Xbox Developer_Direct Live Reaction & Review - Kinda Funny Gamescast

Summary

Kinda Funny Gamescast

Episode: Xbox Developer_Direct Live Reaction & Review
Date: January 22, 2026
Hosts: Greg Miller, Blessing Adeoye Jr., Paris Lilly, Snowbike Mike, Gary Whitta, Andy Cortez

---

Episode Overview

This episode is a live reaction and review of the 2026 Xbox Developer_Direct, where the crew breaks down the four big games showcased: Forza Horizon 6, Beast of Reincarnation, Kiln, and Fable. The team discusses their excitement, critiques, and overall impressions, rating the Developer_Direct, and delving deep into what each game brings to the Xbox ecosystem.

---

Key Discussion Points and Insights

Developer_Direct: General Impressions

• All hosts agreed this was Xbox’s best Developer_Direct to date.
• Focus was on solid gameplay showcases, meaningful announcements, and transparency about release windows for all titles.
• The mood was celebratory, calling it a "tone setter for the year" for Xbox’s 25th anniversary.

[06:43] Snowbike Mike:
"This is their best one. They had dates to everything, or at least timeframes. I'll give it a nice nine: amazing."

What Could Have Been Better

• Firmer release dates, particularly for Fable and Beast of Reincarnation, would have elevated the Direct to a perfect 10.
• Some worry about second-half-of-the-year “jam-packing” from Xbox.

---

Host-by-Host Scores and Key Takes

• Snowbike Mike: 9/10 – Would've been a 10 with firmer release dates.
• Paris Lilly: 9/10 – Impressed by clarity, pacing, and game quality.
• Gary Whitta: No number score, but called the vibe “very good” and the strongest lineup thus far (“I would play all four of these games in what order, there wasn't anything that didn't interest me at all. For me personally, Fable’s the headline.” [08:54])
• Blessing Adeoye Jr.: No number, but “fantastic,” most excited he’s been for an Xbox year in a long time.
• Andy Cortez: 8/10 – “Kiln” was a little less exciting for him, but everything else looked strong.
• Greg Miller: 9/10 – Fable segment was “10/10,” slightly held back by lack of a hard date.

---

Game-By-Game Reactions & Deep Dives

Fable – The Standout Headliner

(Primary discussion: [17:42]–[34:24])

• General Excitement:

  • Fable is the clear highlight, with hosts expressing relief that Playground Games "gets" what makes a Fable game.
  • Greg and Blessing compare its potential to be an industry GOTY contender alongside GTA 6.

  Blessing [12:19]:
  “This is the first game so far this year that I feel like could go up against GTA 6 as far as critical conversation and game of the year conversation.”

• Key Features Noted:

  • Living, reactive world with a thousand+ unique NPCs.
  • Morality/reputation is based on actions witnessed by others, rather than a simple “good/evil” slider.
  • Social simulation: job systems, marriage, family, people reacting to player actions in meaningful, granular ways.
  • Signature Fable British humor present.

  Gary [09:20]:
  “The only thing that I didn't see them show, a lot of which is a key part of Fable, is the comedy. We know that's going to be there… that acerbic, British humor.”

• Concerns Raised:

  • Will the NPC routines and social systems be surface-level or deep/diverse enough?
  • Morality and reputation: will they feel more nuanced or become repetitive/shallow?

  Greg [28:15]:
  “I do think it will be shallow. Obviously. A thousand people, they're saying the things. I'm sure people are gonna say the same stuff... I'm sure I'm gonna hear 'I'm a knob' a million times as I walk through based on some decision.”

• Performance/Technical Notes:

  • Concern that the console version will run at 30fps, while PC can offer higher performance.

• Playground Games’ Reputation:

  • Multiple hosts voiced trust in Playground, now carrying two flagship franchises (Fable, Forza) for Xbox.
  • Discussion about Playground potentially becoming Xbox’s most important studio if Fable lands successfully.

  Gary [31:43]:
  “They’re already carrying two of their biggest franchises on their shoulders at one developer. That’s a heavy boat.”

---

Forza Horizon 6 – Dream Destination and Shared Experiences

(Primary discussion: [34:24]–[49:04])

• Setting:

  • Game is set in Japan, a long-requested destination. Features the largest cityscape ever in Forza Horizon, with massive Tokyo city areas and countryside.
  • The city will offer exciting night races, cherry blossoms, iconic drifting, and opportunities to “get lost in Tokyo.”

  Gary [09:55]:
  “I wanted the urban, I wanted the Tokyo Drift vibes. Right. I want to, like, scream through Akihabara and do all that kind of stuff. ... It’s exactly what I wanted.”

• Major Features:

  • 550+ cars at launch.
  • New shared player garages and “estate” base-building feature, giving players a customizable headquarters.
  • Ability to visit friends’ estates, showcase cars, and collaborate on content creation and race tracks (up to 8 players co-create).
  • Social “meetups” for car shows, possibly even betting pink slips (desired by hosts).

  Snowbike Mike [39:02]:
  “When you play Forza, it’s all about showing Paris, my best friend, this cool car I got or Gary, this new paint job that I put on the Warthog. ... Now it’s like, hey, let’s share this experience together. I’ll go to your garage. You come to my garage. Let’s show you the 10 cars.”

• Special Content:

  • Hints of crossover races featuring mechs (potentially Gundam) and other themed showdowns.
  • User-generated content remains a major pillar, now even more accessible/social.

• Concerns:

  • Early game could feel overwhelming, with too many concurrent objectives and distractions.
  • Some debate over how deep the estate-building and social features will be.

• Game of the Year Debate:

  • Hosts believe this could be a GOTY nominee, but skepticism remains around racing/sports games winning top honors.

---

Beast of Reincarnation – Game Freak’s Non-Pokémon Leap

(Primary discussion: [49:04]–[66:16])

• Overview:

  • Game Freak steps out of Pokémon to deliver an original action-RPG: “one person, one dog.”
  • Blends real-time katana combat (Emma) and tactical commands (Ku the dog), with a parry-and-spend system.

  Blessing [54:19]:
  “I'm excited for this game in the way that this game seems like a combination of so many games that I like and so many types of games that I like. ... For some reason, I'm still cautiously optimistic as opposed to pure optimistic.”

• Combat System:

  • Not a “Soulslike,” but rather an action-RPG that allows pauses/command-based skills, compared to Final Fantasy 7 Remake's hybrid system.
  • Adjustable difficulty levels (including a forgiving story mode) makes the game approachable.

  Andy Cortez [56:05]:
  “All the abilities that you could kind of do with the dog and like, the freezing of time… If they can kind of replicate [FF7 Remake’s combat] in a really neat way, I think they have a hit on their hands.”

• Setting/Style:

  • Stylized visuals; boss fights and world design are unique, though some think it could blend in with other recent action RPGs.
  • Story is a concern — some worry it may lack narrative depth compared to its stylish gameplay.

  Blessing [59:26]:
  “I think I'm worried about story. That's where I'm like, very cautious because I have Stellar Blade... I need to hear a hook, right?”

• Noteworthy Meta-Discussion:

  • Reflection on how different it looks compared to “assembly line” Pokémon releases, and a celebration of creative freedom for Game Freak.
  • Some worry it could get lost in an increasingly saturated action RPG field.

---

Kiln – Double Fine Gets Weird

(Primary discussion: [68:38]–[79:06])

• Premise:

  • Online 4v4 multiplayer party brawler themed around pottery, creative mode lets you design your own pottery for combat.

  Snowbike Mike [69:10]:
  “Love a good multiplayer game. ... I think this is a fun, unique, weird, wacky idea that Double Fine gets to do, right?”

• Unique Elements:

  • Pot shapes impact gameplay (health/capacity inverse), 24+ special attacks based on pottery design.
  • Built out of Double Fine’s “Amnesia Fortnite” internal game jam, exemplifying their experimental spirit.
  • Focus on creative expression over competitive meta; hosts compare to games like Fat Princess, Gang Beasts, and Splatoon.

• Business Perspective:

  • Acknowledgment this isn’t a “massive” title, but perfect for Game Pass and an example of Xbox supporting experimental, lower-budget projects within their studios.

  Mike [70:51]:
  “This isn’t going to sell. ... People are going to play this twice and they’re never going to want this. ... But this is a great game to add on to Game Pass. It’s fun for a night, or two nights with friends.”

• Industry Commentary:

  • Hosts reflect on how rare it is for Microsoft to give studios like Double Fine room to make these offbeat games (“keep Double Fine alive” sentiment).
  • Confirmation that all four games, including Kiln, will have PlayStation releases, except Forza (coming later).

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Blessing on Fable’s Potential [12:19]:
  "This is the first game so far this year that I feel like could go up against GTA 6 as far as critical conversation and game of the year."

• Gary Whitta’s Rant on Audience Feedback [66:24]:
  "First of all, go fuck yourself. I was playing and analyzing and reviewing video games and computer games before you were a fucking itch in your daddy’s pants. ... Secondly, can anyone point to any point at all in this—point where I've done anything to shit on PlayStation?"

• Snowbike Mike on Double Fine’s Value [73:10]:
  "I love that they're able to do that. Right. ... The leeway that Phil and Xbox and Microsoft has given Tim and his team. ... That's really great that we've been able to say that on the X cast for years now: man, that's wild they do that.”

• Greg on Fable's Player Agency [16:13]:
  "That's what I'm always talking about wanting out of my RPG's—choices, consequence, recognize what I'm doing, give me things that make my playthrough incredibly different than Andy's, incredibly different than Gary's.”

• Gary on Xbox's Maturity [83:11]:
  “Good to be here on a day when the Xbox vibes are on. ... This is a strong showing.”

---

Timestamps for Significant Segments

• [06:34] – First roundtable: Initial review scores
• [17:42-34:24] – Fable deep dive; discussion of reputation, living world, humor
• [34:24-49:04] – Forza Horizon 6 reaction: Japan location, base-building, car culture
• [49:04-66:16] – Beast of Reincarnation: combat mechanics, art style, Game Freak discussion
• [68:38-79:06] – Kiln: Double Fine’s creative party brawler, business context, creative freedom

---

Themes and Tone

• The mood is upbeat, humorous, and riotously conversational—classic Kinda Funny energy.
• Celebratory of Xbox finally “getting it right” and giving its studios room to explore.
• Frequent jokes targeting each other and their chat (British humor, “read a book,” etc.).
• Refreshing candor about Xbox’s past stumbles and the importance of a strong 25th anniversary year.

---

Final Thoughts

• Xbox delivered a Developer_Direct celebrated as its strongest yet, with all four games showcasing a diverse and promising future.
• Fable’s new vision resonates strongly with the hosts, with broad interest and high hopes.
• Forza Horizon 6 is marked as a long-awaited destination for the franchise, deepening its social and creative aspects.
• Game Freak’s Beast of Reincarnation is a curiosity, enthusiastically received but facing skepticism about running against a crowded genre.
• Kiln stands as a quirky, creative outlier, showing Xbox is willing to support wild experiments.
• The episode ends with excitement for the year ahead, and anticipation for hands-on opportunities and more information at the next big events (such as Summer Game Fest).

---

This summary captures the in-depth analysis, humor, and camaraderie of the Kinda Funny crew as they break down Xbox’s 2026 Developer_Direct—an episode sure to excite anyone invested in gaming’s future, even if they missed the live show.

Transcript

[A]

Refreshing Wild Cherry Cola meets Smooth cream. The treat you deserve. Pepsi Wild Cherry and Cream Treat yourself.

[B]

Are you dreaming of the perfect prom?

[A]

But there's just one thing holding you back. Speak English, Mom. Welcome to Ethnosync Ethnic Modification.

[C]

What is this place?

[A]

We help you reach your true potential.

[D]

How are you feeling? It's good to be Hawaii.

[E]

Hey, new girl.

[B]

Hey.

[A]

Look at what you've done to yourself.

[E]

For a new plant to grow, the

[B]

seed has to die.

[C]

Slanted Rated R. Only in theaters March 13th.

[A]

Side effects may occur. Close your eyes. Exhale. Feel your body relax. And let go of whatever you're carrying today. Well, I'm letting go of the worry

[C]

that I wouldn't get my new contacts

[A]

in time for this class.

[C]

I got them delivered free from 1-800-contacts.

[F]

Oh my gosh.

[C]

They're so fast.

[A]

And breathe. Oh, sorry. I almost couldn't breathe when I saw the discount they gave me on my first order. Oh, sorry.

