Rematch Review, Dune: Awakening Review (So Far) - Kinda Funny Gamescast

Summary

Kinda Funny Gamescast: Rematch & Dune: Awakening Reviews – June 25, 2025

Hosts: Tim Gettys, Greg “GameOverGreggy” Miller, Blessing Adeoye Junior, Andy Cortez, and Nick Scarpino

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Introduction and Overview

In the June 25, 2025 episode of the Kinda Funny Gamescast, the hosts dive deep into their reviews of two prominent games: Rematch, a new sports title from Slow Clap, and Dune: Awakening, an expansive multiplayer experience set in the iconic Dune universe. The episode promises an engaging discussion filled with insightful analysis, personal anecdotes, and enthusiastic gameplay commentary.

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Rematch Review

Blessing Adioye Junior kicks off the Rematch review by expressing overwhelming enthusiasm for the game:

“This is maybe the most fun I've had in a video game so far in 2025. I'm just in love with it.” ([03:57])

Art Style and Visual Appeal Rematch boasts a distinct art style reminiscent of Slow Clap’s previous hit, Sifu. Blessing highlights the game's "sharpness of character design" and the "sleekness of the stages," emphasizing its visually captivating nature.

Gameplay Mechanics Comparing Rematch to Rocket League and FIFA, Blessing describes it as:

“Rocket League with people.” ([05:00])

Rematch strikes a balance between the arcade excitement of Rocket League and the authentic soccer experience found in FIFA. With modes including 3v3, 4v4, and 5v5, the game caters to different playstyles, emphasizing team chemistry and strategic positioning over individual statistics.

Strengths

• Visuals: Highly appealing art style and character customization.
• Gameplay Balance: Combines arcade action with genuine soccer elements.
• Team Dynamics: Focus on chemistry and teamwork without over-reliance on character stats.

Areas for Improvement

• Network Performance: Blessing notes issues like lag and rubber-banding, particularly on non-local servers:

  “I think it’ll get fixed over time, but that stuff still happens enough.” ([08:24])

• Single-Player Content: Unlike Rocket League, Rematch lacks robust single-player modes or bot matches, limiting solo play options.

• Cosmetics: The cosmetic options are seen as “boring” and “basic,” with a desire for more creative and diverse customization choices.

Future Potential With over 3 million players and counting, Rematch shows significant promise. Blessing is optimistic about future updates and content additions, hoping for enhanced cosmetics and continued support from Slow Clap:

“I think this game is going to be a staple. I think this game is going to be huge.” ([09:08])

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Dune: Awakening Review (So Far)

Transitioning to Dune: Awakening, host Nick Scarpino and Snowbike Mike share their immersive experiences within the game’s expansive desert landscapes.

Gameplay and Mechanics Dune: Awakening combines survival elements with MMO-style questing. Nick praises the game’s onboarding experience and the seamless integration of Dune lore into gameplay mechanics:

“They do a great job of drip feeding you everything you need, nice and slow, at a good pace.” ([51:59])

Survival Elements The game emphasizes resource management, base building, and strategic crafting without being overly punishing. Unlike traditional survival games, Dune: Awakening offers a more relaxed approach:

“It's a lot more chill about it.” ([39:13])

Social and Multiplayer Dynamics The multiplayer aspect allows for cooperative gameplay, fostering teamwork and community interaction. The hosts recount humorous and challenging experiences, highlighting the game's ability to create memorable moments:

“This game has sold 3 million players. It’s on Game Pass.” ([17:37])

Threats and Challenges A unique feature is the Sandworm mechanic, which adds constant tension and excitement. Players must navigate the vast desert while avoiding or confronting these formidable creatures, enhancing the game's thrill:

“The threat of the desert, that is just the Sandworm itself.” ([47:15])

Story and Lore Integration Dune: Awakening effectively weaves the rich Dune lore into its gameplay through missions and environmental storytelling. Nick appreciates how the game allows players to feel part of the Dune mythos:

“It feels like you were in the movie.” ([33:44])

Areas for Improvement

• Enemy Variety: Andy expresses a desire for more diverse human enemies to keep combat engaging over time:

  “I just don't know how that progresses and how creative they can get with that.” ([48:10])

• Base Building Features: While the building mechanics are praised for their ease, some features like the blueprint system could be more intuitive:

  “I just wish it had the house blueprint mechanic like Nightingale.” ([55:53])

Future Prospects With ongoing updates and the introduction of PvP elements, Dune: Awakening is positioned for continued growth. The hosts remain excited about future content and community-driven features:

“This game is not cool is great.” ([61:03])

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Community Interaction

Throughout the episode, the hosts engage with listener Super Chats, addressing fan questions and comments. Notable interactions include:

• Field Size Inquiry:

  “I don’t think the field is too big at all.” ([22:49])

• Game Mechanics Discussion:

  “How approachable is it for somebody that is not familiar with soccer games at all?” ([14:26])

These interactions provide additional insights and clarify gameplay aspects for listeners.

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Conclusion

The June 25th episode of Kinda Funny Gamescast offers a comprehensive and enthusiastic review of both Rematch and Dune: Awakening. The hosts commend Rematch for its engaging gameplay and visual appeal while suggesting improvements in network stability and single-player content. Meanwhile, Dune: Awakening is lauded for its immersive world, seamless integration of lore, and cooperative multiplayer experience, with suggestions for enhancing enemy variety and base-building features. Overall, the episode reflects the hosts' passion for gaming and their commitment to providing thoughtful and entertaining content for their audience.

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Note: Timestamps correspond to the original podcast transcript provided.

Transcript

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Psst. Your payments are showing, but with Apple.

[Snowbike Mike]

Cash, your payments are private by design.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

There are no public feeds. Send and receive money privately in messages or with tap to Cash. Switch to Apple Cash. Apple Cash services are provided by Green bank member fdic.

[Tim Geddes]

What's up? And welcome back to the Kinda Funny Games cast for Wednesday, June 25, 2025. June 25. That was the birthday of my best friend in elementary school who stole all my Pokemon cards. And I haven't talked to him a day since.

[Snowbike Mike]

Oh, my God.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Are you gonna say he died?

[Tim Geddes]

No. Even worse.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

You know what? Fair.

[Tim Geddes]

Even worse. I caught him because he was selling my Zapdos on the schoolyard.

[Andy Cortez]

Oh, that happens to all of us.

[Tim Geddes]

And I'm like, I knew that was my Zapdos. That happened to everybody Pretending it wasn't. I knew it was mine. I knew where the crease was.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

I'm still.

[Andy Cortez]

I'm still best friends with my friend Carlos, even though it. You know, when we were trading Pokemon cards in the dark while they're showing a movie, the thing, they're showing Twister on tv. But we were all. We were all.

[Tim Geddes]

They're making you watch Twister?

[Andy Cortez]

Yeah, it was like a science class, but it was like substitute. You know, put on Twister, science tornadoes or whatever. And we were underneath the desk all trading Pokemon cards. And I traded him some shit. But I was getting a holographic articuno. Lights come back on, scratch. I was like, dude, this is so scratched. He's like, yeah, deals, deals done.

[Tim Geddes]

The deal. The deal in the dark, man. Can't take it back.

[Andy Cortez]

Crazy.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Andy, can you unplug your mic and plug it back in?

[Tim Geddes]

Sure, of course. I'm your host, Tim Geddes. I'm joined today by Blessing Adioye Junior.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Good day, Tim.

[Tim Geddes]

Snowbike, Mike.

[Nick Scarpino]

Good afternoon, Tim.

[Tim Geddes]

Andy Cortez.

[Andy Cortez]

Hello. Hello. Test. Test.

[Tim Geddes]

Sounded okay.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

No, I think it might be Mike's. Mike, you unplug.

[Tim Geddes]

Sorry.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

We're trying to figure out which one it's doing it right before we went live, it went ding.

[Nick Scarpino]

And then back and live. Hello, Tim. Good afternoon. This is Mike checking in.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

He's not doing it anymore, so hopefully that's it.

[Tim Geddes]

So far, so good. And rounding out the group, we have the producer slash seducer, Nick Scar.

[Snowbike Mike]

The shy Hulude Giveth and the shy.

[Nick Scarpino]

Tell them, Nick. Yeah, tell them about it, Nick.

