Game Scoop! 854: The Call of Duty Catch

Summary

Game Scoop! Episode 854: The Call of Duty Catch

April 24, 2026 | Host: Damon Hatfield | Guests: Nick Limone, Sam Claiborne, Martin Medina | IGN & Geek Media

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Episode Overview

This week, veteran IGN host Damon Hatfield and the Game Scoop! crew tackle one of the biggest recent headlines—Xbox’s surprising price drop on Game Pass Ultimate—analyzing what it means for gamers and the industry, with a particular focus on the “Call of Duty catch.” The panel discuss shifting subscription strategies, leadership shakeups at Xbox, and speculate about the future of AAA game access. The crew also share hands-on impressions of hot new releases like Saros, Pragmata, and Vampire Crawlers, followed by their trademark deep dives into game design, trivia, and what they're watching and playing outside gaming.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Xbox Game Pass Ultimate Price Drop & The "Call of Duty Catch"

Timestamps: 02:20–18:21

• Breaking News: Xbox has reduced Game Pass Ultimate from $30/month to $23, an unusual, "virtually unprecedented" move in subscription history (02:20).
  • Damon: “You guys realize how absolutely virtually unprecedented this is for a subscription service to lower its price?” (03:04)
• The Catch: Call of Duty is no longer included day-one with Game Pass—its price is unchanged for those players.
  • Martin: “Let’s not just throw a parade. If you buy Call of Duty, it’s the same price.” (03:24)
• Math Breakdown: $7/month off = $84/year, roughly equivalent to the price of buying CoD at launch with extras (03:41).
• Bethesda/Elder Scrolls Speculation: Is this precedent for other big franchises being removed?
  • Nick: “If an Elder Scrolls game comes down, wouldn’t that be… not on the same level as Call of Duty monetarily, but maybe it might be.” (04:13)
• Changing Expectations of Subscription Libraries:
  • Sam: “The expectation that you have day one free triple A Xbox games that they own is already insane. Nobody else does that... It’s just like, give me games to play so I don’t have to buy a bunch of $70 games.” (04:32)
• Future Tiering & A la Carte Add-ons: Discussion about “tiers” and possible a la carte options for online play, AAA games, etc.
  • Nick: “It kind of feels like… this might be a testing ground for that. And I just wonder what that means for the state of things going forward.” (06:45)
• Historical Comparison: Only Hulu’s price drop in 2019 and MoviePass’ infamous drop are comparable (17:06).
  • Damon: “I can only find two examples of this ever happening. …If anyone remembers Movie Pass, I do.” (17:30)
• Leadership Shakeup:
  • Phil Spencer’s Departure: Team reacts to how abruptly this Xbox icon left, lacking the usual roadmap or goodbye (10:13).
    • Sam: “He didn’t announce he was leaving... He’s been addressing Xbox fans directly for years… but he’s not going to like share the news that he’s leaving. I don’t know.” (10:57)
  • Company Culture Shift: Microsoft refocuses on "Xbox hardware first", reversing Phil Spencer’s broader gaming direction (11:27).
    • Martin: “We’re going to reverse everything that he ever did for the past 10 years. …We’re focusing on consoles and lowering the price of Game Pass.” (11:54)

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2. The “Call of Duty” Debate & Shooter Landscape

Timestamps: 12:51–16:55

• Cod’s Star is Fading?
  • Damon: “I think Call of Duty is past its prime. …It was the best selling game of the year, we just took it for granted. …Last year Call of Duty was not the best selling game of the year, it wasn’t the second, it wasn’t the third—it was fourth or fifth.” (14:24)
• Genre Speculation: The next CoD may go back to WWII to recover lost momentum, or attempt an extraction shooter to chase current trends (15:31).
  • Nick: “I would be very surprised if the next time we see Call of Duty it isn’t set somewhere in the past, a la World War II.” (15:31)
• Multiplayer’s King Remains?:
  • Martin: “Call of Duty multiplayer is kind of unique in the fact that they’re kind of the only ones that still…” (16:55)
  • Sam: “Steam Counter-Strike’s the biggest one, so it’s just like… I don’t see [anything competing on the console side].” (17:01)

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3. Game Impressions & Reviews

A. Saros

Timestamps: 18:27–25:53

• Martin’s Take: 7/10 from IGN, “If you liked Returnal, you’ll like Saros. If you didn’t like Returnal, you might love Saros because it is very different…” (19:11)
  • Progression: More straightforward roguelike progression, “You just get stronger and stronger.” (20:31)
  • Story: Clear, readable plot—corporate exploitation, “profit above all” (20:50)
  • Easier Gameplay: Shield and power-up mechanics make it more accessible than Returnal (21:51)
  • Mystery Remains: “Each of the cast members is slowly going insane, I don’t know why. So there’s still a lot of mystery there.” (24:03)
• Returnal’s Story Spoiled (for those curious—skip to 25:12): “You have to beat the game twice… it’s all kind of like an allegory for her [Selene] crashing off a bridge, killing her daughter in an accident…” (24:29, Nick)

B. Pragmata

Timestamps: 29:07–37:44

• Nick: “Pragmata is fantastic… it feels like a PS2 game in the best possible way in 2026. …Super charming. The relationship between Hugh and Diana is very wholesome…a nice subversion of the sad dad trope.” (29:34)
• Arcadey Combat & Puzzles: “The puzzle combat combined with the… strategy, rock-paper-scissors approach… is really fun.” (30:32)
• Optional Challenge Levels: “They are not optional. You need to do those. …The rewards are worth it.” (31:38)
• Visuals & References:
  • Mega Man nods, Capcom references, “the hideouts just look like Mega Man’s helmet,” etc. (33:50)
  • “Moon as a setting… it just looks really cool.” (32:56)
• Design Praise: “All of [the tools] feel useful…I love it when a game gives you an excuse to use all your verbs and it really forces you to.” (34:54, Nick)
• Trophy/Platinum: Notoriously hard “ludicrous mode” required after main quest (36:54)

C. Vampire Crawlers

Timestamps: 44:53–47:15

• Damon: “Really, really good. …When you start the game, it starts looking exactly like Vampire Survivors, but then the camera zooms in…” (45:06)
• Roguelike dungeon crawler, reminiscent of Wizardry or Etrian Odyssey; each run is rewarding and “so hard to stop playing.” (45:34–46:05)
• Sam excited to try: “I can’t wait.” (45:06)

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4. TV, Movies, & “Extracurricular Activities”

Timestamps: 49:42–58:59

• Mario Galaxy Movie: On a second watch, more fun than the first Mario movie, “It’s just really fun to watch… the montages are really fun.” (49:52, Damon/Nick)
• Mario Movie Easter Eggs: “They bring in a lot of pixel art… you see Mr. Game & Watch pop up every now and then… that’s the dragon from Odyssey, right?” (51:09, Nick/Damon)
• Mario 3/Koopalings: Fans want to see more deep references and wonder how much is left for future movies. (52:02)
• Speculation: Zelda live-action may be next; some doubts about its style and sword design (53:18–54:13)
• Star Wars: Maul Animated Series (aka “Mall: Shadow Lord”): Noted for a fresher art style than Clone Wars and a solid revenge-driven premise (54:32)
• For All Mankind (Apple TV): “Great show, but I think it’s getting worse, which is unfortunate, but I’ll keep watching it.” (58:20, Martin)
• Miscellaneous: Bloodsport as Street Fighter 2 inspiration, recent movies like The Substance get recommendations (59:13–59:46)

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5. Video Game 20 Questions

Timestamps: 60:15–67:43

• Game: Halo 2 (Xbox, 2004)
  • The panel quickly zeroes in on the PS2/Xbox era, exclusivity, shooter focus, and multiplayer features, with the clincher being dual wielding. (65:17–66:31)
  • Notable Moment: “We’ve never had any LEGO game for 20 questions!” (67:25, Damon; 67:28, Nick)
  • Listener submission: “It’s so good. Nothing feels quite like getting a headshot in Halo 2 with a sniper rifle.” (67:43, Nick)

Notable Quotes

• Damon: “Xbox did it. They lowered the price of Game Pass… It’s virtually unprecedented for a subscription service to lower its price.” (02:20, 03:04)
• Sam: “The expectation that you have day one free triple A Xbox games… is already insane.” (04:32)
• Martin: “If you liked Returnal, you’ll like Saros. If you didn’t like Returnal, you might love Saros.” (19:11)
• Nick: “Pragmata…feels like a PS2 game in the best possible way in 2026.” (29:34)

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Memorable Moments

• “The Call of Duty Catch”: Panel celebrates the Game Pass price drop, then deflates at CoD’s removal, joking: “Let’s not just throw a parade…” (03:24)
• Company Shakeups: Surreal talk about Phil Spencer’s abrupt exit—“Phil’s just gone… now this town hall is like, we’re going to reverse everything he ever did…” (11:27)
• Pragmata’s Mega Man Theories: Nick and Martin dive deep into possible references, joking about Nick being the only player of Mega Man Legends (34:16)
• Returnal Spoiler: Nick summarizes the ending, “It’s all kind of like an allegory for her crashing off a bridge, killing her daughter in an accident…Jacob’s Ladder to some extent.” (24:29)
• Mario Movie Impressions: “I'd rather watch this [second] movie again than the first movie... I'd rather watch a movie with more shiny objects that makes me clap like a seal.” (50:06, Nick)

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Important Timestamps

• Game Pass Price Drop & Discussion: 02:20–18:21
• Saros Review: 18:27–25:53
• Pragmata Impressions: 29:07–37:44
• Vampire Crawlers: 44:53–47:15
• Mario Galaxy Movie Chat: 49:42–53:53
• Maul Animated Series, For All Mankind, TV/Film Roundup: 54:24–58:59
• 20 Questions Game: 60:15–67:43

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Overall Tone

Casual, fun, and fast-paced, with lots of friendly ribbing, deep gaming knowledge, and a balance of big news, deep dives on new releases, and off-the-wall trivia and references. Expect the lively, informed banter that’s made Game Scoop! a mainstay for two decades.

