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Michael Haim
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Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Free and our exclusive shows go to patreon.com kindafunny Today's stories include Crimson Desert continues to look insane. Next week's rumored Nintendo Direct is a partner showcase and a new AI tool has made video game stocks plummet. Love all this and more because this is Kind of Funny Games Daily. Foreign. Yo, what's up? Welcome to Kind of Funny Games daily for Friday, January 30, 2026. I'm one of your host blessing Addie Oye Jr. Joining me is IGN's Michael Hyam. Michael, welcome to the show.
Michael Haim
You gotta say it like that. I will say today is the first day in like maybe a week that I have dressed up like a proper person. You know, today I woke up feeling like a bad.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I mean dude, those earrings, those earrings are looking fanc fantastic.
Michael Haim
I got the dangly earrings, got new frames, you know what I'm saying?
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
What's the shirt you got on?
Michael Haim
RX Bandits. Shouts out to RX Bandits. One of my favorite bands in the world. Andy with them too, so.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Oh yeah, you know what I'm saying? You got the chain, you got the necklace on.
Michael Haim
Come on. I'm kind of a pretty.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Come on.
Michael Haim
You know what I'm saying?
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I never seen two good looking roommates like this.
Michael Haim
Right? Yeah. On one podcast, man, you come through our apartment, man, we'll take care of you. I don't know what I mean by that.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I mean you'll cook.
Michael Haim
I'll cook.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah. Yeah. And I reap the benefits when you have people over and cook.
Michael Haim
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
So I appreciate that. Of course we're doing something fun this episode in solidarity with the general strike today. You can send all of your super chats to kindafunny.com donate where we're fundraising for the Immigrant Rapid Response Fund, which directly supports urgent basic needs, legal services and mobilizing and organizing in Minnesota. If you're abstaining from spending money during the strike today, we'll also be donating our YouTube and Twitch ad revenue from today's videos. And so if you want to support a very good cause, of course for ice, you can go over to kind of funny.com donate and we can make the damn thing happen because of course there a general strike today. We're trying to make sure we're doing our best to support that. Without further ado, remember we couldn't do this without our producers over on patreon.com kind of funny. So shout out thank you to Carl Jacobs, Omega, Buster, and Delaney. The Psalm twining for now, let's begin with what is and forever will be. The Roper Report. It's time for some news. We have six stories today. Baker's Dozer. Oh, yeah, we got smoke machines here.
Michael Haim
Dude, I've been here. I've been here before. Still scares me.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Listen, I mean, we have. Whenever Cole, Greg's dog, comes through, it's always like hit or miss. Because Greg will happen, you know, in like his little. I was gonna say cage. It's not a cage.
Michael Haim
Damn.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Right. Between his dog.
Michael Haim
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
In this little thing, right. Just hanging out behind here. And you'll see him when the smoke comes up. He's like, the fuck is that, baby? Actually, before you even get into story number one. Yeah, Michael, for people who. I assume most people who are watching know who you are, but of course you write for ign. What are some things that you've worked on recently that people should check out?
Michael Haim
I think you should check out the top 100 Xbox games of all time.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
There you go, man.
Michael Haim
I was. I was so funny because, like, I let my podcast, my podcaster just run with like, whatever new episodes of podcasts I follow. And gamescast came up and. And I like, woke up in the middle of night because I was just letting it play and I heard Snowball Mike talking mad shit about our list. And I was like. It was like fighters flight response. I got about my bed. Like, fucking rail.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Like, talk.
Michael Haim
Y' all talking shit. So thank you for paying attention to our list, Mike. I like, also, I'd like to think.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
It'S synergistic, though, you know, the fact. The fact that we're, you know, talk about the list. We read the list, you know, and I feel like here's the thing, right? Mike was more harsh than I was on the list. But the fact that we, I think, enter it with the idea of like, we're trying to critique positively, you know what I mean? Like, it's a better energy than like half the IGN comments that just like, who are these idiots making this list?
Michael Haim
Yeah, that was. That was a collective effort between us and outside Xbox. So Jane Douglas and other folks at Outside Xbox, we collaborated with them. Hey, man, listen, every list, you know, no list is going to be. You put 100 games on the list, someone's going to be mad. Most people are going to be mad.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
What's up with all those third party games, though?
Michael Haim
Hey, that's none of my business.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I was like Simon Cardi always texts me after the things too. And he's like listen. He'll tell me like the, the secrets right? Of like listen, I didn't want this game on the list but like hear from me. So I love hearing the behind the scenes.
Michael Haim
There's. There's that. And I reviewed Code Vein 2 recently as well and I got some other things lined up from previews that we we'll be able to talk about at a later date.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Oh yeah. Well I'm really excited to talk to you about Crimson Desert specifically because that is story number one after going gold Crimson Crimson Desert developer deep in optimization phase to make the game run as good as it possibly can before launch I'm reading from Wesleyan Poole at IGN. If you've seen Crimson Desert's impressive 15 minute gameplay video, which Kevin I have the link to it in the doc. You can just play it. As I read through the article, you might be wincing at the thought of it running smoothly on your console or PC. Well, right now the developers at Pearl Abyss are focusing on optimization to help ensure a smooth experience, while when the game comes out in March, Crimson Desert is set in a huge and seamless open world packed with enemies, NPCs and all sorts of things to do. It's dense with detail and you can zip around quickly on the back of a dragon. Based on the video, Crimson Desert will be a demanding beast. It will be interesting in particular to see how it runs on the Xbox series s. According to Will Powers, director of Public Relations at Pearl Abyss America, the developers are doubling down on the optimization phase as we speak to telling Dustin Legari in a new interview that this is the focus ahead of Crimson Desert's March 19th release date. QUOTE We've gone gold. Now comes further, further optimization to make the game run as good as it possibly can, powers said. And that's as important of a part. So that's the phase we're currently in between now and launch to make sure that the experience when players eventually get their hands on the game is as smooth as possible. End quote Powers wouldn't go into specifics on the graphic settings that will be available on consoles, but did confirm Crimson Desert has PS Pro Enhancement. You can also turn off the particle effects in settings, although Power said they do not convey or Power said they do convey important information during fights. Pearl Abyss built a new engine for Crimson Desert and Powers explained that it's capable of providing a 4K60 native presentation complete with ray tracing without the aid of graphics technology such as DLSS or fsr. But of course you'll need powerful hardware to enable it. Quote yeah, we'll show 4K60 native.
Michael Haim
Sure.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
With Ray tracing on. That's not done through DLSS or fsr, that's done natively in engine. And then if you want to further optimize then you can tweak all the settings and do all the things. But we want to show that you don't have to like the game itself should be able to stand on its own, end quote and on that decision to go with a proprietary engine. Quote I'm not going to say that the game is absolutely perfectly optimized, but within the engine it's using every single thing. So it's as optimized as it can be within that space. That's not possible otherwise. And so rendering thousands of trees within draw distance, it does those things better than an off the shelf engine could. Because of that. Crimson Desert's huge open world has been a topic of debate recently. Pawel is divided into five distinct regions. Hernand, Pilun, Demenis d' Alessia and the Crimson Desert itself. The main quest revolves around protagonist Cliff's journey, but you're free to explore the world in any order, taking faction driven quests, large scale battles, fortress sieges and smaller character focused missions. Prolobis confirmed that that as the story progresses, two additional playable characters become available. Powers went on to insist that the size of Crimson Desert's open world wouldn't determine its quality. Rather, what you actually do in its world is the key factor. Quote the continent of Paiwell is absolutely massive, but size doesn't matter if there's nothing to do. Open world games are about doing things, having activities, having distractions. So we wanted to create a world that's not only massive, but is also incredibly interactive. Of course, large article there. I had to skip through some portions to get to the end of this. But Michael over at ign, you work a lot with hardware.
Michael Haim
I do.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
And so I want to know what your thoughts are on Crimson Desert and how it might perform on console hardware.
