computer. They'll just get the steam deck and the Xbox. helix and they're going to play our games there we don't want that we want them to buy a ps6 they can also look the other direction and find an example of someone uh enjoying phenomenal success without ever putting a single game on steam nintendo it's nintendo so think of what a terrible week this is for uh pc exclusive fans i won't use the term so so this week they they get you know God of War, Ragnarok, Last of Us, taken away from them in the future. They won't have these games in their PC anymore. And they're totally getting cucked by Xbox, who's going to put all their friend slop exclusives and garlic-like crap clones that you can only play on Steam. You can only play those on Steam on a console. Can you believe it? What a terrible week. What a terrible week to have a curse. What are the other PC exclusives? Is Ark Raider a PC exclusive? I don't even know. I mean, it's... Play the Spire 2 is. Yeah, Play the Spire 2. There you go. Anything early access. Like, I just played Windrose all weekend, and I'm like, man, I would love to sit on my couch and play this with a controller. Do we even care that the Steam... that the Xbox can play Steam games? I mean, the PC exclusives are like, you know, the games with little guys running around. Like, you know, Paradox Games, or Dwarf Fortress likes, as I call them. Or what about the Factorios? Yeah, exactly. That's on Switch. All those nerd games where, you know, you just lord over your little minions with your keyboard and mouse. Those are PC games. Cocked by Helix. Yeah. Well, interesting times ahead. Yeah. What has been happening? There's still no news coming out of the Capcom Spotlight. Well. Then let's talk about Resident Evil Requiem. Five million copies so far. We talked about this last week, so we're not going to dwell on it, but I'm still making my way through it. I've left the hospital, and now I'm in that big open area with Leon. And I saw people in the Facebook group talking about how the first half of the game is like the best Resident Evil has ever been, and the last half of the game sucks. and I know Sam was like saying this is not how he felt last week and so far I've done that first big boss fight that a lot of people are talking about and so far I'm not I'm still enjoying it so far so we'll see how it goes people that are saying that haven't played the game because the game literally goes back to that first part of the game two more times after the part that they don't like okay cool I think you'll like it I liked it you are coming up on the part that people say that they don't like but I think it's fine and it's like two hours of kicking asses leon and it's really fun yeah they bring back a character who i think we're it's from like resident evil zero is that right sam we don't need to name the character but like i didn't know who this was i thought it was someone else and then sam was like no no no this is this other person i didn't know it's like a lookalike villain yeah yeah yeah which is really confusing yeah anyway and has the same like powers and shit yeah yeah yeah resident evil lore as someone that hasn't played a Resident Evil game in probably almost 20 years. The lore is just unbelievable. It's just... Here would be a fun project. A fun video would be like, is this a real or fake Resident Evil lore fact? You would never be able to tell. That's because the game used to be about zombies, and it's not. There's still a lot of zombies in this. There are a lot of zombies, but there's a lot of other things, too. And they call them zombies, which I always... I just had a line on the side, like, this place is crawling with zombies. Also, was Leon always this cool? Yeah. I feel like this whole zeitgeist of... Only in four. In two, he a noob remember So he just learning the ropes and they welcoming him to the police station In four he a badass though He saving the president daughter That true And then he Bad dude style He takes her home by riding a jet ski across the land Yeah. Yeah. That would be cool. I love Leon. He's so great. He's very cool. He's so good. Is it the same actor from the RE4 remake? It is. It is. Okay. Yeah. That's cool. That's very cool. Okay. Well, Justin, what have you been playing instead of Resident Evil Requiem? Well, I just started playing Pokemon Pocopia, and I love it. Even as someone, I'm not a big Pokemon guy. It's really cool so far. And, like, I like it even more. And, you know, these are very early impressions. I played it last night and a little bit this morning. And, you know, I knew I thought I would like it. It's like, oh, it's a Pokemon game that sort of crossed with Animal Crossing and crossed with Stardew Valley, so it's a little bit more of, like, a life sim. But I like it even more than I expected it to because what it actually secretly is is it's like it's a Dragon Quest Builders-like, which I love Dragon Quest Builders, and it's much more like that than it is. than animal crossing um you can see that game boy that's cool yeah it's super cool so it's a little bit like you know like a minecraft or a game you know you have some freedom to sort of you know create terrain or destroy terrain or sort of build things how you want but it's a lot more guided and directed and what you're doing is you're trying to build these there's these little puzzles to make a habitat for a pokemon and sometimes they give you a little clues of what the habitat is Like you have to put four pieces of tall grass next to a rock or you have to put, you know, flowers next to a tree. And like I'm in the early game. So they're like very kind of simple habitats. I'm assuming they get a little bit more complex later. And so sort of meeting those requirements for like, what do I need and how do I want to build out my space? So the fact that you get to be creative and kind of build out your area how you want, but but it's but it's still guided and directed is I don't know. it's like it it it's really compelling so far and it's not annoying from the start either it's no it has a good first couple hours and i think that and like and i say this with uh with love and affection but like this is a checklist game right like just i love it yeah it gives you a laundry list of kind of chores to do like pick up these sticks and gather rocks and do this but like it's sort of the best example of that kind of game i've played in a long time i would say so far Dude, it's just so smart to be like your ditto, and that's your explanation for why you can do everything. It's great. Well, there's kind of like sad lore behind that ditto, and like where are the humans, and like what's going on is all really cool. I think it's funny to compare it to Dragon Quest Builders because I've never even heard of that game, and so now I have a great – They made two of them. Yeah, there's three. I have a great game to play after this, which is great, because I'm loving it, and like what I've taken away from it most of all is that – So you're doing – there's 200 or so habitats and 300 Pokemon. So there's a lot to figure out. There's a lot of combos to do and a lot to sort. While you're doing that, though, like so far, like everything – every time you unlock a Pokemon, they do something useful, right? So it's like I'm really curious what the late game reasons for unlocking are and like what the complexity becomes. It's super cool. I love that like – you know, I like games – this is a weird comparison to make, but it reminds me a little bit of a vampire survivors where like something weird unlocks something new. And then that thing