[C]

Namaste. Visit 1-800-contacts.com today to save on your first order.

[E]

1-800-contacts.

[B]

It's not just something you made. It's the privilege that you get to

[A]

work with your hands.

[B]

It's building something that serves a purpose. Proof that you have the grit to keep going.

[A]

At Timberland, we understand you take your craft seriously.

[B]

And we do too. Which is why our products are built to the highest quality.

[F]

We put in the work so you

[B]

can perfect yours with purpose, in every detail, and crafted with intention. Timberland Built on craft. Visit timberland.com to shop, go to boot.dev and use code kinda funny to get 25% off your first year on the annual plan. If you want to get our shows ad free and our exclusive shows go to patreon.com kindafunny.

[A]

What's up everybody? Welcome to the Kinda Funny Games cast for Thursday January 22, 2026. I'm one of your hosts, Greg Miller alongside Forbes 30 under 30 aka New York Game Awards nominated aka Xbox Poppy Blessing. Adio. Yay Junior. Good day, Greg.

[F]

Why are you calling me Xbox Poppy?

[A]

Well, you know, because it was an Xbox show where we're doing right now. Yeah, okay, no problem. Of course. Next to you, one of the former hosts of the kind of funny X cast, the best voice in the business, Paris Lily.

[D]

I'm going to Japan.

[A]

Yeah, I'm. I'm sure you all going there. I'm more excited to go to Albion, but we'll talk about that in a second. Next to him, the master of hype, Snowbike Mike.

[B]

Hi Greg. Good Afternoon fun time. Fun time.

[C]

I can't wait for you in Paris to start posting those pictures from Japan when Microsoft sends you out there and fucking leaves me at home.

[A]

Mike's other gaming dad, the rogue one at Gary Witter.

[C]

Hello sir. Thanks for having me.

[A]

Thanks for having me. Thanks for coming out.

[C]

I mean obviously it's good to be back with my ex froze.

[A]

Sure, sure. Everybody in person. This is huge. And of course he's a Hispanic heartthrob. Texas street Latino heat. Clicking heads and ripping them to shreds. The globe shot and head shot and three point shooting. Rootin Tootin Nitro rifle from Twitch tv. Andy Cortez.

[D]

Ghostburs go.

[A]

Ghost spurs go. Are those Gary's spurs?

[E]

The we can say both.

[C]

You can also say ghost spurs, just different spurs.

[A]

If you are catching this later, maybe not live because we are live on YouTube.com kindafunnygames twitch tv kindafunnygames. We just watched and live reacted to the Xbox developer direct for January 22nd. Now it's time to dive into each one of these four games, talk about what we liked, what we loved, what we didn't like and of course rate the overall experience. If you are live YouTube.com kindafunnygames you can super chat to be part of the show. Give me your thoughts on what you saw, what you liked, what you didn't like. What about dates? Of course, if you are listening or watching later, we will be doing your hot takes about Xbox tomorrow. So Roger will be putting up social media posts everywhere. You can comment on those and say, hey, this is what I thought. We'll pull in the show tomorrow, have a great time. Maybe you go to Patreon where I'll put up a free quip though and you could do it there. You know what I mean? Like the quips I'm quipping right over on Patreon, get a free membership, come over, be part of the condo Feudi surveys, be part of the hot takes. It's great. Also thank you on patreon.com kindafunny to our patreon producers, Carl Jacobs, Omega Buster and Delaney the Psalm twining For now, let's begin with what is and forever will be topic of the show.

[C]

Wow, that's my first time seeing that. Yeah, yeah, that's cool.

[A]

Thank you. Thank you very much. I'm glad you finally watched the show.

[F]

He's never seen the show.

[A]

He's a listener.

[F]

It's been like that for two years.

[A]

It was similar when the ad was running.

[B]

I was like, Gary look at your ad. He's like, oh, that's not.

[A]

We would do it.

[C]

You said you would run it. But I, you know, I believe it when I see it. I believe it. Thank you.

[A]

We just saw the Xbox developer Direct. We just saw Forza Horizon 6. We just saw Beast of Reincarnation. We just saw Kiln and we just saw Fable. Mike, I feel like you got it. You got to kick me off here. All right, Mr. Xbox.

[B]

Yeah, Greg. What a great way to start off the year. Xbox and the Xbox on a sword. Direct really delivered. The big three games that we knew about beforehand all looked great. And then of course, Double fine being double fine Xbox. Microsoft continuing to let Tim Schaefer and that team just create really whatever the hell they want from Keeper to this. They just let that team continue to have fun and they put out fun games and fun products, which is great. But I mean, man, oh man, I mean, we'll kick it off with Forza. We'll keep it easy. I'll save the best for last.

[A]

We're going to go game by game.

[B]

I know, but I'll just quickly hit on it.

[A]

All right.

[B]

Forza looked great out in Japan. The dream location that we've all wanted. The stunning vistas, the awesome cars, the sound and audio design all the way to what I am very excited for. The five times the largest cityscape that they've ever had. Right. That is what I want to get lost in in Tokyo. I am so pumped up for that. Then over to Game Freak and Beast and Reincarnation. Looks great. I'm excited to play a fun action game. I'm excited to see what Game Freak does outside the Pokemon world. See what they got. Fable Playground games. You delivered. Everybody has been sitting on pins and needles waiting to know do they got it? Can they deliver? And you made Fable look great. And I can't wait to play that game. Great. Xbox Underscore Direct.

[A]

That's where I want to go on the kind of funny review scale. Operating on our patented 20 point review scale. Where would you put this Xbox developer direct?

[B]

I mean, this is their best one.

[A]

Whoa.

[B]

You know what I mean? They had dates to everything, or at least time frames of everything. Everything this year that we all knew. I'll give it a nice nine. Give it. Amazing.

[A]

What do you think could have taken it to a 10 in your opinion?

[B]

Having a firmer date for Fable? I like autumn. I appreciate that, but always things slip, you get a little worried. I would have liked to seen Fable in the front half. I think Xbox Has a lot of games. Usually the front half kind of gets ignored and we jam a lot into the second half. But there is a lot coming in the front half, more games that we'll have to talk about if you really look at the big picture. But that game freak of course saying summer when Summer. You're going to reannounce it some other time. But yeah, some firmer dates would have been nicer.

[A]

Paris, as a member of the X cast, you should go next.

[D]

Are we doing a game by game or you want me to run it

[A]

all the way down?

[F]

I want.

[A]

This is our overview of what we thought overall and then I want your over your score as well.

[D]

I thought this was a great dev direct, arguably the best one that they've had because it just really comes down to the games themselves. Force Horizon 6 looks fantastic. Beast of Reincarnation, which I didn't know what to expect from it. But when we finally got to see it, I go this is something I definitely want to play. Fable. I mean it just almost goes without saying at this point. Long awaited but highly anticipated. I'm kind of with Mike. I wish they were a little firmer on the date, but autumn is kind of what I expected up in that range. But I have to admit the double fine game, as much as, as cool as it looked and I loved it's a double fine ass game. It's what you want from that studio. I hope enough people give it a chance and try it because that'll be the biggest thing about it being a multiplayer game. Having enough of your friends and having enough people wanting to jump in and play. Overall, I give it a nine out of ten.

[A]

Nine out of ten. Okay, Gary, round out this xcast. Where are you reviewing this one? What's your overall thought on the developer direction?

[C]

I thought it was, I thought it was very strong. You know, we always talk about like the, you know, the other vibes on or are they off. The vibe check I think is very. Is very good. Those are. I mean I would play all four of those games in what, you know, this is a question like what order. There wasn't anything there that was like, oh, that doesn't interest me at all.

[E]

Right.

[C]

It's all, it's all good. I think for me personally Fable's the headline. You know, I historically I'm an Xbox guy, you know, I remember I played the original Fable a lot, A lot, a lot. And actually went back and played the remastered version of it not long ago. Just kind of like, yeah, I booted Anniversary. Yeah, It's. It's. It's still a great game and it looks like they're keeping the spirit of it alive. The only thing that I didn't see them show, a lot of which is a key part of Fable, is the comedy. And I think that we know that's going to be there.

[A]

Right.

[C]

That that's going to be a big part of it. And that's something that's not necessarily easy to show in a trailer. But I think, you know, you'd like Rich Twat and stuff. Like, clearly that voice is still there. Right. There's going to be that acerbic kind of very British humor type voice. And I think that's. That's important. Looks beautiful. Looks great. I think the. The red pills in the chat were happy to see you can play as a man. What's your overall well done to them? I don't like. I think that's reductive. I don't like putting numbers on things. Forza. Fantastic. It's pretty much exactly what I thought it was going to be. But that's a compliment. That's what I wanted it to be.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

I wanted. I. I wanted the urban. I wanted to Tokyo Drift vibes. Right. I want to. I want to like you scream through Akihabara and do all that kind of stuff. It feels like it looks beautiful. It's exactly. That's the most known quantity of all these things.

[D]

Right.

[C]

We kind of know what, you know,

[A]

Force is gonna be amazing.

[C]

The fort's a formula here. The thing that stood out is really exciting is the base building. I want to know to what extent that is going to be something you can really get your teeth into. That's like, you know, it's like about doing Awakening earlier. That's a game where I just. I very rarely went out into the world and did things. I just. I liked to kind of nest. You want to nest?

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

And like build your base and have it set up just the way you want. So I'd be very interested to see like it looked like maybe they showed you that massive like open field that you could build into. It looks like you can build like a really big complex.

[E]

Yeah. Right.

[C]

And I think that'll be. That'll be fun to see. To what extent can you hang around there? What things can you do? Beast of Reincarnation, probably. Oh, no. I think you wanted. You wanted the overview.

[A]

Yeah, but you already given me. You don't have a score. But you like the thing you did.

[C]

Yeah, I liked it. I wouldn't get into it specifically.

[A]

I like that blessing. What'd you think?

[F]

That was fantastic. I think this was the best Xbox developer direct. I'm somebody who, you know, I feel like when it comes to Xbox overall, I feel like I'm lower than the last few years compared to other people as far as like even last year, I look at the games that we got, I'm kind of like, all right, it was fine, it was whatever, right? I love Keeper, but some of the other games didn't hit as hard. For me, this is the highest I felt looking forward to an Xbox year where we're talking about Forza Horizon, of course, going to Tokyo, all the stuff they showed me, it's, you know, an interesting place where I've loved Forza Horizons as Forza Horizon 3. I play it religiously when it comes out. I'm fucking obsessed with Forza Horizon. And so when you show me a showcase that is, hey, here's more of this thing that you love. Part of it feels like going back to a Michelin starred restaurant that I.

[A]

What's the new menu?

[F]

Yeah, and it's like, all right, here's how we update the menu. And somehow, somehow they excited me again. Like the, the complex, like, you know, hearing how they've expanded, like, hey, this is how big the cityscape is. All that shit really worked for me here. The cherry blossoms. I'm like, all right, cool.

[B]

Yeah, Damn.

[E]

Denny's just getting a hobbit menu. Like, whoa.

[B]

Yeah, exactly.

[F]

Yeah, that's kind of what it feels like.

[A]

Five star Michelin restaurant, Denny's.

[E]

Really exciting.

[D]

And 550 cars at launch.

[A]

Yeah. Plus they said, very impressive.

[F]

Yeah. And so, yeah, to do. To do the thing of taking Forza Horizon and finding a way to, to excite me even more for this thing that I'm already like, hey, I'm. I'm showing up either way. Good on you, Fable. I mean like I have a mild take, medium take in a hot take on Fable. My hot take being that in the same way that like, actually, I won't

[D]

put it like that.

[F]

The way I'll put it is that this is the first game so far this year that I feel like could go up against GTA 6 as far as critical conversation and game of the year conversation.

[A]

What they just showed, if they can deliver on that vision, that is a game of the year contender in the

[F]

way that in 2013, the last of us was the game to be like, all right, hey, this is the game of the year contender in contention with GTA 5. Babel, looks like the first game where I'm genuinely like, yo, yeah. If that delivers the way that it. That they're presenting it, that could be an Alzheimer, right. Of an RPG that has given me all the things that I want. We'll get to that later. Beast of Reincarnation looks great. I think my one. My one caveat with it is that, like, it kind of gives me a bit of the things that I already got in Stellar Blade. And it does look a bit more fresh, a bit more unique in certain ways than Stellar Blade. But even still, I'm looking at it and I'm like, man, this is gonna be tough. In the same year that I'm getting a Phantom Blade zero. But some of the turn based. I don't even know if term makes is the right word. But, like, the pause menu stuff in the combat looks fun, looks interesting. And so I want to see more of that blessing.