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Summary

Game Scoop! 854 delivers expert dissection of the surprise Xbox Game Pass price drop (and its fine print), speculates on the subscription future of AAA franchises, and assesses Xbox’s shifting corporate priorities in the wake of leadership changes. The team shares hands-on praise for fresh releases Saros, Pragmata, and Vampire Crawlers, debates the legacy and future of Call of Duty, and rounds things out with entertainment recommendations and video game trivia, serving up signature IGN camaraderie and insight every step of the way.

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For listeners wanting to catch up on all gaming news, reviews, and inside baseball—with a side of deep-dive trivia and pop culture—this episode is essential listening.

Transcript

[Damon Hadfield]

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[Nick Limone]

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[Damon Hadfield]

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[Nick Limone]

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[Damon Hadfield]

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[Nick Limone]

At launch, the roster includes 18 playable fighters including Invincible himself, Mark Grayson, plus Omni Man, Reksplode, and more.

[Damon Hadfield]

What's up everybody? Welcome to IGN GamesCube. I'm your host Damon Hadfield. Joining me here in studio but just as far away from me as possible at this table is Nick Limone.

[Nick Limone]

I'm back baby.

[Damon Hadfield]

Sam Claiborne is here.

[Sam Claiborne]

Oh the scoops we will have for

[Damon Hadfield]

you and Martin Medina.

[Martin Medina]

I'm here Damon.

[Damon Hadfield]

We got a great show for you this week. I've been playing Pragmata. I know Nick's playing Pragmata. I've got lots of thoughts on that. I also started playing Vampire Crawlers, which is very, very good so far. And I think Mark can talk about Soros, so I would definitely want to hear his thoughts on that, even though that game is still a week away now. But he's been playing it because he's cool. But first, they did it. Xbox did it. They lowered the price of Xbox Game Pass ultimate and Xbox PC Game Pass. Obviously, they raised the price 50% last summer in September, I think, from 20 bucks to $30. That was way too expensive for people like myself. I canceled my subscription. But now they've lowered it, effective immediately, earlier this week, seven bucks a month off. So now it's $23 a month.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

First of all, I mean, sure, that's. That's good. Cool. Yeah, that's nice. But you guys realize how absolutely virtually unprecedented this is for a subscription service to lower its price?

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, I mean, I think just went up recently.

[Damon Hadfield]

What? What?

[Martin Medina]

Hold on.

[Sam Claiborne]

What?

[Damon Hadfield]

What? What?

[Martin Medina]

They took out Call of Duty.

[Damon Hadfield]

So that's an important.

[Martin Medina]

Just.

[Damon Hadfield]

That's an important.

[Martin Medina]

Let's not just throw a parade. If you buy Call of Duty, it's the same price.

[Nick Limone]

Let's be real. Did you really need to play Call of duty Black Ops 7?

[Martin Medina]

No, you don't. I'm just saying.

[Damon Hadfield]

It is true.

[Nick Limone]

I did and I could tell you. Yeah, I didn't need to do that. That's fine.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, it's funny. So $7 a month is $84 a year.

[Martin Medina]

$4, yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Which is the price of buying Call of Duty at launch and getting whatever the War Band or the Operator, whatever it is, whatever in game stuff people buy in Call of Duty. So, yeah, it's a good deal for everyone except Call of Duty players who've subscribed to Game Pass. Nothing changes.

[Martin Medina]

They just have the same deal.

[Nick Limone]

I am. I am very glad and very curious as to why they decided to exclude Bethesda games from there, because I feel maybe they.

[Damon Hadfield]

Is this.

[Nick Limone]

Am I speaking too soon?

[Damon Hadfield]

Elder Scrolls 6 when that comes?

[Nick Limone]

Because that's. If an Elder Scrolls games come down, wouldn't that be like. I would argue that it's not on the same level as Call of Duty monetarily, like from a. You know how many copies it's going to sell. But it maybe might be. I don't know. It's hard to tell.

[Martin Medina]

I mean, this does open that door you all.

[Sam Claiborne]

The expectation that you have day one free triple A Xbox games that they own is already insane. Like, that's completely. Nobody else does that. Nobody does that. PlayStation doesn't do it. Nintendo doesn't do it. So, like, yeah, like, I think everybody should have a different expectation of, like, you know, you're gonna get probably a bunch of triple B games, maybe some single A's and a AAA sometimes, but it's not gonna be all of them. And that's fine because I think that's what we all agree on that we kind of want out of these services. Right. It's just like, give me games to play so I don't have to buy a bunch of $70 games. That does get at this. Right. And you can cancel your subscription each month. So if you're going to pay for a game, it's going to be 23 bucks, period from now on. If you want to pay for a game, that's not bad.

[Nick Limone]

What about Gears of War E Day? That's. I think that I would.

[Sam Claiborne]

Gears of War. I'll be on. On this day one. Which is an insane value.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah, I think so too. I think that's worth it alone, I don't think. I think they'll rework the tiers before they. I think. I think this is a quick band aid. And then I think they're going to eventually rework the tiers where it's like, you know, there's a very specific tier for AAA games for. For their first party.

[Sam Claiborne]

Well, yeah, hopefully not, because that's so annoying, but that's what I. Damon and I have been in a bunch of meetings about covering this topic this week and I did. I. I keep bringing up. There is a time when subscriptions go down or. And that's when they add ads into them and it sucks and we ignore those. Right. But, like, it does happen and it's really stupid and I don't want that to happen here. So that's possible. And then I was thinking of a funny instance in which subscriptions have gone down and in our industry, and that's at the end of magazines, remember that when they're just giving us EGM for free.

[Nick Limone]

I do think, though, that you're onto something in terms of the reworking tiers, though, because, like, I'm not sure if you guys got a chance to see it because it happened like, literally just before we started recording. But there was a reveal of the internal memo that went out to a bunch of Xbox employees from Asha regarding just, you know, kind of rebranding the internal teams at Microsoft. We are Xbox. It's kind of putting. Putting the Xbox hardware first and foremost up in the front and prioritizing hardware and things of that nature. But One of the things that she

[Sam Claiborne]

talks about, all the things that one person said that they weren't gonna do

[Martin Medina]

for sure it Phil Spencer. Everything you did for the last decade was trash.

[Nick Limone]

But both her and talk a little bit about customization of the player experience and I couldn't think of a better way to do it. Whether you like it or not is a kind of pay at will for Game Pass. Like if there will be pick and choose options where you can basically add a la carte style. Do you want online play? Do you want AAA games? Do you want your AAA games to also include Call of Duty? Well, here's different options that you can add a la carte. I don't know if that's going to happen, but it kind of feels like we're. This might be a testing ground for that. And I just wonder what, what, what that means for the state of things going forward. Because one thing that does seem really outdated in the year 2026 is online. Like I know you can do that on, on, on PC. That's why I play PC games primarily. It just works. You can play multiplayer with your buddies without worrying. But it does feel outdated that for PlayStation you need a subscription and for Xbox you need a subscription just to play online. It feels like the next step forward is to just have a subscription service for in game, for game access and things of that nature. So curious.

[Sam Claiborne]

Cancel all online games.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, no more multiplayer. It's going away.

[Sam Claiborne]

No one wants going away. You, you all can't afford it anyway.

[Martin Medina]

They already did rework the tiers, right. Like the most expensive one. That is the only tier where you get the first part of games. Day one, right?

[Nick Limone]

Ultimate. Yeah, ultimate.

[Martin Medina]

I think any other tier below that you don't get them. But I don't know. We're going to, we're going to see how they.

[Sam Claiborne]

The tiers are just really difficult to market and they're annoying and I don't understand anything that PlayStation's doing with theirs. Like that's the one issue. But that's not know a huge problem. If they make it extremely, you know, check, check the boxes for the things you want and this is what you're going to cost you. Like nobody's really done that. It's kind of interesting.

[Damon Hadfield]

I really like Ryan McCaffrey has a really good idea for like a Nintendo voucher system where Game pass is a library of games. You get a library of games that aren't new but then you can choose yourself like say two or three day one games that you want to Get a year, but it's up to you. You can spend your voucher on certain games and I like that idea.

[Nick Limone]

I dig that.

[Sam Claiborne]

And the trade off would be you'd have to subscrib for a year or something like that.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, something like that.

[Martin Medina]

Kiln day one, I mean.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, Well, I don't know.

[Martin Medina]

I came out today, I didn't even know.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, I really do think, like, even 30 seemed too much to do the toggle on, toggle off subscription to me, which I think is funny. I mean, 23 is. It's fine. You know, 1999 seems to be a sweet spot. But like, it is cool that if you like, Like I do this a little bit more now. I manage my subscriptions and watch an Apple TV show and then turn it off for a year. Like it's totally doable with Xbox. Like, they're not churning them out right now.

[Martin Medina]

I just canceled Netflix because they raised the price and then they released Beef Season two.

[Sam Claiborne]

And I'm like, I know, I know. I'm gonna watch.

[Martin Medina]

What am I gonna do?

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, it is pretty good. Season two.

[Damon Hadfield]

Is it?

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay. I haven't watched it.

[Nick Limone]

Not as good as season one, but I still liking it quite a bit.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay.

[Sam Claiborne]

And. And Apple went straight from shrinking into your friends and neighbors. So, like, I have to keep that going for a month.

[Martin Medina]

Now I'm watching for all mankind. And then I just started watching the new Margot show.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, my wife is watching. Margo's got money problems. She read the book too. Yeah, so far she likes the show anyway.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah, it's cool.

