Game Scoop! 820: Our Most-Anticipated Fall 2025 Games

Summary

Game Scoop! Episode 820: Our Most-Anticipated Fall 2025 Games

Release Date: August 6, 2025

In the latest episode of Game Scoop!, host Daemon Hatfield alongside co-hosts Justin Davis and Mark Medina dive deep into the gaming landscape ahead of Fall 2025. This episode provides a comprehensive look at the most anticipated releases, industry updates, and personal gaming milestones, all enriched with insightful commentary and engaging discussions.

---

1. Celebrating Gaming Milestones

Daemon Hadfield kicks off the episode by sharing personal achievements, announcing that both he and Justin Davis have successfully beaten Donkey Kong Bonanza. He humorously teases that they won't spoil any details but expresses immense satisfaction with the game's progression.

"[00:00] Damon Hadfield: ...Justin and I beat Donkey Kong Bonanza. And Mark finally got that elusive platinum."

Mark Medina echoes Daemon's enthusiasm, positioning Donkey Kong Bonanza as a strong contender for Game of the Year. He praises the game's ending sequence and overall delivery, likening it to Nintendo's masterpieces like Mario Odyssey.

"[02:49] Mark Medina: ...I still think this is a game of the year contender. Absolutely. For sure."

The trio discusses the challenging final boss, with Mark sharing his frustration over multiple attempts, highlighting the game's difficulty spike while Daemon appreciates Nintendo's approach to boss fights, emphasizing quality over quantity in confrontations.

"[04:25] Mark Medina: I had to do the final boss way more than three times."
"[04:29] Damon Hadfield: ...that's what I have the attention span for."

They also touch upon the game's post-story content, with Mark describing it as more challenging and rewarding, akin to titles like Kirby, offering satisfying explorations and additional layers to the gameplay.

---

2. Navigating Through Death Stranding Platinum

The conversation shifts to Justin Davis's accomplishment of achieving the Platinum trophy in Death Stranding 2. He candidly shares his struggle with repetitive missions and the complexities introduced by Hideo Kojima, expressing mixed feelings about the grind required for completion.

"[08:25] Justin Davis: ...but after 25 hours of grinding those last 10 hours, they did start to weigh on me."

Mark Medina inquires about a potential sequel, to which Justin expresses skepticism about the necessity of Death Stranding 3, pondering whether Kojima Productions should continue diversifying their portfolio beyond the delivery-centric games.

"[10:37] Mark Medina: Do you think they're going to... Are they going to make a Death Stranding 3?"
"[10:41] Justin Davis: I don't think so."

Despite the challenges, Justin acknowledges the satisfaction of completing the game, likening his release from the game's demands to newfound freedom to explore other titles.

---

3. Spotlight on Upcoming Fall 2025 Games

a. Gradius Origins and Konami's Nostalgia Push

Daemon highlights Gradius Origins, a collection celebrating Konami's legacy in shoot 'em ups from the '80s and '90s, featuring titles like Gradius, Salamander, and Life Force. The compilation includes 17-18 versions and introduces a new game, Salamander 3, developed by M2, renowned for their adeptness with retro ports.

"[15:00] Damon Hadfield: ...but maybe the most exciting part of the package is that they made a whole new game, Salamander 3."

b. Trails Series Remakes

On August 21st, three Trails games are set to launch on the PS5, including a ground-up remake of Trails in the Sky, originally a PSP title. Mark elaborates on the interconnected nature of the Trails series, likening it to the Marvel Cinematic Universe with its interwoven stories and characters.

"[18:21] Mark Medina: ...they're interconnected even though they're like separate. Like you don't have to have played games... to appreciate the new one."

c. Metal Gear Solid Delta Snake Eater

Releasing on August 28th, Metal Gear Solid Delta Snake Eater marks the return of the iconic series. Daemon, Justin, and Mark express eagerness to revisit the franchise, especially since Kojima wasn't directly involved in the remake.

"[20:20] Damon Hadfield: ...he did not work on the remake to be clear."

d. Cross-Platform Surprises: Helldivers 2 and Gears of War

A notable crossover occurs on August 26th, known humorously as "video game crossover day," with Helldivers 2 launching on Xbox and Gears of War making its way to PlayStation. Mark finds the simultaneous releases amusing and highlights the fluidity of modern game releases across platforms.

"[21:06] Mark Medina: ...it looks like video game crossover day."

e. Ninja Gaiden 4 and Battlefield 6

Ninja Gaiden 4 is slated for release on October 21st, with Platinum handling its publication. The hosts reminisce about the series' legacy of challenging gameplay, anticipating that the latest installment will uphold its reputation.

"[22:28] Damon Hadfield: ...I think it's going to be mostly more of the same. Great stuff."

Simultaneously, Battlefield 6 debuts on October 10th. Mark appreciates the team's efforts to align the game with player expectations, suggesting a positive trajectory for the franchise after previous entries.

"[29:16] Mark Medina: ...they were made by a team that has their pulse on what people want."

f. Other Anticipated Titles

The episode also covers a slew of other upcoming games:

• Ghost of Yotei (October 2nd): Hailed as a standout release, Mark anticipates it to be one of the best games of the fall.
• Final Fantasy Tactics Remaster (September 30th): Daemon expresses excitement to revisit this classic, reminiscing about its engaging party dynamics.
• Shovel Knight: Mina the Hollower (October 31st): Celebrated as a potential Game of the Year candidate, the release is highly anticipated by all hosts.
• Katamari Time Travel: Mark is intrigued by the time-traveling mechanics and the whimsical nature of the game.
• Kronos: The New Dawn by Bloober: With Bloober's track record from Silent Hill, Justin is cautiously optimistic about this horror title.

---

4. Industry Updates: Nintendo Switch Price Increase

A significant portion of the discussion revolves around Nintendo's decision to hike prices for the original Switch and its accessories, citing potential impacts from tariffs and manufacturing costs.

"[44:33] Damon Hadfield: News Update. This week, Nintendo has announced they're raising prices for the original Switch and accessories like the alarmo."

The hosts debate the rationale behind the price surge, speculating on factors like tariffs affecting manufacturing in regions such as China, Vietnam, and Japan. Mark highlights the unfortunate increase, noting that the Switch OLED is now priced lower than the upcoming Switch 2, making the latter less attractive financially.

"[45:47] Damon Hadfield: ...the Switch 2, the base model is 450 bucks."
"[45:49] Justin Davis: That's completely nuts."
"[46:21] Mark Medina: ...it's because the Switch 2 is about to be, you know, $125 more expensive."

The conversation underscores the broader implications for the gaming industry, touching upon the sustainability of hardware pricing amidst global economic challenges.

---

5. Interactive Segment: 20 Questions - Spy Hunter Guessing Game

In an interactive segment, the hosts engage in a lively game of 20 Questions, attempting to identify a game suggestion from a listener named Colin. The target game is revealed to be Spy Hunter, an iconic title originally launched for the PS2.

"[71:00] Damon Hadfield: ...This was developed by Paradigm, which is no longer in business."

Throughout the segment, Mark and Justin navigate through their guesses, eventually uncovering the game's identity. This playful interaction highlights the hosts' deep knowledge of gaming history and their camaraderie.

---

6. Closing Remarks and Upcoming Promotions

As the episode wraps up, the hosts briefly mention upcoming events like Gamescom and tease future episodes, ensuring listeners remain engaged with the exciting roadmap ahead. Additionally, promotions for Humble's game sales and sponsor messages for brands like Pretty Litter and Progressive Insurance are succinctly integrated without overshadowing the core content.

"[75:10] Damon Hadfield: ...Listen to Next Gen Console Watch on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts."

---

Conclusion

Episode 820 of Game Scoop! offers a rich tapestry of discussions, from celebrating personal gaming triumphs and delving into the intricacies of beloved titles like Donkey Kong Bonanza and Death Stranding 2, to eagerly anticipating a robust lineup of Fall 2025 releases. The hosts' insightful conversations, punctuated with memorable quotes and timestamped highlights, provide both seasoned gamers and newcomers alike with valuable perspectives on the evolving gaming landscape.

---

Notable Quotes:

• "I love the end. I think it finished strong."
  — Mark Medina [02:55]

• "I'm ready for this one."
  — Mark Medina [32:14]

• "My early-adoption's important."
  — Justin Davis [47:28]

• "This is the year of the ninja."
  — Mark Medina [22:15]

• "The future is bleak."
  — Mark Medina [49:05]

---

Stay tuned to Game Scoop! for more in-depth discussions, industry insights, and your weekly dose of all things gaming. Visit Geek.com for more information.

Transcript

[Damon Hadfield]

It's time to make a playlist of what we want to play for the rest of the year. Get out your calendars and day planners. Plus, Justin and I beat Donkey Kong Bonanza. And Mark finally got that elusive platinum. Coming up next on IGN gamescoop.

[Justin Davis]

This episode is brought to you by Amazon. Sometimes the most painful part of getting sick is the getting better part. Waiting on hold for an appointment, sitting in crowded waiting rooms, standing in line at the pharmacy.

[Mark Medina]

That's painful.

[Justin Davis]

Amazon One Medical and Amazon Pharmacy Remove those painful parts of getting better with things like 24.

[Mark Medina]

7 virtual visits and prescriptions delivered to your door.

[Justin Davis]

Thanks to Amazon Pharmacy and AmazonOne Medical Healthcare just got less painful.

[Mark Medina]

On WhatsApp, no one can see or hear your personal messages. Whether it's a voice call message or sending a password to WhatsApp, it's all just this. So whether you're sharing the streaming password in the family chat or trading those late night voice messages that could basically become a podcast, your personal messages stay between you, your friends and your family. No one else, not even us. WhatsApp message privately with everyone.

[Damon Hadfield]

What's up, everybody? Welcome to IGN Gamescoop. I'm your host, Damon Hadfield. And joining me this week are Justin Davis and Mark Medina.

[Justin Davis]

I'm here, Damon.

