New Game Coming in God of War Universe

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1:03Hey everybody, welcome to Game S mornings with me, Jeff Grubb, your host from giantbomb.com. Thank you for tuning in in this episode, we're going to be talking about more games launching this week to glowing reviews and do we now know what the next game from the God of War team is? It's going to be a good one because we have John Martin on the show, John, how are you doing? Doing well, Grubb, I am doing well. It has been an interesting couple of weeks, but there has been a lot of time for video games and there's been a lot of video games coming out. How are you doing? I'm doing pretty good, I can't stop playing Requiem, you know, I beat it like two weekends ago, played it, I played through the first half, like three or four times now, once on PC, then I restarted it on Switch again, and yeah, man, that game is just real good. I kind of can't wait in some ways for some backlash because I just want to see what people

2:05have to say, who have different views for me. I'm like, who are the people who don't like this game? I'm sure they're out there and it's kind of hard to post that on social media without sounding sarcastic, oh, I can't wait for the backlash, but I kind of can't because it just feels like, oh, this is what one of these big budget event games should look, play and feel like, and who's got the alternating opinion on that and why? Like, what do you want that's more interesting from big AAA games? In the meantime, I just feel like I'm feasting. Such a good game, have you been spending any time with it? Yeah, so I actually got to try it a little bit yesterday, I had so much to do over the weekend, but I got to play through, I think probably the first hour or so in Switch 2 yesterday, it was fun, I got to borrow my friend's copy, and yeah, that game is great. I honestly, I think it's the first time I've really felt like the character is representing my emotions. I feel like Grace is how most people would actually react in a Resident Evil game and never happens mainly because they're like all military ops or they're just so focused on

3:07the next thing, but like, yeah, no, Grace shaking, Grace, that intro sequence just, I don't know, I am excited to play with her. It feels a little bad, they threw like the people in that game through her in that situation, but I don't know, like maybe they knew Leon was coming or something, I haven't gotten pretty far yet, but I got through that first Leon's action and that was very fun. Yeah, it's Resident Evil, there's always more going on, that's how it is, but yeah, I'm really enjoying that game quite a bit, continues to run great on the Switch, and boy, it looks pretty nuts on a 5090, you've got to say, took me a second, it was broken a couple of times when I was trying to boot it up, it was crashing, especially when I would try to turn on Path Tracing, which is like why am I playing this game if I can't have all these features on? So yeah, eventually got it working, and it's, yeah, looks incredible, kind of hard to be like, okay, do we want things that look better than this? I don't need it, that's for sure. All right, let's get into things by explaining what we do here, we're Giant Bomb, we're a small team of internet video game

4:12doofuses, trying to make things work because we are also independent games media out here on our own, we need your help, go to giantbomb.com slash join, become a premium member, and help ensure that we can continue making the stuff that we want to make, that you want us to make, you can also get ad-free shows, you get some other goodies, you get grubs next premium, nine lives of Mr. Mustafa Lee's, you get the Mary Meetoma Dotchy, which is going to be happening again this week, you don't want to miss it, it's the best dating show on the internet, there is a lot of fun and cool stuff happening and you could be a part of it and ensure that we can keep doing it by going to giantbomb.com slash join, become a premium member, thank you to everybody who has, it means the world to us if you can't, no worries, tell a friend about the site. As far as this show goes, most weekdays iJeff grub will help piece your gaming life back together, that includes breaking news and maybe even some of our own original reporting for all these topics, I'll get the input of a bonafide expert who will make me look smart, if you are watching live on Twitch, welcome, you can always listen to the show later on podcasts feeds by searching for

5:16game mess mornings or find the rss feed on giantbomb.com, you can also catch the show later with chapters and timestamps on youtube, hello youtube, all right, we have a lot to get into so let's start the morning mess with, well actually I have this other one written down here, let's do this real quick, there was a bunch of stuff popping off about bloodborne over the weekend, John, that kind of just can't, won't go away, the latest is kind of something that I think people have been listening to this show for years, I've been saying, it seems like the key lies with from, with my diplomatic way of saying, this is on from not Sony necessarily, not that Sony is blameless in this or whatever, people want a bloodborne remake remaster, re-release anything, John, and it's not happening right now, I've said that over and over again, nothing's happening there, Jason Trier had a report basically saying that blue point did multiple pitches for bloodborne over the years, the most recent one, Sony was like we scoped it out, we say yes, the money is there, when we're doing the map,

6:18it all looks good, let's make it happen, and from soft came in and said no, and there's some back and forth there, but that is what happened, John, like my understanding is that's how it went down, now is it like, Sony, it was like a hard no, well no, because bloodborne can't be stopped by from software, if Sony wanted to push ahead without from, but it's complicated, like why would a business partner like Sony want to upset a potential, you know, gold mine of working with from soft again in the future, they wouldn't want to do that, so it's kind of a one of those situations where yeah, like technically Sony doesn't need to listen to what from software has to say, but they are probably better off doing so because keeping that respect between the two sides is more important long term, how do you feel about all this? Yeah, I mean, it is unfortunate that it happened, I mean, blue point, I don't think it should have resulted with blue point being shut down, but at the same time, like I totally get where they are coming from, it is that business relationship you don't want to sour, like Miyazaki and Placish

7:24were like super tight in the beginning of the PS4 generation, and even I always forget, but there's some like crazy doll VR game that Miyazaki directed for PSVR, that like kind of mentions Bloodborne, so it's clear like they weren't done with exploring that kind of universe. I just think it needs to be in Miyazaki's hands, or at least that's how he sees it, it needs to get like that gold seal of approval, but yeah, it's interesting because like a lot of times when I think about like why it doesn't Dark Souls do a lot more crossovers, like why aren't they in Smash, why don't why in like Soul Calibur or Tekken in something like, since it's a Namco Bandai game, like why don't they put those characters in there, and it does seem to be like we just want to, they do all this work for us, they bring in so much money, why would we want to upset that? Yep, exactly, is the game and Rich Bad at Games wants me to pronounce this, Derasine? Derasine? I don't know, yeah, I'm not sure, yeah, the one that for PSVR, I think is what we're saying. Yeah, so the other side of this