unlocks something new. And then that thing unlocks something new. And like the connection, like the map of like, you know, I unlocked a hit Monchan and that gave me this move and that let me do this. And that let me unlock this. And that let me unlock this. It's like really complex and cool. And like, you know, it feels like you're kind of peeling apart layers of an onion. I really, I really like it. And I feel like, like I'm not a Pokemon person. I've actually never played any of the Pokemon role-playing games. So it's like, you know, I know them as someone that's been in the video game space my entire life. But, like, I feel like if I was a Pokemon fanatic, I'd be losing my mind over this game. Oh, they are. They are. Even just someone that's like, you know, just as a fan of video games, it totally works on that level, too. So I also, like, really respect Nintendo's, like, seal of quality that they actually use for games like this. They bring it out once in a while. where you can see the lessons they learned from Animal Crossing. That menu that pops up looks like Animal Crossing. There's things in this game, and there's a sheen of Switch 2 graphics to it. I know it looks kiddy when you're watching it in a video, picture-in-picture on GameScoop, but when you see it playing on your Switch 2, it looks great. It just looks really good. It's not supposed to. It's supposed to be functional, but it looks really good. So I like that about it. And then there's also, why are you playing this game? like to unlock Pokemon, to make more things, to clean stuff. There's actually a through line good mystery because I've loved Pokemon. I've played all the RPGs except for maybe like, I don't know, two out of 20 or something like that. Like I know it really well, and it's always really boring to walk around and talk to NPCs. All they have to say is, don't you like Pokemon? Pokemon are your best friends. You know, I have an item for you. Like that's all that happens in them, and everybody's talking about friendship. There's this overall thing, like first game you get Team Rocket. They always have this kind of villain set that you're beating in gyms and all that stuff. This has nothing to do with that. You're a Ditto, and all the humans are gone, and it's a mystery. And that's cool. It's a cool setup because you're kind of in an apocalypse. Everything's just destroyed. There's a destroyed Pokemon Center. There's all these Kanto region Pokemon. The reason for being there is you as a Ditto are imitating your trainer from the start, and all the Pokemon are surprised about that. It's just cool. Like, that lore is, like, pretty good for Pokemon. It's not good for, like, humanity because it's really stupid, but it's good for Pokemon. Yeah, that's the mystery. So that Dragonite flying, that was you? No, you don't turn into the Pokemon. And then he, like, turned it? I don't know. You have, so far, I can tell you, Pokemon follow you. Because you're Ditto, when Bulbasaur shows you how to cut or grow grass, then you just have that ability because you can mimic the ability. Like right there, Ditto just used Scyther. Yeah. Like, again, the early game impression is like I'm pretty invested in, like, the lore and storyline of, like, where is this all going? So, yeah, I'm into it. Nice. Well, I'm not a Pokemon guy either, but Kingo is. So maybe this is something we can check out together. Yeah, you would have to. That was going to be my advice is, like, Nintendo, you know, for how family-friendly they are, like, modern Nintendo games, and I know this is developed by, what, Koi Tecmo, I think. um but anyway like there's a lot of reading is what i was gonna say um so you know just something to be aware of if you have little ones well a little anecdote i could share that justin will appreciate is kingo's learning to read and he brings home books from school that are like meant for him to read to us and like the first time he reads you a book it's like you feel like it's complete wizardry like my son can read oh my god it's it's been really really cool to watch I felt that about when they learned to talk, too. I was like, what? Several of those milestones. Okay, let's talk about a game that's been in the news a lot this year, but we haven't really talked much about here. It's not the type of game most of us would play except for Mark, and that's High Guard, which was launched on January 26th, a day of Kings, and is being shut down March 12th. So 45 days. It's just yet the latest in a long line of live service failures that did not get much runway to try and succeed. This was, of course, announced at the Game Awards in December. It was the big finale for the show. And here we are, what, two months later? Two months, yeah. And it's gone. So you actually played this, Mark, right? I did, yeah. Okay. And we gave it a seventh. It's apparently a good game, right? I mean, yeah. Go ahead. Games, you mentioned Runway, right? And like having a chance to be successful. Games set that for themselves. Nobody told them this game needed to come out in January. And the big criticism for the game was that I played it for one evening and I was done. There was nothing else to do. And then they quickly rushed out of 5v5 mode that didn't change anything. It just made it where there could be more players. yeah I I don't know this is a weird one because people seem to be blaming the players a little bit on this one you didn't give the game a chance and it's like nobody told you you had to come out in January with no content so like everybody gave the game a chance the game had 150 thousand people playing it on Steam that was such a wild day and they had half of that by the end of the day by the end of the week they had an eighth of that and now they're in triple digit numbers. That is, that is, that's nobody's fault. We played it. It's kind of boring. So then we stopped playing it. These games are a little bit of a popularity contest, right? Of like, you know, you play it if other people are playing it. And if, and if, and if, if it doesn't, if it doesn't feel like it's going to sustain itself, then anyone, like maybe there's this millions of people that are kind of high guard curious, right? And they're like, well, why bother? Like even before, even before the announcement, that it was shutting down and being canceled. It's a risk to invest your time and effort and energy and money into a game if you don't have consumer confidence that it's going to stick around and last. Here's the part that I just cannot wrap my head around. It's a new studio, Wildlight, former Respawn devs. They hired 60 people. They work on this game for four years. But then if it's not a hit right out the gate, they have to shut the whole thing down? Like I said, they didn't have a runway of... I don't know if you can hear me, but I can't hear anybody anymore. Okay, stop down. Gilbert, Mark has lost us. We hear... I can hear him. Yep, I hear him fine. Check, check, check. Damon was just making a really good point, though. Rip. I just want to leave and go play Pocopia. I know. Well, after this, we're going to Disneyland. Just Kim and I. Oh, shit. Dang. Disney After Dark. Is it a theme night? I don't think it is. I think it's just a Disney After Dark. Hello? Hey. Okay. Sorry about that. All of a sudden, my sound just completely went out. Okay. Never had that happen. Like, what business sense does it make to just spend all that time and all that money working on a game that has to be a hit right away or else? I would think when you plan your release, as Mark was saying, you set it for a time. when you have enough