[Damon Hadfield]

And that's it. That's all you get this week. No Sam. I hope you're happy YouTube commenters. You scared Sam away. Just kidding, just kidding. Sam's traveling to see family. Sam is just fine. We've got a great show for you this week. We've picked our most anticipated games that are still to come in 2025. And I think there's, I think there's a lot of, lot of fun looking games still to come this year. There is the unfortunate price increases happening with Nintendo Hardware, older Nintendo hardware, not Switch two yet, but we'll get into that. But first we'll be talking a lot about Donkey Kong Bonanza. I've seen the people that said they're sick of hearing about Don Kong Bonanza. So we're not gonna, we're not gonna spend a whole episode on this. But just to provide an update. I beat Donkey Kong Bonanza. Justin beat it as well. Not gonna spoil anything here. We're not gonna get into, you know, it's not, this isn't a spoiler cast. Although I would like to talk about the final game stuff at some point in the future because I think there's some interesting things there. But once again, I love this game. I actually loved every minute of this game. Some people said it was a little bit slow for them to get into, but no, right. I, I've played it almost every night since it came out and finally be just had the best time with it. Without revisiting Mario Odyssey, I feel like Odyssey still has an edge for me, but I've seen other people said that after dunking on Bonanza, they went back to Odyssey and they really miss being able to climb everything. And I could totally see that as well. But Justin, what are your thoughts after having finished the story?

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, I loved it. I, I think, I think it's still my game of the year contender. I, I put it, I put it one tier below the absolute like goat tier. Best of all time platformers. Like, I don't think it's quite on Mario Odyssey' level. I think I probably put Galaxy 1 and 2 up there too on like the Mount Rushmore of best platformers. Best Nintendo platformers ever. And like, I still think this is a game of the year contender. Absolutely. For sure. I loved it. I love the end. I think it finished strong. As I said. I, you know, I'm gonna talk about it in very general terms because we don't want to spoil anything, but like Nintendo's just gotten really good at, you know, kind of delivering fan service and having the ending not just be a boss, but it's like a whole sequence. Like the whole ending sequence and the storyline and the build up and the boss fight's really good. Like all of it just comes together in a way that is delightful and wonderful.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yep. Yeah, the whole thing is the game is bigger than I was initially expecting. There's a lot of similarities and parallels to Odyssey where you have the destination that you're going to and you think you've gotten really close, but then, oh, you get, you get completely sidetracked and you're in this strange new area and then you got to sort of get back on track. And like you said, it's a very satisfying, you know, very sort of lengthy ending sequence. That's great. Overall, I love the boss fights in this game. I think, I think Nintendo, for me, Nintendo, they just do the boss fights in the best way. Like, I'm not the kind of person that wants to like just bang my head against the wall trying to defeat a boss 100 times in a row. Basically, I want to play, I want to, I want to try a boss three times. Yeah, that's about all the, that's, that's what I have the attention span for.

[Mark Medina]

I had to do the final boss way More than three times.

[Damon Hadfield]

Like, oh, I know, I know. It took me a few tries.

[Mark Medina]

I think I died as much on the final boss as probably the rest of the game combined. I think it probably took me maybe 10 tries. Like it's a, it's a huge difficulty spike. Like it never felt impossible or anything like that. But the whole game's pretty breezy. Like I would say it's almost borderline, like too easy for me, you know, Grant, I've been playing video games my whole life. Like my daughters who are Nintendo's, you know, primary demographic these days are not, you know, that it's not too easy for them. But. But yeah, man, the final boss is like a huge spike up.

[Damon Hadfield]

It is. It probably. It took me at least five times, maybe six or seven. And it is a little bit annoying. You. It starts you way back. You have to run back to the boss fight, which I don't love but. Oh well, it's fine.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah. Great game overall.

[Damon Hadfield]

Loved it.

[Mark Medina]

Did you, did you get into. So you just did it last night. You haven't gotten into any of the post game stuff.

[Damon Hadfield]

But that's my plan now. So, you know, I finished, you know, finished the story and now I'll get back to actually exploring more of the layers and finding bananas and fossils and stuff. And I don't know if you correct me if I'm wrong, but what I'm expecting is just kind of an easy, breezy collectathon now.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah. Again, some people would consider this a spoiler, so I don't want to get into details, but broadly speaking, similar to Mario Odyssey is there's some stuff. It's not like it's a completely different game. I don't want to overstate it, but there is some stuff that's different. There is some stuff that's changed and added in the post game and there's kind of post game challenges for you to go through in addition to kind of going back and collecting bananas that you missed the first time around. Like, so it's got this very kind of satisfying. It's the thing that we always talk about, we like in games of like, you know, you get to take a little bit of a victory lap and sort of go back into the stages and go back into the world and sort of see how things are a little bit different, see what's new there that wasn't there the first time around. It's great. And then. So I wouldn't describe it as breezy. Like I would consider it. It's a little bit more like Kirby, in the sense that the game itself is pretty easy. And then in the post game, it actually gets really hard. Like, there's sort of really hard, like, Dark side of the Moon style stuff in Donkey Kong.

[Damon Hadfield]

Cool. Well, look forward to checking it out. I think this game is totally on the level with other modern Nintendo masterpieces like Odyssey and Breath of the Wild. Tears of the Kingdom. I have incredible game.

[Mark Medina]

I have one more thing I want to share.

[Justin Davis]

Go.

[Mark Medina]

Which is I had a similar moment where we all played Zelda. Then we talked about it for years, how we tried to climb everything in every game after that. So I beat Donkey Kong and I went back to Zelda because as I said on the show, I'm replaying Tears of the Kingdom and then Donkey Kong. Like, I didn't beat it. So anyway, I'm like, okay, time to get back to Tears of the Kingdom. I want to pick that back up. And immediately I'm like, trying to dig in that game. I'm trying to turf surf in that game. Like, it. It like these Nintendo games, man, they get under your skin and they rewire your brain of like, just like every single open world game just felt like BS where it's like, I can't climb everything. After Zelda. Now going back to Zelda, it felt so quaint and weird that, like, when there's explosions and bombs, it's not leaving a huge crater in the ground like that. The geometry of the game world is just static. So it's like this. This layer of interactivity and sort of player empowerment. Like, you just get so used to it. And man, it was weird. It was weird going back to another big open game with a lot of freedom like that, where the terrain is not destructible.

[Damon Hadfield]

And like we had mentioned in a previous episode, all. All these modern Mario Zelda and Donkey Kong games have different jump buttons.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So there was. There was some actual, like, muscle memory problems too, but just. Yeah, bombs going off and it not leaving a hole. I'm like, oh, that's. That's kind of disappointing.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. Interesting. Mark, I know you've been off on some other adventures which we can get to in a second, but have you played any more Donkey Kong?

[Justin Davis]

I have not. I will. I'm very excited to. But. Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, you finally defeated the beast that you were wrestling with, right? The. The death stranding to platinum.

[Justin Davis]

I do have the Death Stranding 2 Platinum. My clock says like 150 hours, but I did. I did a lot of wiki work for the game, and then there's a lot of just like, I just, like during wiki work, I just, like, I'll just pause it. And so then the clock is just ticking. So, you know, I don't know how long it actually took. Well over 100 hours for sure. But yes, I saw a few comments where people are like, if you're not enjoying it for this digital trophy, and it's like, I'm with you, I get it. But the problem is I was enjoying it until the last, like, I don't know, probably like 10 hours. And so then you just feel like all that time was wasted. 25 hours of grinding for the Platinum. Yeah, I. If I had just stopped after I beat the game, I would have been fine with that. But after 25 hours of grinding those last 10 hours, they. They did start to weigh on me because you're. You're doing a lot of, like, repeated missions. But the issue is, is freaking Kojima. He can never make anything easy. These missions get repeated and so you'll see them on the list, but if they're grayed out, you can't do them. And so I got down to the last three preppers and they just, they. They weren't refreshing. And so it's like, I'm looking on Reddit and people are like, yeah, it takes like six hours. And so for the, the, the past, like the last, like two days of grinding for the Platinum wasn't even. This is also why my clock is all messed up. It was just me leaving the game on, waiting for these things to refresh. And it's like, it got really annoying doing that kind of stuff. And I would, I would see one that's refreshed and I'm like, I'm so excited. And it gets like, nothing towards a star. And I'm like, come on, man. But I will say now that it's done it. It was totally worth it. It was great. I love felt. It felt good. It felt good to have it done and to have seen basically everything that game has to offer. So, yes. But I also also kind of feel like I was released from a prison and now I can play other games. I could play everything I missed while I was on the inside.

[Mark Medina]

Do you think they're going to. Are they going to make a Death Stranding 3?

[Justin Davis]

I don't think so. So here, without spoiling anything, they did the classic. There is a cliffhanger at the end. But I don't take it as a cliffhanger.

[Mark Medina]

I take it as, yeah, his adventures will continue.

[Justin Davis]

Somebody's adventures Will continue. Exactly.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, exactly.

[Justin Davis]

And so it's like. It's. Yeah, so it's kind of like that where you're just like, oh, this is. That was. My first thought, was like, oh, this is teasing, you know, Death Stranding 3. Because the whole. This part isn't a spoiler, but the whole journey is you're trying to open up another plate gate. Right. So the plate gate makes it where you could teleport from Mexico to Australia. And. And then if you connect all Australia, then you can open up, like, potentially, you know, the UK or Asia or whatever. And that's. That's supposed to be the goal. And so my. My feelings towards it is, is this is just going to go on forever and that you're not going to be around for it. This is just the future of this world. I also personally don't believe we need another one of these. I think. I think after playing Death Stranding 1, I felt like there was a lot of room for improvement. And he improved on. Well, Kojima Productions. It wasn't just one person improved on almost everything. I could have had a gripe with the first game and I really wouldn't know where they go from here. And I don't. I just don't know if we need another delivery game to Kojima's favorite famous friends and Troy Baker being a weird clown. Like, I just don't know if we need a third one of those. I would play it, but I don't know if we need a third one. He's also very busy now.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, he's got at least two other games that we know of. Yeah, I know. Nicely Job Mark.

[Mark Medina]

I'm gonna start the first one tonight.

[Justin Davis]

Nice.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah. Bought it on sale. Finished Donkey Kong. So in we go.

[Justin Davis]

Is it Director's Cut?

[Mark Medina]

Yes.

[Justin Davis]

Cool. So, like, what I was just saying won't really apply to you because all of those quality of life things they added in the Director's Cut, so you're in for a fun experience.

