Pax East 2025: Return of the Boyos

[00:00:00] ask for. I'm gonna be stinky.

[00:00:33] We fucked it up. I fucked it up. I fucked it up. It's been too gone. Welcome everyone to season four of the Friday Night Gamecast, a dedicated video game podcast where two best friends come together to celebrate games and bring you industry news, game impressions, reviews, and more. I'm your host Nick and I'm joined as always by the Grandmaster Painter himself, the King Zozo Tai, the anime admiral, something, the Sultan of the Sunside, Sultan of the Sunshine State, I can't do abbreviations like that. It's Will. It's Will. He's joining me again.

[00:01:04] We're back. Every time you say that, I think of Randy Quaid at the end of Independence Day when he's flying back into the ship. That's the one. That's the reference. Just so you can see it. Oh, everybody. We're back for season four of the Friday Night Gamecast and this is our, I guess, inaugural, inaugural, inaugural episode of season four. Yep. And this time we're going to be talking about our experience at PAX East 2025. A little bit of housekeeping for you.

[00:01:33] We've been doing a few features since January. Will, you want to talk about some of the stuff you've gotten your fingers into? Yep. So as far. I don't know why I said that. That was a little intense. It was a little intense. But as far as, you know, the recordings, the people around here, I've been doing a lot of listening. So just lots of listening there. But as far as hearing myself on something that's not Friday Night Gamecast, I do recommend everyone go over and listen to Jala and her team there. They got Zatoichi meets Yojimbo. So we have a great episode. Myself, Jala and Moxie, we did another review.

[00:02:03] If you recall, I believe it was last year we did Bunraku. And then this year we came in and did Zatoichi meets Yojimbo, which is another great time. Another blast with the team there. Oh, great movie. Okay. Look, the old school samurai movies. They're unbeatable. They be hitting. They be hitting. Man, it's a blast. You just sit there, especially you got some friends you're kind of watching and listening to. It's always a good time. So no, it was a blast. Please go over there. Listen to Jala. Show her some love. Listen to her overall podcast too, just because I think she's on two if I'm not mistaken.

[00:02:30] She can remind me in the comments there, but all good fun. All great listens. I highly recommend you go check that out. But that's been me really as far as on the content creator fun. Other than that, a lot of listening. A lot of listening on my end. Yeah, definitely a lot of really good stuff. Everybody has been keeping up great work while we've been relaxing on the beach with our feet up, not doing anything content wise, but we're ready to get back at it. We're ready to jump in there and kick off 2025. This is going to be an incredible year for gaming. It already has been so far.

[00:03:00] We're jumping in basically midway through the year. During our hiatus, I've done a few things. I've appeared on a few shows. And please, anybody out there who's listening, remind me if I'm missing a call out or anything like that. But I did go back through and I saw that I remembered I was on the GameDuo pod for when they covered the Grand Theft Auto 6 delay. I had to eat crow. It's sad. I'm just so devastated about that. Not because Grand Theft Auto 6 isn't coming out, but it's because my fantasy critic is fucked. Right?

[00:03:30] Because it's like, it could come out this year, it could come out next year. What's the difference? Right? We're never going to know really how different it will be. Correct. But at the end of the day, it was delayed into May 26th, 2026. Yep. So that's going to be fun whenever it does eventually come out. And I just talked about how sad I was that it happened. And I also did a code name Good Game with Samurai QBG, good old Tony, over on YouTube. And we did a prediction, if I'm not mistaken, of something.

[00:04:01] I can't remember. It might have been an Xbox showcase or something like that, but we did a prediction earlier in the year and we had a good time over there. So yeah, those code name Good Games over on YouTube.com slash Samurai QBG are always really, really fun. A lot of really great community involvement over there. And then last but not least, I did a Get Wrecked with Ben Robinson from Play Along Podcast. We did a Get Wrecked episode where basically the concept of those episodes is where we'll offer

[00:04:27] each of us one game that is a part of our backlog or current log, however you want to look at it, and then just talk about like why they're good and why people should play them. And so we paired up Baldur's Gate 3 with Dredge. So he really, he really wanted, it's just how it works, but he really wanted to talk about Baldur's Gate 3 and I was happy to. That was the bulk of that episode. But then I got him a chance to talk about Dredge, which is an incredible little indie little fishing sim if anybody hasn't gotten the chance to play that. So yeah.

[00:04:55] All that to say, you will not be beating Baldur's Gate 3 in 2025. That's not true. I'll play it. Okay. You'll play it. You'll play it. See, nothing's going to come out for the rest of this year, right? And then what's going to happen is that I'm going to finish Death Stranding. And then you play Death Stranding 2 and it's going to take you right into Ghost of Yote. Am I going to play Death Stranding 2? Is that what's going to happen? Kojima be Kojima-y. Honestly, it all hinges on whether or not the ending of Death Stranding 1 slaps. It slaps.

[00:05:25] You say that and it makes me so dismayed because Death Stranding 2 is like guaranteed 120 hour experience. Not quite. But if you want to do everything. I feel like it's almost guaranteed if you want to do everything. I don't. Not at those games. I don't. If you want to deliver more packages, if you want to play UPS man, then yes, you will be playing for 120 hours. For sure. Definitely. Let's go ahead and get into some game updates for what we've been playing on our hiatus. Will, why don't you start us off? Put us on some games here. What's been going on?

[00:05:54] I've been playing nothing but gas on break. All right. It's been a great time. I've been eating. I've been sitting here. You know that meme, all those plates of pasta getting pushed at... Was it? It's not Michelle Zellweger. I can't remember the person's name. I feel bad now. But she's the homie. Shout out to her. Rachel Zellweger? Yes. I don't think it's her though, but it's... I feel like it's shorty off Buffy, but I can't recall. Oh, yeah. Is that an Imani Python skit? I don't think so. I think it's just off of a movie. There's definitely a Imani Python skit where they're eating too much and they start vomiting.

[00:06:23] I just meant the meme where she's getting past different plates and all this. She's like, there's too much food. No, no, no, no. That's me. I've been eating too well. I've been playing crazy games out here. South of Midnight, Xbox game. Oh my goodness. Look, they had this showcase. I want to say it was in the Game Awards or Gamescom, one of the two like a year or so ago. And it looked cool, but I was like, okay, this is going to be fine. Fun little like platformy action, yada, yada, yada. This game came out and I was just enraptured in it.

[00:06:53] It was such a good time. It's so interesting you say that. Storytelling. Yeah. Just really quick, not to cut you off, but it's interesting you say that because everything that I've heard about this game is so polarizing. I think people either love it or they like really, really don't like it just because of a lot of like the negative feelings that they get from the experience in the game, which I guess is weird. Yeah. Which yeah, because I, from what I've heard, like the, some of the tone in the narrative is not like super uplifting. Like it's relatively dark.

[00:07:19] It's dark on a media front, but it also was like they, I think Xbox, it's one of their pillars for game pass. At least this year is what they like really touted out there from the people who did. Um, it's the same, same developers who did, uh, uh, we happy few. Yes. Yes. You can see that with kind of the art style. It shares a lot of similarities there, but no, as far as the storyline, yes, there's definitely some dark elements to it. It gives you kind of like a grim fairy tales in the Bayou situation. Um, that's effectively what it is.

[00:07:47] Lots of really nice folklore that doesn't have quite as nice of an ending for some people in it. But just very, very fun to get through. The story itself is incredible. I feel like Hazel as a character, I mean, this is like an open and shut game. It's not really a spoiler, but it's like, it has a different definite ending, but they could, if they want to. And I would love to see them do some sequels or stay in this world just because of how much good world building they do with it. Uh, combat is perfectly fine. That is not really like the main reason you're there.

[00:08:15] I heard people turned off combat a lot. I think you can. The accessibility is very high so they can make it so you can go through story mode and you don't have to do a whole lot of fighting. It's not that the combat's hard. It's just, it's perfectly fine. Mm-hmm. You get through it. You beat your enemies. Um, it's, you know, it's not a devil may cry where you're just like, hell, the combat is the reason I'm here. Yeah. You're here for the story. You're here for the world. And that game has both of those in spades. Okay. So highly recommend it. I feel like if you like kind of darker tones in your mythical stories, if you want a little

[00:08:45] bit more of a Southern flair, especially after going to see sinners during this spring and you had a blast with that, then I think you would love South of Midnight a lot. Good old Bayou Horror. So good. So good. It's making a comeback too. Let's, let's go Louisiana. Shout out to you. Shout out to you, Nala. I love that. Aside from that, a continuous great hits on my end, Monster Hunter Wilds. Look, don't believe some of the downers that are like, oh, it's not world. Oh, it's not real Monster Hunter. Monster Hunter Wilds is a great time.

[00:09:12] It has, I guess, unfortunately, one of the better stories in Monster Hunter, which people are still like, the story kind of sucks. But I'm like, it's also Monster Hunter, right? You're here to kill monsters. And that's exactly what you're doing. You're finding a monster. You're gutting them from snout to tail. You're taking off his skin and you're wearing him as a boot so you can go kill more monsters. The loop is still as fresh and nice as it always has been. The armor sets look amazing. The game is gorgeous.

[00:09:38] You're getting all these great characters that you can interact with on the normal basis, like Alma making things so much easier on the field to just go jump into quests and play with your friends. I honestly can't say enough about this game that, you know, I love more. And just like in classic Capcom fashion, especially for Monster Hunter, they're continuously updating it, giving you more. As we speak, they've had a update to one of their apex creatures. The Ray Dao has now an arc tempered variant. So it's just significantly stronger, faster, better combos.

[00:10:08] And they've also added on new creatures as well. And they continue with that classic Capcom roadmap for Monster Hunter. They're going to be pushing out every couple of months a new monster, which means you're getting new gear sets to use, more things you can mix and match more weapons. So they're trying to keep you on that treadmill for a while. So with Monster Hunter specifically in terms of what they're asking from their players, is it going to be similar to Diablo where it's like they do want you playing it all the time? At the very least, they want you hopping on once a week.

[00:10:38] Yeah. Doing your weekly challenges. That's what I'm doing. Okay, challenges. Exactly. Maybe even once a day depending on if an event's going on, like the recent Cherry Blossom kind of spring event that we just had. Okay, yeah. So you hop on, you do your dailies, you fight some monsters, you dip out if you don't want to continue. That's kind of like the least that they're asking. Nice. And I'm trying to get you in here with these regular seasonal events, trying to get you back with monsters, things like that. Okay. So highly recommend checking it out. If you like Monster Hunter, you'll like Wilds. If you don't like Monster Hunter and you've never played it, this is the easiest it's been.