cash to give yourself a runway so that if things don't go smoothly right out the gate, you can tinker with it. You can listen to player feedback. You can pivot. But what if you're going to make a new restaurant? You build the building. You hire your whole staff. You hire your chef. You plan the menu. You get an interior designer to design the thing. And then if it's not a success in the first week, ah, shut it all down. I just don't... In what world, what sort of business plan is that? Yeah. Because this, as sort of perverse and sad and wrong as the decision is, it makes a little bit more sense at a big company, at a big studio, because then it's like, well, you know, look, let's cut our losses. Like Sony and Concord. They'll do a tax write-off literally with it, right? They'll actually write it off as part of their losses that year. Yeah, so they can literally write it off, and that staff, they're like, well, we should just have them working on something else. But if this is your whole company and your whole business – What was the point? What was the point? Well, I mean it has to be a Tencent thing, right? Because it kind of came out that they were the ones funding it. So Tencent is probably just doing what Sony is doing, which is like, all right, we're writing this off. Are you guys going to be able to turn this around? Probably not. All right, then we're done. All right. It does give you a – it does do a little bit to explain why so many things do in early access or do – probably part of Steam Next Fest, and then do an alpha, then a beta, and all this stuff instead of like, you know, this was an attempt as almost a stealth launch, right? Like the surprise announcement, it's out right away. It's an interesting experiment in that, but it just shows you that there's an ecosystem to building why people would care about your game, and unfortunately paying influencers to play your game a bunch, right? Like doing all this stuff that gets in front of people, it's really hard to do without that. That's exactly, and that's the Apex Legends model, and that's what these executives at this company, so it's like, you know, Apex Legends was surprise launched and they did exactly that, paid a bunch of influencers to play their game and sort of sustain interest until there is enough of an ecosystem of kind of organic interest from fans that it could sustain itself. And like, they tried to replicate that exact same thing with High Guard and the market has just moved now. It's a different, you know, you build and launch interest in your game in a different way. Yeah, and speaking of the market moving, like it's super risky to put out multiplayer games games right now. If you thought two years ago that Marathon was going to come out after a game that everybody likes a lot, and it's going to have to go up against a game called Arc Creators, nobody would believe that. That just wouldn't even be part of the conversation. These are just such risky things because the whole idea of these games is that you're going to make money off people for a long time. It's this big hangout platform that people are going to buy stuff in and have as a live service forever and everything like that's like that's a lot to ask but if you're making a triple a you know single player game you're like well we're just gonna have to sell a bunch of copies of that that's just a completely different model yeah and i don't know what's more risky but it does seem like right now that putting out these big multiplayer games a little bit more risky because boy there's no community you don't you're not going to sell anything i mean i think that they're i i i hope that these companies don't have illusions like they're not dummies right i think that it i think that it's you know 99 of them are going to fail and then one of them is going to be fortnight and make literally billions and billions and billions of dollars like you know and then it's like if you're a 10 cent you're like well okay like maybe we should we can roll the dice on that yeah yeah well like rolling the dice on these like kind of single player big experiences i just don't know like it seems to me it's a better choice like i would like i i would only be saying this if i hadn't known that like last year mafia was this giant success for 2k right like what yeah yeah i I don't know if it was a giant success. I mean, bigger than Mafia should have been, right? It was one of their top sales situations for last year. Yeah, I think that we're seeing these big multiplayer companies get taken out of that game and put into making these multiplayer experiences. And I just wonder if that's going to shift after the many, many times we've seen this fail. but maybe to Justin's point like you just got to gamble on that one out of nine one out of a hundred I was gonna say there's there's also something weird about perspective when it comes to these games so you had overwatch right which is first person and and like people liked it people love that game for a really really long time but something that more of arrivals did different which was going into third person it allows them to make more money because it's worth it to buy the skins because then people get to actually see the skins that they're buying and it causes them to make more money right and so it's i'm thinking about the arc raiders marathon comparison right now arc raiders a lot of not only is it fun to play but a lot of the pursuit is to make your character look cool whereas marathon's first person yeah i don't care what my character looks like ever so i will never care about buying a skin or anything from that game so it makes me wonder the longevity for that. And that's why Fortnite's so huge, right? Every time a new skin comes out, people buy it because they want to be Grace from Resident Evil and actually see your character. That's an interesting... I mean, in addition to the economics of how the game makes its money, there's a game design. Like, the FPS, for, what, 20 years, FPS was the dominant genre, and obviously Call of Duty and Battlefield are still some of the biggest things on Earth. But look, Fortnite's third person, right? It is not an FPS. So it's like there's been this kind of shift under our feet, kind of in plain view, but until you kind of say it out loud, it's like you don't think about it as much of like maybe the era of like the dominant FPS is just kind of like it's just maybe it's over. People want to see their characters. They want to see that, but they bought. Well, and like even like a game like Cyberpunk, six years later, we made a video about Cyberpunk like a month ago and all the comments are like, but did they add? It was like and everything that's been added to the game since launch. and all the comments on that video are still did they make it where you could play it in third person now and I'm like I don't I wouldn't want that but like that makes me sad I feel like that's people that don't that don't get it no I know because I think cyberpunk is wonderful in first person I think games like Skyrim and stuff like that in third person are not great and that's different there's a difference between an FPS multiplayer shooter and a decision to be experiencing this world from a character's eyes and the storyline of the game takes place in that character's head. And so it's important for you to sort of see out of that character's eyes and be immersed in the world. So, you know, I don't know. Let's leave Cyberpunk out of here. Leave it alone. So with High Guard, some people were saying it was being the last big reveal at the Game Awards