Your PlayStation State of Play HOT TAKES - Kinda Funny Gamescast

Summary

Kinda Funny Gamescast: Video Game Podcast

Episode: "Your PlayStation State of Play HOT TAKES"

Date: February 13, 2026
Hosts: Blessing Adeoye Jr., Snowbike Mike, Andy Cortez

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Overview

This week’s episode is a deep-dive discussion and reaction to the latest PlayStation State of Play. The hosts — Blessing, Mike, and Andy — read and debate a series of hot takes from their community and share their own spicy opinions about the major PlayStation reveals, direction of the PlayStation brand, first-party output, nostalgia projects, and the enduring debate around remakes, new IP, and the health of PlayStation’s portfolio.
The tone is lively, humorous, and candid, with the trio riffing off each other's energy and audience feedback, focusing on what excites (and sometimes frustrates) the PlayStation faithful after a big showcase.

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Episode Structure

1. Friendly Banter & Recent Gaming Experiences (02:29–06:13)
2. Overwatch/Keyboard Mouse Learning Curve (06:13–11:01)
3. State of Play Hot Takes: Audience Write-ins Begin (11:13–66:00)
   • PlayStation’s recent showcase: Games, announcements, and expectations
   • Community reactions to new God of War, John Wick, Ghost of Tsushima, and more
   • The debate over Sony’s remake/remaster strategy
   • PlayStation’s approach to showcases and marketing
4. Reflections on Showcase Format, Sony Strategy, and the State of the Platform (66:15–71:13)
5. Final Audience Hot Takes & Super Chats (71:18–76:41)
6. Humorous Close and Mario Tennis Fever Tease (76:41–end)

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Podcast Kickoff: Banter & IRL Content

• The show opens with a lighthearted chat about last week's Magic: The Gathering content, the fun of IRL streams, softball memories, and Magic view count goals.
• Andy on IRL content: “I think it’s just fun seeing us hang out in an IRL setting ... and just having fun.” [04:27]
• IRL cooking and gaming is framed as something special and worth celebrating within their content grind.

2. Overwhelm of Modern Gaming & Too Many Games

• Blessing expresses being overwhelmed by the sheer glut of high-quality games, citing recent releases and personal backlogs.
• Notable, funny quote:
  "My steak is too juicy. My pancakes are too buttery. But, like, I got home last night and I was looking at the amount of games there are to play, and it's like, OK, I got overwhelmed." — Blessing [05:37]

3. Overwatch, Keyboard/Mouse vs. Controller, and Training

• Andy chronicles his transition from console to PC shooters, the importance of consistency, and his push for Blessing to learn keyboard and mouse.
• Mike explores Moira for the first time, loving the change from Mercy:
  "I was sucking, sucking hard and pissing on people. And I'm playing Moira." — Mike [06:39]
• Group discussion on how hard it is to switch habits but how rewarding it can be; pledges to commit to a week of Warframe.

4. PlayStation State of Play: Community Hot Takes

God of War: Sons of Sparta (2D Metroidvania) Debate

• Audience Take #1: "Sons of Sparta is totally an uninteresting game..." — Cyan Farar
• Audience Take #2: "People complaining ... should just shut the fuck up. You can't put expectations on leaks." — Oliver aka Ollie Shoes [12:17–13:05]
• Hosts discuss the effects of leaks, personal expectations, and the importance of letting developers experiment.
• Andy: "I think everything's subjective...but a lot of that has to do ... with kind of the earth tones being used..." [16:27]

John Wick Game Design Take

• Hot Take: "A shooter/beat 'em up is the least interesting version of a John Wick game you can make..." — Blake Elizondo [17:02]
• Regulars ardently disagree, wanting power fantasy and rejecting turn-based John Wick, with Sifu name-checked as an example of how you’d want John Wick action to actually play.

Where Is Infamous? Demand for Nostalgia Revivals

• Hot Take: “Where the f*** is Infamous?” (Why does Sucker Punch ignore the series?) [19:41]
• Blessing argues the superhero niche at PlayStation is full (Spider-Man, Wolverine) and that business realities mean Infamous isn’t a priority.
  "If you're another studio at PlayStation... why would you want to make Infamous?" — Blessing [21:20]
• The panel agrees that desire for constant revivals clashes with publisher priorities.

Should PlayStation Announce Games Years in Advance?

• Multiple write-ins question if announcing the God of War Trilogy Remake so early is a mistake.
• Andy: "A remake of a trilogy... those need to be a lot closer to release date. Those need to be like three months away from the release, if that..." [26:41]
• Mike prefers early announcements, mirroring player hype with TV tie-ins:
  "If you wanted to play the games, you could play them." — Mike [27:01]

Are Remakes Wasting Top-Tier Development Talent?

• Hot Take: “Having an S-tier studio waste their time remaking games...is awful.” [33:56]
• The team dismantles the myth that remakes consume the entire studio, noting modern flexible development and that new IP is still in development.
• "You need to go back to IP that made us the money at the beginning..." — Blessing [36:48]

Horizon Hunters Gathering & PlayStation’s Live Service Strategy

• Discussion on whether Sony buried Horizon Hunters Gathering due to lack of faith (47:06–48:56), with Mike arguing there’s experimention and recalibration post-Jim Ryan’s heavy live-service push.
• Andy: "The simple block style of that art style kind of detracts … that kind of bums me out." [49:09]
• Blessing wishes the multiplayer project used Forbidden West's engine or assets, like FromSoft did with Elden Ring DLC.

State of Play vs. Full Showcase—What’s the Best Way Forward?

• Hot Take: “This is as good as the state of play gets, but it shows how badly an actual full showcase is needed...” — Hot dog man [66:36]
• Blessing: "I think doing the more better paced out...State of play in February, state of play in June, state of play in September ... this is the better way to do it, in my opinion. That's my hot take.” [68:27]
• Discussion on the evolving nature of PlayStation marketing and showcase cadence.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Leaks & Expectation Management:
  "I can't get mad that, like, a thing that they hadn't shown or didn't want to show or be leaked out there didn't meet up to what my preconceived notions of it were going to be..." — Blessing [14:50]

• On PlayStation Nostalgia & Portfolio:
  "Let other IP that aren't Nintendo continue to spin off and do weird things with them... Mario was such a good way for Nintendo to get people to play things that are more experimentative." — Blessing [59:16]

• On PlayStation’s Multipronged Approach:
  "I want these IPs to be in rotation." — Blessing, regarding Konami’s resurgence and PlayStation’s third-party partnerships [63:47]

• On the Numbers Game & Showcase Grades:
  "People just get uptight about the number. If we didn’t put a number to this and we just said, I had a good time ... that's all that would change and then we wouldn't have this because too many people get caught up with the numbers." — Mike [57:39]

• On Gaming Industry Realities:
  "Video games are expensive as fuck to make... if you can squeeze that juice out of the ip... you gotta pay the bills is, like, the reality of it." — Blessing [38:13]

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Important Segments & Timestamps

• [05:37] — Overwhelmed by game releases (Blessing’s “too much good stuff” problem)
• [07:01] — Mike discovers Moira in Overwatch; team talks learning new playstyles
• [11:43–17:02] — Audience Hot Takes: God of War 2D debate
• [17:02–19:41] — John Wick: What makes the right kind of adaptation?
• [19:41–24:38] — Infamous nostalgia and Sony fatigue with superhero games
• [25:19–32:41] — God of War Trilogy Remake: Early announcement debate & synergy with the TV show
• [33:56–38:40] — Are remakes a waste of talent? Studio resource spread
• [47:06–53:27] — Horizon Hunters Gathering, art style controversy, and wish for a more “Horizon” look
• [62:40–65:51] — Konami’s big presence; PlayStation’s first-party pipeline
• [66:36–69:59] — Showcase vs. State of Play pacing debate; format future
• [70:16–76:41] — Rapid-fire superchats, spicy takes on Control, pricing of God of War remakes
• [76:41–end] — Humorous send-off, Mario Tennis Fever tease

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Superchat & Audience Take Highlights

• “Horizon Hunters gathering to burn in hell...their bastard son they banned to the Shadow Realm.” — Jake bakes cakes [46:45]
• “Let's be honest, those Sony PlayStation gamers ... just want copy and paste Sony third/semi open world action games.” — Omega Buster [73:03]
• “God of War remakes will either be one big full priced game ... or three $40–$50 games.” — El Capitan 2293 [73:46]
• “Konami having more time in an hour long state of play than PlayStation first party titles isn't a good sign for the state of PlayStation First Party Studios.” — Ryan Poala Higgins [62:25]
• “State of play was good, Sony still not giving a reason to turn on PS5 if you're on other platforms; they rely on third-party to keep people interested.” — Adam Bren [64:33]
• “Snowbike Mike has the best style in the office.” — Rotating Cast [65:46]

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Final Thoughts

• The hosts are generally positive on the State of Play and PlayStation’s trajectory, with nuanced takes on remakes, nostalgia, and new IP.
• While they acknowledge community fatigue around remasters/remakes and the desire for "something new," they also defend Sony's resource allocation, pragmatic business decisions in a volatile industry, and willingness to let other studios take creative shots.
• There’s clear passion for multiplayer innovation, bemoaning the slowness/lack of risk for Sony’s first-party output but appreciating the cadence of smaller, regular state of plays as a realistic modern marketing strategy.
• The show closes on a fun note, banter about inside jokes ("Mario Tennis Fever," "Dwayne the Johnson" as a chicken pun), and a call to get ready for more Kinda Funny content.

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Quick Reference: Hot Take Segment Timestamps

• God of War 2D, Leaks, & Community Split — [12:17–16:27]
• John Wick game adaptation, genre suitability — [17:02–19:41]
• Where’s Infamous & prioritizing new IP — [19:41–24:19]
• Remake announcement timing — [25:19–32:41]
• Are remakes a waste of studio talent? — [33:56–38:40]
• Horizon Hunters Gathering & multiplayer art style — [47:06–53:27]
• Showcase format debate — [66:36–69:59]
• Audience superchats rapid-fire & Control concern — [71:13–76:41]

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For further details on any segment, see timestamps above and quoted speaker notes.
The episode is rich in community engagement, industry meta-commentary, and candid takes on the evolving state of PlayStation.