8:27is that some companies, some publishers are calling up Sony to ask about maybe acquiring the remnants of Blue Point at this point, like there are still people who are there because the studio is closing down in March, and I guess you could bring back those other people, that's early word, who knows if anything happens with that, but Blue Point was well respected around the industry for their technical know-how, I'm sure that still has a lot of value even if Sony couldn't make the math work, I bet other companies will look at it and be like, we can, and we're going to go for, you know, had Blue Point stayed independent, like they would probably just still be taking on contracts and making stuff pretty regularly, and would probably still be operating, so it seems like a real shame not to find some landing spot for that studio, although why Sony didn't consider that in the first place, who knows? All right, let's get into the actual headlines here, Pokemon, Pacopia reviews are in, it is at an 88 on open critic, as, you know, again, review scores are what

9:28they are, they don't matter all that much, but we always point out on the show, it's very hard to get anything in the higher end of the 80s on a site like Open Critic that's collecting all the reviews, you can only do that if you get stuff like a nine out of 10 from Red Valentine at IGN, who writes Pokemon, Pacopia is an enjoyable personality-packed building simulator set in a surprisingly deep world that is stuffed with fun things for its delightful ditto protagonist to do and create. As a reminder, this is the Minecraft lights crafting life simulation game with like Viva Pinyata vibes that takes place in a Pokemon universe where you place a ditto who is pretending to be a person who is raising other Pokemon in abomination, as we all know. Three stars out of a potential five, I believe, from Stacey Henley at the gamer, as ever with Pokemon, there is enough charm to see it through and the mechanics aren't shallow, even if they're used in aid of the same few tasks over and over again. It's Pokemon's take on a bunch of other villager games,

10:32it's not quite as good at, but if you persevere, there is a game waiting for you here, you just have to get to the actual game, you have to get the actual game over with first, interesting. GameSpot has a review that is a nine out of ten and says Pokemon, Pocopia, gives you a massive amount to do and a story that propels you forward while also letting you enjoy the simple pleasure of living among your Pokemon friends and building your perfect community. I feel like I've barely scratched the surface and I can't wait to keep exploring. I'll get Squirtle back yet. I'm pretty good reviews. First thing I want to ask you though, John, is how do you say Pocopia? Yeah, Pocopia. Yeah, right? It's like dystopia, right? Oh, is there a discourse around the pronunciation? There might be a discourse out here. I don't think anyone in chat, I think we're getting it right is the thing. I think it's got to be Pocopia like dystopia. But I have seen some other takes on it. I'm like, oh, okay, no, I don't think so. I say on the show, it's correct. This is the end all be all. This is the authority. Right, exactly. Right in the Bible.

11:36Exactly. Bible too. This is how you say Pocopia. John, how are you feeling about this game, however? Yeah, it's weird because it like really did kind of come very quickly around where it kind of was the silly thing. We were waiting for like a bigger Pokemon switch you game. And then like, yeah, the groundswell really did start with the Dragon Quest Builder predictions. I am honestly shocked. I mean, I'm shocked that as far as I know, I think this is the highest rated Pokemon game. Ever? Like I was looking into it and I really thought some of those earlier ones would have ranked higher like Ruby and Sapphire is like an 82. I think Pokemon X or something back in like 2013 was the next highest. But yeah, I mean, it really does everything I would want out of this kind of game. I lost so many hours last year to fantasy life. I kind of a similar animal crawl ish animal crossing ish world where you are kind of improving your island, your land, but doing

12:36a whole bunch of other stuff. And this with the blend of Pokemon definitely seems like it's fantastic for me. I and I really am curious about a couple of different things. So but like for $70, it is interesting, but it seems like there's a lot more meat here than even I was expecting. Like there's a story, there's a campaign. It really does feel like this was probably going to be the anniversary game. And it's where they didn't like market it a little bit harder in the beginning, but I think people came around to it. Yeah, I it does feel like I can begin to understand a little bit better while Nintendo was like, Hey, let's just do a Nintendo Switch 2 version of Animal Crossing for the early part of this year and then give this pacopia a game of chance to really breathe because there's a strong chance here that this has a breakout moment for a Pokemon spin off. Obviously, Pokemon sells incredibly well for the core games and the spin offs, but this feels like it could

13:38be something like an animal crossing where it just takes off and a lot of people jump in on it. It builds up a culture of its own. And next thing we know, it's another 25 million selling game for Nintendo and the Pokemon company. I guess I like what I hear about this game. This it sounds very cool. I'm going to try to force us over here to do a multiplayer stream because I you know, it sounds like it's got strong online multiplayer features. And I think that could be a lot of fun. So yeah, I'm getting ready to play this looking forward to it. It launches later this week, right? It's on the fifth, right? So Thursday. Got it. All right, looking forward to it. We'll see more reviews came in as well for Esoteric Eb, which is one I hadn't heard about until I saw the reviews. It also has an 88 on open critic. It is my understanding like a computer RPG, sort of like disco, Elysium, but they're trying to do even more of the hey, this is what it feels like to play a tabletop RPG. And that's definitely something we've seen more and more games going like

14:44trying to capture. And many have gotten pretty close. Sounds like this one is right there in that pantheon of like, hey, they are nailing what they're going for. Got a nine out of 10 from Shane Limbaugh at Dual Shockers. No relation. I got it. I won't be honest. I saw that. I'm like, let me just double check, make sure this is not Rush Limbaugh's grandson. It was very relieved to find out Rush Limbaugh did not have any children, everybody. That was a great sense to read. Yeah, all right, something nine out of 10 from Shane at Dual Shockers. Sorry, sorry, shame. While it doesn't offer up information on completing quest, it does give you the freedom to explore the world and characters. If you're a fan of D&D looking for something unique with some solid writing and good humor, then you won't find a better game to play than Esoteric Eb. Got a nine out of 10 from Matt so in it. So whiskey at console creatures. Esoteric Eb is incredible saturated with fantastic writing and memorable characters. It's systems blend CRPG and TTRPG in clever ways and in 4.5 stars