[Damon Hadfield]

Oh yeah, Someone mentioned Phil Spencer. I was just thinking about this. I still think it's insane that the news that he was leaving was. It broke on a Friday. Our own Ryan McCaffrey broke that news. And then on Monday, he was just gone. And he's been such like a gate. Like a Xbox gamer, focused personality, face of Xbox. But he never had, like, first of all, he didn't announce he was leaving. You know, leave like a six month roadmap or something.

[Sam Claiborne]

He is in like a little bit of limbo right now.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah, yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

He was like walking around with Asha.

[Martin Medina]

He's supposedly still there.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay.

[Martin Medina]

Until October.

[Sam Claiborne]

But I think he's like completely saying, like, I'm doing a handoff at work. I'm not the face of Xbox.

[Martin Medina]

Something's up.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, something's up.

[Sam Claiborne]

I mean, it's not like, go ahead.

[Damon Hadfield]

He's been addressing, you know, Xbox fans directly for years, ever since he took over and then. But he's not going to, like, share the news that he's leaving. I don't know.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, that seems weird too. I mean, the Sarah Bond thing was.

[Martin Medina]

And then her just quitting. Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

Something's up. There is some drama there. And I'm not saying that like anybody was being immature or anything. Just like it seems like there's more. More. There's always more to the story. Like, like we heard about with. With Sony's leadership shake up with. When was that? 15 years ago? That came out this week.

[Damon Hadfield]

Was it when Shuhei left?

[Nick Limone]

The Shuhei.

[Martin Medina]

Oh, with. With Shu. Yeah. Yeah. That was wild too. Yeah. The Phil Spencer thing's weird because that. That's what I mean about this whole, like, town hall thing they had is it's like Phil's just gone. And that. That whole thing was kind of weird. And then this town hall thing just seems to be. We're going to reverse everything that he ever did for the past like 10 years. Like, we're not Microsoft gaming anymore. We're back to Xbox. No more. This is an Xbox. It's. Yeah. We're focusing on consoles and lowering the

[Damon Hadfield]

price of Game Pass.

[Nick Limone]

I mean, it does seem like a reassuring thing though, if you are an Xbox only player. It feels like, okay, this. It's not all doom and gloom for me. It feels like they are making an active effort to make me feel like I'm getting my money's worth. And I. I do feel that that is a very strong PR move. But again, actions speak louder than words. And they just literally dropped the price of Game Pass, which is a pretty strong action. So curious to see if they can carry this momentum forward.

[Damon Hadfield]

I don't.

[Sam Claiborne]

So what. What happens when they do something like this? They're like, okay, Game Pass. We're gonna make it really expensive and we're gonna say you can play games everywhere. When. When corporations do that, you try it and when it doesn't work and people unsubscribe and you're losing money, you change tactics. It has nothing to do with who's in charge of the company. Like, that's great that it's synced up, but they would have had to do this. Like, they. They have to be ex. They can't just cost the company money. So it's like this was gonna happen. The fact that they synced it up with the leadership change and everything is

[Nick Limone]

like, that's the eyebrow raising, the corporate timing, the.

[Martin Medina]

The weird thing is gonna be like, there's so much talk about exclusives. Like, if they're gonna Come back. Who? Who knows?

[Nick Limone]

Well, I mean we talked about the Call of Call of Duty no longer being a part of it. That's not necessarily the case. You do get Call of Duty. You just get it one year later. Yeah, which is effectively. I'm talking about like play it.

[Martin Medina]

I'm talking about like Forza Horizon 6. Come to PlayStation Fable is Gears or like I know a lot of folks are kind of hoping that their showcase next month is going to be like, Nick, Gears is exclusive. So I'll be interested to see if it happens.

[Sam Claiborne]

Did you see in that email that there was this talk about creative platforms, creation platforms or something and it mentioned Minecraft and Roblox

[Nick Limone]

and Sea of Thieves and stuff like that?

[Sam Claiborne]

It was Sea of Thieves. Yeah, Sea of Thieves, Minecraft and Elder Scrolls and like what's. What does that mean? Mods, I guess. But like I thought that was funny.

[Nick Limone]

Community driven style like content creation and stuff like that.

[Sam Claiborne]

But it scares the hell out of me to say that in the same breath as Minecraft and everything. It's like, did we. Are we getting an Elder Scrolls? It's taking a long time because they wanted to make it a builder like Fallout 4.

[Nick Limone]

Congrats, congrats guides team. There's going to be grow a garden and Elder Scrolls now.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, but the, but that, that seemed a little bit scary to me. And then you know the. If I were I should. The thing in my email would be like we have to put out an Elder Scrolls game. Like that's it.

[Martin Medina]

That's someone release this.

[Sam Claiborne]

You know, just put out the game.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, well you're, you're sort of question about whether or not Elder Scrolls will be part of game pass. And whether or not it's as big as Call of Duty. Dude, I think Call of Duty is past its prime.

[Nick Limone]

I think it's good too.

[Damon Hadfield]

I'm not saying it's going away, but it's just, you know, for like 15 years it was.

[Sam Claiborne]

You also said that in 2007, Damon.

[Damon Hadfield]

I probably didn't say that in 2007. I was probably excited about Modern Warfare back then. Yeah, it was the best selling game of the year. We just took it for granted. We just knew Call of Duty was going to be the best selling game of the year. With the One anomaly being 2023 when Hogwarts Legacy came out.

[Martin Medina]

Hogwarts, yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Last year Call of Duty was not the best selling game of the year. It wasn't the second best selling game of the year. It wasn't the third best selling game of the year it was the fourth or fifth. I've seen a couple different reports now, you could say. But it was in Game Pass and millions of people accessed it through Game Pass. Yeah. But on PlayStation it didn't even make the top five downloads of the year. So that's it. I think Call of Duty is done as the thousand pound gorilla. I think it's just one of the heavy hitters this year. It's just alongside Fortnite and Minecraft and Roblox. It's just one of them now.

[Sam Claiborne]

What if we put Jon Snow in it? What if.

[Nick Limone]

I mean, wait a minute. Warfare 2, perhaps? No, I mean, I, I would, I would be very surprised if Call of Duty if the next time we see Call of Duty it isn't set somewhere in the past, a LA World War II or something within, you know, from the 40s to the 80s. I, I have a feeling we're gonna see something set in that era and it's gonna be boots on the ground, old school feeling. Call of Duty with some cinematic flourishes. That's my bet.

[Damon Hadfield]

At least they did a World War II and not too long ago, right?

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think it was just called Call of Duty World WW2.

[Damon Hadfield]

Right?

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah. It would be interesting if they. I mean, everybody's scrambling right now to make an extraction shooter, right? So it's like, it's always like if they're not at the head, like they, they of course made their pubg knockoff or whatever, Warzone a few years late. Like they just seem to be behind multiplayer shooters. But I don't think like the multiplayer shooter platform of Call of Duty is really going anywhere, but just doesn't seem. Is it as big as Apex and everything now? Like, I don't actually know.

[Nick Limone]

Well, like, I mean, Call of Duty

[Martin Medina]

tried these stuff with D. Really big.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, yeah. What about the base multiplayer? It still seems like the biggest base multiplayer that's around, right?

[Martin Medina]

Yeah, I mean, I think it is. I think it is because it's, it's. You don't really get that like anymore. Right. Like, that's not comparable to, to Apex or anything like that.

[Damon Hadfield]

Right.

[Martin Medina]

Like, Call of Duty multiplayer is kind of unique in the fact that they're kind of the only ones that still,

[Sam Claiborne]

I mean, Steam Counter Strike's the biggest one, so it's just like, I don't see.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah, yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

Into the world of Call of Duty console.

[Damon Hadfield]

Getting back to this game. Pass price drop. This is so, so unprecedented. I can only find two examples of this ever happening. Ever GM no. In 2019, Netflix raised their price and Hulu countered it by lowering their ad supported tier by $2. So there's that. And then if anyone remembers Movie Pass, I do.

[Nick Limone]

I was a subscriber.

[Damon Hadfield]

It was like 40 bucks a month and they lowered it to $10 a month.

[Martin Medina]

Wow.

[Damon Hadfield]

Which obviously that. That just completely destroyed their business. But I don't know. I don't know what the thinking was there.

[Nick Limone]

I still have my movie pass.

[Martin Medina]

Movie Pass, me too. I only think of that Johnny Knoxville like theme park movie because that is a movie I would never watch unless. Unless it was for Movie Pass.

[Sam Claiborne]

You know, Red Lobster made shrimp all you can eat and then went out of business. And now all you can eat shrimp is actually back. They're back.

[Nick Limone]

Hey, man. I'm still an active supporter of AMC A list and this is not sponsored content.

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, it's nice. I was planning to resubscribe to Game Pass next month for Forza Horizon 6 anyway. Nice. Nice that I can do it for 23 bucks instead of 30 bucks.

[Nick Limone]

The sun is fore

[Damon Hadfield]

and so am I. Seros. What's is this? Is it just a preview embargo that's up today, Mark? Or is the review embargo?

[Martin Medina]

No, no, the review should be live right now. Actually, that's a week. The game's actually. It's actually not a week early. The game comes out Monday. It is one of Those very secret 48 hours early and then add another 24 hours early because people in New Zealand get to play. So the game actually comes out 5am on Monday. It's a weird thing.

[Damon Hadfield]

Weird.

[Martin Medina]

I think it's. So apparently it's pronounced Saros. Okay, Sarah, I'm going to say. I'm going to say Saros for the rest of this podcast because that's what I'm calling it.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay.