[Mark Medina]

That's so I hear. Are we going to do. Sorry, I don't mean to cut you off. Damon. Are we doing games or gaming this week?

[Damon Hadfield]

Please go right ahead.

[Mark Medina]

I want to shout out a game called Wheel World. It's published by Annapurna Interactive. It's developed by mesoff, who made Nidhogg 1 and 2.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay.

[Mark Medina]

Very different game from Nidhogg. You'll probably recognize the trailer if we manage to get the B roll up. But it's a very, very chill, so it's on game pass and I think it is a perfect game pass game because it's just about going around this world and doing bike races and they're all pretty chill and the world is really. If you're not watching the show, if you're listening, it's just cell shaded and really kind of beautiful to look at. It looks kind of like sable if you remember that game from a few years back. And that's the whole game. Like I think I didn't look at how long to beat, so maybe it's possible that you know, it's going to be like, congrats, you've completed chapter one. But off my progression, I'm pretty sure I beat like 60 or 70% of the entire game in one sitting last night. Like, I think it's like a four or five hour game and you just roam around and get new bike parts and complete bike races and it's just got a perfect. It's a very simple game. That's the whole game. But the feeling of being on the bike, it's like, you know, you're, you're, you, you go really, really slow when you're like pedaling uphill, but then you zoom on the downhills and like kind of your back tire slides out when you're trying to go around a corner too fast. It just really, really nails that like moment to moment feel. And I loved it. It's been an excellent palette cleanser after Donkey Kong, which I described last week is like such an assault on the senses. It's like a mile a minute. Like this game has a really, really cool soundtrack that in the boss races, like it's just sort of. I'm not a musician, Damon, so you would have the vocab to describe it better than me. But I guess it's just indie rock with like a female vocalist. Like I don' the band is. But just like really chill music that like reminds me of like, you know, se? Or like something like that. And you just kind of ride around and chill and collect bike parts. And the writing's really funny. It's like making fun of these hardcore bike nerds, but also kind of like celebrating that culture at the same time. And love it. Recommend it. It's on steam, it's on every platform, but I'm playing it on game pass. And I think it's a perfect game pass game.

[Justin Davis]

Nice.

[Damon Hadfield]

Nicely recommend. You know what doesn't belong in your epic summer plans? Getting burned by your old wireless bill. While you're planning beach trips, barbecues and three day weekends, your wireless bill should be the last thing holding you back. That's where Mint Mobile comes in. With Mint, you can get the coverage and speed you're used to, but for way less money. And for a limited time, Mint mobile is offering three months of unlimited premium wireless service for 15 bucks a month. So while your friends are sweating over data overages and surprise charges, you'll be chilling, literally and financially. All plans come with high speed data and unlimited talk and text delivered on the nation's largest 5G network. Use your own phone with any Mint Mobile plan and bring your phone number along with all your existing contacts. If I were in the market for a new wireless plan, I'd be looking into Mint Mobile this year. Skip breaking a sweat and breaking the bank. Get this new customer offer and your three month unlimited wireless plan for just 15 bucks a month at mintmobile.com gamescoop that's mint mobile.com gamescoop upfront payment of $45 required, equivalent to $15 a month limited time new customer offer for first three months only. Speeds may slow above 35 gigabytes on unlimited plan. Taxes and fees extra. See Mint Mobile for details. By now you've probably heard of Bilt, where you can earn points on your monthly rent payment, but did you know they make it possible for you to get more outside of your home too? By paying rent through Bilt, you earn flexible points that can be redeemed toward hundreds of hotels and airlines, a future rent payment, your next Lyft ride, and more. But it doesn't stop there. BILT is about making your entire neighborhood more rewarding. You can dine out at your favorite local restaurants and earn additional points, get VIP treatment at certain fitness studios and enjoy exclusive experiences just for built members. Every month, Bilt is turning a monthly expense into an opportunity to earn rewards and discover the best that your neighborhood has to offer. Your rent is finally working for you. Earn points on rent and around your neighborhood, wherever you call home, by going to joinbilt.com gamescoop that's J O I N B I L T. Make sure to use our URL so they know Scoop sent you. Okay, but these are all games that are out now. What of games that are still to come? Games of Gaming Future I've made a short list of games that I'm excited to play or at least excited to check out later this year. I also want to hear from both Justin and Mark, but just sort of growing in order of release date. Starting off this week on August 7th, we're getting Gradius Origins, which is the latest Konami sort of collection of some of their older games, collecting a bunch of their shoot em ups from the 80s and 90s, everything from Gradius to Salamander slash, Life Force, Salamander 2, and then all the like arcade and home console variations of all those. It's something like 17 or 18 different versions of those games. But then maybe the most exciting part of the package is that they made a whole new game, Salamander 3, Life Force 3, developed by M2, which they just do a lot of great, sort of like retro ports of Shmups and classic games and that sort of thing. So I have high hopes for that that'll turn out well. There's a surprising number of Konami games coming out this fall. I think I like the story of what's happening with Konami right now. Justin on August 21 I think three Trails games come out.

[Mark Medina]

What?

[Damon Hadfield]

On PS5? I think they're older games, but I think they all come on one day.

[Mark Medina]

Which ones?

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, I don't know. I thought maybe you would know. I remember one time you were like playing through the whole trail series, right?

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, well, yes, except each of them are like 100 hours and there's like 12 of them. So like I, like many people got kind of burned out somewhere. In Trails of Cold Steel, I think I made it to Trails of Cold Steel 3, which is like that's not even like halfway anymore. It's like nine more games after that now. Yeah, yeah, no, I mean they're, they're really, really great sort of slice of life JRPGs that are a little bit like the MCU in the sense that like, you know, there's trails 1, 2 and 3 and then there's another series and there's another series and they all take place in the same world, you know, and some characters, like a protagonist from a previous series who you played as will come back as like, you know, a character have a cameo in another game. So they're interconnected even though they're like separate. Like you don't have to have played games, you know, those other franchises to appreciate the new one. So they're building up to like sort of a bigger mega story. They'll have like some Avengers like thing to, to cap it all off in the end.

[Damon Hadfield]

And what's like the oldest train that these are related to.

[Mark Medina]

So Trails in the sky is the first one which, which is getting remade. So a total like Trails in the sky is great. It's rad. Like I think it's still playable. In 2025. But it is old, right? Like I think it was a PSP rpg. So it's like it's feeling old and it's getting a ground up remake that is coming out. I don't know when it's coming out actually, but like, you know, fully 3D, fully modernized, you know, it's getting the final FANT remake treatment.

[Damon Hadfield]

Got it.

[Mark Medina]

And then what's interesting is the Trails RPGs themselves are a spin off of another Falcom RPG series, but they're not connected from a storyline perspective. They were more like final fantasies where like each one was completely disconnected from the one that came before.

[Damon Hadfield]

Got it. Well, three of those are coming to PS5 on August. What did I say? 21st. And then Death Stranding 2 is not the only Kojima game coming out this year. On August 28th we'll get metal Gear Solid Delta Snake Eater. Well, it is a Kojima game. Well, it's an older one, but I mean, I know he, he did not work on the remake. To be clear. I was just. I wasn't trying to trip anyone up. I was just trying to be cheeky. I've never played Metal Gear Solid three, so I'm actually interested to check this out. Like I said, there is interesting things happening with Konami these days. The Silent Hill 2 remake was well received last year. They're doing a good job with all the collections of their older games for the most part, I think. I don't know. Mark, have you played Metal Gear Solid three?

[Justin Davis]

No, I'm same. Same as you. I'm excited to check it out.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Mark Medina]

You don't know, Maybe you're about to bring this up, but something very weird and funny that's happening in August and September is that Helldivers 2 is coming to Xbox and then Gears of War is coming to PlayStation.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yep.

[Justin Davis]

What is this on like the same day? I think.

[Mark Medina]

Oh, is this like the same day?

[Justin Davis]

I think it's like the same day.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, you're right. You're right. I'm looking at it now. It's August 26th, so that's like video game crossover day. I love it.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, it's kind of like what we were talking about last week. Just wondering about those PlayStation exclusives coming to Xbox. Maybe someday, maybe on August 29th. Is Shinobi Art of Vengeance continuing the Year of the Ninja? I'm excited for this one. I think we've got a preview up, a recent preview up that was very positive on this game from Michael Hyam. And this is being handled by the team behind Streets of Rage 4, which I love. So it's a very stylish 2D action hack and slash game. You know, Shinobi goes back to the SEGA game, going back to the arcades, and then had several entries on the Genesis. And then I think There were some 3D versions in the 2000s for the PlayStation 2, but I never played those.

[Mark Medina]

I mean, it's interesting. We're getting this right after.

[Damon Hadfield]

What was it called?

[Mark Medina]

Ragebound.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

I mean, yeah, like I said, Assassin's Crew Shadows earlier in the year. Ninja Gaiden 2 Black got early in the year. Then Shinobi, Ninja Gaiden, and then Ninja Gaiden 4 coming, and then Ghost of Yotei. Mark, it's the year of the ninja.

[Justin Davis]

It really is. Speaking of ninjas, Damon's. He's gone.

[Mark Medina]

Oh, yeah, on my screen. We just lost your audio, your video. I mean.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yes. Speaking of ninjas, a ninja snuck in here and stole my camera. No, my camera's battery died. So we're gonna make do with this camera for now. So please do, please enjoy a new look at my little office here and a new perspective on me. Okay, getting into September, Justin. We've got on September 5th, everybody's golf. Everybody's Golf hot shots.

[Mark Medina]

I know. I'm excited. I mean, I hope it's good like, this franchise. Like, I love the Everybody's Golf games, but there's also been some clunkers in the series, too. And it can be sometimes hard to know, like, are we gonna get one of the good ones or are we gonna get one of the iffy ones? So I hope it's good.

[Justin Davis]

That game looks. I. I cannot wait. I always love a good golf game, and it's been a while.

[Damon Hadfield]

There aren't as many as there should be. It's just like, golf games because. And we got that Mario Golf few years ago that wasn't great.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

So I don't know. I'm excited. I hope. Hopefully. Hopefully, this is one of the good ones.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

And then on September 12th, we get Borderlands 4 coming to everything except the Switch 2. That'll be a little delayed.

