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- [00:01]
A
Hello to you, my friends. You might be wondering, why don't I see his face right now? The answer is, I'm in San Francisco and not at the studio. And I forgot to record the intro to today's very special guest, which is a travesty of justice, because today's guest is responsible for some of the coolest, weirdest video games I've ever played in my life. The Binding of Isaac, Super Meat Boy. And now, coming out around February, he's got a new game, Mugenics. And holy shit. After this conversation, I'm just deeply impatient. I really want to play this game, and I'm not going to spoil it for you. I'm gonna let him explain what this game is about, but it's definitely gonna be maybe the biggest video game hit of all time. I guarantee it. It gets the Trussell Ching. Ching. Guarantee of excellence. Now, everybody, please welcome to the DTFH, Edmund McMillan. Evan, welcome back to the DTFH. How are you?
- [01:24]
B
I'm. I'm. I'm busy.
- [01:26]
A
Yeah, I'm good.
- [01:27]
B
I'm good. I'm overwhelmed.
- [01:31]
A
Yeah. And I'm assuming that overwhelmed feeling is coming because in. What is it, February, you're releasing your next game, Mugenics.
- [01:41]
B
Yeah, I mean, I don't. I would say it's kids, mostly.
- [01:47]
A
How many you got now? How many you got?
- [01:50]
B
Two. I've got two.
- [01:52]
A
I got three now. They're on the way. And. Oh, yeah. Oh, wow. Oh, yeah.
- [01:58]
B
Things that must have been going smooth for you then, because there's no way I would ever have another one.
- [02:02]
A
Oh, my God, man. You know, I have an Irish wife, and she likes having babies, and she cooks up some cuties. And, you know, it. Just being a parent, you know? Don't you? Don't you? At least for me, I get the sense of, like, there's just, like, we're in some kind of cosmic watch. There's big gears that I can't see, and you're just some infinitesimally tiny part of that watch. And sometimes you get swarmed with offspring and what are you going to do? You know?
- [02:36]
B
I mean, yes, I can understand that. That's actually something that I've brought up to people who don't have kids because people would always say, like, you don't know. You don't. You don't understand how much it changes things. And that's usually all they, like, say, but they can't put into words that, like, it opens up these doors that you didn't know existed, and they're terrifying.
- [02:57]
A
Yes. Yeah.
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B
Like, it's like, oh, this is the reality that we're living in.
- [03:01]
A
Yeah.
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B
Well, you just can see everything, you.
- [03:05]
A
Know, if you sort of like look at America from the perspective of like this like, relatively brand new casino, when you have kids, you're putting all your chips on the table, you're fully in. And so for me, a lot of weird things changed for me. One of them being it's harder for me to watch movies where kids get hurt.
- [03:31]
B
Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yes. Yes. That is horrifically horrible.
- [03:36]
A
Yes. And I get mad, you know, when it, when it happens. And like we just watched 20, 28 years later or 26 years later, the zombie movie.
- [03:46]
B
Yeah, I haven't seen that one yet.
- [03:47]
A
Oh, God, it's so good, man. But this is the second time this has happened. My wife is very pregnant. The first kid when she was pregnant. Just like, let's watch a horror movie. Pick some random horror movie out. Starts off with a murderer going into a nicu and just stabbing a bunch of kids.
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B
You know, what movie, you know, movie not to see.
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A
What? Dear Zachary will not thank you for warning me.
- [04:15]
B
I don't recommend anyone ever see it. And it is a good documentary, but it is way too much like, it is way too much. And as a father, I don't even like thinking about it.
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A
What's it about?
- [04:30]
B
It's about a crazy woman and us. It's. It's like a dad's note to the. Their son.
- [04:40]
A
Oh, God, already I'm. Already my insides are twisting up. I just.
- [04:45]
B
It's so. It's so hard. It is, absolutely. And I didn't know what I was getting myself into until I, until I did. And then it was like, oh, great.
- [04:53]
A
Yeah. So it, it, you know, my friend told me it actually, you know, even with fathers that you. Your DNA changes when you have kids. Like it's an actual biological change happens to you. And. Yeah. I don't think anybody. You can't really understand it until you are, you're in the midst of it and.
- [05:10]
B
Yeah, for sure. And then there's also like this camera back moment where it's like you suddenly see like the echoes the, the every, all your past selves into your genie G. You know, like every ancestor back as far as you can see and all of the echoes that have come through you into these kids that you couldn't see until you're third person or whatever, you know, like.
- [05:41]
A
Oh, yeah.
- [05:41]
B
I mean, really, that's like kind of what me Genics is about. Like, it's really it started out as like a, you know. You know, we. I have. We have a bunch of cats because we didn't have kids when I originally designed it. We had a shitload of cats. And that was kind of the replacement for kids at that point in time. And it was kind of interesting because we were getting these cats that were weird, that were like, from breeders and stuff, like hairless cats and then these things called bambinos, which were like dwarf, dwarf cats and then bambino hybrid cats.
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A
Hang on, let me just pull up. I want to hear what you're referencing because I though I'm not a cat expert.
- [06:18]
B
Look up sphinx bambino.
- [06:21]
A
Okay.
- [06:22]
B
They are like hairless cats with half sized.
- [06:25]
A
Holy. Yeah, dude, those are cool. As.
- [06:32]
B
Sadly.
- [06:32]
A
God.
- [06:33]
B
The thing is though, is they have a lot of problems. A lot of problems come with these cats in general. Like, a lot of hairless cats don't usually live past like 8 to 10 to 10 because they have heart problems.
- [06:44]
A
Yeah.
- [06:45]
B
And we, we had a. We had a. Two hairless cats at that point. And when we ordered the bambino, it. It did had heart problems and it died like before we even got it. So it was kind of like this weird. Weirdly horribly tragic, but weird. Like morally ambiguous. Not really ambiguous when you look at it in the way I described it. But at the time it just seemed like that, you know, like, we're doing like, we're like totally fine with this. This is crazy. We're totally fine with it because it's a cat, you know, like it's a. It's just an animal or whatever else, you know?
- [07:25]
A
Man, this is like. I used to have a joke about it on stage. When you consider that, like, cats and wolves used to be a real problem for humans, like tigers, in some parts of the world, they still are. Every once in a while you'll see a video pop up in India. A tiger will get into a village and just fuck people up. It'll rampage. But that used to be normal. Like your kids might get eaten by a wolf or a tiger. And over time, we mutated these beings down into these bizarre forms, like what used to be this. The last thing you wanted to hear when you were camping was the sound of wolves howling or the sound of a feline growling in the woods. And we took over time. We took them and we have shrunk them down, remove their hair, made them silly, made them caricatures of their former, like, terrifying selves. And yet what's cool about cats is they still have. Not that dogs don't but cats still maintain this gracefulness, this nobility, this, this aloofness that is just incredible to be around. And that's why there's cat people, because it's just amazing to witness that in a bambino, you know that.
- [09:02]
B
Sadly, I never got to witness it.
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A
I'm so, I'm sorry about your bambino. I truly am.
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B
It happens. It wasn't, it wasn't the only defective animal we've gotten over the years.
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A
It was the only what?
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B
It wasn't the only defective animal that we've received.
- [09:16]
A
What other defective animals did you get?
