Game Scoop! 800: Wonder Woman's Amazonian Adventure Axed

Summary

Game Scoop! Episode 800 Summary: Wonder Woman's Amazonian Adventure Axed

Release Date: February 27, 2025
Hosts: Damon Hatfield, Nick Limone, Sam Claiborne, Mark Medina
Podcast: IGN & Geek Media's Game Scoop!

---

1. Episode Milestone and Introduction

Celebrating its 800th episode and 100th as part of the Game Scoop series, Game Scoop! 800: Wonder Woman's Amazonian Adventure Axed kicks off with enthusiasm from host Damon Hatfield and the core team—Nick Limone, Sam Claiborne, and Mark Medina.

[02:25] Damon Hatfield: "This is our 800th episode. This is the 100th episode of Game Scoop which is absolutely insane."

The hosts express gratitude towards longtime listeners and tease the week’s topics: the unexpected cancellation of the Wonder Woman game, insights into Avowed, and an engaging game of Video Game 20 Questions.

2. Cancellation of Wonder Woman Game and Monolith Productions' Closure

The episode dives straight into the shocking news: Warner Brothers has canceled the highly-anticipated Wonder Woman game and subsequently shut down its developer, Monolith Productions.

[03:54] Nick Limone: "That was monologue wow with actual canon about the Matrix universe."

Monolith Productions, known for successful titles like Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor and Shadow of War, has a storied history dating back to 1997 with games such as Blood and the Fear series.

[03:54] Damon Hatfield: "Their first game was Blood on PC and they did the Fear games... They did the Matrix Online."

The hosts reminisce about Monolith's innovative contributions, particularly the Nemesis System—an AI-driven mechanic that created dynamic enemy relationships within games.

[08:41] Nick Limone: "They're excellent, they feel good to play and there's just a perfect power fantasy game."

Sam Claiborne highlights the Nemesis System's legacy:

[07:22] Sam Claiborne: "...the fact that this Nemesis system... it's just really sad to lose that because I don't think we're going to get it replaced in anything."

3. Impact on the Gaming Industry and Developer Community

The cancellation marks a significant blow to the gaming landscape, as Monolith was a pioneer in open-world and AI-driven game design. The hosts express concern over potential loss of innovation within Warner Brothers Games.

[09:46] Nick Limone: "It seems like there's a lot of things that might be affecting something that they have no control over, and that's always a bummer."

Sam emphasizes the difficulty in rebuilding such a talented team:

[11:00] Sam Claiborne: "They were all working on games... they're just really feeling it, you know? Like, it just... it feels terrible."

4. State of Warner Brothers Games

Discussion shifts to the broader challenges facing Warner Brothers Games, including recent shutdowns of other studios like Player First Games and WB San Diego. The hosts critique Warner Brothers' strategic direction, noting a shift towards "sure wins" and live-service models.

[09:03] Mark Medina: "...currencies have gotten so high that they have to cut all this experimentation... we're seeing it with PlayStation a lot right now, too."

Nick adds a layer of speculation regarding internal conflicts influencing these decisions:

[09:46] Nick Limone: "It feels like there is this left hand not talking to the right and vice versa."

Sam laments the loss of creative experiments within the company:

[09:46] Sam Claiborne: "They're all working on games... it's just really sad to lose that."

5. Positive Shift: Avowed Discussion

Transitioning from the somber news, the conversation lightens as Damon shares his growing enthusiasm for Avowed, an upcoming title from Obsidian Entertainment.

[21:46] Damon Hatfield: "I'm really liking Avowed. I was a little bit lukewarm, but the switches flipped where I'm thinking about it during the day..."

The trio discusses gameplay mechanics, character companions, and the immersive open-world experience that Avowed promises.

[24:08] Nick Limone: "I love that the game doesn't have enemy scaling so that you can accidentally wander into an area where enemies will kick your ass..."

Mark praises the game's combat feel:

[24:42] Mark Medina: "...it just feels good. The melee feels great in that game."

6. Video Game 20 Questions Segment

In the interactive segment, the team attempts to guess a listener-submitted game through a series of questions. The suggested game, Mini Ninjas, proves challenging, highlighting the diverse and sometimes obscure preferences within the gaming community.

[74:44] Mark Medina: "This is Mini Ninjas."

Despite numerous attempts, the hosts struggle to identify the game, ultimately revealing it and reflecting on its unique place in the audience’s gaming history.

[78:17] Nick Limone: "Mini Ninjas. I don’t think anyone would have gotten this one."

7. March 1992 Issue of Nintendo Power Review

Damon presents an analysis of the March 1992 issue of Nintendo Power, offering nostalgia and insights into the gaming culture of the early '90s. The discussion covers:

• Cover Art and Featured Games: Examination of the Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening cover and other NES, Game Boy, and Super Nintendo titles featured.

  [46:14] Damon Hatfield: "...they have an ad for the Super Scope 6."

• Reader Contributions: Highlighting fan art and letters, such as parents painting Mario scenes on their child’s bedroom walls.

  [48:03] Damon Hatfield: "Christian, DJ actually live in Super Mario Brothers world. ... we still spend time squashing creatures, dueling monsters..."

• Nintendo Power Awards '91: Overview of award categories and nominees, reflecting the popular games of that era.

  [60:49] Mark Medina: "Best overall Super Nintendo was Super Mario World, Final Fantasy 2, Final Fight, and SimCity..."

The team shares personal anecdotes and fond memories associated with the games featured, enriching the review with a sense of shared history.

[43:19] Nick Limone: "Final Fantasy 2 is up there. Probably because it looks dramatically different from Final Fantasy 1 NES."

8. Closing Remarks

As the episode wraps up, the hosts invite listeners to continue engaging with Game Scoop! and share their thoughts and questions for future segments.

[77:00] Damon Hatfield: "Viewers, listeners, if you have your own suggestions for video game 20 questions, email them to me at gamescoopgn.com..."

They express excitement for future episodes and gratitude towards their team and listeners, cementing Game Scoop!'s place as a cornerstone in the gaming podcast community.

[77:36] Damon Hatfield: "Thank you to Tayo and everyone working behind the scenes to make this episode possible."

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Notable Quotes

• [02:25] Damon Hatfield: "This is our 800th episode. This is the 100th episode of Game Scoop which is absolutely insane."

• [07:22] Sam Claiborne: "...the fact that this Nemesis system... it's just really sad to lose that because I don't think we're going to get it replaced in anything."

• [21:46] Damon Hatfield: "I'm really liking Avowed. I was a little bit lukewarm, but the switches flipped where I'm thinking about it during the day..."

• [24:08] Nick Limone: "I love that the game doesn't have enemy scaling so that you can accidentally wander into an area where enemies will kick your ass."

• [24:42] Mark Medina: "...it just feels good. The melee feels great in that game."

• [02:06] Nick Limone: "I'm back, baby."

• [03:54] Nick Limone: "That was monologue wow with actual canon about the Matrix universe."

• [42:27] Nick Limone: "You gotta play Link to the Past. You gotta do it."

---

This episode of Game Scoop! masterfully balances critical industry news with passionate discussions on beloved games, providing listeners with both insightful analysis and heartfelt nostalgia.

Transcript

[Damon Hadfield]

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[Nick Limone]

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[Damon Hadfield]

This week on gamescoop, we're discussing the shocking news of Wonder Woman's cancellation and the closing of its developer, Monolith. I'm also really coming around on Avowed and we'll play video game 20 Questions. All that and more coming up right now. Please be excited. What's up everybody? Welcome to IGN gamescoop. Your host Damon Hadfield. And joining me this week here in studio is Nick Limone.

[Nick Limone]

I'm back, baby.

[Damon Hadfield]

Sam Claiborne joins us.

[Sam Claiborne]

Good to join this crew for a second week in a row.

[Damon Hadfield]

Second week in a row. Mark Medina is here as well. Yee haw.

[Mark Medina]

We're riding again. I'm excited.

[Damon Hadfield]

That is not your catchphrase, Mark.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, what the heck. That's not what I signed up for.

[Mark Medina]

I'm here for a root episode. Let's go.

[Damon Hadfield]

It is going to be a Root and Tootin episode. This is our 800th episode. This is the 100th episode of Game Scoop which is absolutely insane.

[Sam Claiborne]

Your first rodeo. Yeah, definitely not the 800th rodeo.

[Damon Hadfield]

Have I given enough? Now I rest. No, no, no. We're just getting started. That was just the prologue. The first 800 episodes were just the prologue. Lots, lots of scoops to come. We've got a great show for you this week. I woke up today thinking this was going to be another light news episode and we'd be leaning heavily on lots of listener. But no, some big news actually happened today. I also am really coming around on a vowed I'm enjoying that more and more. So we'll discuss that. And I have the March 1992 issue of Nintendo Power. Any, any guesses what would be on the COVID of the March 1992 issue of Nintendo Power soon?

[Nick Limone]

Metroid. I'm bad with dates.

[Sam Claiborne]

We'll see Game Boy Metroid.

[Damon Hadfield]

We'll see. We'll see in just a little bit. All right. But first, really, really big news this week. Really kind of shocking and kind of bummer news. The Warner Brothers is canceling that Wonder Woman game that was announced back in 2021 and that they never gave us any more information about. And they're canceling its developer, Monolith Productions, which is probably most known for the Middle Earth, Shadow of Mordor and Shadow of War games. But they go all the way back to 1997. Their first game was Blood on PC and they did the Fear games. They did Condemned 1 and 2. They did the Matrix Online.

[Nick Limone]

That was monologue wow with actual canon about the Matrix universe.

[Damon Hadfield]

I remember. Yeah, that was actually tit into the.

[Nick Limone]

Maybe a spoiler where Morpheus is originally killed. It happens in Matrix Online. So there you go.

[Sam Claiborne]

The, that's a, that's a good run of games. Like I just want to throw out there. I love first of all, Shadow Mordar games, stuff like that.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, I, I love those.

[Mark Medina]

Is this what the game looks like? That looks atrocious.

[Damon Hadfield]

I mean this is what, 2,000?

[Nick Limone]

Yeah. This is like.

[Mark Medina]

There we go.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

That was a cool fact. I thought that was.

[Mark Medina]

Never mind. I stand corrected. That was cool.

[Damon Hadfield]

You may not understand because you've never seen the Matrix. Right?

[Mark Medina]

I see the Matrix. I love it. Okay, it looks like. It looked like. What was the Game Boy VR thing? And it was like, you remember it was like black and red and then. But it looked like mixed with Game Boy Virtual. The Virtual black and green.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, the Virtual Game Boy VR is way good. Way better name though.

[Sam Claiborne]

Weirdly. The Game Boy is black and green.