Transcript

[Blessing]

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[Mike]

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[Blessing]

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[Stassi Schroeder]

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[Blessing]

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[Stassi Schroeder]

Nope. But I've got tonight's dinner paid for. Start selling on Depop, where taste recognizes taste list. Now with no selling fees, payment processing fees and boosting fees still apply. See website for details. This is your fix. I am your host, Stassi Schroeder. Welcome to Tell Me Lies, the official podcast. What's the most unhinged thing of season three?

[Andy]

Steven.

[Stassi Schroeder]

Because he's so evil.

[Mike]

I do think he is misunderstood.

[Stassi Schroeder]

You see everyone face consequences.

[Blessing]

It's intoxicating.

[Stassi Schroeder]

The writers just know how to trick you. There's always a twist in this show. Tell Me Lies, the official podcast January 6th and stream the new season of Tell Me Lies January 13th on Hulu and Hulu on Disney.

[Sponsor Announcer]

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[Mike]

If you want to get our shows ad free and our exclusive shows, go to patreon.com kind of funny.

[Blessing]

Yo, what's up? Welcome to Kind of Funny Games cast for Friday, February 11th February 13th, 2020. It was Mike. Why did he look like that.

[Mike]

What are we doing on this podcast today? I, I, you know what? It just occurred to me? Am I supposed to be on this?

[Blessing]

Yes.

[Andy]

Usually.

[Mike]

Like, I wanted to be on this podcast, but then I looked at YouTube. I was like, are they doing the Dark Souls in the review right now? I don't want to be on that.

[Blessing]

Just so we're clear, on the calendar, it says Blessing and Andy. Yeah, but Mike is supposed to be on.

[Mike]

Yeah, but they're doing something different now. We're not doing that.

[Andy]

Right, right. It was only Blessing, Andy, when we were only gonna do the Near Automata Dark Souls review, but then the state of play got announced, and then you really. It felt like you woke up right now.

[Mike]

I looked at the two of you, and I was like, I'm not supposed to be here. If he starts talking about near and Dark Souls, I'm walking out of this.

[Blessing]

February 13, 2026. It was the thing where he was looking at me, and I was like, mike has gotten both Roger and Andy this week. I'm not gonna let him fuck me up. And then I let him fuck me up. God damn it.

[Andy]

Got your ass.

[Blessing]

February 13, 2026. I'm one of your hosts, blessing.

[Andy]

Adio.

[Blessing]

Yay, Junior. Joining me is the master of hype Snow, Mike.

[Mike]

Mike, bless. Congratulations. You made it to Friday, man. Big week. You've been killing it, homie.

[Blessing]

Thank you so much.

[Mike]

You know what? I want to give a shout out.

[Andy]

Oh.

[Blessing]

I want to give a shout out.

[Andy]

Oh, wow.

[Blessing]

Okay.

[Mike]

Magic the Gathering.

[Blessing]

Come on.

[Mike]

We had a great stream. Thank you. The Big Kevin on production. We got to sit down and play Lordwin Eclipse. I want to make sure the audience knows we had a lot of fun doing that, and I hope they enjoy that content. But it was awesome to sit down at the table with you because we didn't do it this pre release. You were sick.

[Blessing]

We.

[Mike]

You were busy. We didn't get to have our two had a giant day. So I want you to know that I really appreciated playing Magic with you.

[Blessing]

Here's the thing. As long as people show up and watch those videos, we'll keep doing it because we want to keep doing it. We'll do more, but, like, we can't keep doing it if it's only, like, 2,000, 3,000 views. But shout out to a. Shout out to the audience for actually, like, showing up and enjoying it.

[Andy]

And I'm really excited wanting to learn,

[Blessing]

wanting to learn right with us, because, like, even if you don't know Magic, I think it's just Fun seeing us hang out in an IRL setting and being, like, looking at these cards on a table and just having fun. Did you know that?

[Mike]

It's fun watching us hang out in an IRL setting looking at you. Okay. I invite you to do so many IRL things. Okay? Yes. I want it to be content. At the same time, you can't appreciate what we had.

[Blessing]

I'm in the middle of saying, man, we had such a great job, great time hanging out irl the grass is always greener. And he turns towards Andy and says, we could be doing this. Appreciate what you have.

[Mike]

We're doing.

[Andy]

The grass is always greener. Man, I wish Nick and Andy were here.

[Blessing]

And I'll never forgive that. I'll never forgive that. Us playing softball for the first time. Being like, man, it'd be of Nick and Andy were here. Speaking of Andy, of course, sitting on that side of the table, we have the one and only nitro rifle. Andy.

[Andy]

Hello, gamers.

[Blessing]

Andy, how's it going, man?

[Andy]

I am. I'm tired, man. Yeah, yesterday was yesterday really took it out of me. And then it didn't help that, you know, after some Overwatch last night, I was like, let me. Let me play a couple matches of some Deadlock and I just kept on going. God, Deadlock.

[Mike]

Where you at with Overwatch?

[Andy]

Good, dude.

[Blessing]

Here's the problem. This might be my hot take to start off this Hot Takes episode. There's too many video games, and I don't mean to echo what I said yesterday, right. My steak is too juicy. My pancakes are too buttery. But, like, I got home last night and I was looking at the amount of games there are to play, and it's like, okay, I got overwhelmed. Yeah, I got overwhelmed too, because I was like, all right, like, this God of War Sparta game is out. So I could do that. Oh, yeah, there's High on Life too. I kind of want to play that as well. There are game I've. I've started both mugenics and I'm still in my playthrough of Karen and a final fantasy fantasy 10. Yeah. So I'm like, okay, well, maybe I can pick up one of those. And then it hit me that I had Mario Tennis Fever.

[Mike]

Mario Tennis fever.

[Blessing]

And so I immediately picked that up. I immediately had to start picking up some Mario Tennis fever. So I'm not being able to get back to Overwatch, by the way.

[Andy]

Roger, Keep unlocking stuff. Go use play my switch and unlock stuff. Adventure mode.

[Mike]

I want you to know that Andy put me onto a New hero in Overwatch. Yeah. Change my Overwatch gameplay because, you know, I complain now he makes me play Pocket Mercy and I get uptight.

[Blessing]

I don't think he makes you do that.

[Mike]

He makes me play Pocket Mercy.

[Blessing]

I get up tight.

[Mike]

But this time I went offensive. Yeah, okay. This time I went. I went out there and I started sucking. Okay. I was sucking, sucking hard and pissing on people. And I'm playing Moira.

[Andy]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Mike]

Sorry, J.D. neal. I stole your character for a night, but I had so much fun.

[Andy]

He played Moira yesterday. Bless. And was like, oh, my God, this is the easiest hero. Like, this is just like.

[Mike]

Like, I get to do things.

[Andy]

Like, I'm just dominating right now, and I barely learned her. And it's like, that's Moira. She's very, very good.

[Blessing]

I'm not a Tank player whatsoever. I've never had a Tank that I've gravitated towards where I made one of my mains. However, the Streets have been talking a lot about this new character, Domina. I read Simon Carty's IGN article, which is more of a Valentine's Day profession of love. But like, I read that. I was like, man, maybe I might start playing Domina.

[Andy]

Domina.

[Blessing]

This character sounds kind of neat.

[Andy]

Domina is so good. She's so much fun to play. She just got a bit of a Nerf. They put out some. They put out a patch today. They made her shield a little bit weaker, but that's it. But her. What. What I really need to do, we need. We need a full, like six hour stream, maybe a 12 hour stream of the blessing keyboard mouse boot camp. Oh, that's what needs to happen.

[Mike]

Commit to it.

[Andy]

Because anybody can learn keyboard mouse. I was in the same position you were. Bless. I was in the same position. Louis Medina would. We'd want to play Overwatch. And I'd be like, well, I'm playing on console. He's like, you play on consoles? Like, dude, I'm. I'm a terror on the sticks, man. I'm. I'm a Zenyatta. I'm. I'm nasty at Zenyatta on console. And then I finally picked up keyboard mouse and was like, oh, my God, this is actually way easier than I thought. It's all about getting you in the right situation to where we got. Where Mike. We got Mike in the right situation.

[Mike]

I think it's a great game to learn.

[Andy]

We got Mike. We got Mike in the right situation where he'd play here at work, he'd go home, his settings were Always different. He never felt comfortable. He was always like, I want that. It's like, no, you need the consistency. You need to know, like, when I move my mouse this much, I'm going to move that much. And then you come to work, and then when you move it an inch, you do a 720. It's like, you don't want that. You want consistency. We can get you to learn that way. You could shoot this fucking cat in midair.

[Blessing]

It's the problem. Oh, my God, the problem. It's me. In fighting games where I. In Tekken 8, there's a character named Victor, and I've been playing Victor for two years. And if I try to pick up a different character, it's almost like I'm learning the game from scratch again. And when I'm so good at Victor, it's like, oh, man, do I really want to spend the time to, like, reclaim and relearn and do all these things? That's how I feel about with keyboard and mouse, where I'm. I spent all my life playing controller, so I know how that feels. It's second nature to me, picking up keyboard and mouse. It's like, I want to do basic things and I'm thinking about it is

[Mike]

the deal lowering my game once you switch, it's hard to go back. There's no back.

[Andy]

Yes.