[Martin Medina]

The devs call it Saros, but what do they know? Anyways, we gave it a 7. I can't speak to the review because I haven't seen it. It's live now, but we are not where you guys are watching this yet. So I haven't seen it yet. I have played probably like four hours. I think it's great. I think if you liked Returnal, the. The very quick eler elevator pitch. If you liked Returnal, you'll like Saros. If you didn't like Returnal, you might love Saros because it is very different in the sense that like you pick up the controller and you're like, yep, this is Returnal. It does all the same kind of stuff. You. You can see it right here. It's bullet hell.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yep.

[Martin Medina]

It does the dulce stuff where you like half press the left trigger for the alt fire full trigger for your. You know, your power move. You pick up different guns. All that still there. It's a roguelike. You die. You start over at the base. What this game does that I personally like a lot better is it. It is a much more straightforward rog. Like in this game, you play through, you die. You pick up these little crystal things. You use those to beef your character up in a very straightforward way. You walk up to a computer, you put skill points in that stay there forever and then you continue your next run. So it's a very.

[Sam Claiborne]

So you just get stronger.

[Martin Medina]

You just get more stronger and stronger where Returnal. Not quite like that. So that's why I'm saying if you were turned off by Returnal a little bit, Saros might be your. Might be your game story wise. I think it's way more comprehensible. It's a. It's a more straightforward. You're on this planet because corporations want to mine the planet for different things. They've sent out three echelons. You're part of the fourth. It's. It's a very much like the notes will tell you. You know, profit above all. Even you know, employee safety type of deal. So that's that kind of corporations kind of a marathon esque type of trend there. There's a lesson in there somewhere with today's world. And. Yeah, but other than that, if again, if you liked Returnal and you played Returnal, you know what you're getting with Soros. It's. It's just. There's just a few minor changes. Some of them will be like your dash is on your L1 now. Because having to take your thumb off the right stick to push circle was kind of a pain. You have a shield, which makes the game a lot easier than Returnal was. So that's a little shield there. And that's how you power up your power weapon. So not only are you. You can dodge and stuff, but sometimes those little bullet hell things are shooting at you become collectibles that you actually want to run into. What he's doing right there is he's powering up his shield and. And then he does a shield. He does a power move.

[Nick Limone]

Karuga lives again.

[Damon Hadfield]

So because of that, demand for this game increases.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah, the game's actually a little bit easier. This is the first boss. This is Profit. He's. It's Good times. So just to sum it up, Housemark is just the king of visuals, presentation, gameplay, and they've done it again. Like, this is a really, really, really good game and a great addition to the psy library if people are interested in it.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay. With four hours into it, have you discovered or can you share whether or not it is actually a sequel to Eternal and Connected and in the same universe?

[Martin Medina]

As far as I know, it's not, but I don't know. Okay. As far as I know, it could be. Who knows? But we all know Rahul Cooley. He's great in it. You know, he. He sounds exactly how he's all sounded to us in real life, so that's great.

[Sam Claiborne]

But the. The character has a great beard.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah, yeah.

[Nick Limone]

It's modeled after.

[Martin Medina]

Okay. He used to just hang out the office all the time. Yeah, yeah, all the time.

[Damon Hadfield]

So, yeah, he's in the haunting.

[Martin Medina]

He's great in it.

[Damon Hadfield]

Hunting of Hill House.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah. Haunting of Hill House. He's in the house of the Fall of the house. I can't remember.

[Damon Hadfield]

Oh, yeah, that was the one. I was thinking.

[Martin Medina]

I know him from. I know him from Izombie.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah. He was also mostly know him from.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah, yeah. And then. Yeah. And then story wise, I. I feel like it's more comprehensible because when you die, you go back to a base and there are other people there. So unlike. What was her name? Celeste from Returnal.

[Nick Limone]

Celine. Selene.

[Martin Medina]

Selene, yeah. There's no way to know where she was. Just like alone. This game, you have a whole cast of characters that you can interact with in between runs and.

[Damon Hadfield]

No, you don't like that.

[Nick Limone]

I like how weird Returnal was, man. I like that it didn't tell you everything. I like that it made you use your brain. I'm. I'm excited for this regardless, but that's a little bit of a bummer to hear.

[Damon Hadfield]

Hold on while.

[Martin Medina]

While you're playing the game, he'll radio back to the base and talk and stuff like that just to kind of like keep that stuff going. But there is a lot of mystery, like right now in my game, like each of the cast members is like slowly going insane. I don't know why. So there's still a lot of mystery there.

[Damon Hadfield]

I want someone to spoil Returnal for me because I never finished it. So if anyone doesn't want to hear it, feel free to skip ahead. No idea what ends up being the mystery in Returnal. What's happening?

[Nick Limone]

I mean, it's been a minute since I'VE beaten the game, but I think the tldr is you have to beat the game twice. The first time you do it, it's like, oh, cool, I escaped from this alien planet and whatnot. But then upon, like, you get reset when you beat the final boss and she's like, what the heck? I thought I escaped this planet. What's going on? And then it's revealed ultimately, by beating the game again, that this is all kind of like an allegory for her crashing off of, like, a bridge, killing her daughter in an accident. It's like trauma of all this stuff that's like the tldr and there's a lot of cosmic horror thrown in there.

[Sam Claiborne]

But it was all a dream.

[Nick Limone]

That's roughly what I remember. It's basically like Jacob's ladder to some extent.

[Martin Medina]

Well, and this game does the same thing. So if you'll remember, like, returnal, like, it would, like, when you die, it shows these, like, queer, weird, like, flashback type spaceman kind of. Kind of like, yeah, stuff like that. This game does the same thing. He'll hit you, die. And then it'll like, okay. The game kind of centers around the sun because then the sun can. If an eclipse happens, all the enemies get, like, way harder and stuff like that. And so there's a lot of, like that. There's a lot of mystery.

[Sam Claiborne]

Once again.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah, exactly. Great game.

[Sam Claiborne]

I think it's acting.

[Nick Limone]

I cannot wait, though. I am very excited. I'm a little bit sad to hear that. It's easier because I want something just as mean to me as returnal, but that's fine.

[Martin Medina]

So what I. So what I'll. I'll say is Mitchell, who is another class of human being. So I'll just, you know, be Elden Ring before it came out, probably one of the only people on earth to do that. He said he only died nine times and beep, man.

[Nick Limone]

See, I don't want to hear that. I want. I want to.

[Martin Medina]

Okay, okay. But for reference, I have died five times and I haven't even beat the first boss.

[Damon Hadfield]

All right?

[Martin Medina]

So I got. I got to. Got to throw that out there. Mitchell is. He's another classic human.

[Damon Hadfield]

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[Nick Limone]

Yes.

[Damon Hadfield]

Even though your theory was wrong, it's not a mega.

[Sam Claiborne]

Well, I don't know.

[Nick Limone]

I haven't finished the game yet.

[Damon Hadfield]

Who knows, maybe a mega man.

[Nick Limone]

But we're going from a game where in Seiros with its dash is set to L1, where Pragmata the dash is set to R1. This is going to be a little bit tricky, but I think I can manage.

[Martin Medina]

It's rough. It's rough. But luckily In Seiros the R1 is the shield. So even if you think you're dashing, you at least turn your shield off, still use it.

[Nick Limone]

No, but Pragmata is fantastic. Honestly, it passed the Nick Limone 5 second test of it feels good to move around that dash button. Whoever made the dash feel sound and the way it moves work, you deserve a raise. It all feels so nice. And the game is. I'm sure you've seen this all over the Internet, but my suspicions were correct that it is a game that feels like a PS2 game in the best possible way in 2026. And I think we need more games like that. It's super charming. The relationship between Hugh and Diana is very wholesome and just really nice to see. It's a nice subversion of the sad dad trope that we've seen in games where he has a tragic backstory. He reveals that he was an orphan and all this stuff, but he goes, yeah, it turned out all right though. So it's like he doesn't dwell on the fact that he was an orphan.

[Martin Medina]

He's very like, he had a very loving family.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, it's nice.

[Martin Medina]

Didn't really want for things and stuff like that.

[Sam Claiborne]

He's not a dad.

[Nick Limone]

And, and just the game feels very arcadey. Like dead space, but arcadey. And I really like that about it. And the. The puzzle combat combined with the. The strategy, the rock paper scissors approach of what weapon to use, what weak spot to hit on enemies, combined with the different ways of going about doing puzzles is really fun. And the game is super flexible. And you know, do I prefer puzzle mechanics, do I prefer shooting mechanics? Or do I prefer a nice blend of the two? And the game has customization options and upgrades that will complement whatever play style you prefer. Obviously you're going to have a better time if you do more balance stuff, but it's just really smart, very fun and it feels like it's a nice, short and sweet experience. I think I'm about halfway through the game roughly and loving it. And my favorite stuff in the world is the game is mostly easy and then you get to the red zones, which are like the locked off zones. And those are the most fun things that you. That. That I've experienced in the game.

[Sam Claiborne]

Have you unlocked the challenge levels too?

[Nick Limone]

Yes. They're really good too. It's like the Metal Gear VR missions. They're.

[Sam Claiborne]

They're just really fun and the rewards are super good for all these. They're like not 3%.

[Martin Medina]

They are not optional. You. You need to do those.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, you do. Well, there you go. You heard it here first.

[Sam Claiborne]

Really good things.

[Martin Medina]

They.

[Nick Limone]

You.

[Martin Medina]

The rewards are worth it. You shouldn't just not do like a death stranding and stuff like that. You could just not do them in this game. You should absolutely do that.

[Sam Claiborne]

There's punishment for losing. Even in the red rooms. You just get sent back to your. Your place and you pick up the weapons and go back in. It's great.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, it's such a cool.

[Martin Medina]

And what. Halfway through a challenge, you could just be like, restart. If you're like, this isn't going well.