15:46from three to play. The disco Elysium-esque gameplay of Esoteric Eb provides a blank canvas for a colorful 2D graphic style that feels a bit like an interactive comic and often creates an interesting balancing act between style and content. I have very little bad to say about Esoteric Eb. The only thing I still find difficult even after many hours of gameplay is navigating the different areas and moving from one to another as well as the questing tree, which is a bit rough in use while looking gorgeous. But those are really just minor things recommending such a story driven game without spoilers is always somewhat impossible. So to put it mildly, the visuals are awesome. The music is great and the story is absolutely wild. Esoteric Eb is really good. Okay, I'm sold. I want to see at least want to see someone play in this game and like get like, oh, talk to some people I trust and see what they think. Like I would love to have Austin Walker's take on this. Say what like you're the guy that I think I want to think about the crossover between video games and tabletop RPGs. What do you think? And then for someone like me who has

16:52an interest in those things. I'm like, I can imagine myself having fun doing both of those things and I often do, but I'm not like in that space. So I would come out with a critical eye. I bet for me, this is going to hit pretty hard. How about you? You have any interest in Esoteric Eb? Yeah, not a game I had ever heard of until I saw it on the docket for today, but it does look gorgeous. For these kinds of games, I'm always just so interested to see like every single kind of dialogue option. So I've never beat these kinds of games, but I just like playing like characters I feel I could exist in the world, which honestly in and of itself can sell me on a game. And yeah, like when I think of these like kind of tabletop games or trying to translate a tabletop games like a sleepers citizen or disco at Liseum or something like that, it really does come down to the art and how much I want to exist in that world. disco at Liseum makes me kind of sad. So yeah, like sleepers citizen and this looks kind of perfect for me. And there's not really much

17:59else to say. It's just I'm so fascinated by like kind of the mic mignola, like kind of pop art kind of deal. I guess yeah, more colorful than that, but I know what you mean. Yeah, it's it's it's a strong look. Yeah, I'm definitely curious to try this out. Or like I said, hear what some experts have to say. All right, excuse me. Let's get to this next one as we get into some news stories now. Nintendo indie world March 3rd is announced. It's happening March 3rd. It'll be roughly 15 minutes of news and updates on indie games coming to Nintendo Switch 2 and Nintendo Switch. It starts tomorrow at 6 a.m. Pacific time 9 a.m. Eastern. Jay, why don't you just sleep through that one? I got that. We'll try to talk over it. I'm just seeing this now or I saw it right before the show started. So we'll figure it down. Probably do a talk over. But yeah, 15 minutes, you know, this could be the kind of thing where it's like all new stuff we hadn't heard about before or maybe an update to like silk song. It's like, oh, here's an update in silk song that's coming

19:04soonish. We'll tell you about it here. That could happen, but that's that seems unlikely. It's much more likely that we're getting a bunch of games we just never heard about from a bunch of studios that want to put out stuff on Nintendo. And I always look forward to these. Often some of my favorite games come out of Nintendo indie worlds. How about you? Yeah, no, absolutely, and especially like the timing of this is like right before PAX East for me. So I'm excited to check some of these games out that are going to be there. There's always the games that you kind of hope are here. Like, I do hope you hear more about like, I guess play the Spire 2 isn't confirmed. And I think it's launching in early access, but that would be great. I would love so many different games. Me know the Hollywood, although that game kind of feels like it's a little bit bigger than like a 15 minute kind of showcase. Right. That's definitely where we are with a lot of these. Yeah, but like a lot of ones that we would name drop almost feel too big for Andy Rolts at this point. Yeah. Yeah, though. I mean, those would be cool. I'd love a replace. I'd love an Abyss X zero or something. But I mean, I'm honestly just looking forward to the different voices around the world, which I

20:07think has kind of been like a feaming that they've done recently. It is like so diverse of the viewpoints that are getting reflected in these kind of showcases. So even though it's only 15 minutes, I think we'll still at least have three to four games that really do just like kind of speak to all of us. Yeah, same. And it's like, you know, there's always a chance that like we get like a golf story or something. Yeah, it's like, oh, yeah, we're early on in the switch to there's still some space for one of these tiny games to blow up and become sort of a signature game for the switch to Nintendo has hasn't like like given themselves to that concept. They've embraced it somewhat and you know, with with Hades and then really supporting Hades to and a handful of other games that are kind of in that realm for them where they're like, oh, we see that this is selling very well in the switch. We want to sort of take it under our wing and they at the very least sort of try to make a fertile ground for that to happen again by showing stuff off in an indie world or would have you. All right, moving right along. Here's here's one Santa Monica studio Santa Monica studio is working

21:10on a new series in the God of War universe reports suggest. This is from Haley Williams at GameSpot. Rumors about the next project helmed by Santa Monica Studios Corey Barlog have been making the rounds since 2021, but a fresh influx of information information suggests the project will be a new franchise set within the God of War universe in a LinkedIn post that has since been deleted but not before it was screenshoted and posted to the reset era forums. A former senior writer at Santa Monica said that they had helped shape the narrative vision and creative direction at Sony Santa Monica for a new franchise within the God of War universe. That's how they put it. The LinkedIn link has been backed up by other reliable sources and seems to fit with prior rumors about the about the project industry insider Nate the hate posted some information to Twitter saying he's heard that the game will be set in God in the God of War universe and will feature Faye as its protagonist. He also said that the game will have more of a focus on action than those God of

22:13War God of War Norse games. Nate added that he expects the game to be announced this year with a release following in the first half of next year. This timeline would fit with comments made by Kratos voice actor Christopher Judge who recently said that Santa Monica studio would be revealing its next game this summer. Rumors also make sense of comments made by prominent industry reporter Jason Shryer who said that Santa Monica's next game is not a new IP but might feel like one. Shryer also recently reported that Sony wants to expand the God of War franchise into an MCU like universe with sequels and spinoffs all right. This is one of those ones where like I bet when we see this everything we're hearing makes sense where it's like like oh this looks like a completely different game but I okay I see in these small little instances how it wraps back into a larger God of War lore but the idea here of like doing an MCU sounds I don't know very like it sounds stupid it sounds