[Mike]

Oh, yeah. I'll play it on, like, any other game, but when it comes to shooters, once you go mouse and keyboard and you're really into it, you don't want

[Andy]

to tell you a weird thing. The only game that I feel okay playing, the only shooter I feel playing okay on controller, and it's kind of because I was forced into it because of the circumstances of. It's a console exclusive, was Returnal. That's the only game I feel, like, competent at. Like, now that I go back to it, where I'm like. I always would get annoyed when we'd want a game with Alfredo Diaz, and I'd be like, just come play on. Constantly. Be like, no, dude, I can't do it. I'd be like, man, you're so spoiled. And I'm like, no, I get it now. I can't go. I cannot play a shooter on.

[Blessing]

You know what? I'll make it one of my New Year's resolutions.

[Andy]

Yes.

[Blessing]

For 2027.

[Andy]

Yes.

[Mike]

It's your one.

[Blessing]

I'll make it one of my 2026 initiatives.

[Mike]

We have an initiative that we all share.

[Blessing]

Yeah.

[Mike]

One week of Warframe. You asked me for it. We're going to do one week of Warframe. That's three of us.

[Andy]

Let's do it.

[Blessing]

Let's do it.

[Andy]

Let's get episode so far.

[Blessing]

Yeah, these hot takes.

[Mike]

Let's hang out. Let's just hang out gaming for a little bit.

[Blessing]

Of course if you're watching live you can be a part of this show by super chatting in over on YouTube.com kind of funny games. In this episode I want you to super chat in with what your hot takes are about yesterday's state of play and about PlayStation in general. Give me your PlayStation hot takes. Let's have a good time. Of course, over on Patreon we posted a post that was asking for your hot takes for free. For anybody who's a member of Patreon you can go over there, make an account comment and I compiled a bunch of the comments for a handful of really good hot takes. Oh some of I, I try to.

[Mike]

This is our best hot takes episode yet. I think so on the take side.

[Blessing]

Yes, I would say so because I, I definitely was trying to look for actual hot takes. I was trying to find some certain ones that would piss me off but then also certain interesting perspectives and I think we got a mix of both and so shout out to the people that wrote in on Patreon but also you can get in on the super chats if you want us to read live what you're saying. Remember we couldn't do this without our producers on patreon.com kind of funny. So thank you to Carl Jacobs, Omega Buster and Delaney the Psalm twining. Thank you for now let's begin with topic of the show. I said I wanted to pay you a compliment. I forgot I. I wanted. You did great hosting yesterday. You did fant a fantastic job hosting. Yes.

[Mike]

Yeah, I was a little worried that I was going to lose you two cuz we went very long. That was a long day.

[Blessing]

I know.

[Mike]

I wish I was like oh it's like 4:30. I was telling Andy I was like the room is about 77 degrees right now.

[Andy]

Right when the show.

[Mike]

I feel like I'm going to die

[Andy]

Right when the show ended he was like I'm going to die of heat stroke. It's so hot in here.

[Blessing]

I know I had leave around like 4:45 cuz I had an eye doctor and so I was like I can't,

[Andy]

I can't be late to that Pocket K using your prime on us. Remember if you have Amazon prime you have Twitch Prime. I'll keep the lights and the mics on.

[Mike]

All right, let's read some hot takes. Let's talk about it.

[Blessing]

Let's read some hot takes.

[Mike]

What are people going to say?

[Blessing]

Let's start with two competing takes. Oh, we're going to start with Cyan Farar on Patreon who says Sons of Sparta is totally an uninteresting game. Overused art style for the genre. Basic looking gameplay from such a big franchise. I expected something much more similar to Prince of Persia. The lost crown on the opposite side. Oliver aka Ollie Shoes says people complaining about the new 2D God of War not living up to expectations should shut. Just shut the fuck up. You can't put expectations on leaks. I had no idea that it could be a possibility. Was immediately hyped when they announced it would launch yesterday and immediately bought it. Okay, on one hand somebody does not like the look of this game. On the other hand, Oliver is saying sfu, but that's part of the industry,

[Andy]

I think putting an expectation on something that like the reality is we knew about it, the leaks made us know about it and that's just reality. And we talk about the same thing with something like High Guard where it's like, well they. This was never the plan for them or whatever to sort of have the to. They were just supposed to, you know, they were just supposed to apparate out of nowhere just like this God of War game is supposed to happen. And that would have been cool, but that's not the reality of the situation. And I think it's totally fine to not love the art style of a game. I think everything's subjective. But I also thought it would be a 3D sort of still side scroller video game. And so yeah, I was a little surprised to see it being pixel art.

[Mike]

I am very much like the first take from Siam.

[Blessing]

Yeah.

[Mike]

Of I think my mind started to wander and go a little too crazy with. When we talked about, hey, what will be. What could be this 2 2, 5D Metroid Vania like in my mind went a little more Prince of Persia art style. Right. It went a little crazy. I'm like well, what I wanted to see. And yeah, at first I was like, ooh, this is not what I pictured in my mind right off of the leaks and the rumors. But then once I played it for two hours, I've actually really enjoyed the game.

[Blessing]

Hell yeah.

[Mike]

On the flip side of it, I will say I do think that the opening area is pretty plain. Right. It is the golden hills of Sparta. Right. Like it is pretty much like Gladiator when he Russell Crowe's walking through the. The wheat field, right? Like, it's pretty gold and pretty plain. But I think once I get past that, there will be some more to it. But as of right now, I'm enjoying the game.

[Blessing]

Yeah, I'm. I think I lean towards cyan a little bit.

[Mike]

Oliver.

[Blessing]

I definitely understand the Feel the sentiment, though, because I. I mentioned this during our breakdown yesterday of, you know, I had expectations of what I wanted this thing to be. But I can't get mad that, like, a thing that they hadn't shown or didn't want to show or be leaked out there didn't meet up to what my preconceived notions of it were going to be like, that's not on them. And I don't think people are. I will speak for myself. I'm not mad or at Sony Santa Monica that, like, oh, man, this isn't what I wanted it to be. But to Andy's point, yeah, it leaks, right? And so, like, when that happens, my natural thoughts are, man, what would I want out of a God of War 2D Metroidvania game? And part of that, part of. Part of that for me is thinking about what God of War has unique to other franchises. I like the idea of a Kratos that is like, you know, big burly, has the blades of chaos, and I almost want more of like a destructive Kratos Metroidvania, again, that's me dreaming. That's me being like, what would I want out of this thing? The fact that it is what it is. Doesn't make me go, damn, this sucks. I don't want that. But it does make me like. I think the thing for me is, without the leak, if I didn't know this game existed, if I saw that 2D God of War trailer trailer, I've been like, oh, yeah, it looks neat, but I wouldn't have, like, you know, gone. Gotten super hyped for it if it was the. We're playing as. I don't want to say modern Kratos, but I guess, like, power powered up Kratos. I got my family's ashes on me Kratos, right? Like, I think I would have been a little bit more hyped, but sure. Why? Like, I don't. I. I'm not mad that I'm not getting that. I think I'm more so, like, okay, yeah, that looks that. That looks cool. I love that they're trying something different. I love that this looks like a neat, different take on what God of War can be. But also it's not lighting my world on fire.

[Andy]

I also don't know if I would be interested at this game at first glance if it wasn't God of War. I, I don't know if it's interesting looking enough. I thought it looked a little bit bland, but a lot of that has to do, like I mentioned, with kind of the earth tones being used and, and I think if you try to get too colorful and too stylized with it, then it's like, well, this isn't God of War. You know, give me. I don't know, I just feel like a lot of the, maybe a lot of the styles and directions are kind of clashing with each other and they don't, you know, maybe they didn't land on the. The most ideal of. Of arts art directions.

[Blessing]

Let's jump in to another take from Blake Elizondo who says Hot take a shooter slash Beat Em up is the least interesting version of a John Wick game you can make. I acknowledge it's the most profitable, but it's also the boring choice. Let's make quote, let's make the shooter game out of the movie. That's basically a shooter game. Wow. Brave. Want to make a hack and slash Star wars game next off the take. This pisses me off.

[Mike]

Wow, that's a wild take.

[Andy]

Yeah, that's a bad one.

[Blessing]

Blake. You better have played John Wick Hex is all I can say.

[Mike]

Exactly. You better look better.

[Blessing]

You better be John Wick Hex's biggest fan.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Sponsor Announcer]

Yeah.

[Blessing]

That's cuz that exists.

[Andy]

Yeah. When we. Whenever you watch a movie and go, this would be so cool to experience this in a video game, it's because you want the, that power fantasy. It's because you envision the dude in the movie doing these moves. I want to control that and see how that would translate to game design. But I don't look at, I don't look at a, you know, if I'm getting a predator video game and going this would be really cool as a tactics game.

[Mike]

Yeah, like that's exactly that.

[Andy]

That's insane to me.

[Mike]

A great turn based rpg.

[Andy]

Yeah. I, I want, I want to see how can talented game developers translate this in a way, you know, into a gameplay mechanic and loop and combos and how can they do that in a cool, creative, satisfying way?

[Blessing]

Yeah, yeah.

[Mike]

I mean, I totally agree with both of you right there. I am on the opposite side of this hot take.

[Andy]

Right.

[Mike]

Like I am super excited for the Beat Em up shooter. Right. That is my power fantasy of that. Put Me in the museum. Let me shoot somebody up on the top. Second story, as I'm running around. I mean, my mind goes to Batman and Batman. Arkham Asylum.

[Blessing]

Right.

[Mike]

And Arkham City. Like, that's my dream game. Yeah. Now I watch John Wick four movies now, or whatever it is with Keanu Reeves is like, yeah, I want to live that. I want this video game to happen, and I wouldn't want it any other way if they were like, hey, if this was like, a tactics game like you said, it's like, we're giving you John Wick's tactics. You would hear a big huff and puff for me of like, oh, yeah, we already got John Wick Hex. Hex. And it's like, that was already a huff and puff for me of, like, that's not my style of game. No, this is very much me on this one.