[00:11:08] They kind of said that every time a new one's come out because they do continuously make it just more accessible for people. So if you looked at Monster Hunter and you thought that looks like math and it's too difficult, this is the one to try. Look, this is math with a calculator. That's what Wilds is. Okay. So go ahead and hop on now and give that a shot. I like calculators. Yep. I'm the classic. Don't listen to Will, you know, the Capcom shill because that's what I am. That's what I've known to do. Listen to me, the professional gamer. TM.

[00:11:40] Can I call myself professional if I don't get paid? I don't think so, right? You're professional if you think it is. As long as you believe it in your heart, that's how it works. That's how it works. So yes, check out Monster Hunter Wilds. It's a great time. I'm taking it back a little bit, not as triple A-ish, but so Robocop. It's a game that came out, I want to say 2024. I think it did like kind of early mid-year 2024. Yeah, something like that. But maybe 23. Very fun game. I can't sit here and say it's a perfect game.

[00:12:07] It has, you know, some issues, some bugs, a little bit of leggy glitches here. A little bit of jankiness there. That being said, if you like Robocop, this is a love letter to that series. I love Robocop too. You need to check this game out. It's a complete love letter to the series. It is so fun overall to play, but mostly it just really feels like you're in from, unfortunately it feels like you're in that like Detroit scuzzy. You know, there are pimps and prostitutes on every corner. Okay. Got it.

[00:12:36] You're shooting at people and you're like, you know, blowing limbs off and people are dying left and right. Robocop, come, you know, dead or alive. You're coming with me. Like it feels, it's there. You grab somebody by the throat and throw them out a window. Like, you know, you're playing an action movie. So, uh, it's actually a really good time. If you love the Robocop series, if you don't, I do hesitate to recommend it cause there's more fun action games. How long is it? I haven't beaten it yet. Okay. So I can't speak. I haven't beaten it because I was playing it for a while and then the next game came

[00:13:04] out and I was like, Oh, I'm done with this for a while. Uh, but it does not seem very long from what I understand. I think Robocop is pretty short. I know our good friend over at gaming together, Knave, he played it. I want to say the beginning of this year or end of last year, one of the two, he had a pretty good time with it. Uh, Rogue city for the main story is 11 and a half hours. There you go. So how long it beats. That's pretty nice and tight. 11 hours. Right. So not a whole lot of time out of your day. Um, so it's a fun game. Once again, if you like Robocop, you like those old 80 action movies, this will be a

[00:13:33] good fun one to kind of hop into and feel like you got the control of it. Otherwise, if you have a pulse, if you are a breathing human being, and if you like French, I can recommend this next game to you wholeheartedly. If you like the French or just you'd like French, like French, the language period. All of you both, all of you both insert the theme music here. Got it. Got it. Got it. I'll put it in there. Put it in there.

[00:14:04] Um, expedition 33 is one of those games where when we first saw it, this is not like hell divers where I was like, Oh, this looks like, you know, blah, blah, blah. And then it comes out and I was like, wow, I'm enthralled. I love it. Um, I saw expedition and we were doing it. I can't remember. I don't think we did a live review, but we were watching it together. And I was like, Oh, well, turn-based, but it looks interesting. It looks cool. You're interacting with it. This might be something to kind of keep an eye on, but I wasn't like a one day one. Let me check this out. I knew you were reticent about it.

[00:14:34] This game came out. This has the words RPG in it. Whatever. This game came out in, oh my goodness. Yeah. Yeah. It is a gripping story. First off, like I, I was not prepared for how like much I would enjoy the story here. I thought it was going to be fun to the background of the noise and the fighting and all this jet. But no, I'm, I'm honestly probably going along for the ride for the story, especially,

[00:15:04] but how well they integrate this combat for, you know, keeping you active, keeping you paying attention, but also keeping a pretty nice, Hey, turn-based, you're going to build a party. You're going to do your might, stamina, magic, all that jazz, just trying to make everything kind of make sense for you specifically, because you can do a million different builds. You know, you don't have to be me one-shotting everybody. You can do a full defensive build, full AP build, build. I've seen a machine gun build.

[00:15:30] Um, it just seems like the kind of game that very often people will say a game for everyone is a game for no one. I think expedition kind of breaks that where it's like, this is a game that honestly can be for everyone. And it is, look, I'm, I'm gonna be a little hyperbolic, but this is an almost perfect game for me. Like this game is really, really, really good.

[00:15:56] And any flaw I have with this game is immediately overshadowed by how much fun and the good things I see about it. From like the graphics to the gameplay, to the story, to the characters interacting. Like I feel like I'm getting old school, like Bioware with how some of these character interactions are happening. And I'm just like, I actually genuinely care about how these characters feel. I'm not trying to turn this into a review for the game because we're definitely going to do that.

[00:16:24] Uh, but yeah, we are all that to say expedition 33, um, is probably going to be my game of the year unless something really, really crazy comes out. Like unless something just pops off, if ghost of Yote, you know, does a somersault backflip, they have a hard uphill battle. If they really stick that landing. A hard uphill battle. I just don't trust their writers that much. I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Sony. I get you. I get you. Yeah. All that to say, Expedition 33, highly recommend it. Cannot recommend it enough. I'm playing it on Game Pass.

[00:16:54] I am very, very tempted to just go buy this game so that I can support the devs. Yeah. Sandfall, you know, cause I think, is this their first game? It's their first game. Yeah. What are you supposed to do after this? A bunch of industry veterans. And that's, that's such a cool question. Cause I mean, you know, I didn't know if you had any more thoughts on that. No, no, that was it. Nothing, you know, just because we're just going to continue the Expedition 33 hype train. I have also been playing it. Um, it's one of these games where, okay.

[00:17:21] I talked recently on other shows that I've been on a lot of the shows that I mentioned at the top during our housekeeping. I talked about how I've been facing like a little bit of like gaming burnout. And it's also just like lifestyle burnout just cause I've been in the gym a lot lately and just doing just light flexing juggling juggling a lot. Yeah. Just, just light flex. Um, but it's one of those things where it's like, I haven't made time for gaming this year the way I have in the past, like two years previously, um, where it was like really, really a priority for me.

[00:17:48] And in part of those reasons, because there's just hasn't been a lot of games that have like spoken to me and like, and of course I have everything in my backlog, you know, the Baldur's gate three meme insert the meme of like every other RPG that I have left unfinished, you know, here. But the thing is, is that I started playing expedition 33 and very, very quickly from, from beat one from, from the intro. I'm like, okay, this is different. The story that they're telling here is completely just out of left field.

[00:18:18] Like you're, it's not expecting it. It's a premise that you don't, you don't really see a lot or something. It's the, the ideas that are within the premise, of course, like if they've been explored in other ways, but never in the way that we're experiencing it here. And it's just so holistically unique. And it kind of like laughs in the face of everything that's derivative in the games industry today. Um, you know, see anything made by Ubisoft.

[00:18:41] And that's the ironic thing is that the creators of sample interactive are mostly Ubisoft, uh, former Ubisoft developers. There's a couple in there. Yeah. I don't know. Cause I think they have a team of what 30. So maybe there's like around five or so there. Yeah. Like a lot of, but it's like the leads. Exactly. Some of the leads were in there. So it's, of course it really is just, you know, it's in a lot more people than just 30 folks made this game, of course. And this is something been a little bit of discourse that's been online. Cause everybody kind of has been racking their brains about like, why is this game so good? How is it so good?

[00:19:11] Because it seems to be a game that's like, uh, just kind of taken everybody by surprise, even though it's like anybody who's been paying attention to like Xbox showcases and other showcases that have been out and about. You've been seeing them recently. We've been seeing this game and being like, oh, this is one that's been on our radar. But it wasn't until it came out this year that everybody was like, holy shit. This is like just insanely next level because it not only combines a really enthralling story with realized characters that have great voice actors behind them.

[00:19:38] But at the same time, like the gameplay of it all is just insane. And I, and you, everybody who knows me knows that that's not really the first thing that I lead with gameplay is great for me. It helps me get through games, but it's one of the things that I enjoy the games. I enjoy the gameplay so much that I am willing to beat my head against overleveled bosses at with an underlevel team and just learn Perry counters and stuff. That's how much I like it. So it's just got everything working for it. So yeah, expedition 33 is incredible.

[00:20:06] It's a must play for I think the both of us this year. Indeed. You're going to see it at all the game awards later on this year. The golden joysticks. Enjoy all the music. Yeah. Go stream the whole soundtrack. Stream the soundtrack. All eight hours of it. I've been driving in the car with nothing but expedition 33 as the soundtrack to my life right now. So it's been, it's been great. The other one that was the heralded game of the year for, for all of the fake deep, you know, journals online. I'm kidding. I'm rude. Immediately. Am I kidding? Am I?

[00:20:36] Episode one of season four. And it's like, let's just start getting saucy immediately. No, no, no. I promise not. No, but everybody has really been loving blueprints. Um, me included. Uh, besides will, will played it and he was like, I don't want to make house. Am I building? Am I my architect right now? What am I doing? Oh, that's why it's called blueprints. Hold on to me. Oh my God. Um, but no, we've been, uh, I have been playing blueprints and I'm kind of towards the end game. I'm on like day 45 or something like that.

[00:21:04] Kind of in the mid to late forties. And I've got a lot of little pieces unlocked. Uh, part about this game is obviously it's a roguelite. It's a, like a roguelite kind of like deck builder, but you're not building a deck. You're building rooms. So you have to kind of set yourself up for success. And the cool thing about blueprints is kind of similar to what you've always described to me about Obra Dinn is that it's secrets upon secrets. It's layered.

[00:21:28] It's there are multiple layers and it's, it's interesting cause like people call it a puzzle game and it has puzzles in it, but it's not really, it's like the gameplay itself. You could argue is a little bit of a puzzle because you have to make the pieces fit, but it's more, I think you would be more apt to characterize it as just a pure rogue light.

[00:21:47] And it's just making sure that you have to optimize your builds to get the right RNG, to get the things that you need in order to, you know, obviously make the things happen that you want in order to progress roll credits on the game, whatever the case may be. And a lot of people have rolled credits. It's not particularly a difficult game. It's just something that you have to be thoughtful about. One of the things I really liked obviously is the art style.

[00:22:10] It's a really cool, interesting art style, kind of like a painted glass 2d, um, voxel art, maybe they kind of in that area, but it's, it's good. It's, it's really peaceful. It's kind of like a thing where if you're willing to expose your eyeballs to blue light before bed, it's definitely like a low stim game where you can play as you're falling asleep. And yeah, it's just, it's interesting because you, there's this whole story that's going on in the background of blue points.

[00:22:36] There's actually a narrative that you're kind of like, you're this nephew of your uncle who was a great baron and you're kind of figuring out what happened to this family, what happened to your family and why everything is the way it is. And there's this whole like undercurrent that's kind of following you through the game. So really, really cool, interesting stuff that they do there. Highly recommend people play that it's on game pass as well. So you can play that or, and it's, and it's not super cheap. It's like a $20 game on steam. I bet. If you want to play that on the computer.