- [09:18]
B
We, we. We were like, okay, our. Our sphinx is all passed. And we're like, okay, we're gonna. We were catless. And we had never been cat. We hadn't been catless since. God, since Guppy, which was like ages ago, you know, before Guppy. And Guppy was a real cat. He was our cat, or for me and my wife's first cat. And we ordered a, a Persian, like a Persian cat with like a short haired Persian. So it's like more dense Persian cat, which has like the little pug nose and it looked really funny. And we finally got. It was imported from Russia. And when we.
- [10:00]
A
You.
- [10:00]
B
When you get an animal, you got to take it to the vet and get it basically checked and approved, make sure it's all good to go. And the vet's like, I don't like this nose. We're like, what do you, what do you mean? And they're like, well, you, you didn't breed this. And they're like, no. And they're like, okay, well, because if, you know, if you did, you know, it's kind of illegal to have a nose up. You can't be doing that. There's a certain. You can't have the nose all the way between the eyes. It's very similar to pugs.
- [10:29]
A
Right?
- [10:30]
B
Because there's the same sort of stuff.
- [10:31]
A
Yeah.
- [10:31]
B
Like, the higher up you go, the more breathing problems they have, which is why they're so docile as well, because they just can't really jump and run around like a, like a normal cat. Because, you know, and this is all stuff you learn from, from taking them to the vet and them saying, this cat needs a nose job. She got a nose job. But to open up her airways more. But yeah, that was one of many interesting cat breeding stories and situations that we've been in over the years that I'm always kind of taken aback and being like, oh, this is, this is weird. This is weird in a wonderful way. But Also a horrific way.
- [11:14]
A
Yeah, like a Lovecraftian way, isn't it? It's a little Lovecraftian. Right. Like you're an elder God. This being has no idea, theoretically why its nose is in a weird place. But the reason its nose is in a weird place is because over the years, these advanced intelligences have been breeding it specifically to make it look a certain way. And man, as above, so below. Anytime I let my mind wander into the various animals that look the way they do because of intentional breeding programs, and then I hear someone spouting off about the Anunnaki coming to Earth and genetically engineering us. It just doesn't seem that strange.
- [12:00]
B
Yeah, it's like we're predisposed to want to do that.
- [12:06]
A
That's right. Yeah, that's right. And you know, like, as they said, you know, Book of Genesis, God made man in his image. And also Book of Genesis. I don't know if the last time you read it, what's really weird about the Book of Genesis is God refers to God self as a plurality. It's not me, it's they will become like us. Implying some cosmic progenitive species that was totally genetically biologically engineering a life form that, at least in the Book of Genesis, failed some cosmic test and was abandoned. That's the, you know, some envoy, I guess, hanging out, wandering around, scolding them from time to time. So very strange. Very strange, man. And you know what I really loved about the binding of Isaac? Among many things. One of my favorite video games ever made. I put it up there with Elden Ring. I put it up there with, like. It's one of the top best games.
- [13:08]
B
It's a high honor. I also really like Elden Ring.
- [13:11]
A
Oh, I bet you do. Because you got some darkness in you, Edmond, but that's what I. The Binding of Isaac. It's got so many satanic biblical references in. Always felt Satanic to me. That game. Not that you're satanic or intentionally made a satanic game. And I'm not saying satanic in the pejorative either, but, you know, it an occult sense that gives you the same feeling of like when you listen to Led Zeppelin backwards or something like that.
- [13:50]
B
For sure. What's the quote? What's the Manson quote? Yes, you're gonna do something. Make it witchy.
- [13:55]
A
Yes. This is. Oh, God. If, like, I was not a pussy, I would. That would be on the list of tattoos I would want on my body.
- [14:04]
B
And it's true, though. I mean, it's. It's.
- [14:09]
A
Foreign. This Episode of the DTFH has been brought to you by the Genies of Paradise over at Squarespace. Squarespace is my longest sponsor and let me tell you, it is a Swiss army knife. If you want to do any anything online. You want to build a website, no problem. You want the help of a super advanced AI to help you build that website? No problem. Want to buy a domain name? Easy. Want to connect your website to that domain name? Easy. Want to send emails out to your subscribers clients that don't look like they're about to have their identity stolen? Easy. The proof is in the pudding, friends. You can go to duncantrustle.com and prepare your eyeballs to weep as you stare at the beauty that is Duncan trussell.com which was made using Squarespace. It's an ever evolving suite of tools to extantiate your identity onto the world wide web. And yes, I love saying extantiate. And no, I'm not sure if I know what it means. Why don't you give Squarespace a test run? Go to squarespace.com dunkin try it out and when you're ready to launch, use offer code Duncan to get 10% off your first order of a website or a domain. Again@squarespace.com Duncan use offer code DUNCAN to get 10% off your first order of a website or a domain. Thank you. Squarespace.
- [16:16]
B
That's what draws me in. So when I'm making something, I'm making, I'm. Whenever I'm creating anything, I'm creating it to, to appease my past self, you know, what would I have really been like, oh my God, as a kid, right, or whatever else if I saw it? Something that has danger and something that crosses the line or at least dances around the line and yeah, I think that was kind of important. I mean, it was. I don't think there's any other way I could have a full conversation, at least with myself, about what I was writing if I wasn't going to go both sides, right? And for me, it was like being the total black sheep of, of both sides of my family. And it's hard to not identify with, with the darkness, the, you know, the, the evils in the Bible, which, which all feed towards like this, this well of black creativity which always seems to be embodied by an evil, you know, Loki God type, you know, causing chaos and mischief. And so it had to be part of it. The duality had to be there.
- [17:29]
A
Has your fascination with channeling that kind of energy shifted since you had kids? Do you, do you ever feel a Little more nervous about invoking that sort of thing now that you got kids.
- [17:49]
B
I mean, I don't feel like I'm invoking anything that I, That I believe is. I mean, I believe all that stuff is metaphorical and not literal. So I don't feel like I'm pulling from something. I, I just, I view that side of things as. I, I don't know. I've always, I've always viewed it as that, like the, it's the chaos. It's, it's, it's the, it's the, the antithesis. Antithesis of, of control. It's letting loose and flying by the seat of your pants and just being impulsive and self destructive. And it's, it's being able to go there, get what you need and come back that I, I think they'll always, I always use in, in my creative process.
- [18:43]
A
Oh God, it's thick. Well, because it's. Without that in the creative process, how is it even a creative process without whatever that alien visitor from whatever you want to call it, the subconscious, the liminal realms. Without that, I don't know how you make anything at all. And, and, and so, and this is, you know, I think with Christianity versus like other like, mythologies that it doesn't, it shows up as pure. Just. It's bad. Bad. Whereas like, you get like Coyote, the, you know, the Native American version of Loki. And it's an, it's an. You need it. It's. It. It pushes the story forward in, in some way. And what I love about the, the trickster in those stories is that the trickster wasn't ever trying. Doesn't. Doesn't have an intent. There isn't a reason behind what.
- [19:46]
B
It's. It's chaos.
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A
It's chaos.
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B
It's like the. I, I think it's, it's really embodied really well in like the monkey God, the whole, like Hanuman. Yeah. Like, if you let me loose, like, I'm having a lot of fun and I'm very strong, but don't let me completely loose. Or the, what's the Shiva one too? Where, like, I have such power that once I start going, I will lose sight of everything and just destroy.