[Mark Medina]

It looks really cool.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, I want to check it out. Like I said before, I loved Borderlands 2, but three didn't really do it much for me, so, you know, I hope this is more Borderlands 2. Mark, how about you?

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, no, I'm super excited for this game. That's. I made a short list myself, and this one is on there as the game I know will just Be fun. I don't really care if the story is like incredible or whatever. Like I know it'll just be a good time to play and so yeah, I'm very excited for this game.

[Mark Medina]

I mean they're calling, they're not using the phrase open world, they have some other marketing word for it but like just the big wide open gameplay space and sort of like run up and do main missions and find side missions. Like obviously that's been done many, many times across many, many games. But like, you know, Borderlands hasn't really been like that. Or at least not in spaces this, this big and wide open based off of some of the previews and stuff. So I think that will be a great time.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, it's a good game to just kind of turn your brain off and just accept what it gives you. It's fun to play.

[Mark Medina]

What zany stuff is Claptrap going to be up to this time?

[Damon Hadfield]

That little rascal.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Another Trails game comes out on September 19th. Again, I don't know which one this is. So four Trails games in two months.

[Justin Davis]

That'S 400 hours of gameplay.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, yeah, that's true. And then on September 30th is Final Fantasy Tactics, which I'm super, super excited for.

[Mark Medina]

And then that same week, we're getting two good remasters that week because we're also getting pac Man World 2 Repack.

[Damon Hadfield]

Oh, is that a good one? Is that a good one?

[Mark Medina]

I mean, I don't know. I mean the trailer looked kind of interesting, but I think Pac Man World.

[Damon Hadfield]

Repack is on PlayStation plus and we, we downloaded it and Kinko messed around with it, but he wasn't. We. I don't think he was super impressed. But Final Fantasy Tactics, I'm super excited to return. I haven't played it since it first was out in 98 or whatever.

[Mark Medina]

So yeah, I'm trying to think. I mean, maybe that's true for me too. Did it ever get ported? Anything else? I can't. I mean, I know the game and.

[Damon Hadfield]

Then it was on. I like iOS iPad.

[Mark Medina]

Oh, that's right. That's where I replayed it. I think I might have reviewed the iOS version.

[Justin Davis]

Oh yeah, I. I mean like this game is. You said 98. I was nine years old, so I. I remember I played like an hour of it when I was a kid and it was just beyond my understanding. Especially since at that point like I was playing other Final Fantasy games and I was like, this is nothing like those. I don't understand what's going on. Why Are we stuck in squares? I don't want to play this, but now I love those kinds of games. So I, I, I, this one's getting remade from like the ground up. Like rebuilt from the ground up. Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Because they like lost all the old code.

[Justin Davis]

They lost the source code.

[Mark Medina]

So funny. I mean, it's not really funny. It's actually kind of like sad.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah. Yeah. Well, now there's new source code.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. One thing that's always stuck with me is that, you know, you, you build this huge party with all these different characters and different classes. And I remember you can send them off onto like missions on their own so that they like improve their skills and they'll like report back on what happened. And it's. The dialogue was always really funny. It was like I searched really hard and I got a good feeling. That's always just really stuck with me. Then it's good.

[Justin Davis]

All right.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay. October 2nd, Ghost of Yotei.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, that's a big one.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, that's probably the biggest one for me personally.

[Mark Medina]

We have an interesting shape to this year with huge games like Ghosts of Yotei and Borderlands coming out. You know, Mafia is coming out this week earlier because. I'm presuming because of gta. Right. Like every game was trying to get out of the way of GTA and now we have kind of a front loaded 2025 as a result. Guess October is not that early, but still, you know, a little bit early.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah. Go to Yotai. Also on my list. Yotay probably like likely to be one of the best games of the fall. No doubt.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. I mean, I just, it looks great. It's, it, I guess it's a little bit less exciting to talk about maybe because it's, it's a known quantity. It's a sequel to an excellent game already. I think it's going to be mostly more of the same. Great stuff. So. Okay. Bring it on.

[Justin Davis]

Yep.

[Damon Hadfield]

Don't really need it.

[Justin Davis]

I'm ready.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. Don't really need to debate much there. But then on October 21st is Ninja Gaiden 4, which I'm excited to check out. The 3D games are not my favorite Ninja Gaidens. I'm much more of an old school like 2D Ninja Gaiden fan than like the new Rage Bound. But it's been so long. It's been over 10 years since Ninja Gaiden 3 and it's. Wait, is it Platinum doing this one or is it.

[Mark Medina]

No, I don't know actually. That's a good Question.

[Justin Davis]

I forget who it is.

[Mark Medina]

Nobody knows.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, there's no way. But anyway, I'm just excited to see a modern day 3D Ninja Gaiden in 2025.

[Mark Medina]

How that looks like. Obviously there's the NES ones, but this is a direct continuation that goes back to what the techno games on the original Xbox. Right. Like Ninja Gaiden and Ninja Gaiden Black. And those were sort of. They're not souls likes, but they were doing that like ultra hard third party character action just unapologetically going to kick your butt and you have no choice but to just get good. Like it was doing that way before, you know, Demon Souls and Dark Souls.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah. I looked it up because I didn't want to be wrong. Yes, it is being made by Platinum.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Cool.

[Justin Davis]

It's like being published by Microsoft, so. But it's still on every platform, so I was. I couldn't remember what the deal was there.

[Mark Medina]

We also have Battlefield 6 is in October.

[Damon Hadfield]

That's October 10th. Yeah, that's been. Yeah. Not really like my kind of. It wouldn't be on my personal list, but sure. Yeah, that's.

[Mark Medina]

They're saying the right stuff. Like, I'm one of those guys are like, I'm not a gigantic Battlefield or Call of Duty guy, but I do like to play them every few years. Right. And like, it's previewing really well. Like, they, they seem to be. It seems to be made by a team that has their pulse on kind of like, what do people want and what do they need to deliver to kind of win them back? After a few sort of iffy battlefield entries, they weren't even that iffy. Right. But they just didn't, you know, they just, they, they didn't. They didn't sort of stick.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah. Luckily there's two open betas for this one, so that, that, that's, that's what will make my decision. Like, I'll jump in with some friends, I'll play it, and if I feel compelled to play more, then, then I'll grab it when it comes out. But I wouldn't say my hype level is through the roof on this one.

[Damon Hadfield]

We still don't have a release date for its counterpart for Call of Duty this year.

[Mark Medina]

COD Blops.

[Damon Hadfield]

COD Blops.

[Justin Davis]

Coblop seven. I have a few games if you're done, Damon.

[Damon Hadfield]

I'm not done, but.

[Justin Davis]

Oh, sorry. Go ahead.

[Damon Hadfield]

By all means.

[Justin Davis]

Okay.

[Damon Hadfield]

I'm not trying to be militant about it.

[Justin Davis]

When does this episode go live?

[Damon Hadfield]

Friday. This Friday.

[Justin Davis]

Okay.

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, no, no, no. I'm sorry, I don't know why I said that. That's old habits. Either tomorrow or Thursday, whenever I'm done editing it.

[Justin Davis]

Okay then. I'm really excited for Mafia. That game looks cool. I remember mafia 3 open world. I, it was okay. I did, I did not dislike it as much as other people, but this game, it's like a story driven, you know, more linear. Seems, seems like a shorter experience. I, I'm, I, I, I think it's Upgrade.

[Mark Medina]

Upgrade your knife.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, every, every video I've seen on the game, like it looks really, really cool. So, and it's, you know, just getting an original linear story that just doesn't happen very often, it seems like anymore. So I'm excited for that. I'm also excited for Hell Is Us, which comes out in next month. We're getting a demo for that next week, so, so we'll get to see if that's cool.

[Damon Hadfield]

I need, I need a primer on what that is.

[Justin Davis]

It's, it's. A lot of people keep saying it looks like death Stranding, but I don't think it does. It looks more like an action game, but it's, it's kind of semi open world. There's puzzles and places to delve into. It just looks super stylish and that's. There it is. That's, that's the game. It kind of plays a little bit like Stalker, where there's not going to be very many map markers and anything like that. You need to just talk to people and they'll kind of just tell you where to go and then you kind of have to find your way there. So you get a little bit of Elden Ring vibes. I don't know where people are getting the death stranding, but I keep hearing that. So maybe there's something I haven't.

[Mark Medina]

This looks like a Mark Medina game.

[Justin Davis]

There's a lot of like puzzles and stuff. Like they, they showed a recent like gameplay deep dive and it showed him, you know, under a crypt and it's like looking crypton, looking at a wall with like symbols and stuff. And it's like you have to figure stuff out and so maybe I'm just excited from a guide's aspect to have like a really guidey game to dive into. But I, I think it looks cool. I think it looks fun.

[Mark Medina]

There's a new, I don't even know if I'm going to play it, but I'm delighted that it exists that there's a new katamari game coming out.

[Damon Hadfield]

I Just saw that when I was looking at release dates today.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah. And I watched the trailer. It was in, you know, some, some showcase recently. And the trailer, the conceit of the game is that it's kind of time travel. So you're traveling around as a katamari through these different historical time periods and gobbling things up. Seems fun. Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Cool.

[Justin Davis]

And then I, I have one more Kronos the New dawn made by Bloober. You know, Bloober's been, you know, they did great with Silent Hill, so I expect them to hopefully, hopefully continue that trend. It looks like Dead Space, which my only introduction to playing Dead Space was, you know, the remake that was what, last year and I liked it a lot. In this game you like, you could see by the B roll just looks like dead space again. So I am excited to see if they stick the landing because I know, I know sometimes we had that other one something protocol, Callisto Protocol. So it's like, I know it doesn't always like land these like kind of slow paced, spooky monster games, but this one is previewing well and I am interested to interested right now. Unfortunately, as much as I love the team at Bloober, you, you still just don't always know what you're going to get because it's like you have layers of fear where you're like, this is kind of a PT knockoff, but it is cool. And then they, and then they did Medium, which was not great. And then they do Silent Hill which was fantastic. And so we, we will see. And then, yeah, the other games on my list were Borderlands and, and Ghost of Yote. Both very exciting games to look forward to.