[00:23:04] But other than that, I've also been continuing on playing death stranding. This is like an ongoing joke of, of Will and I just the things, the things that I play that I try to finish, but no death stranding is different because I have to play this because we're doing that for pixel project radio. And I want to have a lot of clear, consistent thoughts. It's just so large. It's just so big. Um, it's what I say that even though it's like some of our friends beat in 40 hours. Yeah, it's like you can go to golden path. Yeah, you can go to path. And that's ultimately what I'll have to do once I'm done with expedition.

[00:23:34] Um, and then other than death stranding, which, which I really, I, I do enjoy pieces of death stranding, by the way, I'm going to wait until the end to see kind of what my full feelings are on a lot of the friction points for that game. But I've also went back, um, when we did the get wrecked episode with Ben Robinson to play dredge the DLCs, I got the little DLC pack. No, you're thinking of, um, Dave, the diver that they did get, they did dredge and Godzilla as like a collaboration.

[00:24:03] Um, but for dredge, they did a thing where it was like, it's just blackstone key. I think something like that. Yeah. And then the iron rig. Okay. So it's like the remote in world DLC. Yeah. Basically. So it's like, yeah, they just kind of put new markers on the map or they're adding new like situations. So yeah, the one that I played through, I still, but I played through one and that was a really cool one, the iron rig. And it's basically just like this oil rig and executives going out. There's everybody's favorite oil rig movie, but just in dredge.

[00:24:33] Um, which was really, really cool. Mark Wahlberg there. You know, he's not there. Surprisingly enough. Surprisingly enough. He didn't save the day. You're not getting my money. He didn't save the day. Okay. Okay. Moving on. Um, so yeah, I think that's everything that I have been playing. That's like super noteworthy. Did you have any final thoughts? Any, any other games that are just kind of hanging out there that you're looking at that you're, you're excited to play for the rest of this year other than Yote and not GTA 6? Yeah. Ouch.

[00:25:02] Pain. Look, look. All right. I'm gonna take, I'm gonna take a one minute timer and lose my timer. Okay. Okay. To cry about GTA 6. Let's do it. Let's do it. My heart hurts so bad. I was so ready for that game to be out. I had been waiting for that game obviously for a while, but even, I think it was maybe two years ago at this point. It's been a while. It's been so long. People forgot that it happened and people like will look at you because they don't remember that the game leaked and it was a pretty big deal for a while. Yeah. I remember that. It looked good.

[00:25:31] It leaked like right when we started the podcast, I think. I think it did. Maybe so. 21, 22. Yeah. So people were talking about it and they were like, oh my God, look how this looks. And I was like, well, obviously like it's a, you know, pre-alpha. It was leaked. It's not near gameplay at all. It's a proof of concept stage. But it was showing, you know, the characters that we now know from the trailers, but they're showing them like interacting with NPCs and like robbing people in the streets and stuff that was eventually looks like you could have done it in five, but it wasn't implemented yet. But you could see the progress, you could see the vision. So I was already like hype. I was hype.

[00:26:01] My hype has been through the roof. Yeah. And then we had the old trailer, which people will agree and they still say looked really good, looks great, gives you really hype for the Vice City area. And then I think it's new Leonida, which is what they're calling like the equivalent in that world of Florida. Okay. Or Leonida, something to that effect. However, this new trailer that came out with the now, we'll see, release date of May 26, 2026. This new trailer is absolutely ridiculous. And I'm not Digital Foundry.

[00:26:29] I'm not going to go in there and tell you about some, you know, reflective scattering. I'm not going to tell you about Ray Trace. I'm not going to tell you about beer bottles. Yeah. I'm not going to do all that because people will, either you love it or you don't like it or you get into this. You can go watch that if you like that. Go check it out. It looked good. It looked so good. And just classic rock star. These kids don't know these young bucks. They go in here and they're just like, well, whatever, it's just a trailer. It's just like all out of the game. It's not even like in engine. I'm like, y'all don't know rock star. Yeah.

[00:26:59] They've been doing in engine cut scenes since like Red Dead 1. It was a mix. I think they confirmed it was like a mix. But it's still. The whole thing is in engine though. It's a mix of cut scenes and gameplay, but it's all in engine. They don't do like, this is not, you know, the old Final Fantasies where you're playing with your characters and it cuts to like an FMV. Yeah. Of, oh wow, this game looks like it's super pretty and stuff, but it's just like an actual video and it's not playable at all. So rock star, they do that. This is what they do. I'm the classic rock star guy.

[00:27:28] So I'm just excited no matter when it comes out. I'm ready for it. I'm disappointed that I got pushed back, but I got no qualms waiting for some high quality. Look, take your time. We've been talking about all these great games. I got great other games to play, but just know that when GTA comes out, I'm wiping my calendar. He's just going to be gone for two weeks. I'm throwing things off. No more podcast. No recording the pod. Look, you're going to have to get somebody to come on here and take my place.

[00:27:54] It's Nick and insert guest for like four weeks, five weeks, and then I'll come back on and then I'll do my review. You going to take off work for GTA, you think? That's a good question. You think maybe May 26th, if that falls on, I think it's a weekday. I think it's like a Thursday or something. That'd be crazy if it was a Thursday. They don't care about nothing if it's a Thursday. No, they're still going to sell billions. Now, my question for you is, obviously, now that GTA 6 isn't here, my cat is currently freaking out and trying to attack our setup.

[00:28:24] But yeah, so are you going to play Borderlands 4 to hold you over? Get that little 2K injection into your heart, into your bluestro. No comment. No comment? Okay. Doom the Dark Ages? I don't know. I don't know if I'm going to play this year. I have to play Eternal. Full things. I played 2016? So you refused? That was 2016 when the first one came out, right? Yeah. Yeah, I played that and I liked it a lot. I've had the opportunity to play Eternal for years. I just have not. So I want to play Eternal before getting into Dark Ages. So I'm going to play Eternal this year.

[00:28:52] No guarantees on playing Dark Ages this year. Now, okay, so no guarantees on playing Dark Ages this year, but eventually you'll get to it. I do plan on eventually getting to it. I like the Doom series. Now, we all know that since Expedition has done this to you, you're full blown back into the RPG hype train. Are we going to do KCD 2? Kingdom Come Deliverance. I mean, look, if Elder Scrolls have anything to say about it, then I must, I gotta. You gotta. I gotta play a game of the year. It's just Henry. It's just him. It's Henry.

[00:29:23] Honestly, I feel like if you played it, you would really resonate with how much of a... It's not the kind of thing where I'm like, oh, I'm so against it. It looks neat. It's just I see others. Like, I don't know. I am torn because I like my kind of medieval. But if I'm going to teeter towards medieval, I prefer it to be high fantasy versus just like... Like grounded. Yeah, realistic medieval. That's kind of what makes it cool to me, though. Is that it's a little bit different. The incorporation of like the history and everything in it. But I get you. I hear what you mean.

[00:29:51] Like even with my Assassin's Creed, I like the history and stuff. But I also like jumping off of hay bales into... Well, I'll jump off rooftops into hay bales. Like I need my extra craziness. But I mean, it looks cool. I'm sure it'll do great. I think it already sold well. It'll probably be game of the year contingent. But it also unfortunately came out the same year as Expedition 33. It sure did. You know, tip my hat to you, sir. Tip the hats. I'd be very curious to see how everything kind of like plays out whenever everything lands.

[00:30:20] We'll definitely both be probably on the Little Nightmares 3 hype train. As long as it doesn't get like abysmal reviews. Because that's my thing. If people come out and they said that this is disconnected from the idea of what each of the Little Nightmares 1 and 2 and it's like a completely different story, then I'm not playing that shit. I feel you. I feel you. But if they stick the landing and they know what they're doing, then we'll go ahead and do it. But on that note, let's go ahead and transition into our topic of the show. We're talking about PAX East 2025. So let's take a quick break and we'll come back. Yep.

[00:31:11] So we're re-reviewing Boston City, huh? What's the... You gotta do it. I think we do have to do it. You have to do it. I'm gonna be so real with you. I'm gonna be so for real with you right now. That city is still kind of ass. What? No. Okay. Go ahead. I'm gonna let you land. I'm gonna let you land. To be fair. To be fair. To be fair. The weather was marginally better, especially on the day we landed. And the day we left. But during the con, it was fucking miserable, rainy bullshit.

[00:31:38] And I also made the mistake of like walking outside without a hoodie or a jacket. We also made the mistake of like going out there without a water repellent jacket either. So that's kind of a... That's on me. That's a me problem. We were rocking the Friday night game cast. We were. We gotta get updated merch. You know what I mean? We gotta do that. We gotta update everything. We gotta get some hats. We gotta get some tanks for the summer. But they just know how to take your money. Rain jacket. And I'm like... Rain jacket. Yeah. And the thing is, is that I should have bought...

[00:32:04] I should have bought that Metal Gear Solid bomber. You'd be chasing it forever. That bomber jacket. You know, I should have gotten that. Your one big regret is not getting the fucking clothing merch. How much... Okay. Here's a serious question for you before we move on. How much is... Like, how much anime and video game apparel in your closet is too much? I think you probably have about too much at this point. Damn. You have too much. You have too much. You have too much. Ah, that hurts. What do I get rid of, though?

[00:32:33] Just close your eyes. You ever seen the movie Killing of a Sacred Deer? No, actually. I haven't. It's on the list. I don't want to spoil it for you, but watch that movie in its entirety. Okay. Listeners, if you know, you know. Watch that movie in its entirety and then just do the end scene. Okay. Yeah, just do that. That makes me very sad. I don't know. I don't know what that means. I think that just means I get rid of half my wardrobe. And that's okay. That's okay. But yeah, Boston was all right, I guess. I guess. What did you think?

[00:33:02] Dear viewers, I need you to stop us right now. Go back to our last season episode where we tore Boston a new one. Oh, God. Love PAX. Love PAX. We hated it. Love PAX. Shout out to all the PAX listeners and the PAX goers for sure. I was just going to say, it was so colored by the fact that we had to drive through that goddamn traffic. Yeah, the driving was not great. Shout out to Sarah for being a champion with the, at the time, one-year-old baby. So yeah, we were putting in work there. However, I believe I've turned a new leaf on Boston.

[00:33:31] We stayed at a very nice Airbnb. Shout out to Sir Nikolai for finding us a nice Airbnb. We're on the steepest steps in Boston. Those neckbreaker 9000s. I don't know how anybody gets down those in ice. It was insane. Holy shit. They even had explicitly, they were like, when it snows and rains, be careful. Yeah, yeah. Seriously. You will die. But went in there. The place was actually really nice. It was a solid inside. The neighborhood, I thoroughly enjoyed that neighborhood. Nice neighborhood.