23:17stupid but but I think for someone who's actually like working on this what they mean is we want to establish these things that like pay off if you are paying a lot of attention but like those early MCU movies where it's like they obviously could all just stand on their own and this game I expect them to be like it can stand on its own you can come to a completely fresh you don't have to have played the other God of War games but if you have there's things there for you and then down the line they're probably imagining having them all intertwined into big stories or whatever super games super games but okay on its face as we know about it now which is not much but you know enough to kind of talk about it how do you feel about this yeah it's interesting because I mean I think the the talk for a while is that it was going to be more of a science fiction game but like at the same time as soon as we learned about intergalactic it would be like are they moving from just like kind of old school or more so just like modern modern day to future or six stuff so I think it is kind of

24:18cool that it is going to be within the realm or I guess flavor of fantasy to a certain extent it's not necessarily the direction I would have expected to go especially because I feel like the God of War brand has been around for such a long time and it now is known to redefine itself whether it's a good red definition with like Norse games or a bad redefinition with that Metroidvania game that just came out it's interesting right because I think a lot of us were expecting some sort of direction to go with maybe an atreas game or something like a smaller game so doing it with Faye who is Cretus's wife I believe I'm flavored Debraan wolves that's that's certainly interesting because I mean like if anyone is interested in God of War 2018 they know that she's dead like that's the first scene of the entire game so where they would go with this is interesting I I don't know where it would go if it is literally in Valhalla if it's she's just esokite into another location

25:21or whatever it could be could be a could be a prequel right because she was always a warrior a warrior is my understanding but I mean you know it's one of these if they want to like have these things wrap into one another you write they probably want to take it into the future she could easily be fighting her way out of whatever like oh she's in Valhalla and then she gets taken down into paintings whatever the version of that is in Norse mythology it is just hell with one L right what oh yes hell with one L yeah okay and so yeah so they would you she could be fighting out of there and you know Cretus like it starts off the thing being like I know she's in there but I can't help her I'm not allowed in there and it's like okay well let's just watch her save herself look I I'm not a huge fan of the 2018 God of War game I I thought it was fun to play for a handful of hours and then I kind of like I get it that not that's not a negative sort of review it's just me being like oh I get it I don't need to play this whole thing to get the rest of it so I'm not the right person to come here be like oh this sounds cool is it gonna be like a

26:23character action game is it gonna play more like that's original God of War games that would be I'm hoping I think I mean too I would I'm hoping for that that sounds pretty cool they could do some really cool stuff with that uh bring back Deborah and Wolf she will give herself to it like she does like she's a great like ambassador for like tabletop role playing games yeah I bet she would like take this character under her wing be like yeah let's grow it and do more with it I have seen a lot of people be like who asked for this all some of it in chats all some of it oh you know around this morning some of it is definitely coming in from from a place of like who's asking for this and then some of it is oh great a God of War game with a woman at the at the helm and I haven't seen any of that in chat to be clear of course ain't probably yeah it is um yeah look we get told let's talk about the reasonable side of it fuck the chud's yes people were like hey no actually who asked for this uh kratos is basically play stations mascot do you think a God of War game can work without kratos yeah I do because at the end of the day like

27:23when you think obviously he is an iconic character in those original three games I don't think anyone came to those games for kratos like I think it was for the gameplay like he was like one of the most unlikeable characters because he's just screaming and murdering and like I love to play those games but I wouldn't necessarily I came to them for like him the story by itself like I think the stories are what elevate that character um and even in 2018 like seeing the growth of kratos into an actual character I think was the best part about that early game until you got to just all the crazy powers and boss fights in the spectacle but I think it can work alone um especially if it is I think one of my biggest criticisms for those like two new games was the RPG mechanics like it was fun I loved having a skill tree but after a while it's like you're in menus far more than you should be in a game where you do you just want to like tear apart the environment um yeah I think there's absolutely a niche there hasn't been like devil may cry takes breaks for like 10 years

28:28I don't I don't see why we couldn't have any other badass action game just coming out right and this is you know this is not the Ragnarok team so uh I think there's a lot of people like oh great so we're not going to get the next kratos game until whenever well probably yeah probably not because the games take forever to make anyhow but it was we always were under the assumption that the Ragnarok team was going to sort of continue that series forward in whatever way and bell rug was a bar log excuse me was off working on the sci-fi game is what you know yeah you write the rumors were we're early on although that was always just like people just talking I guess um and then it's okay so yeah they're doing something else and out here that it's like oh no it's still is a god of war game and then to hear well not really it's it's it's gonna feel like a new franchise that's how everyone keeps putting it despite the fact that it takes place in this universe and it's like okay it's going to be like a new superhero getting written by Marvel eventually they'll end up in the adventure so whatever whatever but for now they're getting their own run and it's okay I can kind of see that being like something that it makes it easier to get a lot of money to

29:31make a game under a Sony right now that is just like every company in the space very risk of averse um yeah I we'll see it soon it sounds like and I bet most people will be happier if they just wait until they see it before they start judging it so let's just wait and see all right uh let's take a break plenty of more headlines to get into including hey what's what's PlayStation 5 have happening here pretty soon and people are accidentally resetting their Pokemon leaf green and fire red progress we'll talk about all of that after these messages if you want to skip out on these ads you could do so go to giantbomb.com slash join there you can find ad free versions of the audio and video shows in the meantime we will be right back hey it's Cole Swindle and when I spend 200 days a year rolling down the highway the bus can start to feel smaller than a guitar case everyone wonders how I stay chill while the hours crawl by truth is one good luck spend on