[Mark Medina]

It was portable. It had legs. Take it anywhere.

[Damon Hadfield]

I mean, Sam owns it. He knows. You don't have to tell Sam about the Virtual or the VB Virtual Boy.

[Sam Claiborne]

I have the whole library. Damon's played my Virtual Boy.

[Damon Hadfield]

I have.

[Nick Limone]

Dang.

[Mark Medina]

You have all 12 games.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, there's about 20 if you include the Japanese ones.

[Damon Hadfield]

There was one other interesting game that Monolith made right before they did Shadow of Mordor, a game that I had completely forgotten about that went to XBLA and psn. They did Guardians of Middle Earth, which was a Middle Earth moba.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, wow.

[Damon Hadfield]

And I think we gave it like a 7.5.

[Nick Limone]

I don't remember that all pour one out though, man. Like Fear First Encounter and Assault Recon. Iconic games to me. They scared me so much when I was like early teen and just. I love the slow mo effect. I love being able to slide and just, you know, kick someone up into the air and light them up with shotgun shells and then get scared by that very creepy little girl as you crawl through it. Air duck. Like the Fear games are so fun and so varied. Like Fear two kind of escalated the action then. Fear three was a weird co op game, but just man, really, really fun games. And condemned criminal origins. Xbox 360 launch titles that.

[Damon Hadfield]

Launch title or launch window 2005.

[Nick Limone]

But we're weird. Weird aside on that. I met the guy who is the character model for the main character in Condemned Criminal Origins.

[Sam Claiborne]

John Condemned.

[Nick Limone]

His name is Greg. Greg Grumberg. And when I asked him, are you the guy from Condemned Criminal Origins? He's a. He's, I think a famous actor. He was like, how's that the one you know me from? And then he gave me a signed copy of his game.

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, it's kind of. It's a very varied output.

[Mark Medina]

Right.

[Damon Hadfield]

Because the. The Shadow of games are big open world games. They have Fear and Condemned, which is a lot like linear, pretty hardcore first person shooters. First person shooters. The Matrix Online and Then this, this guard, this Middle Earth Moba that they made also. That turned out pretty well. Yeah. So Wonder Woman, we, we've spent, you know, there's in recent years since that game was announced. We would often bring up the fact that where the heck is this game?

[Mark Medina]

Well, now we know you have to wonder what like. Yeah, like three years, were they just like we have to cancel this because we don't have money to produce it or like was just this like not going anywhere?

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, like so.

[Sam Claiborne]

Well, there's so many other problems at wb.

[Mark Medina]

Right?

[Nick Limone]

Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

Like if you have to assume like where. What are they doing? Where are they cutting? Unfortunately, you know, they cut a lot more than Monolith today.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

And it's, it's strange because like these people are all working on, you know, games. Like I hope they land on their feet. Maybe there's other jobs at wbi. I don't know. I don't know the details of the cut but like the fact that this, there was, there was magic at this company. Like this company made a thing called the Nemesis system in Shadow of Mordor, which aside from Climb, everything in Zelda is like my favorite invention of this generation of gameplay. I guess it's last generation now, but it's so fun and it's such a good idea and they got to use it a little bit more in the sequel to that. They copyrighted it or trademarked it. So I don't know if it can be used by other people. But it presumably would have been used in this Wonder Woman game. And if that would have been against really funny, you know, C and D tier DC villains or just Amazonians, you know, like, I mean all that was just cool sounding and a company that, you know, made those games and made that innovation. It's just really sad to lose that because I don't think we're going to get it replaced in anything. And boy, those Mordor games are awesome. I really do think they're awesome.

[Nick Limone]

They're excellent, they feel good to play and there's just a perfect like power fantasy game.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yes. And they're set and they're in a cool setting. Like you can really screw up Lord of the Rings settings. But it's like this is neat. It's like a neat time period. It's goofy, it's action y, but it's like set on this like you know, the creations of Mordor. It's cool. It's just cool.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, I think it's just further. We're seeing further publishers go further, further down the Route of, like, only betting on sure wins, right? Because it said that they're going to fuck. It's weird. They listed the things that they said they're going to focus on. So obviously one was, you know, Hogwarts Legacy 2. And then one of them said DC. And it's like, wait, hold on. You guys just cut a DC game? Presumably they. They are talking specifically about Batman games because there's, you know. But it's. I don't know, it. It's a scary world where it's like, budgets have gotten so high that. That they have to cut all this, like, experimentation and maybes because they can only bet on sure wins. We're seeing it with PlayStation a lot right now, too, so I don't know, it's just kind of a bummer.

[Nick Limone]

I mean, it's pure speculation, but, like, you can't help but take a look at something like Rocksteady and what happened with Suicide Squad kills the Justice League. And it feels like there is this left hand not talking to the right and vice versa, you know, I know these developers are unfortunately victim to decisions that were out of their control, more than likely. And so it's just a bit of a bummer when you see stuff like that. It's not a bit. It's a serious bummer, but just. Yeah, it seems like there's a lot of things that might be affecting something that they have no control over, and that's always a bummer.

[Sam Claiborne]

And, like, just to have an intact team making a game, game after game that are pretty good and they're going to get better and better than they make these kind of two games we all love. Like, that's. That's to break that up. It's really hard to build that back because it takes so many people to make a video game. And just that kind of institution that was developed that had, like, a path to making another cool game in Wonder Woman, like, that's just. That loss is. I'm really feeling it, you know? Like, it just. It feels terrible. And, like, just seeing for a second there, the flashing up of, like, an orc taunting you, like, that was so funny. And, you know, they call me, oh, I'm gonna eat your brains for breakfast.

[Mark Medina]

Dude, that was so good.

[Nick Limone]

That was a really good.

[Sam Claiborne]

They were so funny. And then. And then they'd have, like, a randomly generated name. You know, it'd be like, Eyeball. The Eyeball Eater. You know, it was, like, so funny. And then you would, like, recruit them. And then there was that little chessboard of, like, who was stronger. And you could, like, go for the stronger ones, and they would be, like, a little bit overpowered, but you could send your orcs after them to help to weaken them. And then remember how the orcs are all kind of, like, they're all kind of cowards. So eventually some of them have this attribute that makes them flee, and then all of a sudden, you're, like, chasing them down by running. Like, that whole gameplay loop, it's just. There's just nothing like it. And yes, it could have been worn out by now, but I was ready for another one. And because that's something that the studio made and they specialized in, I don't know, maybe it'll happen. Like, you know, it happens sometimes. It's like, well, this is a spiritual success. Or like, you know, this. This creator is making this game that's exactly like the other game in C. Castlevania. Right. Maybe that'll happen, but probably not, because it was probably 50 people's game or 250 people's game. And it's just the magic might not ever happen again. It's really sad.

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, I mean, it's crazy. The Shadow of war shipped in 2017. They haven't shipped a game in eight years.

[Nick Limone]

Wow.

[Damon Hadfield]

You know, like, how did. What I, I. How do you work? How do you toil away on something for eight years and not having anything to publicly show for it, you know?

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, right. Yeah, that's a problem in itself. But, you know, how close was the game? Wb, I'll remind you, is pretty famous for canceling full movie completed movies.

[Damon Hadfield]

Movies, yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

Where they have. They had the Roadrunner Coyote movie, right?

[Nick Limone]

Yep.

[Sam Claiborne]

Completed and shelved. And then Batgirl right before that. Completed and shelved. How. How far along was this?

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, I mean, it cut the.

[Sam Claiborne]

Cut the losses, you know?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Nick Limone]

We may never know.

[Damon Hadfield]

There was never any gameplay of it shown. Never even a full trailer. Just that short teaser announcement trailer.

[Nick Limone]

Also, shout out to the team at Monolith for creating one of the best prompts I've seen in a video game. In Shadow of Mordor, when the game is teaching you how to do stealth and it's press X to kiss wife instead of execute people. And then that button would just get used to execute people. Chef's Kiss. So good.

[Sam Claiborne]

Remember how the protagonist, you could convince an orc to be under your thrall, but to do that, you would, like, grab the orc's face and the orc would just be like.

[Nick Limone]

I still play Shadow of War. Maybe every other six months. I'll Load it up. I'll knock out a couple of missions, be like, man, this game feels good.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, I bet that game.

[Sam Claiborne]

And there's a little window where you weaken them by battle, right? You fight to fight, and all of a sudden you can just grab their face and just. I think they would turn around right away and start fighting for you, too, in some cases, which is, like, so badass. It's just so cool. It feels like Metal Gear Solid five, where you're like. Or Peace Walker is like this too, where, like, most of what you're doing in that game is to, like, build your own resources in your army. And I just, like. I love that loop of, like, even though you're like, you could kill all these enemies and just run through this level, like, no, you, like, meticulously get everybody by parachute and get every single vehicle and then get them back to your base. You know, it's really fun.

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, I think Warner Brothers is the one that trademarked or patented the Nemesis System. So do they get.

[Nick Limone]

I would assume they get to keep the patent.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. I mean, so. Yes.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, that's true. So, I mean, potential.

[Damon Hadfield]

I mean. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Nick Limone]

I wanna.

[Sam Claiborne]

I think that'd be cool to do Batman, but like a Year zero, and then all the nemeses are like, crappy early versions of those villains. Like, Clayface is just like a Dick Tracy villain that, like, has. Can you wear different masks or whatever, like, those early things. Penguin is just like a goofy, waddling.

[Nick Limone]

Gangster, you know, dude, it should be like Sifu whenever. A Year two Batman Year two, it's like the thugs come back a little bit stronger, you know, missing an eyeball and stuff. Year three, they're all different colors for that. Kind of sick.

[Sam Claiborne]

Is that how Sifu handles it?

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, it's like every time you die, you age a little bit. So this would be like the inverse of that.

[Sam Claiborne]

That's great.

[Damon Hadfield]

To Monolith wasn't the only developer shut down by wb. They also shut down. What is it? Player First Games. Player First Games and WB San Diego. W. San Diego was working on mobile stuff. And then Player First Games did Multiverses. And what's sad about that is that they were only acquired by WB last July.

[Nick Limone]

And it's wild, too, because Multiverses had such a good impression in its open beta, and then it just completely squandered that good reputation on its 1.0 launch. And everyone was just baffled at all of the design choices, the rebalancing and. And everything. It's just. I. I did not see a quicker, like, change in attitude towards the game. I've never seen one that quick.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah. I don't know if you know this and I don't want to take stabs if you don't, but do you know what the. Was it. Was it gameplay changes or was like microtransactions? Like, what. What made people mad?

[Nick Limone]

I think it was a mix of both. I believe it had to do with microtransactions and earn stuff and also just some like, balance changes.

