Patreon Preview #385: New Games Jam-Four-ee

Summary

Hey Riddle Riddle – Patreon Preview #385: New Games Jam-Four-ee (July 24, 2026)

Hosts: Adal Rifai, Erin Keif, John Patrick Coan (JPC)
Podcast: Hey Riddle Riddle (Headgum)

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Episode Overview

This Patreon preview is a lively “new games workshop” episode, where JPC unveils a selection of never-before-played game ideas for his cohosts, Adal and Erin. The episode is less about riddles and more about quick-witted, chaotic improvisation, playful banter, and the trio’s unique comedic chemistry. The concept: JPC's “Patreon Ideas” folder is overflowing, so the team samples a smorgasbord of quirky games that are too, as Erin observes, “good to carry a whole episode” on their own.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. JPC’s Overflowing Game Ideas Folder

• JPC introduces the premise: he has so many half-baked game ideas saved up that it’s time to try a bunch in one episode.
• Erin immediately ribs him:

  “So what you’re saying is all these ideas are so good that they couldn’t possibly carry an entire episode on their own...” (00:56)

• The group brainstorms absurd “game” pitches, including “Guess the Butt,” “Jellybean Flavors or Greg Kinnear Movies,” and “Goodwill Hunted.”
• JPC admits:

  “I’ve never playtested any of these games. I don’t know how any of them will go.” (03:01)

2. JPC’s Sleep-Deprived Creativity (and Domino’s 'The Noid')

• JPC recounts being woken early by emergency sirens and, unable to sleep, using the time to write these new games. He’s a bit “annoyed” and scattered:

  “Most of these are just me working for two hours this morning where I was just like, let’s fucking write these fucking things down.” (04:03)

• An extended digression on being “annoyed” leads to reminiscing about Domino’s mascot, The Noid.
• Notable moment: Adal admits it took him years to get the pun behind “The Noid”:

  “It took me until early 30s, late 20s to realize that the noid is like being annoyed.” (04:29)

3. Game Selection Banter (Mario Party Analogy)

• After ads, the group debates how to pick among a list of game titles. Adal compares it to selecting minigames in Mario Party:

  "One of my favorite things in the world is playing Mario Party ... the great joy ... is selecting a game.” (09:21)

• They each reveal their Mario Party character preferences—Yoshi is in hot demand and Adal bemoans being forced to “pivot” since marrying someone committed to always picking Yoshi.
• JPC lists his games: “Order in the Court,” “Guess That Movie,” “How High Can You Name,” “The Banned List,” and “Ship of Heus.” There’s confusion (and puns) about the Ship of Theseus reference.

4. Playing “How High Can You Name?”

• JPC explains the game, where each player bids on how many “things” within a category they can name; the other can “call” their bluff and make them list them.
• The first category is “shades of blue.”
• Bidding, bluffing, and goofing ensue:
  • Adal: “It’s almost like balderdash. I’m gonna say I can name five shades of blue.” (14:29)
  • Erin goes for seven, Adal calls her bluff: “Name those shades.” (14:50)
• The actual naming/listing is cut off as the Patreon paywall kicks in.

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• JPC (on game idea overload):

  “There comes a time when my folder on my phone marked Patreon Ideas is so full of delicious good ideas ... I have to kind of just crack it open a little bit and say, come out here, all you little good ideas.” (00:12)

• Erin (lampooning the game selection):

  “So what you’re saying is all these ideas are so good that they couldn’t possibly carry an entire episode on their own...” (00:56)

• Adal (on The Noid):

  “It took me until early 30s, late 20s to realize that the noid is like being annoyed.” (04:29)

• JPC (explaining ‘How High Can You Name’):

  “This is different, because I’m going to give you a category and you have to say how many things in that category you can name.” (13:13)

• Adal (on Mario Party):

  “One of my favorite things in the world is playing Mario Party and I feel like this is akin to Mario Party...” (09:21)

• Adal (on his Mario Party character journey):

  “Now, I used to be all-time Yoshi and then I married a lovely lady who demands all-time Yoshi and now I’ve had to pivot.” (10:02)

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Important Timestamps for Segments

• 00:00–01:12 — Cold open, sponsor parody, concept setup, and immediate riffing on game ideas.
• 03:01 — JPC explains the “new games workshop” episode format.
• 04:03–04:55 — Wake-up story; “Noid” tangent about names/puns.
• 09:21 — Mario Party game-picking analogy introduces the game list.
• 11:01 — JPC reads out five new game titles.
• 13:13–14:52 — Explanation and playthrough of “How High Can You Name?” (Shades of blue segment).
• 14:52 — Preview ends; Patreon paywall triggers.