[Tim Geddes]

That's a good last is a tale of two stories. I'll tell you that right now. We are giving our review of Rematch and a review so far of Dune. Awakening and oh my God, these boys have a lot of energy when it comes to Dune and this boy right here is a lot of energy when it comes to Rematch. So we're gonna have a great time talking about a whole bunch of very cool video games that are out now because this is the kind of Funny Games cast where each and every weekday we get together to talk about the biggest reviews, previews and topics in video games live on YouTube, Twitch and podcast services around the globe. If you love what we do, please support us with the Kind of Funny membership on Patreon, YouTube, Spotify or Apple Podcast to get all of our shows ad free and a daily exclusive show. For a chance to be part of this show though, please YouTube Super Chat In. If you have any questions about Rematch or Dune Awakening, please send them in and we'll get to them throughout the show. Little housekeeping for you. We are an 11 person business all about live talk shows. Games Daily is talking all about how Sony really won't be putting new first party games on PlayStation plus day one anytime soon. Soon after this the boys are playing some Dune Awakening if you're Kind of Funny member today's Greg Ways 25 minutes about how unfair and unexp an unexpected cancer is. Thank you to our Patreon producers Carl Jacobs, Omega Buster and Delaney Twining. Today we're brought to you by Cash App and Mood, but we'll tell you all about that later. Let's start with the topic of the show. Let's start with Rematch, a sports game developed by Slow Clap. Who Nick. They're the creators of Sifu. Oh very cool. Your favorite game and co published by Kepler Interactive. In the game, players control one player on their team in an association football match from a third person perspective. The game was released on June 19, 2025 for Windows PS5, Xbox Series X and S. The game is sitting at a 74 on Metacritic and attracted more than 3 million players and over 1 million sales already. Bless. You've been talking a whole lot about it, but you haven't yet. Given your formal Kind of Funny review, what would you give? Rematch on the kind of Funny scale?

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Ooh, on the kind of funny scale. This is one I've gone back and forth on a little bit. This is maybe the most fun I've had in a video game so far in 2025. Like I'm just in love with it. I'm going to keep playing it as the year goes, but I think review wise, this is one of those interesting ones of having to balance how Much fun. How much enjoyment I'm having out of a thing versus, like, the launch quality and like, potential. I see anything and what it can do better and what I think it will do better over time. So I'm going to land at an eight for a while there. I was going to give it a 7.5, but I had a session last night where I'm just like, dude, I am having way too much fun with this game to be able to give it anything less than an 8. Starting with the good of it. It's giving you what you want out of Slow Clap. It has a really, really good art style. It is taking, I mean, a very similar art style that we already had in Sifu. As far as, like that, like, like the. The Amy's more of an artist, you might have the better words for it. But like, kind of the sharpness of like the character design and like the sleekness of the stages, like all, like, kind of the animated nature of it, like, it hits like a really, really good place as far as being so visually appealing. And I just love looking at this game. I love looking at the characters. I love the character creator. Even though it's like, it's not that advanced, it's kind of bare bones. But like just the art style of it, I just love looking at the characters. It is such a visually appealing game. But then when we talk about the gameplay of it, I described this game a while ago as, you know, like Rocket League. We call soccer with cars. This is Rocket League with people. Right. And I mean that in the best way possible of. I think they hit the perfect middle ground between what you want out of a soccer game, but then what you want out of an arcade game, and especially a game that is 3v3, 4v4, and 5v5, because those are the only modes that are available in the game. It does the same beautiful thing that Rocket League does, which is it takes soccer and gives you, I would say, a more genuine soccer experience than you would even get from a FIFA, right? Like a FIFA. In terms of gameplay, I would almost look at it as like, almost kind of like an RTS where you are zoomed out, you are, you know, passing, passing, passing, trying to line up your plays and do and do all the stuff.

[Tim Geddes]

Think about that way. But yeah, you're kind of right.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Yeah. Well, whereas Sifu, or not Sifu, I want to call it rematch. And in conjunction with that, like, I would say this about Rocket League as well. There's an element of when I'm playing these games, Where I feel more closely aligned with when me and Mike are playing rec league soccer, where I am one individual, right, which you can do in FIFA as well. But hear me out here, right? You're one individual. The placement, the physics, the like, you know, passing isn't as magnetic as it is in FIFA, right? Like you are picking a direction and just like passing in that direction and praying that it gets to the person that you're passing to. That is how soccer works. Like when I'm on the field and I'm playing with Mike or I'm playing with the folks on our soccer team, I am like, I might not see where somebody's making a run, but sometimes I'm like, I pray somebody's making a run right now. Because I'm passing this either way. I'm passing this either way. And like this game rematch captures that feeling so well of having to pay attention to your position, your teammates position and like the freedom that is involved with playing the actual sport. This game captures that so well. And I think the tools that they give you as far as like, you know, the square for that directional pass, the R2 to do your hard kick and then like, you know, R1 is the modifier and all these things, right? Like it really brings the, the necessary bare bones mechanics you need to make this game really fun. There's no fat in this game. In fact, that's almost to a detriment where there's no like stats, there's no, if I make a bigger character, they'll be more heavy. There's no RPG elements. Like there's none of that.

[Tim Geddes]

So all characters play exactly, all characters.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Play exactly the same. You are going into each game on the same ground level and it is way more just about your chemistry with your team and how you guys enter each match. Like that's the thing that matters the most, right? And I love this game for that. And I'm going to continue to love this game for that. I, I think as far as where the game I think falters, it comes down to the, I think a lot of network stuff. You know, when we played the beta months ago, we noticed that there was a lot of lagging, a lot of like weird rubber banding, a lot of like the ball. You would think that you made a pass that was successful and then like the game would skip and then you would see the ball on the other side of the field. It's like, oh, how the fuck did that happen?

[Andy Cortez]

One out of every four matches you were in Asia servers or European servers.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Yeah, and granted that that stuff is better, like I'm not. Most of the matches I'm playing run fairly well. But there's still weird things as far as like when I am attacking an opponent player and like trying to get the ball and like I think I have it but then like, oh, it turns out I don't have it or like I make a catch as the goalkeeper and then it still goes in. I'm like, oh, something skipped here. That stuff still is here. And like, I think it'll get fixed over time. I hope it gets fixed over time, but that stuff still happens enough. And then also I think this game has or could have such a bright future ahead of it. I'm going to predict that it does because there's 3 million players on this thing and has a mill over a million sales. So I think it's going to be supported.

[Tim Geddes]

And over the last couple days on games daily, we've been like every day pretty much like updating those numbers. Like they just keep getting more and more and more. Yeah, they got a hit on their hands.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

And I think there's a lot of reasons for that. There's the love of soccer, there's the quality of the game, there's all that stuff. There's the tick tock virality of the game where I've been seeing clips of this game non stop on my, on my algorithms. But it's hard not to compare this game to Rocket League. And I think one of the things that Rocket League did from the get go was the content. You had like single player stuff that you can do in Rocket League. Granted it's not like there's a story or anything, but like you could play with bots in Rocket League and do like a mini season and stuff like that. So if you didn't have people to play with, you could at least like have something to do. This game doesn't have that. This game really is 3v3, 4v4, 5v5. And then you have the 5v5 ranked mode. And even with that. Right. Like I wish those 3v3 ranked, that's the way I prefer to play.

[Tim Geddes]

Right. So yeah, can you talk about that a little bit more? Like how does the game differ with three, four or five players?

[Andy Cortez]

And what are you gravitating to towards the most? Because I know when the beta, when the multiple betas were out, we kind of experimented with all of the three, four or five modes. But I feel like we always kind of fell back on 4v4.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Yeah.

[Andy Cortez]

Being kind of the sweet spot 3v3.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Has been my go to, Mainly because I touch the ball more. Mainly because it's like I'm way more in the action. And I kind of. I like, I like the flow of 3v3. 3v3. Feels like you're playing 1v1 smash 3 stock. No items kind of situation where it is. All right. It is. I'm. I have two people that I have access to on Discord, where I'm playing with my friend Asen, and I was playing with Eric as well. And like, we have our communication. We know where to go. We know all these things.

[Snowbike Mike]

Right.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

I wish they had a rank mode for that. They don't have a rank mode for that at the moment. They also don't have crossplay. But that's. That's another conversation. Um, 5v5. You have a bigger stage and it feels, I think 5v5 feels the most like you're playing rec league soccer, where you're relying so much on your other team or on your other teammates to be where they need to be and deliver and pass and do all that stuff. And so, like, really, it is a scale of how you want to play and how much you want to be directly involved in the action there it.

[Andy Cortez]

Becomes such a cool management game of managing your. Your stamina and your. Your burst of energy. Because the game has normal sprinting and that's a normal stamina meter. But then every once in a while, you'll have another meter that is kind of a super fast burst. Right.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Extra effort.

[Andy Cortez]

Yeah. And when you, when you pop that, that's when you. I think of, like, it just. It is kind of the closest analog to wow. You know, when I watch, you know, the few times that I do watch soccer, and they always. There's always the jokes about how Messi is always just kind of walking around for a lot of the matches now that he's in his older ages, in his older age. But when he needs to go, that's when all the effort is pushed in. And that's kind of like. I think the coolest thing about rematch and a game that I would be playing if we weren't in Arrakis, you know, trying to fight the shot shy Hallud. I think rematch is a game that I would be playing if it weren't for Dune Awakening or Eliza P, because I had a lot of fun with it. But the thing that I love the most about it is the amount of spontaneity, the amount of. Of because you are one person and the game is so Physics based and it is not automated really in any way. It like it is so hard in this game I think so far to create a meta because the, because things are not one to one. Because it is just so like you, you can be as imprecise or as precise as you want with your passes or with your shots. And when you know, I, I could see a lot of games that, a lot of soccer games that may be a lot more sort of of the FIFA variety where a meta is kind of created based on a character with stats or based on like team comp or whatever. There's none of that, it's just kind of can you be accurate with your shots and there's no real, there aren't a lot of ways to cheat the system. I would say.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Yeah.