- [20:13]
A
Like, maybe that's a form of Shiva where, you know, it just goes nuts. Or Kali.
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B
There's that one. Yeah. I can't remember who it is. It's the one that's dancing on the body of her.
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A
Oh yeah, that's Kali.
- [20:26]
B
Okay.
- [20:27]
A
Yeah, that's Kali at the end of the age of. That's Kali. Doing the dance of destruction. Now with Kali. What I love about Kali. You know what? Somebody gave me this. Check this out. This is like. Oh, you were talking about this. Josh, that's my producer. What's the name of this? The Virgin Mary with the skull head.
- [20:46]
B
That's the. The. That's the death. It's death in Spanish.
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A
What is it called, Josh? Santa Muerte. Yeah. Now this. This seems to be the sort of, I guess, Catholic collie. And so the Virgin Mary, I've got her all.
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B
I've got a giant statue of her in my bathroom.
- [21:05]
A
I love wearing this thing. Whoever. Thank you so much for this gift, by the way. The collie. What I love about her is that any image you see of her is fearsome. And especially if you don't know the story. Now, the story is the garland of heads that Kali is wearing. Those are demon heads. And it's supposed to represent maternal, you know, because you live with a mom, and when they flip into, like, mother bear mode, that's Kali energy. It's the energy of a mother protecting her children. And you don't want to fuck with that. Like, you don't want to. What do they say? You see a bear with its cubs. Get the fuck out of there. That's collie. It's just going to eat you. It doesn't care who you are. It doesn't care that you're vegan. It doesn't care that you came there to protect the bear's habitat. It's going to rip your head off. Just because that's what mothers do when they're protecting their young. I like that version of it. But you. You were saying earlier that you see it metaphorically. I don't quite see it metaphorically. I think it's like a. It's an energy in the. In the. In the connection or something. I'm not saying it's some. I go back and forth on this. I'm not saying it's the devil. You've been summoning the devil through your games. Please keep doing that, by the way. Don't stop. But the. Never stop. But. But I. You know, anytime I've been on a psychedelic or something and I start sensing that energy, I realize, oh, it's something that lives in between people. It's a connection. And within that connection, a personality emerges. The personality generally is not something you'd want to invite to a party, for sure.
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B
Maybe I just don't. I don't think about that side of things as inherently evil. I think about it being chaotic and, you know, if something evil is chaotic, then it's really bad.
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A
But Judas no Judas no Jesus no Judas no Jesus gets no credit.
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B
It's just the yin and the yang of the whole situation. I just. I just feel like there has to be the. The darkness has to be there. And in order for the light to exist, like, it's just part of it. So, yeah, man, I mean, I just saw it. I never even. I don't even give pause when it comes to, like, my kids seeing this stuff. I've got weird imagery all over the house, you know what I mean? Like, and I don't believe I'm inviting anything in that I don't want to deal with, you know?
- [23:45]
A
You know, my feeling on that, man, is like, I just think ghosts are annoying. Like, I don't.
- [23:51]
B
This. I have. I don't believe in ghosts. So I'll say that I don't believe in ghosts. But ever since moving into this house, and this is the weirdest thing ever, because whenever I tell. When I bring it to my wife, she gets really scared and whatever else. But I've very often, like, maybe once or twice a month, I'll be sleeping, and if I roll onto my back, I'll feel somebody touch my foot. Like, in a way that my grandmother used to touch my feet in the morning when I would wake up.
- [24:20]
A
Oh, my God.
- [24:22]
B
And I would feel somebody sit down at the end of the bed, facing away, and then touch my foot. Not scary. Like, I can't explain. Like, I feel somebody sit at the end of my bed when I know that nobody else is there and touch my foot. And it's not scary. Like, nothing about it is frightening in any way, shape or form. I don't feel the need to even look and see, even though I'm feeling this. And I always thought that was interesting, because I really don't. I mean, because I guess maybe I'm just thinking about it in the traditional sense of a ghost, but I don't believe in that.
- [24:56]
A
But, Edmund, can I recommend something? Unsolicited advice. You need to look and see who's touching your foot, because what if it's a clown?
- [25:05]
B
It doesn't feel. Whatever. Whatever. Whatever sixth sense is sensing, whatever this thing is, has already identified it as something that is totally fine.
- [25:14]
A
What if it's a window clown? What if it's those clowns? I'm not creeping into people's windows and touching their feet. You don't want a window clown scooping around your house. They're. They're goopy. They're. You don't want a window. Clown, Grandmother, ghost. I'll take. But I don't want to. I don't want any clown touching my foot in the morning. I mean, and I'm not trying to be sex negative or anything. Or anything against clowns. I just. In the morning. I don't want a clown fondling my foot or sitting on my bed. You should look. Could be grandmother. Could be a window.
- [25:43]
B
It's. I can't see.
- [25:45]
A
Flashlight.
- [25:48]
B
Okay, I'll try to remember. But what if I. What if what I see I don't like? And then it changes now. Now I'm really haunted.
- [25:54]
A
Well. Well, you can't keep your head in the sand, man. It's a clown's a clown. I mean, I guess you could go Schrodinger's clown, but it's a fucking clown in the box. You put a clown in a box, There's a clown down there.
- [26:07]
B
I'd rather not know.
- [26:10]
A
All right, well, I'm not gonna pressure you on it, man. You know, I got some, like. I hope you don't mind. I do have some video game questions. I love video games, and I will never stop playing video games. And they. It's one of my great joys in life. And so if you will forgive me, may I ask a few nerdy video game questions to you?
- [26:29]
B
Yeah, ask me those nerdy video games. I hope I can answer them because I feel like a big poser sometimes.
- [26:34]
A
Well, that's because you're an artist and humans are fundamentally empty. And so once you stumble out of that, you can only feel like a poser. But the. The, The. So I'm really curious what your thoughts are on vibe. Coding, having.
- [26:52]
B
I don't code.
- [26:54]
A
Ah, Okay.
- [26:56]
B
I am. I am. I'm designer. I am. Well, technically, I'm doing some scripting right now, but I design. And I'm the. I'm the artist. Like, I'm. I'm the guy. Like, if you ever see my. My games, I'm doing everything but programming.
- [27:09]
A
Do you ever get into programming at all? Like, you ever try.
- [27:12]
B
I'm. My brain is the opposite. Like, I just don't. I need. Usually when I'm fine, when I'm working with somebody like Tyler on me, Genics or whatever, it's. We're similar people, but absolute opposite brains. Like, he's very. He's the very structured, analytical, math type brain, and I'm the full chaos creative mode brain.
- [27:33]
A
Okay?
- [27:34]
B
And it works really, really well. Like, if you find somebody that you can work in tandem with like that. It's really cool. I vibe design. My. My whole process is something probably similar to stand up where like I'm getting pieces and I'm piecing them together that seem right and I flow from topic to topic and then over time I fill in those gaps slowly. But I leave the gaps because the gaps are the most important part of the creative process for me. Because if I from the beginning write the script with all the details, then I'm done and I have no need to finish it because it's already finished in my head. So that's like number one for me. I noticed that really early on because it's like I'll like oh, I've got this, all these ideas and I write them all down.