Michael Haim
I. You know, this game is so ambitious to the point where if there are hiccups, I'm not going to, I'm not going to cry about it. That kind of comes with the territory. Like anytime a game like pushes graphical fidelity and scale to this, to this degree, you kind of go into it, you know, a little, little skeptical. And I don't want to say like you would forgive it for that, but it's like you Kind of get it. Yeah, this is it. It seems like this might be the new benchmark game. Every couple games a generation you're gonna get that game that you're gonna test your, your hardware on. Right. For it was a long time it was crisis and for a long time it was the Metro games. And then you know, Shadow of the Tomb Raider was a big one too because that was a pioneer for ray tracing and benchmarking back when I was reviewing video cards. This seems like that game as well. But man, I, when you mentioned like how it's going to run on something like series S like damn man, good luck. Yeah. With that because yeah, this is, these are games that are going to be pushing hardware to its maximum. And you think about it now these consoles are. They're about gonna be six years old. Holy.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah.
Michael Haim
And you know, you there, these are, this is the kind of game that's gonna be pushing it to its limits.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Do you feel like we've seen the limits of what the current gen of consoles can do?
Michael Haim
That's the thing though is like I don't think we have. Okay. This is a, it's been a weird generation to where it, it's diminishing returns. Right where these consoles came out and there wasn't, there was a lot of cross generational stuff like you'll get upgraded vers, Xbox One games on your Series X and they'll look good, they'll run good. But you don't see that generational divide. You haven't really still to this day I don't think you've really seen, you really seen its full potential. And with the PS5 Pro, when I reviewed the PS5 Pro, I was like, yo, this is, this is a good piece of hardware and games are running better. But I don't think this is, you're. They're using the full maximum power of this thing because you have to spec for previous generation other pieces of hardware. I think maybe Ghost of Yote might have been the best showcase for PS5 Pro. Actually Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth, it's Pro enhancement mode was like probably still to this day the best Pro enhanced mode I've seen so far. But then, but yeah, these games have to scale and especially on PC, man. Like PC hardware is so goddamn expensive nowadays. And so you know, maybe this is one of those games where you get excited to upgrade your PC or stretch your PC to its limits, but I don't know how viable that is nowadays with how expensive things are. But I think what I will say about Crimson Desert specifically Is that as impressive as it is from a technical perspective so far, that's not the thing that I'm necessarily most excited or paying attention to most. Even though that is kind of one of its selling points.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah. It feels like the thing that's most easily presentable as far as, like, hey, Crimson Desert is the game that looks insane in that it's the game that seems like it's doing everything under the sun.
Michael Haim
It makes me think of, like, this is the kind of game you would see in the background of a TV show where, yeah, everything is happening all at once. Like, it's every game you could possibly imagine.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I see. I've seen. It's interesting. I. I think this overview video, right, the 15 minute one that Kevin's been letting play is one that sparked both, like, I think, fascination yesterday and then also fear of people being like, this can't be a real video game.
Michael Haim
It can't be true.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Right?
Michael Haim
Like, it's. And it's too good to be true.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I've heard Andy went to see this game, I think, during GDC time. Yeah. And he came back and he was like. He was talking about the engine, right? He was like, dude, yeah, the president, the engine. And it's proprietary, like we talk about.
Michael Haim
That's crazy.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
And, you know, it seems like that's allowed them to be able to do a number of things. And this game seems fucking crazy. And the more and more that we see of this video game, the more and more I'm like, yeah, this seems fucking crazy. Like, is. Is this game too good to be true? The idea of this game.
Michael Haim
The idea. I mean, you. If you told me about it two years ago, maybe, yes. But I think, though, every time they've showed off the game, it's. You look at it and think, like, there isn't really. It doesn't seem like there's maybe. They're like, very good at showing vertical slices that are good showcases of the game. But every time you see it, like, oh, yeah, that. It seems like it's running well. It seems like the. The gameplay systems that they're showing off are working well. And yeah, it was playable not too long ago. You mentioned Andy and one of my homies when I was at gamespot, Max Blumenthal, who was. He makes the Zelda videos there all the time. And he's a very, like, gameplay systems guy. He's a fighting game. He's an fgc. He's a fighting game nerd. He's like an action game sicko. So when he previewed this he was like a perfect person to preview this. He got hands on with the actual combat system and said it's very intricate and it works really well and it's so in depth that you're like pulling triggers to do specific actions like how your character interacts with the environment, how they use their momentum and in combat. And that's, that's the part where I got excited more where this isn't just a game where like hey, look at all this cool we're doing.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah.
Michael Haim
They're actually thinking about the gameplay systems on the ground level. So the game is actually feels good to play and is interesting to play and consistently engage with. How long that's going to last over the course of however long this game might be. I look at this, I'm like this is easily a 100 hour game, right?
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Oh yeah.
Michael Haim
So how long that is going to be sustainable throughout a playthrough we'll see. But from that preview alone, just like it was like a 30 minute combat demo that was like a, an impressive slice. And so you elongate through that throughout the rest of the game and you think about all the other systems it has in place. I know the big joke is that it's the, it's every game. It's Breath of the Wild, it's Witcher, it's Assassin's Creed, it's all these other things. So if they're nailing the combat in that sense that they can extend that to all their all other aspects of this game.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
But is that even possible?
Michael Haim
I don't know, dude.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Every single time we see this game and we, every single time we hear them talk about this game specifically, I get the feeling of it feels like they're trying to be jack of all trades and master of them all. Which does not see these board possible. But also I want to give them, I guess not the benefit of the doubt, an opportunity. I want to give them the opportunity to prove that. Because the previews that I've heard and the previews that it sounds like you've heard have been like, oh no, they're doing something here. This is cool, this is fun, this is impressive. And, and I want games to be able to do that because I think we're getting to that point in the generation where I want to see both the consoles and the hardware pushed. But then also I want to see leaps and bounds in open world games because we continue to have that periodically. For me, you know, when I think back to the last decade and a half, GTA 5 felt like it pushed things forward. Witcher 3 felt like it pushed things forward. Breath of the Wild felt like it pushed things forward. Elden Ring, even Cyberpunk to something to an extent felt like, damn.
Michael Haim
All right.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
We're still seeing innovations in what open world games can be and I think this year has the possibility to be. To have three gigantic moments in open world games between Crimson desert, Fable and GTA 6.
Michael Haim
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I, I think all three of these games might fucking push things in three different distinct ways that are gonna have like by this time next year we could be in a place where we're like, oh, video games are just different now. Yeah, yeah. And I hope that. I hope that happens. That's like the loftiest of desires from me for sure.
Michael Haim
Yeah. And you. I. I think there's a. The reason why I think also skeptical is like Pearl Abyss is, is not necessarily a developer that is known on the same level as a Rock Star CD Project Red. So you know, we haven't seen their. The or like their previous work doesn't jump out to us. Like we know Rockstar is like going to push things forward because they've been working on GTA 6 for over a decade at this point pretty much. And that's what GTA games do. And you know, a CD Project Red or like something like Fable, where this is kind of. This is. That's Xbox's huge game. This is like this has been in the works for so long. They're returning to a franchise that people know and love and that has been known to push things forward. But then you look, you look at something like this. I'm like, oh, who's doing this? What's this about? What was the. What's the reference point we have for this game? And you don't really have one. So like. So it's. You're gonna fluctuate in terms of perception. But I again like every time closest.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Thing you would compare this game to. I don't know.
Michael Haim
Yeah, that's.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I would almost say like Dragon's Dogma to a weird way.
Michael Haim
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
That is very systemic.
Michael Haim
Yeah. I think Dragon's Dogma is one that comes out. Comes to mind because of how systems heavy that game is and how reactive that open world is to like your presence and things like that.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah.
Michael Haim
I also think of KCD2 in a way like KCD2 is very different game. Of course course it's a lot more. I. I would say KCD2 feels closer to what a Red Dead Redemption 2 in terms of like deliberate Pacing how you exist in that world. Whereas this is like, yo, what do we. Like, what is this?
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
What's happening?