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Tone & Style

The tone is quick, irreverent, and packed with in-jokes, puns, and improv-style back-and-forth. The hosts are self-deprecating about the games and happily derail for tangents about pop culture and their own quirks, all in their friendly, chaotic style.

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For Further Listening

To hear the rest of the episode—including Erin’s attempt to name seven shades of blue and more new game experiments—join the Clue Crew via Patreon at patreon.com/heyriddleriddle.

Transcript

[JPC]

A colossal monster. A city in ruins. No way out except inside of the all electric Toyota Chr. John Cho stars in Escape Test Drive, Toyota's new all electric family today, Toyota. Let's go places. Adol. Aaron. Every once in a while there comes a time when my folder on my phone marked Patreon Ideas. It's so full of delicious good ideas,

[Aaron]

gets struck by lightning and terrorizes cities

[JPC]

that I have to kind of just crack it open a little bit and say, come out of. Come out here. All you little good ideas. Yeah, get in here. Little good ideas. Why don't we make ourselves a little good idea smorgasborg for my friends?

[Aaron]

So what you're saying is all these ideas are so good that they couldn't possibly carry an entire episode on their own, so you have to sort of give them each a segment.

[JPC]

I don't know why it's so productive to put it that way.

[Aaron]

So let me guess. Wait, let's add a. Let's guess what some of these ideas are. What? What dog won? The dog. The Purina Dog show on Thanksgiving in the 90s.

[Adol]

Yes, yes, yes. Guess the butt. He's going to show us a picture of a butt and it's going to be Ryan Reynolds every time. But make us think it's not a brilliant.

[JPC]

Guess the butt segment.

[Aaron]

Jelly bean flavor. Jelly bean.

[JPC]

Hold on, you're going too fast. You're going too fucking fast. Just the butt.

[Aaron]

Jelly bean flavors or Greg Kinnear Movies.

[JPC]

Easy. Making your movies easy.

[Aaron]

Is this my haircut? What other games does he have planned for us?

[JPC]

Is this my haircut?

[Aaron]

Now?

[JPC]

I like that.

[Adol]

Scream team. Or are we given the name of a sports team and we have to scream it?

[JPC]

Okay.

[Aaron]

Goodwill hunted. Name every will you want to hunt and kill.

[JPC]

Okay, enough of these. Enough of these great ideas. The Good Will Hunting is a game that we might play if we have time at the end the episode. I'm just thinking about, like, that as a challenge. Like, could I name every will that I want to kill? I don't know. I mean, it's all, hey, Wills, it's a lot of you motherfuckers. Let's be honest, it's a lot of you motherfuckers.

[Aaron]

Well, we'll make sure to give you at least five minutes at the end where you can get that.

[JPC]

Okay? I appreciate that, but no. Every once in a while we do an episode. And it's been quite a while since my folder has been this full where we do a new games workshop, or I think I call it a New games Jamboree is maybe the, that's the technical term for what this is. So I have a bunch of games for you guys to play and we're just gonna, we're gonna play em. I've never playtested any of these games. I don't know how any of them will go.

[Aaron]

You know, we might even subject your wife to this. You normally run these by your poor, poor wife.

[JPC]

Can I tell you what happened I. Last night and they shouldn't. I get why they do this, but there was a ambulance like or a fire truck or something, something loud with a siren right outside of my house, like on my block basically at like 3 or 4 in the morning. And waking up at. I usually wake up around 5, 30ish, but so waking up at 3 or whatever it was is like a disaster to me because I'm like, okay, it's not enough time for me to like go back to bed, but it's just enough time for me to like extra tired throughout my day. So I like laid in bed for a while, but then I was like, nah, fuck it. And I went downstairs and I was like, I'm just gonna write because that's like a productive thing for me to be doing at this hour when there's nothing else to do. And so I didn't even talk to Mariah about most of these. Most of these are just. Were like me working for two hours this morning where I was just like, let's fucking write these fucking things down.

[Adol]

And you were in an annoyed state.

[JPC]

Yes.

[Aaron]

Adult Run.

[JPC]

What am I?

[Aaron]

Adol? Save yourself. I'll play the game.

[Adol]

I have a name tag that says Will on it. What the fuck?

[JPC]

Adult I was in an annoyed state. I was trying to get some of those sweet Domino's pizzas. Is that was it?

[Adol]

Yeah.

[JPC]

Was it okay? It took me so long to remember where the. This is how off I am today. I couldn't even remember where the noid is from.

[Adol]

I feel like it took me until early 30s, late 20s to realize that the noid is like being annoyed. Annoyed, yeah, annoyed. I didn't piece that together. I was like, just what a weird little name.