[Sam Claiborne]

You know how like. So the. The plot of this game is that there's a. And I'm. Everybody else spoiled everything they talked about so far. And I. You can trust me, readers listening. You will. I will not spoil a thing here, even though I get accused of that all the time. But they're on the moon and it's all about like 3D replication, right. It's like, oh, these robots are made to build the moon. Is there like a holographic cut scene at some point where you watch like, you know, like a French doctor talk to like the secretary about like, yes, I designed a giant baby used to smash stuff. Why did you design it like a baby? I thought it'd be creepy.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

What are we doing?

[Martin Medina]

I hadn't considered that.

[Nick Limone]

What if we make this robot look like a baby?

[Martin Medina]

One robot look like a baby?

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah.

[Martin Medina]

He's got a hat and everything.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah. It's like, well, that's the welder.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's a really cool visual. Like if Diana wasn't on your back, it would just look like dead space. But having this little girl on your back with her flowing hair Moving around. It just. It looks really cool. The moon is a cool setting. Yeah. I am at the area, the first where you, you know, you go through like a New York City. I don't really know why they're trying to replicate New York City on the moon.

[Sam Claiborne]

They explained that.

[Nick Limone]

There's lore. There's lore, Damon.

[Damon Hadfield]

I like.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, there's just a little bit. It's just. It's just that like, oh, humans want a place to kind of like that's what it is. But like, obviously it's gone amok. Right. Because it's pre printing the same shops over and over again. Stuff like that.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, I mean, obviously. Yeah, that's. There's weird. There's Capcom Easter eggs in there. There's like a Ghouls and Ghosts poster.

[Nick Limone]

Resident Devil 3 or something.

[Sam Claiborne]

Like, there is a Mega Man.

[Damon Hadfield]

There is a Mega Man. I missed the Mega Man.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah. There's a little animated Mega man that cabin. The cool computer in your room will show you sometimes.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah. And also like the hideouts straight up just look like Mega Man's helmet. Like the little icon for him. Also the most glaring thing is that Diana is wearing a blue bomber jack.

[Sam Claiborne]

It.

[Nick Limone]

I'm telling you, it's not off the table yet. And you know, Mega Man Legends does. Mega Man Legends 2 does end with Mega man on the moon. So I don't know.

[Sam Claiborne]

That's where Legends 2 ends.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

And.

[Nick Limone]

And Legends 3, the one that was going to come out for 3Ds, you were supposed to bring him back from the moon, but then that game got canceled.

[Damon Hadfield]

Oh, I just.

[Martin Medina]

Well, yeah, because you're the only person who played Mega Man Legends.

[Nick Limone]

That's not true.

[Martin Medina]

Like they're like, do we make a third one for Nick? Yes.

[Damon Hadfield]

I beat. I beat this boss and then I'm in the next area, which is like, like a. A forest like area. They're 3D printing a forest. That's right.

[Martin Medina]

Forest area is so cool.

[Nick Limone]

Dude. The scale in this boss fight's really cool too. Like the. You're in a big open section of the city and you fight.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's a fun fight. It's a fun fight.

[Nick Limone]

Very, very clever combat stuff in this game.

[Sam Claiborne]

Nothing feels unfair too. It's always like, oh yeah, I forgot I should be using that. Oh yeah, I forgot I should be using that. You know, like there's just a lot of options.

[Nick Limone]

So it's a game where all. I was worried that the game would give me too many tools that I would only use stuff like to use. But all of them Feel useful. And I'm constantly cycling between all of my weapons and all of my powers. And I love it when a game gives you an excuse to use all your verbs and it really forces you to.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

And dodging is like, the. The feels really good. And I do like when they send a little missile at you and you can hack the missile to send it back. Like, yep, yep. You're just capable of doing all of this. Like, it's not. It's not beyond your capabilities to do it. It feels good.

[Martin Medina]

And the game gives you enough guns and hacking nodes that you never feel like, oh, I shouldn't use this right now. Just use it. Use whatever gun you want. You're about to get way more.

[Sam Claiborne]

I always forget about the twin stick super attack, but, boy, is that successful if you forget about it for a while.

[Damon Hadfield]

Oh, yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

I'm really getting pummeled here. I'm gonna have to restart this. I'm like, wait, no. And then I hit that, and it just kills everything.

[Nick Limone]

Game design 101. Two things your game will instantly better if you implement these two features. One, if you dodge an enemy at the last possible second and time should slow down, you get an extra bonus point for the nickel on scale. And two, I forgot what the 22 was, but this is the jump button.

[Sam Claiborne]

This one. That's the jump button.

[Martin Medina]

Number two is the L3. R3 superpower.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Martin Medina]

Every game's got to have one.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Build it up.

[Sam Claiborne]

Is that from God of War? I bet that that thing seemed like.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, the rage meter.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

[Damon Hadfield]

Is anyone.

[Martin Medina]

The press button to win.

[Damon Hadfield]

Is anyone, like, far past where I am in the game?

[Martin Medina]

Oh, I beat it.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay.

[Martin Medina]

I'm, like, on my way to the platinum.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay, well, so I. I'm not looking for spoilers here, but my guess is that at one point, the other shoe will drop and we'll learn something about Diana. There's got to be more to Diana. I think it's going to be something. Something cat. Something sinister about. I. I know that cat is going to be messed up.

[Nick Limone]

That.

[Damon Hadfield]

That I know for sure.

[Nick Limone]

I. I know nothing about the story, but I'm like, I'm calling it now. Hughes 3D printed. Let's go.

[Damon Hadfield]

That'd be good.

[Sam Claiborne]

That's creepy.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah. This game does a really. It has a pretty mean platinum where it has a new game plus, and that's all great. You just go and you get all the collectibles, but then there's one trophy hidden behind a difficulty that unlocks after you beat the game, called it's called like ludicrous mode. So you gotta do a three and you cannot play it in new game plus. So you're just.

[Sam Claiborne]

You gotta super hard mode from this.

[Martin Medina]

So I'm like, super hard mode. You gotta beat the whole game again with nothing. All right.

[Sam Claiborne]

More babies. Wow, she really goes nuts with that globe. I haven't yet.

[Martin Medina]

This is my favorite stuff. Her hanging around in the shelter is my favorite. Look at those AI made.

[Nick Limone]

AI generated imagery.

[Martin Medina]

Look at those AI generated images.

[Sam Claiborne]

You better. 10 year olds.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's great when she speaks in binary really fast.

[Sam Claiborne]

What about when she vapes the data?

[Martin Medina]

Mechanical vape. Dude, I like cabin. I mean, Vanna walks in, I'm like playing his, like, screen goes sideways.

[Nick Limone]

Dude. Dude, it's a serve bot from Mega Man Legends. It's all there.

[Sam Claiborne]

Oh, no. Oh, no. The cabin makes me really, really regret that there's no Merchant in Resident Evil 9.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, for real?

[Sam Claiborne]

I just really missed the Merchant. It was. The Merchant was awesome at 8. That big guy in the covered wagon, Whatever it was.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah, the dude. Capcom is so good at putting like four characters in their game, but they're all really great characters.

[Sam Claiborne]

Except, I mean, the Merchant is not a great character, but he does say, what are you buying?

[Martin Medina]

What are you selling?

[Damon Hadfield]

I'm trying to think how a Merchant would work given the structure of Re 9.

[Sam Claiborne]

It's just. They never work. They just show up in the. In the cave by the boat.

[Damon Hadfield]

That would be in the hospital. Like

[Nick Limone]

it's a vending machine.

[Damon Hadfield]

Right.

[Martin Medina]

Well, you get the Merchant, it's just a box, and only Leon can talk

[Sam Claiborne]

to it in that game. It'd be a freaking big baby that threw us through the wall and says, what are you buying?

[Nick Limone]

Leon would call in it, like a supply drop, airdrop thing where he would just like. Yeah, like a fan.

[Sam Claiborne]

They should have had Hunnigan dropping in stuff when you call it in.

[Nick Limone]

Dude, where's Hunnigan? Bring her back for the dlc, Capcom.

[Sam Claiborne]

Because the.

[Nick Limone]

The.

[Sam Claiborne]

The. The person he communicates with is a. As a young character that grew up basically. Right?

[Nick Limone]

Yeah. Sherry Birkin.

[Sam Claiborne]

Well, I wasn't going to spoil it, but again, you guys can also.

[Nick Limone]

They showed that in the trailer.

[Sam Claiborne]

Maybe it's Sherry Birkin. I would never tell you, but I was. They never really referenced Ashley though, huh? After you saved the President's daughter. She's not your. Your personal assistant.

[Nick Limone]

She might be the wife. Well, I guess we'll find out.

[Sam Claiborne]

Oh, that's right. There's always the wife.

[Damon Hadfield]

I finished my second playthrough of RE9. Did they ever explain how he got infected with the T virus?

[Nick Limone]

Just his time spent in Raccoon City. All people who survived Raccoon City got infected by the T virus.

[Martin Medina]

Oh, so it's like nuclear fallout or G virus.

[Nick Limone]

I forget which one it was in

[Martin Medina]

Resident Evil because they dropped. Okay, got it.

[Sam Claiborne]

It was Air Secretary has the. Who I'm not going to say the name of. Right Corre.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah, but.

[Sam Claiborne]

But that's.

[Damon Hadfield]

She was there. But she's from Raccoon City also.

[Nick Limone]

Yes. Well, I mean, spoilers, I guess, for this character. But she's the little girl that you save in re 2.

[Damon Hadfield]

Oh, I never put that together.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, yeah, that's Sherry. Sherry Birkin. She's the daughter of the scientist who gets the eyeball on his shoulder.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay.

[Sam Claiborne]

Hell yeah.