30:32chamba and suddenly the trip does a whole lot shorter finding your space even when there is a much despair need some chill let's chamba no purchase necessary bgw group void were prohibited by law 21 plus TNC supply sponsored by chamba casino coffee genius here most people see a busy cafe but I see precision at every step thanks to genius from global payments transactions instant inventory precise operations in sync absolutely genius from sold out crowds worldwide to managing the morning rush genius keeps operations running smoothly one potato flawless poor perfectly timed just beautiful big league reliability for any business that's genius at the ups store reinsure your small this stands out with a variety of high quality paper stock options banners posters for stores and more most locations are independent leoned product services pricing and hours of operation may vary see center for details the ups store be unstoppable coming to your local store today and get your print on we're back it's game this morning's

31:36Jeff grub john martin let's do this starfield on ps5 release date confirmed quote unquote by reliable insider this is from Chris scullian at vgc the release date of the much rumored playstation five version of starfield has been given its strongest backing yet from a reliable insider last month polish site ppe.pl cited its insider uh grachadari uh who's who it says handled physical game sales in europe and previously correctly leaked information on the release date of oblivion remastered physical copies the switch to port of sonic racing crossworlds and the ps5 port of microsoft flight simulator the report claimed that the ps5 version of starfield is expected to get a physical release on april 7th but some players have noted that while grachadari has been right with some things in the past they've been equally wrong with other things now however deal labs writer bill bill coon who has a far longer and more accurate track record of consistently leaking

32:37software release dates they seem to have access to some retail back end or something has also stated that starfield will get released physically on playstation five on april 7th lending more credibility to the claim okay yeah uh starfield is one of those ones where i i just think most people have put it far behind them there are probably a lot of people on playstation who have not played the game and never had that relationship with it because they're like i don't mean whatever right there's i'm not it's not on my system i'm not even gonna think about it uh do you think that they've done enough that they have a chance to sort of recapture excitement about this game i mean it's never going to be the game that everyone thought it could be if it hit on all quadrants or whatever but could at least sort of like have a second wind here yeah i do think so um i mean granted it just being a Bethesda game were like the first Bethesda game that was been on a playstation console in i guess Bethesda game software like this is the first game since fallout four that's released on

33:39the playstation console so i think despite what everyone hears they do want to see it for themselves if they do uh release it as more of a bargain game um in terms of like it would cost like 60 uh instead of 70 because it has been out for so long i think that would do wonders but yeah there's always going to be an audience for these kinds of games um a lot of people just buy it off the name alone um yeah i i think so but i i don't think it's gonna change anyone's perspective no matter what the DLC they have in the future is going to do no matter that and i think they've kind of like they're fine with that at this point they are just kind of so shifting focus towards uh elder elder scroll six then you know that's gonna happen yeah uh yeah you mentioned it the pricing billbacune reports the standard edition is going to cost 50 euros or 45 pounds and the premium edition is more than that but uh this is significantly lower than the price of

34:40the game on the xbox currently where the standard edition is 80 euros and 70 pounds so that meant though that's 30 that's 30 euros right so um i mean i bet the price drops on xbox by the time this happens and and you know if this price is even like this price feels like there could be more wiggle room than the date at this point uh i i believe April 7th this date or this price could still be placeholder but billbacune usually is pretty good at about checking these things and knowing so we'll see i guess it should be less it shouldn't cost 80 euros for this game they would they would be better off if they positioned it at a slightly lower price like you were saying that feels like a gesture toward regaining some good will for starfield yeah and i think you need that all at branch to unload people especially people who were kind of swearing it off because it was that xbox exclusive like it was going to change the game and it was stolen from them um there's definitely people who still have the narrative in their head but i don't think many of those people are actually listening to this podcast exactly uh all right let's hit this breaking news uh as of

35:47today retroid has announced an unfortunate $15 increase in the retroid pocket six that is effective as of today uh this will raise the devices price from $229 to $244 this is quote due to significant changes in the global memory market including ongoing shortages and sharply rising costs for both RAM and storage they are discontinuing the 12 gigabyte model they just aren't going to make that anymore that's always like man that's that's rough because one of the ways you think that these companies want to get around this is actually keep the higher end models that have more memory and then just charge a lot more for those this sounds like that's not feasible they just will not be able to keep up close to demand if they keep that 12 gigabyte model around and it's that just raised the price of the lower ones so means the profit margins always lower on these lower systems usually um so they're probably even like maybe just barely making up for that with this increase

36:47in price and then maybe not um this is rough because it's like we had mostly seen these Chinese handhelds which i love uh uh kind of evade these the you know the the RAM apocalypse price increases so far um but here they are you know obviously this is just the first domino more things are going to go up in price because of this and uh even the Chinese handhelds can't avoid it despite their proximity and relationships to the supply chain which is one of the reasons these devices are so inexpensive in the first place uh how are you feeling about prices and hardware and all that right now in the beginning of 2026 yeah it's kind of scary i mean like last week the story it was even that ay and thore was going up like i had i had a batch three pre-order now batch four has gone up a certain amount of money um they haven't straight up removed a model which that's a lot more damning than we're just going to raise the price maybe they had like a bigger stock pile of RAM but yeah it's it it is stressful um it's it's very weird because it's not you only going to be

37:49PC gaming which i think a lot of people are thinking like i think that is the mindset for some people who aren't paying as close attention but no this is going to come for everything it's going to be um really difficult especially for these more niche products to get their foot in the door and get those like pieces of memory that they're going to need to make them um yeah this and this is i mean i don't know what i'm very new to this uh retro console like chinese handheld scene so retro is the retro pocket like the big dog in the in in the space uh yeah it's one of the yes it's one of the one there's like a lot of lesser known brands i don't say no name brands but lesser known brands retro it has a long history it was an early favorite uh continues to be one of the better ones like they aren't the high high end that's that does that is ayan uh but retroid has really good offerings especially for the price point and every retro i've owned i've i've really really really really liked so uh yeah this is this is noticeable because it's them they have tried to