[Andy Cortez]

And I'm sure as we see more and more, I've already seen tick tock clips of at the end of a match all four players stand in front of the goal. Like I've already seen some silly like that which I could totally see slow clap stepping in and saying nope. At the end of the game only one person can be in goal and the other three players are invisible or like the ball will go through them, you know, I, I, I think one thing I love about it is that none of it is automated at all. It all feels very, very like imprecise. And that would, that's what leads to sort of the magic of it where you, there's no real way to exploit a whole lot of things in the game.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

And it's been fun seeing in real time people learning different mechanics and learning different tricks and learning like I literally this morning I get a message from Asin who I've been playing with and he's like, oh dude, check out this tick tock. That'll teach you how to do like these special passes and stuff. And I'm like, what the, like I thought I knew everything. Like yeah, you know. And I've been seeing tick tocks of like ways people have been kind of glitching the game. There's a way where you can like head the ball off of the wall to then start to like climb up in the air that looks like Rocket League that you're not supposed to do and that stuff is going to get patched and that's, I was going to get fixed. But yeah, like there's not at the moment like what feels like a forming meta because there's not the stats because there's not like the different ways to go in and like have to like Kid out, your characters do whatever, right?

[Andy Cortez]

Like yeah, go with the fast, go with the fast character because they, you know, you know, there's nothing like that. You're not going with Bo Jackson and Tecmo bowl or whatever.

[Tim Geddes]

How approachable is it for somebody that is not familiar with soccer games at all?

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Oh, super approachable. Yeah. I think that's the nice thing about this being way more of an arcade soccer game where you don't have offsides, you don't have outs, right. Like you're playing, you're. You're playing in a small stadium that are, that have walls, right? And so like if you're watching the video version you see like the background and like there's a city and all that stuff. But that's all I guess in lore projector or like video wall essentially, right? Like you can, and you can kick the ball off of that wall which like you want to talk about meta or like the ways that people are building as they're playing, right? Like you have the thing now where you have two people running toward the goal and then the first person will essentially kick the ball off of the backboard like on like over the goal to like trick the goalkeeper and then it'll bounce to their teammate and then they'll kick it in. Like those are the kind of plays that people are making and doing which feels, it feels so natural to the community. Kind of like learning and growing and trying to figure out the game and the best ways to play. Going back to some more critique stuff though that, that I have because you know, we're talking about this game as something that is hopefully going to last long. When you log into the game now they have a thing at the bottom that is like, this is the start of rematch. We're hoping to build this game, you know, like, or let us know your feedback. We're hoping to build this game into the future or whatever and I totally feel that. And I think the thing that I would love to see more would just be a like better system for cosmetics and like just better cosmetics. Overall. It is such a pretty and such a good looking game. But the cosmetics they have I think are boring slash bad. You look at the battle pass stuff that they have and it's like, oh, you can unlock new hairstyles, but the hairstyles are like basic hairstyles. They're not crazy things. There's stuff that should be in there by default. You know, you shouldn't have like one black hairstyle. And then I look at the battle pass and I'M like, oh, but you have the other one right there. I got to earn that. Like, I got to buy that. And same for any other. Like, if Andy wants like the, you know, the detached, like, mustache and beard situation, you know what I mean? Like, that should be in there by default. I don't think that should be a thing that you had to unlock. And so, like, stuff like that. I'm not a fan of most of the stuff I look through with the battle pass, I'm like, ah, this shit's boring. They have a thing where when you score, you can have your own stadium design take over for a second.

[Andy Cortez]

Okay.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Which I think is cool, except it then goes away afterwards. And so it's kind of just weird how that stuff works. Rock Lee. I know I'm gonna make a lot of comparisons, Rockley here, but like Rocket League from the Gecko, I think had such a good foundation of. They had the flags and they had so many collaborations already. This game doesn't have many collaborations going on yet.

[Andy Cortez]

You got to let me be a Transformer or something.

[Nick Scarpino]

Yeah. Give Greg a Ghostbuster.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Rocket League launched with the twisted metal truck on PlayStation. They had the kind of funny flags and like all these YouTubers. Oh, sorry. Sweet tooth.

[Tim Geddes]

Thank you.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

They had this sweet tooth truck. They had like a bunch of flags from different creators and all that stuff. Right. They had the different vehicles. Like, there were so many, I think foundational, really good cosmetic and really good earnable stuff that they had from the get go that in this game just feels is are either missing or just not as inspired as that. And I hope those are the things that I hope to see them build and add to. But, man, I'm having so much fun here. Like, I'm having such a good time.

[Andy Cortez]

I mean, the Coolest thing is this 30 game has sold 3 million.

[Tim Geddes]

Sold over a million. 3 million players.

[Andy Cortez]

Oh, it's on game pass. Okay, So I mean, either way, as this game continues to grow and get more popular, C2 the Sifu sequel is going to be so.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

I know. Oh, dude. Yeah, dude.

[Snowbike Mike]

This is.

[Nick Scarpino]

Get the money in there, boys.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

This is going to fund this funding. And like, here's the thing, right? I'm such. This game has now turned me into a slow clap sicko. I was already a sicko from Seafood, but now, like, as I'm playing this game, I'm like, oh, man, I could see a basketball game. I could see like, like a tennis game from these guys. I want a series of sports games from this developer because they got the Stuff here, like, this is so fun. But at the same time, I do want sifu, too. I do want those traditional soccer games. I also want more music in here because the music here sounds like it was ripped from sifu. Like, they got like the. I don't even know what I would call the style of music, but it's like a lot of drums. Like, the same drums I would hear as I'm like, running through a level.

[Andy Cortez]

Throwing a beer bottle at a dude's head. Yeah.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

And I'm like, okay, well, that's the same composer or whatever. So I would like to see stuff in that regard. Just a lot of, like, content. Stuff that I'm a little bit let down by.

[Andy Cortez]

Yeah, it's not as content rich as you would hope, but I. I mean, I. I think, like, it's got the perfect bones and just so much potential. Obviously.

[Tim Geddes]

Yeah, stupid question, but is there, like an offense gameplay style and a defense gameplay style? Are you always kind of playing the same and following that up? Is there a dedicated, like, goalie gameplay style or do you just run in front of the net?

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Yes, there is a dedicated goalie play gameplay style. It's like other sports games where your controls change depending on if you're on ball or off ball. So, like, you know, when you're on the ball, it's like Square to pass, R2 to shoot, all this. Right. But when you're off ball, there is like an L2 to, like, strafe around and like, kind of lock in a bit more. And like, circle will either slide tackle, or do like a regular tackle, depending on if you're sprinting or not. And then goalie. I. I love. One of the things I love about this game is that they do force you to have to learn how to play every position. Granted, there's only really three positions. It's offense, defense, and goalie. And whenever somebody scores, it rotates positions and it just rotates where you start off. But the, like, thing that people do is like, well, I'm starting off as goalie here. I'm going to stay goalie. I'm not going to run out and be an. And like, leave the goal open because that doesn't help anybody. And so, like, as the goalie, I kind of like playing goalie because I'm fucking locked the fuck in. It is triangle to do like an air dive in a circle to do like a ground dive. And you are sort of dictating the flow of the game for your team. Just like a real goalie in soccer, like When Mike's playing as goalie, Mike really is the one who is. You're setting the tone. You are giving the ball to Katie to then, like, take it down or, like, you know, figure that out. Or you're seeing Eric open at the far end of the field and you're kicking it to him. You're making those same decisions here as the goalie. And so it's. It is the most important role on the field. And it is fun to play because it's not like regular soccer, where sometimes you might not even see the ball as the goalie. Like, you might just be waiting because the other team is just not fighting back or whatever. Here you're. You're involved. Like, you're seeing the ball, the ball. Quite often you have to make those plays, make those saves and stuff, and it's fun.

[Andy Cortez]

Except me, whenever I spawn as goalie after somebody scores, and then it just randomizes and then I pop up as goalie, I'm always like, all right, somebody come get me. Huh?

[Tim Geddes]

Are you aged up? When you respond, don't worry about it.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Is a sifu reference.

[Andy Cortez]

Great joke. When it does spot me and I'm like, somebody, I'm scared. I don't like this responsibility. Yeah, somebody, like, switch out. And so when. When somebody else hops into the goalie area, you see the UI change to then make. To show that they're the goalie now. They have the, The. The. The mechanics of being able to block with their hand, you know, grab the ball with their hands or dive or whatever, and those capabilities are now taken away from you. And so there are moments where.