[D]

You're getting Brad.

[F]

I am getting Brad. Getting my guy Brad. And then Kiln. I mean, like, I. I love. And this is something that we ask for all the time. As people who play video games, we always ask for new and fresh ideas. We ask for new ip, we ask for games that are smaller, that don't feel like they have to be the biggest thing ever, Right. Not everything needs to be a live service. Double Fine is delivering that to you time after time after time after time. You better play this video.

[A]

House of Xbox's studios, right? Yeah.

[F]

Like, they're doing all the things that we're asking for.

[A]

And so.

[F]

Shout out Keelan. I think the game looks good.

[A]

What's your overall score?

[F]

I'm with Gary. I'm not gonna give it a score.

[C]

Okay, fair enough. Right?

[B]

I like that.

[C]

Let it spread.

[D]

Yeah, exactly.

[A]

I'm still gonna give a score.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

I'm just. I was throwing. I'm. But I'm not.

[B]

What am I gonna do?

[A]

Put a gun to the kids?

[D]

See if Andy's.

[A]

Andy, what do you think? I'll give it eight.

[E]

And I'm an employee, you know. Yeah, I thought it was awesome. I thought that was. I thought it was a lot of. Lots of great games. I think that if. I think maybe Kiln was the most disappointing, even though it was a stacked lineup. So it wasn't disappointing because it was still very, very cool and creative and neat. And also I go in, I. When I'm watching Kilma, I know that this is their little game jam thing that they, you know, it's a side project. It isn't a main big thing that they are working on but it's something that they want to show love to and I think that's really, really neat and it looks fun, it's adorable. Very charming. And yeah, Beast of Reincarnation looked awesome. I. I'm very, very surprised by how, how much deeper they went with what the story was and you know what they're getting into with kind of having a mix of sci fi in there as well. Forza of course looking fantastic. And then yeah, I think Fable, I can't wait to play it on PC in 60 plus frames because I think that's going to be a 30 frame game at. On Xbox. Much, much like footage. Yeah, 30 frames wasn't super smooth and hopefully they got time to kind of iron out some of those issues. But like I think enough people have learned from the mistakes of cyberpunk to not over promise what their world can do.

[A]

Sure.

[E]

Because when we first saw cyberpunk I was like wow, we can just exist in this world this. And like you just couldn't. That's not what the game really was, you know. But there just seems to be like they really put an emphasis on how deep these systems go with the social talking to people in the town and the job systems and people marriage and family and stuff.

[F]

Yeah.

[E]

People recognizing all those traits and things like that. That's the stuff that I live for in games. I'm like w. That's always been like

[C]

a core part of.

[B]

Yeah.

[E]

The developers put in that much time to kind of make sure that you are being recognized for your actions in the game and I love that shit.

[A]

Yeah. I hope it pays off. Obviously we'll have way more to say about Fable at the end. For me I. This. What a direct. What a great job. What a way to step up. What a. What a tone setter for the year. For the 25th anniversary of Xbox which they're promoting to, you know, to end on Fable and have that. I think in the history of us reacting recent history, the most Greg ass game I've ever seen. Like that's what I'm always talking about wanting out of my RPG's choices consequence, recognize what I'm doing, give me things that make my playthrough incredibly different than Andy's, incredibly different than Gary's. So if they can deliver on that, that's front runner for game of the year for me. Even over gta which I'm also obviously incredibly excited for.

[C]

I'm not now. You're not like now you're just going that's crazy.

[A]

Why am I. I mean, GTA is always a technical powerhouse. It's always cool what they're doing in the world. But like narrative, story, whatever.

[C]

I mean, obviously personal taste, I mean, that's. I just kind of feel like GTA 6 is in a category of one, don't you?

[E]

Isn't it?

[A]

I mean, that's how Rockstar wants me to think about it. And I agree that the amount of time and money they're investing, I'm not. I mean, like,

[C]

they still have shown Almost nothing at GTA 6. I think there's a good chance that when it comes out, it's like, oh, sure. They really Sure.

[A]

I mean, I saw one of the things that called the chat called out that I'm still, I still am in the same boat of. For Fable, right? Of like, so far they've only shown that one giant quest. Literally the giant.

[E]

Right.

[A]

So to have them be like, hey, here's how this also could end new. It's like, on the one hand, of course, tell me more about the thing you've already shown me. But on the other hand, it's like, but what else do you have up? Do you have that? Is that going to be.

[F]

Should we just start this whole thing with Fable? Like, should we just deep dive on Fable? For me, I want to talk about Fable.

[A]

I would give this, I think on the kind of funny score I think, I mean, I think Fable was. I would say the Fable Overall presentation was 10 out of 10. I would bring it down to 9.5 because they didn't have a better date than Autumn, which I hate. And so then overall, I would say nine. I think everything was great. Amazing here. I think I'm with you. Of like double fine. I look at that. I go, wow, so cool. I will never play that. That's not a game. I'm, I'm excited to play in any way, shape or form. And I hope that I'm the total minority and a majority of people.

[C]

Do you think there's any chance it slips?

[A]

I think there's a chance everything slips. But you talk about what? Fable.

[C]

Fable in particular, because that's the one that feels the most slippy if you're

[A]

like, for Xbox to be like, hey, everybody, this is the stuff coming out this year. And then Fable is the one you're promoting. I expected Fable to have a date. I expected Fable to be early.

[B]

I'm.

[A]

I'm right in the second half of the year, right?

[D]

Points on that. Two points on that. What you're saying the fact that with Forza they weren't ready to commit to a PlayStation version, but Fable, they were. I have a little more confidence that they're going to be able to hit the end of the year, but to the point it can obviously slip. But I want to go back to what you were originally talking about there at the end of them showing the same thing, basically extension of what we already seen. I'm okay with that because my biggest thing I wanted to see out of this, I wanted to see the open world itself and I wanted to see combat in action. And it gave me that and extended upon things we've already seen. Clearly they have plenty of time the rest of the year to continue to show us new things. As far as that goes, it's remarkable. Instead of this huge info dump in January, you can space it out as you lead up.

[C]

Unless I missed something along the way. For a game, it's interesting that for a game that has been known about and in development and they remarked upon it for so long now, and they've shown it a few times, this is this. This is the first real proper look that I think we've had at it.

[A]

Right?

[C]

Gameplay, Combat, yeah. You know, social mechanics, all of that stuff. This is the first real deep dive. And like, again, as someone who, you know, has played Fable since the original and knows it well, it feels like they're, you know, they're focusing on all the right things.

[A]

So let's double back. We are jumping right into Fable. We're going game by game. We're starting at the end because we all want to get the cork out of it. Blessing, you want to go, go.

[F]

Well, only to get into the GTA of it all. Because I think that's such a interesting conversation. When I look back at the big Rockstar game, last two big Rockstar Games being GTA 5 and Red Dead Redemption 2, I feel like they've always had the adversaries, right. With GTA 5, it was last. With Red Dead Redemption 2, it was God of War. And I feel like this year the. Everything I'm seeing from this Fable game is answering the questions of what do I want out of a fantasy RPG to push it forward.

[E]

Right.

[F]

Like, I was streaming and talking about, I think, just upcoming video games or something like that. Right. One of the Chatters. Oh, no. I asked the question, what is your. What is your genre? Beef. What's the genre? What's a beef that you have with, like, whatever genre? A video game. And one of the Chatters mentioned that in Western RPGs, I hate that combat Always sucks. And I read that and I was like, you're right.

[C]

Does it?

[F]

Yes. I mean, for me, I don't agree combat sucks.

[D]

Yes, initially I did. Yes, they improved it.

[A]

I'm playing it right now and it's, it's fine. But it's definitely not the best.

[C]

What Western RPG has the best combat?

[A]

Man, I like Veil Guards combat a lot and I know that's a hot

[E]

take and combat rock.

[A]

Andy, this is why you and me are best friends.

[F]

And to be fair, the games that came in mine are the ones that I played. Right. I'm thinking of a vowed. I'm thinking of Skyrim. I'm thinking of. I guess Witcher 3 was one of the ones that come to mind, right? A lot of the first person ones. But I digress. Fable's combat here actually looks fun.

[A]

That looks awesome.

[D]

Yeah, that looks great.

[B]

Really good.

[F]

Really, really good. The enemy animation, jump into that.

[A]

Go into there. When they're fighting in the woods and they're showing all the different things and first off, we're doing dual daggers, which speaks to my heart. We got the big sword, we're using magic now.

[D]

I, I one tiny. It's not really a critique. I just need to see more. I want to see how the, the difficulty, the AI of the Eng themselves, of course, clearly they're, they're showing this off to, you know, because this is a dev direct. But I want to see actual real combat scenarios with difficulty on it because that would be the. I'm assuming there's going to be big bosses that you're going to have to fight and all that as well. So.

[A]

Yeah. You saw one of them, right?

[D]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[A]

How that all shake out and play.

[F]

Getting back to my point, though, you know, there's that combat. When you talk about the morality system. I think one of the conversations that me and Greg have had before on KFC is that like, you know, you look back to games that have had morality systems where it is, you know, black and White, Fallout 3. You do good things, goes up, you do bad things, infamous, all this stuff. And that feels like dated design in some way. In a lot of ways, honestly, when they talk about, yeah, you're going to do things right and that's going to change your reputation very specifically of like, all right, this guy kicks chickens. But hey, maybe not everybody in this town hates a chicken kicker like that to me, sounds like. Sounds fucking awesome. Can they talk? It seems like that goes real deep as far as the way they're talking.

[A]

Exactly. And I have for Me. You know it's a living population, right? Which ties into this morality thing. Sorry, first name. And it's going to expand it. First name, no last name. Said. I got chills when I heard living populations. Me too. And especially when you saw it right? As they're talking about unique. Thousands. There's more than a thousand of them. They have their own lives. You can hire them to work in your business. You can put them, you know, rent them beds, kick them out of beds or whatever, but then tie that into morality and see how each one reacts. And then right now I'm parsing through as I also host, so stick with me. They have an interview with one of the playground people up on the Xbox Wire.

[E]

Right.

[A]

So as you saw in the developer direct, our version of Morality isn't a sliding scale. We've chosen to anchor this around the actions you do and specifically the things you do in Albion that are witnessed. And it's italicized by at least one other person. So if the things you do are seen by one or more people, you start to earn a reputation for that thing. Obviously we always use the chicken kicking. Right. I love this idea in this and like what they were showing in the direct of the pop up of plus rich plus whatever and it's like, oh, not good, not bad. Which is always sounds cool. And then you're 20 hours into mass Effect, like, oh, I'm not suddenly going to choose the Renegade option. I've been doing Paragon. So what's. There's no choice to this when I say dated.

[F]

Yes. The idea that at the beginning of my playthrough I'm going to choose to be good or bad. And that's kind of just going to. That's going to determine every choice I make from there out.

[A]

Right.

[F]

I'm always going to choose the good option here. Yeah. You have all these different things that can happen. And then going into NPC routines that they talk about as well. There's so much here that seems to make this game feel alive and exciting for me when I hear them talk about it. That seems awesome.

[D]

Well, I. I do hope the. The consequences aren't cut and dry as far as good and evil in the sense of like. Like the giant as an example they brought up. You could kill him or you could do something else. Maybe it doesn't matter what choice. You think killing him would be the bad choice, but then that actually turns out to be a good thing because everyone's thankful for that. Or if you let him go for some reason, that or more.

[C]

Or more interestingly, opinion is divided on. Yeah, yeah.

[B]

Not gonna be happy that you killed her brother.

[D]

Yeah.

[A]

It's definitely gonna be the thing. Right. You can see that. If, okay, so you kill him, people will be pissed off. There's a rotting corpse outside of their thing, but there's gonna be people happy he's gone. And if you don't kill him, there's gonna be people pissed off. There's a giant lumbering around, stepping on their houses. Yeah.

[E]

And you're gonna be sad. That one NPC you liked.

[A]

Yeah.

[E]

Is kind of pissed off or whatever. I think about did a very good job with that. With like, sudden, like, oh, man. You weren't happy with that choice.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[A]

I really.

[E]

I really rocked Blessing God of War. Would like a word.

[F]

First off, the fact that people in chat are saying God of War for Western rpg. Learn things. All right.