[Mark Medina]

I like that weird helmet.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It looks like a big daddy from Bioshock.

[Mark Medina]

It does.

[Damon Hadfield]

Justin, I'm excited to play Plants vs. Zombies again.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, we're, we're old enough now. We've talked about it on Scoop many, many times over the years that like accessing and playing video games, it's hard. Like no other artistic or creative medium has this problem. You can listen to, you know, Led Zeppelin for like, it's not, it's not an issue to listen to music or watch old movies, but video games get lost over time, get hard to play the resolution and the technology. And so, you know, like we've been around long enough that like we're getting remakes of things that I didn't even know I wanted or needed a remake of. I would absolutely play Plants for Zombies again. Give me Peggle next I mean they.

[Damon Hadfield]

Made Peggle 2 make Peggle 3. Again, there's not enough of these games. I think actually I'm really glad this is happening. But like this is, it's coming from PopCap. Like what is. I don't know what happened to PopCap. I think what happened to PopCap is like one of the saddest stories in the past, like 20 years of gaming because they basically created the casual gaming industry with Bejeweled, with, with the help of the Sims. They're coming out like right around the same time, I'll admit that. But yeah, they just had a string of incredibly polished casual puzzle games that are super fun, that can be enjoyed by anyone and they just had like hit after hit after hit and then they just kind of got gobbled up into EA and were forced to make garden warfare games. And then who knows what they're doing on a day to day basis today.

[Mark Medina]

What was the, what was the fish one? I like. Oh, Feeding Frenzy. I like those. That was really good. I had it on X. Xbla.

[Damon Hadfield]

Astro Pop on xbla. There's so many good ones.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, that's like a whole podcast topic right there about just devs that because like, I mean I grew up playing Westwood games, you know, Command and conquer. And then they got gobbled up by EA and like man, it's. It is said I have to assume with this game they're testing the waters. Like they want to see like do people still care about Plants versus Zombies? And then maybe they'll.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, maybe they'll do something because they messed up. Plants vs Zombies 2 was like a free to play. Yeah, just like kind of a gross mess. Yeah, no, thank you. And then on October 29th, I don't care what anyone says, I'm excited for Outer worlds too.

[Mark Medina]

Who's. What do you mean? What does that mean?

[Damon Hadfield]

A lot of people. There's been a lot of like complaints about this game.

[Justin Davis]

Well, Obsidian's third game of the year by the way, if you count granted to early access, which is pretty, pretty good.

[Damon Hadfield]

Release of the year.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, yeah, avowed. Granted.

[Damon Hadfield]

I liked about a lot too then.

[Justin Davis]

Outer Worlds. Yeah, I Love Outer Worlds 1 I, I have to assume any negativity is just that like these games are smaller and like whatever. But like the first game was great. I don't.

[Mark Medina]

Well, they're not even that small. It's just people get used to. They, they hear like, you know what? I wouldn't even describe it as open world, but they hear like, you know, third person open zone RPG and they think it's going to be 120 hours, then when it's only 30, they'.

[Justin Davis]

Which is nuts because I loved Avowed way more than like, Starfield.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, sure, yeah.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah. It does seem like Obsidian is just kind of like this, like, younger brother to Bethesda Game Studios, right? This, this is their fallout about. Is their Elder Scrolls. But it's like I'm almost liking these more than Bethesda's output as of late. So, I mean, I guess I'm just going off Starfield, but.

[Mark Medina]

Right. Well, that's, that's the thing, right, For a couple. There's a couple, like, on the one hand they're putting out. Right. So, yeah, for nothing but like, look at their output. Yeah. It's not taking them seven years to release a game. And like, I didn't like Starfield either. But like, when, when, when you're taking that long, like, take. Take a decade to make a game. If you're going to make, you know, one of the, one of the goats. Right. Like, if you're going to make a Skyrim, you know, but when you have one bet every seven to 10 years and then it, and then it comes and goes like Starfield, then it just hurts all the more. Right?

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I, I've. I've heard that they're going to try to more or less relaunch Starfield next year with a bunch of changes, PS5 with a new expansion, but I, I just move on. Just Elder Scrolls, just get it going.

[Mark Medina]

I mean, my thing is, like, you know, if any company could pull that off, it would be Bethesda. Right? Like, obviously they've supported Fallout 76, you know, which is a different thing because it's a live service game. But, like, there's a history of turning things around, you know, within and without that studio. Like, you know, Cyberpunk got relaunched to critical acclaim. But, but like, but Starfield's problem is that that game is just boring. It's a boring game in a boring world and like, the world building and characters are just boring and not very interesting. And so, like, you can't, you can't patch that together. Like, you can patch together, like, the fixes that a game like Cyberpunk needed.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, yeah, it's true. Yeah, yeah, Cyberpunk's good. They were lucky that their game was just broken. Right.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, exactly.

[Justin Davis]

I am excited for Outer Worlds too. Also, Sam's not here, so I'm going to speak for him. He's excited for Metroid Prime 4 and.

[Damon Hadfield]

Silk Soul yes, there was going to be time to comment on those. I was going through games that actually have release dates at the end. I was going to give shout outs to those games that we should be coming. We just don't have dates for and. Absolutely. I want to play Metroid frame 4. And sure, I'll play 6 song too.

[Mark Medina]

What was the. I think late in December. Isn't that when the new Octopath comes out?

[Damon Hadfield]

It's early in December. It's the fourth. Yeah. Octopath Traveler 0.

[Mark Medina]

Yep, yep.

[Damon Hadfield]

That's on my list too. I want to play that. I like the Octopath games a lot. I liked two more than one. So. Yeah, sure. New Octopath with like 30 different characters. Sure.

[Mark Medina]

Wait a second. It's not eight?

[Damon Hadfield]

Not eight? Nope. Now there's a lot.

[Justin Davis]

Octo. Well, anyways, you know what? I'm weirdly kind of excited to try again. The Avatar Game, it's getting a bunch of changes and it's adding a third person mode and the gameplay looks kind of cool. So I. I might give it a proper go because I. I played like the first, I don't know, hour or so and I was like, this is. This is fine. But yeah, I'm always willing to give games a second try.

[Mark Medina]

There's a bunch of stuff that's like, supposedly coming this year. Supposedly Kirby Air Riders is coming out this year, which I wouldn't necessarily care about except it's a Sakurai game. Right. And he only makes bangers. So, you know. Okay, like, I'll give that a shot. Like there's. There's a new Professor Layton supposedly coming out this year.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay.

[Justin Davis]

If it makes the release. Lost Soul aside is next month, hopefully. That is fun. I. I don't. I don't know. I wouldn't be surprised if it got delayed again. They just came out with a trailer confirming the release date. But I'm. I'm. Until I see it, I don't believe it. Just because that game's been delayed so many times. But it looks cool.

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, October's gonna end on a couple of retro theme games that I'm super excited for. October 31st, we get Terminator 2D, no fate, which looks incredible 2D, you know, action Run and gun. Shoot them up with just the best pixel art with like licensed likenesses from all the characters, you know, from Terminator. Got very Contra looking gameplay here. I hope this is really good. It's the bitmap bureau, which they're not super familiar with their work, but they've released. You Know, a handful of like retro games that all have really great pixel art. Most of them have pretty good reviews, so. So I have high hopes for this one. And then that same day as Mina the Hollower, which is the long awaited next game from Yacht Club Games, Shovel Knight. And then this one is a more of a top down link. Linked links Awakening.

[Mark Medina]

Like that's finally coming out.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yep, that's coming out on Halloween, October 31st.

[Mark Medina]

I know, I wasn't aware of that.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, those two games on October 31st, man, that's crazy.

[Mark Medina]

It's like, that's absolutely, you know, based off their pedigree and history, like a Game of the Year candidate. Right?

[Justin Davis]

I mean it's just, it's going to come out and just be one of the best games of the year. Probably.

[Damon Hadfield]

Probably. Yeah. I don't know about you guys. I think there's a lot to look forward to still to come.

[Justin Davis]

There is a good amount. There's also a lot that I haven't played yet this year. I still want to play Wuchong and I want to play more Donkey Kong and there's so many games that I haven't played. So I'm, I'm fine with no GTA 6 and I'm fine if this is the lineup. But we still have Gamescom coming up, so who knows what, what sneaks in there at the end.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, I'm starting to feel a little bit like I don't, I don't really believe in like video game backlogs. It's like just play what you want to play. Stop playing something when you don't want to play it anymore. But yeah, but I do feel like, you know, I've been traveling a lot for work this year so I keep getting had this interruptive, you know, experience of like, oh, I still want to do Kingdom Come. Like I still want to do this. Like, you know, I do feel behind in a way that like in other years I didn't care as much. I'm like, ah, I'll play it if I want to play it.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, there's, there's legitimate games I want to play, but then there are other games where I. Yeah, like I, I've heard Ninja God, every Rage man is very, very good and I have it. But I, maybe I'll play it one day. But yeah, I wouldn't consider it a backlog game.

[Damon Hadfield]

Rage Bound is probably what I should start now that I'm done with Donkey Kong.

[Justin Davis]

I hear it is good recommendation.

[Damon Hadfield]

I mean I did a preview for it. I played the first few levels and they were. I track my steps, my sleep, even my screen time. Why wouldn't I track my cat's health too? That's why I use Pretty litter. It's like SmartTek free litter box. This color changing litter actually monitors your cat's health by detecting potential issues in their urine, things like ph changes or blood. So I can catch problems early. Pretty Litter ships free right to my door. So there are no heavy bags to carry and no last minute pet store runs. It's formulated with silica gel crystals that are safe for cats and people alike. Advanced odor control means your home smells like home, not a litter box. The ultra absorbent formula uses less material than clay litter, reducing waste and saving money. I like Pretty Litter a lot and I think you will too. It's really the best at eliminating litter box odors right now. Save 20% on your first order and get a free cat toy at prettylitter.com Gamescoop that's prettylitter.com GamescooP to save 20% on your first order AND get a free cat toy. Pretty Litter.com GamescooP Pretty Litter cannot detect every feline health issue or prevent or diagnose diseases. A diagnosis can only come from a licensed veterinarian. Terms and conditions apply.