[00:33:58] Well within walking distance of a little shop where we got our kind of coffee, which was some of the best coffee. Blackbird, honestly, star of the weekend. It was. Star of the weekend. We live in Winston-Salem. If you don't know about Winston-Salem, we got coffee. We got great coffee shops. We got great pastry shops. We got good donuts, all that jazz. Great brunch areas. This is the brunch capital of the USA, potentially. Potentially. Potentially. Boston, Blackbird, listen, shout out to Blackbird.

[00:34:27] Blackbird, if you're listening, the team over there, please sponsor us. Please. Those that, goodness gracious, that was that sandwich. It wasn't the Galloway. What was that? It was the Gallows. I think it was the Gallows. Are you talking about the ultimate breakfast sandwich? Yeah. I think it was the Gallows. Oh my goodness. That sandwich was crazy. They threw a hash brown on it. A crispy hash brown, ladies and gentlemen. And they had some of that nice kind of tangy, spicy sauce. Yeah. With some eggy. Yeah. Yeah. It was like that. It was good. It was good. Avocado on there. Donuts were perfectly fine. They were fine.

[00:34:57] We forgot the first time to add protein. Correct. Yeah. We just got a straight egg sandwich. But when they did, it was good. Yeah. It was good. So no Blackbird. Like you said, it was the MVP of the weekend. We had really good food there. Last time we had great food too, but it was like a nice expensive dinner restaurant. This time we had more kind of like good day-to-day eats. We went to Bar Taco. Really, really delicious tacos there. That was great. With crispy bacon. Not bacon. It was beer. Wow, beer. Pork belly. There you go.

[00:35:27] Messed my tummy up a little bit. I'm not going to lie. Just a smegy. It hurt my tummy just a little bit. But what a cool, like I've never, in recent memory, I haven't really been to a bar slash restaurant scene. And that place was like, it was built and organized and run like it was a bar. Yeah, it was nice. But everybody had their own like individual table. So it wasn't like a bar. Correct. Correct, yeah. It wasn't like Lucky's. No, yeah. It was indeed not Lucky's. It was not. That was a bar.

[00:35:56] Oh my goodness. Listen, we were out and we went out to Lucky's and we had a great time there. That was great. Shout out to No Small Game. Shout out to Bo. It was a blast. However, when you walk in, you know you were in a bar, my boy. First off, 20 year olds as far as the eye can see. All 20 somethings. They didn't know shit. There wasn't a brain cell between all of them. No, the children are the future. I'm sure they're great. If you're listening to this and you're 20 years old, don't listen to Sir Nicholas. Listen to me.

[00:36:26] I'm your friend. Listen, you are our future. Please do what you need to do to make this world and this country a better place. That being said, the floor was sticky. When I stepped in and each step, I felt... It's like this Spongebob walking around in bikini bottom. I had to use force to pick my leg up and unstick it from the floor. I was like, oh, we are in a bar. We're in a bar. Yeah.

[00:36:56] It was fun. It was a good time. DJ was killing my vibe. Oh, no. We tried to do it. Cater Blossom though. Yes. Cater Blossom of No Small Games. Life of the Party. Bringing the heat. Life of the Party. Bringing the heat. Definitely. Shout out. Shout out to you. That theater background going to work. I love it. Theater background. I love it. But yeah. So all in all, bar was good for the most part. Most of the drinks and stuff were fine. Very expensive as to be expected. Food was tasty. So Boston itself, it got a couple of notches up. A lot better. Got a couple of notches up for me. I like it. I would say that.

[00:37:26] I would say that. I'm still adamant, and this is going to be on us to kind of look at expense-wise what really does make sense for us at the end of the day. But likelihood of us going back to PAX next year is like, man, we just got to get it. We just got to get, if not the Westin or the Omni, we got to get in a hotel within walking distance because it's just like, if we can avoid some of those Ubers, and even if it's not like, even if it's like just a thing that's down the road, I'd rather walk, but it's just

[00:37:56] like that, the auto hack for PAX, especially because we're fucking working there, is like, you know, we do the thing, you get overstimulated, and then you just go take a nap. Go take a nappy nap. Just shut your eyes, put a washcloth over your face just sort of a little bit, and then you're good to go. You're a new person. You're a new person. But yeah, I agree with you. It was a good time. It was much better this time around for the most part. And yeah, it was just nice being in that part of town in that little Blackstone area. It was good. Yeah. Good pizza. Solid pizza.

[00:38:25] I think it was a pizza Rome. I was trying to remember when we went out after, I think we went out after the video game trivia panel, and we went to dinner. What did you get at that place? It was an umami bowl. Oh, that's right. It was fine. I think it was more on me than it was the food itself. Yeah. Nothing against the food. It was a very dry, kind of a biryani-like bowl. Okay. Which I normally like that a lot, but I think I was expecting something a little bit more

[00:38:54] with kind of a saucy or maybe have some more texture, like a crunchy. But this was like, I was trying to be nice to my organs. We've been drinking Red Bull and eating bad food the whole weekend, pizza and all the good stuff. So I was like, let me get something. I look here, it's umami bowl. It says it's going to be mostly veggie focused, so not a whole bunch of fried chicken, which it was a chicken spot. First mistake is me going to the fried chicken place and not getting fried chicken. So shame on me. Shame on you. But yeah, I just, I wasn't feeling it. I didn't end up finishing it, which is rare.

[00:39:23] If you know me, you know that I eat my food and someone else's at a restaurant. So the fact that I didn't finish my food was a shock to me and I'm sure others. And then I didn't even end up getting it. I didn't have a little late night snacky that night with it and had to chuck it before we got on the plane. It was a bar. My linguine and clams though. You finished it, so it must have been nice. It was really good. It must have been nice. Yeah. It was really good. It was spicy. I didn't know they knew how to use spice up there. That's crazy. Just a little bit. Just a little heat.

[00:39:50] So we kind of did a little food review in Boston, Boston review, all wrapped up in one. So let's go ahead and talk about like the convention itself with PAX. We got there. So a little bit tired, a little groggy, but when we got on the show floor, what do you think? It was nice. It was a good time. We kind of hopped right into it. We hit the Airbnb, put the stuff away, got ready, and then we pretty much got right to the floor as soon as we can and started checking out some things. Honestly, it was a good setup like it was before. Obviously, some things have been moved around. I said obviously twice. Things have been moved around.

[00:40:18] However, the big hitters were there. Boulder's Great 3 was still back because still a huge giant game that people love and they like getting their merch. I think Larian has a really good relationship. They just got a good setup there. So they're just nice. Reed Pop. Saw the big Night Rain bubble. So if you know the sphere from Vegas, that was effectively it, but it was just Elden Ring. I was like, okay. Yeah. Got to get in there eventually, which we did. It was a good time. And then they had a nice big setup for Crimson Desert. It was another big group they had. There were dozens of computers.

[00:40:49] I'm still sad you didn't get the chance to play. Yeah. That's probably one of my regrets is that I didn't get the chance. I looked over some shoulders and I saw gameplay. It looks really cool. For anyone who hasn't kind of been aware or checked it out, Crimson Desert is from the same team that did Black Desert, which is more of an MMO style game. But this is very much like a single player gives me Dragon's Dogma vibes if it was a part of the WWE universe. Just because you're doing RKOs and drop kicks and a bunch of cool wrestling moves. I'm pretty sure it's still an MMO type beat, if I'm not mistaken.

[00:41:17] I think it's single player only, but I'm not sure. Okay. I could be wrong. But it looks really cool. It's very fun. I remember when I first saw the initial trailer for it, it was on a Game Awards or something to that like. I was really interested. I thought it looked beautiful. And I noticed that the frame rate was horrendous. So I was like, this game is very pretty. And I would like for them to work on the frame rate so that I can play it at 60 or at the very least 30 without it chugging and bugging. So from what I saw, it looked a lot better as far as the frame rate.

[00:41:47] Whenever you're dealing with these demos, it could be a vertical slice. So you never know. Take it with a grain of salt. That being said, it looked good to me looking over some shoulders. It looked fun. I saw lots of good gameplay. The drop kicks were there. The RKOs were there. So this is something that I'm very much looking forward to checking out. I want to say it's 25. I don't know if we have a full release date on it yet, but it's something that does have It just says 2025. 2025, yeah. So they're looking at 25. Could easily get pushed back. However, I am looking for that to come out this year. And I'll definitely give that a swing.

[00:42:17] It's very much up by Alley as far as how games look. Like I said before, medieval-ish. However, it's got enough of that magic. It's got some fanciness. There's a dragon at one point that you're flying on or attacking. So it's got to be cool. So just to clarify, they did say it's just an open world action adventure game. Okay. Looks very interesting. It looks very neat. I talked to somebody that was there with us and they said that the fighting system, it looks like Assassin's Creed is not anywhere close to Assassin's Creed. In terms of what it feels. Derogatory?

[00:42:45] Kind of derogatory, but I think it was just, and it might be a good way for you because it's a little bit more involved. Gotcha. I think in terms of maybe they are making you do more input. That's what it looks like. You can get what you want out of it. You can, it's an omnidirectional attack, but it's not a true lock on, which some people, they need their lock on. I prefer the freedom in general to be able to just kind of attack in a direction and be good to go. But I see, I see both sides. Yeah. I see both sides. But the floor looked great. It was fun. Still easy to navigate just like last year.

[00:43:11] And we're going to see, I imagine as years go on, you get there Thursday. Yeah. Do as much as you can. Yeah, for sure. Because Friday, it only gets busier. Saturday is the busiest it's going to be. Sunday and then Sunday, you might get lucky, but you know, some people are kind of leaving out. However, by then you're already burnt. You know, we've been there for four days. And it seemed mostly what we need to see. Exactly. Everything else was kind of just like you were lucky if you get to play.

[00:43:37] Anyway, I will say when we first got there on Thursday, I mean, this is just, you know, it was just a little bit of, this is a little indulgent of me to say this, but like, dude, you were so impressive talking to the developers and everything like immediately. Well, like from Nocturne was just like jumping in immediately. Like you were just so professional and like asking all the right questions. I appreciate that. And yeah, I mean, just from my perspective, I just think that you killed it, man. So I just wanted to give you your accolades for that and jumping in there.

[00:44:05] We get better at this every time we do it. So it's not easy, especially like if you don't have like, I guess, I don't know, background or if you didn't go to school for journalism, that sort of thing. But like being in here, doing the work in the field, like it does, it matters. It all matters. And that's true for everyone who thinks about doing something like this is that going to PAX is really important because it gives you that hands-on experience with talking to developers and like really learning who these people are on a first, you know, you know, on a face-to-face basis and understanding like what their motivations are behind the game.