[E]

Read a book.

[F]

That's what I say.

[A]

Wow.

[E]

Read a book.

[C]

Educate yourself.

[A]

So, Gary, doubling back to you as a fable head like myself, somebody who loved the old games. This gets you going. This is. You're all in 100% of the.

[C]

Of the four games that we're showing, if you said to me, you can go home and play a finished build, it'd be fable, and it wouldn't be. It wouldn't be close. And that's not to say anything bad about the other games. That's the one that is my most, to my personal taste, 100%.

[A]

Anybody else want to. What else? We want to talk. They brought up British humor. Gary, I've never thought a British person was funny.

[C]

No.

[F]

You like, thank goodness you're here.

[A]

I know. I love British humor. I'm just fucking around because Gary's here.

[C]

No, I mean, it's. I mean, that's always been a big part of it. You know, British humor is very specific, you know, and the nice thing about it is it has traveled quite well. You know, a lot of people like Monty Python and that's a huge, you know, the Office, you name it as like British history. British comedy, I think translates very well to the U.S. audience. You know, they appreciate kind of the quirkiness of it, and I think that. But it's tough to. It's tough to do. You know, being funny is hard as, you know, Greg. And that's why I named the company kind of.

[A]

I wasn't over committed that qualifier right

[C]

there in the title. And again, they didn't show a lot of that, but just the little things that they did show, indicated, indicate that that Is again, like, they're not stupid. They know what the, what the core pillars are. Like again, it's, you know, it's open world, freedom of choice, consequences of choices, the sense of a living world. We can have families and kids and just like, you know, nest and, and get into these little mini, you know, you know, social dramas. You know, like, you know, oh God, I've been caught cheating with this person or whatever. Buying houses and all this kind of stuff.

[B]

Yeah.

[C]

Having kids running around and humor. Like those to me are kind of the, the pillars of it. And I think that they, they address to some extent or another.

[E]

I was just gonna say real quick. I think in the other presentations where it was talking with that one dude with the long hair and talking with the guy from the. The IT crowd or whatever. I think, I think we saw enough glimpses of like, we're getting a lot of really like funny, quirky British humor here. And I, I think it's also really hard to sell in a presentation that. But, but I think we got enough here to show me that, oh, we're gonna get a lot more during the game. It's just, I think it's a harder thing to like, let's try to play this joke off and hope that.

[A]

Yeah, even what we're looking at with the, the pop ups above their head, the way they're putting the, the stuff here. Chicken chaser and like, I just love the style that we're seeing, let alone the visuals and how gorgeous this world looks, but just the style this game already has of being that fairy tale. Like that's what these things look.

[C]

They haven't gone for like. And again, this is true favorite. They haven't gone for like a hyper realistic witcher style. You know, there is, there is some stylization to it. It does look like a, like a children's fairy tale to some extent.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

Which again is exactly what.

[A]

That's what I want.

[E]

Lots of bloom. Yeah.

[A]

G. Danner had this one, I think in the fable conversation. Do you think that most of the NPC stuff is shallow? Marrying anyone is cool until they don't have real romance and story, etc. Hard to say. We're just going off of this. My, my thing is I do think it will be shallow. Obviously. A thousand people, they're saying the things. I'm sure people are gonna say the same stuff. You know, we see him get mad at you when you walk by. I'm sure I'm gonna hear I'm a knob a million times as I walk through based on some decision.

[C]

Yeah, we all used to that.

[A]

Of course, that's just me walking around the streets of San Francisco. But doubling over to the marriage romance. I'm still in the camp as somebody who is wearing a Starfield jacket and loves Starfield. Right. Marriage and RPGs usually sucks as well. It's usually very. We're back to the black and whiteness of it. So if we're getting a. As Fable and Gary, you can detest this from playing them before. If we're getting a more. Disposable isn't the right word. But like, yes, it is a thin marriage system because that's what it is. Like you're going to marry this person and get benefits from it that'll augment your gameplay and have these kids that could I assume be good or bad in the future and do that and then they find out maybe you're true to them forever and it gives you the buff the entire time. Or you know, you have another family and they find out and that ruins like.

[C]

Well, that's, I mean that's the thing is like that I think that's the trickiest thing to pull off. But in success I think is the most fun because you can create all these like viral clips and like, oh, look at this fucked up situation I've, I've, I've created. I think it's kind of Maury Povich type scenario where like I'm, I've got a baby, baby mama over here, but this is my real family. What they find out about each other now it's a question that's fun.

[A]

I feel like it's not so much a story bit as a system bit. And I'm there for if it knows it's a system.

[E]

Are you going five miles wide and a foot deep? Are you trying to go really deep into all these mechanics?

[F]

Yeah, I view it more as like the Sims rather than like, yeah, deep ass dating sim.

[E]

Right.

[A]

All those things above their head look so. Sim Sims. Yeah.

[D]

Me, yeah.

[A]

100% out there. Michael, are you stoked?

[C]

Are you.

[A]

You say you're in like, like.

[B]

Yeah, I mean, I'm super stoked on this. You know, I think when we talked about the world design and we got to see some of those vistas and some of those different areas we'll go to, that also got me excited. I think we've talked about the systems and the town and the combat, but like, man, when they showed like the fable world, right, and you think about like the places you'll go, they really knocked it out the park. And I expected that, right. With playground games and what they've done with Forz Horizon and the open world that they've created there to use those systems and all the techniques that they've got. Really knocked it out the park. My mind goes to Greg as we start to move away from Fable is. So what's the next showing? Then we're back at Summer Game Fest.

[A]

Summer Game.

[B]

And then how big is this? It better have the date. Right? But like how deep are we going? Are we going to see a main villain? Right? Like what else are you going to show to get everybody excited besides just the date?

[C]

So obviously there will be another showing. For me personally, that was what I wanted to say. I feel like, yeah, they showed nothing else. I'd be good. That was the thing. A real substantial. Yeah, look at the game. And again, I'll back to what the headline is for me again. As someone who's been around for a long time and was there for the original Xbox launch and played the original Fable and loved it and played it again recently and is familiar with all the Fable games. Just in generally, this passes the smell test. Like, does it look like Fable? Does it feel like Fable? Does it feel like they're focusing on the right things? Does it feel like these people, these developers understand what made Fable good? Like is. Is Fable in safe hands? It feels very much like yes, right?

[A]

100%.

[F]

I think the next big marketing be for Summer Game Fest will be like it'll be a three minute trailer or five minute trailer and it will be press getting their hands on the game. I think that's the more important thing.

[A]

This will be just like it was. This will be the outer worlds version of this past sgf. Here's a story trailer. Here is the guy, here is the thing. And then, yeah, behind closed doors we all go play for 30 minutes and come back and talk about it. I like this question. Slash super chat from Al Wheeler. All right. Late birthday tax from Royal Leamington Spa.

[C]

Leamington.

[A]

I said he wrote it. Leamington.

[C]

Yeah, but it's pronounced Leamington.

[A]

Why do you write it with lea?

[E]

Looks like it's Edinburgh.

[A]

Because gleam. You spell gleam

[C]

just like it's not Leicester. I don't know.

[A]

Leamington Spa. Will Playground games become Xbox's? Xbox's most important studio if Fable sticks the landing?

[C]

I mean they've already. I mean they're already carrying two of their biggest franchises on their shoulders at one developer. That's a lot of. That's a heavy boat.

[A]

Obsidian would like a word.

[B]

I mean, like, those are the top two right now. If not, yeah, they're in the top three to top five category no matter what. And playground games with after what Forza did as a Game of the Year standout last time. Yeah, they're pretty important. They're very important.

[E]

They made a Game of the Year.

[D]

Yeah, but I mean, you can argue. Well, we'll talk about Forza, but they're gonna have two Game of the Year contenders this year.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[D]

From one studio. So.

[C]

No, because racing games never win Game of the Year.

[D]

It won't win, but it'll

[C]

come on

[A]

on IGN they lost a lot of credibility like what, 11 years ago.

[C]

Fighting, Fighting games and racing games always are considered like at a disadvantage when it comes to overall Game of the Year. They're like, oh yeah, we'll give you your category award, but you can never like go for the big prize. Thought so. Yeah, I, I IGN did. Giving him that again.

[F]

That was a, an Excellent Ryan McCaffrey winning a fight after. I'm sure he's been saying that since, since Forza 3, but I could, you

[C]

know, I could see this as a Game of the. I mean, you just never know like when. I'll give myself credit. I remember being excited about it from work, but when they first showed Expedition 33. Yeah, I remember thinking this, this game might have something, but like no one. It's not like we were seriously thinking this game's gonna end up being the most fucking awarded game of all time.

[A]

Right.

[C]

And yet it was. And so I mean, you know, at this point it's, you can never say like, you've really got to get your hands on it to know. But like, does Fable look like it has the potential to be at that level? Like in its in the best case scenario? Absolutely.

[A]

I sure as hell hope so. Shark super chats for our final Fable one. There's a bunch in here and maybe we'll get to the end. Just people's thoughts on it. Of course. Tomorrow's gamescast is your Xbox hot takes. Roger is putting up stuff all over the place. There'll be a free patreon [e-mail] kindafunny where you can sound off. But Shark right now super chats on Fable and says so from this trailer, it seems like this could be a person's first fable without feeling left out from not playing the others. Yes, they've been vocal about that, but over on the wire they do have,

[C]

I mean it kind of has to be right because label has been dormant for a long time.

[A]

We've always referred to this game as a new beginning because one of the things we were convinced of was that we had to reboot. That we had to reboot the franchise. It's been a long time since the end of that original trilogy. Nearly two generations have passed to video game terms and those original games are still available to play today looking even better than they are with backwards compatibility. There's some marketing speed getting into the interview. So we've chosen not to be beholden to the timeline of the original games, the events, the characters, really just to allow ourselves the freedom to build our own Albion and tell our own new story within it, which is 1000% the right move. And I am stoked about that. But Andy, hey, where do you want to go from Fable? What do you want to talk about beyond Fable?

[E]

I'm. I mean I would love to stick with Forza.

[A]

Let's do it.

[E]

I'd love to stick with, with playground games and let's do it. Talk Forza and another one of those games where I think it was Forza Horizon 4 that I got really addicted to. I was like, I'm not a car gamer. Like I don't ever play racing games ever. And so. But getting really into four and then five being, you know, I think number five on my top 10 list that year. I think Forza just has the stuff, man. They have the right, right, they have the right formula for a racing game for me to enjoy. I think everything. It's always like little 10 minute chunks of now I'm doing this challenge and there's a challenge over here. It's kind of like racing Breath of the Wild. There's always like something over there that you want to go see what that is and you go there and it's a new challenge, It's a new thing to kind of show off or it's a new leaderboard you want to tackle. I think all the base building stuff did even more for my excitement. Like you could have not had that in there and it still would have been, wow, this is going to be a Game of the year contender. But to add base building like I, I love just losing myself hours and building and making things and that looks like it's gonna be really awesome. And just kind of a neat melding of two different mechanics. I thought the game. I had several thoughts just like Gary did watching. I was like, I don't know what's footage or not. Like there are so many more And I think it was all just, you know, actual gameplay. But I think the game looks so freaking stunning. And the having the. Having the city of Japan being this care or having. Having the country Japan being a character. But like those Tokyo roadways have me so stoked because I felt very similarly in in Forza Horizon 4 and 5 that like ah. There's not a whole lot of city pathways that I want to be racing around and like they're really kind of small and condensed and you drive for 20 seconds and now you're gone out of the city to see that they are really really you know focusing on making the city a character seems like all right, that's the right call to make. Think it looks amazing.

[A]

Yeah, it looks incredible. And I'm not a car guy either. You know. I've come to Forza late via Ben. Ben being so excited. He loves playing Forza Horizon. And so now this is one I look at. I'm like oh man, I can't wait to play this and explore and unlock and like driving around and seeing the all driving cars that for sure. But I mean just driving around and finding cars parked in driveways, ways that are modded and look cool. I can't wait for that. Plus Are you jumping in?

[F]

Oh, I'm of course I'm jumping in. Yeah.

[A]

No, I didn't mean to insult you.

[E]

I'm sorry.

[F]

No, I. I'm super excited for this. Right. I might have to lobby to get best like moment or sequence back into the smileys because like I feel like racing a mech or Gundam or whatever that is is probably gonna hit like crack cocaine. Like that's gonna crazy.

[B]

You should do the Halo 1.