[Mark Medina]

But isn't that. Isn't that also the game that, like, it was out, you could like buy it or at least spend money on like microtransactions. And then they were just like, hey, by the way, that was our beta.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah.

[Mark Medina]

And it was like. But nothing about it read like a beta. They accepted people's money and they're like, so we'll be back.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. And they relaunched it and then they.

[Mark Medina]

Showed it's already got a. Like, that's not great.

[Nick Limone]

It's an uphill battle. But it was a fun game. Like, mechanically, it felt good to play this game in open beta and I remember having a blast with it with.

[Damon Hadfield]

My buddies and it had some good writing for the characters. This isn't my kind of game, but I saw this in a preview. Bugs Bunny is in it. And then I think it's Jon Snow from Game of Thrones in it. And they have like specific lines written for if you're fighting this one person. So when Bugs Bunny punches Jon Snow, he'll be like, will the north remember this? I thought that was so clever.

[Nick Limone]

It was like the first time you had seen them really embracing the. The multiverse style nature of the game. And then like lean into the. Normally when brands come together like this, you don't ever get to have those fun interactions. And they did well.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah. This should just print money, you know, just on the face of it, like, oh, it's filling this smash void. Which people still just play. Like kids just play Smash Brothers all the time. Right. So it's like, can you do that on a phone? Can you do that on Steam? And then like sell a billion copies? Like, probably. They were on the way to doing that, but it sounds like there was some self sabotage there.

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, it's bummer news for sure. I'm just trying to think. It seems like Warner Brothers Games does not really know what it's doing, but I don't know how like the leadership change. I'm trying to. I'm just trying to look back at all the games that is published because like Batman Arkham was good for a long time and then there's something happened along the way.

[Mark Medina]

I, I trend chasing, like live service trend chasing. And then them realizing, okay, maybe this isn't what people want. They delayed that game a whole year after they first showed it off because like, you know, me and Sam have a very famous. Like we were making fun of it on Scoop because it was just like numbers and you're like, this is not why we play these because you can get like 0.2% more gun shooting.

[Nick Limone]

You talking about Gotham Knights?

[Mark Medina]

No, we're talking, talking about Suicide Squad.

[Nick Limone]

Oh God.

[Mark Medina]

Showed it. But like when they showed it and then they delayed it for like almost a year because like that's when they really blew the lid off. And you realize, oh, this is just straight up like a live service game. And it was like all the screenshots were just like. It was just stats and just stuff that you don't. That's, that's not why you play Arkham games. Right. You don't play it to get to. For all these like stats and raising your gun percent 3% stronger and stuff like that. And so then they delayed the game but like it didn't change anything the game.

[Sam Claiborne]

You know, it used to be that this was the multiplayer mode that you got with your single player game.

[Mark Medina]

Right, Right.

[Sam Claiborne]

And it's just like shocking that like after you know, the better part of a decade, like this was the whole thing. It's just, it's just. Yeah. The time was that this would be the tacked on multiplayer to a Batman game. Fine.

[Mark Medina]

I mean it's also notorious. Like it's like six hours long.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah.

[Mark Medina]

And that's the other thing is like wow. Yeah. It's insanely short. It's very. You could, you could beat it in a couple of evenings for sure. Because I would not beat this game had it, had it not been as short as it was. Because it is. It is not an enjoyable experience. And so that's, that's also what baffles me is like where there was definitely pivots, it was definitely trend chasing when it comes to live service stuff. And then they were like, well, we got to scrap that and we got to make it more single player because that happened with Dragon Age, the Veil Guard as well. That's ea. But like that was supposed to be a more live servicy type games and they ripped it all out and it ended up working out for them. But for Suicide Squad I think they were just in too deep. And I don't know, it baffles me that this game took like nearly a decade to make and you could beat it like five hours. And it's not.

[Sam Claiborne]

You know, what's crazy to me is that I see what people are playing through strategy guides. Like, what people are playing. Like, we just see what people are looking up at what they're playing all the time. And I see that people play Lego games all the time. And the Lego games they play are licenses from wb. They're Harry Potter. They are Lego DC villains was a big one. Obviously there's Lego Batmans and then there's Lord of the Rings, you know, like, those are all wb. Like, those used to come out like two a year. Like, who doesn't want that money? Like, what's happening? Like, why are we not getting those Lego games? It is unbelievable to me that they're not, you know, at least getting put in collections or remade or whatever. But, like, what happened to Lego games? What happened to the Batman games? Whatever. Like, there's existential problems with running this, like Giant, you know, could be great video game publisher. And of course, luckily we have Mortal Kombat still. Let's ask what's left, right? Maybe we'll have a Batman game and maybe we'll have Hogwarts games. Like, that's what we're down to though.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Weird times over at Warner Brothers Games. It looks like their first game was the Matrix online in 2005.

[Nick Limone]

Wow.

[Damon Hadfield]

And I'd forgotten, just looking at their game list here, which is very, very long. They did Scribble Nuts.

[Nick Limone]

Good game.

[Mark Medina]

Oh, dude, Scribble Knots is so good.

[Damon Hadfield]

That was Warner Bros. Wow. Okay, in. In more lighthearted news, I'm really liking Avowed. I was a little bit lukewarm, but.

[Mark Medina]

The more I played got him and I.

[Damon Hadfield]

The. The switches flipped where I'm thinking about it during the day, getting excited to play it, like thinking about what I want to do during that evening's play session.

[Mark Medina]

How far have you gotten?

[Damon Hadfield]

I'm still on the. I guess the. So you leave the tutorial island, then you go to a big area with big city. That's what I'm doing. Yeah. That's where I am.

[Sam Claiborne]

But you've gotten out or you're doing stuff around the big city now, not just in the opening artists and I went through.

[Damon Hadfield]

There's a kind of a. Kind of a big. A big chapter break. Something happens. I'm on the other side of that too.

[Nick Limone]

Gotcha.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah.

[Nick Limone]

Cool.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's like great. I think it Gets funnier the more it goes on in the, in the tutorial area. The whole. The writing just kind of seemed a little bit, you know, like nothing, just a little generic. But I think, I think the game actually starts getting pretty funny the more you play.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, your companions comments are funny.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, I love him. Kai is great.

[Nick Limone]

Guy is awesome.

[Damon Hadfield]

Guy is so good and he's very supportive. Right? Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

And then you get.

[Mark Medina]

What do you get?

[Sam Claiborne]

More companions later.

[Mark Medina]

But, but yeah, you have the dwarf guy, right?

[Damon Hadfield]

I just have Kai right now.

[Sam Claiborne]

Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah, you won't have that there, people yet.

[Mark Medina]

It depends on how much you mainline. Like, you can get him. You probably could get him right now, but like the game kind of just sends you in a bunch of different places and it's fine. It's fine to just have Kai.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, it is. And like, I think it's also fun to see. To start pushing the boundaries in that first open world. And I just, I'm trying to uncover all the map. Right. I just like doing that in a game. And there's areas that I've gone to which like, the enemies are like, way too strong for me, which is awesome. Like, and I tried to kill one of them and I felt good about it because you could just get the heck out of there after you do that. And it's really fun. I love that stuff.

[Nick Limone]

I love that the game doesn't have enemy scaling so that you can accidentally wander into an area where enemies will kick your ass. Or like, all right, I guess I'm not going there. Or if you are stubborn like me, you can figure out a way of like, all right, what if I game this a little bit? What if I. What if I get a little bit sweaty and really do my job here and. Yeah, you can if you figure it out.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yep.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. No level scaling. And as Sam pointed out, the enemies don't return. They don't.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, you can clear out, which is awesome there.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's really cool. My two loadouts, I think that I prefer right now I have just a big sledgehammer and then I. My other one is a spell book and a pistol. And it's pretty fun to have, you know, cast spells and just blast people in the face with a pistol at the same time.

[Nick Limone]

Heck yeah.

[Mark Medina]

This game, it. It scratches that. So there's something about fighting games that I, I, you know, like, I'm not sure a lot of people notice is that like when you make contact, it's. It almost freezes the game for like a 16th of a second and it makes it feel like your attacks are really like they have impact and that's how they feel in a vowed. I feel like the game just does that. It's like a little micro 1/16 of a second freeze and then it's just like. It just feels good. The melee feels great in that game. So I'm glad that you're using a big two handed like.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Mark Medina]

Thing because it's not like Skyrim where you're just like going through them.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Mark Medina]

Like they feel the hits and it feels good.

[Damon Hadfield]

And you can. The smaller ones, like you hit them with the sledgehammer and they'll fly off into the.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, dude. So good.

[Damon Hadfield]

Ragdoll is good. And then I have a freeze spell where you can actually freeze them and then shatter them with the sledgehammer. It's great.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah.

[Nick Limone]

I think, Mark, you kind of.

[Mark Medina]

I never thought about doing that.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, dude. You can also do the. The charge where you shatter them too. So you just basically tackle them and then they just crumble into pieces. It's so good. But Mark, I think you really touched on something there. Like, I think that what you're talking about is like my fate. What? Some of my favorite things about games is how they play with the nature of game to trick you into thinking you're doing something impressive. When in reality this one is connecting with the zero to really distill it down to its essence. Where it's the things like Coyote time in platformers where you can run off an edge but still have the leeway to jump to the next platform. It is how you manipulate the numbers to make people feel good. And I think that's what separates a good game from a great game. And I think that the people at Obsidian, they nailed it. I think they got a great game on their hands.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

And you guys are talking about there's not much enemy variety, but it hasn't felt that repetitive to me so far. I. I saw you fought bears. Of course there's the little lizard guys.

[Nick Limone]

The zar trips or something like that.

[Sam Claiborne]

Then there's like the purple ghosts.

[Damon Hadfield]

The ghost, the wraiths or whatever you want to call them.

[Sam Claiborne]

And then this. Then you start hitting skeletons.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

And just kind of like drunk people.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. I had some human enemies.

[Sam Claiborne]

Oh, the skeletons are funny. They. They sometimes pop back up, I think like after you shatter them like Castlevania style. But they also get right in your face and they like, they do those like funny skeleton jumps at you. Skeletons are always funny.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

That's really fun. I'm Enjoying it, you know, because there's.

[Sam Claiborne]

A lot of verticality. The, the fighting is kind of fun too because sometimes you can just like, like climb away from enemies and it takes them a little while to kind of like figure out how to like climb up to you so you can just spend that time shooting them, which is good. I like stuff like that. That gives you a little bit of an advantage. But it's not, it's not. You can get, you can get killed in this game. Like that's what, that's what makes it fun to like do save spamming and kind of trying to get through the tougher regions without doing it the right way. It's good stuff. That's very Bethesda feeling.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, I like the exploration. I like the parkour. I usually first person games, I'm like eh. But it feels good.