[Nick Scarpino]

When.

[Andy Cortez]

You'Re at the end of a game in a scramble, and there's like, the ball is just kind of like around your. Your net, and there are moments of panic, like, oh, shit, I'm the goalie now.

[Tim Geddes]

Why?

[Andy Cortez]

It's because our goalie kind of stepped out to go try to get that ball. Now. It gave me the responsibility, but it's. Yeah, it's. It's. It's got so much potential. And again, if it weren't for Arrakis, I'd be playing the shit out of it.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

I think this game is going to be a staple. I think this game is going to be huge. I mean, we keep talking about the 3 million number, but, like, I think that's just the start. Just based off of what I've been saying on Social, and based off of the fact that, like, man, people are studios who have the potential to do stuff like this. They're missing out by not making a soccer game. I. There's so much love for soccer in the world, and it's crazy that, like, we just leave it to FIFA because they have the. Or to EA Sports FC because they have the license slash had licensed, y' all. We got to get back to the era of arcade sports games. That's the plea I'm going to make to the games industry. We got to get back to NBA Street, FIFA Street, NBA Jam. Like, we got to get back to that era because there's fucking. There's. There's water in that well. There's fucking oil in these. Like, make some fucking money. That's my review.

[Snowbike Mike]

Make some.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Give me. Yeah, give me seafood, too, with twice the budget.

[Tim Geddes]

So I saw someone in the chat, I think it was Joelies asking, is the field too big?

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

No, I don't think so. When. Depending on if you're playing 3v3 or 5v5, like, the field will shrink to that size. And I don't think the field is too big at all. I think you might feel that a little bit at first because of the boost. Because when you use extra effort, like, you're not gonna be able to run all the way across the field right when you're going back and forth. A big part of this game is managing stamina, but in my opinion, that is part of the game is figuring out where to place yourself so that you. You can recover the stamina and, like, be open for your goalkeeper. Sometimes I'm playing and I. When I'm doing 3v3, I sometimes have to have full trust in my goalkeeper when I see the other team making a run, because I'm like, well, if I chase them, I'm not going to have stamina to turn around and come back. And so I'm just going to place myself here so I can recover and pray my goalkeeper catches the ball and sees me, hits me, and then I hit like I hit for the goal. I think that's part of the strategy. So I don't think the field is too big at all.

[Tim Geddes]

Cool. In terms of how the game's actually played. So is it halves, quarters?

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

No, it's just six minutes, five minutes.

[Tim Geddes]

Oh, that's it.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

That's it.

[Tim Geddes]

And it's whoever has the most points wins.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

It's whoever has the most points. There's also a mercy rule. So if you're up by four points, then you automatically win as a team.

[Tim Geddes]

Interesting.

[Andy Cortez]

Okay, Are you having a lot of issues where people just. If two goals are scored or scored, they just Peace out.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

No, but I, I think once three goals are scored, I sometimes like the goalie like you, you do the first pass backwards and the goalie will get picked up. Pick up the ball, turn around, it is you. Like, I'm gonna score on myself to their own. Get the fuck out of here. Yeah, like people might give up in.

[Andy Cortez]

That sense in the match. Give me the xpm.

[Nick Scarpino]

Yeah.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

I do think it is a sweet spot though where I think four goal mercy rule is just enough to. Where after four goals everybody's giving up. Like, I, I think that is the, the spot where it's. All right. Still a game. You still might have time. Sometimes toward the end of the match where there's 30 seconds left and you're down by three, it does turn into a. All right, well, what are we doing here anyway? But you're not going to avoid that in these kind of games.

[Tim Geddes]

Are they all human players here or are there any bots?

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

They're all human players. That's one of my, my downfalls with it is I wish they had AI bots for if I wanted to play offline or if I wanted to like just practice with them or do whatever. But it is all human players that you're playing with. All customized to, except for an original character they have named Coach Gabby who's like a skin that you can unlock. Who's just like a dude. A dude who's like probably like 40 years old. It's like a handsome 40 year old man. Yeah. There's a. Oh, let me tell you about the prologue to this game.

[Andy Cortez]

Tell what? There's a story.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

There's a. For like five minutes. Yes. For when you first boot up the game. They start you off as a dude who's just like. You're practicing and like it's kind of their tutorial system.

[Andy Cortez]

Okay.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

And it's. But it's cinematic. You could tell this like, oh, the Sifu people.

[Snowbike Mike]

Yeah.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Like made up.

[Andy Cortez]

They're like, give them something to do, man.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Like, like, yeah. For a second I was like, is this going to usher in into like a single player, like narrative story and. No, like you finish it. And they're like, all right, just play matches.

[Andy Cortez]

Go ahead.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

And I'm like, wait, is that the only content? Like you like, there's a menu item in the main menu that now that just says prologue. And I'm like, why is this a thing? But I think in that prologue there is Coach Gabby and he's a character you can play as. And I, I wonder if it's One of the developers or somebody. It's a really detailed, It'd be a.

[Andy Cortez]

Little Easter egg or something.

[Tim Geddes]

Detailed.

[Snowbike Mike]

Yeah.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

I'm like, and you can just unlock him and Ronaldinho.

[Tim Geddes]

That's great. I mean, I, I was sold in this game just because of Slow Clap, but after hearing you talk about this, like, I am definitely gonna give this one a shot because this looks awesome.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Yeah.

[Tim Geddes]

And like it seems simple enough to wrap my head around where I'm not going to be like intimidated by it all.

[Andy Cortez]

So yeah, I'm like, I'm, I'm super down to have this little discord going where Gary Widow really wants to get a squad going because like I, I had so much fun with it as somebody who didn't really grow up playing soccer outside from like, you know, elementary school or whatever and somebody who only watches soccer when it's the World Cup. I, I had so much fun with this. And it is kind of the perfect middle ground between something like FIFA where I feel like it's, I'm just not that type of gamer. But then I look at something like Rocket League and I'm like, it looks. Rocket League is so much more frustrating to me when like just angling the card, it feels like the, the skill ceiling is way higher for that. And this is kind of that perfect middle ground that. It also makes sense to me the fact that there's a crosshair to show you where you are kind of aiming and shooting and, and curving the shots or whatever.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

And I, I think there is something nice about I, I compared a lot to Rocket League as far as the physics of it. But Rocket League is way more of a physics based game because it is like how you hit a big old ball, right. And how it bounces and all that stuff right here, it's, it's less physics based than Rocket League and I think it puts you more into the soccer mindset of I guess, positioning and like essentially trusting in your teammates position and all that stuff. Right. Like, and I like that for it.

[Snowbike Mike]

I, I, I, this is the prologue.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

This is the prologue. I put it into assets and this is how the game starts. It's a fucking cool start to it, to a game.

[Tim Geddes]

So funny.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

And then it just teaches you the mechanics and stuff and there's like a few cutscenes in between, but yeah.

[Tim Geddes]

Brad, awesome. Any final words on rematch?

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Let me tell y' all this to the rematch community. This is even part of my review. Okay. Learn to pass.

[Snowbike Mike]

Wow.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Learn to let go of the ball, y' all. That's the Ball, y' all, first of all, get me the ball. I know what the fuck I'm doing. But also, like, stop the tucker. Stop being selfish with the ball. I know all y' all watched Blue Lock. Let me tell you, the Blue Lock community really into this game. Oh, of course, if you don't know what Blue Lock is, it's the soccer anime. It's actually pretty fire I with it. But in that anime, they have these things called egoists, you know what I mean? Like, oh, you got to beat it for yourself. Everybody's a striker. Everybody wants the goal. Even if you're a defender, you still want the goal. All right? That's the Blue Lock mindset. You're an egoist. You're not from Blue Lock players. Yeah, you're not a fucking anime character. Pass the ball.

[Andy Cortez]

You're not the main character.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

You're not the main character.

[Andy Cortez]

I love passing the ball. In this game, when you nail a good pass, it's like, oh, I crushed that. And even if you didn't, even if that, if the person I passed you didn't make the shot or they, you know, they hit it off the wall or the goalie caught it, I was like, still feel really good about the precision because yeah, at first it takes a while to get used to the passing, but once you kind of get the full flow of it, it feels really awesome to make some successful passes.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

I also do love the shooting mechanic because it is when you're playing, if you press R2, it loads up your shot, right? But the shots always go to where your camera is, which is different from like how a lot of other soccer games work where it's. You just aim and click the stick and like you go that direction. Here it is like a first person shooter where you have to like look exactly at where the reticle is to like hit that shot. But then on, I think the left analog stick, once your shot is loaded, you can like add a curve to it. And so people be making some fucking crazy ass shots where it's like, okay, I'm going to aim top right, but then I'm going to curve bottom left to then create like a fucking C right into the top over the corner of the goal. And like that shit, it's so satisfying.