that doomed it from the start. I don't know. That didn't do it any favors. But, you know, it's a new studio that nobody knows, a new IP. they have to partner with someone to make the announcement. Otherwise, it's just this developer on Twitter that nobody knows saying, hey, we have this new free-to-play game coming out, and no one's going to pay any attention to it. I think you could theorize all this stuff. Did Jeff Keighley kill the game? I think at the end of the day, if the game was good, people would play it. I think that's all it boils down to. There's a lot of hindsight and sort of backseat driving. of like, yeah, in hindsight, there's all these op-eds and think pieces around how that reveal doomed it and yada yada, and then how weird it is that they revealed it at the Game Awards and then never, just never updated their social feeds again for weeks and weeks. But, Damon, I think I agree of like, you're an indie dev, you're a small dev, you know, like reveal your game at the Game Awards, yes or no, like, you know, who's not picking yes in that scenario? There's also just been from the devs discourse about it being written off from the start because of that announcement. But I just don't buy it. They had 180,000 people playing on day one. It was not quite 100. It was like 99-something. Regardless, people tried their game. They gave it a shot, and they didn't like it. Blame it on whatever you want. So just to make sure that nobody thinks I'm crazy, Mafia outperformed sales. I think it did We reported that 800K in the first month that it was out but it seemed to have done 1 million or more after that And then there was a call in which Strauss said if you give consumers great narrative experience that a lot of fun somewhat contained and at a fair price then you can have a perfect result So they were chalking it up to the cheaper price for that. And then they said it outperformed the company's expectations, and they compared it to a high point in this article written by some site called GameSpot. So it was the high point of the Take-Two earning call because of the GTA delay causing the company's stock price to plummet. I'm sure, especially after Mafia 3, I'm sure that they were stoked with how well this game performed. I also really like this game. I think it's great. Me too. Great game. Still a very good-looking game. But remember, Sam, Resident Evil did $5 million right out the gate. Yeah, well, it can't all be Leon S. Kennedy. It certainly can't. Okay, we've got breaking news out of the Capcom spotlight. Oh, no. What do we got? As is tradition, they held a contest for Capcom fans to design a boss for Mega Man. Good. Oh, no. They've done this going all the way back to at least Mega Man 2. I don't know if they did it for the original Mega Man. So they had over 10,000 entries. Capcom picked the best 20, and then the community chose the six winners. But only one of these winners will actually be in the game. Anyway, here are the winners. Would you like to hear their names? Yeah. Here we go. Cleanser Man. What? Wait a minute. I'm just putting this together. Sweeper Woman. Wait, hold on. Hold on. Hold on. Okay. Recycle Man. Okay. Cactus Man. Oh, that's got to win. I love Cactuar. Juggle Man. And Valve Man. And I can't believe there hasn't already been a Valve Man. Well, there's already been a guy that pumps his own head. I think Gabe Newell is Valve Man. Why did the first story have such a cleaning-based theme? I thought that was going to be the whole theme. Japan's a very clean country. You can't even throw stuff away in a trash can. There aren't even trash cans available. That's Sweep Woman? Sweeper Woman. Sweeper Woman. Got it. So that would be the second woman after Splash Woman? I would agree with Sam. I think Cactus Man sounds the best. That is Sweeper Woman. She's in the maid. She's a maid of it. Well, if there was a community vote, that's going to be the winner. She's got a cartoon. It's a bit sexist. Recycle Man. I think Cactus Man and Juggal Man. That's just Captain Planet as a robot. Okay. I could have done a better Cactus Man, but I'll take it. That looks like a boss that would already exist. It does. Yeah, exactly. They also showed a gameplay overview trailer for Onimusha, but no release date. That's just a character from Arms, the Jugglement. Oh, this one, too. These are just Arms characters. He's a fireman? He's a... Oh. Yeah. That's funny. These are really cute. Yeah, I do like them. Cactus Man has to win. Let's check in with the listeners. Hey, listeners. Listeners, remember, you can always reach us at the email address, gamescoop at igin.com, just like Mason from Texas did, who says, with the shutdown of High Guard just announced, after it had only been live for a few months, I'm more ashamed than ever to say that I am a Games as a Service fan. Don't be ashamed of me. So am I. But it's obvious for everyone to see. Only Mark should be ashamed of me. I don't want to. It is none of my business how much money I've spent on Marvel Rivals. I don't want to know. Don't tell me. It's obvious for everyone to see that this business model isn't sustainable for anyone, other than Epic, maybe Blizzard. I know there's lots to say about the art style, gameplay, monetization, et cetera, but what I would like to offer as a solution to the service games industry and for your conversation consideration is this. Would games as a service games be more successful if they released with an end date in sight? Like if a game like Destiny released with a content roadmap for three years and then said that was the story they were telling, and after that they're moving on to a new game. Hold on, hold on, hold on. We already solved this. The solution is see more butts, okay? That's the solution, see more butts. I think that the – sorry, was the question done or was there more? Do you think gamers would respond to that? That's all. I think the problem is the exact opposite, is they want to believe that this is a treadmill that will last forever. The party will never stop. And all the time I'm investing and the loot I'm investing and the money I'm spending, it's the exact opposite of that. Of the moment there's an inkling that, hey, this MMO might be in trouble or this gacha game might shut down or this live service game might not be around in a year or two, you've instantly destroyed your credibility and your ability to sort of keep keep your like i said it's consumer confidence they need to have some confidence that there's intrinsic value in like the money in the of the skins and stuff they're putting into the game yeah and so i i think if they knew that this was only going to be around a certain amount of time then nobody would would care they want to they want to believe in the fantasy that this is a forever game i want to believe i'm going to take the opposite uh i believe what justin's saying i agree with them I'll just plead the other side. So the other side of this would be, it'd be really cool to do a countdown game where there's like a countdown to an apocalypse or something where you are actually like working that into your narrative. And at the end of it, somebody wins a million dollars. Yeah, that's a Peter Molyneux joint for sure. A Peter Molyneux game, 100%. It's like in five years, this game's going to shut down and the world's going to blow up. And then something insane happens at the end of it. And nobody can ever play the game again. that's a that's such a cool idea what about what about if at the end of the game your final character they printed a little uh plastic model of it and it's all the stuff you put into