[Sam Claiborne]

It's forgiving because.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, yeah.

[Mark Medina]

Because they give you that mantle and so even, even jumps you don't think you'll make. Yeah, you, you make them. And this game really, I feel like if you go anywhere you'll find something. And so I like when games do that.

[Damon Hadfield]

I like how you, you earn experience points for discovering new areas. I always like that. I just, all I did was walk up here and I got some experience points. Yeah, that's great.

[Nick Limone]

Reward people for exploring and hats off to whoever is very clearly hand placing all of these treasure chests because it's just they're like yeah, of course there'd be a treasure chest here. I remember seeing, I think it was on Blue Sky, a developer saying that they. One of their mandatory tasks as a developer was he was a treasure chest placer by waterfall guy. So if there is a waterfall, he figured out how to put a treasure chest either inside of it or near it.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, well, yeah, because that opening area has like four waterfalls and I think there's a chest behind one of them. But once you find that one you're like, like well now I have to search them. No waterfall goes unseen.

[Sam Claiborne]

Sometimes it's just like a body in the stream. But they have good stuff on them. I think like one. I mean this just gets at like. I mean I don't care about game marketing stuff but like I didn't care about this game at all. And it's my type of game. So like why did that happen? Like why?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, exactly.

[Sam Claiborne]

Like I can picture what I should have seen. I should have seen like somebody at the top of that lighthouse, maybe in the open area and like going all the way to the other corner of the Map and being distracted on the way there and just kind of like showing what you do in the game because it's like, you can do what you do in Skyrim. You, like, look at somewhere far away. You're like, what? Oh, I can see that big twisted tree root actually goes up above this area that I can't get to. I'm going to figure out how to get up there, which you can't. I still know how to do it.

[Damon Hadfield]

I like the little puzzles of, you know, you. You come to a cabin, the door is locked. How are we going to get inside the cabin?

[Nick Limone]

There's got to be a hole in the roof. What's going on?

[Damon Hadfield]

I love that.

[Sam Claiborne]

It's this classic Zelda solve. And then they play with that a few times. Like, why didn't. Why wasn't. Why weren't we showing that? I just don't really understand. I don't really understand.

[Nick Limone]

I think a lot of the marketing material, too, did a really. Did a disservice to the combat because I thought the combat looked kind of boring in the trailers. But then you see montages of people who've, you know, previewed the game and it's like, oh, no, this combat looks fun.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

Well, showing the. That the command wheel is basically like Mass Effect, right? And like, you're kind of just having your team's abilities which you can upgrade and stuff. Like, that's all, like, important core Western RPG stuff that, like, I miss. Like, not every game has that, you know, and it feels nice just to, like, command your. Your. Your team to just be attacking while you're trying to run or recover or whatever. It's great.

[Damon Hadfield]

I want to ask about a side quest. So this is a very early on, short side quest. I. So I don't think this is a big spoiler, but spoiler alert. Just in case you don't want to experience anything in the game, there's that side quest where right when you get to Dawn Shore, that woman says all those lizard men are, like, around her house. So weird. Yeah. She wants you to go get rid of them or something. And then you find out that, I mean, you read her diary, which is.

[Mark Medina]

Pretty messed up, and then you tell.

[Damon Hadfield]

Her about it, and she's understandably upset, but it turns out, I mean, I don't know, she, like, develops kind of an intimate relationship with at least one of them or more.

[Mark Medina]

Well, she's soul bonded with it.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Mark Medina]

Or something like that.

[Sam Claiborne]

I think fortune teller. I think a fortune teller told her that she was going to. She was destined to befriend the lizard people.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay.

[Sam Claiborne]

So then she got too friendly with them, and then they moved in like, like boys in her house and wrecked up the place. So weird.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's a weird little story which I, I, which I like.

[Sam Claiborne]

Also, they painted a picture of them all dancing with her.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. I couldn't tell if they had painted that or if she did it. I thought it was very cute. It's very weird and I'm here for it.

[Nick Limone]

But every now and then, though, I do fast travel back to the county. Like, I don't know where she went. She said she was gonna go check in on it.

[Sam Claiborne]

That's right.

[Nick Limone]

But I just see home. I just see the homeboy lizard sleeping on the floor. I was like, all right, well, I guess nothing happened. I guess this is it.

[Mark Medina]

She despawned. It's over. Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

So after that, it's like six hours until there's another, just basic side quest.

[Damon Hadfield]

Oh, wow.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

I mean, until you get to paradise or whatever, you know, I'm in paradise now. Yeah. I mean, there's just no. You have to go through the whole, you know, forest and everything and their storyline. There's a bunch of side, side things you can do, but nobody's like, just giving you. Oh, stranger, I have a side quest for you.

[Nick Limone]

Sam with the incredible NPC voices This.

[Sam Claiborne]

Episode, I had fun getting into Paradis. There's two people that come up and they, like, waylay you, and they act like they're like city guards. I killed them. Which I don't normally do in games, but when you kill them, you, like, pick up, like, some, like, thing, which is like, they had a bounty on you. They weren't city. City guards.

[Nick Limone]

It's just kind of funny. That's cool.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

So that's about. It's turned out to be very, very fun. But, Nick, you wanted to shout out something you were playing on Steam Next Fest.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, I very rarely check out, like, demos nowadays, but I realize it is actually super important to do that if you want to support a lot of the developers, because that's kind of how they get notoriety. So I figured, why not on Game Scoop? But Demon Tides. Demon Tides is a game that I've been kind of thinking about ever since I. I touched it, just because the game looked cool. But it is essentially the first time I've seen a game follow up on Bowser's Fury. And it is a 3D platformer that is set in a. It's an open world with. That's kind of connected by a lot of ocean, but you can charge through the ocean. The game features a three like a Mario triple jump where you jump. Once you jump a little higher on the second one, then you do a flip on the third. You can do a side jump. There's a boosting. You can turn into a bat to get a little bit of extra distance or extra height. And it is just so charming. The writing is really fun and it's just. You get in and you. You play around with the movement. You realize you can really do anything if you're good enough. It is evoking Bowser's Fury and Odyssey with its movement system. And I'm having a blast with it. The demo is relatively short. There's not much you can do with it, but man, the possibilities that. That you. That are at your disposal are just. It's just so fun. It is pure video gaming distilled down to its essence. And I cannot wait to get my hands on the full game.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, I heard this game before. I guess I thought it had already come out.

[Nick Limone]

So this is technically a sequel to a game called Demon Turf, which. Which had a. Also very interesting visual style. Very different kind of game. That one was like a 2D environment with like a. Or like a 2D character in a 3D environment.

[Mark Medina]

Rights were 2D, right? Yeah, yeah.

[Nick Limone]

So just like really clever stuff that they're. That they're doing. And yeah, I cannot wait to get my hands on the full game because it just. It's fun to move fast and it's fun to move fast with style.

[Damon Hadfield]

Cool.

[Sam Claiborne]

We're always clamoring for Mario likes. Right? Like make us some contemporary. What's the evolution of the 3D platformer? And this looks like it's doing that. Exactly. Which is awesome. And I loved Bowser's Fury. That was a great game. So it's cool. Looks a little bit sunset overdrivey too, with some grinding and some kind of skateboarding type elements. Yeah, this looks great. I mean, I don't. I'm not super sold on the style, but like sounds like if it's really tight and they really have good motion, then it's going to be a fun game.

[Mark Medina]

I like that I'm sold more on this than I was on Demon Turf because I played a lot of Demon Turf because the guy I do devs react to speedruns and he really wanted that game to. We might have done an episode, I can't remember, but I played a lot of Demon Turf and I could just never. It feels good. To play. But the whole 2D sprite in a 3D world just never gelled with me as much as this looks like this looks really good.

[Nick Limone]

Check it out, Steve. Neck Fest demo, I think just this week. I don't know how long. Next.

[Sam Claiborne]

So this is a Mario. Like, what's the Sonic like?

[Nick Limone]

Oh, the Sonic like Haste. Yeah, Haste. We have like a big slack channel where people are like, oh, is anyone checking out cool Steam stuff? And one of the other IGM producers, I believe it was Ronnie, he posted a link to this game called Haste, which I'd seen before on like Twitter and Blue sky. But it is another just, you move fast, you move forward, and you do it in really cool ways. I am going to check out Haste when I get home today because this is just another one. I love moving fast and I love looking cool doing it. You got grapple hooks, you got tumbles, you got rolls. Yeah, this looks really fun. Just zany. I love.

[Damon Hadfield]

I would guess this is a Sonic game.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. They say. I keep hearing it's Sonic without enemies or chickens. I want to play Monster Train 2. I love Monster Train 1.

[Damon Hadfield]

I love Monster Train so much. But I. I think I just. I'll just wait for the.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, I'll wait for the full release on that one. I know what. That one. I know what to expect from Monster Train too.

[Damon Hadfield]

I do. At least in the. In the Monster Train subreddit. Everyone who's played it says it's great and it's just. It's just the same with just more stuff added on top of it.

[Nick Limone]

Love it.

[Mark Medina]

Great, Great.

[Damon Hadfield]

Love it.

[Sam Claiborne]

Did you all see this Game of Thrones game that doesn't look so bad?

[Mark Medina]

No, I saw when they unveiled it and we all thought this looks like a phone game. And it was like Xbox Series X, PlayStation 5. We're like, oh, okay.

[Sam Claiborne]

And it's on Steam and so there's like, you know, it's coming out like Q2, it says, but like it's an action. There's a new trailer that I was watching and it's an action rpg. And the newer trailer, it doesn't look like this. It looks like. Although I think that's what it could be. The same game. But yeah, it looks like Shadow Mordor coincidentally. Looks kind of big and open and cool combat. It's calling itself an action RPG now.

[Damon Hadfield]

That you said that I could see a shot of Mordor style Game of Thrones game with a nemesis system.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, right.

[Damon Hadfield]

We shouldn't have to come up with these ideas for you.

[Mark Medina]

I mean all of Game of Thrones is really is just one big nemesis system.

[Sam Claiborne]

This is the game Kings Road but.

[Damon Hadfield]

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[Nick Limone]

It is not great to pay multiple.

[Damon Hadfield]

Hundreds of dollars for cell phone use when you could just spend $15 a month instead. I mean, it's kind of a no brainer. I'm not the strongest in math or statistics or finance. There are things about me that other.

[Nick Limone]

People find offensive, but one thing that.

[Damon Hadfield]

They definitely do not is when I.

[Nick Limone]

Say hey, you should be switching to.

[Damon Hadfield]

Mint mobile because it's $15 a month and you're probably paying way more than that right now. And they usually agree with me.