Michael Haim
That like, that's straight up Tears of the Kingdom. Then you have some Assassin's Creed. It's like Witcher. This guy is like a. Like Clive at home. Like from Final Fantasy 16. It's just. Yeah. And. And it's almost. You want to joke about it, but at the same time, like, wait, I.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Want this to be real.
Michael Haim
Might be cooking here.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah, of course we have a lot of super chats coming in. And specifically, we also have a lot of donations coming in.
Michael Haim
Hell yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
It's funny I didn't mention the goal because I don't even know if we're trying to hit this goal. But our goal is $5,000. We've already had 13 $51 just a second ago. Shout out to the people that are donating.
Michael Haim
The KF community is coming through.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Let's really is coming through to read a few. Right. Dan V writes in and says Greg sucks with a $25 donation, of course. Kindafunny.com donate of course. We're pushing to support Minnesota right now with this. We have another one From Big Dong McJohn who says, I can feel the noise. I can feel the heat. I can feel the warm sa. Warm sauce landing on my feet.
Michael Haim
Whoa, whoa. Hey, hey, hey, hey. Whoa.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Hey. If you're donating. Hey, listen, I'll read it.
Michael Haim
Listen, I'm not here to kink shave. You saw my CES coverage.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
So Banner SN with a $10 donation says, hey, Michael. No tales. No Tales of Vesperia in the top 100. It was Xbox 360 exclusive in the states until the remaster. Also, is there a character limit because. And then they drop their. Their message drops off after that.
Michael Haim
Damn.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
That's crazy.
Michael Haim
But you know what?
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
No Tales of Vesperia. I thought you're. You're. You're the biggest JRPG sicko.
Michael Haim
I know, I know, I know. Hey, I got. We got Lost Odyssey on that list. So I'm. I'm happy about that.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
So my fall goat, what's the deal with Lost Odyssey? Because me and Mike were talking about that.
Michael Haim
It's. It was the Final Fantasy creators. One of his big games at time Microsoft. I believe Microsoft helped fund that. Mist Walker was his development studio after he left Square and Blue. He made Blue Dragon and Lost Odyssey. Both were 360 exclusives. And so. And Lost Odyssey came out at the same. Around the same time as Final Fantasy 13 and the running Joke is that Lost Odyssey is the actual Final Fantasy 13, which I do not endorse because Final Fantasy 13 is a banger, but Lost Odyssey is too. And there's the design. Similar similarities between those two is like, it's kind of uncanny, but. But that is like the big game from the OG Final Fantasy creator, and it's a very good game.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Oh, yeah. Turns out we got another one from jam van, another $10 donation and says, Crimson Desert is the kind of game I want to be. This crazy super game. But healthy skepticism is keeping me arms length until someone reports back. I think that's a healthy way to look. Look at this game. Of course. Be skeptic. I be hopeful, but skeptic. You know what I mean? Like, this seems kind of impossible.
Michael Haim
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Like, the more they show me, the more I'm like, how. Yeah, that doesn't seem possible.
Michael Haim
But like you said, it's like, give them an opportunity to prove themselves. I think. I think, like, you know, this has been going on for many, many years at this point. But it feels like large swaths of gaming communities or just like hobbyist communities are so quick to pull sides before something even comes out. Like, if I'm. When a big movie comes out, like, yo, this is going to be the greatest ever, or, this shit's going to be trash. Like, dog, y' all don't even know. It's not even out yet. Like, dude, relax.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
This last, like, two weeks of not to invoke high guard discourse. Yeah.
Michael Haim
And that's.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah, the last two weeks of high guard discourse has saddened me in a way because I'm like, man, y' all didn't even give this game a shot before it came out. I'm not saying y' all have to like the game. I'm not saying that. Like, I don't think this is, like, a game of the year. Best multiplayer game far from that. Right. But, yeah, there's a lot. There's a certain level of haterism that has entered into video game conversation where I'm like, damn, motherfuckers, can't even try anymore. Even try with their game. It's deflating a bit.
Michael Haim
But also.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah. Like, I don't know, you have control over your own purchasing decisions and because video games cost money. Yes. Enter things with a level of wait and see, be skeptic, be aware, all that stuff. But also, I want games to be good.
Michael Haim
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I want games to come out and innovate and try things and be new and have different IP rather than the same IP over and over and over again. I think on the other hand, there's that to strive for.
Michael Haim
Yeah. It's like, it's, I think it's not funny, but there's a. Like again, I feel like it's weird when folks who are into games talk about how they're, how they, they expect the game to fail or they, they want a game to fail or like, oh, this game's gonna be trash. It's gonna fail. As soon as they shut down. It's like, damn, is that what you really want out of your, out of your hobby? Like you do you want games to fail, man? Like there's this one dude on, I've been watching on Tick Tock and he's like, gamers are like the only people where you have to convince them to do their hobby. Oh, 100. Like I have, you know, ball and gun games. Sometimes that's, that's all, that's all they gravitate towards. But yeah, and I. Not to talk about a completely different topic, but for sure, because gaming is so expensive and so time intensive. I get why, why you need to spend more time deciding whether or not you're going to buy something or spend time with it. I get it. It's not like a movie where you pay like it's on streaming service or you pay a ticket and watch it for two hours, whatever, and then you move on with your life.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Like buy a game like that's 70.
Michael Haim
Bucks and that's also might be like 50 hours of your time. So I get why you would be skeptical. But again, like if you're, if you're wishing ill will on the folks making games like, damn, you might need a new hobby brother.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah. Yeah, you might need it. That's actually the perfect way to put it. You might need a new hobby brother.
Michael Haim
Pick up a ball, man, Shoot some.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Hoops, play some volley. It's a fun time. Yeah.
Michael Haim
Anyway, Crimson desert seems pretty lit.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Crimson desert seems like it could be very fantastic and I hope it is hopping into more super chats. I'm going to now. I'm, I'm, I'm reading from the kind of funny super chats. But remember, instead of super chatting in kind of funny.com donate, that's where you want to funnel all of the support into. But thank you for all those who are still super chatting in. Just like kebabs who writes in and says melt the ice, then fuck it, Claw master writes in and says, all right, straight up, why was there no killer instinct on the Xbox list? I love that we're. We're litigating. We turn this into litigating. The Xbox list.
Michael Haim
I'm here. I'm here to do. To do damage control for Xbox top 100. I like the list. There's a lot of great shit on the list. I think the top 20 is on point. No Ki. Like, I don't know what to tell you, man. I don't know what to tell you. Like, you got me. You got me.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
You become like the IGN scapegoat for this list, which I love.
Michael Haim
It's fine.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Jose Ruckus writes in and says, last night we learned that. We learned of the tragic passing of Kai. Kai Bud, arguably the greatest magic, the gathering player of all time. It would be great if y' all could show some love for the German juggernaut.
Michael Haim
Wow.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Rest in peace. I didn't. I wasn't familiar with Kai Bud, but that's really sad.
Michael Haim
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Obviously hate to hear about somebody who is notable to a community passing away and so rip to Kai Bud. T. Roy Jenkins writes in and says, birthday Tax. Weird. Celebrating a Sonic themed birthday at work at the age of 33, but grateful for y' all making every workday tolerable. Looking forward to streaming party games with friends online this weekend. Ice.
Michael Haim
Yeah, that's what I'm talking about.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Only special features writes in and says, michael Haim, I love you. You the best, Ice.
Michael Haim
Hey, that's what. That's up. Hell yeah. Ice.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Nettie, 42, writes in and just says, ice.
Michael Haim
All right.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Zeke Speak writes in and says, michael, love your Yoti review style. Thank you.
Michael Haim
Hell yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Oh, Kevin Vasquez writes in and says, these patients won't let me listen fully live. Lol. But just a shout out to y'. All. You guys rock. Happy Friday. Thank you so much. Kevin Vasquez, you rock. Hell yeah. The postman writes in and says, birthday Tax. Got a Trails. Got a Trails series tattoo on Wednesday to celebrate and watching since 2015. Thanks for all you do. Fuck Ice forever.