it and all the things that you added to that character are become a visual 3d printed model that you get at the end yeah yeah yeah yeah here's what would happen mason from texas here's what would happen if they announce bungee announces destiny 3 and they're like we have a three-year roadmap and then and then we're going to shut it down. If Destiny 3 is successful, by the time that end date comes around, Sony is going to be like, I don't think so. I don't think so. Thanks to the power of friendship and all of your efforts combined. Great news, everybody. The world has been saved. Yeah, the world has been saved in another three years. Now, I think humans are, I think we like collecting things, right? Like the whole thing with the console generation between PS4 and Xbox One, as Phil Spencer has said, we lost you know the worst generation to lose because everybody built up their digital libraries on playstation and you know i have my 25 or so platinum trophies over there if the ps6 and and project helix came out they were like no backwards compatible no you know trophies no nothing then then there would be quite the decision on which console you go for but right now like i'm a lifetime sony man because that's where all my games and stuff are and same with like rivals like i know my account's not worth anything, but I'd like to know that in 10 years, all of my work is still there. And if you told me from the start that Rivals is only going to last for three years, then yeah, I probably wouldn't spend it. Modern video games are toil, right? And it's work and it's checking off boxes. And the idea of that all being, quote unquote, not for anything. Oh, we made to lose. Wow, wow, wow. Celebrate, we're all going to do that. it's like you know it's it's horrible for gamers to contemplate something like that i mean it's all a grind that's all that's that's human existence though that's the that's the human condition we're all grinding for nothing and you know even our progenitors will all be dust one we're all gonna do it we're all worm food in the end and you cannot take your fortnite skins with you when you but i hope all right my rivals so many things with gold i hope they persist long after I'm gone. It's going to be part of my will. Are you happy with this answer, Mason? Are you happy? What if we told you there's only going to be 1,500 episodes of Game Scoop? Would you be happy? Would you still watch? It should have. Okay, well, instead of looking forward, let's look back a little bit. This is Charlie Gadsden, our friend in San Diego. It says, last week in response to Justin, Mark mentioned he would go back and listen to old GameScoop episodes while working a warehouse job. Yeah. I don't believe this is an uncommon practice. The ever-loyal GameScoop fan sees the show like one of their favorite bands. It's always fun to go back and listen to their old stuff from time to time. Over the years, I've listened to the whole GameScoop catalog three or four times. Wow. The most recent happened a couple years ago while grinding through the harder VR battles in Final Fantasy VII Rebirth. I even took the time to write down some recurring segments, inside jokes, or overall themes the show had in the earlier days that have gone extinct. I plan on sharing these in full when the show officially hits the 20-year mark this summer. In the meantime, here's one for Scoop Nation. Damon used to confiscate everyone's phones before the show started as he demanded 100% focus. As he should. It's this sort of dedication to the craft that has allowed the podcast to survive all, well, literally all other gaming podcasts have gone the way of the dinosaurs. I hate clicking on podcasts And you just see everyone They're just all on their computers I hate that Take my phone I agree with that Damon, I'm only saying Because I don't remember listening and hearing that Was that a thing that you did Because it was like a policy Or something like that I think Greg probably just annoyed me By looking at his phone one time I was just going to say This is 100% a great thing I have a very distinct memory of Damon being like, do you really need to be on your phone right now? I was like, well, someone got in trouble. The worst thing about that is that you were actually the person that suffers there because you had to touch everybody's phone, and they took it into the bathroom with them just minutes before that. Just get a basket. Put your phone in the basket. The basket of bleach were clean, man. Spencer, man. I'm glad this topic came up because I represented my opinion poorly, which is like I completely get and I respect. So first of all, we love all of our fans. And thank you so much for going back and listening to old episodes. But the part that was a little bit baffling to me was people that go back to episode one and like, all right, back to one. And I'm going to relisten to the whole thing. Because they think they should start with your first episode. Like picking random things, episodes here and there and going back and like, you know, doing reruns. Like that totally makes sense to me and I respect it. But, you know, let's just run it back and do it again. that's the part that like man I just it's amazing that there's people that will you know give us that much of their time I'd like for someone to tell my wife that they've listened to me tell the same jokes more than she has and they enjoy it you think you got it bad try to be a GameScoop fan okay so that's settled and she's not going to listen to this episode I'll tell you that much No. That's settled. Let's put that one to bed. So this is Nick from Wisconsin. In episode 845, Justin asked, what was the point of going back to listen to old episodes? We want people to like our show. What are you losers doing? Justin said it didn't make sense. Damon countered that there's more than just news that is discussed, which is very true. I personally have gone back to listen to old episodes recently as I was looking for more things to listen to while I drive and have found it quite interesting to see how the show and hosts have evolved over the years. I originally started listening to GameScoop around 2016. I missed out on the early years, so when I went back, I started as far back as Apple Podcasts has available, which is July of 2010. Wow. It has been quite interesting to hear people like Damon from back then to see how much he's matured over the years. I think it's true. Wow. It has also been fun to hear when people who are still at IGN join the podcast for weeks, such as I recently heard the first episode Sam was on, as well as a few with Brian Altano. There wasn't a first episode. I was always there somewhere. I believe there was also an episode I listened to recently where one Andrew Goldfarb wrote into the show as a listener. Wow. Also, I would argue that those old episodes actually had less topical news and more veered into games-flavored entertainment shows, with things like knocking boots, frequent recurring discussions of bathroom etiquette, general partying, and also just general antics of Greg Miller. And even the video game news from then, I do find interesting because the PS3 and 360, they're blind spots for me since I only owned a Wii at that time. That was more of a waning of my video game hobby during those years. Anywho, thought I would throw out my thoughts on why us listeners find it interesting to go back to old episodes. Who is this? Keep up the great work and scoop. And that was Nick from Wisconsin. Well, Justin hates you. I like how Nick from Wisconsin recounted that episode. And Damon, looking