[Andy Cortez]

Man, when it hits.

[Tim Geddes]

Oh, what a game, what a game. Everybody check out Rematch. It's on Game Pass and available on PlayStation Windows and all that stuff as well. After a quick word from our sponsors, we're going to talk all about Dune Awakening, but here's some ads this episode is brought to you by Cash App. We've all had those moments getting meals out with people that always end in some kind of awkward experience of having to figure out the least complicated way to just get it done or even after figuring it out. Have you used an app and ended up having to wait days for your money to finally show up? What if we could solve all of that easily? Cash App is a completely different experience. Fast, easier, easy and safe and a great way to receive and transfer money to family and friends. It's incredibly easy to set up. You just enter your phone or email and some other basic information. No bank account needed and then there's no waiting around for days. It's your money. You shouldn't have to wait. We love using Cash App because it's fast, it's safe and it just makes life way less stressful. For a limited time, only new Cash App users can use our exclusive code to earn some additional cash. For real? There's no catch. Just download Cash App and sign up. Use our exclusive referral code. Kind of funny in your profile. Send $5 to a friend within 14 days and you'll get $10 dropped right into your account. Terms apply. That's money. That's Cash App. This episode is brought to you by Mood. Let me tell you about the online cannabis company that's revolutionizing how we deal with life's challenges. From sleepless nights to stress filled days, Mood.com has created an entire line of functional gummies that target sports specific health concerns. With 100 federally legal THC blends, they'll deliver them discreetly right to your doorstep and you can get 20 off your first [e-mail] with promo code. Kindafunny. I've been having a great time trying out all their different gummies and I'm loving how each one feels. Their sleepy time gummies will knock you out in about 15 minutes flat. No hangovers, no grogginess, and their epic euphoria Gummies are perfect for those days when nothing's going right. And best of all, not only does Mood stand behind everything with an industry leading 100 day satisfaction guarantee, but as I mentioned, listeners get 20% off their first order with code. Kinda funny. So head to mood.com, browse their amazing selection of functional gummies and find the perfect gummy for whatever you are dealing with. And remember to use promo code Kind of funny at checkout to save 20% on your first order. And we're back. We have a couple quick super chats about rematch here Christoph. Christoph says, where's Gary for this review? I don't know. He's probably playing.

[Nick Scarpino]

I'm sure he's all about this game right now.

[Tim Geddes]

And then a 107 says, while they got Ronaldo.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Ronaldinho.

[Tim Geddes]

Ronaldinho.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Come on, Tim.

[Andy Cortez]

Ronaldinho.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Get some culture.

[Tim Geddes]

I hope they keep the collabs coming with kids, et cetera. Need to add clubs to find friends. And Mike is a commentator.

[Nick Scarpino]

Yeah, I need Will. I need Will Ferrell from kicking and screaming in this game right away. Do they have private matches? That's a big one for me. Of course they do.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

And they have good spectating.

[Nick Scarpino]

They have a private lobby with spectating.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Private lobby with spectating. I haven't tried it out yet, so I don't know what spectating features they have, but, like, in the trailer or in some footage we're showing before, it looked like people were being shown from, like, an angle, like almost a FIFA angle. So that must be a spectate thing.

[Nick Scarpino]

Interesting.

[Andy Cortez]

What about the Big Green?

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Green.

[Tim Geddes]

The Big Green?

[Nick Scarpino]

Yeah, yeah, the Big Green.

[Andy Cortez]

Yeah.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

I'm. I. I'm in, like, the. The Mike mindset of, like, I want to figure out how to throw a tournament of, like, I want to figure out, like, that's how much I'm into this is. I want to figure out how to, like, do things outside of the game.

[Tim Geddes]

Hold on. I have questions. So Ronaldo.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Ronaldinho.

[Andy Cortez]

Ronaldinho is.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

He's different from Cristiano Ronaldo.

[Tim Geddes]

No shit.

[Andy Cortez]

Ronaldinho is much like a decade prior.

[Tim Geddes]

Unrelated.

[Andy Cortez]

Unrelated.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Unrelated. He's from Brazil.

[Tim Geddes]

Cool.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Yeah, he was one of the goats.

[Tim Geddes]

Good for them. Let's get to Arrakis. Nick, let's get you off the bench. Dune Awakening. You've been playing the hell out of it. You're literally having nightmares about it.

[Snowbike Mike]

I'll just say this. We've all had that one relationship in our past, right, where you just can't quit each other. But you know, you should. And that is me right now, currently with Dune Awakening. We start our playoff last night. We had a great time yesterday on the stream. I go, I'm just going to run and get this one stupid thing so that I'm not behind the guys. I hit quicksand. I die now, Tim. Of course, when you die in combat, you just respawn quicksand with all of your stuff. If you die to the desert, Tim.

[Andy Cortez]

You give it back to the desert. You give it back to the desert. The desert always takes.

[Snowbike Mike]

We build.

[Andy Cortez]

There's a quicksand right there.

[Snowbike Mike]

There's the quicksand. We build back better. The boys help me. We're crushing it. We do our final testing station, and all we have to do is traverse back through the quicksand and like.

[Andy Cortez]

Or just to the sand.

[Snowbike Mike]

To the sand. Like a smart ass, I go. I'm gonna let Andy go first, because if he gets caught, I'm gonna. I'm gonna watch him. And if he gets caught in the quicksand, I'll go a little bit left, but I let him do the walk. No, no, you. Well, they don't actually have the walk in this.

[Nick Scarpino]

You have a.

[Snowbike Mike]

It's too far. It's the sand bike that you get.

[Andy Cortez]

You could slowly just jump and not alert the sandworm. Yeah, but if you're running, you see the meter making noise.

[Snowbike Mike]

You hear it off in the distance. So I see Andy. I let Andy get about maybe 50, 50ft ahead of me. And I start off not thinking that it's so far that once the worm comes up, Andy's gonna make it to safety, but my dumb ass will be out in the middle of nowhere. And I panic. Panic mode sets in. I turn around and I try to go right back, hit the quicksand again. My fucking. My sand bike explodes. The shy haloot eats me. I'm done. I can't play this game anymore. This game fucking rocks.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

It's.

[Andy Cortez]

I. I. Mike, I need you to.

[Snowbike Mike]

Hear the text that. Hear the text that came in after this.

[Andy Cortez]

Publish your video and, like, you can publish it because you, You. You, like, deleted your vod, right?

[Nick Scarpino]

Yeah, yeah, because I like to jam the music.

[Snowbike Mike]

Oh, yeah.

[Andy Cortez]

Damn. Because last night was DJ Mike. Last night was one for the ages of Nick losing his stuff. Full wipe, right? For the second time in a couple of hours. In several hours. And then it's like Nick's looking at the map and he goes, oh, my God, my loot is still.

[Snowbike Mike]

My dead body is still in the middle of the desert. I can get it.

[Andy Cortez]

I can go get my stuff.

[Snowbike Mike]

And Mike says, dude, let it go. And he's like, let it go. And I was like, no. So I make Mike give me one of his sand bikes, which, by the way, you can't just. For whatever reason, the permissions on the sand bikes are, like, broken. So he has to break down his bike. Give me the things to build it. I build it back. I'm naked. I'm buck naked.

[Nick Scarpino]

Naked.

[Snowbike Mike]

I've got the. I got the sun beating down on my back, giving me a sunburn. But I make it out there strategically. And everyone's watching at this point. Mike's streaming, but they're all streaming my.

[Andy Cortez]

Stupid ass via Discord showing his gameplay.

[Snowbike Mike]

I get out there, I've got Tim, I've got capacitors. I've got fucking ironing gets. I've got Spice. I've got all these things we just did from this mission. I get out there. I finally get out there. I get in the middle as the fucking sand worm. I can hear him off in the distance. And as I hover over my stupid dead body, all there is is 200 of the basic ass scrub brush. The first fucking thing you get. And Mike laughs so hard at me that I just. I literally once we turned it off, this is what I get from Mike, right? 11:34pm I'm dying. I'm fucking dying. And then a GIF of the sandworm eating me. And then realizing that I stopped replying to because Nick, we will build everything back eating tomorrow. Don't worry about it.

[Andy Cortez]

And.

[Snowbike Mike]

And he's like, I'll give you a purple sword. I have other melee weapons. Mike's like, I got a purple gun. They're just texting me like checking in on me to make sure that I'm not.

[Tim Geddes]

Yeah.

[Snowbike Mike]

And I'm not okay. I'm not okay. I'm here to say I need the help.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

I need it.

[Andy Cortez]

It was, it was a real rough one. This game kicks a lot of ass.

[Snowbike Mike]

It's so cool.