Michael Haim
Hell yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
All the fuck. Ices is like.
Michael Haim
It's warming my heart.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
It's warming my heart for real. Openness. Prime says, what is Crimson Desert's Monkey's Paw? Shallow story, Enemy variety, character customization, procedural areas, repetitive gameplay.
Michael Haim
I will say that it seems like it's going for so much that if one or two of those pillars are kind of mid, I think it'll still be fine.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah.
Michael Haim
If every if. But if you get hands on the game and it turns out that everything's kind of middling, then like, maybe that's the thing that it's like, if it's trying to do too much and doesn't go hard enough in one particular direction, that might happen. Yeah, but again, like, ah. But I, I don't know, maybe they've been like. They've just been very specific about what they've been showing off. Like, damn, look, this should look crazy, huh? Like, don't you want to. And then you get in like once you dig into it, maybe you'll start to find things here and there. But I don't know. I. If, if there is one, I haven't seen it yet.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah. I think my two would be story. Just because there's been nothing in the trailers yet that has gotten me invested into what the story is, what the characters are. And I think they're trying. It's not like they haven't had that stuff in there. It's just not captured me yet. But also to your point, if the gameplay is good enough, if the gameplay lives up, I don't really need the story to be that fantastic. I'm somebody who can forgive a, A like subpar story if the gameplay rocks.
Michael Haim
And vice versa too.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Like, vice versa as well for sure.
Michael Haim
Like, I don't, I don't go into games expecting it to be everything right. If it does one thing really, really well. And like there's, there's some of my favorite games have. Aren't necessarily fun to play, but I remember what happened in those games and like why I was doing those things. If it can. The reverse can be true too where, you know, I'd probably. I might not know what the hell's going on in the story. I might not even care about the factions and like, yeah, the character himself, who I don't even know if he's gonna be very interesting. But if I'm, if I'm doing like rad shit in this game, that, that might be good enough for me.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
And my other one is gameplay loop. And specifically it seems like there's so many disparate systems in this game. I want them to work together. Well.
Michael Haim
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Because I think I've had that before. Starfield is probably like my pinnacle example of this, of a game that has so many systems, but I never felt encouraged to interact with a lot of them.
Michael Haim
Sure. Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
And like this could be very much like a preference thing.
Michael Haim
Right.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Where I kind of want to. I want to want to do the things, you know, I want to want to. If there's farming, like, okay, what's the thing that's that I'M farming for if.
Michael Haim
There'S encourage me to do engage with these systems way and I think having just reviewed Code Vein 2 not to compare this game to Code Vein 2 very different but Code Vein 2 has a lot of interesting systems in the back end when it comes to how you build your character weaknesses, elements, weapon types and all that. But I beat, I beat all the bosses. Like I got the true ending beat all the bosses in that game and I did not have to engage with most of those systems interesting systems but again did not encourage me to engage with them. Even though that is a like a tough game like I figured out like it wasn't that difficult I didn't have to engage with those systems. Whereas something like Octopad Traveler 0 whereas like a town building, it has farming has all these things and then by the end of that game like no, you should have been engaging with all of this because you now need to be able to you pull from all these different systems and I'm like hell yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah.
Michael Haim
Moments like that where I'm like yes, it all comes together all makes sense and they made me want to do all the things.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Let's move on to story number two A Nintendo Direct is reportedly coming next week dedicated to partner games. This is from Andy Robinson at Video Games Chronicle. Nintendo will reportedly stream a new Nintendo Direct dedicated to third party games next week. That's according to Nate The Hate and GameXplain who claim a Nintendo Partner Direct will take place on Thursday, February 5th. This matches what VGC has heard from our own sources. Partner Direct is Nintendo's Digital showcase for third party titles scheduled for release on Switch and Switch 2 rather than games Nintendo currently has in development at its own studios. I know the crew kind of talked about this before, but the partner bit of this is new. Michael, where do you stand with next week's rumored direct seemingly being a partner one?
Michael Haim
Oh, that's, that's cool. I mean, yeah, any, any. I'll take any direct. Sometimes I get more excited about the partner directs too because it's since the Switch 2, I've been curious about how third party support is going to look with the games that were not like porting over games that were like too graphically intense to get on Switch 1. Finally seeing them on Switch 2 is an exciting thing and seeing a lot of third party games day and date with Switch 2 because for a long time one of the questions we would always ask developers when they, when they're showing off new games like, oh, is there going to be a Switch Port. What kind of compromise is you going have to do for a Switch port? Now we're getting closer to the idea of like, no, it's going to come to Switch two as well. And something like, I don't know, Resident Evil, Evil Requiem, like, that's, that's crazy. Like, oh, that, that's coming day and day with everything else.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Right.
Michael Haim
And yeah, that's. It's kind of, it's kind of wild that we're getting to that point where like Switch 2 is powerful enough and talking about graphical fidelity before it's hitting that plateau means like something like the Switch 2 can kind of keep up and make fewer compromises. Closing that gap between the Xbox and PS5 and switch like switches. I wouldn't say it's comparable to Series S, but if you're specking for the Series S, you're kind of almost already there with the Switch 2. So that's exciting to see in terms of like third party games I still want to see on the Nintendo platform. I don't know. I would like to see Metaphor refantazio on Switch too. I think that would be a sick game to have on Switch.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
They did slam dunk.
Michael Haim
Yeah, they did P3 reload, and I think that one turned out to be okay. But if they can get Metaphor on that, and if you all haven't played Metaphor, IGN's Game of the Year 2024 that hit Switch too, that'd be pretty sick. But yeah, I get excited about partner showcases because I like seeing what third parties do on the Switch too.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah, I mean, same here, right? I think you hit the nail on the head. The only thing I'll say is that I. I want to hear more about what the big first party games are for the year. Of course we have a handful. If you go through the list, I'm on dualshockers.com right. And they list out Mario Tennis Fever, Pokemon Pickopia, Tomodachi Life. Tomodachi Life.
Michael Haim
Tomodachi Life.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah, I was gone for two days and then I saw the Reddit call out that apparently none of us could read. And I'm like, what the fuck happened? And I think it had to do with Tomodachi. So if I'm saying that wrong, let me know you have yos in the mysterious book the Dusk Bloods is that's. That's one that Hope shows up. Cuz that is a third party.
Michael Haim
Dust Blood.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Dust Bloods Better be the premiere of this thing. I. I need this to like close the. The director.
Michael Haim
I just want to know what the hell it is, man? Like we, I mean, we kind of, kind of know what it is already, but show me more, because what the hell is from software up to these days?
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
People are saying Greg kept saying Tamagotchi instead of Tomadachi.
Michael Haim
Yeah, Tomadachi and Tomagotchi are very, very different things.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Also Karen. He couldn't pronounce Karen. Karen. Karen. There's no way Greg couldn't pronounce Karen. That's what's.
Michael Haim
It's a five letter word, dog. What are you talking about? You could just say Karen.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Karen. What was oh was Greg saying? He kept saying Karen.
Michael Haim
Oh, Well, I mean, close enough. You're halfway there, man. You'd be all right, cut us some slack.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
You know, we talk for a living. Fire Emblem, Fortunes weave. You know what? I might be, I might be not giving Nintendo enough credit for this year because actually, as I read through this, I'm like, ah, there's a lot of good for rhythm. Heaven Groove is out this year as well. Pokemon Champions and then Splatoon Raiders.
Michael Haim
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I just want to hear more about these games.
Michael Haim
Yeah, I think for me, Fire Emblem is, is the thing that I wanted. Like all these other games seem sick, but they, I not against not saying anything against them, but they don't seem like headliners. Like Mario Tennis, Tomadachi. Like, those are, those are interesting games.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah. I feel like Fire Emblem is the Fire Emblem. That's the one.
Michael Haim
It can be the headliner. Like the game that is, that represents the, the platform on that level. And you know, I, I think Fire Emblem reached a higher critical mass when Three Houses came out. Engaged, not so much. And I would like to see, I mean, I want to see the next Fire Emblem really push things forward because I do think Three Houses is a fantastic game. One of my favorite games of the year. It came out. I remember, I think you came home one day and I was having tea with Manuela and if y' all play Fire Emblem, Three Houses, you know, what's up with that?