a little hurt, was hurt during sports. I thought the episodes were pretty good. I just want to say again that I apologize. And it didn't – look, this is an extemporaneous podcast where we're speaking off the dome. And I didn't represent my point very well on that episode. And I'm very glad that everyone – and I do – like, obviously, I'm goofing around. Like, I do genuinely understand why people would go back. It's just the listening to hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of them. And that's the part that like it just is misaligned. Warehouse jobs are really, really boring. I just want to be on the record and saying that I always thought that Damon was very mature. Thank you. Thank you. Compared to the other chuckleheads I worked with. Okay, okay. That brings us to Video Game 20 Questions, and our suggestion this week comes from John Peacock, who actually has an anecdote here. We'll find out his location at the end. That's just required. I just listened to the most recent GameCube episode and heard about your six-year-old son asking you to play Fortnite. Oh, yeah. As a fellow dad, I thought I'd share my experience. For a bit of a background, I'm 48 years old. Same. And though I played shooters pretty regularly back in the 360 generation, my current taste in games has a fair bit of overlap with yours, mostly retro, indie games, card games, strategy, tower defense, etc. So when my son had just turned six, he came home from school in December of 2018 and said, Dad, why won't you let me play Fortnite? To be clear, he had never asked me to play Fortnite. We had never even talked about the game before. I told him I knew very little about the game, but we could check it out together to see if it was appropriate. I was thrilled to find there was a split-screen mode on the Xbox. So we downloaded it, turned off voice chat, muted the other players, and jumped into a game. We had no idea what we were doing, but played a few rounds because he was enjoying himself. And I was enjoying hanging out with my son. After a couple matches, we moved on to something else, but he let me know how much fun he had. So a couple times a week, we'd play a few matches in split screen. Before long, we began to figure out the map, learned how to revive each other, started completing quests, etc. And soon, we were both having a blast with our regular gameplay sessions. After about a month of this, my wife started to come hang out with us while we played. My son really wanted her to try, which she did. She's not much of a gamer, had never played a shooter, began to enjoy completing quests, reviving teammates, unlocking characters in dances, et cetera. Before long, it evolved into my wife and me playing split screen on the Xbox while my son played in the same room on the Switch, all in the same cross-platform game lobby, playing family Fortnite matches every night after dinner. This went on for two to three years until eventually my son became more independent with greater interest in other games, and the family play sessions became less and less frequent. But to this day, playing Fortnite with my son and wife are among some of my favorite family memories. And now as an annual tradition, when my family asks what I want to do on my birthday, I reply, order sushi and play some family Fortnite. Once again, last month for my 40th birthday, we sat down and played a single round of Fortnite together after dinner and got a victory royale, the perfect ending to my day. I will also mention the various crossovers in the game, like Marvel, Star Wars, et cetera, led to my son becoming interested in other cultures that I enjoy. Because of this, we started regularly reading comics together and watching movies with much greater frequency. and then years later when Epic bought Harmonix and integrated their version of Rock Band into one of the Fortnite game modes, it helped expose my son to some of my favorite music as well as exposing me to some of my son's favorite new music. So, I have no idea if your experience with Fortnite will be as positive as it was for my family and me, but if you do give it a try with your son, I hope you both have as much fun as we did. Nice. And end story. That's amazing. I mean, we've been kind of goofing on live service games a little bit this show, but it definitely shows the power. Cross-platform multiplayer, no barrier to entry, just download and play. It's very sweet. Very wholesome. The quickest extracurricular thing, I watched the Light and Magic season. The second one? Yeah. And there's an entire episode about the Jar Jar reaction, which is an amazing documentary to watch the internal team at Lucasfilm produce an episode, something about how people the backlash of Jar Jar. We're really critical. It's incredible. Just watch that. It's It's kind of hard to watch. It's really good. It's kind of a bummer watch, but also just super interesting. And because it's about light and magic, George Lucas is like, you don't need to care about what people say about the character. All they're saying is that it looked realistic. Yeah, and also, if he really said that, they say something like, he said, in 20 years, they're going to love it, which is true. It kind of happens. Yeah. I thought it would happen more than it did, but it has happened. And then the other thing is that there's a new Lucas gift shop in San Francisco that just opened the Presidio to, like, no fanfare. But it's so cool. It's right by the Yoda Fountain. And they sell wine made just from the vines at Skywalker Ranch. Oh, cool. Just brought home a bottle of wine made at Skywalker Ranch. It's like, there's not a lot of vines there. It's really cool. Anyway. Okay. John Peacock says, P.S. In 2024, I submitted a list of 20-question game suggestions on behalf of my son, Lowell, who is now 13. Jedi Survivor was selected, which the crew got in 20 questions. Wow. At the risk of being greedy, I will submit my favorite redacted that has never been on the show. Redacted. And as Sam and Justin will surely want to know, I'm from Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I've been listening to Game Scoop since year one of the podcast. Nice. And with that, let the questioning begin. Great show at X-Ray Arcade in Milwaukee this summer. It was really fun. I love that. Milwaukee is a great city. We got good hints from that redacted, so I appreciate that. We also lost last week, so we need that. Okay, okay. We'll be serious. Did this come out in the 70s, 80s, or 90s? Yes. Great. Can you see your butt in this game? No. Oh. Maybe it's GoldenEye. Maybe it's GoldenEye. Yeah. But you can see your butt if you were screen sniping your multiplayer opponent. You can't see your butt in StarCraft. You can't see theirs. That's true. We don't know who you are in StarCraft. You're the commander. You're buttless. Okay, did this game come out in the 90s? No. Wait, you already asked that. You said 70s, 80s, and 90s. But he asked about the 90s specifically. Because the answer was yes, the 70s, 80s, or 90s. Oh, it was. Oh, okay. Okay, let's see. 70s, or 90s. But how many games can you not see your butt from the 70s and 80s Well if you in a helicopter you can see a vehicle In a vehicle Could be Spy Hunter You don see your butt in that I want to put that on a shirt Could be Spy Hunter You don see your butt in that Did this game come out on the NES? Yes. Sweet. Was it also an arcade game at some point? Yes, it was. That's five. Spy Hunter's alive. Are you controlling a vehicle mostly in this game? Yes. Okay. That's why you can't see your butt. Could be Cobra Triangle. Is that in arcades? What? Blaster