- [28:22]
A
Yeah.
- [28:23]
B
Once I feel like they're locked into place, I'm like eh. I'm less inclined to like follow through.
- [28:28]
A
Yeah.
- [28:29]
B
But then also the for. And I don't know if other people even work this way. But for video games, for me I need the game to show me what, what it wants. So I throw a bunch of things out and I let it naturally find the, where they come together and, and then I fill in those gaps and then I find little more. More little gaps that I fill in as I, as I go. And it becomes an exciting experience for me creatively because I'm always improvising. It's like it's really hard to improvise in this environment, like this highly structured, obsessively structured art form. But I need that and that's how I work. So I don't over design. I keep things open in every way possible and I let the gaps fill in. So it's fun, exciting and the game can find itself and complement itself with things that work as we're going instead of, you know, it's one of the things that like large companies can't do that at all because they have to. They have so many cogs in the machine that need to be turning correctly. So they need to place the whole machine out there right from the beginning so they can't pivot. They can't be like, oh right, this game's now because for me, like me Genics, like starting it out, it was about cats and then it became about having kids and then it became about passing down traits and a legacy and all this other stuff. And then it became about playing God and like all these things didn't exist at once.
- [29:55]
A
Right.
- [29:55]
B
It was this process into where we're at. And I'll tell you what it's about now. Or I would like to maybe off camera, because it will spoil everything. Oh, don't.
- [30:07]
A
For my own selfish interests. Please don't spoil it for me because I'm very excited. I've been watching your streams of you playing it, and it is so badass. So. Yeah, I know. Please, no spoilers. No offense. Anyone listening? I would rather not have a spoiler.
- [30:22]
B
It goes places. And again, like, I say this with the binding of Isaac. Like, I don't think everybody is going to get it in the way that I get it. And that doesn't. That never matters to me. It's like, if. If you just see it as being weird, that's totally fine, too. But in order for me to work on something and be passionate about it, it has to have a piece of myself in it. It has to be honest. It has to be about something that I'm trying to figure out myself. And I'm really proud of it. I mean, I. I think it's really interesting in ways that are very difficult for me to explain why they're interesting, which is interesting.
- [30:57]
A
Well, a few thoughts on what you just said with. With. When I got to make the Midnight Gospel with Pendleton, what he did.
- [31:06]
B
You guys improvised this, right? Like, that's how you. You just.
- [31:09]
A
Yes, it was such a. He's so good at doing what you're doing, which is. With animation, I guess the equivalent to what you're talking about in a big game company is what I think they call it the grid. And so that means that in a character design, there's a grid, and the artists have to stick that character onto the grid, so there's continuity. Whereas Pendleton, one of the things he did was like, don't worry too much about the grid. And so all these artists didn't have to do this, like, technical recreation of the characters, but could just sort of, like, make it sort of wobbly. And that created a real psychedelic look in the show because, you know, depending on what artists were animating, what, it would suddenly look sort of different. And. And then that creates a kind of. I guess. I don't know. I feel like what you're talking about is weirdly similar to what some of the UFO people talk about. This idea of, like, what do they call it? Energy that comes from the vacuum, that potentially the vacuum of space could produce infinite energy. And that in those spaces that you leave, something else emerges from it that you didn't expect. And if you can be nimble enough to incorporate that into whatever you're making, then you start Collaborating with the Void or something and that.
- [32:37]
B
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [32:39]
A
And stuff. Things surprise you, whether it's you're working on just by yourself or with someone. I don't mean to get technical here. I do want to get philosophical, but I have to ask, what does it look like? I'm trying to imagine what this looks like between you and entire. Like, what's the back and forth here? Like, when do you see the game and how do you say, okay, now here's the next step. Like, what would a typical back and forth be in the creation of a level?
- [33:11]
B
Well, like the levels itself are kind of whatever, but in the creation of the game. Like, it's. This is the longest dev cycle that I've ever done. It's like almost six and a half years since we actually decided what it was we were going to make. And a lot of it is like unspoken. And I don't know if it's that I'm bad at communicating or if I just feel like. Like I still. Sometimes when I'm working with people, I don't like to over share my thoughts because they seem too intimate in some way. Like the. I don't want to show people the clay before it's been molded because I feel like I'm exposing myself. But so they'll just be like, I'll just throw a few things out here and say, you know, this is what I feel like the game is about and these are the different structures that we need, these systems. Like, this game is just a mess of systems and we just agree, we have a lot of similar interests when it comes to video games and we both just agree on all these things, check them off, and then we just start going like, it mean me and Tyler kind of been working in tandem, but it's. It's weird. It's kind of unspoken of what we're. I just start working on, like, I see what needs to be done. I'm like, okay, I'm gonna move over and start working on NPC dialogue today. He's like, okay, I'm gonna start working on translation stuff. We both have an. A sense of what needs to be done by this point. And we just kind of go, but creatively, that's where the. I mean, this is all technical stuff. It's just like, you know, you put. You put this piece in and then I'll build off of this piece and then you put this piece in, build off of this. But creatively it's a different story for me because without any of the other creative people working on this, like background artists and musicians and whatever else. I collaborate with these people in ways that they don't realize. So, like, if I have Matthias and John write a song, I'll say like, all right, this song needs to be about a king who has been stealing pieces of his people and creating himself. But he thinks of himself as a self made man, but he's made out of all these people and he's ruthless. So I'm telling the story and then I'm like, you tell me that story back, but you tell it to me, like, however you would interpret what I just said, then they tell it back to me and then I pick up on these interesting bits and pieces they've added and then incorporate that into the game. Like, I change.
- [35:45]
A
Wow.
- [35:46]
B
So there's a lot of. A lot of that. There's like. You're not from the Bay. Were you originally from the Bay Area at all?
- [35:53]
A
No, no, I'm going up there actually this weekend. I love it when I get to go up there. But no, I.
- [35:59]
B
Well, let me know if you're coming through Santa Cruz. But there was a Bay Area late night independent show called Fish Masters. It was this really, really funny show that acted like they were like public access, but they weren't. They were on, like right after Saturday Night Live on, like one of the stations here.
- [36:15]
A
Cool.
- [36:16]
B
And so it was like, anyway, they were my heroes. It was like this ultimate independent nonsense, but really cool. Took itself seriously without taking itself seriously. And I contacted the guy to do a meow for the game and he actually came out. He was just like, he's my hero. His name's Carl. Carl Edge. And I was like, you ever want to do that stuff again? Because everything he did was just improvised comedy, usually with people on the street or just camera and just riffing. And he's like. He's like, yeah. I'm like, would you ever want to, like, reprise one of your roles as like a character on the radio and eugenics? And he's like, I. I guess. And he's like. I'm like, try something. And he just riffs this amazingly. Just perfect. Like, like, it was just plucked out of the show from wave from the 90s, like 9097 or whatever. And he gives me this. His name is Jimmy the Hammer Valentine. And he's just man on the street talking about nonsense. Usually it's just this a bit where he. Like, there's one where he's just coughing and it's agonizingly horrible because you can hear that he's like legitimately, like dying.
- [37:34]
A
Yeah.