[Andy]

I. I want to be in a museum showing off medieval swords, and as John Wick grabbing the off the wall, throwing it at bad guys. You know, it's. It's why whenever we played seafood, we were like, dude, this would be the perfect John Wick game because of that impromptu nature of, you know, kicking chairs and throwing that at the dudes and then comboing that into something else.

[Mike]

It's.

[Blessing]

That's.

[Andy]

That's what we want out of a John Wick game.

[Blessing]

100. Let's do one from flip the USB twice. Who says my hot take is where the is infamous? Ghost of Yoti Legends looks dope. I enjoyed Legends in the first game, but I want infamous. Let someone else make it if Sucker Punch doesn't want to. Also, I'm incredibly excited for Kana too, though. I was kind of hoping Ember Labs would be making a new Sly Cooper game. Sony give them any IP they want. So let's start with that first one.

[Andy]

Okay.

[Blessing]

Where the is infamous?

[Mike]

Well, they found success with Ghosts of Tsushima, and they followed it up. Right. And so, like, that's how that goes. Yeah, I think they had a great run and a strong run with Infamous, and now we've kind of moved on from that saga of their time, and now they've moved on to something different. Now, how many will we go? Right. I think you and Greg had a great conversation of, like, is Ghost of the Ghost series a trilogy? Is it going to be three? Is it going to end after two? What will be the next thing? Right. But, like, we're very much after Ghost of Tsushima. It was. The writing was on the wall. The fans wanted more of that.

[Blessing]

Oh, yeah, you're for sure.

[Mike]

You were going to go. You were going to follow that up with Yote no matter what.

[Andy]

I think that's an apt question to ask. If games took a year and a half to make, and we. And we had five Ghost of Sushimas or six Ghost of Sushimas or six Ghost games in that franchise, I think maybe then you can ask that question. But we just got this sequel to Ghost of Tsushima, so there's only been two Ghost games, and these games take five years to make or whatever. So it's like there hasn't really been enough time, I think, to ask that question. Unless you're just asking the Sony at large, hey, we know Sucker Punch is doing that. Give me Infamous from somebody else. Blue point on that or whatever.

[Blessing]

You know, they say let someone else make it if Sucker Punch doesn't want to. The thing I'll say to that is, if you're another studio at PlayStation, and I'm saying this as somebody who likes Infamous, why would you want to make Infamous? Spider man is the Superhero game for PlayStation. Wolverine is about to come out for Insomniac.

[Andy]

Right.

[Blessing]

Like, I think when you look at Infamous, beloved by the hardcore PlayStation audience. Right, there's nostalgia there, there's memories there, there's fun gameplay there. But I think that category of game within the PlayStation library is so fulfilled.

[Andy]

And.

[Blessing]

And I think for a developer under a publisher that is always looking to expand the library, try different things. Right. You know, fill the different niches that they might not have filled in other places, I feel like the superhero game is very much spoken for.

[Mike]

Oh, yeah.

[Blessing]

And so it's just a tough one,

[Mike]

especially with the MCU craze that we're currently in.

[Andy]

Right.

[Mike]

Like, Infamous was big, and that was. Right. Probably what MCU was about to start blowing up. And really being. Right now, I think the fans don't want just a hey, here's my superhero take. And it's like, you don't know any of the characters. Yeah, we're very much riding the high of, give me the characters. I know in the universe that I love, I want to be in that. And that's why Spider man is so wicked hot right now. I don't. If you're not doing that, if you're

[Andy]

any executive at Sony, you go, but we have the Marvel license. No.

[Blessing]

Yes.

[Andy]

Like that.

[Blessing]

If I'm a.

[Andy]

If I'm a portfolio, you're tacking on 2 million extra sales by attaching it to an X Men or anybody in the MCU.

[Blessing]

You know, if I'm a portfolio manager at PlayStation. Yeah. And a studio comes to me and is like, hey, we want to make Infamous. Yeah. I'm looking at you and I'm like, what if we. Honestly, this is the. I'm. I'm being the asshole here and being like, hey, we have. Yeah, we have Marvel here. If you want to work on these games or even, like, are you sure you want to do Infamous? We. We can make Uncharted. You can make Uncharted. We have other things here that, like, are probably more profitable here than an Infamous.

[Andy]

Yeah. I just don't know if that's. I don't know if you are any executive who only cares about the bottom line and not necessarily about developers just wanting to make art and make their. And work and have fun on the own on the thing that they want to make. You can't, you know, where everything is all about number going up. You go for the popular. The more popular ip without question.

[Blessing]

And I think the. The studio that could go to PlayStation and be like, hey, we want to make an Infamous game would be Sucker Punch. But I don't think Sucker Punch is going to PlayStation right now going, we want to make an Infamous game. You know, to the second part of this, though, talking about being incredibly excited for Kana 2, but, you know, hoping Ember Labs would make a new Sly Cooper game. My response to that is, do you want new IP or not? Because we can't keep getting these games that are fresh and new and from, like, these indie studios that are very talented and going, yeah, but why didn't you make this thing that already existed? I hear you on wanting more Sly Cooper. I. But I feel like Kana has such potential to continue to grow and be a thing. And, you know, I want more games that feel like they're not just rehashing things that have been around for decades.

[Mike]

It's the banjo conversation.

[Blessing]

Yeah.

[Mike]

Yeah. There's a thousand games that we'd all love to dig up from the toy chest and bring back, but guess what? All these studios right now are currently making games that they're passionate about. If they were passionate about a Sly Cooper game, they would be making one. This team is very passionate about bringing Kena and making a sequel to that. Yeah, let him do it.

[Andy]

And this also kind of goes back to what I was just mentioning with, you know, if. If games took a year and a half to make, if. If games had a much quicker turnaround nowadays, then, yeah, I could see a lot of different people making A Sly Cooper game or having Ember Lab work on something. But it's. You know, this team was likely just working on KANA 2 in the time that CANA. Since KANA 1 had come out. So it's like, it's really. It's really hard to say, all right, go work on an IP that maybe you don't care about a whole lot. Because it's like, well, that's not just going to be six to 12 months of our time. That's a three to five year commitment.

[Blessing]

You know, let's hop in to people asking, did we get the God of War trilogy announcement too early? And as I asked this, I want you guys to check around to see if there's a charger I can use for my laptop.

[Mike]

Oh.

[Blessing]

Oh, perfect. Okay. That's actually.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Blessing]

Because apparently this thing didn't charge overnight. I meant to be charging my laptop. Did we get the God of War trilogy too early?

[Andy]

I'm going to maybe pop those questions. They on the dock?

[Blessing]

What's up?

[Andy]

Are those questions on the dock just in case your shit actually does that?

[Blessing]

Oh, yeah, it is. They're on the dock. Yeah, they're on the dock. But we're good here. Let's start with Mesh, who writes in and says, absolutely fantastic showcase. Had something for everyone. But I think it was a mistake to mention the God of War trilogy remake at the end. It seems like it's at minimum two years away, likely three plus. And I don't think Sony needed to slip back into that old habit of announcing a project so many years in advance. This could have been saved for a closer to the Amazon prime show, for example. I also have one from Game GEO saying the God of War announcement wasn't all that hype. The I just have PTSD from in development announcements. So I expect that trilogy to be released five years from now.

[Andy]

You're not far off from that. I am. I think if it were a brand new project, I'm way more okay with you all mentioning. Mentioning something that far away.

[Mike]

We're doing the intergalactic is right.

[Andy]

Right.

[Mike]

You know, let's say that, hey, we're out. We're way out there.

[Andy]

A remake of a trilogy and announcements of that nature. Whenever it's like, hey, we're bringing back this thing or we're remastering this or we're remaking that game or whatever. Those need to be a lot closer to release date. Those need to be like three months away from the release, if that, you know.

[Mike]

Now I'm on the opposite side Bless.

[Blessing]

Yeah.

[Mike]

You know what? I like this announcement. I like it early because you know what we did the first time that we watched Fallout Man? They got to make a remake of this, right? Now where's the remake? We were all let down when there was no remake, right now, you know, after this Amazon TV series that you're going to. There's a remake somewhere in here, right? Like, I like knowing this. And also, this isn't a major announcement for me, right? I've played the God of War games. Sure, I'm excited for a remake, but this isn't something where I'm like going to be checking my wristwatch all the time, right? It's like, hey, they're making a God of War trilogy remake. I'm okay with that. Like, I don't, I don't think this is as big as we're making it sound of like, oh, now I got to wait five years for this. It's like it's a trilogy remake. If you wanted to play the games, you could play them.

[Blessing]

See them announcing it like this makes me think it's going to be bigger of a thing. And I don't know if that's to the detriment of this or if that's the benefit of this. I think maybe what they needed was a two second shot. Hey, these are remakes. This is what the remake is going

[Andy]

to look like, right?

[Blessing]

I know that's impossible to do this early on because they probably don't even have like, what, like an example of what that would be or like a showable example, I should say, of what that would be. But I think when you just say we're remaking these iconic PS2 games, remakes come in so many different forms. And so like them saying we're early in development, us having to assume it's years and years away, I'm expecting something blue point level.

[Mike]

See, that's funny because that's where we divided yesterday on the conversation of when they said we'll be back with the next time we announce this, it will be a big deal. Right, Right. You talked about like the redesign kind of.

[Andy]

Right.

[Mike]

And I said, no, the next time they announce this, this will be. We're three months out or it's releasing today. Right? Because in my mind, if we're not doing a full redesign and we're really pushing this, right? It's like you've already been there, done that, right? So it's like, I don't need to see this again. If it's a, hey, guess what? The God Of War trilogy is here. We're still a year or two years out. It's like, no, just drop it. Right? Like, we know what we're getting. You're remaking it. That's awesome. But if it is a redesign, it's got to be big things, then that's a big deal. But I think it's just dropping.