38:53have competitive prices and it's always been super like shockingly low and now yeah ayan now this it's like oh it's coming for everybody but there is there is no avoiding this and we knew that but here it is all right uh back on to the stories as written bungee promises updates to marathons pvp med and ammo economy q options ui and more this is from bin lions at game reactor the game popped off it had big test over the weekend uh the server slam uh and on friday kind of really did very well 150ish thousand concurrence on steam again a metric that is public and that's why we use it uh it's not a perfect metric but it's the one we use because we have it uh that's pretty good it's sort of like fell off after that there is some people be like oh here it is evidence that the game's bounce rate is really bad people are playing it and not coming back to it and it didn't have a higher peak over the weekend but there's some excuses for that like a lot of people were having trouble getting the game to launch because of the anti-cheap was was blocking the game and there was

39:55a lot issues with that um and really there's this list of problems that were the most common complaints about the game that bungee is promising to address very quickly uh while the very nature of the server slam from marathon was for bungee to stress test the game and ensure it has a smooth full day view later this week the influx of players testing the game also allows the destiny destiny to developer to gather feedback and additional thoughts to see how the community is resonating with the project to this end now a full server slam feedback article has been shared which comments on the areas that bungee will be looking to improve and make changes and it is those issues people really don't like the UI um a lot of people are struggling to find ammo and felt like okay this yeah this is like who I don't feel like I have a lot of chance to survive here I guess same with med with uh you know uh with healing items and the pvp I actually don't know what the problem with beyond this the pvp and the low time to kill values are on bungee's radar so okay that's the

40:55problem people had with it that's right um yeah I think that the article starts off correctly John where it's like this they do this to test the server capacity that's number one and importance but now you can take all this feedback and act on it as quickly as possible probably can't do much about like the UI before this game launches in less than a week uh but you can at least make gestures sort hey we we we hear you and we are going to improve things so the people that have some positive feelings about the game early on don't feel discouraged and can be like okay the things that I don't like are getting addressed here pretty soon marathon guy like the the winds blow back and forth on this one it's you know early on everyone's like this is dog shit and then some tests came out and people were like oh no it's much better now uh they had some problems with the art where they were just stealing it then they seem to fix that by paying the people and and kind of addressing that so okay we're back to least square one on that and then you know this recent test so okay people do seem to like it but also some people are a little bit muted about it

42:01gee I do not know where this one is going to land right now I am so confused about how marathon is going to do how do you feel about it yeah I mean just talking on this uh server slam alone it's just a weird situation where it is so close to the launch of the game that it's going to be kind of hard to reframe the actual launch day as a launch and obviously like the best part about this like we were talking about is like a potential hot fix patch that happens if not on day one then maybe like the next day or like Saturday or Sunday morning but yeah I mean it's weird because it's a fight for the word of mouth and I know the gameplay feels good I've played it and I know a lot of people who actually did do this server slam too like how it feels but um I don't know it's like the messaging is kind of laying the tracks like miles ahead of where they actually are on the train I I know bungee has a uphill battle and I think they can do it on name recognition but um yeah

43:07I don't know like for metrics and like for PlayStation what is that threshold of success like it do they need to hit our creators numbers and like peak our creators numbers PlayStation definitely assess the things at the absolute maximum of what performance could be for one of their products so um yeah it's interesting they're gonna stick to it because it's bungee but I don't know yeah it's you know and bungee was working on this before Sony was even in the picture uh they they set out like what this game needed to be a long time ago so the expectations are sort of built in uh because it's you know the expectations are based on how many people work at bungee and are working on this game and it was a lot for a very long time and they've had some cuts uh but there was this was a big project ahead that like it probably needs to do about as well as destiny did I bet that is the sort of expectation and that's not just at Sony that is at bungee itself um can it do that I don't know we'll see like I said I really cannot put this on a sort of

44:10scale right now uh as we are a week out from it um but it it does seem like it has at least a chance um so uh we'll see um it's yeah the launch is coming uh it's $40 let's see how many people after getting a chance to play for free are lining up to actually drop that money to play the game uh all right there is a new windows gaming handheld that is at least uh neat in concept it's not confirmed as a product yet uh the Lenovo Legion go fold uh this is from Antonio GD Benadeto at I want to say the verge uh yeah that was I didn't write it down here I think that's the verge uh the Lenovo Legion go fold concept is a windows gaming handheld built built around a foldable PO led display that expands from 7.7 inches to 11.6 inches offering multiple multiple play modes and even a mini laptop configuration so this thing is weird it is as a like laptop screen which

45:11it also can be it's an 11.6 inch screen then you could undock it and fold it in half backwards so the screen is on the front in the back and that's when it becomes a 7.7 inch thing and then you can tap in the controllers which disconnect just like on the original Lenovo Legion go and just like on a switch and then play it in a 7.7 inch mode like you know just uh uh a landscape and then you could unfold that so remember the the screen on the outside folds up from the back and now you have a tall 11.6 inch screen but then you could undock it again turn it sideways put the controllers back on the side then and then you have 11.6 inch tablet landscape again um weird kind of kind of kind of like it definitely feels like a concept because it's like what are the use cases for all these things and uh yeah it's just weird that the the screen cannot fold in to protect the thing when it's in the handheld mode that only works when you have the laptop case to sort of have the laptop keyboard come up and protect the full screen but I like these things um I'm interested I bet this

46:15when it comes out if it's real if it becomes a product is like two thousand dollars I don't know what do you think John yeah I mean for me and especially having reinvested in like a DS sort of form with the A1 and Thor again hasn't chipping I haven't no I don't have it in my hands but it's weird because it's like a who's asking for this like I think it conceptually very interesting very cool right it's all it's pretty customizable but whenever I see those hinges on like those phones and these consoles it's kind of hard to want to invest in that because you don't know how soon it's going to break um I like I have siblings and stuff that I wouldn't trust them with this device um it looks fragile yeah it does and at the same time it it is a laptop adjacent product and I love the uh Legion uh I have the Leno Joe leave Legion slim or something uh for a previous job and I and I really do like it um but I don't know if now is the right time to