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Oh, in the game?
Michael Haim
Yeah, yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I was like, which one?
Michael Haim
Oh, man, Manuela hit me up.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Who was Manuela? I don't remember.
Michael Haim
Manuela hit me up.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I remembered that one.
Michael Haim
Yeah, he came home, I was like, oh, I gotta wrap up this, this, this tea session. You know what I'm saying, man? But yeah, that's Fire Emblem. Three Houses push things forward. I, I can't wait to see what Fortune's Weave does. But that's the, that's the first party game I'm paying attention to most. And for talking about third party as well. Dust Bloods, man. Like, is that supposed to come out this year?
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yes.
Michael Haim
I should know this. Okay.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah.
Michael Haim
Should.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
It's. It's supposed to come out this year. We'd not seen any of it since they first debuted at the Switch 2 event. Yeah.
Michael Haim
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I mean, that'd be such a It. Honestly, that makes. It makes sense now for it to be a third party showcase, in my mind.
Michael Haim
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Because I think Dust Bloods has enough juice to be, like, a main contender this year for Nintendo. Right. Like, you got fortunes. Weave, you got whatever you're doing with Pokemon. Because the Pokemon. We're the. At what, the 30th anniversary? Yeah, that sounds right.
Michael Haim
96 was. Yeah, I guess so. Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
30Th anniversary of Pokemon. So you're gonna probably have a big Pokemon game. And I think Dust Bloods helps fill that in with all the other things I mentioned between Mario Tennis. Weave. No, not Weave. Mario Tennis. Sorry. I'm more. I'm more. I'd combine two different games. Mario Tennis Fever. Fever and the All Star Game. That seems like a good year. Now that. Now that I think through it, I think that's actually pretty. Yeah.
Michael Haim
If all those things can hit this year and are of the quality we expect, I ain't gonna complain about that.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Speaking of pushing things forward, you guys are pushing this tilt five forward. Let me tell you. We're at about $2,500 raised right now. Exactly. $2,486. $2,536. Y' all are really pushing this thing from eight bit to now. Says for Minnesota, Evan Robot says we're supposed to be getting some snow down here in Georgia tomorrow. Snow is cool, but fuck ice. Solipsist3d says ice PP don't work. Anonymous writes in and says, thank you, Minneapolis, for your bravery. I gotta refresh because I know we're getting a lot of things here. I'm sorry we're not able to get to all of them because we have so many. But Neo Aoshi says shout out to kf. And all you do, of course. Ice. Sabine says, ice. I'm in the UK and this is terrifying. Raphael says, chinga la migra.
Michael Haim
Yeah. Yeah. I don't know what that is Spanish for. It's bad. Oh, okay. Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Lady Smog.
Michael Haim
Well, it's good. It's good. And like, it's. It's. That's what you want to be saying?
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
It's what I want to be. Okay.
Michael Haim
Yeah. You want. You want to be saying it's not problematic.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I didn't call out like a group of people.
Michael Haim
No, no, no, no, no, no. It's not problematic, but it is. Those are curse words in Spanish.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Sick lady smog says, fuck Ice, fuck. I divorce your maga. Your maga spouses rip Moira Rose hundreds of monkeys says disgusting. Un American fuck bags. Fuck Ice and fuck this Pluto, Pluto this plutocracy. And then one more from Jacob.
Michael Haim
Y', all, y' all are never beating the. The can't read allegations, man.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Sometimes I read a new word and I'm like, oh, I gotta take my time with that one. At least I can say Karen. And then Jacob S. Writes in and says, melt the ice. Of course, like we mentioned at the top of this show, all our proceeds for today's episodes are going to the Immigrant Rapid Response Fund in solidarity with the strike that's going on today. But of course, we can't do any of this without the support of our sponsors. If you go to patreon.com kind of funny or YouTube.com kinda funnygames that gets you the kinda funny membership which allows you to get shows ad free. And speaking of ads, let us tell you about our sponsors.
Rocket Money Ad Voice
This episode is brought to you by Rocket Money. Do you know how much money Mike was wasting on hidden subscriptions that he wasn't using? Well, it turns out Mike didn't know either until he started using Rocket Money. Rocket Money is a personal finance app that helps find and cancel your unwanted subscriptions. It monitors your spending and it helps lower your bills so you can grow your savings. Rocket Money tracks your subscriptions and has the ability to cancel within the app with a few taps, saving time and avoiding charges. It automatically categorizes your transactions and tags them to reveal spending patterns and add context. Getting ready to buy the Steam machine. Rocket Money helps you save for big goals by setting budgets and getting personalized in insights and regular reports. It consolidates checking, savings, loans and investments into a single dashboard to give you a clear view of your financial picture. Let Rocket Money help you reach your financial goals faster. Join@rocketmoney.com kindafunny rocketmoney.com kind of funny story number three.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Google rules out Rules out Google rolls. Greg's infecting me now.
Michael Haim
Damn.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Ever since he said Karen, that's the.
Michael Haim
Real sickness around these parts.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Google rolls out prototype of Project Genie, an AI tool which generates playable worlds. This is Chris Scolion at Video Games Chronicle. Google has started rolling out access to a prototype version of Project Genie, an AI tool which lets Users generate their own playable worlds. According to Google, users can create worlds by either typing in prompts or uploading images. They can create their character in a similar way. Users can also define certain other properties, such as how the character moves or whether the world is explored in first person or third person. As players explore the world, the tool generates it in real time, depending on the actions of the player, or depending on the actions the player makes and where they move the camera. Users can also remix existing worlds by building on top of their prompts, changing the art style or characters. They can then download videos of their created worlds to share online. Of course, I have a link that Kevin's showing to somebody who essentially generated their version of Zelda Breath of the Wild. On top of this, I have a Tweet here from Shinobi602. Sorry, it's a blue sky. That's a BS Tim. He posted on Blue Sky. Video game stocks are suddenly crashing today with the launch of Google's Project Genie as investors think games will start magically getting made with AI.
Michael Haim
Ugh. Out of here.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yuck.
Michael Haim
The out of here. Yo, Ice and AI too.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah.
Michael Haim
The same time. This is. I don't know, like invest. I'm sorry, but investors are the dumbest in the world. I'm sorry.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
This is. What I'll say is, I'm not somebody who knows much about investing, but I know you invest when things are low. That way you can reap the benefits when things are high.
Michael Haim
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
And if I had to predict how this is going to go. Is this supposed to be a gta? If I had. Jesus Christ. If I had to predict how this is going to go, it's going to go fucking badly. Right? Like I don't. This is not going to be successful. Yeah. So if shit's crashing today, it'll be up and they'd be.
Michael Haim
I.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Could we put in the disclaimer? Not real investment advice. Yeah, whatever.
Michael Haim
Don't be taking us to polymarker. Greg.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Stocks. Thing is. Thank you. There we go.
Michael Haim
What the fuck is.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yo, what's up? Welcome to your investment advice with me blessing. Adio, Yeju Jr. All right, listen. The fucking stocks are plummeting in video games because of AI. Because Google. Google what? Genie is what this is called Google Genie. Google Genie. People think that they can just create video games by saying things you thought by putting in worlds words. Remember, this is not real financial advice. But this shit's not going to last. All right? There's a lot of AI stuff that's driving investment that's driving profits for companies. And that's a whole different story. This specifically is not going to fucking last. And so the fucking stocks are going to go back up. Remember, not real financial advice. If you do what I'm saying and you lose all your money, I am not liable for this.
Michael Haim
That's on you.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
But I. The vibes I get, shit's gonna bounce back. You're gonna become a millionaire. Not just a thousandaire, not a hundred thousand, A million.
Michael Haim
Damn. Remember when investing with crypto was a big thing too? Yeah, that was, that was a time. What a time.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I. I'm big. You know this, right? I love Nas, I'm a big Nas fan. But he put out his recent album. There is a song about on there that is about him investing in cr. He calls himself the cryptocurrency Scarface. And I had to spit that, man.