[00:44:35] So anyway, you killed it. And I was on the same way with you. Nothing really to add on in terms of the first day of the PAX. And then it's PAX again. I was just, I was a little sad because some of the stuff that we saw last year that I thought maybe would be like repeat, you know, repeated acts that we would see kind of like the, like the new bloods, you know, booth and some of that wasn't there. But again, it's like, it's new cool stuff every single year. Exactly. So I feel exactly what you're saying there. I love seeing the folks that we kind of got those relationships that we started building with last year.

[00:45:04] And I'd like to see some of them kind of pop up and see what DLCs and what extra stuff they have. Yeah. But it's great talking to new people. That's why I love the PAX rising area, just because you get to see these like up and coming and fresh faces. Speaking of some of the games there, which we'll get into, you know, folks seeing things like Bogdan's Cross, one way.exe, Nocturne. These are just games that could easily fly under the radar. Or even if it's something that I am interested in, there's so many good games coming out. You know, you cannot play them all. You can't see them all.

[00:45:30] So I just really appreciate PAX being able to put a spotlight on some of these smaller teams, these, you know, smaller games, but just like, hey, boom, no small games. The big thing is just being able to get a chance to play around with these, get in there. And I especially love playing through and almost doing like a little bit of kind of like quality assurance while playing. Like, you know, you'll find a bug, you'll stumble across something, you'll see something and then you can let them know. And I think we saw at least maybe two or three times with other areas as well.

[00:46:00] The dev can be sitting there and like, the dev can like fix the game on the fly as you're playing, you know, they'll pull up the background and they'll, they'll fix up the code and they'll be like, all right, it's rebooting the system. Give it like a minute. And then you can start playing again and fix a glitch like kind of on there. So it's very nice. I like that. It's really cool seeing that. But there's impacts in general too, before we kind of get more into the breakdown of the games, just like always shout out to the PAX team, putting everything together, getting this out there year after year and putting those panels on. Didn't get as many panels this year as we did last year, just because as Nick mentioned,

[00:46:30] you know, we were in our official media capacity. So we were working, but it was great being able to see how everything is set up. I felt like things flowed really smoothly. Not that anything was bad last year, but it's just, I'm impressed with the amount of people that come to a convention like this and you know, their spots, people aren't fighting, didn't hear any like yelling or craziness. It's easy to get in, easy to get out. And so no, it's just a blast. Shout out to the PAX team. Shout out to the enforcers, especially those people that come dedicate their time and volunteer

[00:46:58] their time and ability to kind of keep things running smoothly. So it was nice. And also shout out to the cosplayers. I didn't notice it as much last year. I don't think I was paying attention as much. They were big last year. But cosplayers were doing great this year too. Saw lots of cool Borderlands cosplay. Saw some folks from Rivals. Even saw, it just come out, but we saw some Expedition 33 cosplays. And then even now in the background, as we're looking for videos and pictures and things, there are people that were like, oh, was that a PAX? And it was like little cosplayers that I didn't see here and there. But yeah. Shout out to you.

[00:47:27] If you're a cosplayer, you're a content creator, you're out there at PAX, you made it a really special year. There was a cool Space Marine that was there. Yes. There was an Imperial Fist. Yeah. A big yellow guy. That was awesome. That was great. Yeah. People absolutely kill it in terms of that over there. So yeah, it's definitely, the show floor is really, really cool. Down to the top three. We played a good amount of games there, but I wanted to get to your top three.

[00:47:53] I'll go ahead and kick us off for this one just because we have some stuff that's on the list here. And I think the one that I really, and I don't want to steal it from you. Go for it. Yeah. But I see what you have written down here. So definitely I want to highlight this because this is something that I feel like I'm definitely going to play and something that I was super surprised by is Nocturne. Yes. So Nocturne is really, really cool. I unfortunately should have remembered to write down the name of the developer.

[00:48:22] His name is Ben, but I was trying to remember their actual like development studio. Okay. So it's Precy Studios. And I believe, oh, so they're looking at a release date of Q1 2026. So like just the Steam description that it says the afterlife is now digital. Discover that eternal life comes with sacrifice in a genre defying RPG with unique rhythm combat. This game is really freaking cool, guys. It's it's pixel. It's a pixel art rhythm game.

[00:48:50] And it takes place in the digital afterlife where you basically play guitar hero and build up attack power in order to fight enemies that you see on the screen. That's kind of like the gist of the gameplay loop. But essentially the story is about this your main character named Karma who is looking for his lost brother. And it's about wrestling with the afterlife. He expects to find the brother in the afterlife. They're not there.

[00:49:18] And so essentially he has to and it's like a huge time skip. It's kind of like a like a Breath of the Wild Tears of the Kingdom style time to where it's like thousands of years later from where it's supposed to happen, where it's supposed to take place. And so everything is kind of like in ruins in this digital afterlife. So you kind of are going through and you're, you know, fighting enemies and trying to search for clues in order to find your sibling. You meet probably quirky, goofy characters along the way.

[00:49:45] We saw a little bit of that in the quick little vertical slice that we got to play. Got Satoru, the little fish man. Yeah. It's so good. Yeah. Like kind of, you know, like the Asian like rice farmer hat. Oh, it's awesome. Oh, it's really, really cool. And yeah, there's just it's really cool. The enemies are interesting. Let me tell you, this is I there are probably people out here there, you know, obviously the the knaves of the world, you know, shout out to knave. But like the people who are really good at rhythm games, I thought I was going to make it through. Holy smokes. Like second, bring some heat.

[00:50:15] Second enemy. I was like, I need to bump this difficulty down. I need to like dial it back a little bit because I was missing crazy notes and it started getting, you know, through the fire and flames on me. But it was fun. I really, really liked this style in the music specifically. It's what stood out to me the most on that. Definitely makes sense in a game like that. It's funny, too. You mentioned through fire and flames when talking with some of the team there. They were mentioning, I believe it was Ben specifically, who was saying that that's kind of the behind the scenes name for the expert or like the hardest difficulty is through

[00:50:44] fire and flames just because it's such an iconic song for anyone who's in that kind of guitar hero community as far as like, all right, if you could do this, you know, you can do anything. I'm sure me saying that is wrong and I'm going to get pinged to death in the comments. This song is actually harder, but just that to the layman. You see somebody playing through fire and flames on expert and guitar hero and your brain starts to melt a little bit because you're like, there's no way they're actually keeping up with it. Yeah, for sure. For sure. I'm just like how the button notes don't even sound like they're actually hitting it correctly.

[00:51:12] But no, it's really good and it's great. So definitely go recommend everybody. Check that out on Steam. Wishlist it. Take a quick look because that really does help the developers. The next game that I wanted to highlight for my top three was Demon School. This is by Yusperd Games. And I think that, you know, we both said this together of all of the games that we played at PAX. This was the one that was like, this is a Nicholas asked Nick game. Most definitely. They were like Persona and Fire Emblem. And I'm just like, I just hear it.

[00:51:42] It's like you're ticking boxes in his head. It's like, yep, rubbing his hands together. He's like, we're doing it. We're doing it. Yeah, boy. But looking at the Steam description, this is the developers, Necrosoft Games, and it was published by Yusperd. Demon School is a new style tactics RPG where motion equals action. So you defeat big weirdos in between human and demon worlds as Fae and her misfit companions while navigating university life on a mysterious island.

[00:52:10] It is really, really cool, y'all. Like this is a game that's like, it takes the best out of all of the really cool sim elements that you find in Fire Emblem. Of course, you know, I don't know how long this game ultimately will be. It seems like a game that would potentially benefit from being on the shorter side just because of just kind of the tactility and the way that they're presenting it. But I would say that this is, it's really interesting.

[00:52:37] It's a top-down isometric turn-based combat. And so the idea behind the fighting system in this game is that, you know, for anybody who's played Fire Emblem or any grid-based tactic game, the actions that you have are kind of simply character-dependent. So you choose a character and then you move that character. And where and when you move them determines what actions they do. And it's really, really cool. I actually fought a boss and I beat the boss.

[00:53:07] And it was surprising. The guy was like, that's not many people did that. So good job. And I was like, yeah, I'm a pro gamer. So, but, you know, we play this and it's just, it's really, really beautiful. The pixel art is outstanding. The music, again, really, really good. And it's got like a quirky writing style to it. Like the actual characters seem to have a lot of like just very authentic, like teenage kind of mentality that's baked into them. It's just kind of, it's refreshing.

[00:53:34] It's not, I don't see this game being as serious as a persona. It could get there. It could explore that. We talked, we asked him a little bit about that and he said, it's going to be a little bit lighter. But yeah, so. Robert was great talking to him about that game. Yeah. He really put us on. Huge shout out to Robert. I love showing to that kind of in between because I'm not historically, because it's not like I talked down on it, but it's just, I haven't really played a persona. I know people talk about the persona games a lot. I think they're great. I think eventually I'll get around to at least playing five, which a lot of people really love.

[00:54:02] But I did really appreciate, okay, you're fighting your boss, you're fighting your enemies. And then afterwards you have the chance to go back to your clubhouse or you can go back to the school and kind of talk to people. I didn't see yet, which is one of my kind of turn offs for like the persona series where you take tests and you're like doing little quizzes. So I didn't see that, but getting to interact with people and kind of build and further those relationships, I always thought was really cool in the persona, you know, getting your social links, social links. There you go. Yeah. So it looks like you can do that in this game. Yes. I love the characters interacting and talking to one another.

[00:54:30] And also that shared AP pool that you were talking about. Yeah. Working with the team. It was awesome. It was like, okay, if I want to, for example, have like, you know, not go in and do a bunch of healing because everyone's really hurt. Everyone can take three hits. It's not like you have a bunch of AP pool to kind of use with everyone and take multiple hits. You really have to be strategic. So if I need a bunch of healing, he can go in, heal the whole team, move, heal the whole team, move, heal the whole team, move. And then that's my turn instead of, you know, having my main character go in and actually

[00:54:59] do some really heavy duty punches. Yeah. I also really love that like super Saiyan mode. Oh yeah. When they were pumped up. It's so cool. You used all your attacks and it's like, okay, now you can do a super attack, which is super damage. Savage or you can heal a whole row of your people for their full life and then heal yourself to full life. I know it's very impressive with the amount of work that you could do. It's just what the four characters that they showed. And I believe they said what they were like, maybe a potential of 15 or so characters that would be kind of added in later that you would be able to play as.

[00:55:25] So it's really interesting thinking of the different kind of mechanics that you can use with the mixed and match blended characters on who does what for what boss or what fight. For sure. It was nice. Yeah, definitely a great, great thing in terms of how they paired everything. I do have in my notes here, they essentially say it's like half and half slice of life in battle. It's kind of like what it is. And so, yeah, there's a heavy emphasis on like those social links and improving your relationships with your friends. The game is structured into weeks.