Master? That's the boat game, right? Yeah, that's the boat game. That's a cool one. Yeah. Blaster Master was not in arcades. Yeah, this is my blind era. Was this developed in the United States? was it developed in the United States? No. Does this game take place in, is this a sci-fi game? No. It's not a space, you're not in a spaceship. It's not Life Force or Gradius or. Is the, we determined you are in a vehicle for most of the time, right? Yeah, you control a vehicle. Probably like a plane, maybe a plane. Is it a drivey car? No, it's not a car. Not a car, not a spaceship. could be Cobra Trank could still be Cobra Trank okay I mean is it an airplane? yes and that's 10 B-17 bomber 1941, 1942 Capcom is this a Capcom game? no but an airplane game could be what Space Harrier you definitely see your butt in that Afterburner not an NES no you're right I was thinking 80s That might have been 89. I don't know. Well, maybe Afterburner was on the NES. Maybe it got boarded. It didn't make a face. I don't think Afterburner was on the NES, was it? I don't know. It could have been a black cartridge game eventually. Really? Isn't Afterburner made by Sega? Yeah, but says Vindicators, or not Vindicators, sorry. There's a series of Sega games that made it onto the... Yeah. What's the one called? That's an interesting bit of trivia. I don't remember what it's called. Okay, NES and Arcade. Was this made by Sega? No. NES and Arcade Airplane Games. Time Pilot? I don't think that came to NES. I would also call Time Pilot a sci-fi game, I think. Yeah. I don't think it is. I would know if there's an NES port. It would be top-down or side-scrolling. Yeah, that would be helpful. Is this top-down? No. So side-scrolling. And Tailspin is a Capcom game. You may have just narrowed it down to exactly one game. Yeah, I was going to say. Yeah, I think so. I think it could be like a really... Well, I'm trying to think of like... It could be like a really early arcade game. Side-scrolling. plane game. Plane game. I don't know. I don't have an NES mind palace the way that Sam does. We're not made in America. Is this based on a license? No. I thought maybe it'd be like they'd ported some movie to that. How many questions do we have? You have five questions and a guess. Yeah, so probably made in Japan. it came out in arcades there wasn't a lot of side scrolling shooter things there's that game Stinger but I think you're like a little spaceship in that right yeah I was thinking about Xevious until I found out it was side scrolling Stinger's so cute is that Konami? I can't picture Stinger you're like a little ship with like you can shoot and stuff, but you have, for some reason, boxing gloves. It's a good little cute series. All right. Five questions. NES. I know we're trying, Damon. I don't even know. Like I said, I don't have a great NES. I know a lot of NES games, but not the whole library. I don't even know if it was developed in Japan, but I presume it was. I presume it was. Is this company still around? Yes. That's 15. Is it Konami? Nope. So Capcom? We already asked if it was Capcom. Yeah, we asked about Capcom and Sega. But Namco... Namco would be... Let's see. Let's think of the Namco games. I can't think of any planes. Dig Dug, Pac-Man. Yeah, Rally-X. Stupid. Mappy. I mean, Nintendo. I was thinking about if there was a Nintendo game. Is it Pilotwings? Not Balloon Fight. They actually have this. Okay, this is not the game, but they have a game called Sky Pilot or something like that that they made that didn't come to the NES. Yeah, maybe it is. Maybe would Nintendo make a flying arcade game? Not that I... I mean, maybe. I don't know. Am I going to be mad if I can't recall what this is? Yeah, I can't think of the Nintendo situation. Is it made by Nintendo or Namco? Yes. Two questions and a yes. Maybe regret phrasing that question that way. I think it's a Namco game. I'm just having trouble figuring out what that is. Yeah. I mean, I can't remember who made Time Pilot at this point. But that's not really side-scrolling. That's kind of like on a single screen, right? What else did Namco make? Yeah, I can only think of their early NES games. I don't know what they were up to in the late 80s. Is Namco? Is Namco. One question and a guess. Okay. There's these games that are like... I'm trying to think of even the names of them. They're like... They're about like prop planes. Red Baron is a vector game. Yeah, but it's not... Yeah. And then there's like... I might not know what the game is because it was so unappealing. There's probably a game about flying called High Fly or something, but I'm thinking it still could be World War II themed, you know? Or World War I themed, or bombing or strafing or something like that. They did Namco. They were all Galaxian and Galaga and all those. What did they do that wasn't sci-fi. Because they were Xevious, too. That was Namco. And side-scrolling, which is interesting, right? Yeah. Yeah. I don't know if we know this one. Alright. Time to land this thing. Yeah. I'm out. I was never in. Is it like with the Namco Museum? I'm trying to picture games that were in that. I don't even know if this game was in that. Yeah. Yeah, I don't really know where to go. I'm kind of curious if it was a World War II game, but I don't think so. Yeah, I don't know. I give up, Damon. Does everyone give up? Yeah. Well, you came very, very close. I believe this is a World War I game. Like I said, this is the only side-scrolling game where you fly an airplane that I can think of on the NES. And what's even more interesting is that the screen scrolls from right to left. What? It is Sky Kid. Sky Kid. Sky Kid. I was trying to think of that name because I could picture like there's these kind of generic sounding games like that. This is weird going the other way. Why are you going this direction? I don't like it. It's a little bit weird. Like a prop plane, you always have to pick up a bomb and then drop it on target. I wouldn't have thought of this as an arcade game either. I thought it was a little miss. arcades in 86 came to the nes in 87 yeah i don't know this game looks goofy developed by by namco and then published on the nes by sunsoft actually i just thought it was interesting that this was his favorite nes game yeah it looks fun sam do you have a copy of this in your house absolutely this is the dollar bin game that everybody has the box art has like a guy let's see if they show it at the end there's like anyway uh the boxer has like a pilot like a world war fighter pilot. You're actually a bird, as you can see at the top of the screen. Oh, yeah, you sure are. You're actually a bird man. But the art in the United States was a man-man. Yeah. But the arcade flyers showed birds. Yeah, that's really funny. The United States wasn't ready for bird man. Some corrections. Cobra Triangle was a rare game, just made for NES, not in arcades. And Afterburner came to NES alongside Alien Syndrome. That's what I was trying to think of. Tengen. Tengen published them on the NES. Yes. I did not know Afterburner was on the NES. I don't think I've ever seen the NES version of it. Yeah, it's a black cart Tengen. Well, nice attempt. Thank you for the suggestion, John Peacock. Viewers, listeners, if you have your own suggestions for Video Game 20 Questions, email them to me at the email address gamescoop at iGin.com, and that is all the scoops that we have for you this week. Thank you, Mark. Thank you, Sam. Thank you, Justin. Thank you to Jobert, working behind the scenes to make this episode possible. My name is Damon. This is iGin Game Scoop, and of course, there's