Michael Haim
Maybe Jay Z did win the battle after all. Yeah, you hate to see it.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Well, absolutely hate to see it.
Michael Haim
You live long enough to become a crypto fascist or a crypto nerd, whatever. Whatever you want to call it. That's something different. Never mind.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I had, I referenced this the other day and so excuse me for repeating the same story that I have, but my brother in law works in tech, works high up at a tech company and we're having a conversation about this exact thing. Yeah, we were talking about the idea of creating video games or creating movies using prompts and if that's something that people want. And I was talking to him, him being a pure tech person, right. He is tech minded, he works in AI, does all that stuff. And he was presenting these ideas to me as if they were exciting. And as I listened to all them, I was like, dude, you have no idea. This sounds like fucking shit. This sounds like I. We had a conversation about video games being art. And it almost felt like I was enlightening him on the fact that people consider video games art. Right? And like there's so many practices within video games that are artful practices, whether it be design of characters, visual design, environment design, gameplay design. Right. All of these things are arts. And I think out of all of the uses for AI technology, because I think there's plenty of things that I can help with as far as, you know, dlss or processes or whatever. Right? Creativity and art is one of the things that is not one that's off limits. That's off limits. Like it's gonna make art worse, like categorically worse. And so, yeah, like, I know I don't think there's Anybody out there, super chat in, you know, let us know if you're the person who wants to make, who wants to play video games that people just generated with.
Michael Haim
Yeah, I don't even, I don't know. You're not gonna snitch on yourself now because they get jumped.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
People do not want this.
Michael Haim
Yeah, well, I mean, I don't. And if, if they, if they're curious about it, I think they will come to realize that, that they don't want it eventually.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yes.
Michael Haim
Because like, damn, we don't need, we don't need AI creating infinite worlds. We don't like the, the whole.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Not an appeal of video games. Yeah.
Michael Haim
The joy of video games. You're having these created things made by somebody who has ideas, who has the technical skills and the creative ideas together and working with teams who can make these worlds come, come to life and the stories that they tell and the things that happen in these curated worlds. The emergent gameplay you get from an open world, something like Breath of the Wild or a gta like that's, that's the magic of it. And you don't get that from something that is made by an algorithm.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Last Glass gaming in chat said here's some diseases for sake.
Michael Haim
Yeah, come on now.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Like there are things I'm sure you can do. You can use this technology for, for good.
Michael Haim
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
And yeah, I think this, as I look at more and more of these videos of people generating AI video games type shit or like even trying to create any, I guess creativity based thing or art based thing. It feels like it totally misunderstands what people love about art, what people love about video games. I don't play video games because I asked for a thing that like was spit back at me and now it's a combination of Breath of the Wild and Super Mario 64 and like these random games I love, I play things because somebody's presenting to something to me, right. That they believe in. I play clear, obscure because somebody wanted to tell me this unique tale about grief and the things that I don't.
Michael Haim
These are people who are inspired by the things that we loved as well and they want to create their own version of their vision of it and make that thing, make that thing possible with their own hands, with their own ideas. And like that's. You ain't gonna do that with, through an algorithm. And like I think when you talk about how everyone. It feels like there's an AI quote unquote gold rush. I don't think there's any gold in this. But Everyone sees it as a gold gold rush, where we look at video games as art. They see dollar signs and they try. They're trying. Like, this is across the board, especially coming out of ces, where everyone is trying to convince you that AI is something that you need in your life. It's not like, when it comes to day to day products. When it comes, like, oh, you could have AI read out your. Your calories. You could take a picture and it'll create a meal for you. Or, like, it'll give you a recipe idea, or it'll calculate calories. Like, dog, I could do that already.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah.
Michael Haim
And it's not that hard, man. The information is out there. I don't need a AI app to tell me all this, and I sure as hell don't need AI making video games for me. Like, damn, you know how many goddamn video games are already out there? You know how big my backlog is, dog? Like, I don't need AI spitting out these. These soulless worlds back at me. I don't think anyone else.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Right now, on my Steam deck, I got Return of the Obra Dinn down Return of the Obra Dinn downloaded. I got. I'm partway through my playthrough of Final Fantasy 10, right. Like, I got to play. I ain't trying to play diet Breath of the Wild, which, by the way, to close this conversation.
Michael Haim
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yo, Nintendo. You gonna let that slide?
Michael Haim
Yeah, I know.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Like, Nintendo.
Michael Haim
I'm.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I thought y'.
Michael Haim
All.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I thought y' all were the guys.
Michael Haim
Yeah, I thought y' all got shooters.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I thought y' all got shooters. I thought y' all moved different. Yeah, like, you know, power to you. Y' all were litigating.
Michael Haim
It's one of those things.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Where's that energy? Nintendo.
Michael Haim
Yeah, give them some.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I'll give them some time. Give them some time.
Michael Haim
They might cook these.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I'm just saying, you know, if you're about that life. About that life.
Michael Haim
Nintendo, Nintendo lawyers. Them. Them dudes is ruthless. Yeah, they are ruthless. I mean, this is the one time where they need to be ruthless. So do your thing.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
This feels like I've not watched the latest Godzilla versus King Kong movies. But, like, when you have, like, a big force that, like, usually is. You're kind of scared of or whatever, but you have another bigger bad, and it's like, okay, if we can get the other big bad to fight, like, let them. Let them fight. How do we. How do we get these two things to fight?
Michael Haim
Yeah. Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
So, yeah, that's what's up now. Michael, we just talked a lot about some big old news stories. A lot of big stories here. But if I wanted something smaller, some.
Michael Haim
BBs, beautiful stories, the tiniest news I.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Needed to know about WE News. Where would I go?
Michael Haim
This. Oh, okay. Damn, I haven't been on in a while. Well, you go. You go. I can't read. Fuck.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
It's the Karen.
Michael Haim
Oh, I gotta step into this. I step to this damn studio and I can't read. You go to our last story, the Wii News Channel, where we cover all the small news items you need to know about.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Nailed it. WE News stories number four and five. I'm demoting to WE News because I want to spend some time in the super chats because a lot. You guys are riding in a lot. And so story number four, which is being demoted. Nintendo comments on dispatches Nintendo Switch 2 censorship this from Jordan Midler at Video Games Chronicle. They basically said Nintendo requires all games on its platforms to receive ratings from independent organizations and to meet their established content and platform guidelines while we inform partners with their titles don't meet our guidelines. Let me say again, while we inform partners when their titles don't meet our guidelines, Nintendo does not make changes to partner content. We also do not discuss specific content or the criteria used in making these determinations. VGC in the article goes on to theorize that the possible reason for the censorship is the way games are sold across different regions on the eShop. For example, the Eshop hosts a single game across multiple languages, and the game simply changes this language depending on the system settings of the console. In cases like this, the single versions of the game must pass certification with each regional ratings board, which is a lot of work. Our next one. The director assures Ubisoft remains committed to beyond good and Evil 2 despite recent upheaval. You sure about that? That's this. That the story's in the headline and so I'm not gonna get into detail about that. But Beyond Good Evil 2 seemingly still in the works. They're saying, yeah, I will see, you know.