- [37:34]
B
And he's trying to like give you news. A news story about a collapse of a cave that caved in on these kids. You know, something like that. Well, that's like, that's the bit, right? And I was just like, oh my God. I'm like, can you do like 12 more of these and we'll just put them in as commercials, like this is going to work. And then for whatever reason, he started to talk about something called Pinky Winkies. It was this ongoing theme. It's like Pinky Winkies is giving food poisoning, yada, yada yada. And I'm like, oh, like we need to incorporate Pinky Winkies into the game. So we started pulling that stuff in and then he would reference this guy called DJ Bill and he didn't exist. So I'm like, well, can you be DJ Bill? It's just, there's just a lot of that of like trying to be as open as possible about all this stuff and just let.
- [38:32]
A
This episode of the DTFH is brought to you by BetterHelp. Who hasn't ended up trauma dumping all over some stranger. I know I have. It's the entire story of Forrest Gump, if you think about it. And if somebody's accepting chocolates as payment for therapy, my guess is they're not a licensed therapist. But you can find a licensed therapist online with Better Help. As the largest online therapy provider in the world, BetterHelp can provide access to mental health professionals with a diverse variety of Expertise. Find the one with BetterHelp. Our listeners get 10% off their first month at betterhelp.com Duncan that's better. H E L P.com Duncan thank you, Better Help.
- [39:39]
B
I'm pulling into all these different things and they all means something to me personally and that's good enough for me. So I just put them all together and we get this really fun riffing, long winded riffing that I really, really, really like. And it's one of the things that's this whole development cycle. Like I said, like six and a half years, dude. It's been easy. Like it's been a breeze. Like it's, it isn't what's stressing me out. There's a lot of work and I like working. So that's fine. It's never been stressful. And all the people that I've been working with in the project have been fantastic. They're all independent artists, they're all self motivated. They're not doing this really for the money. As much as it's, they're all on board of making something cool.
- [40:26]
A
And you know, this is sort of like the story that keeps repeating itself right now in the video game universe. Seems to be that these AAA game companies are spending all this money to make these beautiful looking games that are performing half as well as independent games. And it's, I personally, I don't want anybody who's trying to make art to suffer. But there is something thrilling in that to me that, you know, these small teams of people with far less capital are making beautiful works of art that could only be possible in the context of being independently made. And I want, I, you know, I want that to be representative of some incoming renaissance or something. And that's where I get, you know, idealistic or naive. But I like to fantasize that because tech is getting, you know, everyone hates AI right now and I understand why everyone thinks it's the demon or like dumbing down everybody, and I understand why. But I love to fantasize that like this creative revolution is going to happen where more and more people are doing what you're doing and producing incredible things. And I know you're not using AI, but not everyone has access to coders, not everybody has access to someone who can do that.
- [42:02]
B
You know, it is, it is weird to, you know, and I know people don't like anyone talking positively about AI in any way, shape or form. But I will say this for the independents, you know, AI would be helping you a lot. Like, yeah, large companies have a bunch of AI, they're actual intelligence. They have a bunch of people that are doing all this work and you could, you could automate out a lot of the basic people in. You know, I feel like I shouldn't be saying this because I know like people will just jump down my throat about this and I, I, AI is unavoidable. Yeah, unavoidable. We're already locked in and we're already heading down that path and there's going to be no doubt horrific things that happen because. And most of those things I don't think are on anyone's radar. Like whole replacing a person's job, that's like the least, oh my God, the least of your worries. Like, oh my God, get ready for people to start worshiping.
- [43:05]
A
They are anyway. Get ready. I'll send you some subreddits, friend. They already are. They already are.
- [43:12]
B
It's gonna, it is, it is introducing an alien life form to our society. And what, like this is the closest we're going to become in our lifetime to an alien landing on Earth and seeing how everybody else reacts to it.
- [43:25]
A
It. That's right.
- [43:26]
B
And people don't even realize that it's really already kind of happening. But like I said that the. But. But, you know, AI is really good at recognizing patterns really quick. And, and it, it's good at automating stuff that is just mindlessly or, or impossible for one human being to ever do. And so for, for programmers especially, I do think that there are tools that are essentially just faster versions of stuff people are already using to automate out things. Like, you could write scripts that do what AI is doing, except the AI can just. You just tell it to do the thing.
- [44:08]
A
Edmund, I'd like to present to you one of these possible avenues that people aren't thinking about when it comes to the chaos that is going to explode around this planet because of AI. And it's specific to you and anyone who's made great art. So let's take the binding visa right now, and this is my thinking when it comes to video games in general, is that it's an alternate reality. It's a portal. It's like in this sort of. Once we merge our subjective consciousness with any kind of media that pulls you in as the character, you have now entered into an alternate reality. Now, it might be a 2D alternate reality, it's not VR, obviously, but it's still a portal to a node of the multiverse. It's a little window into an alternate reality, that alternate reality. I'm not saying it's a literal universe, but I'm saying you, for all intents and purposes, are God. You channeled a reality, a universe that God only knows how many hours people have spent inside that, just that universe. I mean, you've made a lot of great games, right? So I don't know. I mean, I'm sure we could look it up on Steam how many hours people have played the Binding of Isaac. But my guess is hundreds of human lifetimes, hundreds of human lifetimes have been spent within that realm. Now, what AI is going to do, whether you want it to or not, is it's going to make it so that reality becomes fully immersive at some point. And it's going to do it in a second. You can take any game you want, whatever it is, and it is going to. It can unfold that into an actual immersive universe, a kind of Rocco's Basilisk, where you, a super intelligence could just drop you into that game. You could live there. In other words, What I'm saying is any video game is a seed right now. Baldur's Gate, no more patches. What the fuck? I wish they would never stop patching it. I love that game, Larry, and I get it, though. But that's just the seed. That's a seed of a universe that as long as there's any kind of demand to be closer and closer to that universe, and Cosplay is an example of that, people want to live in that space. They want to be in that space. As long as that market pressure is there, and there's some AI that could just do that on its own in a few years, probably you are. And I guess this is the whole core of the podcast. I came here to tell you, Edmond, you're God. You're creating worlds that you think it's just going to stop there. It's not. It's. You know what I mean? If there is interest. Human lifetimes have been spent already living in that two dimensional realm. Have you ever thought about this? You've. You're.
- [47:12]
B
Well, I thought. I have thought about it because there's you. You know who Chris Chan is? Yes.
- [47:17]
A
Yeah, sure.
- [47:17]
B
Okay, so Chris, I mean, is a friend of mine. And Chris believes that everything that they create basically splinters off. And once it's created in their mind and drawn on paper into its own universe, and everything anybody has ever created also is in their own universe. Chris also believes you can combine the universes. But just that little bit of logic, the idea of, like, once, once the human mind creates this thing, it's. It splits off into its own universe.
- [47:54]
A
Yes.
- [47:57]
B
Is, Is. Is. Is cool. I mean, it makes it. It does make creativity turn into magic, which is neat.
- [48:04]
A
Yeah, yeah.
- [48:06]
B
But I mean, it's beyond my understanding, so it's just words to me.