[Mark Medina]

CSI for details this episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever think about switching insurance.

[Justin Davis]

Companies just to see if you could save some cash?

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, Progressive makes it easy. Just drop in some details about yourself.

[Mark Medina]

And see if you're eligible to save money when you bundle your home and auto policies. The process only takes minutes and it.

[Damon Hadfield]

Could mean hundreds more in your pocket.

[Mark Medina]

Visit progressive.com after this episode to see.

[Justin Davis]

If you could save Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates.

[Mark Medina]

Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states.

[Damon Hadfield]

News Update. This week, Nintendo has announced they're raising prices for the original Switch and accessories like the alarmo. Alarmo's up $10.

[Justin Davis]

Dang it. I missed my chance.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay, so what? The Switch 2, the base model is 450 bucks. You can get get it with Mario kart world for 500 bucks. So now the original switch model is $340. It, it's been 300 for almost, what, for eight years now? Never, never got a price drop. So that goes up 40 bucks. And the OLED model is now 400. So the Switch OLED is now $50 less than the Switch 2.

[Mark Medina]

Absolutely wild.

[Justin Davis]

That's. That's completely nuts. That, that, that is that price.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah. No one should buy one and nobody will buy one. The only the only way that any of these get sold are from, you know, are to confused grandmas that act that accidentally buy the wrong thing.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, I don't, I don't understand in this world why, why anybody would buy an OLED for when for $50 more you're getting a bigger screen. It's not an OLED, but it's a bigger screen and you're getting access to all of those games and every future game for the next eight years.

[Mark Medina]

And I don't like the answer to that question of like, why, like this makes no sense, especially in the context of Switch 2. And I don' to be sky is falling. And I hope I'm wrong, but it's because the Switch 2 is about to be, you know, $125 more expensive. Right. They just haven't, you know, they're still holding meetings, I mean, you know, to figure that out.

[Justin Davis]

Oh yeah. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

My guess is that, you know, there are tariffs in all the territories where they do their manufacturing. China, Vietnam and Japan. So I think they, I'm sure they're being hit on their hardware manufacturing for the Switch too. And they're just holding off. Like Justin was saying, like, like it's a brand new console, they don't want to raise the price on it.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, early adoption's important and so you would think, I mean it's like already in stock everywhere. It's not really. So my guess is that they have front loaded manufacturing to get a lot of them out. And so they want, you know, they need those out there to sell software for Donkey Kong and Mario Kart and Metroid Prime 4. But it's almost without question that this thing will, will be 550, I mean.

[Mark Medina]

At least in a few months. If not 599. I mean I would. And by the way, like when the, when the Switch one prices went up, it was that day. So you know, it's like, hey, we're raising prices because of tariffs. And then like the target prices were like immediately raised, no warning. Yeah. And so they might not do that with the Switch 2. They might say hey, the price is going up in 30 days. Like which, which honestly, like, you know, that's a, that's a sales tactic too. Like right, you better buy now. But like, but there's a chance like if you're considering buying a Switch to like maybe you should just go ahead and grab it.

[Damon Hadfield]

Now might be the time.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, same with PlayStation. PlayStation is the only one that's held off so far as far as Price increases. You could still get a slim for like I think it's 400 and then get the, the slim with the disk drive for 450 and then the Pro is obviously 7 and those prices have held. Of course at this point you would have seen press drops and it hasn't really dropped much. But I, I assume that they will go up. I, I think so. I'm. I'm thinking back and so it's like PS4, I want to say was 400 when it launched with the Xbox One being 500 because it was bundled with Kinect and then we, and then PS5 and Series X was 500. I think 500 for the new, like, I think that that was a, that'll be a pipe dream for PS6 and whatever the next Xbox is. Yeah, those will almost assuredly launch at 7 or $800.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah. The future is bleak.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah.

[Mark Medina]

In some ways. We just talked about a bunch of rad video games. Oh, the future of video games is great. But it's like if you zoom out, it's like maybe the zoomed out perspective is a little bit more troublesome than the, than the zoomed in. Like the next few months are going to be cool. Yeah, I mean it's, I believe. And look, a commenter can tell me if I'm completely off base here. My understanding of tariffs and how they work is that if something's on the boat now, if it's already on the way to the United States, it's not subject to tariff increases. I think it's only like new, new imports, like products that you're manufacturing and trying to import into the United States kind of starting now, like whenever the tariffs go into effect. So like if there's warehouses full of Switch Twos in the US Right now and they're already saturated throughout Targets and Walmarts and Best Buys all around the country. Nintendo could conceivably say, let that invent. Like, okay, we're gonna sell these for this price and then the price is going up in four weeks, six weeks, eight weeks. Like they could do that, but they might just tear the band aid off and say, no, it's just a unilateral price increase right now. But I don't think they're paying the higher import price until, you know, except for things are loaded onto the boat at the time the tariffs go into effect. So, you know, hopefully I'm, I'm not talking out of my rear end.

[Justin Davis]

I've just seen a lot. I've looked into things before and I'm Seeing a lot of, you know. Yeah, it's, it's hard. Yeah. It's like I don't want to get politically whatever, but people are learning, right? It's like, I mean there was the knife guy where he's like, I manufacture my knives in America. Turns out all the steel comes from wherever else. And so it's like the thing is, is like these video games mostly, you know, except for the Xbox are based in Japan. The Xbox is obviously made other places not in America. And so we, the video game industry is definitely going to take a hit when it comes to tariff stuff for sure.

[Mark Medina]

A lot of surprise Pikachu face with. Yeah, like, what do you mean? Like my steel that I import from overseas I now have to pay a tariff on.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

What this means, I think for the original Switch, the Switch one is that, you know, the PlayStation 2 has been the best selling console since it was released back in 2000. And we always just kind of thought that number is attainable like 155 million units sold. Nothing else came close. Not the 360 or PS3 or PS4. Nothing came close except for the Nintendo DS. But in recent years it really. Switch just kept selling and selling and selling and we were like, wait, is the Switch gonna catch up to the PS2? Well now I don't know. I don't think it probably won't now. So there you go. Enjoy your first place trophy PlayStation 2.

[Justin Davis]

It was a DVD player. It was. Nothing else ever stood a chance.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, it's true. So that means the Switch never got a price drop ever, ever. It was $300 when it launched and stayed $300 forever until they raised the price and then discontinued it.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, it got a cheaper model with. Yeah, that's the, the one that can't plug into the tv, but still. Yeah. And micro. I forget what Xbox prices are, but they, they raised pretty dramatically.

[Damon Hadfield]

They raised earlier this year in May.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, it's. Man, it's, it's rough out there.

[Mark Medina]

I mean I do think like, you know, I, this is a subject I brought up on the show before. Like Nintendo's refusal to lower prices on game hardware and software is, is, it's, it's, it's both like really friendly to the consumer and like so rude to the consumer of like, like you want to buy this six year old game, it's 60 bucks. Like screw you, we're never going to drop the price of our games. But the flip side is you can buy securely, unlike Ubisoft for like the moment you buy one of their games, it's going to be half off in like a month. Right? Whereas, like, so if you, if you like this dollar cost averaging of like, I don't think the Switch 2 is worth buying today. I just don't, like, I don't think it's worth 500. I think it's too expensive. But if you're gonna buy one ever, eventually, you might as well buy it now because it's gonna be the same price or even higher. And if you think you're gonna want1 in two years, it's like, well, why not? Like you'll get. If you buy it now, you'll have 600 more days with it for the same price.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, that's what Ryan McCaffrey did. He, he, you know, he wants to play GTA 6 on, on what will, you know, will be the best console at the time. And he went and got a pro because he's like, I'm not gonna, you know, primarily an Xbox gamer and just built a really fancy PC, but he, the pro is almost assuredly going to raise in price. And so it's like, you got to just go do it now. It sucks. The weird, like, chokehold. We're all in.

[Mark Medina]

You don't even need to use it. Like, $500 is a lot of money. So people can decide for themselves if they, if they can spend that. But like, you could conceivably get the Switch 2 and just put it in your closet. Like, you know, like it. You spend 500 now or 600 next year.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, it's, it's never going to get cheaper, but it will probably get more expensive.

[Damon Hadfield]

Weird times. Well, that brings us to video game 20 questions. Our suggestion this week comes from Colin in an undisclosed location concept. Long time, first time on the outset. I want to say nostalgia is a hell of a drug. I was introduced to gaming by a cousin on his Super Nintendo. Instantly was hooked. My first gaming vehicles I had were the Sega Genesis, game boy advance, N64 and PS2. I'm a faithful gamer to this day. Currently playing on my PC, PS5, Series X and Switch. Dying to get a Switch too. Maybe see our previous conversation on that column. I also still play my GameCube, N64, PSP and DS. I'm looking to expand my collection of retro games. I just got a copy of Mega Man Network Transmission for the GameCube. I'll stop rambling now. Great podcast. I always look forward to new episodes. I have two recommendations or suggestions for 20 questions in no particular order. So number one, he reckon he recommended Road Trip or Road trip adventure for PS2. No, I've never heard of that one.

[Justin Davis]

Pick that one.

[Damon Hadfield]

I've never heard of that one. So I picked his second suggestion. So with that, let the questioning begin.

[Mark Medina]

Road Trip Adventure.

[Justin Davis]

Never heard of it. Colin sounds exactly like my age though, so.

[Mark Medina]

I know, I know. Desert Desert Bus. Penn and Teller's Desert Bus for the Sega cd, though.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Justin Davis]

That is a game.

[Mark Medina]

Okay. Did this game come out in the 70s, 80s or 90s?

[Damon Hadfield]

No.

[Mark Medina]

Oh, boy.

[Justin Davis]

All right, let's see. Well, he primarily started sounds like in 2000, so that's no surprise we're there.

[Mark Medina]

No, he said Sega Gen Genesis and stuff, I think, didn't he?

[Justin Davis]

Oh, did he? Okay, let's see.

[Mark Medina]

Can you play this game on the Nintendo Switch?

[Damon Hadfield]

No.

[Justin Davis]

Is this game exclusive to one of the platforms?

[Damon Hadfield]

Not anymore.

[Justin Davis]

Oh.

[Mark Medina]

Oh. But it was a launch exclusive. Was this a launch exclusive for a Sony platform?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yes.