[JPC]

The guys sitting in the office of Dominoes being like, will people get it?

[Adol]

Will people get it, Jerry?

[JPC]

I'm sure. I'm sure people will get it, Jerry. Like it's the noid.

[Adol]

Will people get that? The seven up dot is a period.

[Aaron]

And Jerry, where are you spending Christmas this year? We're kind of worried about you as an office. Why don't you Come home and be with me and Maureen this Christmas, Jerry.

[JPC]

Yeah, right. Like I'm gonna fall for that. Like I'm gonna fall for your nice little Christmas with you and Maureen.

[Aaron]

Jerry, get out of the office. No, no, we're not. Come on, man.

[Adol]

Hey everybody, adol here. Don't panic. I'm trying not to. The three of us were at the Cook County Pie Factory. I'm still here on a self guided tour, of course. And JPC and Aaron leaned over a bit too far and fell into the pie vat. So they've been baked into pies. I'm trying to run around eating through the pies to find them. No such luck so far. But I do want to let you know this is stressful, of course, but one of the most stressful things we have to deal with after a busy day of recording riddles is what are we going to have for dinner? Jpc, of course, always suggests. I've got a bone to pick with you and Aaron's all. We should have a bowl of contrada. 45 minutes later, 2/3 of us are baked into pies. This all could have been avoided with Tempo. The meals are already prepared, ready in two minutes and make it a whole lot easier to eat fresh balanced meals during the week. With over 20 recipes every week made from nutrient rich ingredients, Tempo keeps things exciting and helps you stay consistent with healthy habits. And no matter your goals, there's a Tempo meal for you. Protein packed meals with over 30 grams of protein fiber, rich calorie, conscious gut Support and even GLP1 smart meals. GLP1 I guess is maybe how you pronounce it. Personally, I've recently had some favorites from Tempo, including the barbecue pulled pork sweet potato Skillet, the Fiesta grilled chicken and rice, and the most fun to say, the lean and clean Rotini Bolognese with garlicky broccoli. Yum, yum, yum. For a limited time, Tempo is offering our listeners 60% off your first box. Go to Tempo meals.com riddle that's tempomeals.com riddle For 60% off your first box, Tempo meals.com riddle rules and restrictions may apply. Oh, oh, I bit into a pie. It's Aaron. Oh, nope, that's a blackbird. Mmm, maybe Aaron. Oh, it is Aaron. You're free. Oh, she just flew out the window. Classic Aaron.

[JPC]

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[Adol]

One of my favorite things in the world is playing Mario Party and I feel like this is akin to Mario Party. And one of the great joys of Mario Party is selecting a game.

[Aaron]

It's getting into a fight with your significant other.

[Adol]

It's almost. Getting divorced is a fun little name. So I feel like I like hearing the names and choosing off names.

[Aaron]

I'm with adol. I love that idea. Who are you when you play Mario Party? Adol.

[Adol]

I'm usually either Waluigi or the Shadow.

[Aaron]

Say it.

[JPC]

I was hoping ADOL would be like, I'm Debenet of St. Cloud. He's just like a different guy.

[Adol]

He's a detective, a Nintendo detective.

[JPC]

But he's from the future.

[Aaron]

Or you said. Or shy guy.

[Adol]

Or shy guy. Or the ninja. Now, I used to be all time Yoshi and then I married a lovely lady who demands all time Yoshi and now I've had to pivot.

[Aaron]

I am also an all time Yoshi person. So what do Gemma and I do now?

[Adol]

I guess you never play. You just trade controllers. You never play against each other.

[Aaron]

Oh my God.

[JPC]

I'm always Luigi or Waluigi if they have it. Good work if you can get it.

[Adol]

I usually am Waluigi just because when he screams, it's the. He's like wah wah. Like it's really delightful.

[JPC]

He's got a delightful scream. Okay, so the first one, the name of these is order in the court. Then we have guess that movie. Then we have how high can you name? Then we have the banned list. And then we have ship of Hehe. Ship of Heus.

[Adol]

He.

[JPC]

Ship of Heus. I think it's Ship of hes.

[Adol]

Is it like Michael Jackson saying Theseus as Michael Jackson gets reconstructive surgery? At what point is he no longer Michael Jackson?

[JPC]

Ship of Theseus. Ship of Heus. I want to call it ship of Heus. I just don't like reading it written out.

[Adol]

Yeah, of course. Okay, Aaron, anything grab your fancy.

[JPC]

First of all, nobody grabbed her fancy.

[Aaron]

Okay, what if I liked it? What if I liked it?