- [48:11]
A
Well, you're a wizard. I mean, you know, like that. I've been around wizards. I know what they're like. Pendleton's a wizard too. I'm sorry if you. If you somehow see this Pendleton. But that's my feeling. And it's cool. I mean, it is magic and, you know, magic, all these words are just. They are just words, you know? But truly, what is the difference? I mean, really, what is the difference between going into some, like, using some, I don't know, vellum or like some special quill and inscribing runes in just the right way onto a piece of paper to summon entities, to create illusions, to create fantastic distractions. What really is the difference between that and coding, other than we know how coding works? We know, like, the why it's happening, the ones and the zeros and such, but ultimately, if you're like. You're essentially like telling some sorcerer your vision. You're opening up, like you said, spaces within which whatever you want to call it, chaos, the universe, whatever you want can then move through. And then you're extantiating that reality into a universe that you know is going to absorb hundreds of thousands of hours of human life energy blissfully spent. You're a wizard.
- [49:47]
B
Whenever you say the numbers, it always makes me feel a little bit guilty. I feel like I've done something wrong.
- [49:53]
A
Yeah. Sometimes I look at, like, the bullshit I put on YouTube and it shows how many hours people have watched it, and I feel a twinge of, like, my God, what if people spent that much time trying to create a peaceful society? We'd be in a utopia.
- [50:10]
B
It's. It's weird because, I mean, my. My interest in infinitely replayable things is less in people playing. Like, I never thought people would keep playing the Binding of Isaac. I didn't design it for that. I wanted just everybody's experience to be different than the next person's experience.
- [50:25]
A
Yeah.
- [50:25]
B
It was never like, I wasn't trying to make something that you could initially just play forever and ever, or would play forever and ever. I just wanted to make something that was so unique that every run would be different, so every person's experience would be different. That's what I'm the most interested in. A dynamic world, like world building. Creating a world and making it feel like it's special to the person who's playing it. I feel a little bit bad and weird about the idea of people. And I've wrestled with it for a while until, like, I started to get emails of people saying, like, somebody in my family passed away, and I want to thank you because it. It made the time pass faster.
- [51:09]
A
Yes.
- [51:10]
B
And like that. It's a weird thing to think of, but that's. Yeah, that's like a. That's good. I'm down with that. Like, I'm down with that kind of escapism, I guess.
- [51:21]
A
Oh, let me. Let me try to soothe you, wizard. Let me just try. Because the last thing you need to be doing is feeling guilt. Here's the thing, not to get all, like, anarchist on you or anything like this. Capitalist systems create a method of quantification for how to spend one's life energy that is 100% based on producing something that has some kind of value within that system. And so the irony in technology is that the dream of tech was that it was going to automate, thus giving humans the ability to spend their time having fun. It didn't have that effect. The work week is longer. People are working more hours. It actually only seems to have made things more difficult, or at least more people's life energy is fully absorbed into generally participating in some kind of like corporate superstructure that makes money for CEOs and not much money for the people who are getting paid minimum wage. And so what emerges in that paradigm is you're wasting your time playing games, man. You need to be out there slaving, grinding. Dude, I wake up at 4am, I hit my balls with a hammer, I jump in ice cold water, I start doing push ups and then I hit my Excel spreadsheets and start making sales calls. And then I, I snort Adderall when I get too sleepy. And that's what I do because that's why I have all this money. But it, but, but truly it's like what's. A lot of people don't have access, you know, many of us live in cities, urban areas, and we don't have the luxury of taking a nice fucking Appalachian Trail hike. We don't get to go into nature spelunking or in the caves, or, you know, anywhere fucking cool. And so video games create this environmentally incredibly sound way for people to take many vacations that we need. Because if we're not supposed to play video games and we're not supposed to have any kind of recreational activity that doesn't fit into the capitalist fucking paradigm, then this is hell. Then we live in hell. Then our entire life should only be spent for a reason. And that reason needs to be the bottom line. Making money, self improvement. And that's sad as fuck. So no sir, don't feel you should feel happy about those hours because you know what? Those were hours not spent in some dreary fucking cubicle with shitty fucking lighting. Those are hours not spent, hopefully not spent in a long commute, you know what I mean? Those are hours spent in joy and fun. And trust me, because I love video games, I don't make them, but I've really spun through the guilt stuff with it and I've, my final assessment is I'm getting to participate in art. I'm getting to experience this new form of art. And it's like it's a shared dream. I'm playing Silksong right now. I love to think I'm sharing this dream with all these other people. And so now, please, I'm sorry, I Went on too long with that, but. Please, never. We just don't want you to stop. Well, I don't know.
- [55:04]
B
I don't know. I don't know if I'd ever stop from that amount. I mean, I'll stop when it's not fun anymore.
- [55:08]
A
Right.
- [55:09]
B
But that's not making it not fun. It's just.
- [55:12]
A
Tell me about Mugenics, though. Like, I. I've seen some clips of it. I don't want to ruin it. I don't want any spoilers. I'm thrilled because the. The type of game it is means that, like, I'm not gonna need a PlayStation controller for it, which I. I love. I love turning.
- [55:27]
B
You can if you want. We're adding. We're adding game set pad support, but. But no, you don't. You can use mouse or even a touch screen. So.
- [55:35]
A
But what's the. So what. So what is the. Like, what are we pitch? What's the. What's the pitch?
- [55:42]
B
I have mine. Terrible at the pitch. Like, it's. It is cat dnd. I don't think I'm supposed to say dnd. It's a cat rpg.
- [55:56]
A
You can't say D and D anymore. What's in the world?
- [56:00]
B
I don't know if I like. If I can, like, market a game.
- [56:03]
A
Saying, no, it's an rpg. It's a. It's a cat rpg. That's right. It's not candy.
- [56:09]
B
I don't know. Like, it's. It pulls from so many different genres into one, but really it's. You ever played Magic the Gathering?
- [56:19]
A
Yeah. Yeah.
- [56:20]
B
Okay. So Magic is my favorite game.
- [56:22]
A
Okay.
- [56:23]
B
I'm more inspired by board games currently than video games. I pull a lot, and I think there's a lot of designers. You'll see. You're going to notice that a lot. Like Balatro is another one that's like. Like love very much. Not inspired by video games as much as actual physical games, but I love magic. And Richard Garfield's philosophy when making magic was to come up with a bunch of systems that all work into one in this rule set. Right. And then if the logic was if you made enough cards that were unique and enough ways to win, you could allow people some creativity over. Over their deck.
- [57:02]
A
Yeah.
- [57:02]
B
And they could. They could play it how they want to play it, and they came up with a bunch of names like Spike and whatever else. The different types of players that I play, I play magic because I want to win. I'm competitive. I play magic because I want to be controlly. I play Magic. Because I would just want to make memes, you know.
- [57:19]
A
Yeah.
- [57:19]
B
I play it for the chaos. Like all these different personality types that play the game. And he allowed for enough of those mechanics to be in the game to allow them to. To. For you to do that as. As you wished. And that is the foundation of Mugenics, where it is a game. I mean, at its core, it's. It's a. It's a simulation that. Where. Where you've got these cats. They share DNA, they breed, they do whatever. All the stuff's there. Birth defects, you know, inbreeding. They. The cats hate or love each other. They can bond. You know, they have a horniness value and a libido value and a gay value. And all these things.
- [58:00]
A
Yeah.