[Andy Cortez]

It's. I think my favorite thing about. I always tell Mike, like my favorite thing about survival games is that first five to 10 hours of getting your, you know, finding your footing, creating your first house, finding those early missions. And I think the cool thing about Dune Awakening is the tutorialization is one of the better ones. I've really in a lot of tutorial in a lot of survival games. It does a great job of doing player onboarding. And early on you don't feel like you are constantly find this one rock and mine these boulders to find that rock. And the amount of times in other survival games, especially early on when you are mining, it's like, dude, I found three of these goddamn things and I've been mining for an hour. Like what the hell, right? This game is so like bountiful in the. The loot and the things that you are scavenging and mining. I think that you. It's essentially a lot less of a breathing down your next survival game where you are, you know, a lot of other survival games you go off to finally do that side quest and you're like, ah, my guy's hungry. I gotta eat something. You have something. My guy's thirsty. Oh my God, I'm dying of this. This game is a lot less about being a pain in the ass in that way of a survival game, when really you are just kind of needing to regulate your thirst every now and then. But it's not the biggest pain in the ass. It's. It's a lot more chill about it.

[Snowbike Mike]

Yeah.

[Andy Cortez]

But at its core it really kind of is a. It's a third person. Like mmo. Yeah, I see it very much as that. You know, I'm having a great time doing third person shooting and just being with the homies and going to an enemy encampment and trying to find loot and upgrading my gun and find, you know, figuring out the best way to melee these people. I'm, I'm having so much fun with it in a way that I, I never thought that I would. And it is really kind of just sucked me in.

[Tim Geddes]

Mike, I know you love Survivor games. I know that you love playing with your friends.

[Nick Scarpino]

Yeah.

[Tim Geddes]

Is this game different, Tim?

[Nick Scarpino]

This game has the sauce. It's a little bit different. It's actually a lot different than some of the survival games we had. And I do think it's that MMO touch of the questing and just that kind of push of like you keep going. Right. I think, as Andy said, that first couple hours of the wow factor of a survival game, of learning new crafting techniques, building out your base, having that moment of defeat where you lose it all and then you got to build back is great. But the sauce in this one is found in the true to heart dune aspect of it all. It feels like you were in the movie.

[Snowbike Mike]

Right.

[Nick Scarpino]

Like, if you love the movies, you will smile the whole time. Nick loves the books and the movies. He constantly is telling us fun little tidbits of what he's seeing from the story side of things. But the world itself is beautiful. It's big. It's Dune at its core and that's a really awesome factor to it. And then like I said, the MMO questing I think is a big push. That's something a lot of these survival games kind of lose track of. It was like what's next for the player once they hit that certain level of crafting and base building that they need to keep going with. And that's why we really gave a lot of love to grounded back in the day of having that narrative kind of pushing you to new areas you've never seen. And for this in particular with Dune, it does a great job at stealing MMO techniques of just basic questing. Right. None of this is out of the box or different. It's just simply, hey, go to area B, go mine this, or go to area A, go kill this different boss or member of the allegiance. And I love that. Right. Because I think a lot of these times in the survival crafting genre, we get to hour 15 and it's like.

[Snowbike Mike]

It just seems repetitive. Yeah. Right.

[Nick Scarpino]

Or I've built the biggest base. There's not much more to do. I love the push of that. And like, for us, we're still early on, Tim. There is a PvP section that we haven't seen yet, and that's the deep desert.

[Snowbike Mike]

Well, we haven't even gotten the ornithopter yet.

[Nick Scarpino]

Yes.

[Tim Geddes]

No.

[Snowbike Mike]

Or we're still sand by goons.

[Andy Cortez]

We're trying to make our ornithopter, but it's requiring different materials that are a bit further out there. Yeah.

[Nick Scarpino]

And there's a. There's a thrill of seeing the PvP of this and seeing more of the desert that you haven't seen. And so, yeah, this has the sauce, unlike a lot of games that we've played before, Tim. And I think it's the right mix of having that MMO touch, having the great survival crafting that you want, and being set in the world of Dune, which is just so hot right now, coming off these two movies that this team, from Conan Exiles to this has really nailed it.

[Snowbike Mike]

Yeah. That's the surprising thing to me, because I was thinking, I was like, why does. Why did this one stick with us? And I think it is the combination of all those elements. But for me, I think really, like, I'm not one to say, you know, you have to have a good property like Doom to make an amazing game.

[Tim Geddes]

Right.

[Snowbike Mike]

Obviously there's an incredible, you know, original things out there that aren't based on anything that are games that are great. But I really do think that being in the Dune universe and how much they nailed it, just the. Not 100% across the board, they kind of were just like, we're just going to give you Dune. We're not going to go so far into it. We're going to let you guys exist in this world. I really think that adds a lot to it. And the game is gorgeous.

[Andy Cortez]

It being this alternate history thing too. Yes. Tim, do you know?

[Tim Geddes]

No, I don't know anything.

[Andy Cortez]

Go.

[Snowbike Mike]

So the, the history, of course, for the first Dune movie, it's Basically takes place right after the new movie. First do movie, I think, and chat Greg, if I'm wrong. But the idea is that Paul Atreides was never born. Instead, Jessica listened to the Bene Gesserit and birthed a daughter who then became a truthsayer, who then saw Dr. Yuhay was like, wait, you're lying. And then so the slaughter of the Harkonnens, like, basically, remember in the first movie, at the very, very end, the Atreides spoilers get completely wiped out. That never happens. And so you are on Iraqi now where, like, there's a lot more politics happening and there's a lot more. The houses are still sort of in play, all of them as well. So it's very, very cool. And it's one of the things that I like most about it is that I feel like I'm existing not in a prequel, which always doesn't do it for me. I just feel like I'm existing this alternate universe where I get to actually, like, be a part of the Dune mythos, which is great. And again, the game is gorgeous. It runs, for the most part, great. And when you're running with the Jabronis, man, it's, it's super fun.

[Andy Cortez]

I, I booted it up last night on Steam Deck. Tried to find some settings. I don't think it looks, you know, particularly great if you want it to run smooth, but it's still totally viable if you were just, I want to do some base building or I want to like, you know, work on this little, small, small part of the game. I wouldn't recommend it if you're trying to do big, major quests or whatever. Yeah, but you can go kill some random encampments or whatever. I, so I, I, I just think that it's, it's so bizarre because so much of my interest and some, so much of, I think the general gaming interest whenever you're playing any sort of video game is ego. Like, yeah, but like, it's, it's just the desert, right? Like, where are the different biomes? Like, that's always like a sticking point for a lot of different games whenever you go, yeah, but they have the snow and they have the jungle. It's like, what else is there going to be in this game? And for this game to just be sand and variations of sand. And now this sand is a bit more red and then this area has, I still think they do a really good job of, of making these areas look more distinct with having these gigantic, like, caverns and rock formations. They do Enough. A good enough job, art direction wise, but it's. It's so crazy to me that I. I'm having just so much fun with the gameplay that you could just have a game set in various desert environments. And I'm still just super stoked to go explore and find more things. These, the larger bases you take down are so much fun and so varied so far. And yeah, I think a lot of it helps that the game is super gorgeous. And when I think of MMOs, obviously my. I think like the most recent MMO I played was like World of Warcraft when we hop back into it. Mike. But classic. You know, it's like these games have obviously advanced quite a bit and now they can look like this and still be a massively multiplayer experience.

[Snowbike Mike]

Look at this. And it's seamless. Right. Also, I just want to point out that Andy really not hitting your parries here. And Mike, what are you doing?

[Andy Cortez]

He was watching.

[Nick Scarpino]

This was when I was teaching Andy and so I was doing a lot of watching, taking a lot of photos as well.

[Snowbike Mike]

This is flash forward to Mike running through the desert naked because he lost all his. One more time.

[Nick Scarpino]

Yeah, there's some really cool threats in the desert as well. Right. There's like, of course, these enemy encampments. And you know, me and Andy will go back and forth on the combat later on. I. I think it's a little bit basic. I wish there was just a little bit more, but they do a really good job at the third person over the shoulder shooting. They have a melee component. They have skills that you'll learn from different classes and aspect that all kind of do a little bit something different. My concern is a little bit later on when you get into the PvP aspect of things, what that combat will really look like after 60 hours. And now three jabronis surrounding you with the sword and you having a tough time really battling back.

[Snowbike Mike]

What's happening here?

[Andy Cortez]

This is me trying to ride my back to safety and I didn't give him permission to sit on the back seat. And the. And the shy halludes coming and Mike's like, run. Mike's like, run. And I'm like, oh my God, Mike got him.

[Nick Scarpino]

The threat of this sand worm here in this giant open world is amazing because each area is connected by just these giant open plots of sand. And that is just where the Sandworm runs.

[Snowbike Mike]

Right.