Michael Haim
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
More WE News for you from insider gaming. They've learned that the developers behind Mind's Eye Build a Rocket Boy are planning to announce soon. They have decided to part waves with their publisher IO Interactive from Noble. RGG addressed player feedback after the Yakuza Kiwami 3 and Dark Ties demo. They said they have a version 1.11 patch available at launch, which fixes the graphical issues and other problems. And then Finally, Virtua Fighter 5 Revo World Stages launch on Nintendo Switch 2 on March 26th. And that is it for We News. Jumping over to the Tiltify. Of course. We're pushing to raise this bar for the Immigrant Rapid Response fund. Go to kindafunny.com donate if you want to donate now. Right now we're already. Oh my God, it's going up. We're at about 3, $500. $3,496 to be exact. We got one from hand Height who donates 25 and says, Wish there was more that I could do. Ice and their chicken shit face masks. Jeremy writes in and says, ice. Love you. Kind of funny. Thanks for all you do. Infinite Corpse writes in and says, here's some for the flamethrower fund. Put them. Put them on ice. Anonymous writes in with $100 donation and says, I live in Minneapolis and KF is one of the mentally safe spots I have now. Keep up the amazing work. Thank you so much for that, Anonymous. Moonlit Domphier writes in and says, abolish ice. Anything less is wrong. Old man screams in rage says at age 62, not your typical demo, but I love what you guys do. KF is not afraid to note the emperor's lack of clothes. First dono to anything since 2024. Thank you so much. Old man screams and range. And also I, you know, you say you're not our typical demo at age 62, but Nick Scarpino, he's 62.
Michael Haim
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah. Like him being the age he is, we actually do get a lot of older audience.
Michael Haim
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
And so you're probably on the younger side when we're talking about Nick's demographic. And then off to 741 says, melt the ice. Their peepee don't work. To hop over. Over to the super Chats. Let's see here.
Michael Haim
And like Chad Ocho Cinco ran out of pee pee.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Let's see, let's see. There's a lot of, a lot of in here, Jack. Animation says something that concerns me the most is how the streaming slash influencer culture will spin this. Will they end up loving and popularizing these AI games?
Michael Haim
Oh, I, I, nope, I. You're gonna be able to see right through it. I think so.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah. I think this is where quality is going to become the big factor because I just don't believe in AI video games. Like AI as a whole. Right. Like, I like. I think when you're using AI as like placeholder assets, you can kind of skirt around the quality issue because it's like, okay, well, by the time the thing's out. Hopefully it's not there anymore or whatever. And so you can kind of hide it.
Michael Haim
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
When you're just making pure AI games, I don't.
Michael Haim
Shit is ass.
Rocket Money Ad Voice
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I don't think you can quality control that in a way that's going to be compelling with the final product. Yeah.
Michael Haim
I. What I. I will say this though. I think we might get to a point where games are like foundationally might be like foundational material might be created with AI and then work like that is the thing that they then work on from there. That might be a thing you see more in game dev and I think we're seeing some of that happen. I think there's a. Don't quote me on this, but there's a story about how Mihoyo and Honkai Star Rail content has relied heavily on AI for like foundational then punched up from there which is. I still think it's a. That's a huge problem as well. And I. Unfortunately it might get more difficult to detect these things one way or the other when they're used in that particular way.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah.
Michael Haim
So yeah. Just be. Be more. I hope people are a little more adamant on inspecting the things that they are engaging with. Being a little bit more curious about how something is made and not just be like, oh here's a new shiny thing. I'm going to play it or I'm going to engage with this thing like think a little bit more about how it's made. I just. I can't. You can't expect everyone to do that. But I just hope that that is. More and more people have that at the top of their mind when. Especially when it comes to gaming.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
And to expound more because I saw somebody mention like, you know, arc Raiders is doing it right. Like when I say AI video games, I'm talking about this Google.
Michael Haim
Yeah. This Project Genie shit.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Project Genie shit specifically I think will be very bad quality. I think too the Arc Raiders of it.
Michael Haim
All.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Right. Like. I think. Yeah. Into like the clear obscure assets. What was the other one? There was another game that did the same thing as Clear Up Scare the Altars Alters. Yeah. As well. I think that is where it's going to be way more tough to parse out. And that is something that we're gonna have to navigate and figure out and learn and do all that.
Michael Haim
And when you have. You have a studio like Larion or the CEO of a studio like Larian.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah.
Michael Haim
Kind of waffling and getting into fights online with people about these things. It's like, man, this. This shit's kind of getting hostile in a way. And. And also, I think it's rightfully so that we should be able to push back on these things as well. And not to, like, attack like Svenviki or whatever for what he's saying, but, like, engage with it in an honest way and be like, hey, man, this is why we don't with this. This is why, you know, we love DOS 2, we love Baldur's Gate 3 for these reasons, man. Like, don't burn that goodwill for something that seems like it's going to be a fad or like you might not even need in the end because that studio is talented enough and has that pedigree. You don't need to do this, man.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah. Lord Foosh writes in and says crimson desert looks sick. Also Ice forever kind of funny. Best friends, stand strong, stand fast, stand together. Anyone in Madison, Wisconsin has a safe place with me. Hell yeah.
Michael Haim
Hell yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Mighty Headcanon 44 says fuck ice. Mr. Nice, Mr. Nice Guy. Rye says, just circled back to Haim's Octopath Traveler 0 review and I think I may start it tonight. Best reviews in the biz. Coolest roommates ever.
Michael Haim
Aw, thank you. Appreciate that.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Gerardo is cool says happy Friday, y'. All. Shout out to Michael from Chula Vista, San Diego.
Michael Haim
Oh, shit.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Let's go. Chinga Lamigra.
Michael Haim
Hey, we out here. Yeah. Let me know if you ever been to the big five supporting goods down there in Chula Vista. I worked there for like four years. Oh, hell yeah. Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Only special, special feature says where to donate. The link is not in the Description. Kind of funny.com donate is where you can go. Trembly Wimbley says love that y' all are using your platform to support a good cause. ICE and anyone who stands with them. Let me hop back to the tiltify. So people are talking about it over there. Right now we are at over $4,000, $4,021 raised over on the Tiltify. Foxy Steve says love to all the beautiful immigrants that make this country great. Screw off to the false patriotism that MAGA and ICE represent. Matthew says abolish ice. Anonymous says fuck ICE and fuck Trump. Canon or Canon says Canon says love you guys. You keep us all sane. Thank you so much, Canon. Scott Tremper says ICE also give me that fuser shirt blessing.
Michael Haim
It's kind of sick actually.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I know. I love this. I never wear this shirt, yo.
Michael Haim
What?
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I'm not like a long sleeve shirt person.
Michael Haim
Like a. Like a nice fitted Black long sleeve, man. That's because it helps make the, it makes the chain pop.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
That's what I, when I put it on this morning I think part of it is that I've been going to the gym more and so I feel more confident about, you know, because I'm waking up at 6:30am Every day makes me feel a bit more confident wearing it and then the chain I think does bring it it together.
Michael Haim
Yeah. So I'll be going to sleep at 6:30 in the morning, man.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Dude, you really, you really do.
Michael Haim
Oh man.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Sometimes I wake up, I'm like man, Michael's still awake.
Michael Haim
I'm doing, I'm doing dishes at four o' clock in the morning and it's, it's, it's a, it's a problem. We, we, we'll, we'll figure this out.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Offline and also shout out to Fuser for sending me this shirt In I think 2020 whenever that game came.
Michael Haim
Yeah, and, and you got the, the fuser Adidas too. Those are fire.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I do have the Fuser Adidas that are falling apart sadly but yeah, Nikki.
Michael Haim
Grayson was going to steal those last time they, they stayed in place. Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Oh my God. Hitting the refresh. We're at $4131 now over on kind of funny.com donate Rakan says let that damn ice melt away and then I read these other ones but hopping back over well I guess we gotta, we gotta sunset this episode at some point. We got Gamescast coming up where again we're gonna continue to support and continue to encourage you guys to donate. I'm just gonna do one more pass at the super chats to see if there's anyone. Oh, Rakan also donated there. Thank you so much Rakan. Huey Yang says as a proud Minnesota resident and refugee, thank you to the kind of funny community. Thank you for being in an audience.
Michael Haim
Hell yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Thank you for the support. Nightlife says power world is proliferated with AI. AI sucks. Yeah, I mean a lot more games, excuse me, A lot more games are going to be using these tools and it is on us to cover it, talk about it and if you're somebody who like stands against the usage of AI like stand on business.