[Nick Limone]

And that's a good feeling.

[Damon Hadfield]

And it's also a good feeling to only spend $15 a month.

[Nick Limone]

I don't know if you know this.

[Damon Hadfield]

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[Damon Hadfield]

Okay, here it is. The March 1992 issue of Nintendo Power which has Zelda linked to the past on the COVID And this is where I realized I was not. I. I do not recognize this cover. So at this time I was not a subscriber.

[Sam Claiborne]

Oh wow. It's still so early though. Yeah, I was a subscriber and this is the second live action Zelda cover. You remember the first one which would have been.

[Damon Hadfield]

That was for Zelda 2. I wonder if this is the same link actor for context.

[Nick Limone]

I love link to the past so don't. One of my all time favorite Zelda games. But this issue came out one month before I was born.

[Mark Medina]

Wow. Wow.

[Damon Hadfield]

But see, what's I think Scoop Nation likes about you so much, Nick, is that even though you are younger than us, you've gone back and you've done all of your homework. You know, you know all these games.

[Mark Medina]

You got, you're an old soul.

[Nick Limone]

You gotta play Link to the Past. You gotta do it.

[Mark Medina]

You know what's funny is I've actually never like played more than a like hour of Link to the Past.

[Nick Limone]

What? You gotta fix that. It's a great game.

[Mark Medina]

I didn't have it. I didn't have a super Nintendo growing up. Not, not saying that that's an excuse because I've gone back and played like super Castlevania. 4 is one of my. Is my favorite Castlevania.

[Nick Limone]

Crazy. I like Super Castlevania. I like. I like Super Castlevania.

[Mark Medina]

Hold on, hold on, hold on. That's crazy.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yes, that's crazy.

[Nick Limone]

Kinda.

[Mark Medina]

What's the best Castlevania?

[Sam Claiborne]

There's three better Castlevanias before it.

[Damon Hadfield]

Symphony of One is the best.

[Mark Medina]

Oh, okay, hold on.

[Damon Hadfield]

That's right. You're too old for Metroidvanias.

[Mark Medina]

That's what it is. It's just the linear nature of Castlevania Forge just scratches my brain.

[Sam Claiborne]

I think Castlevania 1, 2 and 3 are all better than 4.

[Mark Medina]

Simon's quest.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah.

[Mark Medina]

Look me in the eye, Berkeley Mansion.

[Nick Limone]

I'll vouch for 1 and 3. I won't vouch for Simon's Quest.

[Sam Claiborne]

You guys don't understand that you needed Nintendo Power to play that game.

[Damon Hadfield]

I love.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, yeah. Well, yeah.

[Nick Limone]

I love crouching on screens and praying that something happens on.

[Mark Medina]

I hope I have the right item selected in a tornado.

[Sam Claiborne]

Stuff between the places. It has the best music ever. It has, has. What a horrible night for a curse. It has the day night cycle. It has a great ending. And then once you get place to place, it's fun to fight. Even if you're a little kid like you don't know what you're doing. It's fun to fight around. The mansions are awesome. They're great unique dungeons in Castlevania. They've never really done a dungeon like that before, which is platformy and hard and I don't know, I think it was really fun. It's just, it's like the first Metroid. It's like, it's really hard to go back to. It's hard to explain to people that like you had to be steeped in playground lore to understand anything about that.

[Mark Medina]

Game, I'm just gonna Octo directional whipping.

[Sam Claiborne]

But Castlevania 4. The issue with Super Castlevania is that it is more like Castlevania 1 than anything else. So the games progressed and then they went back. And that's why it annoyed me at the time. Like, Castlevania 3 is remarkable. It's different characters, different paths, like all this cool stuff.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. But four is a real visual showcase for what Super Nintendo could. So, like, that's. That's what they're focusing on.

[Nick Limone]

And that music, the opening music's really good. That's so good.

[Sam Claiborne]

That's pretty funny. It's got the slap bass and that's a lot going for it. I just living through those times. It felt dated and not cool when I played Castlevania 4. And now when I go back to, I'm like, it's pretty fun. It's really hard. Are you big in it? You are big.

[Mark Medina]

You can ask.

[Nick Limone]

You kiss when you.

[Mark Medina]

Apologies.

[Nick Limone]

The thing that never works.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah. But I did play a lot of Link's Awakening because my first, like, my first gaming thing that was mine was a Game Boy with Kirby's Dreamland and Link's Awakening.

[Nick Limone]

Nice.

[Mark Medina]

I don't know. I don't know what it is.

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, on this cover, I really like just visually how the text Legend of Zelda. There's a cool gradient from red straight through a rainbow to like a turquoise. It just looks very cool. And then the tagline is magic, danger and daring Ds, which I don't really like. If they were going for alliteration there, they kind of dropped the ball. I don't know why they chose those three things to point out.

[Sam Claiborne]

Anyway, this was a really magic time because this is a Super Nintendo game on the COVID with an nes. There's like a some kind of voting thing happening for the nes. And then of course, the Game Boy was out. So there was three Nintendo systems.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, my gosh.

[Sam Claiborne]

Being covered. And it was awesome.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yep. I mean, the NES gets the lion's share of the coverage in here. This is trying to get people to subscribe. I really like the wacky manga versions of Mario and Luigi. Like, why can't we get a game that looks like that?

[Mark Medina]

That. That's good.

[Damon Hadfield]

But I also don't know who Mario.

[Mark Medina]

On the top left. I know. That's amazing.

[Damon Hadfield]

I don't know who this guy is. Who's this villain? It's not Shredder.

[Sam Claiborne]

It's a dark nut from Zelda I think.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Interesting.

[Nick Limone]

That's 100% it. Good eye.

[Damon Hadfield]

This is when they started having ads in Nintendo Power. So this is actually pretty early on they started putting in ads. There's an ad for the Super Scope 6.

[Nick Limone]

I want to get one of those so bad. I want to play the Mech fighting game. That one looks really fun.

[Damon Hadfield]

There's two Tetris games in here. Blastris, Blastris A and Blastris B.

[Sam Claiborne]

That's right.

[Damon Hadfield]

So, yeah, you can see there you've got sections for nes, Game Boy and Super Nintendo. And then in that bottom right, whoever that artist is, they were. I guess they were always at Nintendo Power because that someone was doing that art style in the very first issues.

[Nick Limone]

They're crushing it.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, yeah. It's a very color pencil theme, art style. One time, IGN made a fake Nintendo Power for. For E3. And it was like our little handout guide to E3. And Scott Bromley did pencil drawings for the whole thing in this style. Perfectly.

[Nick Limone]

Wow.

[Sam Claiborne]

Absolutely nailed it. And they were so funny.

[Nick Limone]

That's really.

[Damon Hadfield]

That was a really funny issue. Okay. There's one letter I wanted to shout out here on the right page says, you live where and I think this is really, really cool. And I'll zoom in so you can see it even better. So this is from Dan in Bangor, Pennsylvania, when it's, you know, first came out. To say we enjoyed hours upon hours of Mario and Luigi would be an understatement. Seven months of that enthusiasm produced these scenes on the walls of our son's room. Christian, DJ actually live in Super Mario Brothers world. Though the scenes were painted years ago by my wife and I, our enjoyment of the NES has not diminished. 35 games and a Super NES system later, we still spend time squashing creatures, dueling monsters, and jumping the longest gaps like. So these parents painted their kids wall like Mario.

[Nick Limone]

That's really cool. That's really cool.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. Those are some lucky kids.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yep.

[Nick Limone]

That reminds me, my first like handcrafted thing that I remember making as a kid was I had just played Super Mario rpg, the Legend of the Seven Stars, or my brother did. And I. He let me watch him and I just remember like immediately drawing very badly, Mario, Luigi. And I made my own comic of them. It was very, very cute.

[Damon Hadfield]

Cool. They've got Empire strikes back for NES. They've got Terminator 2 Judgment Day. So. Yeah, this is late. Yeah, this is late stage NES here.

[Sam Claiborne]

Did you see how complex that side of the Empire Strikes Back levels are, though?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

Like, this is pieced Together with Polaroid shots of the game. But like, that's a really cool way to depict what these games are like, you know, October, I was obsessed with these. You know, this is definitely the origin of why I love strategy guides. And then you see the Terminator 1, the next page, you're like, why did you guys even bother with this? Oh, no, no, no.

[Damon Hadfield]

Because that's the only. That's just stage one. That's like a truck stop. But like, look at stage five on the bottom right there.

[Sam Claiborne]

Like, it's pretty repetitive.

[Mark Medina]

Whoa.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, the 5 one looks great.

[Damon Hadfield]

I feel.

[Sam Claiborne]

I mean, this is really cool, like layout just to do the magazine this way, you know?

[Damon Hadfield]

I know, I love it. Although I think these big. These portraits of the characters from the movie are pretty bad. Like the T1000 looks. Looks pretty bad. That's just me. They've got Nightshade, which is a weird game from Ultra, which was really Konami and it's like a part point and click, part adventure game.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, it's just. Yeah, this looks like a Shadowgate knockoff, right?

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, yeah, except it's not first person, but yeah, I thought this Mc Kids, the McDonald's game was by Treasure, but I guess not. Treasure did another McDonald's game on the 16 bit systems.

[Nick Limone]

McDonald's Happy Land or something like that.

[Sam Claiborne]

Virgin had the license to Disney at the time. They did like Lion King and like Little Mermaid for nes. Like there was different licenses for Genesis and Super Nintendo and stuff at the time. So yeah, it's interesting to see them.

[Damon Hadfield]

Be a Virgin and know that these three games are all licensed games that they feature here. And also where it says cause what Cosmic's retreat. They repeat that typo. So I guess it's not a typo. I think it's supposed to be. Yeah, McDonald's just Mc.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, exactly.

[Nick Limone]

Cosmic.

[Damon Hadfield]

See. And then in the classified information section, I never realized this. There's a little note here. It says, Wanted Special agents. A popular activity among Nintendo game experts is discovering tips and strategies. If you'd like to share your own special tips with us, send them in. Choose your own agent number, three digits. And be sure to include it with your tips. So when you see like this tip for whatever, Rainbow Islands from Agent 644, it's just some reader that made up that number. I just think that's cool.

[Sam Claiborne]

Or they encourage that by doing their internal discoveries. But yeah, it could be. I mean, ign When I started, you know, I looked over our submissions for cheats and that that's how we got Most of our cheats, like people would just break, you know, their games by testing them with just putting in, you know, codes, unlock wrestlers over and over again, or figure them out somehow, or get them from different magazines. We got. We got submissions all the time. It's just like that.