- [58:01]
B
Collide. Then you take these cats out on adventures. You class them like you would in any rpg. And you go further away from home so you can get food to survive, to continue rolling the dice and breeding in this house that you slowly upgrade over time.
- [58:17]
A
So cool.
- [58:18]
B
You make friends with the people around town who give you things in return for cats, so they become a resource in the game.
- [58:25]
A
Okay. Okay. So let's say I've got, like two different cats that have some set of traits. I've got cat A, it's got traits that I like for whatever build I have. And then I have cat B also has traits that I like. And the goal. One of the goals would be to figure out a way to get those cats to mate, to produce offspring. And so what are the methods in the game to. To get cats to hump?
- [58:55]
B
Well, number one, you want. And this is an ability that you will gain. You'll learn. You'll. You'll learn gaydar from one of the characters in the game. You'll get gaydar. So that's. That's a big one. Is the cat gay? And how gay is it? Maybe it's just by. Or a certain past a certain threshold. It's gay. A gay cat will still mate with a straight cat if the gay cat is horny enough.
- [59:21]
A
Okay. Yep.
- [59:23]
B
That checks out the factors. That's how it kind of works. How do you affect that? Put, number one, put them in a room together alone, so there's no distractions, nothing else. Make sure that the cats have not bonded with another cat. Because once a cat has sex with another cat, there's a chance they are bonded and they can just be permanently bonded for life.
- [59:43]
A
Okay.
- [59:44]
B
And. And that makes it really hard again, unless some. Someone's very charismatic and the other cat.
- [59:49]
A
Is very you can't unbond them. There's not some way to.
- [59:52]
B
No. And it happens sometimes because then the bonded cat will. Will die. And then it'll be really hard to. To breed. You know, that's just life.
- [60:04]
A
This game is awesome. Please release it. I can't wait. I can't wait till February. Man. This is like, oh, my. Oh, my God. Like, how do you code that?
- [60:17]
B
It's not that. It's not that crazy. Like, there's just a few variables in play, but.
- [60:37]
A
This episode of the DTFH has been supported by True Classic Tees. Dang it. I'm in a hotel room in San Francisco, which is why you can't see my beautiful face. But if you could see me, I'm wearing a True Classic tee. And I love them. It's my favorite T shirts, and I am a T shirt snob. In fact, maybe the way I feel about T shirts, maybe it means I'm a little on the neurodivergent part of consciousness. Because if I'm wearing the wrong kind of T shirt, it bums me out. I don't like. It feels like I wrap sandpaper all over my body. Who knows? Maybe I just have sensitive moobs. Regardless, True Classic Tees is the perfect T shirt. And if you're a T shirt man or lady, as I am, you know what it means. You know what it means when you realize that you're going to be wearing your favorite T shirt today. That's how you will feel every time you put on a True Classic T. So forget overpriced designer brands. Skip the cheap throwaway stuff. True Classic is built for comfort, built to last, and built to give back. I had a conversation with the leader of True Classic Tees, and after I told him what had happened to my hometown of Asheville, he immediately donated an insane amount of money to them. These people are the real thing, man. You can find them at Amazon, Target, Costco, Sam's Club. But if you want to do me a good one, why don't you get it@truclassic.com Duncan that's trueclassic.com Duncan to try them out for yourself. Thank you. True Classic.
- [62:47]
B
You want to put furniture in the room that is comfortable. You know, you don't want to put like. Like wooden. Wooden. A piece of wooden furniture with. With sticking out of it or whatever. Comfortable furniture. Whatever else we're currently working on. On the. The. The gay factor of this because we want you to be able to, like I said, like the Richard. The Richard Garfield design for gay cats wanted there to be the logic. There's a lot of like, oh, this is logical, right? And then we go with it. The logic of, well, what if you have a cat? What if you have a whole house full of gay cats? Yeah, what then? You can't get anything from that.
- [63:29]
A
Right?
- [63:30]
B
And. But we're adding a gay party house. So whenever a two gay cats mate, it raises the chance of a stray cat that is gay appearing on your doorstep that shares the same values as the cats that had sex. So if, if a cat, a gay cat that is a fighter that is retired and has a fighter ability has sex with another cat that also is a fighter or whatever, the chance of a gay cat appearing with a fighter ability because he's like, hey, I like, fighters will appear. Yeah, they. It's. This is the game.
- [64:13]
A
Like attracts like. Like attracts like.
- [64:16]
B
Yeah, but yeah, it's. It's fun to be in a situation where I get people yelling, woke and then problematic at me from both sides.
- [64:24]
A
Oh, my God, that is so fucking funny. You are gonna get. Oh my. You can't win. You can't win because like, yeah, on one side people are like, oh, my God, Edmond, look at him. Sold out gay cats. It's like, dude, have you ever been around a fucking cat? Like, there's a lot of gay cats that's just.
- [64:49]
B
I mean, Guppy was a gay cat. Like, their cats can be gay.
- [64:52]
A
I'm sorry if you, you know, there's just no way to. That you're going to be able to make a game about cats where some of the cats aren't gay. And that is so crazy that other people are going to be like, dude, you can't. Like, what you're insinuating here about, like, gayness is not okay. Like, yeah, So I think, you know what? I think what, what happens there is. It's like matter and antimatter. I think because the two sides are going to collide and extinguish the controversy. It's like, it's balanced.
- [65:23]
B
Yeah, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not worried about it. Like, it's. It is what it is. It's. It's pretty interesting though, because I get to throw. I get to throw a lot of hooks out there and, and see, just to kind of gauge the waters, you know what I mean? And one of the recent was the game has a lot. The game has a lot of disorders in it. And disorders are an important part of why I made this game. You know? What do you What? When you've got a kid born with a disorder and the disorder is the disorder, you pass down to them in real life, you've got to work with what you've got.
- [65:55]
A
That's right.
- [65:55]
B
I mean, there are positives to almost all of them. And in Mugenics, that is the reality as well. So I wanted to pull from that. And we were tiptoeing around a lot of things, and then we just dove right into autism. Yeah, it was like the design that I had for autism was such a good design. Like, it was. It's, you know, plus intelligence, minus charisma. The abilities that the cat is born with, they're very good at, very efficient at, but everything else is very hard for them. Yeah, perfect design. I really loved it. But it was like, are people gonna get mad about this? Like, is this something? Like, this is kind of left field. Like, what do we do here? But this is. I have to do this. Like, it just feels like I have to do this. And I put it out there and everyone's just like, yeah, yeah, man. Like, I have autism, and this is perfectly, you know, encapsulating who I am. And.
- [66:47]
A
Yeah.
- [66:48]
B
And then it was just like, you gotta add this and this disorder that I have. And also. Yeah, we had already. We had already done them all. But it was. It was very fun to design. It felt correct. I really like the theme of hardship with silver lining, where you have to pivot and work with what you've got because, I don't know, it's very satisfying and it feels more true to life.
- [67:14]
A
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- [67:45]
C
Hey, it's Ryan Seacrest for Albertsons and Safeway. Cough and cold season is coming, so make sure you're prepared and stock up on your family's favorite personal wellness products. Now through October 7th. Shop in store and online for savings on products like Mucinex Kickstart Combo, Zyrtec allergy relief tablets or Liquid Gels, Halls cough drops and Mucinex Fast day and night, so you and your family are armed and ready for the season ahead. Offerings, October 7th. Restrictions apply. Offers may vary. Visit albertsons or safeway.com for more details.