the pickles. I'm waiting an hour to say that. I shook you in my dream As hard as I could stand When I stopped, you fell away Pockets full of sand Waking up a world away Cutting through the air 7,000 miles to kill I'll see you when I'm there I've been modified I've been modified Well, I guess it was worth a try But I've been modified Which one's No Time to Die? Is that the most recent one? Yeah. Have you seen it, Mark? Yes, I have. So James Bond just gets blown up by a bunch of missiles? Yeah. Okay. And I thought, because I knew that he died in it, but I'd never seen it. I've never watched it. And so I thought that they'd leave it slightly ambiguous, and it's like, no, you see him get blown to bits. Yeah, yeah. They so went out of their way to just make it completely like there's no wink like, ah, maybe it's like, nah, he dead. I don't know. I mean, I didn't I didn't love it, but I liked it. I thought I thought the bad guy layer was like really good, like a really cool evil guy layer. Who's the back? Is that Rami Malek? Yeah. OK. I didn't know Skyfall is Javier Bardem, right? Yeah. Yeah. I like that one. Yeah. I like Skyfall. It is funny. it's like people really like the daniel craig bond era but in hindsight it's like there's five movies you know two of them are very good casino royale and skyfall yeah yeah quantum of solace is quantum of solace is terrible terrible i definitely didn't see all five but i can't keep it straight yeah i mean what's the fifth one what am i what am i missing uh uh specter oh yeah specter see that's what i mean it's like people like people are like oh yeah i like the this era of bond but It's like, yeah, but like the batting average is two out of five are good. Although I like No Time to Die. But I like, look, I understand why people don't like it. I like it because I think they leveled up the action. And I think I think James Bond action had been kind of like outclassed by like John Wick in movies like that for a long time. And this one, like the Anadarmus action sequence in Cuba, I thought was like really well choreographed. there's a really good one where he's like fighting his way up the stairs that felt very modern at the end of the movie so i don't know i liked it they just went too hard with casino royale it's too hard out the gate i do like that one i watched them they could never live up to it it's just too good i watched all five because they're all on netflix so i watched all five of them the last couple weeks quantum of solace is terrible it's like terrible it's actively bad is that the second one yeah that's yeah that's the second one first of all it's incredibly low like and i don't need every movie to be like the the world is gonna end but like it's incredibly low stakes like nothing that's happening in that movie matters it's like the bad guy's plan is just to steal water he's just trying to steal the water in bolivia and that's it yeah that one yeah they pushed up the release date of pragmata they did april 17th now i just like that they that card that they kept using for all their delays. They got to use it for pushing it up now. Yeah, we regret to inform you. You can play our game earlier. I'm still not done ranting about Quantum of Solace. The bad guy is stupid and not intimidating. He's just a little dweeb. But the real sin is that it does, and granted, this is an artifact of when it came out, but it does that shaky cam. like none of the action is comprehensible at all it's all just you know cut the camera every second and it's all shaking everywhere and i'm like this sucks yeah that's the born movies i i've tried to go back and watch them because it's also batman begins the same way i just i love matt dame and then the born i i love the the original born identity um yeah when we were younger and so but they're unwatchable. I never watched this for the last one, like the one where they brought him back. I did never see that one. So what is this guy doing? I haven't been watching. He's showing off some sort of I can snatch things really fast. It's like he's trying to get them to just land? No, he's just trying to snatch them really fast. Oh. and he's trying to not knock over the other okay that was fast holy shit okay it's pretty fast I hadn't oh he's pissed yeah get it together bro this is your thing me sitting there with a full bag of Doritos what a loser yeah it's me watching the Olympics every time I'm like you suck I like how you know when you sit down to watch a video And he did explain to you You say what's happening here Joebert's description was he's very fast Yep Nothing more needs to be said Joebert you should have been on Sega's marketing team You fucking nailed it He's very fast This is the kind of thing though Where since you have never actually tried this If you were to try this You would probably be just as good as this guy I don't know man He just thinks he's very fast I don't know. It seemed pretty fast. I'm pretty slow. I can admit it. All right, that's squared away. Jesus. That's crazy fast. Jobrit, this might be the best one yet. It's very fast. It's better than the girls that are trying to inhale cockroaches. But maybe he'd be faster than them. Thanks. I had just forgotten about that. i missed that one oh yeah well don't look it up yeah i won't you should look it up actually you know what we all have to be on the same page with how bad terrible it was to watch that the last one i saw was the uh the shopping carts one imagine instead of pushing shopping carts people were pushing cockroaches into your mouth yeah there's also there's an element of like you know when he puts them really close to frame like that like it makes it look faster there's like a perspective trick almost. What about his weird little flinches before he does the attack? It's like, I see my cat do that. Yeah. Justin, have you played Resident Evil yet? No, and I will not. But I've played Pocopia. Okay, I'll ask you about that. I did the spider battle last night. It was annoying, but it only took me one time. It's freaky, it's freaky. That's only, yeah. That battle's not difficult. It's almost QTE. I mean, there's the one part where you're on the building, but yeah, I don't remember having too much trouble with it. But yeah, it's funny. It's funny how surprising the spider is. You gave me the heebie-jeebies. Really good at surprising you. But yeah, it's also like popular right now because of how Shelob-like that spider is. Like I can handle like Resident Evil 2 moving the dude's head and his like jaw comes off. That's like, yeah. Who's in this game? That's like one of the great, oh, I know. You could go to a skeleton and it's like, it appears his jaw is missing. The spider is also a reference to Resident Evil 2, right? Well, there were spiders, but not a giant spider like that. What do you mean? They weren't that big, and they just crawl around the sewers, and they only take a shot or two from your shotgun. Okay, but they're bigger than a dog. Yes. All right. Those are big spiders, too. Yeah. They did grow up by this game. What were the things in the Lickers? In the original Resident Evil in the sewers? Yeah, those were in this game too. I hated those fuckers. Didn't the Lickers start in Resident Evil 2? I don't think so. Well, they're in Remake. That's the last Resident Evil I played. It was Resident Evil Remake. They're basically zombies that crawl around, but they also are blind. It's funny. If you're slow and quiet, they won't know you're there. But this game strategically placed broken glass on the ground, and it's very mean great i wish i could talk about crimson desert