[E]

Halo 1 is a race.

[F]

I've done that one.

[B]

The Pelican that was.

[F]

I mean like. Well that's the thing is in all these games right. You're either racing on an airplane or you're racing a train. They always have those special sequences for you or those crossovers like with the Halo one.

[E]

Right.

[C]

I always DLC as well. Was fun that they did.

[E]

It didn't look like a licensed Gundam. I think they're just going for overall large mech. Cuz it didn't have like the exact same like oh that's the whatever. Not that I know the most about Gundam, but I love it as you know. I follow way too many Gundam fan accounts just because I love looking at mechs, you know. But I. I'm wondering if they got the license or not.

[C]

Yeah, I mean, I mean, I mean maybe we can freeze For. I mean, I'm not in any way a Gundam expert, but those Barbados.

[B]

Oh, if we go.

[C]

Go back to that foot. I mean, we. I did someone know enough about it. Definitely from this or that. Like. Okay, what does that tell you? Look at the YouTube. Like up all this. Get those, get those.

[E]

All right. People are saying that it's gundam Barbados.

[A]

Okay.

[C]

100. So that means they have the license, right?

[F]

Yeah. That's crazy.

[E]

That's awesome.

[F]

But yeah, I mean, that seems hype. And then yeah, I'm. I love when they add things that are. That feel a bit more meaningful. Right. And so like the wristband stuff, I'm actually kind of curious to see how that goes. Like, I love a good progression system. I love a good way to kind of get you back even more world.

[C]

You think Godzilla is too much to ask for? Maybe it'll kite.

[E]

Oh my God.

[F]

I mean, I think that's dlc.

[D]

That's a big.

[C]

Yeah.

[F]

Yeah.

[C]

I think you'll keep something in the back pocket.

[F]

Yeah.

[E]

Over the water with him walking next to.

[A]

Yeah.

[F]

More ways to unlock cars. I love. Right. I like the barn finds, but I want even more stuff there. I'm really looking forward to this.

[A]

Anybody else?

[B]

Yeah. I mean, for me it's about the shared experience. Right. I think these guys touched on a lot of things that I would highlight as well. But to piggyback off of bless. Right. These things that I'm looking for is like that shared experience. And I think you're going to see that with the garages now being able to see your friends in a lineup of cars similar to.

[D]

You stole. What I was gonna say.

[B]

Right. I know we've been doing this a long time. We know when going to talk about here. But yeah, like when you play Forza, it's all about showing Paris, my best friend, like this cool car I got or Gary, this new paint job that I put on the. The warthog. And it's always a. All right, stay right here one sec. Let me go into the menu. Let me switch the car. Okay. Let me pull it out. Let me load it in. Awesome. Now it's like, hey, let's share this experience together. I'll go to your garage. You come to my garage. Let's show you the 10 cars. The big lineup. Right. The idea of building a base place. How deep is that really? Is that just place? You know, we'll see what kind of fun that is. But they've done a great job of like identifying that Forza, particularly Horizon is a fun shared experience. With your friends. And it's all about how do we keep you together, how do we showcase the things that you love? And it is the cars, it is the fun moment. So, yeah, I loved everything they showed here. Cherry blossoms, some initial D, some drifting.

[A]

Yeah, I like, did show some drifting, man.

[E]

We get that orange supra like Han. Oh, my God.

[D]

I mean, I can't really add too much to what both Bless and Mike just said, because I really think they're. They're enhancing the social experience, which I think is the most important thing about this. The fact that you even start off as a tourist in there. So I think there's going to be a lot of, hey, let's discover Japan. Let's understand the culture, you know, the different regions, all these things that. That make up Japan. The fact that we're getting. What do they say? Tokyo. Five times.

[B]

Five times bigger than their lives.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[D]

They've done before. Gary even was saying while we're watching it, the night racing. And that is just, oh, my God, fantastic. I can't wait for that as well. And then you even touched on it, Greg. The fact that there's going to be that discovery aspect of finding these cool cars just sitting off the beaten path. I. I think the meetup thing, even though they didn't say it's in there, I would love if you could race for pink slips.

[B]

Yeah.

[D]

If it's not in the game now, damn it, put it in there. As dlc, I would love that you have these meetups. You show off the cars that you have, have. And then Roger, put your toy.

[E]

Put your Yaris on the line.

[B]

Exactly. It's really cool of like the meetup, like you said. Right. We saw this with Call of Duty recently of, hey, that guy's got an awesome gun. I want that. Oh, you could just steal the blueprint now. Same thing. Here we go to the meetups. Greg's got a dope car. Or you could just buy it right now and then it's in my collection. I'm doing that. I don't have to worry about. What's the name again, Greg? I lost it. I couldn't hear you. Yeah, I'll never find that again. They do do a great job with that. They touched on more things to do in the open world. Right. You know, Forza, there's so much to do from smashing billboards to hitting massive jumps. What more do you add is super, super exciting to all of this? Like, I'm pumped up. And then, of course, we don't even talk about the user generated content. But that is where Forza, oh, it's really shine.

[D]

They're giving you this sandbox and these tools to be able to the base building that you're do the crazy that Andy's going to be making. And you go to Andy's house, you were like, how the hell did you do.

[B]

Here is Halo Forge, here is Battlefield Portal. Here's Forza user generated content that we've seen in 4 and 5. Right. Of like there are people out there that make awesome races, fun ideas that are outside the box that even the team at Playground can't think of. And then all of a sudden you're playing this with your friends. You're going, this is so dope, man. I love when they add that.

[D]

And, and Gary, I'm gonna push back on what you said before about Game of the Year stuff because I, I truly think, think this game can be a Game of the Year contender this year.

[C]

Because I think, I think, I think it's good. I think it could well be good enough to be a Game of the Year contender. I'm speaking more towards the kind of. There's a bit of an inherent bite.

[D]

Do I think it wins? No. But do I think it could get nominated and stay oh station throughout the year? Absolutely.

[C]

It looks great. Look, they've been. I've been waiting for them to go to Japan for a long time. I was really disappointed when Forza 5 was in Mexico. Not that Mexico wasn't caused, but I really wanted Japan.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

And now, and now we're getting, you know, we've been waiting for the shoe to drop for a while.

[A]

Right.

[C]

And I think like in general, Forza Horizon, if you're. I don't know, correct me if I'm wrong but like if you're a car enthusiast, there isn't any other game that scratches that itch than this one.

[A]

Better than this Gran Turismo.

[C]

Gran Turismo is not a fun game. Gran Turismo is great if you want to feel like you're going really slow. Even though the odometer says 200 miles an hour.

[A]

They're so real. My clock dies at blessing. And I want to see what that was about before then I want to bring in Rabbit Canterbaugh who says, of course Forza Horizon looked great and Fable looks amazing. Dot dot dot. Could this be a year where one developer has multiple Game of the year now?

[D]

Yes, 100% I said it while we're watching it.

[C]

Yeah, why not? I think again, Japan to me makes a lot of sense, not because of the car culture. And you know it's really, really interesting bifurcation between those big rolling hills area areas. Mount Fuji. I just, I didn't miss. I saw it for the second time. I must have missed it. That like driving through that road that's dug out of the snow that look really, really cool. That almost like that tunnel. But of course again we talked about what. What I want is. I'm gonna. Most of my time is going to be drifting. I'm going to be in Akihabara, you know, again at night. I want that kind of initial D Tokyo drift kind of kind of vibe. I think that's going to be really,

[F]

really fun night time in this.

[B]

They did.

[C]

They didn't. But you know that they're going to

[A]

do it and the car is going to glow under.

[E]

You have to mark it as like for mature and adults only. Like if you're gonna get too sexy.

[F]

I was waiting for another.

[C]

I think this, the social aspects are super, super fun. I love the idea of the meetups. You know, the you know, go and hang out. Oh, cool car. You know, is it for sale and that kind of stuff. You can have fun with that. The bay again, the base building to me is the biggest unknown. And where I would, where I would like to see more like I don't think it's going to be the kind of thing where you can like physically I think it's going to be like snap to this location. I don't think it's going to be like a fully traversable. You know, it's probably too much. At some point could I invite you over to my crib and like show you, show you my garage? Like is that part social? I don't know. But like, like I mean look at that.

[A]

They said in the thing it was.

[C]

Yeah, okay. So I mean I. I think that's going to be really cool. And again, I can see myself putting a lot of time into just nesting and like building the perfect base like for Horizon 7.

[F]

My number one request is a walkable garage.

[B]

Yeah, it should be walkable because I think you if I'm wrong and one of the forces you get out of the car and can walk all the way around.

[A]

They said and they, they showed the garage they. But it was first person.

[C]

Can you tell me the venue? Can you do that in a fully contiguous way? Can I walk all the way around the campus or am I just like snapping from one location?

[E]

No, I don't think they would let you build stuff without touring it I

[B]

don't even know yet what the campus will even have for you to really want to see. Right? What, what are these buildings in the background that will be that cool that you have to see? Right?

[C]

I'm just a homeboy. Like, give me, give me like a TV. Just give me a room with a big screen TV that I can put YouTube on. Just stay at home while everyone else is racing.

[E]

I agree.

[F]

That's what I want to do.

[C]

The only, the only thing I'll say. And I don't think this is going to change. And this is just me. I've actually mentioned it before. I thought so. And you mentioned it. Forza. The Forza Horizon games have so much to do and they offer so many different ways to play. Oh, here's an event. Here's a. Here's a. Here's a. Here's a thing. You can go on. You can do this. You can do the main quest, the side quests. You're discovering something new every two seconds that it almost. It feels overwhelming, at least in the early couple because the game is interrupting.

[A]

Hey, Gary.

[C]

Hey, Gary.

[F]

Hey, Gary.

[C]

Because you know, you put your name in.

[F]

Hey, Gary.

[C]

You can go do this, you can go do that, you can go do this. It's like, it's almost hard to like pick something to do because it's like, it's an embarrassment of riches. Like there's. There's so much to do that I personally kind of find it overwhelming. And I wish I know that you can do the things I just ask Anna, like, what I should do next and it will like curate it a little bit for you. But I do wish there was a little, a little bit more of a curated experience because it's almost. You can have too much choice can be a good thing. And when it's constantly saying do this, do this, do this, do this, do this, it's almost. It's going to ADHD way of playing well, like, just let me focus on one thing, which of course you can do. But like the game really like barrages you with. And if you remember the first couple hours of Force Horizon 5.

[F]

Hey, Gary. Hey, Gary. Hey, Gary. Hey, Gary.

[C]

Don't forget, you can do this.

[A]

Don't forget to do that.

[C]

And it's like, just shut the up and let me play. It's almost too much that's going to continue. But it is this open world style of like, I've never liked this idea. I've got to drive to the starting line, like, and stuff like that. Just like, let me play Let me just snap to places to somebody saying you can do that but like I

[A]

don't know, the open auto drive, you

[D]

can do that in Grand Prisma.

[C]

Yeah, yeah. So I mean, I think it looks beautiful. Will I be playing it day one? Absolutely. Probably on PC so I can get, you know, all the. Get the frames I play it. I played Forza Horizon 5 on my super ultra wide monitor because it supports that resolution on PC. It looks absolutely sick. That's the way to play every.

[A]

Just so we're all on the same page. The base is called the estate.

[C]

Nice.

[A]

All right.

[B]

That's what we'll call it Shout out as well. We saw it just a moment ago. I forgot to bring it up. When you're making user generated content, being able to make it with a friend at the same time, right? Like that is something we're in the

[D]

social aspect, getting it all moving closer

[B]

and closer to Parkitect that we've played before with the boys. Being able to build your own theme park with up to eight friends at the same time is awesome. Right. I think there was a recent game. I forget what we were able to be able to build and then you could build after. But I had to be off, right? But being able to build together at the same time is really special. And that is the future of like keeping us engaged, keeping us together with the community is awesome. I love that.

[C]

So I mean, so you look at that estate, right, and it's massive and there's all these different buildings. What I mean, what's in all of those? I get. There's a garage, right? That makes sense. And maybe there's like a little kind of residence area. But like what is going on in

[E]

all of these other receptionist is over. Yeah. Building. That's.

[B]

That's the motor testing spot right there. That's the paint area, right?

[C]

Yeah, yeah. I want it to be like Faze Clan house or something. I want like a streamer house. Like I got all my goodies, I got all my. There's my candy machine over there. I want to. I want to live like a ball.

[A]

Are you talking about the estate? Yeah, yeah.