[Justin Davis]

See, this is why I was never good at the 20 questions that we had on the website. Because you don't get those nuances like the hints.

[Damon Hadfield]

You don't get the hints.

[Justin Davis]

Okay, let's see here. So it was a launch PlayStation game, but it is now, but after 2000.

[Mark Medina]

So at least PS2. Was it a launch exclusive for the PS2?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yes. That's.

[Justin Davis]

Wow. Okay, let's see here. And. But then it went other places.

[Mark Medina]

It's funny because it could be disgaea. Could be anything. Yeah, it's probably disgaea. Okay. Was it made in Japan?

[Damon Hadfield]

No, it's not disguised.

[Justin Davis]

Wow. Not made in Japan. Eliminates. Eliminates a lot.

[Mark Medina]

Yep. I'm letting you jump in here. I've been. I've been monopolizing.

[Justin Davis]

I know, I know. That's because you're just so much better at it than me.

[Mark Medina]

That's because I care less.

[Justin Davis]

Okay, well, let's see here. Is this game. Is this a game part of a series that is still running today?

[Damon Hadfield]

Not today.

[Mark Medina]

Oh.

[Justin Davis]

But possibly recently. Let's see. PS2, that was like really before PlayStation hit their stride with their like first party.

[Mark Medina]

I mean, unlikely it's a first party game if it eventually went multi platform. But it could be. Look, we got Helldivers coming out on Xbox this week.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, but that's what's weird is because it's like, I feel like this is a different time. Right. Where games cost so much that they eventually just pour other places where it's like final C10 never came to Xbox. Like.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, it might be on Steam. I don't know if that Counts.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah.

[Mark Medina]

Okay. Okay. Okay. But it wasn't made in Japan. Is it helpful to know what. I'm having a hard time. I have a closet full of PlayStation 2 games, but I'm having a hard time picturing, like, game genres back then other than RPGs.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, I mean, there's like, stuff like Call of Duty.

[Mark Medina]

Okay, Was this. Was this. Was this a sports, racing or puzzle game?

[Damon Hadfield]

It's one of those genres of a.

[Justin Davis]

Sort, so could be something like grand theft auto, because PS2 had three, which are now everywhere, but they launched exclusively on PS2.

[Mark Medina]

One of those genres of a sort.

[Justin Davis]

Right. So like Grand Theft Auto is. Is. Is kind of a racing game? Not really. Is this game. Oh, but he said. He said the series is not running today and Grand Theft Auto is about to have a new game, so it would not be that.

[Mark Medina]

Is it a. Is it a sports game of a sort?

[Damon Hadfield]

No.

[Mark Medina]

Is it a puzzle game of a sort?

[Damon Hadfield]

No, that's 10.

[Justin Davis]

So it's a racing game of a.

[Mark Medina]

Of a sort of a sort on PS2. It was. It eventually got ported to other stuff, but Launched on the PS2. Not made in Japan.

[Justin Davis]

Is this studio still making games?

[Damon Hadfield]

No.

[Justin Davis]

Whoa.

[Mark Medina]

Okay, so it's not Project Gotham Racing because that was Xbox.

[Justin Davis]

Correct. Yeah. And then there's like, need for Speed, but those studios all still exist.

[Mark Medina]

It could be need for what? But no, but that was. That's like Namco. I also don't know if there's still. I feel like someone could tell me, like, yeah, there's a new need for Speed game that came out last year and it sold 8 million copies. I'd be like, oh. Or they could say there's not been one in a decade. I would believe either of those answers.

[Justin Davis]

There was a new need for Speed like last year.

[Mark Medina]

Is that true?

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, there was like a cell shaded one. So I don't think it'd be that. What else? Racing.

[Mark Medina]

Just PS2 racing games. Or maybe, but not. But maybe it's a. Well, this came out on Dreamcast, but like the. Oh, well. And GameCube. But like, there's crazy Taxi. I'm trying to think, like, maybe it's a driving game, which is. Well, that's what they call Turismo. But that's.

[Justin Davis]

That's. That's kind of what. That's kind of what I went to is, is it's a. It's a game with driving. That's why I was thinking Grand Theft Auto because, like, there is racing in that game. But.

[Mark Medina]

But what about Burnout Yeah, they're not making burnout games anymore. Damon said the studio's not in business. Obviously, EA is still in business. Yeah, I don't. Criterion made the old burnout games, didn't they?

[Justin Davis]

All right, I'm gonna do the cheating. I'm gonna do the cheating question.

[Mark Medina]

What? Well, what. Tell me what this cheating question is first.

[Justin Davis]

Have we named the game yet?

[Mark Medina]

I think we need to wait on that. It's too early. Okay.

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, okay, but you only have three questions and a guess. What?

[Mark Medina]

That's not true. We have, like, 10 left.

[Damon Hadfield]

No, wait, really?

[Justin Davis]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

I already said you're at 10.

[Justin Davis]

I thought you said you're at 10.

[Damon Hadfield]

Maybe you're at 11. Wait, we were definitely over 10 because I said that's 10.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, you said.

[Mark Medina]

But then we only asked, like, one or two more.

[Damon Hadfield]

I think you've 11 and I just opened my face.

[Mark Medina]

We might be missing a hand.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay, I think you read 11.

[Justin Davis]

Got it.

[Damon Hadfield]

That's why I shouldn't open my hands.

[Mark Medina]

Do you. Do you race cars in this game? Do you drive cars in this game?

[Damon Hadfield]

Oh, yeah.

[Mark Medina]

Okay.

[Justin Davis]

Oh, yeah.

[Mark Medina]

Because I. I was thinking, I'm like, maybe, you know, racing of a sort. And like, maybe it's some weird. You race on giraffes, snowboarding games or something. Like.

[Justin Davis]

Okay, okay, so cars are. Cars are definitely. Okay. But I. I just want to, like, go for it. Is racing the main objective? Like, is that what you're doing in this game? Or does this game, like. I don't know how to word it. Is this a racing game?

[Mark Medina]

We don't. We already. Because I don't.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay, hold on. You already know that it's a racing. You already know that it's a racing game of a sort. And so now you want to ask if it's a racing game?

[Justin Davis]

He said of a sort now. Okay. Of a sore. All right, well, what's the. Of a sword? What does that mean? That means it's got to be burnout, right? Because it's like, it's.

[Mark Medina]

There's a good chance it's burnout. We know it's cars. So that, like, car cars really helps me because then it's like, there was weird, you know, there's like whatever. Whatever the Star wars thing was, you know, There was. Oh, yeah, there was. There was like kart racing games, you know, so it's like, it eliminates all of that junk.

[Justin Davis]

Is the purpose in this game to crash your car?

[Damon Hadfield]

No.

[Mark Medina]

Aw.

[Justin Davis]

Well, shoot.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah. Are you sure?

[Justin Davis]

Are you positive.

[Mark Medina]

Car based? I mean, I don't like, there's driver, like, there's open world, you know? I don't know. Like, I don't know. I don't know how much I would consider that, like, racing. And I also don't know. Was that. That might be PS1.1. That's PS2. I think that's PS2. So need for Speed Burnout, Gran Turismo. Yeah, maybe so. Maybe I. I think the Gran Turismo slogan or whatever is, like, it's not a racing game, it's a driving game. So maybe that's where, like, it's the racing game of a sort comes from.

[Justin Davis]

But I. I can't. I can't recall any Gran Turismos ever going to any other platforms, even the newest. Not on any.

[Mark Medina]

Also. Also, we know it wasn't made in Japan.

[Justin Davis]

Oh. Yep.

[Mark Medina]

Is this game based off of. Is it helpful to know if it's based off of, like, a movie or television show, if it's based off a license? Would that help you?

[Justin Davis]

If it. If the answer is no, then it doesn't help me. If the answer is yes, then it does.

[Mark Medina]

Okay, we'll save it. We'll save it. I don't want to ask that. I'm trying to think. I don't think it can be. Well, it also can't be Crazy Taxi, because that was made in Japan. What about. What about, like, Midnight Club? That's just Rockstar, right? They're still.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah. Yeah. Well, yes, but that's like Rockstar San Diego or something. They're technically not around.

[Mark Medina]

I thought they. Oh, didn't they make Red Dead? Red Dead? Wasn't that Rockstar San Diego?

[Justin Davis]

Red Dead 1, not Red Dead 2.

[Mark Medina]

Okay. Okay. I think we've listed a lot of games. I think we should use the hat. Have we named this game series or game yet?

[Damon Hadfield]

No.

[Justin Davis]

Okay, that does kind of help, because now we've eliminated everything, it kind of puts us back on square one. A card game.

[Damon Hadfield]

What the heck?

[Justin Davis]

So now we know it's no gta, no Burnout, no Need for Speed, no Project Gotham.

[Mark Medina]

We named a lot of series as. No, no Midnight, Whatever. Midnight. I almost said Midnight Run. That's a different thing.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Think about the games of that area that are all about cars, but not necessarily about racing.

[Mark Medina]

I mean, I. I appreciate that you're giving us a good hint, but that doesn't. You say that in my mind, they're.

[Justin Davis]

All about cars, but it's possibly not about racing.

[Damon Hadfield]

Not always.

[Mark Medina]

Not.

[Justin Davis]

Not always?

[Mark Medina]

What does that mean?

[Justin Davis]

Yeah.

[Mark Medina]

Was there. Maybe there was A cars game. Did that game come out. Did that movie come out in that era? What about, like.

[Justin Davis]

I'm sure there's a cars game.

[Mark Medina]

The Licensed. Maybe it's like Simpsons. Simpsons Hit and Run.

[Justin Davis]

Oh, yeah. Okay. Is this game based off a license? No, gosh darn it.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's 15.

[Mark Medina]

I really. I really thought I was on to Simpsons.

[Justin Davis]

Hidden Run was a good guess. Yeah.

[Mark Medina]

What was the other one? There was the Simpsons Hit and Run and. Yeah, there was another one.

[Justin Davis]

Wasn't there, like, old, like, Mafia games and they were like open world driving games? Well, not Mafia. Godfather.

[Mark Medina]

There was a Godfather. Open World. But that was just like a. It wasn't a driving game. It was just an open world action adventure game.