47:20put this out where it is competing for people who do want that so it's a very light laptop what I have and it's fantastic for the size the performance is good I don't know if it's worth taking memory away from a potential laptop sale than it would for this um everyone's different that's kind of just my take but it's yeah I don't know as a gimmick it's kind of um interesting but I don't know how well that would be especially like the maneuvering around like I feel like that's just going to be a lot more heavy than would be worth it like I feel like I don't want to play games on an iPad sort of screen even if it's like two iPads to the uptaped together yeah I mean it looks obnoxious uh it is right it's a bag of just like all gimmicks which to be fair the original Lenovo Legion go kind of was all the gimmicks as well like it had the detachable controllers and then like the switch to long before the switch to uh you could take the the right uh Joy-Con for the Lenovo Legion go off and it had an optical sensor on the bottom you could use this a mouse and you could

48:24use the left one as like sort of a joke a joy pad to move characters running first person shooters uh had all these various like things you could do with it and it's okay cool uh that's fine I bet for the next one they're gonna start take it stuff out and really just get down to the meat of what makes this thing good and competitive because that's what most people are gonna want and use this thing for it's like oh no they went the opposite direction even more gimmicks on top of this and say uh okay uh this space is maturing in such a way where it's like we know that these things are viable people just want a strong reliable daily driver and uh this this thing does not look like it's going for that it is going for the very very high-end uh people who show up for boutique items and um I don't know we're we're just not in that world right now because of the cost of things and this feels like looks like it's going to be very expensive uh all right evercade announces a super pocket unit dedicated to rare classics this is from Jonas Mackie at game reactor if you like rare and retro games evercade now has something fun and store for you they have

49:29developed a super pocket device with rare design and 14 built-in games and it works with evercade's other game collection so evercade is one of these retro game hardware and public like hardware manufacturers and game publishers they uh have devices like little game boy like things that could take cartridges and then they put out evercade cartridges they have collections of games um they also now I have this one that they're doing with rare that is hey we're just putting out the rare handheld it has 14 of their games which includes banjo kazooie conquer the conquerist pocket tails battle toads in battle maniacs battle toads cobra triangle arcy pro am two salalam snake rattle in roll solar jet man hunt for the goal yeah hunt for the gold in warship uh yeah warship uh attic attic attic attack jet pack lunar jet man night lore and gun fright um cool uh this this is neat uh do you think like we should we're gonna see more of these things as older of sort of um

50:31retro publishers or our students they have a lot of uh of of of games in their back catalog look for more ways to sort of put them back onto the market after they've sold us the roms on digital storefronts a million times yeah um the these evercades are always very interesting because it seems like something you would find in a CVS but it looks a lot cooler than that it's always that thing that I really want but can never justify the price of I think for the people that are into it they collect a ton of them like I know one of my friends is super into these um pocket devices and um they have like multiple capcom collections they have multiple Atari collections um so there's a market for this um I don't know how many people could really take advantage of this because I mean when you're reading through the list actually that's weird it's conquerors pocket tales which is cool because that hasn't been re-released as far as I know but they are including banjo kazooie so like how far does this actually go yeah yeah I just know that that's

51:36the most recent game right that was so yeah I don't know that's uh it's weird like I want to see banjo kazooie on this thing uh it should probably be okay but they like selected that one because whatever emulator they're using plays nice with that game because in 64 emulation could be a little bit spotty sometimes especially on a low-end device uh there is early pricing for this 49 pounds 59 euros so I mean to probably comes in around 60-70 dollars that's yeah that's somewhat reasonable but I mean that's a little bit of a premium because you're right the comparison point for this probably is something you would find in a uh a CVS that has a bunch of like data east games on it or something uh but rare is going to command a little bit more respect and and evercade does make higher quality stuff so it's like add of like 20 or 30 bucks to those things and here you go you have this device um I like this stuff but it's like oh I'm always going to end up getting the one where it's like give me full control put Android on their put Linux put

52:36whatever put um steam OS and let me just go into the desktop and download all my games uh and I want full control and evercade is not really that device uh but for like gifts and stuff like that this is going to be a stocking stuff for a lot of people I think yeah how much stock stocking stuffers cost now 70 dollars yeah go ahead of course because that's cheap um they actually did point out uh chat point out I think is king high wind uh there's is there an analog stick on the evercade how is banter gonna work like that interesting yeah I'm gonna see if uh what's the new let me go let me google this thing and take another look at it let's see evercade rare super pocket uh yeah I mean that's that's weird I mean they're gonna have to remap the controls well okay so there's four uh shoulder buttons so that will help with some of the stuff because there is no C stick either and there's no same buttons um which is what would have been on this on the N64 so that's gonna be bizarre uh and then there's a D pad although it's a big chunky D pad that won't

53:42be as much of a problem they'll just map analog controls to that uh and then maybe you give you a toggle for like walking or something but there's there's that a ton a ton of buttons on this thing I bet it's gonna be yeah I bet banter because he's not gonna be great on this yeah you're gonna have to press that like center camera button that like all the N64 games kind of had because on top of using the C stick buttons that's just how I orient stuff and I still use that to this day I've been playing through control I'm pressing that lockdown button but yeah that's interesting um you know uh there are a lot of uh big companies that support this thing I think the people that already have this device are gonna go crazy with it because if you have this device you're gonna want to pick the stuff that looks good on a shelf and good to play yep all right uh last handful of stories here as we uh begin to run up close to the hour uh resident evil requiem almost cracks 350,000 concurrent players on steam overlaunch weekend it was at 344,214 really good for resident

54:44evil requiem which is just like I we talked about earlier a delightful game very very good uh that rushes for the series uh I think the previous high yeah let's see here for reference the next best performing game in the series on valves platform in the recent is the recent remake of resident evil which topped out at 168,191 players at one moment so that's the highest peak concurrent player count for that game um yeah resident evil has been put in the work to get people excited about it and excited about a new one and it just feels like oh it all culminated here with what is in my opinion the best game in the franchise since resident resident evil for like the original one um so yeah this that's a big number what do you think I think that's freaking awesome like I'm so glad more people are playing these kinds of games and I don't know they've just they kind of just hit a new peak with requiem like that the freedom to choose between what style of game you like it's kind of the best of both worlds and they've really are only gotten better um yeah it's a game