[Blessing]

This is what I'll say, because I have two things for it. Right? One, I think Pearson Chat might have actually mentioned this. They're bringing back the VO and I wonder what that looks like, if you're maybe redoing voice work or what does. What is. What does his involvement in this look like as far as going back and retail tailoring things and redoing aspects like that. My other thing is God of War PS2 still plays pretty well. You could have just ported the. Either the PS3 remaster that they did or just, I guess, remaster it again. Those games are pretty flawless as far as how the gameplay feels. If you're going to go back and say you're remaking this, yeah, I expect this to be redesigned. I expect this to look maybe like the modern God of War games as far as picking this up and playing them today. So do.

[Mike]

Do we know a timeline on the God of War show right now? I know that we're getting there where we're announcing people, but, like, they haven't filmed it, they're not editing it, they're not ready for post production. Here it is. Right.

[Andy]

I got to assume we're a year to a year and a half out.

[Mike]

Do we think this lines up at all with the end of it?

[Andy]

Right.

[Mike]

Like our always dream with Fallout. Hey, Fallout ends. Here's the new game.

[Andy]

Okay, but Phil G. But I would feel more. I would be more on your line of thinking if we were only casting people that were from the OG trilogy. But everybody getting cast are in the Norse mythology stuff. We're getting like Thor being cast. We're getting, you know, everybody.

[Mike]

You're talking about the tv.

[Andy]

Everybody for the. The last two games have been getting cast. I. And this is a different discussion, but I think that, like, closer to when the TV show comes out, you get the PS5 Pro Director's Cut edition of God of War 2018 and ragdoll, as opposed to. I think this game is probably two and a half to three years out. I think this game, I think this trilogy based on them saying we're super early in development to where they couldn't even show a screenshot or concept art that to Me tells me that we're way further away than we think and this thing will come out like, you know, maybe a year after the TV show comes out or something.

[Mike]

Now, I don't think you can go wrong with having more though, right? Like, Fallout is a little bit of a different beast of you tell your own story and fall out. But like, we've jumped from we want Fallout 3 to Fallout New Vegas. We've gotten 76 and 4 with updates, right? Like, I don't think you can go wrong if this show goes two seasons, three seasons, right. Of having a God of War 2018 remaster or bundle edition with Valhalla and also tying it in with a remaster of 1 through 3. Right? No better way than having this Sony team come out and be like, hey, you might love the show. What if we told you there's a story of Kratos before the show? You can play it now with this ultimate remaster.

[Blessing]

And depending on how the show goes, I'm sure they have long, long term plans of eventually we're going to adapt the Greek God of War Games into TV as well. And so like this being there, waiting for the audience that watches that, let's say probably at that point, seven, eight years from now, we'll be sitting them again, sitting there. I don't know if that's like the long term planning that they're trying to initially intentionally do because that's so far out. But I, I think the goal here is for IP to just be synergistic all around. And so to Mike's point, yeah, like if we get to season two of the God of War TV show, even if we're still in the Norse Realm, like it could be cool to be like, yo, these remasters or these remakes are out so you can get the origin of Kratos to see how he ended up in the Norse Realm. Right. Like, I think there's something there to it, but I think it all just feeds back in until God of War is just one of PlayStation's biggest franchises and it's their original, original franchise. And so they're going to do whatever. They're going to make a Metroidvania that's pixel art. They're going to make remakes of these things. They're probably going to bundle in 2018 and Ragnarok and they're going to have the TV show coming out.

[Mike]

It will be interesting to see everyone's hype and interest level on this. Right. And how big and different they go with it.

[Andy]

Right.

[Mike]

Is this Something that at every showcase now people will be clamoring for and going, man, when are they going to announce that God of War remake? When is this coming? Right? If that's that says right of like, hey, you announced it too early right now. Now I'm going to be sitting here waiting for it. Or is it just going to be like, hey, when they announce it, we're all going to be happy and it's going to be cool. But it's not like when I look at PlayStation's Rolodex, this won't be high on the list of I have to see this next. Right? There's a lot of other games I'd rather them go to and talk.

[Blessing]

I have the weird thing of I think the longer we, the longer before we see this thing next, the higher my expectations are going to be for it. If we see it pop up next year and they're like, yo, all right, here's what it looks like. I'm probably going to be expecting something smaller, but if it's not until 2029, until we see this thing next, I'm going to be like, yo, this shit better look like fucking God of War 2018. Speaking of God of War, Roger actually sent me a write in that we had from. I think the full username is seeing a picture of a white boy and saying Jordan, you is the name of the person who writes in and says having an S tier studio waste their time remaking games instead of working on something new is awful and a perfect encapsulation of the industry right now.

[Andy]

If you're.

[Mike]

I, I mean, so they're thinking that Sony Santa Monica is not making other things right now.

[Andy]

Yeah, that's.

[Blessing]

I saw this when I didn't initially include it because I didn't.

[Mike]

I.

[Blessing]

For me it is the thing of. I don't think you can say that we know.

[Andy]

We know so many. We know nowadays that teams have to be super flexible and have different departments working on. I like. I don't. It. I don't. In my heart of hearts, I do not think that the whole studio is dedicated to 300 or whatever for whatever it is are working on this. Like there's no shot for that. Like there's no way.

[Mike]

It's 2026. We've seen all of these games that you love and know worked on by so many teams. So many different groups come in and support each other. It's like it's not just Sony Santa Monica making this. There will be a number of teams coming in to help because the other parts of the teams are probably making your next big game and the other game after that.

[Andy]

Right.

[Mike]

So I, I don't think you can look at and go, oh, all 300 are working on this. Absolutely not.

[Andy]

The fact that I. When this sort of 2D metroidvania God of war is kind of being, you know, rumored here and there. I thought part of Sony Santa Monica was working on it. I thought they had like a little team of 20 or whatever working on this Metroidvania and the fact that it's mainly a completely different team who worked on the backyard sports games or whatever. Hell yeah.

[Blessing]

Hell yeah.

[Andy]

It's a. It's cool. Okay. I was.

[Mike]

What? I was like, is there a dog in the studio?

[Blessing]

Like, little, little pitter patters. And I'm like, what's going on?

[Mike]

Do you think if you picked up that dog right now, I would let you pick it up? I've never picked up the dog.

[Blessing]

Yeah, I think he's very. Yeah, I pick up a bo.

[Andy]

I think he's more with me nowadays.

[Mike]

No, he's just so low to the ground.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Mike]

He's not a dog that gets up. You know what I mean? Like get up on their feet.

[Andy]

Well, you got to get up.

[Mike]

This dog doesn't get up. He doesn't get vertical.

[Blessing]

If you have a little treat for him, he'll get up.

[Mike]

He'll get up.

[Blessing]

Trust me.

[Andy]

This dog, he's a very horizontal T word in front of this dude.

[Blessing]

Wow. As of 2024, by the way, according to Wikipedia, Sony Santa Monica has 250 plus employees. And yeah, that's my thing is we know Cory Barlog is working on a new IP and expect it to be a big thing. And so it's hard for me to go, man, we're all, we're wasting all these resources. How dare you go back and try to remake the games that people loved from the PS2. Like, I.

[Andy]

If.

[Blessing]

If somehow we got the information that, no, actually the whole studio is doing this for the next five years, then I'd be like, oh, yeah, that's.

[Andy]

Then I'd be disappointed.

[Blessing]

Yeah, then I'd be kind of disappointed. I'd prefer something new. But I think when we're talking about the way the industry works, and I think they mentioned this. Right. Let me pull up the thing that Roger sent me. They say it's a perfect encapsulation of the entry right now. I'll give you that. In terms of. The video games industry is in a place right now where companies need to do what they can do to make the money, how they can make it. And so, like, you need to go

[Mike]

back to IP that made us the money at the beginning. And they hold that tight. Yeah.

[Blessing]

If you have something that's a surefire bet, like remaking.

[Mike]

This is the God of Fire bet too.

[Sponsor Announcer]

Yeah.

[Blessing]

Like, if you God of War, then do it. Yeah. Like, if that is what is going to secure Sony Santa Monica to be able to make the new IP Corey Barlog game and also to have something that's God of War in the interim and then return to God of War whenever this is done.

[Mike]

I don't.

[Blessing]

I don't care. Like, I'm gonna play this and probably like it.

[Mike]

So I get the feeling, right. Because we have, you know, for me, on the Xbox side, but just a gamer in general. Like, we've had a lot of Sony of like, Last of Us 1 remaster, Last of Us 2 remaster. We're getting the Last of Us 1 and 2 rebundle. Rebundle. And you're like, this is just a lot.

[Andy]

Right.

[Mike]

But for me, God of War one through three, isn't that recent?

[Andy]

Right.

[Mike]

Like, this is a old game that's getting a remaster. I'm excited for this. I'm okay with this.

[Andy]

Yeah. But also, I can't even, you know, hindsight being 20 20, I don't even look back at the Last of Us stuff in an annoyed way. I think it's easy to get, so. But it's. It's marketing. The TV show is popular. Like, duh. What? You know, we complained about Fallout not having stuff, you know. Now would it have been awesome to have had a. An arc Raider style Last of Us multiplayer game to kind of coincide with the Last of Us TV show? That would have been great, but that got canceled off or whatever. But all of that just makes sense. That's just marketing. You put out something new whether there's a whole lot of new to give or not.

[Blessing]

Yeah, you're.

[Andy]

You'd be dumb not to.

[Blessing]

It's marketing and it's paying the bills.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Blessing]

Video games are expensive as fuck to make. And the video games industry, like I said, is volatile. So, like, if you can squeeze that juice out of the ip. And I know the milking part of it is annoying, Right? Of like, oh, shit. They just keep putting out the same thing over and over again. That I understand the annoyance of it, but you got to pay the bills is like the reality of it. And so if this means I get to get a new thing later down the line, I'm okay with it. It doesn't ruin my day at all.

[Andy]

Now on the flip side of that, we can always. With the caveat, you know, whenever I'm talking, I always just wish I could have like permanent lower thirds. So people always know, like, here's my actual belief, like, yeah, it'd be great if those CEOs could make 30 million instead of 50 million.