[C]

That's what they want.

[A]

I mean, I mean look at how much.

[B]

Look at all.

[C]

What's in all these different buildings.

[A]

Anything you want. A mountain hideaway, a personalized track for friends. The only real constraint is the items. That is that the items cost in game currency. When you build something, you pay a few credits to put down credits you earn in other activities across the game world. And you get the credits Back if you delete something, quote, it creates a sense of connection for us that you've worked to get these credits by taking part in something the developer says, winning races, delivering tofu, exploring the world. There's all sorts of things you can do to generate in game credit credits. The result is a little slice of Japan that, that isn't just built by you, but earned by you. I bet you're a goofy ass. Shit you can put in there.

[C]

Yeah, I want, I don't want a lot of personalization, customization. I think it'll be fun.

[A]

Okay, blessing, but talk to me about Beasts of Incarnation Reincarnation. Beasts of Reincarnation.

[E]

Yeah.

[F]

Game freak.

[E]

They're doing it.

[A]

They're freaking.

[F]

They're freaking. They're finally making a game that looks like it's for modern platforms. Good for them. Yeah, no, this game looks really good. This game looks really good. I'm so curious about how it's going to feel when you get into combat. I think one of the big things I saw people in chat even going back and forth on was like, is this souls. Like this doesn't seem really souls, like. And then we see the combat pause and like all this stuff and I

[A]

want to talk about that.

[F]

Yeah.

[A]

Because that is like souls games. Not my usual cup of tea is, you know, I'll play them, whatever, blah, blah, blah. But this didn't look like.

[F]

I don't think so.

[A]

I want to put a pin in this. Put a pin in it and remind everybody that we couldn't have these cool conversations, these cool streams, this cool studio, our cool friend like Paris Lily Gary without your support. On patreon.com kindafunny YouTube.com kind of funny games. Apple and Spotify, you can go there and pick up up your kind of funny membership so you can get everything we do ad free. Get your daily dose of me, Greg Miller in a podcast series that's 15 to 20 minutes each and every day called Greg Way. And of course get good karma for supporting an 11 person small business. All about live talk shows. But right now you're not using your benefits. So here's a word from our sponsors.

[B]

This episode is brought to you by boot.dev. if you're listening to this show, there's a solid chance that you one like video games and two, at some point in your life have been interested in learning Software. Software development. Boot.dev combines those things because they know that the smartest way to learn is to never get bored. It takes your coding from beginner to expert the fun way through a hands on RPG like experience. If you're ready to put in the time it takes like Kevin is my

[F]

favorite feature is that you could find a solution that works but then afterwards you can hit solution and see the way that they were trying to teach you to do it. That's really cool.

[B]

Curriculum designed for building builders with gamers sensibilities in mind, boot.dev welcomes you to the most captivating way to learn to code. You can learn back end web development from start to finish in Python, SQL and go. Bored learners quit. Smart learners never get bored. That's why you'll learn by doing what you'd actually be doing at a job building real projects. Go to boot.dev and use code kinda funny to get 25% off your entire first year on the annual plan. There's no better time to give your coding dreams a chance. Just like Kevin's doing. Again. Go to boot.dev and use code kinda funny to get 25% off your entire first year on the annual plan.

[C]

From the co writer of Rogue one Come See youe in Hell, a new Hollywood satire. Kind of like the studio, except you'd never get away with this on television. Starring Shannon Woodward.

[A]

You seriously need to see a shrink or something before you get arrested for

[B]

dicky waving Thomas Sadarsky.

[A]

I don't have imposter syndrome.

[C]

You should John Cryer. You think I don't know bullshit when I hear it? I represent Sean Hannity and John Boyega.

[D]

I was in Star wars and Pacific

[B]

Rim, the second one wherever.

[C]

See you in hell wherever you get your podcasts and @seeyouinhell tv.

[A]

Hey you. Join us in person for our live in review of Howard the Duck. That's right, Howard the Duck joins MCU in review. Wednesday January 28th at 7:30pm at Cobbs Comedy Club for SF Sketch 4 Fest. You can come watch me do all the podcasts within a podcast you love. Andy will be going. Nick will be shopping for pants during it, but everybody else will be there too for you to come hang out and see. All you have to do is go over to kind of funny.com sketchfest right now to get your tickets before they sell out because come and watching a bunch of people talk about a very old Howard the Duck movie is really selling tickets fast.

[C]

Spring is here and there's a whole

[A]

new way to chai at Starbucks that's made perfect for you. Choose your sweetness, dial it up or keep things light. Add a touch of pistachio, a hint of Strawberry or vanilla. Or make it a spring classic with lavender because this season there's endless ways

[F]

to chai at Starbucks.

[A]

And we're back to talk Beast of Reincarnation, the game from Game Freak. I'd like to give you a few paragraphs from the Xbox Wire, a one person, one dog action rpg. The gameplay blends two styles. The protagonist, Emma fights using fast paced katana action, while Ku supports her with powerful skills triggered via command based system similar to a turn based rpg. In this game, we don't. You. I'm sorry. In this game, you don't have to rely on raw action skills alone to survive. By performing a parry against enemy attacks like with Emma, you earn points that can be used to unleash Ku's abilities. You can open Ku's command anytime. And Coup possesses a wide range of skills designed to handle a variety of combat situations. Whether whenever you're in a pinch, Coup is always there for you. While you are selecting coup skills from the menu, combat slows down and gives you the breathing room to assess the battlefield and strategize your comeback. We place a high priority on this sense of tempo. Rather than forcing players to rely solely on split second reflexes in high pressure situations, we wanted to create moments where you can pause, think carefully and fight with a tactical mindset of a command based rpg. Furthermore, the game features three difficulty settings. In addition to the standard normal mode, we have included high highly challenging hard mode as well as story mode. In story mode, the parry attacks or parry timing is more forgiving and the enemy damage is reduced. Even matter more you can do the spirits and yada yada yada. I went there. They're speaking my language. Yeah.

[F]

I'm excited for this game in the way that this game seems like a combination of so many games that I like and so many types of games that I like. Right. Like I see near in this. I see a stellar blade in this. Weirdly enough with the turn based stuff, right. Or with the command based stuff. Like I even see a little bit of even clear, obscure, you know, I. I like a game that's looking at so many things, pulling them together and aesthetically I like what they're doing with taking a lot of plant life and invoking life into it and creating combat scenarios where you're fighting things that are like these big moving trees or whatever, the mechs in the background. Like there's so much here that excites me. For some reason, I'm still cautiously optimistic as opposed to pure optimistic.

[A]

New ip, new thing going on There, there's a lot they've got to nail before it all nets out and we go, okay, that's awesome. But, Andy, you're always lost in these Souls games, these stellar blades and this. What did you think of this one?

[E]

I think it looks fantastic. Since the first time they showed it this time around, I think it's, it's got such a cool kind of matted look to it that doesn't look like most other, you know, this new game in Unreal Engine 5, which I, I, that's not an engine thing, that's a, an art direction thing. But I think this game just has a really kind of unique look of blending. We're still going to try to be realistic with lighting and with materials and global illumination and all that, but it's just got, like, a really cool kind of stylization to it. And, yeah, I think we're going to probably. I hope we have a really cool, interesting story that's going to tug at the heartstrings in some moments. And I hope we get to meet cool, quirky, weird NPCs along the way that kind of guide us on our journey. But, yeah, everything I've seen, from the boss fights to what they're doing with the, the patterns and the stuff, you kind of have to, like, recognize in the way that these bosses are attacking. I live for that. In action RPGs, it looks like it's gonna be a freaking blast. And all the abilities that you could kind of do with the dog and like, the freezing of time, that Final Fantasy kind of, you know, freezing the action like you would in Rebirth and Remake, like, that's one of my favorite combat systems of all time. And so if they can kind of replicate that in a really neat way, I think they, I think they have a hit on their hands.

[A]

Harris, you're gonna jump into this one?

[D]

Yeah, I'm definitely gonna jump into it. This isn't necessarily, you know, at the top of my genre list of games that I play, but I like the fact that this has a scaling difficulty level. So if you just want to jump in and enjoy the world that they're creating, enjoy the story that they're telling in this, you can do that. But if you want to ramp it up and really dive into that combat that they're gonna have. Yeah, I mean, it looks great. I love the visual style that they have here. Is it cool? It's cool.

[E]

Yeah. Little Dog, I brought up to Tim, like, it reminds me of when your favorite director is working in a genre that they never did like, oh, Christopher Nolan's doing that. Like, yeah. Oh, I wanna, I would never really, never really, you know, gravitate towards that genre. But, but it's so, it's so weird that like, yeah, this is Game Freak and they are working on something that is way more than they've done in the past. And like, you know, how do, how are they going to tackle this genre? How, how are they going to make it their own and kind of, you know, find their creative ways to iterate on it? I think, I think it could be really special.

[D]

And you know, and they're literally just showed it right there. They're going to make you care about coup.

[E]

Oh yeah.

[C]

And they're going to, they're going to melt.

[D]

You know, that's going to happen at the end.

[A]

They'll get separated. Yeah. Maybe you have to go the opposite way and save Emma. Is that what her name was? Yeah, Emma go out that way and then Brad, never forget Brad. Brad's gonna be a main part of this story.

[E]

Don't worry about me. I'm also.

[A]

Brad's just killed. With no reaction from anybody. Kyle the Buff super chats and says, same studio that produced Pokemon Legends Za and Scarlet Slash Violet. Think about that for a minute from the tech perspective. And again, that's what Nintendo's paying them to produce.

[C]

Right?

[E]

Right.

[F]

I mean it's the time they're giving them and it's just the cycle of Pokemon. If you want to learn more about why Pokemon's the way it is. Chris Plant had a good podcast that came out I think last year about Pokemon talking to an expert and they kind of went in into like, you know, Game Freak. The Pokemon company creatures, the Nintendo, the relationship between all of them and why it is the thing of like, hey, we got to get a Pokemon out. Because that then informs merchandise and anime and cards and all that cards and XYZ thing. And so it's not even that they don't have the money, it's more so that they just don't give them the time.

[A]

You're really looking at what I think we always talk shit about with Matt Madden with football or sports games in general. You got a nine month dev cycle, get it out, then get the next thing out and then get the next thing out. And so it's always a glacial movement in terms of things getting better.

[E]

Yeah. We were talking about yesterday at a thing we're at where it's, it's cool seeing.

[A]

What are you doing?

[E]

It's cool seeing Game Freak do Something out of this genre. And similarly with Playground, like, yeah, here's Playground, known for the car games and now they're working on, you know, this sort of open, massive open world action rpg. It's. It's just really neat to see and it's got to be super exciting for a lot of these developers. And we saw it plainly here in this video with these developers from Game Freak going, yeah, it's awesome to be able to work on something different, like, and something that you can kind of get re. Energized and not kind of just be in that, you know, got to pump out another one of these, you know.

[A]

Yeah.

[F]

I think I'm worried about story. I think that's where I'm like, that's the thing. Very cautious because I have Stellar Blade. That was the big thing for me where I was like, man, I really like this gameplay play. This story is dog. I don't care about anything going on in this world. And like, already from the things they're talking about, the blight, you know, the world that they've set up, I'm already more interested in what's going on here than even in Stellar Blade. But I. I feel like I just got to see. I got. I got to hear a hook, right? I gotta. We're talking about they're gonna make you care about coup and they're gonna, you know, do whatever. I hope they make me care about coup.

[E]

Pokemon, like, you'll care about. As goofy. As goofy as Pokemon stories can be, they make very, very memorable NPCs and moments and. And things that that are like, for better, for worse, really, really stand out. I think they can deliver a lot of that here. I. I think they have like, storytelling power in an underrated way that makes you go like, that's how that Pokemon game ended. What? You know, like, oh, yeah.

[F]

And I think it was Pokemon Scarlet had that for me, dude.

[E]

Yeah. Pokemon Scarlet and Violet had like that one side path that was one of the best things that they've done ever. I was like, why? Whoa. This is kind of crazy to be getting this in a Pokemon game. But I think that they have the capability to make really memorable characters. I mean, God, again, this is a more of a for better or for worse because some of them are just so goofy that you go like, whoa, what the hell are you doing in this game? But I hope to see some of that weird quirkiness here.