[Justin Davis]

I mean, is. Okay, so I'll ask, like, is this game. Does this game, like, feature open world gameplay?

[Mark Medina]

Nope. What about, like. What about, like, a Twisted Metal, like a car. A car fighting game?

[Justin Davis]

There it is. There it is.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, but twisted metal was PS1, so the, like, with Twisted Metal Black.

[Justin Davis]

Twisted Metal Black.

[Mark Medina]

What was the other one?

[Justin Davis]

There's a very good chance that Twisted Metal Black is. Is on, like, steam now.

[Mark Medina]

There was like.

[Justin Davis]

Is this game first party?

[Damon Hadfield]

No.

[Mark Medina]

Oh.

[Justin Davis]

I was ready, dude.

[Damon Hadfield]

Two questions into.

[Justin Davis]

I was. I was ready, but there was another. Well, like vigilante eight.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah, that's PS1.

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, that's. And then. But then. Because then I was thinking of. I never had the game, but I had the demo for Destruction Derby, which I feel like was also PS1. But I don't know if there were more.

[Justin Davis]

I have no idea.

[Mark Medina]

Is this a car fighting game? Yes, but it's not first party, so.

[Justin Davis]

It'S not Twisted Metal, but all the.

[Mark Medina]

Twisted Metals were definitely first party. Right. Who could it be? Vigilante 8.

[Justin Davis]

I feel like vigilante 8 was PS1 because twisted. Because twisted metal 1 and 2 and 3 were all PS1.

[Mark Medina]

And I think I never played Vigilantes around that time. I never. Yeah, I never played that one. Does that one.

[Justin Davis]

I. I guess my only. I get. I guess my only thing is, like, maybe you're right. And maybe Twisted Metal Black wasn't technically. Like, maybe I thought it was Sony Santa Monica that made.

[Mark Medina]

So did I. So did I.

[Justin Davis]

So that's where I'm like, those have got to be first party.

[Mark Medina]

I think they got to be. I. Okay. In Vigilante 8, does your car shoot guns or like, missiles, like in. Like in Twisted Metal?

[Justin Davis]

No.

[Mark Medina]

What's it like? You don't remember?

[Justin Davis]

I thought it was, like, Twisted Metal. I think I think it's like twisted metal, but I can't remember.

[Mark Medina]

I'm trying to carve out a distinction between destruction derby like, and a twisted metal, like. Yeah, I can't picture Vigilante 8 in my head to, like, know what's going on in that game.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah.

[Mark Medina]

Do you? Well, Twisted Metal got a television show if we really wanted that one to bed. How many questions do we have?

[Damon Hadfield]

One and a guess.

[Mark Medina]

One and a guess?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Justin Davis]

It can't be.

[Mark Medina]

I man, I don't think it's twisted metal.

[Justin Davis]

It can't be twisted metal.

[Mark Medina]

I also feel like destruction derby would be weird. What do you think, Mike?

[Justin Davis]

I don't know. I think we do the hack again.

[Mark Medina]

But what if the answer is yes? Then we're not. We haven't narrowed anything down. Do you. Do you. Does your car have weapons and shoot missiles or guns of some kind out of your car?

[Damon Hadfield]

Hell yeah, it does. Okay, that's it.

[Justin Davis]

Maybe it is twisted metal black. And maybe we're just wrong. And it wasn't first party at the time.

[Mark Medina]

I mean, I feel like it was, but I don't know. I don't know what else it would be. What else?

[Justin Davis]

I really don't know.

[Mark Medina]

Car combat. Well, so that eliminates any kind of destruction derby. Okay. Is it twisted metal black?

[Damon Hadfield]

No, it's not twisted metal.

[Justin Davis]

All right, what is it?

[Damon Hadfield]

2001, published by Midway. This was a modern reimagining for the time of a classic 80s.

[Mark Medina]

Spy hunter.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's Spy Hunter.

[Justin Davis]

God dang it.

[Mark Medina]

I even thought about that too.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's Spy Hunter.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah.

[Mark Medina]

RIP.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yep. Originally announced to have the rock, I think attached. And he was in some promotional materials. But then he's not in the final game, but. Because they were gonna make a movie. But I think he actually does the voice in the sequel. In Spy Hunter 2, which came out a year or two later.

[Mark Medina]

They made a sequel. Yeah, they were just making all kinds of video games back then. Used to be able to make video games to Damon.

[Damon Hadfield]

This is exactly my point that we were making over the recent weeks. They used to just chug turn games like this out every year. And they were fine. We were fine with these games. We gave this an 8.9. That's practically a 9.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah. Yeah. So I'm looking into this Twisted Metal black and it is first party. But it's Incognito Entertainment, which looks like it was a Jaffe spin off. Yeah, that's studio that then got dissolved.

[Mark Medina]

I knew there was some. I don't know how like sensitive like you know, he was not at Sony Santa Monica and then you know, came back to make Twisted Metal but at like a new studio and then there was some, some, you know, it just wasn't smooth sailing.

[Justin Davis]

Interesting, interesting.

[Damon Hadfield]

This was developed by Paradigm, which is no longer in business, but also helps Nintendo with, with Pilotwing 64, you know, earlier than this.

[Mark Medina]

This is the era we were getting. Remember like mercenaries, Playground of destruction, like games like that.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Mark Medina]

Used to just be able to make video games.

[Damon Hadfield]

I know somewhere, somewhere along the way western developers forgot how to make video games. Thank goodness for Japanese developers because they are still churning it out.

[Mark Medina]

And what a, what a role Chinese developers right now we are having the exact opposite conversation. A decade ago it's like what's going on in Japan? They can't.

[Damon Hadfield]

This only applies to AAA games. By the way, plenty of western indie developers bring us great stuff. Well, nicely attempt. Thank you for the suggestion. Who is this Colin in an undisclosed location. Viewers and listeners, if you have your own suggestions for 20 questions, you got to drive into the van. You ever played this game, the Arcade original?

[Mark Medina]

Yeah, it's really great.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's a great. It's one of the classics. It's an all time arcade classic.

[Mark Medina]

Spy Hunter hears. At the end of the show, I'll drop some Justin lore. I don't think this was the first video game I owned or had, but my earliest video game memory ever. Like the first thing I can remember is Spy Hunter on the nes. Played it playing it with my cousins at my cousin's house.

[Damon Hadfield]

Did you ever play the arcade? When I had the steering wheel. And yet they had a gas pedal.

[Mark Medina]

Only on the nes.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's good. I think I rented the NES version at some point. Anyway, if you have your own suggestions for 20 questions, email them to me at the email address. Game scoopgn.com Before I let you go, why don't you know that now is a great time to score some incredible games. Through Humble live now through September 2, grab Persona 5, royal banishers, ghosts of New Weed, My time at Sandrock, and more. Whether you're building your backlog or discovering something new, it's the perfect time to pick up these fan favorites. Plus, every purchase supports a good cause. Get a curated mix of PC games every month, all for just $14.99 a month. That is all the scoops we have for you this week. Thank you, Justin. Thank you, Mark. Thank you to Jobert. Working behind the scenes to make this episode possible. We've got a busy couple weeks coming up with some travel and then Gamescom and Justin's gonna be in London, but we're still gonna try and piece together shows for you over the next couple weeks without interruption, so. So fingers crossed we'll make that happen for you. Scoop Nation. My name is Damon. This is IGN gamescoop. And we're out. This episode of Game Scoop was produced by yours truly, Damon Hadfield and Gilbert Atienza. Technical direction is handled by Jobert Atienza. Technical production is by Marian Franzen and Amir Raqib. Audio engineering is by Amir Raqib and post production editing is by me. Graphic design is by Nicole Kagempun. Game Scoop is an IGN production and part of the Geek Media Network.

[Mark Medina]

Egg salad sandwiches for dinner tonight?

[Justin Davis]

Hell yeah. I love egg salad sandwiches.

[Mark Medina]

I. I don't know if you've heard me talk about this before, maybe two years ago when we were eating so many eggs at IGN Live, but I think there's never been a bigger mismatch between a food that tastes yummier, that sounds more disgusting if you describe what it is and what's in it. It's like it's a. It's a boiled egg and then you mash it all up and you put in mayonnaise and, and, you know, relish and some mustard and you're like. Like that sounds disgusting. Like it sounds abhorrent, but it's so good.

[Justin Davis]

We love it.

[Damon Hadfield]

Wait, what are we talking about?

[Mark Medina]

Egg salad sandwiches.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay.

[Justin Davis]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Next Gen Console Watch is the Igen show, discussing the latest gaming hardware. Whether it's the PS5 Pro, Nintendo Switch 2, or something new from Xbox, it's all fair game on Next Gen Console Watch, hosted by me, Damon Hatfield, a 20 year IGN veteran. I'm joined by my co host, Ryan McCaffrey, host of Unlocked, IGN's Xbox podcast, and Max Scoville, host of IGN's PlayStation podcast Beyond. I'll try to keep those console war discussions civil, but no promises. Listen to Next Gen Console Watch on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes drop every Friday. Next Gen Console Watch is produced by IGN and is part of the Geek Media Podcast Network. For all the latest news and discussion around the always busy and always changing.

[Justin Davis]

World of Xbox, be sure to check out Unlocked. It's IGN's weekly Xbox show, hosted by.

[Mark Medina]

Ryan McCaffrey, who's been covering Xbox professionally.

[Justin Davis]

Since 2002, Miranda Sanchez, an Xbox expert.

[Damon Hadfield]

And super fan who's been playing Xbox since she was a kid, and Michael.

[Justin Davis]

Hyam, an RPG guru whose Xbox roots run deep.

[Mark Medina]

New episodes of Unlock drop every Thursday.

[Justin Davis]

On Apple, Podcasts, Spotify, and wherever you.

[Damon Hadfield]

Get your shows with full video versions on IGN.com and YouTube. Unlocked is produced by IGN and part of the Geek Media Podcast Network.

[Mark Medina]

This is Steve Downs, the voice of Master Chief Sierra117, and you're listening to.

[Justin Davis]

Podcast Unlocked, the world's number one Xbox podcast.

[Mark Medina]

Now finish this fight. Master Chief out.