[Blessing]

Oh, of course.

[Andy]

And that money could be pushed, you

[Mike]

know, but like, I think they know.

[Andy]

Yeah, that's just not the reality of things.

[Blessing]

Yes, we're gonna move on. But before we do, I want to do a couple things here. I want to read a couple super chats like this one from Omar Gonzalez, 5666. Oh no. Who says? Great job, Mike. You did a great job hosting and thanks to the whole crew for some great content. Mike. Mike lamos87 writes in and says, I agree with Mike and andy. I played PlayStation my whole life and only built my first PC back in May. Mouse was easy. Keyboard was hard.

[Mike]

Way better once you get on it. Especially with a game like Overwatch. Right. I learned with Halo and I think those are two good onboarding ones. I would never throw you into the war zone and make you train in the war zone. That was a nightmare. That was too fast, too insane. I think Overwatch is like a perfect learning curve. Andy always has it. Just play a single player game like a Doom is a great way to learn.

[Blessing]

Okay.

[Mike]

Truly and honestly, if we spent 12 hours of nothing but Overwatch us in a room, you would love it.

[Blessing]

You know what's funny is that like I do, I think I played Starfield keyboard and mouse. Like there are games, maybe they're slower pace that do work for me is the. It's getting into that competitive aspect. Like the single player stuff. I can do well enough, but it's when, it's when these fucking, you know, try hards are breathing down my neck. You know, I fucking spawn and all of a sudden like they're in my spawn killing me.

[Andy]

I'm like, oh, but, but, but keep in mind that whenever you play with us, you're going to be put in the keyboard lobbies. Yeah, a couple of days of like is going to just have you so much higher start of like ready level. But yeah, I would say my advice when I was first learning keyboard mouse in 2020 was like to anybody who was interested in, in playing keyboard mouse was like Mike said, play a single player game, play Ghost Runner, you know, play RoboQuest.

[Mike]

High on life too oh yeah.

[Blessing]

Oh yeah.

[Mike]

You could try it on that. That is a perfect game.

[Blessing]

That's true.

[Mike]

I played control.

[Blessing]

There you go.

[Andy]

Dude, I wish I played control on keyboard. Yeah, that was a good. That was a console game for me.

[Blessing]

OMGLX Super Chats and it says a hot take within a hot take. God of War, Greek Trilogy remake announcement wasn't big for me. I've played those games but I prefer that kind, that kind of Redux Over Horizon, the Last west or Days Gone remasters, which is kind of what we were just saying.

[Andy]

Yeah, I mean, yeah, you're, you know, you're talking remake versus remaster, which is always the question. But you know, if we, if this game comes out and has a lot more different camera styles. Like unless, you know, if we're getting a screenshot comparison of the old God of War versus whatever this remake is and it's like a perfect one for one, but one side has updated models, updated lighting, updated particles, updated everything that like. Because I'm wondering are they trying to change perspective at all? Not saying that they are going to get close to the more recent God of War games with like behind the back third person sort of style, but are they going to do a bit more with what the camera style? Because God of War, the old school game is very, very zoomed out. Very like you know, kind of old school actiony type style stuff. And you know the camera style or the camera angle would change here and there. But if they start doing a lot with the camera then that's like, oh, they're going like the extra mile with this. It's not just an asset sort of recreation.

[Blessing]

And we'll do one more before we move on from. I mean this if fits in the conversation we're having. Currently Science Dog official says my hot take. I don't want a remake of the Greek God of War games. I want Sony Santa Monica to make something new. Which kind of feeds back into the conversation that we were just talking about, which is you're going to get something new from Sony Santa Monica. The rumor is that you're going to get it.

[Mike]

You're going to get something real soon.

[Blessing]

Real soon.

[Mike]

Yeah, nobody sounds like you're going to get in about two months, three months you're going to get an announcement. Get ready.

[Andy]

Yeah, when we get ready. Dude, I don't even. I need someone to like throw away all of my electronics when God of War comes out so I don't have to see people complaining about nudity being censored or whatever. Or like, oh, how the Internet is

[Blessing]

going when the remake comes out.

[Andy]

Just how like the. The woke is that you know, taking, you know, titties away from, like. I just don't even want to be around the discussion.

[Blessing]

They're not gonna take out the titties. Well, you're talking about the. In the. In the remake of the games.

[Andy]

In the remake, they're not gonna take out the titties.

[Blessing]

It might be less actually not even gratuitous because, like, it's Greek mythology.

[Mike]

Yeah.

[Blessing]

And they were. They'd be.

[Andy]

It's horny.

[Blessing]

You're still gonna horny.

[Andy]

It is horny.

[Mike]

Game of Thrones.

[Blessing]

You know what? People might get mad if they take out, like the tap square to bang. Because that was a thing and you would like. It would be. The camera shot would be on the vase that's next to the bed. It'll be shaking or whatever. And it was kind of juvenile.

[Mike]

Yeah.

[Blessing]

So, yeah, you know what? Yeah, take my phone away too. I don't want to be on the.

[Andy]

Destroy my.

[Blessing]

Yeah, people are gonna be real upset about that if they. But something that you shouldn't be upset about, something that you should be real happy about are the benefits that you get over on patreon.com kind of funny. And YouTube.com kindafunnygames with the kinda funny membership which allows you to get shows just like this. Ad free. Speaking of ads, let us tell you about our sponsors.

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[Blessing]

Jake bakes cakes.

[Mike]

Oh, I like Jake.

[Blessing]

Writes it and says hot take PlayStation wants Horizon Hunters gathering to burn in hell. It's their bastard son they banned to The Shadow Realm, aka the PlayStation Blog. They're bearing the sins of Jim Ryan. Except Marathon, which they have to sell to justify their multibillion dollar acquisition of Bungie.

[Mike]

Didn't we just get a 10 minute video about them?

[Blessing]

Ah, but it wasn't in the state of play. It wasn't in the state of play.

[Mike]

Yeah, but that nobody saw it fit a nice developer direct style of like, hey, we're going to talk about this game. We're going to educate you on what it is.

[Blessing]

You don't agree.

[Mike]

I mean, it's just like, are they banishing them to the Shadow Realm? No, I think Horizon is getting some love and letting people play in the sandbox and they're trying different things with it. We're also looking at a Sony that was like what, five years ago planned to do nothing but a bunch of live service games. And we're still kind of redirecting the ship maybe a little bit away from some of Those, but there still are some that are going to make it out here and you will be the judge if you like it or not.

[Blessing]

The thing I will say I was, I was surprised not to get just a little reminder or a little like a quick trailer with saying the name or not the name. The date of the like beta or play test thing that they said that they're doing. That's a great call.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Blessing]

Yeah. Because like with both marathon and go see OT Legends, there's just a lot going on in the next couple of weeks for PlayStation. I feel like you want to get that out there, drum up some excitement for that to get people in or maybe they just don't care about that many people doing the play test.

[Mike]

When is the play test? I think towards the end, very close

[Blessing]

end of February I wanted to say they said. And so like if that's the case, give me another little trailer and then hit me with the date for that. Other than that though, I think they've treated this the right way because Horizon Hunters gathering needed the 10 minute breakdown of this is what this is. This is what this is what the game plays like. Like, I think you need that kind of breakdown for this game and I don't think that would have served the state of play well. I think that would have slowed down the pacing of the state of play trick.

[Mike]

Yeah. Now the audience says it's a closed beta test and it's NDA any age.

[Blessing]

Oh, okay.

[Mike]

Then fit. What? Yeah, a normal play test to me that you would be promoting and sharing would be. It feels like that game is still in the works.

[Blessing]

Yeah, fair enough.

[Mike]

But I'm a Dauntless guy. I like Dauntless. That's the monster hunter for identification 1. And I thought they did a great job with Dauntless and I'm very excited. I've always wanted to share monster hunting, Robo dinosaur dreams with my friends. And so I'm into it. I'm going to give it.

[Blessing]

And there was, there was a little bit of night rain in there.

[Andy]

A lot of night rain.

[Blessing]

Yeah.

[Andy]

Now the only thing that I, I wasn't the biggest fan of and it's not like I don't want people. I don't want the haters to think that I'm like totally on their side. Sure, sure. Because I do like the art style. I liked the way it was like shaded. I liked the way it looked in certain situations. It was like, whoa, this is. Yes, this is stylized. And we've seen a million stylized games. Like we've seen A million other types of art directions, but this one just has like a different kind of polish on it. Yeah. In a way that, you know, when I look at. I mentioned looking at a Beast of Reincarnation and going like, yeah, but this, this just has like a different sort of, I don't know, framing of it. But I don't want that for my Robo Dinos. I love the fact that my robo dinos are so intricate and, you know, almost Transformers level. Like, that's going too far. Michael Bay, Transformers level. But I love all of the little intricacies of their. Of, yeah. The modules and all and the, the simple block style. I say block style, but like the simple shape style of that art style kind of detracts from that and that kind of bums me out otherwise. Like, I think the, the humans look cool and kind of the, the environments and everything like that. But I, when, when we were reviewing Forbidden west and I talked to Blessing the next day, I was like, can you imagine just the multiplayer Monster Hunter style game of shooting off the pieces of the robots to try to use that piece to upgrade that piece of armor? Because you've been waiting to get that one drop and that one's really hard to get, like chasing that sort of high. I think. Night Ra, this Night Rain style of game is still going to be cool and satisfying and fun based on how a lot of the boss fights looked. But it's still like, there have been a lot of games coming out recently that are almost exactly what I want. And like, this is just missing a lot of things for me, unfortunately.

[Blessing]

Yeah, I wonder what the conversation was for our style, because I remember when this first started being talked about, I believe it was like leaked first, but then they had the job posting and, and all the conversations about it. The art style was emphasized. Like, you know, in the job posting they put up a couple years ago, they said, we're working on a multiplayer game in the Horizon universe that's going to have a new art style. And it seems like that's something that they, they've been leaning into this entire development process. I wonder why. Like, I wonder why that was the conversation.