[C]

Th percent I think it's really interesting. Andy, what you said about how it looked, looks visually distinct to you from A lot of the other stuff that's out there just. It really goes to show just how subjective these things are. Because my impression of it aesthetically was to me it does look very samey to the other stuff that's out there. Like we saw Fable has that store, that picture book that storybook talks about. It distinguishes itself that way. I look at this and like if I squint I could be just as easily be looking at Black Myth, Wukong or you know, Stella Blade or anything. This is becoming a very, very crowded genre, right? This kind of running around, you know, run around rpg awesome combos, kind of hybrid turn based and, and real time attack, Sword and magic. Yeah, I mean obviously all of, all of the Souls Born games, like it's a, it's a very, very crowded genre and it's becoming harder and harder I think to distinguish yourself. I think if this game's gonna do that, I think having the, I think the dog companion I think is a big deal. We always love having a companion and obviously again that's going to speak to story and yeah, we'll come to care about the dog and when they almost kill it we'll go oh no, what are you doing? And all that stuff is kind of, I think taken for granted. I think where the dog is more interesting is as this additional gameplay mechanic, right. Where you can bring him in and what's. It's correct. So where, where Expedition 33, one of the areas where it found a lot of success was kind of the hybridization of that combat system, right where it was mostly turn based but they had sprinkled in a little bit of real time when you had to time the, the parries. Right. And that was, and that made it kind of bit more interesting than just like sitting back pressing a button, wait for the animation to play out. This almost feels a bit, a little bit like, like the opposite of that. Where it's pro, it's primarily real time, but then you can, but then there's a little bit of sprinkle in that turn base where you can pause the action, slow it down, but you notice also and if you, if you watch it there. But like when you activate whatever the, whatever COO's power is, there's also a timing specifically you have to nail the timing to get a perfect hit. Almost like a clear obscure where you get when you want that perfect parry to really be able to like pop off with your counter attack. And so I think there's potential for the combat system to be really interesting again. Visually it looks Again, it looks great, right? Technically, it looks great. It just looks. It doesn't look terribly different to Yote or Assassin three Shadows or Black Myth or a lot of other stuff that's

[F]

out in the next year and a half. Right. Like we're always. I say half because I'm thinking of Ties Annihilation. I don't know when that game's coming out, but, like in the next year, we're talking about Neo 3, we're talking about Phantom Blade Zero. Right? We're talking about this. And again, these games aren't all the same, but I think they're speaking to the same audience.

[A]

See if I can jump in. That's my. One thing I think, to throw in the pot here is that. That I think the games you just talked about, I know, aren't great games. I don't want the stylish action combat, the combos, the. I have to be so precise with my parries when I watch this game and I could just be being sold a false bill of goods. It doesn't look like that. It looks like, yeah, it's going to be a Rise of the Ronin, it's going to be a Ghost of Yote, and not to that degree. It's going to be an Assassin's Creed, whatever. Because I am stealthing around. They were like, you can stealth around and attack them this way. Way you can use them this way. It didn't seem like that was a can thing as much as a choice for my Emma and how I play. Which, again, when I look at the way you are fighting and you have health bars and all that jazz, it's making me go, oh, it's an action RPG and not a Souls like, which is a Greg game. Even though I think at a glance,

[F]

sure, I would say that even the games that I'm listing, though, aren't necessarily Souls likes. Right. Like, I don't know if I'll describe a Tides of Annihilation or a Phantom Blade Zero is Souls likes. And I. But I do think they speak to that same audience and I think, think a lot of that audience just doesn't have the time or is tired.

[E]

Yeah, it's where the genre's gone. I. I think, you know, a lot of developers saw the success of Souls games and said, oh, we want to make something like that. And you don't necessarily want to make a game as hardcore. So there's just been a lot of games that are action RPGs. It's, you know, we're swiping away, we're Doing cool abilities. Things look really. There's a lot of visual flourish on everything. I, I think when I was talking about this game having like a very distinct look, I meant more in like that I play these games all the time for many, many an hour and it, it just has a really nice like in the way that, that I was talking about with Fable having this very kind of bloomy look. There's like kind of a very neat little matted like I think the way the materials are, are acting with the world is what I'm noticing more than anything. But also it doesn't look like it's what we've gotten from Team Ninja countless times with. This just looks like a.

[A]

Right.

[E]

This looks like a remastered game in an old ass engine that like just. We just need to do away with that engine. You know what I mean? Right.

[F]

You should try Neo3. I mean you like Rise the Ronin?

[A]

I do.

[F]

I feel like Neil3 is gonna have more commonality commonality with that one than these other action games.

[A]

Maybe I will. Maybe I will.

[B]

This one is a pragmata for me. One that a game that I've seen many of times. But then you switch up the combat system, you add something flavor and I go, oh, I'm into that. Like I might try this now. Because pragmata for me was that gunplay where it's like, oh, it's just a third person action adventure shooter. Right. But oh, now you have this hacking mechanic where then you shoot at it. Right. I love The Final Fantasy 7 comparison of like, hey, there's this like real time strategy mixed in with that action combat that you know and love for from all these games. I'm like, you know what? Like that's selling me enough to be like, I would try this now over. Hey. Oh, it's just a thing. I've seen a thousand.

[C]

I think that, I think that that hybrid combat model where you're mostly slashing but like you can drop into that bullet time and like give yourself a moment to think and then deploy something. Yeah, I think that is really fun.

[E]

The remake or Final Fantasy? Remake, man. That's the like that is that game.

[C]

That's the same vibe.

[E]

It's the same thing. It is like this.

[A]

You, you are.

[E]

You're hacking and slashing, but then, then you pause to go. I want to do this ability because I know it's going to weaken their shield and then I'll have homie do whatever ability. Like oh my God.

[C]

Hold on, hold on. I'm sorry. Yeah, you know, I have to do Sith Hunters 965. Gary claims he's not biased for every game mentioned at every turn. He will on PlayStation. Pathetic for such an old guy.

[B]

Tell him, Gary.

[A]

Give him the wine of Gary.

[C]

First of all, go yourself. I was playing and analyzing and reviewing video games and computer games before you were a fucking itch in your daddy's pants. So go fuck yourself on that. You have no fucking idea what you're talking about. Educate yourself before you fucking start shitting on the keyboard and embarrassing yourself. Secondly, can anyone point to any point at all on this? Point where I've done anything to shit on PlayStation?

[B]

Even one or one where.

[F]

Even one time, Once, I believe when

[C]

we were watching people live in their own fucking.

[A]

When we were watching Fable, you said, this isn't as good as Helldivers. I did hear you say that.

[C]

Yeah, that's right. Yeah. I vividly remember saying that. Again, just seriously, don't embarrass, because I will eventually cook you. Yeah, you don't know what you're talking about. What a stupid. First of all, again, respect your elders and betters because I am older than you. I am also a lot better than you. I'm smarter than you. I know a lot more about games. I've been doing this for a lot. A long time. My opinion actually has weight. Your opinion is meaningless.

[A]

You're watching Gary.

[C]

I've been saying. I've been saying for a while now, both to you probably and publicly. I'm shifting over to PlayStation a little bit. I asked for PlayStation 5 codes now.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

I'll be.

[D]

Never.

[A]

Come on. The review you asked for the cards.

[C]

I like that because I'm hedging my bets, you know, because Xbox, you know, might be one foot in the grave. We don't know. You've got to. You've got to start, you know, spreading. Spreading your bets out a little bit.

[D]

You did say the PS5 Pro will be the definitive console version for Forza.

[C]

Version will be the best place to play fucking Forza other than a PC. What a fucking moron. Don't. Don't ever. Don't ever fucking mouth off, run your mouth in this chat again, because you're a fucking twat.

[A]

Jesus.

[F]

Amen.

[E]

Amen.

[C]

Sorry, I didn't mean to. Every, you know, every now and again, I've just got.

[A]

You got to know you're fair.

[F]

How long is it gonna take for Forza to come to PlayStation?

[A]

They didn't say.

[D]

They just said into the year.

[F]

I want to play a launch, though, you know, but I Also want to play my pro Cross. Wait, is it Cross save?

[A]

I mean anywhere right now. Anywhere for us.

[F]

But that's not how PlayStation works if

[A]

you got a PC.

[C]

Where's this guy? Oh, he left the chat.

[D]

Good.

[B]

Fuck off.

[A]

And then of course the fourth and final game, even though we're doing everything out of order, was Kiln the shadow much shadowy mentioned. Hey, this is what the fourth game will probably be. It actually was from Double Fine, an online multiplayer Pottery. Pottery. He got me too. Party brawler. Gonna be 4v4 Spring 2026 Xbox, PC and friend P S. That means PlayStation. Tim Mike, again, I will go to you. You are the streaming guy. You are. Well, I mean you are the streaming of the multiplayer party briefing. What did you think of this?

[B]

Love a good multiplayer game. Love a good fun party game. I think this is really cool. I think this is a fun, unique, weird, wacky fun idea that Double Fine gets to do, right? We talk about these games. Blessing said it so well. It's like we talk about all these developers wanting them to try different things, do different things things. But then when we see them we're like, oh, I don't want that. Just give me the normal stuff, right? It's like Double Fine continues to get weird with it and I love that Xbox and Microsoft somehow give Tim Schaefer all the leeway in the world to just make these games. No matter how well they're received or sell, it doesn't matter. Just make them and have fun with it, right? And there's a lot of great party games out there that you can play with your friends. That this looks just like that I've played before and I get excited for those because it's going to be a fun one night, two nights weekend with my friends that will laugh and enjoy this, right? And I think the big one here is the creativity. The creation of making your own pottery is the big deal, right? If this was just eight set pottery pots, you'd be like, ah, I'm good. Like I'll get bored after a while. But the idea that we can spend countless hours creating our own fun creations and then bringing them out into the battlefield and laughing when Greg brings out a dick pot. And we laughed at it. And Gary paints his whatever crazy colors he wants, like it's going to be really cool. And I think the creative suite is probably the most interesting of like wowing of this. But then also the gameplay looks fun. It's going to be a fun afternoon. A good couple hours of playing with your friends, laughing, doing Whatever crazy, you know, quest this is to collect water, put it on the other team's kiln and then walking away with a victory or a loss will be fun. I'm. I'm excited for this. This will be a. A good night to. Two nights for me.

[A]

Is that enough?

[B]

It's never enough. Greg, if you want to get business mic with me.

[A]

I do. Give me business. Business.

[B]

Mike looks at this and goes, damn it, Tim Schaefer. Like, this isn't going to sell. This isn't going to move the needle. Like people are going to play this twice and they're never going to want this. But then like in reality it's like, yes, this is a great game to add on to Game pass. This is a fun time for people to enjoy. To show that your team team over at Double Fine can create something weird, wacky without going, hey, Mike, I'm blowing the budget. This needs seven years to create. Right.

[F]

I don't think Tim Schaefer and Double Fine are idiots though. They don't make this and going, this is gonna, we're gonna, we're making this to sell.

[B]

Oh yeah. But they go from a creative side, right? They don't. I don't think Tim Schaefer's.

[F]

I don't think they're saying.

[B]

I don't think business side is like penny pinching wise. It's like this is not worth their time. This was never. I think it is development time creates.

[F]

But I guess on the, on the business side of it, right, they're talking about how they made this out of Amnesia. Amnesia Fortnite. Right. This was a side project. Oh. Oh, this is a cool idea. Yeah, sure. Let's make this. Let's put it out. No company makes this game thinking people is going to have, you know, 20,000 concurrence on week three. I don't think. I think they know that. I think this is one of those ones where they're like, hey, we did something here. Hey, this is pretty fun. I look at it as like a Gotham City imposters. I look at it as like a, hey, we're putting out something that does not need to live, that does not need to thrive that a small group of people are going to enjoy and we get to keep doing Double Fine things. And I think that's just how this

[B]

studio operates and that's what I celebrate. And I love that. Right. I love that they're able to do that. Right. But like this is gonna at retail. This is probably $20, right? For a PlayStation copy of this right. 20 to 40 is usually the window of these games. Right. It's like, how much is that really gonna sell?

[D]

Right.

[B]

How much effort and time did this studio put into that? When they could be making. Making Psychonauts 3. Right. That would probably be more of the priority. Or getting them being real and being like, it's time to make Banjo.

[F]

I think you're talking about. I think you're talking about any other studio. That's not double fine, though.

[B]

Well, that's what I'm getting at. Like, yeah, the. The leeway that Phil and Xbox and Microsoft has given Tim and his team to create the fun stuff that we all love from the keepers, which has no dialogue. It's just a three hour walking experience. No one gets that. Which is crazy. That like, man, shout out to them. That's really great that we've been able to say that on the X cast for years now. To be like, man, that's wild. They do that. Or Obsidian with pentiment and grounded.