[Martin Medina]

Shoulder stuff in my brain.

[Nick Limone]

She's right there.

[Martin Medina]

Baby from Village should have been the Merchant. You know, the big blob baby that, like. That should have been the Merchant. He got. He grew up.

[Sam Claiborne]

What about if the Merchant was a scary doll that just appeared that you couldn't pick up?

[Nick Limone]

There you go.

[Martin Medina]

Village is so good. What a game.

[Damon Hadfield]

Ever since not 17, ever since 7, they've all been so good.

[Sam Claiborne]

I really think. I think Requiem is better, though I do think with some hindsight, it's. It's becoming better and better.

[Martin Medina]

In my Requiem is very good game. They're all good.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's the only one that I beat and then immediately started playing again. Nick, are you still playing? What is it called? Marathon?

[Nick Limone]

I. Okay, so I was on vacation for a while, so I have not been at my PC. But as soon as I got home, my buddy text me. He's like, are you back from your vacation? I was like, yeah. He goes, you ready to marathon this weekend? I was like, hell, yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

He goes.

[Nick Limone]

And I asked him, because we cryoarchive, the. The new area that opened up earlier this month is only available on weekends, Friday through Sunday. So I asked, like, have you guys done a cryo run without me? It's okay if you have. And they're like, we've been waiting for you, buddy. So catch me in cryo archives this weekend, folks.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay. And then, Sam, you've been playing anything else besides pragmata?

[Sam Claiborne]

Yes, I did play something else. Well, I just. I can't talk about it yet.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay.

[Martin Medina]

Oh, I'll talk real quick about Windrose. Windrose is really, really fun. If you like survival games with a pirate paint job. That is a very. That's what I've been playing pirates.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, Pirates are back, man, in a big way.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah, they are.

[Damon Hadfield]

Black Flag resynced Coming. Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

Looks great.

[Martin Medina]

It looks so good.

[Nick Limone]

It does look really pretty. It does look really pretty.

[Martin Medina]

Everyone forgave Ubisoft. Just real quick. They're like, this looks great. Ubisoft's back. Not that they ever needed forgiving. Assassin's Creed Shadows is immaculate. What a game.

[Nick Limone]

I mean, I think a lot of people would agree with you. That game sold a lot.

[Damon Hadfield]

I played a lot of that at launch and I never finished it. It's probably in a really good spot now. That'd probably be a good one for me to return to at some point. I don't know about you, but I like keeping my money. Unfortunately, traditional big wireless carriers also seem to like keeping our money. After years of overpaying for wireless ign Seth Macy finally got fed up with crazy high wireless bills, bogus fees, and free perks that actually cost more in the long run and switched to Mint Mobile. Isn't that right, Seth? That is right, Damon.

[Sam Claiborne]

The longest part of the process, I'm

[Damon Hadfield]

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[Seth Macy]

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[Damon Hadfield]

Anyway, I also started Vampire Crawlers, which. I know that.

[Nick Limone]

Tell me about it.

[Damon Hadfield]

I know Mark is interested in this. Well, I played it for a couple hours last night. It's really, really good. And Sam, you should absolutely play this because you like.

[Sam Claiborne]

I can't wait.

[Damon Hadfield]

You like Vampire Survivors and you ended up liking Balatro.

[Nick Limone]

Look at how good this looks. This is nuts.

[Damon Hadfield]

I know. But the best part is I have it.

[Sam Claiborne]

I have it loaded up.

[Damon Hadfield]

The best part is that when you. When you start the game, it starts looking exactly like Vampire survivors. But then the camera zooms in and then.

[Nick Limone]

That's so sick.

[Damon Hadfield]

So cool. It's really, really cool. Gameplay wise, it's wizardry or Etrian Odyssey.

[Nick Limone]

Ah, I love it.

[Damon Hadfield]

In a roguelike. In a rogue light version.

[Martin Medina]

Wait, hold on. So you actually walk around? I saw like.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, yeah, you walk around and there's a little map in the bottom right corner, just like you would make your map in Etrionada.

[Nick Limone]

That's why it's called Vampire Crawlers. It's a dungeon crawler.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's a dungeon crawler. You got your map. You can see where the enemies are. You can see where treasure chests are. You see where the boss is.

[Nick Limone]

I cannot wait.

[Damon Hadfield]

You can decide if you want to go straight for the boss or try to get the treasure chest. You just keep going down floor to floor to floor and see how far you can make it. And then when you die, you get to spend all your gold on upgrades and new stuff and new characters.

[Martin Medina]

This looks insane.

[Sam Claiborne]

It is insane.

[Martin Medina]

This looks so good.

[Damon Hadfield]

It has all the same, like, feel good things that the hooks that Vampire Survivors has in it. It's the same formula that it's so hard to stop playing because every run you've got gold to spend, you can buy upgrades. You're like, well, I really want to see this new. I want to see this new level or this new character. I want to see these new weapons or upgrades I got. So I'll do one more and then it's two in the Morning.

[Sam Claiborne]

This always reminds the name keeps reminding me of in what we do in the shadows. There's a subplot about an adopted vampire who they don't know what her skill is. It turns out she's, you know, like invisible or something like that. But what's her name keeps on? Nadja.

[Nick Limone]

Nadja.

[Sam Claiborne]

She keeps on saying like she's like, maybe you're a creepy crawly like me. She crawls up the wall.

[Martin Medina]

What a show.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, I did play mouse, but we already talked about that on a previous show.

[Damon Hadfield]

Right. Do you like it?

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, I mean I like. I think I had mentioned on this that I don't readily say this usually, but that game makes me feel sick.

[Martin Medina]

Oh yeah, yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

That's what you're saying.

[Nick Limone]

Is it like the motion sickness type thing?

[Damon Hadfield]

I think it's more of a color palette.

[Sam Claiborne]

It's the color palette and then just like the scaling is really good. It's like it's not a game is running well, but it's really, you know, you're looking at 2D objects that are scaling. Really. It's like when they first ported. Actually I think it was marathon.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, Marathon made me motion sick on Xbox when I first played it. It's like old style. Like the head bob combined with the smooth.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yes.

[Nick Limone]

The smoothness of which you fly through a map. It really like it takes me out of commission. It's rough, man.

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[Nick Limone]

Study and play come together on a Windows 11 PC. And for a limited time, college students

[Martin Medina]

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[Nick Limone]

Get the unreal college deal. Everything you need to study and play with select Windows 11 PC. Eligible students get a year of Microsoft 365 Premium and a year of Xbox game. Pass ultimate with a custom color Xbox wireless controller. Learn [e-mail] studentoffer while supplies last ends June 30th. Terms at aka mscollegepc.

[Damon Hadfield]

Those are games. Let's do some extracurricular activities. I saw the Mario Galaxy movie a second time and I decided I really like it.

[Nick Limone]

I watched it too.

[Martin Medina]

All right.

[Damon Hadfield]

I like it.

[Nick Limone]

I like it too.

[Damon Hadfield]

All right. There you go. You know, we were maybe a little down on it. Like it has no story or whatever. It's just Nintendo references happening back to back. But I. Man, but I'll be down if that isn't. It's just really fun to watch.

[Nick Limone]

I'd rather watch this movie again than the first movie.

[Damon Hadfield]

Interesting.

[Nick Limone]

And even though I will acknowledge the first movie has an actual quote unquote story and an arc for Mario, I would argue it's so weak and paper thin that their borderline doesn't exist. So I'd rather watch a movie with more shiny objects in it that will make me clap like a seal, which is the Galaxy movie. You best believe I clapped like a seal. Like internally. Not in the theater. I'm not one of those people.

[Sam Claiborne]

Did you. Did anybody watch the Yoshi storybook game footage at all?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yoshi and the Mysterious book.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, I watched it all. And I just wanted to point out for you, this is important, Damon, that Bowser Jr. Is in the game.

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, there you go. Day one by like, this fight scene is really good. It's just a good fight scene.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

The fight scenes are well choreographed and

[Nick Limone]

they make use of the environments in a really cool way. The montages are really fun.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yep.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

That Super Mario World montage is like, I want just more of that.

[Nick Limone]

And. And like the end sequence where they go to the last boss fight, like, that stuff is really cool the way it makes use of the 2D aesthetic. Also the varying art styles are all really fun.

[Damon Hadfield]

They bring in a lot of pixel art.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah. And also it is. There is a moment where they're. They showcase early on in the movie, like a sequence where everyone's paper. Missed opportunity to not use the. The Paper Mario art style for that. Like, what are you doing?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, yeah.

[Nick Limone]

Otherwise, good stuff.

[Damon Hadfield]

I like it. It's fun. When it's on digital, I'll totally buy it and then I'll just be happy to have it on. Playing with my kids. Ever want to watch the movie? Just happy to have that on and see Mr. Game and watch pop up every now and then. That big purple dragon. That's the dragon from Odyssey, right? Correct. That's just like. I'm surprised at how deep they go with their references sometimes.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yep.

[Damon Hadfield]

Anyway, that's good.

[Nick Limone]

They're going to run out of references soon, right? Like.

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, yeah. It's like how every three years we're just going to get a bunch of Mario references.

[Nick Limone]

How much more stuff can they actually showc in a third movie that we haven't seen already?

[Sam Claiborne]

Well, they went hard into Mario 2 in this and they really have not gone hard into Mario 3. And 1.

[Damon Hadfield]

They haven't done anything with the couplings. Right. And Kingo's really obsessed with all the Koopalings.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, man. Remy Koopa, Lemmy Roy. Roy Ludvig. I'm sure. I was like,

[Martin Medina]

I think this is the last Mario movie. Well, that's what I think.

[Damon Hadfield]

You know what's funny?