[Mike]

Yeah, it's odd that they didn't point to Ghosts of Tsushima Legends and go, hey, have we thought about trying this right? Like, yeah, like, Andy just described the fancy. I think we've all had that experience, right? You play Horizon, you see that giant snake robot and you're like, oh man. Imagine me and four friends running around Monster hunter style on that one it is surprising. Like they didn't point to Legends and go, hey, this found success. Yeah, maybe you should just try this.

[Blessing]

Or even the thing of like, hey, we have these assets. And like, not that it not. I mean, kudos to them for not just going, hey, we can asset flip this thing. But I look at something like Elden Ring Night Reign and they were able to get that out the door and guess what? It looks like Elden Ring. It feels like Elden Ring and it works as a multiplayer game. I think that's kind of what we wanted out of Horizon Hunters.

[Andy]

I think with how good Horizon Forbidden west looks and just how amazingly that that guerrilla makes Decima engine look and how like just how awesome and polished those video games look and how amazing they are visually. I like, it would have been a perfect situation for me, in my opinion, to be able to create a character that I want with that engine. And when we talk about game style and game mechanics, I understand why games like this do the pick a class and like that character is that. And this character does healing and that character is the tank or whatever. But it's like I felt the same with Night Rain where it's like, I want to create my dude and then let me put my dude in a bucket of this is my tank guy. You know, I want to. I want that level of customization. Your characters look so good. This, this world looks fantastic. It looks amazing. Why you would make a multiplayer game that's not in the most visually impressive, one of the most visually impressive video games you've ever had. Why you would. Dude, why you would choose to not do that? It's like kind of crazy to me.

[Blessing]

Did you ever play the Forbidden west dlc?

[Andy]

No.

[Blessing]

Oh my God.

[Andy]

It somehow looks Echoes of the Broken Heart or something.

[Blessing]

No, the one that went to Vegas Burning Shores. Yeah, the one where they. Not Vegas.

[Andy]

No, Vegas was in the main.

[Mike]

Cisco.

[Blessing]

No, that was also in the main game.

[Andy]

LA Vegas. I think it was la.

[Blessing]

Yeah, I think it was la. But that game somehow looks even better than Horizon Freedom West. Like the character models in the DLC in particular had me like, yo, this is crazy. I mean, Destiny 2 I think had that as well because they're working off the same engine. We got another hot take from EOF Gizmo, who says hot take some cool multi platform stuff in this. But first party wise, we got a logo. A very ugly 2D God of war, A multiplayer game that looks bad. A multiplayer game that everyone was hating on last year, and a multiplayer that's free Free DLC to an existing $70 game. It's a solid 7 out of 10 show, but slap Sony on it, 10 out of 10 greatest ever. Not a hater. Just really don't understand the lack of consistency across across platform coverage over in the U.S. mike, why do you love PlayStation so much and hate Xbox?

[Mike]

Oh my God, man. I've always been a Sony pony. I ride for the blue team. I just love PlayStation, their catalog.

[Andy]

Talking into that controller.

[Mike]

Exactly. I was playing Sons of Sparta and out of nowhere Dominus called me on my controller and I said, this is the coolest thing I've ever. Very odd. I've seen this take a couple of times now and yeah, I really liked this showcase. I think the pacing was fantastic. A lot of the games, really almost all the two games didn't speak to me. Everything spoke to me. I liked the announcements. It is exactly what I'm looking for from PlayStation because I already know the big games. I know about Wolverine right now. I know that we are working on intergalactic, right? So it answered the questions that I needed in the close range, right? I think we always talk about the show me the three months, six months, give me a year, give me the two years, five years out, right? And so I got what I wanted out of this. But I am different, right? I am a multiplayer gamer. I enjoy multiplayer games. I know that the PlayStation audience, when they hear that they do this because they don't want that, right? Like I am someone who wants a SOCOM to come back. I do enjoy Ghost of Yotei Legends, right? Like, yeah, this speaks to me and I know that the PlayStation fan base is not that. I want a third person action adventure, narrative driven game. I want more Uncharted, I want more Last of Us. I want these games that are iconic that made this platform go. And unfortunately the leadership at PlayStation changed that about five years ago. They saw the, the money was somewhere else and they said, shit, we should be doing that. And then the audience spoke up and was like, actually that's not why we're here on this platform. And now they're trying to get back to that, right?

[Andy]

I don't ever grade showcases on the strength of the portfolio, of the exclusive portfolio. Like if the showcase brought hype and had me excited for a lot of the games, I don't ever go, yeah, but 80% of them were third parties. Like, I don't give a shit about the plat because I'm playing on PC, I'm playing wherever I want to be, right? I don't I think maybe it's a different story if you go, okay, but what does this say about PlayStation and their portfolio? But I don't really give a shit about that because it had the per. Like, even the games that were already known quantities were shown in a way that looked better. And that's also a rarity where whenever we see, like, we've already seen this game before and I think maybe James Bond was maybe the only one that we were like, I'm tired of seeing this game. Like, I just want to play it already. But usually whenever we get known quantities, it's either the same trailer or something that's less hype. But I thought they still kicked ass with showing off stuff that looked even cooler. Control Resident being one of them. Kana Bridge of Spirits being a brand new one. Beast of Reincarnation having another cool showing. Like, they, they. Even the games that we knew about still looked cooler. And so like, I just base it off of was I excited? Was I happy during the. The showcase? And yes, I. I really was.

[Mike]

My hot take.

[Andy]

Bless.

[Blessing]

What's up?

[Mike]

People just get uptight about the number. If we didn't put a number to this and we just said, I had a good time. That was a great showcase. That's why that was really well done. This is one of my favorites. That's one of the reasons writing this because, yeah, if we. If I didn't put a 10 out of 10 on this, then we wouldn't be seeing that.

[Blessing]

Right?

[Mike]

If it's like you just say, hey, this was a good time. Oh, man, I'm going to call up my friends and tell them to watch this because I enjoyed the games. Like, that's all that would change and then we wouldn't have this because too many people get caught up with the numbers.

[Blessing]

I think I like the numbers. If we were to cut off the cameras and it just be between us, I think once we let. Of course we bring in such a large audience when it comes to the showcase reactions and stuff, right? But I think once we say the numbers, the reaction gives me such anxiety where I'm like, if I give something a number and if I give the next thing a different number, they fucking freak out.

[Andy]

You got to sit here, you know, look.

[Blessing]

And then the one time I didn't give. I forget which one. I didn't give a number. I think it was Xbox. Gary didn't give it a number. I didn't give Xbox a number. And then somebody was like, oh, but if it was PlayStation Blessing, we gave it a number and I'm like, I can't win. There's nothing I can do. There's nothing I can do.

[Mike]

Let's talk about the hot take though. Give me back, Read me back the first party stuff because I agree. I liked the third party showings that it was a solid one. Let's talk about Sony's pro portfolio right now. What, what was the rundown that they weren't happy about?

[Blessing]

So they said we got a very ugly 2D God of war.

[Mike]

That's Sons of Sparta right there. Coming from Mega Cat Studios. A team not inside of Sony Santa Monica holding up them whatever they're making. It's a new God of War game inside of the sandbox. And we always love more. More franchise, more love. I like that.

[Blessing]

I mean, yeah, listen, Mario.

[Mike]

Yeah.

[Blessing]

Nintendo put out like a billion different Mario spin offs. You know what I mean?

[Mike]

Like tactics was a fantastic.

[Blessing]

Let other IP that are that aren't Nintendo continue to spin off and do weird things with them. I saw a good blue sky. That's a B.S. tim. Talk about how Mario was such a, a good way for Nintendo to get people to play things that are more experimentative that they wouldn't play before. Think about how many people play sports games because Mario's the same star. You know what I mean? There are people that own a Switch where every year they play a new sports game because it's Mario.

[Mike]

Yes.

[Andy]

I think Mario. They play.

[Blessing]

They play Dr. Mario.

[Andy]

Mario's missing.

[Blessing]

Exactly.

[Andy]

You know, that's a different genre of like this is a true crime.

[Mike]

And that's a new game you didn't know about that's out today.

[Andy]

Right.

[Mike]

Like adding to your year of games right now that are exclusive to your platform and giving you more games to play. That's one.

[Blessing]

So they also say a multiplayer game that looks bad. I think that was For Loop.

[Andy]

For Loop. Okay. Loop.

[Blessing]

Yeah.

[Mike]

For Loop. Yeah. We've had, we have concerns about, for. We all have concerns about For Loop.

[Andy]

I am not like of the opinion that For Loop looks awful, but I, I'm totally fine with anybody having concerns about it. But if that was the only thing shown, then maybe I would feel more of that way if. God, it's. But it's all about like this delicate dance and this like perfect chemistry of things of the right ingredients being thrown in. And like I mentioned yesterday, if God of War, Son of Sparta isn't a, A shadow drop, then I'm probably less high on this. But sure, like if it's. If God of War, Son of sparta shows like 2027 or fall 2027. I'd be like, okay, that was all right. But there's hype that leads into like, whoa. Available now. That's cool. And that's one of the factors that leads into like, what an awesome showcase.

[Blessing]

You know, a multiplayer game that everyone was hating on last year. That's Marathon.

[Andy]

Marathon.

[Mike]

Okay. Marathon. But like people back redesigned it. They're going to get a second chance here.

[Blessing]

Yeah. People are excited for it. I feel like. I feel like Marathon's the thing that people actually are looking forward to now.

[Andy]

Right. The momentum is definitely on the upswing with Marathon on the up. Yeah.

[Blessing]

Okay.

[Mike]

I mean, what else would you want from Bungie, Right? We're not ready for Destiny 3. So this is another project to get you to a Destiny 3, whatever is the next big thing. I don't think their whole studio is like, we're. We're going to bank everything on. On Marathon right now.