[00:55:54] So completing mission during your time frame of like the week that it's in, it's kind of again, very three houses reminiscent where it's like you are able to plan out, okay, what you're going to do on different days and what objectives you're going to tackle as you go through the game. So really cool. Hits all my boxes. I'm going to be very excited for this to come out and for me to review it and just see what it's like whenever it lands.

[00:56:19] Now, I do want to talk about the very my third standout game that we played together. And it is hello, Sylvie. She said hi to the podcast listeners. Um, it's compensation not guaranteed by toga interactive. Very good one. Yep. Incredible. Um, so basically just think papers, please, but in the historic 1960s Singapore. So this is during like the post world war two reformation era, um, of Singapore at this

[00:56:46] time, all of the characters are anthropomorphized animals. Um, and you play as a character who's working for a government agency that's responsible on basically like redlining or they're, they're essentially trying to buy properties in order to revitalize, uh, the districts of the city that you're living in. And in essentially the idea is that what you have to do is you have to meet people and you have to make sure that their documentation for their citizenship and, uh, their, their title

[00:57:14] deeds match up in the information and their stories all flesh out. And this is, it's a really cool, like consequential choice based narrative game where you basically like if you, you can make decisions and sometimes these decisions cannot be good for the people that you're intending on helping, but it's the right decision that you have to make for the job. And on the other side of that, you can make a decision that's actually like, oh, well, you feel bad. Like I think I made one decision where it's like, oh, I felt bad for this one person. I'll, I'll let it go this time.

[00:57:44] It was just a small mistake. And then like my boss asked me about it and they were like, well, why did you approve this person? Oh yeah. And so, so it's really cool how it's like this, the decision making elements of the game have real consequential impacts in terms of like what it means for your character. And it just, it really imposes a lot of like real life decision making on you as the player. Like how, how would you respond to this situation? Are you going to let people go or are you going to actually play into the role of like this person in this position of authority and what they're supposed to be?

[00:58:14] Doing here. So really, really good game. Also super sharp writing, not something that I, I mean, the writing was great in the coffee talk. So these are the same people from the same developers who made coffee talk episodes one and two. But I, and while those games were good, it was just the writing here has a completely different tone. So I imagine they had a different writer or different, you know, team that was behind this, but really, really sharp, great writing. It feels really nice. Every character, cause I think you interacted with maybe three or four characters over the course of the demo.

[00:58:43] So you had, you know, like the elephant lady that you spoke with, which is one you're talking to where it's like, oh, maybe there's like a small air, we'll let it go. And then in like the dream sequence later, you know, it's one of those like, oh, it's just a small air. It's just a small air. Why don't you figure this out? It's just a small air. And it's like, oh no, they're taking advantage of me. Um, you also had like, you know, like a cat character. Yeah. I love, love that cat character. So, but she had like a nice little head wrap on and she had like the very particular way of speaking. Um, I don't know, flows very well there, but I think there's a dog that we spoke to as well. Just very aggressive.

[00:59:12] Whose children just were acting up. Yep. Yep. Just act. Kids were acting bad. Like you said, the writing is very sharp. Everyone feels very fleshed out. So I don't know. It's, um, the papers please vibe. I feel like people really enjoy. However, I don't know how much kind of games in the past between papers please and maybe now really fit the bill for what this is doing. Um, so I think this is just, if you've been along that line, if you kind of want to, you know, be someone that, that marks off and double checks things outside of VR, I know some VR

[00:59:42] games have done something like that, but it's, it's definitely one to keep an eye on. I think they said that they didn't, what do you believe it was like 2026 is what they're looking for for compensation, not guaranteed. I believe it's Q3 26. Let me check. It's Q3 25, uh, for demon school. Let me double check that. So I think they were looking for 26. So definitely keep an eye on as things get on. If you've played coffee talk, you already know the games that come out of Togia are quality. So this is just another one to add into their cap. Yeah.

[01:00:10] I think, I think, uh, Lala, when we were there at the booth, she said 26, but on the steam page, it just says coming soon. So we'll see. Very cool. All right. So over on my side had a couple of games, some that especially blew me away as far as me, not really knowing in that kind of vein of game that I would like it. Um, but I think contrary to maybe your experience with it, I actually had a pretty solid time starting off with the contentious one here. So God save Birmingham.

[01:00:39] This is a game that we kind of got like plugged into a little bit. Yeah. They reached out before PAX and they were just like, Hey, you know, come check by the booth and check this out. And I was like, well, you know, zombies I'm in. So I was like, let me go check it out and give them a shot. We went and spoke to the team a little bit and they told us to come back. I think it was like the next day. Um, yeah. It have comes and kind of set up so that we can get a chance to talk to one of the developers there and just really get like hands on. I think it was the creative director. I want to be specific on it. Um, however, God save Birmingham.

[01:01:08] I actually did have a really fun time with it. One, the game looks beautiful. It's running on unreal engine five. I can hear it now. Ooh, unreal engine. Ooh. Um, say what you want. Sometimes it's not always optimized. And of course that's depending on maybe like the team necessarily and how comfortable they are with it. But the game was very, very pretty. Um, being a game that's in early build, there were some really fun bugs. I, uh, personally enjoyed the one where your character's like torso just went limp after getting attacked sometimes.

[01:01:36] So you're like running around like wavy, wacky, inflatable arm, man. They gotta keep that. That'd be a fun, that'd be a fun, like a little add on to have there. Um, also one of my favorite ones, not quite a glitch, but it's just a part of the game there's different food items and drink items because at the end of the day, it is a survival game, which is one of those like, Hey, Will doesn't normally play survival games like rust in sons of the forest. But this was definitely kind of, uh, getting me more into it. I really appreciated some of the gameplay, but that being said, you need to eat, you need to drink.

[01:02:06] Um, you need to bandage yourself when you're hurt, things like that, just to kind of keep your character at a hundred percent. So, you know, you find some bread, you eat some bread, you find some, um, wheat and some toast and some other stuff. You eat some toast. Uh, however, everything was fully not animated. Like, Oh, you're taking the chunks out, but it's showing whatever you're eating in your character's hand and they eat it. So at one point I break into this kind of like Lord's house. It's like upper, upper society. He's a merchant. He was a merchant. There you go. And they have a large roasted pig just kind of sitting out.

[01:02:35] Obviously they were about to have dinner when the zombie outbreak broke out and started killing people. Um, I just grabbed the pig. They're like, Oh look, it's a big roasted pig. It'll feel like most of your health. So I was already kind of hurt at that point, ran through a horde of zombies. I was like, all right, let me eat this pig. It'll probably just like show me putting my hands to my mouth and then boom, I have full health. This man proceeds to pull an entire roasted pig out of his pocket and in one hand just like start shoving chunks of it into his mouth, you know, eats it in three gulps and

[01:03:04] then stashes it away. Uh, so I just love things like that when it kind of like breaks that little, Oh, this game looks really immersive. It's like beautiful. And then a very silly video game thing happens. That's like my shtick. Uh, so I would love for them to keep that. I expressly told them that, um, while playing, but, uh, the big thing is, you know, you're starting off right now. They just have the pitchfork. They are implementing as the game continues more weapons, um, different variety of things to use. They had even during the demo, you can get on some different armor.

[01:03:31] So I found a different kind of shirt that gives me a little bit more defense against the enemies grabbing me. Um, if I were to maybe not run past the blacksmith area, like I did during the game, you can actually go in there. And I believe if you work the forge, you can make yourself some armor and then you can put on that armor and just like how it should sound. A zombie grabs you when you're wearing full plate armor, they can't bite you. So it makes it so that they can't grab onto you and kind of hold you down while other zombies are trying to attack, which is really cool. It was interesting.

[01:03:59] One thing I, I don't know if you, you like emphasize it too much, but one of the cool mechanics is that like, obviously like it's a very, it's more of a sim heavy focus on like a zombie survival experience. So they do have a lot of like, oh, your hand is injured from using the pitchfork too much. Like you or the, yeah, it was, it was just a pitchfork I think that you're using right now, right? Right now. Um, and so you like, you, you broke your hand or you have a bruise on your hand. So you have to find like a healing wrap to do it.

[01:04:27] Or it's like, or if you fell down or if you got mogged by a few zombies or something like that, like, yeah, you're going to need to like fix yourself up, heal yourself. Uh, I think I died a few different ways by just like, oh, you're bleeding. You need to wrap up your wound that's bleeding. Otherwise you bleed out. Yep. Yep. So that happened a couple of times there. Uh, but it's really the blast. So ocean drive studio is the team that made it and, uh, they're working on continuing to bring it up. And I said, as they continue to bring it out, it's going to be one of those games that they continue to update.

[01:04:55] So as it comes out right now, it's just like a kind of sandbox survive. They eventually planned on putting out like a kind of larger single player focused story, which would be really interesting to see like how this town got covered in zombies. Yeah. Um, you know where this plague happened. Is this something that we could potentially disrupt or stop? Or do we just need to kill all the town while we're here? Cause that's one of the things they let us know is interesting. It wasn't just zombies popping up randomly. They were like the whole town, you know, like maybe 300 less people, what have you, um, have been infected. And there's different versions of the factor.

[01:05:24] There's large bodied men. There's people that are like walking around naked cause they got caught in the bath. Yeah. It's like scrawny ladies, um, things like that. However, it is a finite number of zombies. So in theory, you can go around the town killing all the zombies and eventually they will stop popping up because you've killed the town. A genocide run. Yeah. Straight up. That and there said, as far as what they've done right now, they haven't done a maximum or like a minimum or my maximum or like on screen for the zombies. So if you were to run around town, kiting all the zombies and then get somewhere high where

[01:05:53] they can't necessarily get to you, you could have in theory, the entire village, you know, staring up at you Allah dead rising, uh, while you're trying to escape or get away. Now I'm sure with the game looking how it is, you know, good old unreal engine five being very, very gorgeous, but very graphically intensive. Yeah. Um, your system will chug unless you're sitting there, unless you're running one of those black site FBI computers where they bought up all the, one of the alien wear joints, you know, then it's going to chug.

[01:06:20] However, I found it cool that they didn't put a cap on there that they say, you know, we're going to let you be able to kind of do all that. Yeah. So God save Birmingham, very fun, cool action survival game. If you're into there, definitely keep an eye out for it. Um, I want to say that they didn't have a like full on date, but it's the classic it'll, it'll be ready when it's ready. So definitely keep an eye out there. Aside from God save Birmingham, I had a blast playing world light. So world light here is no time to trip. This is from the team imaginary lab. They're a real small team.