55:47I wish I I could play right now but um man I don't know work and everything so busy lately there's so much to do and so little time but that game is just incredible um and then uh resident evil requiem is uh hit with people as well I mean that people are playing it uh but that's someone to chat just playing it down I did see this uh the user score on metacritic is at extraordinarily high for for reference it is above whoa Disney Cory in the house which is a meme game uh that people will give a perfect score to and it's number that's number three now number two is resident evil requiem which has a 9.5 user score which puts it right next to clear obscure expedition 33 which also has a 9.5 my understanding is it's like going back and forth between uh those two like occasionally it like it's been number one um yeah that's that's the kind of thing that's happening with this game where it's out it's here people playing it and immediately be like this rules uh so

56:47yeah uh capcom's it's beyond just hitting their stride right they're at like a new peak this is like a new golden era for capcom yeah that it's it's it's just dope like I that game feels so much better and it I in a in a fun way I think it will make developers a little bit more creative to have those two different viewpoints on how to tackle a problem um it's so fascinating the way that game the interconnectedness of that game works and I'm only like an hour and a half in I'm very very happy that single player games are crushing it right now yep I like I said uh whenever we like I review thing I think the worst thing you'd say about it is it leaves you wanting so much more uh and you know 10 hours for the first playthrough but I like I said I keep replaying it and the fact that it's like 10 hours on the first playthrough actually makes it even better for the replays because you could just like I can get through this thing really quickly I'm just going to go again oh good stuff uh nacon is delayed this week's connect showcase to May 2026 short version is they were planning one uh for February 23rd and then or the on February 23rd

57:53excuse me they announced one from March 4th and then since then they've declared insolvency basically bankruptcy and I'm gonna say wait what what's happening there and they're like okay yeah we're gonna delay it till May while we figure out what the future holds uh they're also losing some publishing deals I think declaring insolvency is likely uh uh made some contracts expire so they probably they probably have to sort some of that stuff out as well and then finally Pokemon fire red and leaf green players are accidentally losing hours of progress excuse me this comes from Kenneth Shepherd at Kotaku um these are older games that were on uh and it's just the ROMs so they were and they were made for devices that did not have a lot of like uh UI they didn't have um uh a base operating system that you could go into by hitting the home button there was no home button so the developers developers built in a way to reset the game by doing a button combo and I think it's uh it's all four face buttons I think um yeah so yeah or maybe yeah ABXY uh or maybe it's AB

58:54start select I guess that would have been what it was back on the uh on the GBA yeah on the GBA yeah a GBA um and it's people are accidentally doing this and an hour and a half in losing all of their progress okay it's ABXY says resets the game yeah that's pretty easy to hit ABXY it should not be that it should be something more complicated than ABXY um but a lot of people are learning the very hard way that this is in there I've seen a lot of clips so far of just people looking crestfallen uh it's it's rough stuff hopefully they just update this right yeah it's interesting because like for me that's a positive like I am a sicko that was rerolling my starter trying to get a shiny PokeBuddy that run the game like that but yeah it should absolutely be a toggle there should be some kind of like virtual console-esque menu that pulls it up because yeah it it is unfortunate that a lot of people are losing progress um but you know I I don't know I learned the hard way but on the same time I'm pretty fidgety and in a turn based RPG like I will just be

59:56hitting buttons just to hit buttons um and so I can total I empathize with a lot of people yeah that's weird yeah imagine like you're you finally just got that shiny and you get excited to hit the buttons in efforts that's oh fabby rough stuff uh all right that does it for the headlines uh there was no pull question because last uh Friday was the bomb 12 we have the updated bomb 12 up on the site I think if you go to the vote now uh uh um did I not I did update that but I put the wrong month it's just February six but six but I said sex I said February sex tonight oh no yeah uh month of love month of love it should say March 6th everybody that's when we'll get the next bomb 12 go ahead and submit your game uh we'll get the results talk about it at the end of the week the meantime though we have uh plenty of stuff happening on giant bomb for the rest of the week looking forward to hanging out with you uh we'll see about doing some miss today some other fun stuff um yeah uh I want to I want to play prokopia Jan Jan how was prokopia

1:01:03I love it I think it is the best pokemon game to come out in quite a while and also the pokemon company should keep giving other companies besides game freak pokemon yeah I mean this feels like yeah if you fall in off pokemon but you still really like those characters this feels like a really great way of like catching those people and giving them an alternative way to continue to enjoy it um oh I'm I'm excited it seems like it should be a lot of fun I'm gonna see what it's really like with four players all at once gimmicks would love the shit out of it I okay I can't wait like I said Emmys more and more into pokemon all the time mostly the characters so yeah we'll play this together that that sounds like a very good time all right uh like I said well I love the giant bomb stuff poppin off all week just go to john bomb calm to keep up with us everybody um in the meantime john martin thank you so much for hanging out with me to oh wait you know why don't you tell people where they can find you on the internet I haven't done that yet go ahead and tell people about all that good stuff yeah um you can find me on blue sky john martin the blue sky

1:02:07dot social um I I am uh after this I'm probably going to pin a couple videos that have come out in last couple of weeks a lot of podcasts about backlog games beating backlogs um I am currently exporting a video as we speak um and that's going well so yeah uh I have good stuff coming up um and yeah you could see that on blue sky but yeah man I really appreciate it uh you guys have been killing it lately um I look forward to all the premium content it is fantastic and you know really good it's really good to smile and laugh in uh pretty pretty difficult times thanks man and uh we appreciate that we uh we like we like doing it we we're glad to hear the people like it and thank you for being on uh and thank you for spending the day with me talking about video games man I really appreciate it anytime Jeff I love it thank you all for watching and listening you are the best audience in gaming until next time have a good one take care of yourself and goodbye

1:03:14Tyler retic here from 2311 racing another checkered flag for the books time to celebrate with chamba jump in at chamba casino dot com let's chamba no purchase necessary btw group void were prohibited by mall ctnc 21 plus sponsored by chamba casino