[JPC]

Look, first of all, I'd always ask, okay, I wouldn't just grab somebody's fancy and hope they like it. If I'm doing it, they're gonna like it.

[Aaron]

You're being really loud and really defensive. You're being really loud and really defensive. How high can you name? Is that what you said?

[Adol]

That also is my number one.

[Aaron]

Yeah. What does that mean?

[JPC]

Can you tell I wrote the name of this at like 6:30 in the morning. How high can you name? How high can you name Is what we're gonna play.

[Aaron]

How high can you name?

[JPC]

Stop.

[Aaron]

What?

[JPC]

I'm dying. You pick the category. Adel, you can go first. And how high can you name?

[Adol]

Lucky Woo sucks.

[JPC]

The song. Are you guys familiar with this Is basically like an existing game. I used to listen like 10 years ago. I don't even know if it's still a podcast anymore. But the podcast, Doug loves movies and they would play a game called like the Leonard Maltin game. And I believe the way that. And again, this has been like 10 years since I've listened to this is like one person. I don't even know how it came up, but like one person. Or like Doug would say, there are 12 people in this movie and here's the name of the movie. Can you name all 12? If I'm remembering how to play this game. But either way, one person would say like, oh, I can name all 12, or like I can name 10 or whatever. And they would go until another person was like, okay, you think you can do seven name it. And then that person would have to say seven names of the people in that movie. Or something like that.

[Adol]

Yeah. Where it's like top billing. Yeah. Trying to guess from top billing down maybe, or something like that.

[JPC]

This is different because I'm going to give you a category and you have to say how many of things of that category could you name? So Adol, you're going to go first. Aaron, if you think that you can say more things, then you can give a different number, that's how many more you can give. And then at any point, if you think that the other person can't do it or you can't do one more than they said, you can tell them to start listing off that category. Okay, got it. So, Adol, we start with you. The category is Shades of Blue. Shades of the color blue.

[Adol]

Oi, boy.

[JPC]

I can name.

[Adol]

Yeah.

[JPC]

I will be on hand to look something up if it's. And it'll be my judgment call if you name something that you think is blue. And I'm like, that's more green, brother. We're into solidly greens at this point.

[Aaron]

Can I make a different pitch to you about your game?

[JPC]

Sure.

[Aaron]

What if you can't look it up? But if we sell something as a shade of blue, you can make a judgment call on if we're telling the truth or not.

[JPC]

First of all, this is way easier. This is way easier for me because I still have to say yes or no, but now I just don't have to type anything in. So. For sure. Yeah, let's do that.

[Adol]

It's almost like balderdash. I'm gonna say I can name five shades of blue.

[JPC]

Okay. Aaron, can you name more than five shades of blue?

[Aaron]

I'm buying time. This is interesting. While I think of shades of blue, I think I can name seven.

[JPC]

Oh, okay. Seven.

[Adol]

I'm gonna say name those shades.

[JPC]

Okay.

[Aaron]

Fuck you. Fuck you, Seven.

[JPC]

One, two, three, four. Hate riddle. Riddles. Clue Crew, listen to the rest of the episode now by starting your free 7 day trial at patreon.com heyriddle Riddle.

[Aaron]

Hi, I am Mandy Moore.

[JPC]

Sterling K. Brown.

[Adol]

And I'm Chris Sullivan.

[JPC]

And we host the podcast.

[Adol]

That was us now on Headgum.

[Aaron]

Each episode, we're gonna go into a deep dive from our show. This is us.

[Adol]

That's right.

[JPC]

We're gonna go episode by episode.

[Aaron]

We're also gonna pepper in episodes with different guest stars and writers and casting directors.

[Adol]

Yeah. Are we go?

[JPC]

Yes.

[Adol]

A little bit.

[JPC]

Are we gonna laugh a lot? A whole lot.

[Adol]

That's what I'm hoping, man.

[JPC]

Listen to that was us on your favorite podcast app.

[Adol]

Or watch full video episodes on YouTube or Spotify. New episodes every Tuesday evening.

[JPC]

Buyer's remorse. Buy a new car. I'll be moving in. Let's get started.

[Aaron]

Sorry, I think there's been a mistake.

[JPC]

I bought it from Carvana.

[Adol]

You what?

[JPC]

Yeah.

[Aaron]

Great price.

[JPC]

I even have seven days to love

[Aaron]

it or return it.

[JPC]

So there's no.

[Aaron]

No. No Buyer's remorse. More like buyers rejoice.

[JPC]

I guess I'll let myself out. Congratulations. I mean it.

[Aaron]

Buyers rejoice.

[JPC]

Buy your car today on Carvana. Limitations and exclusions may apply. See our seven day return [e-mail].