[01:06:50] I believe it was three people out in Italy, but this is very fun. If you are into the monkey Island type of games, um, then this is definitely the blast for you. It's the classic, your characters in this big 2d plane, a little bit 2.5. You can kind of go back and forth in. Yeah. But the big thing you're clicking on stuff in the environment, you're trying to make things happen with the items you either have in your pack or to grab an item out of the environment to then maybe make a combination item to grab something.

[01:07:16] So one of the classics is, um, you take some tape, you take some chattering teeth toy, you put that together, you make like a whip that you can grab an item with. That's just out of reach font. And that's kind of just one of those standard moves that you can do in here. Um, however, playing as this elect, uh, eccentric inventor named Hector, you're going to be working in the heart of Venice Bay, a brilliant idea, take shape in your mind. And you're going to follow Margaret to a point and click graphic adventure, takes you to the edge of space and time to help them avert imminent danger.

[01:07:46] So the foot I played voice acting, very high quality. That's one of those games because there's not a whole lot of like crazy gameplay to distract you. The story is a big focus, the voice acting, because you're going to be hearing your character say, I can't do that. I shouldn't do that right now. Whoa, I can't do that because you're trying to click on everything in the map and it's not working. So it needs to be good. It needs to be quality. It can't make me kind of enraged by the fact that my own brain is getting in the way of me being able to progress.

[01:08:13] Um, however, playing with just Hector, not hearing Margaret quite, but Hector specifically, uh, was great working with him, hearing him play, kind of grab things, hearing how his mind works because he is an inventor. It definitely lends to you being able to put things together in the environment to make an item that can help you reach something or to further on do something. And then because of that as well, how he's thinking about the items in the environment, like a tree that grows oranges that continues to like automatically populate again as you

[01:08:39] pull an orange off or, um, a frog where you need to go find like a different kind of style off into the side is like a little piece to put into the back of the frog so he can start dancing. And then you can hit a little dab on the frog, uh, things like that just makes it make more sense for me. Once again, giving me those really heavy kind of, uh, monkey Island vibes. And it's just a very fun, I think we mentioned earlier in the episode here, if you're looking for like blueprints where it's kind of light, cozy, easy blue light, not a whole lot of stress on the eyes.

[01:09:09] I think this can easily be a game where it's like, okay, I've stressed out my eyeballs enough. Let me pop on world light. I've tried, I've tried parrying the expedition boss too many times. Let's play the world. This character's beating my butt. So it was like, let me play some world light. Let me calm down, use my brain in a different way. Not the fast twitch fibers, but those kinds of longer form, um, you know, doing some math brain tips. So, and what's nice about this too, just a quick note that I had is, uh, similar to like Balter's gate three, whenever you're pretty able to press the alt button, is that in

[01:09:38] this game, because it is a point and click adventure, you are able to like, so, you know, do a button input in like find and see everything in the scene that is selectable, that is, uh, interactable in the game. So that's, that's just a quick little accessibility note. So for people who are thinking about jumping in. Yep. So it made it nice and easy for me too, just because everything looks pretty and you don't want to get lost. So yeah, being able to see, okay, this is interactable. This is not very handy. So shout out to accessibility. I saw a lot of really good accessibility features out there at PAX this year as well.

[01:10:06] A couple of the different games we played, which is nice to see. I do love seeing that continue to be a point of focus for video games in general. Um, but of course, seeing something as like an indie where you think, you know, they're trying to focus on the game, trying to focus on this, this may not be in the forefront. However, the fact that this is something that does help a lot of people and is really getting a good focus from even like kind of the smaller developers. Um, I just really appreciate seeing that. So it's nice. Yeah. I can help people like, you know, my daughter eventually as she's starting to get into games,

[01:10:33] you know, just need this extra bit of like push to get into it and hopefully get better at it. It's important. So had world light there. And then last, we're taking it back to East bird here. We have the developers. I want to say it's Berlka. Berlka. I could be in great B-R-L-K-A. However, this game here, love eternal. Listen, y'all. I came in here, no expectations. I was just told by a friend of the show and, uh, they're Matt storm. Incredible, incredible person.

[01:11:03] So very, very appreciative that they pointed us into this team with these birds to do love eternal. So that way I got a chance to play. What I say is potentially this generation, super meat boy, just because of how much of a blast it was hopping back and forth, doing these fast twitch switches, um, trying to figure out how I'm going to jump into the air and then hit this little red crystal that then flips me back upside down.

[01:11:33] So I can then reverse gravity in the right way and not fall on a spike for the 20th time and blow up and die. Yeah. Um, so playing love eternal here, starting off, you are out in LA. You were playing as Maya. Who's just a normal girl in a normal world with her normal family going out to dinner. You go into your dinner, your parents yell at you. He's like, Hey, you don't, you hear the phone ringing. You should go check the phone. You go check the phone. You come back to the dinner table after of course, no one's on the line. Whole family's gone.

[01:12:03] Doors open. Yeah. Of course you go outside. Where'd my family go? Uh, you are now no longer in Los Angeles. Nope. You are in this destroyed, ancient looking, disgusting city. And what's the first thing you do? Well, I'm going to jump 20 feet in the air and, uh, run into the right side of the screen. Yes. So I can start hitting some spikes. Exactly. So it's very fun setup. Like I said, very super meat boy reminiscent. So if you played those kinds of crazy platformers before, also Celeste is another big one. Those platformers where they really require a lot of precision.

[01:12:33] Puzzle platforming. Yeah. Yeah. It's something that you may be used to. However, one of the great things Robert was telling us there during the playing that he got a chance to show us was that you think you may know what's going on. You see some kind of craziness happening. Um, you see some stuff with your family that I'm not going to spoil. However, he said, you don't know anything, you know, everything's still up for grabs. So I just appreciate the kind of mystery that they've set up with the story. Um, from what I understand, love eternal is a sequel to the original love.

[01:13:00] And that was just a straight platforming kind of game itself. It wasn't a whole lot of story involved. So it's going to be interesting to just to see what we can do with a more story focused part of this already really nice looking tight gameplay. Yeah. It was great. Can confirm. I, uh, when we were playing the demo, when we were playing the vertical slice, I threw Will in the deep end. I was playing, I was playing the, I played through the whole tutorial sequence and I was like, Hey, do you want to try this? This seems like really cool. And he was like, Oh sure.

[01:13:31] No, that was fun. Really enjoyed it. Really great game. So, um, those are some of the games that we played, you know, honestly, the top three for each of us. And we played a few more games in here. Of course, um, you know, Will's got one in here. I want to give a quick shout out, uh, to Krieg's front tactics. Yes. Yes. I enjoyed playing that game from Toge. They've been working on it for quite some time. It's like a pixel art armored core. Yeah. Um, armored core meets XCOM. XCOM. Exactly.

[01:13:59] So your points to use and you get into a position so that you can fire in. And it's like a, I'm talking to Lala there. You know, you get to a point where it's like, you think you're close enough. You're not quite close enough. And you go to shoot your shot and you miss. And like, lovely. Yeah. Sensational. That's great. That's great. We, we love to see that. Um, but definitely wanted to do a huge shout out to the fretless team. Um, when they were, we were there, they had a may release date, um, that I eventually saw got pushed.

[01:14:24] So they, they initially pushed that release date back just to do a little bit more QA to, to make sure that it's right. It'll come out when it comes out. It comes out when it comes out and it's going to be really good. Fretless is of course something that we've talked about last year. Incredible little, um, guitar PG, uh, that I recommend everybody check out there in place. Just got incredible music. And then, and then for, for me in my last one, I gotta, I gotta give a shout out to the, uh, rain world developers new game that they're working on airframe ultra. Holy shit.

[01:14:53] What a chaotic nightmare. That was scenario. It was really fun. It was, it was legitimate. It's just like a racing battle sim game and you get on like these little airframes and you're going on and it's like grand theft auto meets, I don't know, twisted metal. Yeah. It was a big inspiration. Sort of thing. So that, that's kind of like what you're looking at. Rain world devs, right? Yep. Yep. Yeah. So they are, uh, definitely they're working on that and it's going to be more of a co-op like a local or online co-op player focused experience, but really, really interesting, neat game.

[01:15:24] Cool. As far as myself here, taking it back to the PAX rising side, we did have Bogdan's cross, which I talked about a little bit, very fun, kind of not quite an action adventure, but it's definitely a kind of action scrolling piece. You're playing as a bear who is also a knight and you know, the whole world is just kind of anthropomorphic animals. So you're going there and you're kind of choosing between like your, your faith that you have with your Templar and your team and also like your doubt. And that's like a meter that kind of goes back and forth, allowing you to either have more

[01:15:54] strength and kind of power when you're fighting against some of those doubts or to kind of just let you be like a little bit more kind of introspective when you're dealing with some of these creatures and some of these bosses that you have later on. So it was a really nice kind of, you know, seesaw that you were working with while playing through the game. The game itself looked really nice. It was almost like a, not quite a stop action, but it did have like some of those beautiful kind of like old school kind of angles to it. Almost like if you know that like old school Lara Croft and like the PS1, but still looked fresh just because it was done on purpose.

[01:16:23] It kind of looked like more angly like that. Yeah. So I enjoy the light. And then shout out to the voice acting in it because I thought it was just like four or five different people, but we were actually speaking to a member of the team there and he was like, oh no, yeah, we just added in the voice acting and this was me. It was, you know, all I think four or five enemies that really actually kind of talked, including your main person and then a boss. It was all done by Luca. So shout out to Luca with the voice acting. Look, y'all wrap this game up, you know, get it out. It's going to be great, of course.

[01:16:50] And then I need to see you in some boots immediately doing some voice acting. Yeah. That was nice. You got to do it. You got to do it. And then aside from there with another one of my honorable mentions, when we were going through, we actually did get a chance to check out some of the games that are over on. I don't think they're all necessarily horror games, but I know there was like a big focus on the booth. But they had things like the lacerator and white knuckle. It wasn't a game that actually got a chance to play, but looking over your shoulder,

[01:17:20] I liked it a lot. And I wanted to call attention to Heartworm. Now, that was one that it was very much like a fatal frame. Like you're fighting ghost with your camera. You're fighting the controls in that game. Where are you fighting the controls? Yeah, you're fighting the controls. Like I said, I didn't play it. So I'm sure you would be able to give a little bit more as far as like the play style of it. I just love the concept. Really cool publishing studio there. They had it. It's basically just like a whole horror. Yeah, that's what a publisher is. Like the majority of them, if not all the games on that side over there.

[01:17:49] I think it was a critical reflex. I want to say something like that. Yeah, I want to actually get it right. I'm going to plug it in real fast. Let me get that and then we can add it onto here. Dread XP. Dread XP. Dread XP. What's the name of the publisher? That was the booth out there. So Dread XP bringing in some really nice fun horror. I love me a horror game. I don't always like playing them because I'm on big scaredy hours when it comes to playing games. When it comes to playing games, I'm on big scaredy hours.