[Nick Scarpino]

And so your goal as you progress through the world is to go from different zones to different zones, but you have to kind of cross this giant open stretch of land that the Sandworm is going to try to come catch you in. And it is thrilling every time you do it. You can see the meter build up as you're making noise from the music. Yellow to red. And then the Sandworm emerges and lets you know, like, it's going to chase you now. And so it is a really fun game of cat and mouse and will continue to progress with vehicles. Right. There's a buggy to help you craft a little bit easier. There is the thopter that will allow us to fly. And the Sandworm will even find you with that eventually later on. So it's really fun. The threat of the desert, that is just the Sandworm itself.

[Andy Cortez]

It's wild, I think. You know, I don't really have a score for this so far. I would just say that it's a fun game and I recommend people trying it out if they have friends or are into survival games or into multiplayer games. Multiplayer shooters.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

The.

[Andy Cortez]

I think the thing I'm most concerned about and most interested in is how enemy variety could get in the future. Because in Destiny or in a lot of other, you know, third person shooters with universes like that, you could have large monsters that you're shooting or. This kind of reminds me of the. My problems with the division early on where I'm like, yeah, but all the bad guys are just bigger armored bad guys. And in the Dune universe, unless they're taking crazy liberties, you know, I don't think we're gonna fight like a mini shy halluc. We're just gonna be fighting a lot of human enemies. And I am most interested to see in how they can add variety to a human enemy. Because we've already seen higher level human enemies have the little like levitation machine. They will go up and they'll have like moves or whatever. And I just don't know how that progresses and how creative they can get with that because, you know, I still love just doing third person. This is when I lost all my. I died like, right, right before this.

[Snowbike Mike]

I've been there.

[Andy Cortez]

You know what interesting, Nick? I. After the stream ended and it was very, very heartbreaking, I was still watching Mike's stream and. And he was like, that is my fault. Nick dying there is my fault. What was that, Mike?

[Nick Scarpino]

I like to call the worm. And I might have been the first person to cross the desert and I might have done an extra couple of donuts to alert the worm of our location. And so when Andy and Nick went across, they said, how'd the worm get so close to Us so quickly. It was so fast because I already called the worm.

[Andy Cortez]

There are, there are pockets of sand called drum sand. Drum sand. And when you ride over it, it's like.

[Snowbike Mike]

Which weirdly enough, I was like that. I've never heard of that before. And watching the first movie, they have one line where he's crossing. He's like, hey, don't step there. It's drum sand. I'm like, that's it. And there's these massive, massive patches where you go over. It's like it goes. It has like the, the, the thomper or whatever it is. But yeah, Mike, that makes a lot of sense. Yeah, because again, my, my fault for being the, the tail of the human centipede. You don't want to be the tail.

[Andy Cortez]

It was funny.

[Snowbike Mike]

You want to be the front guy.

[Andy Cortez]

Last night, you know, Nick is like, I'm looking at the map, I'm trying to chart my course. I'm like, all right, there's two pockets of drum sand right there. I want to drive right down the middle. So I'm setting a ping for myself and Nick goes, go ahead, Andy. What are you waiting for, man? Go ahead, go drive through it. Like, kind of like giving me. And so I'm driving and suddenly I just see sand pop of like, oh my God, it's here. The shy hallude is here. How the did it get here so fast? And now a lot of things are, you know, we've been called it very, very enlightening.

[Snowbike Mike]

I'm just going to say this, I'm just going to say this. You owe me a sandbag.

[Nick Scarpino]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Snowbike Mike]

I gave you one. I. I went out of my way to pick you up and make you a sandbag. And this is how you do me.

[Nick Scarpino]

This game is not cool is great, Tim. And as Andy said, it's got a great onboarding experience. We brought blessing yesterday as a brand new player and got him caught up. But I think out of this they do a great job of drip feeding you everything you need, nice and slow, at a good pace, where you are learning a lot. But at the same time you, you are still waiting for the next level to unlock X, Y and Z. There's a lot of craftable items on the list that you can get from different fabricators. Of course, there's different ways to get water out of the desert when there is no water around. I think is really fun in the Dune Verse, but on top of that, I mean, all the crafting material they've done a great job at. I'll say this. It's not as boring as just swinging an axe in a picket or an ax in a pickaxe. Yeah, I do like the laser cutters. It's just simply, hey, swipe a tool across super quick, super easy. It never feels like I'm standing at a tree for too long. Yeah, I think they've done a good job for that.

[Andy Cortez]

But then scan like a big ass pile of rock. And when you scan will sort of like 3D sort of readout and then it shows a randomized blue line that you can track to get the best. It's like the vein the most amount of. Oh, what is this?

[Snowbike Mike]

Oh, this is the flower sand.

[Andy Cortez]

Oh, interesting. Oh, this is where. Yeah, you led me out to the. To go get that item, Nick. And I was like, I think we're attracting the worm, Nick. And he was like, no, we should be good. And things were in the wrong way. Things. Why are you running away? I'm running to the shore. And then I was like, oh my God, my bike. And. And then the shy hallude.

[Snowbike Mike]

You know, you're screwed when the camera starts pulling out and you're like, I.

[Andy Cortez]

Gave back the desert. I lost so much there.

[Snowbike Mike]

I also, yeah, I want to point out that I think that's. That's incredibly important. Right. It's like there's little tiny touches with those guns. Like that gun doesn't just serve that purpose or rather the cutting tool. You get onto these ships and you're also can weld through doors to get to like secret passages and stuff like that. So those little tiny mechanics I think really go a long way to keeping the gameplay interesting. The little levitation belts that you can get, the little things that kind of change, tiny little ways you can traverse or mindful resources that keep you wanting to interact with that. And I think yesterday was such a blast. Cuz at first I was a little hesitant. I was like, hot. Blessing is going to be behind us. I don't know what that's going to be. And then it just turned out that for two hours I just, they were off doing stuff and I'm like, blessing, let me just build you a home.

[Andy Cortez]

Let me just get in my backseat. I'm like, let's go over there. Bless. And the whole time I look at at Nick's, you know, perspective and he was like, bless. Can you give me permissions to build your house or like give you. And then we'd get back and Nick is like, yeah, I'm looking at the, the foyer up here.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Yeah, like literally Playing like, two different, like, TV episodes.

[Andy Cortez]

A pod, B block.

[Snowbike Mike]

Yeah. But honestly, I think. I think that one of the reasons why I love that is because the building mechanic is very streamlined and it's very. It's very good. Like, I remember playing Valheim or Valheim or Icarus, and you'd get to that point where, like, God, I really want this wall to just go where it's supposed to go. And that sounds stupid. Like, such a minor critique, but when you have to build your base and when you want to. When you go and say, I want to enjoy this thing, you don't want the tools to get in the way of that experience. And I think that they do such a good job. And also, let's have a conversation about this jabroni right here. You see that guy's house right there? That dude needs to move. Okay. He doesn't need to be in our neighborhood anymore. Move to the Beverly Hills of Iraqi or whatever. This guy's got, like, materials I've never seen before. He's got this, like, cool. That shield wall that I haven't even gotten yet. We need it.

[Andy Cortez]

That's where the ornithopter lands.

[Snowbike Mike]

He just goes through it.

[Andy Cortez]

There's nothing.

[Snowbike Mike]

There's a dude that made literally all four of his walls out of that. So the ornithopter can just land and get out.

[Andy Cortez]

Nobody will flex harder on you than a dude with an ornithopter because, like.

[Nick Scarpino]

They fly over you.

[Andy Cortez]

You walk out of your house and you just. And you see, like, a dude, like, land little helipad. I'm like, man, this guy.

[Nick Scarpino]

Like, dude, it's zone two. Like, go to zone four.

[Andy Cortez]

What are you doing?

[Nick Scarpino]

Know where you're supposed to be?

[Andy Cortez]

Get that out of there.

[Nick Scarpino]

Yeah, I like the base building, Nick. I'm going to give the base building a 9 out of 10. I think it's missing just a little bit of features on that. Out of play. It. I love that it vacuum sucks. Everything in the building that you can use on crafting right away. That's cool.

[Snowbike Mike]

That's great.

[Andy Cortez]

For a team who has no idea what that means.

[Nick Scarpino]

Yeah.

[Andy Cortez]

The. So many survival crafting games, you. You put stuff into an ore refinery or whatever. And because you're trying to get chest ingots, ironing, it's out of the iron ore that you made or whatever. And then when you go to craft something, it says you don't have those. You go, oh, they're in my box. Or they're still in the machine or whatever. The. This Game knows that it's within your household. So it just sort of pulls all that stuff. And it's so convenient to not have to take it out of the machine and have it in your bag or have it on your person. You could just kind of build from there and it really. It's so convenient. It's really.

[Nick Scarpino]

I just wish it had. What was the one that we used to be able to. You would put up everything that you want in, like the light green and then you can just instantly tap what you want. Like it has that, but it's not.

[Andy Cortez]

That was Nightingale.