Michael Haim
Yeah. I always say this too in especially as I went into CES this year is that when it comes to AI, like if you need to understand your enemy and this applies to a lot of things actually is that you can, you can disengage from it, you can boycott it, you can make sure do your best to avoid engaging or putting your money into the things that you are against. But you need to understand it like to be against AI, you need to also understand the difference between the different LLMs, how it's being used, the environmental impacts, what the difference between something like dlss. Whereas generative AI is a different thing. Like you gotta understand your enemy to fight the fight. So when it comes to AI or when it comes to organizations like the DHS and ICE, like you got to.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Know your enemy 1000%. Of course. Kind of funny.com year wrong is where you can write in. Let us know what we got wrong as we got it wrong. Throughout the show I'm looking for factual year wrongs. Nobody wrote in except for Jeppo 1456. I'm not going to read your. You're wrong Jepo 1456. In fact, I'm pleading with you, stop writing in Jeo 1456. I'm done. Enough with the Yakuza.
Michael Haim
It's hands.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
It's enough. Enough is enough. Wait, wait, wait.
Michael Haim
Catch me up real quick. What's. Huh?
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
There's a person who writes it every single day into you're wrong. Specifically calling out greg about Yakuza Kiwami 3 and why don't we love Yakuza Kiwami more. Okay, all right. And I don't read them, but they do annoy me. Please stop. All right, here's what I'll say. DM Greg get into gray. I don't know which of his DMS open. I don't know. Tweet at Greg. Just say I read your wrong. And so now I have to read your. Just tweet at Greg. You know what I mean? Keep it to Greg.
Michael Haim
Yeah, DM me and I'll text him.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
There you go. Keep it out of your wrong, God damn it. Because then it make. Then it takes longer to read through your wrongs. I'm over here like, okay, what did. What needs to be read?
Michael Haim
Like I said, know your enemy. Know who your enemy is.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Know who your enemy. I'm not your enemy and you're only bothering me with this shit. Jepo, go bother Greg. That brings us to the end of the show. Yes, I am. Thank you so much for joining me on this episode. Yeah, if people can. If people want to find you elsewhere, where should they go?
Michael Haim
You find me at Blue Sky. B R A Z Y A Z N B Sky Social. Because that's how those URLs or accounts work. I am also using Instagram a little bit more meta, but you know, Instagram is where it feels. It feels like a safe place for now, at least. I know that is kind of not true as well. But again, like I said, when you. When you engage in these spaces, you also know you're knowing your enemies. Also knowing what the platforms you're using. It's. It's. It's crazy out there, you know, it's crazy. We live in a society, and unfortunately, that means we have to engage with things we might not fully love. But we also need to use these tools to take care of ourselves, take care of our people. And this is how we do sometimes. This is how we do collective action when we talk about doing fundraisers, knowing what's happening out in the streets and the struggles of people. These platforms can also be wielded for good, so long as they do not crack down on us for unstated reasons. So be careful out there. That's where you could find me. And keep donating to these. These causes, man. I know. Giant Bomb Min Max are also doing their own thing later today. Fine folks over there, good friends. And all the. Seeing all the support here in the KF community has been crazy. I knew. I knew I with y', all, of course, for many, many years, I knew I with y'.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
All.
Michael Haim
But this is. This is some next level. So, yeah, this is beautiful.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
This is what I'll say. For those watching and listening live, we're at $4,939 in an hour. Can we get to 5,000 before we end? Oh, this is gonna annoy people that work here. I'll extend this episode by two minutes. Can we get to $5,000?
Michael Haim
Yeah, we're gonna.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Before the end of this episode, we're.
Michael Haim
Gonna hold Games Cast hostage.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
We're gonna hold Games Cast hostage.
Michael Haim
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Get us to 5,000 before the end of the episode. I'll read what Tyler E. Here says. Fuck Ice. Refreshing. Okay, we're still at 4900. Snugs here says, Fuck Ice and their mamas. Get rid of these racist baby dick pieces of shit. As Jack White said, kick yourself out. You're an immigrant too. I love that. Listen, I agree with everything. I agree with everything you said. We can't. I feel bad when we dunk on little dicks because there are good people out there with little dicks. Also ice. You know what I mean? And if you're part of ICE and have a little dick, you. You know what I mean? But if you're not a part of ice, if you're a good person with a little dick, we have no ill will against you. I don't like phys. Physical shaving.
Michael Haim
Yeah, yeah, I, I, I don't either. I do think.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Ah.
Michael Haim
Shouts out to all my homies with small dicks.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Shout out to the homies with small dicks.
Michael Haim
It's, it's, it's about how you use it.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
All right, Exactly.
Michael Haim
I got to worry about, I don't got to worry about none of this, you know, but, you know, if you know what you're working with.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
$1 away, by the way.
Michael Haim
Oh, $1.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
$1.
Michael Haim
$1.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
And we can end this episode of Games Daily.
Michael Haim
Yeah, there it is. Got 50 bucks.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Thank you. There we go. We did it. Shout out to everybody.
Michael Haim
Can we get some, can we get the steam machine?
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Steam machine. Oh, I see what you're saying. Yes.
Michael Haim
We don't have steam machines.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
I was like, can we get the steam machine?
Michael Haim
Not breaking embargoes.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Hell yeah. Thank you to Anonymous who says, happy to help. Thank you to Project Turo who says ice.
Michael Haim
Wow.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Yeah. Everybody donated. Shout out to everybody with small jigs out there.
Michael Haim
Yeah.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Shout out. Yeah. Shout out everybody except for ice. Yeah. Yeah. This has been kind of funny. Games Daily, remember, if you love what we do, support us with the kind of funny membership on Patreon or YouTube to get the shows ad free and get a daily exclusive show. We're about to do Gamescast. We're going to talk about all the games coming out in February and we got all the content, after which I think might just be the stream. But until next time, Game Daily shouts.
Michael Haim
Out, shouts out to tiny meat.
Blessing Adeoye Jr.
Shouts out.
Episode: Is Crimson Desert Too Good To Be True?!
Date: January 30, 2026
Hosts: Blessing Adeoye Jr. (Kinda Funny), Michael Haim (IGN)
This episode dives deep into the ongoing hype and skepticism surrounding Crimson Desert, tackles the hot rumor of an imminent Nintendo Direct Partner Showcase, and reacts to Google’s new AI tool, Project Genie, shaking up both game development discourse and the stock market. The hosts interweave industry analysis with playful banter, a community-driven charity fundraiser (supporting the Immigrant Rapid Response Fund during the general strike), and open, critical conversation about AI’s growing role in creative industries.
| Quote | Speaker | Timestamp | |--------------------------------------------------------------------------------|------------------------|------------| | “This game is so ambitious to the point where if there are hiccups, I'm not going to cry about it... Every generation there's that game you use to test your hardware.” | Michael Haim | 08:32 | | “Is this game too good to be true? The idea of this game… It feels like they’re trying to be jack of all trades and master of them all.” | Blessing Adeoye Jr. | 12:16 | | “If it’s trying to do too much and doesn’t go hard enough in one particular direction, that might happen... But I haven’t seen [the weakness] yet.” | Michael Haim | 25:10 | | “Seeing a lot of third-party games day and date with Switch 2... it’s kind of wild that we’re getting to that point.” | Michael Haim | 29:41 | | “People think they can just create video games by saying things... This shit’s not going to last. [The stocks] are going to go back up. Not real financial advice.”| Blessing Adeoye Jr. | 40:00 | | “The joy of video games is having these created things made by somebody who has ideas, who has the technical skills and the creative ideas...” | Michael Haim | 43:13 | | “Know your enemy.” | Michael Haim | 58:45 | | “This is some next level. This is beautiful.” | Blessing Adeoye Jr. | 61:26 | | “Shouts out to everybody with small dicks out there.” | Blessing Adeoye Jr. | 63:20 |
This episode is a must-listen for anyone tracking Crimson Desert’s noisy arrival, the shape of the next Nintendo Direct, or the immediate, knee-jerk impact of AI on games discourse and investment. Blessing and Michael mix critical insight, skepticism and hope, fun industry banter, and community activism into a rich, accessible, and genuinely funny conversation about what it means to believe in games—and in each other.