[01:18:17] I love a scary movie, but sitting there. Is that why you didn't like Resident Evil 2? It's too scary. No, I don't like Resident Evil 2. Look, I'm not trying to make this. We're going to dodge that. We're going to dodge that. Episode 1, Season 4 is about to get crazy. But yeah, shout out to Resident Evil. Loved 8. Loved 3. 2 is a game. One of the best games in the franchise. Do not listen to this man. That being said, yeah, very good horror side over there. Dread XP. They had a lot of really fun games out there. So check out White Knuckle. Check out Heartworm.

[01:18:47] Check out The Lacerator. Lots of really fun things out there too. So I just want to say to that whole booth, but especially for Heartworm that I saw, didn't play, but saw. Shout out to the team there. That's one of my honorable mentions. Now, at PAX every year, they have a thing. And this is a huge problem for my wonderful co-host because he lives and dies by the completionist mindset. Correct. And every year on the PAX NAV app, if I'm not mistaken, they have a thing where over

[01:19:17] throughout the entire convention center, they put up PAX signs that will have QR codes on them. And if you scan the QR code, I don't know if it like automatically dings off a trophy or if it takes you to a little game that you have to complete, but then you get the trophy. I'm not really sure. I feel like maybe some of them are different. You can enlighten us on that. Sometimes you ding and you get the trophy immediately. Sometimes you have to play a little mini game and you get the trophy. But my co-host set out on a mission. I was like, oh, are you going to PAX this year?

[01:19:46] Are you going to get the platy? He's like, of course. You already know what I'm going to do. Who are you talking about? How'd you do, Will? I did horribly. Oh, no. There are 22, I believe, trophies. I did quick math so I could be off by one or two. 22. 22 trophies. And I got nine. Oh, nine. Under half.

[01:20:12] I wonder how many of those you missed because they were in panel rooms. There weren't a ton in panel rooms. They try to be pretty good with it. They put it outside of areas. Now, there are some that are like in far off areas. For example, last year we did the Warframe one that you had to kind of go up. Yes. We didn't go to the main theater. We didn't go to the magic thing. Exactly. Exactly. And there was one there last year. So, I'll guarantee there was one this year. But, you know, the boys were working. I can't just be running around. I was bummed that we didn't make time in the schedule to get a little shot with a bluster sword because that would have been nice.

[01:20:42] That would have been cool. That's a real trick. Again, next year, you know, whenever, of course, little tips of the trade. If any of our friends or listeners of the show do want to attend packs, it makes sense flying in the day before. Correct. That way you can get there first thing. Yep. And you beat most of the lines, most of the people who are the normal working slobs. Correct. Whoa, whoa, whoa. No. Just kidding. Delete that. Delete that. You guys are all valid. He had me on the correct train. I'm over here co-signing off on his slander. Incorrect.

[01:21:12] But, yeah. So, we'll fail to platinum packsies, which is a shame. He'll have to try to get it again next year. Yeah. We'll see what it is. So, we're going to go ahead and announce. Obviously, this is something that we're doing new for this year. Obviously, for our packs coverage and all of the games that we played, all of the numerous games from the wonderful developers that we got hands on at the show, we wanted to give a special accolade to the game that we felt like needed the most highlight. That was probably our favorite experience hands down at the show.

[01:21:41] And we wanted to give that to, drum roll, Love Eternal. Yeah. Yeah. So, again, like, and I think one of the things about this game, Love Eternal, obviously, you know, I believe that I talked about it. Will. Will talked about it. It's all, but we're the same person. It's fine. It's fine. It doesn't matter. Same thing. But I just think that it's really interesting because, obviously, it's from that same publisher, you know, doing Demon School, Berilka, who's working on this. It's got a very, very unique pixel art style.

[01:22:10] While at the same time, they're doing this interesting thing where they're playing with the understanding of, like, the reality and, like, they're bending the mind. Psychological horror is something that's, like, near and dear to my heart. And the fact that, like, we were so intrigued after getting as far as we did in the game that it was, like, one of the things where you go and you pick up the phone and the world changes and you talk to your parents and there's a little bit of, like, you know, obviously trauma that's involved with how she's working. Indeed.

[01:22:37] This has the capacity to be something really good, to be something astounding. So, I think that's something that we'll throw in there is our love eternal or a love for love eternal. Do you have any more thoughts on that, Will? Good game looks good. Good game looks good. Give it a shot. The same big thing, too, is one of the parts that we talked to Robert about is that, you know, he's looking at about a four-hour game. So, it's one of those small punchy games, though. It's a game that does not demand a ton of your time. However, it may demand that you get good at some of the movements and mechanics.

[01:23:07] Oh, you're going to have to get good. So, that's the big thing there. Yeah. It's, you know, short, sweet, and lovable. However, it has those edges. It has those spikes that you might fall onto and lose some of your coins. So, we wanted to recognize a few developers that we saw out there. Anything, notes that you wanted to talk about when we wrap this up here? Obviously, we mentioned those in passing as we were talking about some of the games, but I didn't know if you wanted to really highlight some of the folks we spoke to during PAX. So, just, yeah, some of the developers there, just in no particular order, and, of course,

[01:23:37] not all-encompassing, just because my notes only go so far. My brain only stretches so far. But we had, you know, Fidei and Gus and Mo and Luca out there with Bogdan's cross. Great folks. Great folks to talk to. Really nice.

[01:24:05] Very fun talking about horror movies and different, like, things that would inspire them, kind of internet-wise, because that whole game was almost like a, I think you mentioned, what's that one game that you played with the creepy bear? Danganronpa? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Like, it looks like it's kind of like that. Not quite, of course, however it has that vibe. But the big crux is that it's different eras and ages of the internet, and that kind of inspires each of the different people in the areas that you're going into, because you're

[01:24:33] stuck in this unfinished game. And that's kind of like the point. You know, not getting into too much spoiler territory. However, Spider and his wife there gave us a great kind of overview. We talked a little bit about the different horror elements as well. And then I got a nice horror recommendation for a movie. So, I'm going to be checking Beneath the Mask. That's going to be a fun one. Yeah, that does sound really good. And then we already mentioned there with Nocturne, we had Ben and Kelly, and they were great talking to there, just kind of getting caught up on that game.

[01:24:59] Very excited to see some of that musicality come into effect with the RPG-like elements. You know, we were seeing, of course, the classic. It was like things like Chrono Trigger. Big draw for that. You can see that with some of the art, and you can see that with some of the different kind of setups for the RPG mechanics that were available. For sure. But aside from that, I mean, I really enjoyed even checking out the section, just going back

[01:25:25] to Toge and looking at how they really started to introduce some of the kind of Southeastern elements. Because I had personally not played Coffee Talk. So, I guess you'd have to tell me kind of off, you know, how much of the Southeastern influence is maybe in Coffee Talk there. But it was very apparent, and especially to some of the kind of political sides of compensation not guaranteed. So, just being able to bring in some of those things that may not even be easy to talk about in real life, but kind of making it playable, making it real, and then giving it more of

[01:25:54] a serious tone while also allowing you to play a game and kind of get a lot of that. It's almost like that escapism that isn't quite escapism, but I think they toe a line. That's very nice. They kind of thread that needle very well. They definitely do. Yeah. And it's definitely, for what they're trying to accomplish with compensation, not guaranteed. I think it's going to be really, really nice in scope. I don't expect it to be a super long game either. But it's just... But nice. Lots of replayability as well. Lots of replayability.

[01:26:22] And also, it's just pairing that authentic, kind of like the authentic historical and like cultural just background in that game and like pushing that to the forefront is unlike some of like what we have seen before. So I think that definitely is something to keep an eye out. Also, huge shout out to Lindsay, who we spoke to, who went above and beyond for us whenever we were playing Royal Light. She was the one that was...

[01:26:49] She was communicating with the developers for the game who are over in Italy. And so, yeah, she did a great job over there trying to make sure that we understood everything that we needed to. Yeah. And then we're looking forward to seeing maybe some return faces next year. Indeed. And if not, meeting some new faces in PAX 26. So really, really excited. And shout out again, if we didn't say it at the top of the show, everyone that is in the

[01:27:19] gaming community that is doing the content, everyone that we saw, obviously, Kate and Emily from No Small Games. Obviously, we saw Dave Jackson there. Met some wonderful folks, Asa Greenwood, and then met the folks over at From 6.1 Indie, Kyle Stephenson, and got to shake hands with Mike Townsend, and a few folks. Just all kinds of people across the board. It was really, really great. Also, shout out to Jacob McCourt. Of course. Of course. Killing it. The trivia king. Killing it. Here's the thing.

[01:27:48] Here's the thing about PAX. There are a few panels that you just don't miss. Indeed. And if Jacob McCourt is hosting one of those panels, that's the one you don't miss. Yes, yes. Go to your Giant Bomb. Go to your Greg Miller Presents, whatever, you know, interviews. If you need to see Ben Starr again, you can go ahead and see Ben Starr. Just kidding. We love Ben Starr. But no, seriously, like, you know, definitely a great time over there and being able to see everybody. A huge shout out to Kunai and Danny. We saw Danny again this year. Yeah, sure did.

[01:28:18] So, definitely. A lot of the people we had on before, and hopefully we go on some more of their stuff. Yeah. And it's just great being able to interact with these people in person and see them after, you know, spending so much time over the interwebs. Exactly. Playing different games, things like that. Exactly. And then there's new faces, those, you know, got a chance to talk to some of those folks like Bo. Yeah. It was nice to know meeting people and hopefully seeing them in the future as well. Exactly. We're not just digital. You know what I mean? We're, we're. We're IRL. We're IRL. We're IRL. Friday night. R-I-R-L. IRL cast. Isn't this a mouthful?

[01:28:47] We'll workshop it. We're workshopping it. Well, folks, that's going to be it for tonight. I want to give a big thank you to all of our listeners. If you've enjoyed our content and you want to support us further, please feel free to leave us a rating review on your podcasting platform of choice, whether that's Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or Good Pods. But until then, Will, if people want to reach out to you and tell you that you're not going to get the Pax East 26 trophies next year, where can they find you? They'd probably be right, unfortunately. I'm busy. I got things going on.

[01:29:16] However, if you want to come chit chat, I'm over on Blue Sky. It'll be at KingZoZotai.BSKY. Social. You can also find me over on Twitter. That's just RealKingZoZotai. I believe that's it. Is it underscore? Nice. You got to remember. I think so. I think so. Something like that. RealKingZoZotai. If you find me, you'll find him. You'll find him. You'll find him. We're the same person. We're like cousins. Nikolai at night and then just at FNGCPod over on Blue Sky. There you go.

[01:29:45] But until then, everybody, please keep gaming, take it easy, and we'll see you next Friday night. Deuces.