- [68:15]
A
I. You. I'm sorry. I hate it. I'm sorry. I'M going to just say, you're a genius, man. And we're so lucky you're making these things because like everything you just described, it's just. I'm gonna get so lost in this game. You get to name your own cats, right? You get to name them.
- [68:33]
B
No, we, we, we cut that, we cut that feature when we realized that the randomized names gave character to the, to each cat. It was really, it was really interesting. We'd get these situations where people would put a personality to a name and it was just naturally happening all the time.
- [68:52]
A
Right.
- [68:53]
B
And then in, in our personal experience with games where, you know, keep in mind that you're going to be breeding thousands of cats. You're not going to want to name them. All right? And if you do, after the first five or six, you're going to start calling them Guppy 2, Guppy 3, Guppy 4.
- [69:08]
A
You know what? Okay, let me stop you there. Cult of the Lamb. You could name your followers and at.
- [69:16]
B
First, how many could you do?
- [69:18]
A
No, first I'm going to name these after all my friends. And then you're like, I don't have friends. And then you just feel sad.
- [69:28]
B
Yeah, yeah, people, people want the feature and they've talked to us about it too. But I'm sticking to my guns because I've seen it's really common, like in our testing server and stuff, that people will be like, ah, check out Gibby. Like this cat. I love this cat. And it's just like there's a personality that goes to the name that you just associate with the cat. And then there's just coincidences that happen along the way, that the cat happens to be fat or whatever else, you know, that just. It works out really well.
- [69:56]
A
No, no, no, I get it, man. No, I totally get it. I honestly, like, when I was looking at your feed, showing the game, I was thinking, like, I want to name my cats. And now that you're describing it that way, I'm remembering Cult of the Lamb when I like you just, I, I'm not gonna spend, I don't want to spend too much time naming things. It just ends up eating into your. Into the, into the gameplay itself. I, I get that. What about any multiplayer? Any trading of cats? Any. Like, if I have a cat, can I trade it to someone online?
- [70:28]
B
No, not at launch for sure. I mean, we've discussed the possibility as if this game does really well and has a huge fan base. We can do DLC in the future and maybe.
- [70:37]
A
Hold on. I lost you your audio Cut out for some reason. Did your headphones die?
- [70:42]
B
I can hear myself.
- [70:43]
A
Okay. There, that's better. Just the last sentence. Do you mind repeating that? Evan? Sorry.
- [70:47]
B
Sure. You can still hear me, right?
- [70:49]
A
Yep.
- [70:49]
B
Okay, you're sorry. Your. Your. Your volume went up for me since you came back, so I lowered my volume and I couldn't hear myself. But okay. What was I saying?
- [70:59]
A
Trading cats.
- [71:00]
B
Trading cats. Oh. Online functionality is something we've discussed. It's not going to be there at launch. Absolutely not. And we could possibly explore in a dlc, but it, it wasn't there from the beginning. It wasn't part of the plan. And it will turn into a Pokemon situation. I don't know if you got into that. But like basically another key piece of the puzzle for this game is that eventually in the first act of the game there's. We dance around mutations. You might see birth defects which are negative mutations. They're just bad.
- [71:36]
A
Yeah.
- [71:37]
B
But you may run into a vat of acid or toxic waste or whatever that if you successfully ingest and could process it could mutate the cat in some way. And then the mutation is now in the DNA. And when you breed cats, you can then breed into this mutation. And the mutations can be pretty swingy. Like really big buffs of strength or abilities like web webbed feet, like walking on water and that sort of stuff too. And in the end. So like my current, my current gameplay save my main one has about 200 hours currently and I'm at the end of the game and my cats look monstrous. So the end, the end game, you have this process, like this long process of mutating your cats. And we've got the whole like you can actually go in and look at the family tree and see like generations and everything. It's easy to see inbreeding when you see the square. But the man. But the end game is to have these really freaky things that don't even resemble cats anymore. And if we had trading, that's all it would be like. It would just be like, oh, you want. Do you want to have my. My nine horned beast cat that you know.
- [72:55]
A
Yes.
- [72:56]
B
That doesn't have a body or you know, whatever.
- [72:58]
A
Like dude, this is so cool. Well, look man, I want to, I want to help. Like do you. Can people do pre orders? Like I'm sure you guys, when you're do like what can we do to help?
- [73:14]
B
I mean just like I guess wish list on Steam. Search Mugenics.
- [73:18]
A
Okay.
- [73:19]
B
Which is a play on eugenics, which certain websites will say that is a problematic name.
- [73:24]
A
Yeah.
- [73:25]
B
And to that I say, yeah, that's the point. That's the point.
- [73:28]
A
Yeah. I don't think reason if anybody keeps.
- [73:32]
B
Why it's called that.
- [73:33]
A
If anybody gets uptight about this game, you're out of your fucking mind. This is. We're so lucky. And I'm pre ordering it as soon as I get off this call with you. And I just cannot wait. Edmond, thank you for your time. Thank you for making this game six years. Dude, it's almost over. You're at the finish line. Congratulations.
- [73:53]
B
It's exciting. I'm really looking forward to seeing people play it. That's my number one.
- [73:58]
A
All right. Well, thank you, Emin. You are the best. All the links you need to find Mugenics Mr. McMillan's Twitter to connect with this genius wizard will be down below. Thank you so much. That was Edmund McMillen, everybody. You can go on Steam and put Mugenics on your wish list. That'd be a really nice thing to do, seeing as how this sweet wizard just spent an hour with my yappy ass. If you want commercial free episodes of the DTFH, go to YouTube.com duncan tro I don't know. Google my podcast on YouTube. I should know the name of it, but I don't know what it is. DTFH on YouTube. I don't know. I don't know. I want to be covered in moss. I want to be covered in moss like some kind of dryad perched above a beautiful babbling brook with butterflies landing on my outstretched arms. I don't want to know my YouTube URL. Hope you guys are doing great. Hang in there. Things are going to be fine. I love you and I'll see you next week.
- [75:10]
C
Hey, it's Ryan Seacrest for Albertsons and Safeway Cough and cold season is coming, so make sure you're prepared and stock up on your family's favorite personal wellness products now through October 7th. Shop in store and online for savings on products like Mucinex Kickstart combo, Zyrtec allergy relief tablets or liquid gels halls cough drops and Mucinex fast day and night so you and your family are armed and ready for the season ahead offerings October 7th. Restrictions apply. Offers may vary. Visit albertsons or safeway.com for more details.
- [75:40]
A
I'm here on the job site with Dale, who's a framing contractor. Hey, good morning. Dale traded up to Geico Commercial Auto insurance for all all his business vehicles. We're here where he needs us most.
- [75:50]
B
Yep, they sure are.
- [75:51]
A
We make it easy for him to save on all his insurance needs, all in one place with coverage that fits his business and bottom line. Oh, I shouldn't have looked down.
- [75:59]
B
It's all right.
- [76:00]
A
We're so far up here. Look at me. Take a deep breath. Oh, I'm good. So good. Get a commercial auto insurance quote today@geico.com and see how much you could save. Get more with geico.