[Mark Medina]

I instantly. I instantly saw the 420. I was like, all right. I figured it was in there.

[Sam Claiborne]

I think that was pre 420. Meaning that.

[Nick Limone]

Ye think.

[Damon Hadfield]

Like, I'm sure there's some blocks in place you couldn't make. You couldn't send in 666 probably.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah. Well, everybody sent in. 007 is the problem.

[Damon Hadfield]

One, two, three. There's a big Zelda comic in here. But this. And this is only chapter three. And this thing goes on for like 16 pages.

[Nick Limone]

That's awesome.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's all in a. A colored manga style. I don't. Does Nick or does Link get wings in Link to the Past? I don't remember him getting actual wings.

[Nick Limone]

No, that's. No, not at all.

[Damon Hadfield]

And then he fights. Then he fights the big.

[Nick Limone]

Because you don't even get Rock's feather in Link to the Past.

[Damon Hadfield]

His final thing, he says to this. Let me back up. Whatever this. The serpent bosses. Nice move, ugly. But now you're playing with the Pendant of Power.

[Sam Claiborne]

Cool.

[Damon Hadfield]

Very cool.

[Sam Claiborne]

Because Link is very sassy.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yep.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Excuse me. In the Game Boy section, they've got Mega Man 2. Oh, man, did they cover here?

[Sam Claiborne]

And then the game, which has remixed bosses, it's not the same.

[Damon Hadfield]

The Mega Man Game Boys just reused.

[Nick Limone]

The gigantic sprites too.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. For the Game Boy. Yeah. Tiny tin adventures for Game Boy.

[Sam Claiborne]

Big sprites.

[Damon Hadfield]

I've never played this one, but they've got some pretty.

[Sam Claiborne]

I played this a lot on Game Boy.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah. Yeah. I played this one on Game Boy. Wow.

[Damon Hadfield]

Cool. I don't know. This Game Boy game, high stakes. It seems pretty interesting. Like you. It's a. It's a gambling game with like old timey mobsters that you're playing card games with and. But you're supposed to be an undercover cop infiltrating their gambling ring.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, that's interesting.

[Sam Claiborne]

I mean, I couldn't have paged past this game faster.

[Damon Hadfield]

I know. Why is this. This like literally Nintendo Power is a magazine for kids. Like, why is this game even in here?

[Mark Medina]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Anyway, then there's a big Mario comic in here too, with that good manga.

[Nick Limone]

Style, Luigi's eyes in that opening. I don't know.

[Damon Hadfield]

So they're depicting the moment when they.

[Nick Limone]

Meet Yoshi and coincidentally, that's what I look like whenever I see a Yoshi, too.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's very good. So they meet Yoshi, and they can't understand him. But then they meet this guy. So they go to Yoshi Village on the right page, and they meet this guy who says, I'm Friendly Floyd. And he's like a salesman that's been trying to sell stuff to the Yoshis, but they don't need a toothbrush.

[Sam Claiborne]

That was part of salesman joke.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, that was part of the doki. Doki panic localization, actually. They couldn't bring that forward. Us people wouldn't get it.

[Damon Hadfield]

I've just. I've never seen any other reference to Friendly Floyd, the human man that lives in Yoshi village. So he has to leave. And they're trying to talk to Yoshi, so he gives them a book on the Yoshi language series. Oh, it's great to say hello. Hello, is Yoshi. How are you? Is Yoshi. And fine, thank you. Is Yoshi. And then they learn that Bowser has kidnapped the princess. And that's where leaves off. To be continued.

[Mark Medina]

Nice.

[Nick Limone]

I really like the art.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, the art is very good. So here's a contest for this. I said we're going to talk about a glam metal band. There's this glam metal hair band called Trickster, which I. I don't. I couldn't tell you what any of their hits might have been. It's the Trickster contest, the White Knuckle Scoring. So they had. There's an album. What I can understand here. There's an album by the band Trickster called White Knuckle Scoring. I don't. Maybe it's like, what's the Pacman Fever? Who Something. Buckner and Garcia.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

So I don't know if this. They made a whole album of video game songs, but to enter Mario's on the COVID Yeah, Mario's on the COVID Like.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, I'm gonna look it up on Discogs.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, I mean, it's a great cover.

[Sam Claiborne]

What's it called? White Knuckle.

[Damon Hadfield]

White Knuckle scoring. Like scoring. And then to enter, you have to write in and answer the question. Name three recording artists who contributed a song to the white knuckle scoring album. Okay, so it's a compilation. Like, how would they know that? How would the person reading. How would the kid reading this know that? They would have had to have bought it. Well, but 100 winners get a copy of the album. So.

[Sam Claiborne]

Chicken and egg problem. Okay, so this is a 1991 cassette tape. So that art that they're showing there.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, the cd.

[Sam Claiborne]

I, I, I can't find a CD version of it. I don't know if that ever came out. But there's a very, very decrepit scan of the cassette tape. You can get it for eight. $8. It has Crosby, Stills, and Nash on it. Inexplicably. It has Trickster. Yes. It's got Roy Orbison.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, wow.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, I know, I know, I know. And then it's got bands I've never heard of, including Jellyfish, Bombshell, Alias, Flesh for Lulu, Brittany Fox, and then two. I have heard of Sheena Easton, Dire Straits, and I'll remind you. Yeah. Crosby still is a Nash, so, like.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. Okay, here we are seeing it. What are. Do they have names of these songs that they sound like video game names?

[Sam Claiborne]

Names of this Jellyfish says, ignorance is bliss, Crispy Sales, and Nash is. How have you been? No magic in the night I drove all night Iron hand into the fire she was line of fire. No.

[Damon Hadfield]

What is this?

[Sam Claiborne]

Nothing.

[Damon Hadfield]

It doesn't make any sense. Anyway, in this contest, the grand prize would be to meet the band and go back.

[Sam Claiborne]

I'm wrong, I'm wrong. There is an LP version of it and a CD version.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay, so the grand prize is to meet the band and go backstage and to have dinner with the band. Dude, again, these are kids reading this magazine.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah. Know.

[Damon Hadfield]

You're gonna go have dinner with this glam metal, this hair metal band. I don't know. Good.

[Nick Limone]

If you.

[Sam Claiborne]

Second prize in Germany. And, and it's pretty expensive.

[Damon Hadfield]

Oh, I didn't, I didn't notice that. Mar. Mark, you're right. The second prize is a copy of the album autographed by Mario.

[Nick Limone]

Mario himself.

[Mark Medina]

So is it, Is it Miyamoto, or is it like.

[Nick Limone]

I don't think it's Miyamoto.

[Sam Claiborne]

Just says Mario.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah. Hey, if you're, if you're listening to this and you won this contest, please, please write in and tell us everything about this.

[Damon Hadfield]

We will have you on the show.

[Nick Limone]

Please.

[Damon Hadfield]

We will have you on the show. Okay, let's try to wrap this up in counselor's corner. You know, it's the. Oh, yeah, say hello to the E3 team. Remember, this is. They're not talking about the electronics entertainment that did not exist yet. The E3 team at Nintendo of America stands for Evening Shift Team 3. And so they introduce them all. E3 team members. Members never cease in their preparation to answer the toughest, rarest, and weirdest video game questions in America. They are the unstoppables if you're losing sleep over a game, these are the pros who can help you. So I guess they just had. They had a team working evenings. Working the. The Nintendo kids.

[Sam Claiborne]

Children working evenings.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah. That's our Australian team. They're the unstoppables.

[Nick Limone]

That is true. The dragon. Oh wow.

[Damon Hadfield]

They draw a little map to how to reach the spring ball in Metroid 2.

[Sam Claiborne]

Oh, that's a cool map. Yeah. They didn't usually do that type of thing. Usually you do those cut together images. But that's really cool.

[Nick Limone]

Great Photoshop opportunity of how do I make Metroid Crawl.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Oh, yeah. And they finally get into the Super Nintendo game. So they've got Lemmings, which is where I did play the original Lemmings.

[Sam Claiborne]

Me too.

[Damon Hadfield]

They've got Joe and Mac.

[Nick Limone]

Joe and Mac. Hell yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

Played the heck out of this.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, that's a good one. But why? Why burying the Super Nintendo games in the back half of the magazine flipping. This looks so much better than, you.

[Nick Limone]

Know, you got a Terminator.

[Sam Claiborne]

Two games came out the systems. They always did this way. It was always nes, Game Boy, Super Nintendo. And it was like save the best for last type thing. The new sf. They always did it that way.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's weird.

[Sam Claiborne]

I don't know why.

[Damon Hadfield]

Just. Yeah, there's that. The Adams family coming soon for the Super NES promotion. And then it's just some. It's just pictures of the Adams family of the movie. They've done a little bit more there probably. And that was the poster.

[Sam Claiborne]

Damon.

[Damon Hadfield]

That's a poster.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, that was the poster.

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, yeah, sure.

[Sam Claiborne]

Three parts.

[Damon Hadfield]

Then you finally get linked to the past.

[Nick Limone]

Dude, this is the. These are the pictures that I would have just obsessed over as a kid. Is looking at their links inventory. It's so cool.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Listening on links tools.

[Sam Claiborne]

It looks like what was in the manual too.

[Nick Limone]

This looks like official art.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

Or maybe in the strategy guide. I just recognize it from multiple places because they did do a Nintendo Power official strategy guide for it with that stitched together world, but in its entirety.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

Looks great.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yep. They go through all the different locations. Kakariko Village, Death Mountain, Castle of Hyrule. Yeah. This is a big. I mean this is a big feature. This is like 20 pages long. Then it goes. The Dark World link's true quest begins.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, wow. So they.

[Sam Claiborne]

They reveal that to walk through through the the woods and until you get the sword and get to the Dark world. It's really neat how they did that.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yep.

[Mark Medina]

Could you imagine them advertising like tears of the kingdom and just being like here's the whole map. Here it is. This is what it looks like. We have to beg for that stuff.

[Nick Limone]

Here's all the things you'll unlock over the course of the game.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

And then they've got Nintendo Power Awards 91. The Nesters. This is the Oscars.

[Sam Claiborne]

Okay. That's what was advertised in the COVID.

[Damon Hadfield]

And they just have the nominees and I guess that you can write in to cast your vote. So they had they split it up by platform. There's nomin graphics. There's nominees for nes Game Boy and Super Nintendo. So I think the categories are kind of interesting. There's graphics and sound theme and fun challenge and play control and then there's a best overall. Best multiplayer or simultaneous Best overall villain and most innovative game. So the villains were Bowser in Super Mario World. Dark Queen in Battletoads. Dr. Wily and what Sardios from Super Ghouls and Ghosts and Zoda from. From Startropics.