[Martin Medina]

We're headed towards a Smash Bros. Movie, and this is like the Iron Man 2. And then we'll eventually get like the Smash Initiative movie and stuff like that and will all culminate into a. Into a smash.

[Damon Hadfield]

I mean, that would be. That would be cool. But it also occurred to me there was a little teaser for Sonic 4 before. This is like, they gotta do the Mario and Sonic movie. Right?

[Nick Limone]

Mario and Sonic at the.

[Damon Hadfield]

We gotta do the Mario and Sonic movie.

[Nick Limone]

Mario and Sonic at the LA Olympic Games.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, sure, why not?

[Nick Limone]

I mean, I would. I know everyone says a Smash Brothers movie is what's culminating. I would like that. But I have a feeling it's going to be something where Illumination has more control over the ip, which makes me think Mario Party Movie feels more likely to.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, I mean, Smash Brothers seems like the most obvious thing I could have

[Damon Hadfield]

done without the B planet and the dinosaur planet with the T Rex. Those two scenes, I was kind of like, yeah.

[Nick Limone]

Even though the movie's like an hour and 38 minutes, it really feels long.

[Martin Medina]

Mm.

[Sam Claiborne]

Instead of all those things, you're gonna get a live action Zelda movie whether you want it or not.

[Nick Limone]

Oof.

[Damon Hadfield]

That one. I don't.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

I mean, I don't know.

[Sam Claiborne]

It's got a big purple sword in it.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, I'll go. I'll go in. I will be there seated in the theater. And you know what? I will. I will pass my judgment then.

[Damon Hadfield]

But like, these movies, the animation is so great. These are beautiful movies. Imagine if they did had done an animated Zelda movie.

[Nick Limone]

I mean, it should be. It should be an anime movie. Like, it should be a movie, like stylized.

[Damon Hadfield]

I would love an anime correct in the style of the original game instruction manual. Yeah, that's a little Chibi.

[Martin Medina]

Exactly.

[Nick Limone]

That'd be sick.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah. I don't know. Like, there was stuff from that set that showed Link and then it showed that the sword and it's like, it is the worst sword design ever. It just looks like a big nerf toy.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

So it's like, how are they doing this?

[Martin Medina]

Well, they're children. They can't give them real swords.

[Sam Claiborne]

Special effects Masters of the Universe is taking a swing at this right now,

[Damon Hadfield]

and I can't believe that.

[Sam Claiborne]

Awful.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's a movie that's coming out this year.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, I think it's a good primer

[Martin Medina]

working at an office.

[Damon Hadfield]

I've also been watching Mall. I'm current on Mall. I think there's. There's six episodes out and it's good. Yeah, it's actually very good.

[Nick Limone]

It's good.

[Sam Claiborne]

Darth Maul. Not Mall Rats.

[Damon Hadfield]

Nope. Mall Shadow Lord. Now, it's not like Andor. All right, everybody, let's. Let's not get our hopes up that high. But it's totally good. And the art style is not the Clone wars art style, which I find it looks much very difficult to look at.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, I agree with that.

[Damon Hadfield]

Oh, that droid is the guy from IT crowd.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, he's.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, he's great.

[Damon Hadfield]

He's not. It's not.

[Sam Claiborne]

Who's also in Fable.

[Damon Hadfield]

Well, at least he's in a trailer for Fable.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, that's right.

[Damon Hadfield]

It's not explicitly a comedic role, but he's still good. And you know, I didn't. Since I didn't watch the Clone Wars, I guess I. Since I just knew it's a new show about Darth Maul, I thought it would open up like, okay, let's find out what happened after he fell in Phantom Men.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, that's already been covered.

[Damon Hadfield]

But I don't know.

[Nick Limone]

He got cool Spider man at some point.

[Sam Claiborne]

Honestly, I only know about it because I watched our like 15 minute video from two weeks ago. It's great.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, I watched all of Clone wars and Rebels and you know what? You're good. You're fine.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Nick Limone]

I mean, those shows are.

[Sam Claiborne]

That video is. It does catch you up on all of this. Like, a lot of these. A lot of this has content.

[Martin Medina]

Next.

[Nick Limone]

Those shows are good, but it is a commitment. So. Yeah, watch the video.

[Damon Hadfield]

This is taking place long time after. I think it's probably even after his cameo in Solo, because at that point, he's like. He's like a crime lord then, but he gets betrayed by people. Now he's. This whole thing is he's getting revenge on these other crime lords that did him dirty.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, that's kind of sick. I didn't know that was the premise of the show. I dig that.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah. He does some mean stuff to crime lords. Right. Right from the start. It's great. The very first, like, minutes of the episodes.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah.

[Damon Hadfield]

Good. I'm enjoying that.

[Nick Limone]

Okay.

[Damon Hadfield]

Anything else? Anybody's watching? Extra. Extracurricular activities?

[Martin Medina]

I'm like, the pit's over.

[Damon Hadfield]

I think I'm three quarters of the way through paradise. I'm having a hard time getting through paradise.

[Sam Claiborne]

Oh, really?

[Martin Medina]

Yeah. Wow. Really?

[Damon Hadfield]

I really like it when they're dealing with the disaster day and it's a disaster show, but when it's not that, it's kind of like. I don't know.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah. I thought the Graceland intro was incredible.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah. Because that was the day.

[Martin Medina]

I love that season.

[Sam Claiborne]

But you. It does get back to that plot line in a really cool way.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

So that's what's fun about it. And then. Yeah, I think your Friends and Neighbors is much better than I expected to be. I'm doing that. The boys season has been gross and fun so far. There's just so much on TV right now.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah. I finished the pit. It ended in a way that I don't think anybody expected, so I wonder. But it just. It was great. Great. And then, yeah, like I mentioned earlier, because of Artemis 2, I'm addicted for all mankind. Except for it kind of falls into a trope where every. It's Get. The show is getting worse. So that's a bummer. And I. I heard the latest season

[Sam Claiborne]

was supposed to be really good, though.

[Martin Medina]

No, I talked to Scott. He said it's not very good. And season four was not very good.

[Sam Claiborne]

Okay.

[Martin Medina]

It's a. It's a weird. Nobody here has watched it, right?

[Nick Limone]

No, I just watched the pilot.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah, I watched.

[Sam Claiborne]

Is it NASA, punk?

[Martin Medina]

No, it's. It's basically, it's an alternate universe where the Soviets make it to the moon before us. So The NASA gets all this funding because it's like, you know, it's all about. It's all about, you know, winning races and stuff like that. But the, the twist of the show is that every season has like a 10 year jump. So every first episode of the new season will give you like a news highlight reel of everything. The show, in my opinion, ends after season three. That's when most of the characters that you know in love because they're all getting old and stuff like that.

[Nick Limone]

Joel Kinnaman is gone.

[Martin Medina]

No, Joel Kinnaman is. He's even still in the new season. He's just insanely old. He's just super old now, which is kind of weird because he cries a lot in season four and his. His tears turn brown because of all the makeup. So it's kind of strange. And I don't know if you saw it. That's Mr. Terrific from Superman.

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay.

[Martin Medina]

He's like one of the best characters in the show. He's great.

[Sam Claiborne]

But yeah, Mark, this is definitely NASA punk. That's what this genre is. It's what they invented to describe Starfield, which is what this is.

[Martin Medina]

Got it. So, yeah, it just becomes this thing where it's like in the 60s, you know? Yeah, it's. It's. Oh, dang. These are spoilers right here. I haven't seen the season yet, but yeah, I. I think it's a great show. But yeah, I think it's. I think it's getting worse, which is unfortunate. But I'll keep watching it.

[Sam Claiborne]

I watched the Substance and it was the grossest movie.

[Damon Hadfield]

But it's so good, right?

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, actually, I take that back. I think the. And I think I mentioned this last week, but the latest. Did I mention it? But the. The Bone Temple 28 years later might have been even grosser.

[Martin Medina]

But.

[Sam Claiborne]

But the substance is great. Yep.

[Nick Limone]

Good stuff.

[Damon Hadfield]

Really good.

[Sam Claiborne]

Good movie.

[Damon Hadfield]

I think a lot.

[Sam Claiborne]

Then I watch.

[Damon Hadfield]

I just. I think a lot about the final shot of the substance.

[Sam Claiborne]

Oh, God, yeah. Yeah. What a final act in general. Just a lot of mutant fights.

[Nick Limone]

Quite the set piece.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah. And speaking of mutant fights, I also. Because we watch a bit of Bloodsport frequently before we start Gamescoop. It's free on YouTube. Like officially you can watch Bloodsport from 1986 or whatever on YouTube. Highly recommend if you're a game scoop fan. You go watch that. It's shot in Kowloon Walled city. So it has all this like, like legit, like actual cyberpunk era, like, you know, filming of a place that looks like A cyberpunk, you know, thing. But it's real. But then they're just assembling Street Fighter 2. It's the world warrior. It's like the beginning of the movie is like, you know, a fighter from every single part of the world and like, you know, kind of garish stereotypes. Just like Street Fighter 2. It's amazing. And then they play an arcade game. Yeah, what's not to like?

[Damon Hadfield]

Which was Karate Champ, right?

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah, Karate Champ. Single player. But they pretend to play it. Two player.

[Damon Hadfield]

That brings us to video game 20 questions. And we're gonna start with one with a one that we're not going to use. But the game is still worth talking about. It's especially relevant to Sam's interests. So this is. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, who wrote this in? I don't have your name in front of me. But they said howdy. I watched a video this week about an enthusiast reconstructing the original arcade release of Wild Gunman. You know what this is, Sam?

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah. But Wild Gunman was only in Back to the Future 2. It wasn't actually an arcade machine.

[Damon Hadfield]

Is that true? Well, they built it.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah.

[Martin Medina]

You have to play with your hands.