[E]

Right.

[B]

Like, that's crazy that when we first have these conversations, it's like, oh, they're going to change this whole team up. They're going to make them make a banjo and that's the only thing they're going to do. They're going to lay off a thousand people double fines out here. Still existing and still making wacky and fun stuff.

[F]

Because this is what Double Find's always been doing.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Shout out to Xbox for continuing to support that. We. You talk about business, Mike, you talk about this. We're always worried about closures X, Y and Z. The fact that they brought them in and didn't make them just be a Call of Duty skinhouse or whatever the fuck it would be. You know what I mean? They're letting them make weird ass shit that is not going to move the needle for sales, but is going to be.

[F]

Yeah.

[E]

I would have been really negative on this if they said. And here's what our battle pass looks like in season two and our roadmap. It's like, no, it's just a little goofy.

[A]

I want to. Paris, I want you to talk. My one final thing.

[E]

The game Pass game.

[A]

It reminds me so much of Fat Princess. I was going to like weird ass stuff you used to do in the early days of online gaming.

[D]

Go. No, actually my question is for you because you've been reading like the Xbox Wire. Have they said anything about matchmaking in this?

[A]

What, like, what would you be looking for?

[D]

Because I'm. I would expect. Because going off of what blessing is Saying, I don't think this game was made to be this big. You know, 50,000 people are playing it at once type of game. So I almost think there isn't matchmaking in it because it's a thing.

[F]

Oh, you play with your friends, you're

[D]

going to get together on a Friday night with your friends.

[A]

I'm searching for matchmaking and I'm not finding anything. It's a Mike Nelson preview. It has some cool stuff in here. I'm told there's 24 total special attacks in the game and they're all inspired by the functionality of their shapes. Something I had to consider when shaping my pots is that my water capacity and health are inverse to each other. The greater capacity, the less health I have.

[F]

That's where the strategy comes to the business conversation. Right. I look at this and while watching this entire segment, I couldn't stop thinking about me and Molecule and how, man, this could be them.

[A]

Yeah.

[F]

You know what I mean? Like, like they put out a big project, they put out dreams, right? Something that was meant to be a. Hey, everybody, look how forward looking this is. This is us still being creative, but also us trying to make this big thing and put it out. And what, like, we don't know what Media Molecule is doing right now. I worry every day about that studio that we're gonna wake up and it is all right. Media Molecule just doesn't exist.

[C]

I feel the same way about Double Fine. I mean, constant letting them make weird.

[F]

The difference is that, okay, Double Fine puts games out.

[A]

Zeke speak super chats confirm matchmaking in an Xbox peer interview.

[E]

You.

[F]

Yeah, and I think if. If this was a problem with Microsoft for Double Fine, I don't think we would see Kiln today. I don't think we would have. We would have.

[B]

No.

[F]

Four months ago or two months ago,

[C]

every time you see a new game from Double Fine, there's almost such a sense of like, they're still going, you know, it's like you're just glad to look. I have a very special place in my heart for Double Fine and Tim, as we all should.

[E]

Right.

[D]

He's a.

[A]

We're taking him to dinner.

[C]

Oh, nice.

[A]

Good for you. How's the prime rib?

[C]

Oh, good. I love it. Get the, you know, get the king. Henry, don't around potatoes. So maybe you told. These are the best mashed potatoes I've ever had. I gotta get back there. So. Yes, Fantastic. I'd love to see it. And I would. I would make the argument that in. In the broader context of this showcase look at the games around it. You need something like this, right? Because don't get me wrong, Fable, Forza and Beasts. What is it? Beast of Reincarnation.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

All look fantastic, right? But they're all very, they're all in various. They're in very established. Honestly. You know, Fable and, and, and Beast are essentially like, not that different from one another in terms like core mechanics and stuff and running around, running around. Fantasy World and Forza Sports are. This is the only. This is like the Wacky uncle, right? This is like the one like the outlier, something that's a bit different. And you've got to have that in your lineup, right. Otherwise everything starts to feel the same. And again, I don't know to what extent Double Fine is operating at a profit or a loss or to how much. You know, Microsoft might see them as a. Like, we don't make a lot of money here, but like, we gotta, you know, we gotta keep going just because, like, you know.

[D]

Yeah.

[A]

An office space very well. And I think cheap in San Francisco.

[B]

Yeah.

[C]

And I think. Yeah, but I think they, I think they've got, you know, very. Like I said, they. When they notice, they said like, we do this when we step away from our core project. So this is, this is like one of their little offshoot things. And I love the fact that they have a model where they can. Presumably they've figured out a way to kind of devote a limited amount of resources to a game. So like, they can take a risk, but not a risk that's going to sink the company if the game doesn't work. Because you're right, this probably isn't going to pop off like, to, to, to a huge degree. These Party Brawlers never really do. Right. Has there ever been like a mega example of that? Like, Party Animals was fun. Gang Beast was fun. You know, these kind of, these kind of games are fun, but like, I don't know if there's necessarily a high ceiling for that kind of game. And it's strange. Like, of all. Of all the four games I can play, I can imagine pretty much what the experience of playing the other three is going to be like, right? This one, I have no idea what this game's gonna feel like to play. And that's interesting to me. Like, how does, how does the, the design of a pot affect its functionality and gameplay? I have no idea. What is it? What exactly does the different game modes feel like? It feels almost a little bit splatoony, you know, when you're like collecting the water and Putting into the. There's a lot of unknowns here, which I think is interesting. I just again, I'm just like one of these people who. I'm so glad that they're still making games like this at Double Fine is still out there. Otherwise everything would feel so much more samey. We need developers and we need people like Double Fine to kind of keep this kind of wacky ass alive because so few people are still doing it.

[A]

I want to be on the stream for this. That's my thing. I want to try this game. I want to see it. I hope it grabs me like a fat princess did back in the day, but we'll see. Yeah.

[B]

If I was talking to create, it's gonna be fun.

[F]

If I'm gonna talk about the game itself, I don't know if I'm gonna play as much as I try, though.

[A]

I mean, that's the.

[F]

Oh, I try it. Yeah. If you put on me, put me on a stream or something, I'll for sure.

[A]

Yeah. I don't think I'm gonna get deep in the meta and like, you know what I mean? But I think that's also the kind of game I think they're trying to make, which again, speaks back to the now dated to a degree, Xbox game path ethos, right? Of like, let's give you cool shit to keep you around and play. This is a night you're here for, fable you're here for, for. So let's give you something weird and wacky that you can hopefully have a friend who already has game pass or could convince to buy for a night for 10 bucks like Mike's always talking about.

[C]

And by the way, I don't know. Again, I'm not business Gary, but I think it's nice for Double Fine that these games can now ship onto PlayStation as well.

[B]

Right?

[C]

Because they can sell more copies of these games that, you know, we want to keep. We want to keep Double Fine alive. And the more places they can sell games and the more. The larger audience they can reach with this stuff, the better.

[A]

Yeah, of course. As we start winding on wrapping up, remember, everything coming to PlayStation. The one exception in quotes is Forza coming later to PlayStation. Not day and day, but everything else was announced, you know, for all these dates. Which actually brings up an interesting point. Snow. Michael. Michael. 25th anniversary of Xbox this year.

[B]

Big deal.

[A]

Grand Theft Auto looming in that November.

[B]

Wow, what a 25. What is 25 years kill with that

[A]

coming spring, Forza May, Beast of Reincarnation,

[B]

Summer Fable, Autumn, World of Warcraft, Diablo, Spring, right? You add in Call of Duty, Starfield.

[A]

Never give up. But I'm also. But I was more driving to Gears. E day Halo campaign of all. It's a big year for Xbox with a big juggernaut waiting in the wings. When do you think you get Gears? When do you think you get Halo?

[B]

That's why we always talk about this. They just jam packed that second half of the year. We're always intimidated this January through March window slide something in there for me. Me, help me out. Right? But like they have those, right? You have Diablo, World of Warcraft. Those all have like that spring dates right there. You also have like games like Fortnites coming out in May, which may feel so far away, but it's right around. So like yeah, I always get on this. I'm like hey, let's hit that first half. But they show this what end of January it's all. It's pretty much February by this point now and we're all going to be turning and burning into that. So it's tough to jam pack this. But you know, 20, 25 years is a big deal. We know we still have games looming, right? Clockwork Revolution is out there. State of Decay is somewhere out there. State of Decay is out there.

[A]

Some not this year.

[B]

There's more games next year. Yeah, but this year is a big deal, right? 25 years of Xbox. Xbox having this new identity. Everything is an Xbox. We're also like what are we doing with the next year Hardware. It's going to be exciting times to show. But. But Gears and Halo. Halo will hit the 25th anniversary and get steamrolled by GTA. It's just fine. It's only the campaign. It's 13 levels. It doesn't matter. Gears is the one that has to make room away from October. Yeah, Gears has to be before gta. That's the one that matters because I'm bringing gears to PlayStation just like Halo is. But like Halo's the old one, this is a new one.

[C]

It's funny that no. No one else can really date a game for the back half of 2026 until Rockstar make their move, of course.

[D]

But they've given a date so that's all people can go by right now. But I got to push back on what you said with Halo. I said it before, I'll say it again. I don't. I think it would be a bad idea for it to come on the 25th anniversary. Not even in the Xbox of things. It is the first time that Master Chief is going to be on a PlayStation platform. If everyone's just playing Grand Theft Auto, guess what? No one's playing fucking Halo.

[A]

No.

[D]

So you put it out in August, you give it plenty of breathing room.

[B]

Yeah.

[D]

You introduce him to Master Chief, and on the 25th anniversary, you know what

[B]

I would tell you?

[D]

Phil Spencer walks out. Yeah, this is the camera. Phil Spencer walks out and he goes, and now the future of Halo. And you show off the next Halo with the multiplayer. Oh, that's what you do on the 25th anniversary.

[B]

You show off multiplayer.

[D]

You show off what's coming. Like, now that we've celebrated 25 years of Xbox. Now let's take a look into the future of Xbox. You show the next Halo.

[B]

Okay, see, that's my problem is, like, you can hype up Halo all you want, but Halo or Campaign Evolved is missing a massive piece. That's the multiplayer.

[F]

Yeah.

[C]

Do you think they're coming? Do you think they will add that component? Do you think they'll be like Halo Multiplayer Evolved?

[D]

I'm. I am shocked that they're introducing Halo to PlayStation without multiplayer. That. That honestly surprises me. So this is why I think you at least have to show what the next version of multiplayer is going to be in this calendar year. You do it on the 25th anniversary, and when I'm wrong, everyone will.

[A]

Yeah, well, I don't think any of you are wrong. What a great day today to hang out, huh? Thanks for coming through, Gary. Paris.

[C]

Yeah, happy to be here. It's good. Good to be here on a day when the Xbox vibes are on. Yeah, we've had a lot of. You know, wasn't that they were canceling Perfect Dark Zero and this and that, and the vibes were all fucked up. This is a strong showing.

[A]

It was a very strong show.

[F]

Great distraction.

[A]

Thank you all for hanging out with us, of course, for this episode of the Kind of Funny Games Cast, if you're watching live, don't go anywhere. Our day is still just beginning. You are getting kind of funny Games daily right after this with Roger in Paris. Paris, I hope you got some left in the tank to talk about. Whatever Roger's assembled. I hear everything's horrible at Ubisoft. Then it'll be in review. Then it will be the video stream. No rest for the wicked. I'm excited to see that and see how co op works. Of course. Shout out to Jason Schreier. When we were talking about all this, the chat was popping off about a bs. That's a blue sky Tim with a Walking Lighthouse simulator and a Pottery Warrior Brawler. It's sad to see that Double Fine has just become another trend chaser.

[F]

Very funny.

[A]

Of course everybody, we couldn't do this without your support. Pick up a Conda Funding Membership Patreon.com Condofunny YouTube.com Kinda FunnyGames Apple Spotify get everything ad free. Get your daily dose of me Greg Miller in a series we call greg way. That's 15 to 20 minutes every day day. And of course get good karma for supporting an 11 person 11 year old small business. It's already up on Patreon. It's already up on bs. Go give us your hot takes about Xbox's performance today so you can be part of tomorrow's Hot Takes games cast. But until next time, it's been our pleasure to serve you.