[Nick Limone]

Sardius, the big hairy guy at the end of the game.

[Damon Hadfield]

I guess that's him. I never knew his name.

[Sam Claiborne]

The most the titular Char. The second Star Trek. Right.

[Damon Hadfield]

The most innovative game nominees were Final Fantasy 2 the Hunt for Red October on Game Boy.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah. I wonder what that plugin. I mean that would have been a link cable game. I wonder if it was just Battleship.

[Damon Hadfield]

You know that's what I was just going to say. The info Genius personal organizer for Game Boy which wouldn't have been a game at all. Pilings and Smash tv.

[Nick Limone]

Smash tv sick.

[Damon Hadfield]

But the NES version of Smash TV which I don't know how that particularly innovative.

[Nick Limone]

I'm trying to think Final Fantasy 2 is up there. Probably because it's such a dramatic looks dramatically different over its Final Fantasy 1 NES. This would be Final Fantasy 4 with Cecil and Kane.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. And that type of game still fairly unusual in the in the US I think.

[Nick Limone]

Great.

[Sam Claiborne]

I mean isn't it crazy that that game was out this early?

[Damon Hadfield]

92.

[Nick Limone]

92. Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Because so the super ninjas. I always forget if it was 90 or 91.

[Sam Claiborne]

I mean these are the nominees for 91.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, you're right because we're in March of 92.

[Nick Limone]

Best overall.

[Damon Hadfield]

Best overall Super Nintendo was actor Asia actor Razor, Final Fantasy 2 SimCity Super Ghouls and Ghosts and Super Mario World Bangers.

[Nick Limone]

Bangers all around.

[Damon Hadfield]

Bangers all on nes it was Battletoads, Ninja Gaiden 3, Star Wars Startropics and Tecmo super bowl then I mean that's a Huge.

[Sam Claiborne]

The NES is just so unstoppable still. You know.

[Mark Medina]

Know, it's crazy that that was kind of my theory about why they show NES first is like. I mean, that's most of their base still. Right. Like in this weird transitional period in. In. In 2021 P they're trying to sell PS5, but like they have AUND and something million PS4s out there still. So it's like that's kind of the vibes I get is it's like they want to show the new stuff, but they. They still have to talk to the audience of the. Their most sold console.

[Damon Hadfield]

And then in the Nestor's Adventures comic, I don't. I have no idea what game is supposed to be tied in. Nestor is like in. It's like maybe the French Revolution.

[Nick Limone]

But Rampart.

[Damon Hadfield]

I mean, how could Rampart be relevant in 1992?

[Sam Claiborne]

Like maybe it was ported to the Super. I don't remember it being on Super Nintendo though.

[Nick Limone]

French Revolution.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. Napoleon.

[Sam Claiborne]

I mean, you can see the two castles there though, right? So it's like that is Rampart like.

[Nick Limone]

And it does say don't crowd the Ramparts.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yes.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

But Rampart is like a 1985 arcade game.

[Sam Claiborne]

It came out in 1990 on Super Nintendo.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. So I don't know why it would be here in 92.

[Nick Limone]

But just that's how long it took him to draw all these.

[Damon Hadfield]

If the whole idea here is to tie into a game to like increase awareness of it, they failed miserably.

[Sam Claiborne]

It looks like we kind of got a Mode 7 upgrade on Super Nintendo. Want to play this now? Interesting. I love Rampart. Great game.

[Damon Hadfield]

I love Rampart too. The top 20, I think. I don't know how they rate this. They. Each game has received points. So like Super Mario Bros. 3 is number one for NES.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

With almost 12,000 points. I don't know what the points are coming from.

[Sam Claiborne]

I know, I know.

[Damon Hadfield]

The top five are Mario Brothers 3 Battle Toads, Dr. Mario, TMNT 3 and Tetris.

[Nick Limone]

Battle Toad is pretty high up there.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Mark Medina]

People love the arcade.

[Damon Hadfield]

The two. I think it's three.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah. Looks like a two to me. I don't know.

[Sam Claiborne]

It's two. The arcade game.

[Damon Hadfield]

You're right, you're right, you're right. My eyes are not great. Super Nintendo is Super Mario World F0, Final Fantasy 2, Final Fight in Sim City. Which is interesting because the Super Nintendo port of Final Fight is not great. I mean, but you don't know that.

[Sam Claiborne]

If I was going to tell you the five Games I played every day this month of this year. Those were them.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

I mean, I wouldn't even got to act race or Legend of Zelda or anything by then. Those are my games. Although I did play UN Squadron a lot down the list.

[Damon Hadfield]

I liked you and Squadron. Yeah. And then Game boy. The top five were Super Mario Land, Metroid 2, Dr. Mario 1 of the Mega man, and TMT 2.

[Nick Limone]

I adore Super Mario Land. That game is so weird, so unusual. Oh, it's so fun.

[Mark Medina]

But the music is great.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, music's incredible.

[Sam Claiborne]

Mo eyes.

[Nick Limone]

Submarines.

[Sam Claiborne]

Pyramids.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

Daisy.

[Damon Hadfield]

Inexplicably, there's a celebrity profile on whoever the main actor is in Parker Lewis Can't Lose.

[Sam Claiborne]

Oh, my gosh.

[Damon Hadfield]

Which is a show I remember watching, but I couldn't tell you anything about it.

[Sam Claiborne]

Me neither. I only remember the name.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. And then at Pack Watch, look into games of the Future. WWF Super WrestleMania got the Addams Family coming. The Duel Test Drive 2, which kind of would have been a big deal because that was a PC series. And Gargoyles Quest.

[Nick Limone]

Gargoyles Quest? Hell, yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. They got a report from the winter CES, which is what they had before E3. And that's it. The next issue they have the Addams Family, Captain America and the Avengers, Star Trek and WWF Super WrestleMania.

[Mark Medina]

You man.

[Sam Claiborne]

Weird. What's going on, CES?

[Nick Limone]

Oh, dude, I gotta get that van.

[Mark Medina]

I know.

[Damon Hadfield]

And that brings us to video game 20 questions. Our suggestion this week comes from Matt in an undisclosed location. So with that, let the questioning be again. Oh, I'm sorry.

[Mark Medina]

It's Matt.

[Damon Hadfield]

Matt said I want to suggest a game I have a soft spot for. So that's your.

[Mark Medina]

That's something. That's something.

[Sam Claiborne]

Remember to channel games you know the titles of and that you've played a lot. So it's a soft spot. It's your big advantage.

[Mark Medina]

He's in wi. He's in Witness Protection.

[Nick Limone]

Matt.

[Mark Medina]

These are our clues. His name is Matt.

[Sam Claiborne]

So a soft spot fork usually implies a stinker, right?

[Mark Medina]

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, seriously, like, it almost. Yeah, exactly. It's like I have a soft spot for Mass Effect. Andromeda.

[Nick Limone]

Well, like, I have a soft spot for Quest 64. So.

[Sam Claiborne]

See, that's a stinker. Is this from the last century? The previous century? I mean, the 1900s.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's not from the previous 2000 on.

[Nick Limone]

All right, yeah.

[Mark Medina]

Let's see.

[Nick Limone]

Was this game made in Japan?

[Damon Hadfield]

No.

[Mark Medina]

Is this game on? Did this game release during the. Never mind. I hate that question. It doesn't eliminate Enough. I was going to say the previous gen consoles, but there's like three more. It could still be then, so doesn't help.

[Sam Claiborne]

Was this an exclusive on a Sony, Microsoft or Nintendo platform that you play on a television, AKA not a handheld.

[Mark Medina]

Nice.

[Damon Hadfield]

No, it was not.

[Mark Medina]

Okay. Is this game part of a. Of a series that is still running today?

[Damon Hadfield]

No.

[Nick Limone]

No. Is this game.

[Sam Claiborne]

Is it based on a license?

[Damon Hadfield]

No, that's five.

[Nick Limone]

Is this game playable on the Nintendo Switch?

[Damon Hadfield]

No.

[Nick Limone]

So this just forgotten the time.

[Mark Medina]

This is not a game.

[Sam Claiborne]

Could you play this on a PlayStation console?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yes.

[Sam Claiborne]

Was it a 2?

[Damon Hadfield]

A PS2? Is that what you're asking me?

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

No.

[Nick Limone]

Oh no. Well, that.

[Sam Claiborne]

Was it a three?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yes.

[Nick Limone]

Okay.

[Mark Medina]

Okay. All right. So PS3 generation, but probably on. Probably on everything.

[Sam Claiborne]

Not made in Japan.

[Mark Medina]

Not made in Japan, not licensed. We got to figure out what kind of game.

[Sam Claiborne]

Ryder has a soft spot for it.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah. Is this open world game?

[Damon Hadfield]

I don't know.

[Sam Claiborne]

Weird.

[Mark Medina]

It's probably Skyrim.

[Nick Limone]

Would this be considered an indie game?

[Damon Hadfield]

No. That's 10.

[Nick Limone]

Okay. So it's a big flagship.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah. We don't know if it's open world. PS3 not exclusive.

[Nick Limone]

Is this game a shooter?

[Damon Hadfield]

No.

[Nick Limone]

No. Try to.

[Mark Medina]

Is this game played in the first person perspective?

[Damon Hadfield]

No.

[Mark Medina]

Jesus.

[Sam Claiborne]

How would you not know if it's open world? It has to be like golf or driving.

[Nick Limone]

But still kind of obscure then though.

[Sam Claiborne]

And it's not made in Japan, so.

[Nick Limone]

Stick to what?

[Sam Claiborne]

Do we know anything about sequels at all?

[Nick Limone]

We.

[Mark Medina]

It is not part of a series that is running today. That's all we know. So when you think of the famous. Like obviously it's. It's not going to be anything like multiplayer.

[Sam Claiborne]

A focus of this game. Like that's why you'd play this.

[Nick Limone]

No single player. Okay. Is this game a part of a series?

[Damon Hadfield]

No one.

[Nick Limone]

And done.

[Mark Medina]

What the heck, dude? What. What is this?

[Sam Claiborne]

Maybe it's like Red Faction or something like that.

[Mark Medina]

You know, I'm trying to think of.

[Sam Claiborne]

Like that's kind of open, bro. Or what is the. I'm just thinking.

[Mark Medina]

Well, not a shooter. Sad. Sucks.

[Sam Claiborne]

What's the game where you play as the. The guy. There's two of them and then you can run up buildings and stuff like that.

[Nick Limone]

Prototype.

[Sam Claiborne]

A guy turning it. Yes. Prototype. Yes.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, well, prototype crackdown. No, those. That was exclusive.

[Nick Limone]

The era of like the destroy all humans. Like three. The. The prototypes. Your infamous obvious open worlds.