[Nick Scarpino]

Yeah. I like when I can just say I want it all done now because there's like pre making it. And you can start seeing the layout in the blueprint mode. And then there was one where it's just like you got it all blueprint out. Hit the button. It will do it.

[Tim Geddes]

All right.

[Andy Cortez]

It was, yeah, like that Nightingale allowed you to build the whole house just blueprint wise. And then when you had all of the resources, you could just hit click and it would just, I would say, sort of pop in.

[Snowbike Mike]

That is one of my only, like pain points with it though was the blueprint, like the house blueprint mechanic, which I was like, oh, this is going to be really cool. This would be really easy way like move your house. And I just found that to be completely frustrating. And I don't even bother using it anymore, which I'm sure it's a main mechanic for moving shit. And I'm like, I would just rather grind resources and rebuild in the next level then try to figure this out. Alternatively, the bike clone tool, where you can suck your bike into a gun is very, very useful.

[Nick Scarpino]

Yeah. Like that is right.

[Andy Cortez]

Do you like my floor lights?

[Tim Geddes]

See? Oh, I know you guys were really big on these floors. Yeah.

[Andy Cortez]

Really big on the floor lights.

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Yeah.

[Andy Cortez]

I mean, they just.

[Tim Geddes]

By the way, these goddamn tariffs. They're hitting hue lights. It's bad. It's real bad. He was already insanely expensive. And yeah. Starting in like first week of July, no one's buying Hugh ever again. No, it's outrageous. They literally just came forward. They're like, hey, it's because the tariffs deal with it. It's like, oh, no.

[Andy Cortez]

Oh, man.

[Tim Geddes]

Give me a much less colorful world.

[Nick Scarpino]

Oh.

[Andy Cortez]

One thing I do want to say before we hop onto the stream is that I'm excited for Nick to walk into his house and maybe open up a little present that I love for him.

[Snowbike Mike]

Thank you, Andy.

[Andy Cortez]

Wow. There's a. You know, last night was very heartbreaking at the end of the night could.

[Nick Scarpino]

Have been the end.

[Andy Cortez]

There have been several moments whenever one of us is close to dying and we go, I may have quit right then and there if I lost all of my stuff. And last night I felt like that the breaking point with Nick going I'm so fucking mad and Mike are cackling.

[Nick Scarpino]

I laughed so hard I thought I was going to get sick again. That kind of shit.

[Snowbike Mike]

Because it just couldn't have been a more perfect Eddie. But I will say that one of the things that I think the, the. The ease with which you guys can jump in with me. The ease with we can join a party and get in the clan and are not clan. Excuse me, the. What do we call it? Gangs.

[Andy Cortez]

Oh, the Guild.

[Snowbike Mike]

The Guild. Thank you. All of that really is a saving grace.

[Tim Geddes]

Right.

[Snowbike Mike]

And so I don't know if you're. If you're, if you're planning on playing the single player and you lose all your stuff, you're probably gonna rage quit. But the fact that I do have these two jabronis here that can like when Mike needed a pickup, we can go, you can run them another bike real quick. That really goes a long way. I do. I love the skill check. Not the skill check but I love the accountability of the shyloot. I love that there is that thing out there but fuck me, I wish there was just like one like Mulligan just give me a gimme with last night. Just let me have my shit back.

[Andy Cortez]

Shy Hulloud Shai Hulud man, I love the threat.

[Tim Geddes]

We have a super chat from Arturo Tron saying I love the use of ludonarrative storytelling. The mechanics of the game tell the story of Dune. And have you noticed that Nick?

[Snowbike Mike]

The mechanics of the game tell the stories. I don't. I'm. I'm a little lost in what that means.

[Tim Geddes]

Like through the mechanics of using the guns or the outfits they would. I. I don't know because I don't.

[Snowbike Mike]

Know if you're learning the story of doing but you are learning a lot of the, the minor sort of world building aspects of it. Right. Like for instance, you've seen this with shields. There's a reason why. You know, I don't think they really explicitly say it. I think eventually you do get lase guns.

[Andy Cortez]

Yeah.

[Snowbike Mike]

But right now you have dark. Everything is dark based and it's very, very. It's cool. And those are. There are those lines where they, you know, they talk about that in the beginning of Doom where it's like you Know, nobody uses lasers. Blessing. Because the shield. The Holtzman shield generators are on people's bodies. If a laser hits, it makes, like, a nuclear explosion, basically. So everyone's just across the board, but, like, no lasers. Unless you're a starter car.

[Andy Cortez]

Yeah. It uses the. The world lore to sort of influence what the gameplay is where.

[Snowbike Mike]

Right.

[Andy Cortez]

If you have a weapon and somebody is running at you, and they are. They have that little blue shield. You can't slash at him. You have to parry. And if you parry, it stuns them. And then you have to hold slow left click attack. And it's that stab and you burst through their shield or whatever. So I. Yeah, I do think there are cool things that are implemented in that way along with your own. The. Remember the beginning of Dune 2, that amazing shot where the Harkonnen are levitating over. So you have those sort of levitating sort of suits as well. But those things call the worm like crazy. So you. If you're running in the open sand, do not use that. Because it's. Essentially.

[Snowbike Mike]

That's why Mike got.

[Andy Cortez]

Yeah, it's probably why the worm came faster to. To Mike in that moment when I was trying to save him. When you're using that, it's like, okay, got it. It's like having a thumper on the sand or whatever. So, like, there are a lot of things like that that influence the game design. And I think they get really creative with kind of implementing things from the Dune lore into the. The game design.

[Snowbike Mike]

Yeah. And I'll say also, I. I think a lot of the side missions and stuff like that is where you're getting the lore for what this Dune is. Right. Like, we're. I'm not gonna say all of us are House Atreides, because some of us, our allegiances vary. I guess Mike as well is how I'll put that.

[Nick Scarpino]

I mean, I'm open for money. You know what I mean? I'm here for any gold that anyone will pay me. It's cool. Like I said, the questing is really fun. They got House of Tradies in there. They got the Harkonnen. You get to choose a side. Just like Hoarding Alliance. There are off sites, just random guilds around the world that you can meet, you can talk to. There are class trainers around that will help you elevate your skill trees. There are merchants at all of these different town centers that all have bounties and different jobs for you to do. So there's always a carrot at the end of the stick. To just keep going after and keep running towards, which is really, really nice in a game like this.

[Andy Cortez]

Shout out to Fart in the bag.

[Nick Scarpino]

And, dude, I'm making friends, Tim. I'm making friends.

[Andy Cortez]

Guy walked up to me and was like, hey, man, there's prox chat, you know? And I'm, like, on my bike, waiting to cross, and I see shy head lud, like, kind of close by. So I'm like, I'll wait for him to kind of go away. Guy walks up to me. He's like, hey, man, do you want to go fight that worm? And I was like, mike, I don't have my mic on, but come talk to this guy. All right? Oh, who. Who is he?

[Blessing Adioye Junior]

Where?

[Andy Cortez]

Yeah, I'm right next to you. All right. And I just hear, like, from far away, like, yo, what's going on, homie? How's it going, man? What y' all doing out here? Fart in the Bag. Oh, hell, yeah. That's his username.

[Tim Geddes]

Farting back.

[Andy Cortez]

Add me. Add me, big dog. Add me. Yeah, Add me. We go run some quests, whatever you're doing out there. Also, add my friend, Nitro Rifle. He's. He's my. He's my homie. You know, we're looking to game with people, and Mike's just, like, being the most ultimate annoying human being, and then just the best. And then I drive away. So I only hear him talking to the guy. I don't hear the guy responding, but I just hear like, so what should I call you? Big Fart or Fart? Fart. Fart in the Bag. What I call you? And then. And then he says, all right, all right, homie. I gotta go. Remember, let the spice flow. I'm Audi. Why do you have an outro?

[Nick Scarpino]

I'm gonna get people to start saying it in the game. Start my own group, homie.

[Andy Cortez]

Here's the thing. My homie over there, Nitro Rifle, Twitch tv, Andy Cortez, he's the next big guy. Like, he's. He's. He's next up right now. I promise you, dog. And then I'm looking at. And I'm like, oh, God, I'm not even streaming right now. But then I. Mike's like, did he follow you? I was like, no, not yet. And then I see Fart in the Bag followed you. I was like, oh, my God, he followed me, Mike. And Mike's like, I'm gonna gift him some subs.

[Tim Geddes]

Shout out to Fart in the back.

[Nick Scarpino]

Fart in the back.

[Tim Geddes]

Let's the spice flow.

[Andy Cortez]

Let the spice flow. We Audi. That's how we're going to end the podcast.

[Tim Geddes]

God bless you, Mike. Well, this has been the kind of funny games cast. Thank you so much for joining us today. The boys are about to drop into Arrakis to to stream the game that we just talked about. But until next time, let the flow.

[Andy Cortez]

I'm outtie.

[Tim Geddes]

Yeah, bye.

[Nick Scarpino]

So stupid.