[Damon Hadfield]

We're talking about. This is Nintendo's original, the first, very first coin operated machine. Not a video game, that one.

[Sam Claiborne]

Oh, no, no, no, that's right. Yeah, yeah, that's it. But the actual video game is in. Is a fake machine they made for Back to the Future 2. That's a retro.

[Damon Hadfield]

Wild Gunman was a zapper game, which is a black box game for the NES. But way before that, in 1976, I think they had a lethal enforcers like coin op game called Wild Gunman that actually was on film.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, wow.

[Damon Hadfield]

And it's like a. A shootout.

[Sam Claiborne]

It was around for a while with actors.

[Nick Limone]

That was actors portraying.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, Nintendo did this. Actors portray.

[Sam Claiborne]

Yeah. And as some kind of censor, did you. I saw it, you know, do you know what urban or is urban or. Yeah, it's in Berkeley. It's like, it's like a. It's a large thrift store type thing, but you can get objects and stuff there. They had a Sega arcade machine from like 1967 there, but it's a Sega on it and everything. But you drive and it doesn't have a video screen. It has a projection screen. Right. So it's rotating like, you know, somehow, you know, cars through it. It's mechanical.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, just like what you're talking about. This is Wild Gummen. And Nintendo put it out it's just a really interesting piece of history. And this YouTuber guy who restores arcade games got his hands on one and restored it and I think he restored the film in 4K. So it's pretty cool.

[Sam Claiborne]

Wow.

[Nick Limone]

They had a.

[Sam Claiborne]

That's amazing.

[Nick Limone]

I went to the Nintendo Museum when I was in Japan. I was lucky enough to get a enter the raffle and actually get selected to. For the opportunity to buy the ticket. But inside the museum they have a whole gallery dedicated to all of their like, toys that were guns and how that evolved into the arcade stuff. And this was one of the things that was included in there. So I was like, oh, wow, what a fun little recap to my trip.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

And then they had. They had actual. They bought bowling alleys and made light gun galleries in the bowling alleys.

[Nick Limone]

Yeah, yeah. Shooting galleries. They're awesome. They showed like old like Japanese commercials of people like enjoying the galleries. It was sick.

[Sam Claiborne]

That's great. Can't wait to go. Another reason to go to Japan.

[Damon Hadfield]

So very cool. But I don't think Wildgamon would be a very fair pick for 20 questions. So onto our real pick this week. Hi Omega cops. My name is Eric Buehler and I live in New York City. I was recently listening to Game Scoop 853. Damon reflects on 20 years at IGN where Damon starts his reflection with cast your minds back to early 2006. I know some of our listeners were still very young. This really struck a chord with me because I would have been nine at this time and just starting to read and engage with igm. My engagement has waxed and waned with the years, but I always find myself returning. In the past two years, I've become a weekly Game Scoop listener. It's always the highlight of my week. So with all this redacted in mind, I figured I'd suggest redacted or redacted for video game 20 questions since they were the games I got with my redacted for redacted. So you must choose out of three redacted games. Redacted game one, two or three. And I checked, I like the third one. We haven't done any of these games yet.

[Martin Medina]

Sounds.

[Nick Limone]

I'll go with Mark number three.

[Damon Hadfield]

Redacted game number three. With that, let the questioning begin.

[Nick Limone]

Is this game after the 2000 or after?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yes.

[Nick Limone]

Ah. Figured I would assume it's like 2006 if we're being honest. But I. I feel like Damon would have redacted that up at the front.

[Sam Claiborne]

People want us to change our questions to do before 2013? Because I believe that's when the PS4 came out instead of doing 2010. It's a little confusing to me. But is this from before 2013?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yes.

[Nick Limone]

So it's probably PS3 era or Xbox.

[Martin Medina]

So we've narrowed it down to between 2010. 2013. Okay.

[Nick Limone]

No, from 2000 to 2013.

[Martin Medina]

Oh, I see. Okay.

[Sam Claiborne]

Is this a console exclusive?

[Martin Medina]

Yes.

[Nick Limone]

Is this in the PlayStation 3 era of consoles? So PlayStation 3, Xbox 360. Okay.

[Damon Hadfield]

Nope.

[Nick Limone]

So it would be before that.

[Martin Medina]

PS1 or PS2? Yeah.

[Sam Claiborne]

Is this from the PS2 era of games?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yes. That's five.

[Nick Limone]

And it's not a console exclusive. Is that correct, Sam?

[Sam Claiborne]

He said it was one.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, it is one.

[Sam Claiborne]

Is this a Nintendo or Sony console exclusive?

[Damon Hadfield]

Nope.

[Martin Medina]

Xbox.

[Sam Claiborne]

That's exciting.

[Martin Medina]

Xbox.

[Sam Claiborne]

Well, there's only three or four games it could possibly be.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah. Is it Halo? Okay. Was. Is the game first party?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yes.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, is this game a shooter?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yes.

[Martin Medina]

Oh, okay. It's probably Halo, though.

[Nick Limone]

Well,

[Martin Medina]

did this game define the genre?

[Sam Claiborne]

Does this game have multiplayer as a focus of the game?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yes.

[Nick Limone]

I guess it could be Halo. How many questions are we at?

[Damon Hadfield]

9.

[Nick Limone]

9?

[Martin Medina]

Yeah. It could be Halo 2. It could. Well, it. Hold on. So it could be 360 though, right? As well?

[Nick Limone]

No, 360 was 2006.

[Martin Medina]

We.

[Sam Claiborne]

We said establish its PS2 era.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah. PS2 era. So Xbox. Let's see. Does this game have space themes?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yes. That's 10.

[Nick Limone]

Does this game feature Space Marines?

[Martin Medina]

Wait, hold on.

[Damon Hadfield]

Wait, are you asking that question?

[Martin Medina]

I was just thinking about Space Marine 2 earlier.

[Sam Claiborne]

I think we know it's hella. We just need to know if it's one or two.

[Nick Limone]

All right, hold on. Then.

[Martin Medina]

Let's do you dual wield in this game? Can you dual wield?

[Damon Hadfield]

Yes.

[Sam Claiborne]

I don't think. Damn.

[Nick Limone]

That would be Halo 2. Then.

[Martin Medina]

Say hello to you.

[Nick Limone]

Do we. Do we need to like, do we want to just go for the kill?

[Martin Medina]

Is it Halo? Is it Halo 2?

[Damon Hadfield]

It is Halo 2.

[Martin Medina]

Yes.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yep, yep, yep. Halo 2.

[Martin Medina]

I think.

[Damon Hadfield]

I don't think. I don't know. You can dual Wield in Halo 2.

[Nick Limone]

I was gonna ask, did someone get a tattoo to celebrate?

[Martin Medina]

He's on the COVID holding the guns to show that it's got dual wielding.

[Nick Limone]

But see, you never actually wanted.

[Sam Claiborne]

How do you define dual?

[Nick Limone]

You don't really want to end with

[Martin Medina]

him being like, I'm going to finish this fight, sir. Something like that.

[Damon Hadfield]

The unredacted messages. With all this nostalgia in mind, I figured I'd suggest lego Star Wars 2, the original trilogy, Guitar Hero 2, or Halo 2 for video game 20 Questions, since they were the games I got with my Xbox 360 for Christmas 2006.

[Sam Claiborne]

First of all, those are clearly Diablo, Fire and medium spicy levels.

[Martin Medina]

You could have told us the middle one would have been fun.

[Sam Claiborne]

We would have never gotten the Lego one.

[Martin Medina]

I don't think I would have gotten that one.

[Damon Hadfield]

I was really surprised. We've never done any lego game for 20 questions.

[Nick Limone]

Oh, wow.

[Martin Medina]

Wow.

[Nick Limone]

All right, start brushing LEGO game history.

[Martin Medina]

Let's do one next week.

[Damon Hadfield]

Let's do it next week. Okay. Nicely job. Yes. Halo 2, which I was very surprised we've never had on the show for 20 questions.

[Nick Limone]

Halo 2's so good. It's so good. Nothing feels quite like getting a headshot in Halo 2 with a sniper rifle.

[Sam Claiborne]

Hell yeah. I played this last year. It's great.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yeah, that's a really good one. Thank you for the suggestion. Eric Bueller, New York City Viewers, listeners, if you have your own suggestions for video game 20 questions, email them to me at the email address, gamescoopgn.com and hopefully everyone saw that tickets for IGN Live are on sale now. IGN Live is happening this year here in downtown LA June 6th and 7th. And we also will be doing a live game soup there, which will also serve as the 20th anniversary of Gamescoop. So you definitely do not want to miss this. I have lots of fun stuff planned. It's going to be a really good time. You can just go to.

[Sam Claiborne]

We got confirmed that we will all be there. Mark got his confirmation day. I got mine.

[Damon Hadfield]

Oh, there you go. We will all be there. You can just go to ign.comlive to get your tickets.

[Nick Limone]

We have such sites to show you it's true.

[Martin Medina]

It's such a man. IGN Live is just so much fun. I cannot wait.

[Damon Hadfield]

Yep, me too.

[Sam Claiborne]

But you would say that.

[Martin Medina]

Yeah, I get to do all the fun stuff.

[Nick Limone]

How much did IGN pay you to say that?

[Damon Hadfield]

Okay, that's all the scoops that we have for you this week. Thank you, Nick. Thank you, Sam. Thank you, Mark. Thank you to Joe for working behind the scenes. Make this episode possible. My name is Damon. This is IGN gamescoop. And we're out.

[Sam Claiborne]

Wait, Sam, Easy episode.

[Nick Limone]

Sam, real quick. What game was it that you said that you've been playing but you can't talk about yet?

[Sam Claiborne]

Well, so I. I was just gonna mention that I wanted to. I have gotten this game. It's called.