[Sam Claiborne]

Is this a sci fi game?

[Damon Hadfield]

No, that's 15.

[Nick Limone]

Oh no.

[Mark Medina]

Jesus.

[Nick Limone]

Do you play as a human?

[Sam Claiborne]

Yes, but we dope sounds boom.

[Mark Medina]

So like Kingdoms of Amular, stuff like that. That's not bad because I don't know if that game's open world or if it's more open zone.

[Sam Claiborne]

We could just ask if it has.

[Mark Medina]

Oh, and that's a game that a lot of people have a soft spot. It's one of those cult following games that people are like, this game was actually a sequel.

[Nick Limone]

It did. It got a remaster too. So I would say it's still kind of relevant.

[Sam Claiborne]

Does this game have RPG elements?

[Damon Hadfield]

I don't know what's happening.

[Sam Claiborne]

Is this like a Burger King game or something?

[Nick Limone]

Sneaking?

[Mark Medina]

Don't answer that.

[Sam Claiborne]

Doesn't know if it's open world. Doesn't know if it has RPG elements. Those are huge clues.

[Mark Medina]

I'm. I'm. I'm resting on Kingdoms of Amulet, whatever.

[Sam Claiborne]

That obviously has RPG elements though. And it's an open world game.

[Mark Medina]

It is open world. Well, it's. That's what I'm trying to figure out. Like, would you consider Mass Effect open world?

[Nick Limone]

No.

[Sam Claiborne]

Well, I mean, come on. The RPG question put this to rest, right?

[Nick Limone]

Let's see.

[Mark Medina]

He said he didn't know. Yeah, probably.

[Sam Claiborne]

Something strange is going on here is the issue. What, what are games where Damien would be so far out of his element that he couldn't even answer that stuff? Like, it has to be a 3D game. Right. Or else you would know. Yeah, I mean, I guess an open world could be a top down game. Where should we go with the statement?

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, just, you know, keep in mind I haven't played every single game that we picked for 20 questions.

[Nick Limone]

Sean researched them.

[Sam Claiborne]

Usually in the first sentence of the Wikipedia entry. An open world game released on PS3. RPG elements.

[Mark Medina]

Every 20 questions game has been a game that if you look on Damon's background, it's. It's on a shelf. It's.

[Sam Claiborne]

That'd be funny. To build the 20 questions library.

[Nick Limone]

Does this game feature driving in it?

[Damon Hadfield]

No. 2 questions. And again.

[Nick Limone]

Not looking good.

[Mark Medina]

No, it's really not.

[Sam Claiborne]

Does this game take place in the past or have fantasy elements?

[Nick Limone]

Yes, in the past or fantasy elements. Oh, wait, hold on, hold on.

[Sam Claiborne]

We did it.

[Mark Medina]

Here we go.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Nick Limone]

Okay.

[Sam Claiborne]

Say a bunch of games.

[Nick Limone]

I'm immediately thinking of the Saboteur, which is. Takes place in the past. It is a game that is fine. But people do have a soft spot for. Is one of those like semi open world games where I could understand Damon maybe not realizing it could or could not? Maybe.

[Sam Claiborne]

What about, what about that game that's called Something, something. Journey to the West.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, Enslaved. Enslaved. Odyssey to the West. That one is for sure not an open world game. And it's like below.

[Sam Claiborne]

Damon doesn't know that.

[Nick Limone]

Okay. I mean, I think the only thing we can go for is like the pass. I. I want to hone in there. I know that the Saboteur is black and white is, you know, in France. France. Yeah, France. Controversial.

[Sam Claiborne]

We've mentioned the game and then just.

[Mark Medina]

Just try our very best here to such a cheat. Because if it's not, it might be our only hope.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah. So then we could just pick a random one. Have we mentioned this game?

[Damon Hadfield]

No.

[Sam Claiborne]

That'S good. That's good. That's a good thing. You just have to now figure out any game that took place in the past that Damon doesn't know jack shit about.

[Nick Limone]

We gotta think games that are on the level of the Saboteur, though. I'm trying to think of what I would. What I downloaded as demos during that. That time.

[Mark Medina]

When did. Did Thief. Thief come out? Was that PS4? Was that PS3?

[Nick Limone]

That was PS4. The thief remake part of the series.

[Sam Claiborne]

What? I threw the hail Mary last week, everybody. Somebody else has got to take one this week.

[Mark Medina]

Oh, right. So this, it's not about series running today. We eliminated that. This game is not part of a series.

[Sam Claiborne]

Correct. This is.

[Mark Medina]

No mafia or anything.

[Sam Claiborne]

Well, you know, like you're running around a medieval world, whether it has dragons or not, something like that. Or maybe it's a steampunk world.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, I'm really trying to think of, like, I'm trying two worlds. Like, it wouldn't be two worlds was it.

[Sam Claiborne]

We never know what type of game it is. It could. It could be like a civ or something, you know, like some sim game. Anyway, we're never. We're not going to get it, so.

[Mark Medina]

I don't think so.

[Damon Hadfield]

What do we got? Shall I reveal? Kill the game. Yeah.

[Mark Medina]

Are we even close?

[Sam Claiborne]

You don't even want to take a stab?

[Damon Hadfield]

You, You. You got nowhere close.

[Nick Limone]

Is this game Wet?

[Damon Hadfield]

No, it is not.

[Nick Limone]

No. Like, there's a game called Wet that was on the same level.

[Sam Claiborne]

Published it, I believe. Or square, maybe not a square.

[Damon Hadfield]

This game was developed by IO Interactive.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, man.

[Damon Hadfield]

Published by IDOS. IO Interactive is the developer of Hitman and Kane and Lynch. But for this game, they wanted to do something a little different and more family friendly. This game is mini ninjas.

[Nick Limone]

Mini. Oh, shoot.

[Mark Medina]

I would have never got that.

[Sam Claiborne]

I've never heard of this one.

[Nick Limone]

This game was always in the, like, 1999 bin when I worked at Best Buy of like, this was the budget game, but I've heard good things about it.

[Damon Hadfield]

We gave it an eight. We gave this game an eight.

[Sam Claiborne]

I've never even heard this name before.

[Mark Medina]

It doesn't look bad.

[Sam Claiborne]

That's.

[Mark Medina]

I don't.

[Damon Hadfield]

It came to everything at the time in 2009. Yeah. This is. This is the maker of Hitman Made this game.

[Nick Limone]

I never. I don't think anyone would have gotten this one.

[Mark Medina]

Nope.

[Damon Hadfield]

So I don't know if it's open. I didn't play it. I don't know if it's open world. It's an action adventure game. And this.

[Sam Claiborne]

I don't think it is.

[Damon Hadfield]

This was a time when RPG elements were starting to show up in everything. So it could have RPG elements. I don't know.

[Sam Claiborne]

Man would have got this.

[Damon Hadfield]

Matt has a soft spot for Mini Ninja.

[Sam Claiborne]

We'll play 20 questions with Justin with the same game next week.

[Mark Medina]

Just have him do all.

[Sam Claiborne]

We'll just throw them off. We'll just ask. We'll just ask questions and try to get him to get it. What do you think?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. Okay.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

I mean, sure. Well, nicely attempt. Thank you for the suggestion, Matt. Viewers, listeners, if you have your own suggestions for video game 20 questions, email them to me at the email address gamescoopgn.com and that is all the scoops that we have for you this week. Episode 800. I can't believe it. Please be excited for the next 800 episodes. Thank you, Nick. Thank you, Sam. Thank you, Mark. Thank you to Tayo and everyone working behind the scenes to make this episode possible. Gamescoop is an IGM production and part of the Geek Media Network. Check out our other weekly podcasts like Unlocked beyond and Nintendo Voice Chat. My name is Damon. This is IGN gamescoop. And we're out.

[Nick Limone]

Shame. I brought shame to my house.

[Sam Claiborne]

We should have played video game 800 questions and we still wouldn't have gotten it.

[Mark Medina]

Nope.

[Sam Claiborne]

Is your butt first this week? Who won in the comments section?

[Mark Medina]

I never even looked.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, I saw nice things about both of you.

[Mark Medina]

Okay, good. Yeah, I forgot to look, actually.

[Sam Claiborne]

That was only like four days ago.

[Damon Hadfield]

I'm not gonna stand for it.

[Sam Claiborne]

Don't.

[Damon Hadfield]

Don't. Both sides. This Nick and Mark thing.

[Nick Limone]

All right, we pulled everyone here at.

[Mark Medina]

Ig.

[Nick Limone]

Welcome to the ultimate social deduction game, Blood on the Clock Tower.

[E]

The evil team must stalk the streets at night Night. Hunting down members of the good team one by one. Meanwhile, the good team must outmaneuver the evil team using their unique abilities.

[Sam Claiborne]

I'd like to kick things off by telling you all that I'm possibly the Demon.

[E]

Our players can mislead and manipulate others with absolute freedom.

[Damon Hadfield]

I didn't like hearing my name in the same sentence as demon. That was very upsetting for me.

[Nick Limone]

Emily and I will be your storytellers, guiding you through every Labyrinthian twin twist and turn.

[E]

How are there so many evil players in this game?

[Sam Claiborne]

What's happening with guests from no Rolls.

[Nick Limone]

Bard, the Pandemonium Institute, and Ox Venture? You won't be able to stop listening. Go to realmspod.com clocktower to find out more.

[Damon Hadfield]

You should listen to the game three biz microcast more people are playing games than ever before. They've never more popular, and yet the business behind it is facing some real challenges and changes. There's been tens of thousands of layoffs.

[E]

Hundreds of studio closures as major companies face rising costs and falling sales.

[Nick Limone]

There's uncertainty around the future of game consoles.

[Damon Hadfield]

There's legal and government intervention into how.

[E]

Games are even being paid for.

[Damon Hadfield]

The role of AI is changing how games are being made.

[E]

There's the impact of games like Fortnite.

[Damon Hadfield]

And Roblox dominating everyone's time.

[Nick Limone]

And then there's the desperate wait for.

[Damon Hadfield]

Switch 2 and GTA 6.

[Nick Limone]

And that's just 2024.

[Damon Hadfield]

Two leading business journalists with a combined 35 years of experience offer you a.

[E]

Weekly guide through all of this and.

[Damon Hadfield]

Hi, I'm Christopher dring, head of GamesIndustry Biz. I'm James Batchellor, editor in chief of GameStry Biz, and you can join us.

[E]

Every Monday for the gamesindustry Biz Microcast.

[Damon Hadfield]

The most important stories, expert guests, exclusive.

[E]

Market data, and all in less than 30 minutes. Usually the gamestry biz microcast every Monday on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.