[Blessing]

And a multiplayer that's free DLC to an existing 70 game. That's Ghost of Yote. Which off. That's a good. I'm excited for Ghost of Yote Legends.

[Mike]

You have four there.

[Blessing]

Yeah.

[Andy]

I mean, awesome.

[Mike]

You have show, you have sorrows.

[Blessing]

They also didn't mention. They didn't say Kana, which opened the thing, which is coming out this year and is a big new first party game 7.

[Mike]

What other games are coming this year from places?

[Blessing]

Oh, coming this year. Soros. Did you say that?

[Mike]

I said Soros and Wolverine. That's seven games right now. Your list.

[Blessing]

Yeah, I don't know if there's much else. At least that comes to mind. Probably M will be the show like

[Mike]

we always get, but it'll be the show. Okay.

[Blessing]

Yeah.

[Mike]

Yeah.

[Blessing]

Ton as well.

[Mike]

Tocom fighting. That's. That's nine games coming to your platform.

[Sponsor Announcer]

Right.

[Mike]

We always talk about like, oh man, Nintendo right now. The person wrote in on the last week's Nintendo Cult. Like, oh man, for the year. They have only announced two games so far.

[Andy]

Right.

[Mike]

It's like they just gave you nine games to look forward to for the year.

[Andy]

For January.

[Blessing]

Yeah. Let's bring in one from Ryan Poala Higgins who says Konami having more time in an hour long state of play than PlayStation first party titles isn't a good sign for the state of PlayStation First Party Studios.

[Mike]

Yeah. Until they announce the next Metal Gear is exclusive to PlayStation, then you're gonna be losing your minds. Right. It's about partnerships. It's about teamwork.

[Blessing]

Yeah. Mr. PlayStation over here. Right.

[Mike]

Like you get in bed with these groups because remember who you are. Looking forward to the future.

[Blessing]

I'm gonna need a shake you and be like, yo, remember who you are. You're Mr. Xbox. I go back to Andy's thing, which is I don't really care. Like I, I like PlayStation first party titles because I like the studios. You know, I'm looking forward to the next thing from Naughty Dog or Sony Santa Monica or Insomniac or whoever. But yeah, I'm. Konami has such a treasure chest of IP that they've been sitting on for so long. So yes, I'm gonna be very excited when they show up and they're like, oh, hey, here's what we're doing with Metal Gear. Here's what we're doing with Castlevania. Here's a new one from the developers of Dead Cells. Here's the weird Octopus game that looks weirdly quality. Here's the fucking jrpg. Like the fact that they're back making games and seemingly pushing to actually have like production and budget and things behind this, that's exactly what I want. And I want them to be successful with it because I want these IPs to be in rotation.

[Andy]

I think if, if this showcase was sort of prefaced with we're gonna get some looks into the big first party stuff and then we got this. I was just never under the under the assumption that Naughty Dog's gonna show up or that the next Cory Barlog Sony Santa Monica thing is being shown off or we're gonna see what Sony Bend is working on. I was never under that assumption. And so that's why I look at the showcase and I'm not immediately going, ooh, I'm worried about Sony first party because we know what's missing from this showcase and those games are just further off and those also seem more like summer game fest adjacent type releases or announcements.

[Blessing]

One more in this similar conversation, Adam Bren says while the state of play was good, Sony is still not giving us a reason to turn on the PS5. If you're on other platforms, they rely heavily on third party to keep people interested in. For me, this reminds me of the conversation that me and Mike were having in the top 100 Xbox games conversation where we saw like a lot of like third party Xbox360 games on the list. And my argument was that Xbox360 was dominant that generation. And so when I think of a Bioshock, when I think of many third party games, even though I know there's like a little bit of Exclusivity there. Like I think of Xbox, I want

[Mike]

to be on the biggest platform. Yeah. And I think games on the biggest

[Blessing]

one, you know, business wise right now, PlayStation console wise is the platform. Right. Like when you're talking about the PlayStation versus Xbox at least. And so yeah, for these third party games to be announced and associated with PlayStation, that's to their benefit because if you're buying a third party console game right now, most likely you're buying it on PlayStation. So for them it's a W. For them it's like, yeah, no, we have to revolve our strategy around this because we are the third party platform. So I think there's that. And also, again, I don't care. Like I want. I. Show me any game. You know what I mean? Announce a Nintendo game here. I don't care. I'll take it. I get excited.

[Andy]

Two dollar super chat from rotating cast is hot takes Snow Mike. Mike has the best style in the office.

[Blessing]

Oh, that is a hot take.

[Mike]

You should see what I'm wearing right now.

[Blessing]

Stand up for Mike.

[Mike]

Thighs out.

[Andy]

Zero color coordination. It's not even.

[Mike]

Well, we're gonna get active today. That's why I wore this because I thought, oh, we're getting active. Let's not overdress with something.

[Andy]

Right, right, right.

[Mike]

We're gonna get up and.

[Andy]

Yeah. Over dress. We got so many overdressing.

[Blessing]

This is what I want to shout out to the write ins this episode is that they were actual hot takes.

[Mike]

I like them and they get fired up. Right. I think I, I like your fight. I like.

[Blessing]

That's why I like this one.

[Mike]

Get me excited to talk because Greg,

[Blessing]

Greg will pull in the interesting conversational points. Yeah, I'm like, sure, whatever, whatever. The name of the episode is hot takes. So I'm looking for hot takes. And so shout out to people that wrote in with your hot takes. We don't hate you. We're just disappointed in you. I want to bring in and we got to land this thing soon. But there's some good ones in here.

[Mike]

Still time. We're hanging.

[Blessing]

Hot dog man writes in and says this is as good as the state of play gets. But it shows how badly an actual full showcase is needed. It seems Sony would rather give an intergalactic away to the game awards and maybe do just one big announcement per state of play, then have a mega hit after mega hit. All competing for news coverage by the time the stream ends like Xbox does every year.

[Mike]

Okay.

[Blessing]

What I'll say is that I think this works better I've been, I've been saying this for a while. Is that PlayStation showcase? I don't want to say it's dead, but like, I don't think they know what the plan is for PlayStation showcase. I think PlayStation is very much just jazz is. When we come around to May season, all right, if we have enough first party things to announce, we'll do a showcase.

[Mike]

We always talk about how tough it is to get all of your team things to line up and different areas of what they're doing to be like, all right, let's all line up on this specific date. Oh, Andy, you're not ready yet. Oh, okay, that's not good. Bless you're so far along, you're ready for this. Like, it's very difficult to organize that many teams. Right. And also they don't have that many teams to put on some giant showcase. Right. When you really break it down, there's

[Blessing]

not a lot of no. And I think this actually works better. Like I. I think doing the more a better paced out. State of play in February, state of play in June, state of play in September. Each of them will have a big announcement there and then we'll use Summer Game Fest and Game Awards. We have other big announcements to make. I think that gives shine to all these different things you have going on. Why are you putting everything in the same showcase at once to then just like, you know, live in obscurity for the next three years? As we're all asking, all right, where's Wolverine? Where is this thing? Where's Intergalactic? Where's Fizz It? Like, if we're being real about the marketing cycle of these things, this is the better way to do it, in my opinion. That's my hot take.

[Andy]

The last PlayStation showcase three years ago,

[Blessing]

it was the one that had three all those multiplayer games that we were

[Andy]

upset about, and it was the last one. And it also kind of feels like that's where they said, let's put this on ice for a bit. Let's rethink this. Because not only is Jim Ryan leaving, but, you know, all this multiplayer strategy is just not working. We had Fair Games, Helldivers 2 update or whatever, Immortals of Avium, Ghostrunner 2, Phantom Blade 0 was the first time we saw that game Wild. Also Metal Gear Solid, Delta, Snake Eater, along with all of the other known quantities of. Of, you know, shared world shooters or whatever.

[Mike]

Yeah.

[Blessing]

But I think that's where a lot of them were first shown. So we, I think we got Concord.

[Andy]

Concord.

[Blessing]

We got, I think Marathon was first revealed there. Yeah.

[Andy]

It's been a long time since the

[Blessing]

showcase, and I think. And I don't want to say that's a good.

[Andy]

Do you think we get another one? Do you think we ever get something called Showcase ever again? Will it be like, that's when we're announcing Barlog's thing. That's when we get more intergalactic when

[Blessing]

the PlayStation 6 is revealed. Yeah, I think it'll be that. And I think it'll be like, here are the big thing. Here are the big games that we have coming out that we want you to buy the PlayStation 6 for.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Blessing]

And maybe we get like another one after that if they have more things to talk about. But I think it'll be the same cadence of. Hey, at least for the rest of the PS5 generation. Let's take it easy. Like, we have a good cadence right now of state of plays and one thing per state of play of, like the big, big thing.

[Andy]

You know what else you had there, Mike? Crossfire. Sierra Squad. You love Crossfire.

[Mike]

You love Got that bag. That's what's fun. And Control Fire X Control Resident.

[Blessing]

Let me see if I can pull one more again. You guys wrote in with some good things. I might do two more depending on.

[Mike]

I like. I like spending time with you too.

[Blessing]

Let me see. Let me see here. Do you guys want a hot take that we're all gonna disagree with? Do you guys want.

[Andy]

Yes.

[Blessing]

Now we're all gonna disagree. Okay.

[Mike]

And one of each Lane.

[Blessing]

Brian says I was disappointed in Control showing as I am not sure on the combat style.

[Mike]

Oh, no.

[Blessing]

Question is, do you guys disagree with that?

[Mike]

No.

[Andy]

God. Or wait.

[Blessing]

Yes, you do disagree.

[Andy]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Blessing]

I was like, damn.

[Andy]

Okay. Yeah, massive disagree. I thought, like I was mentioning earlier, it's. It's really tough, I think, to show off a game that already looked cool and had us super hyped. And then if you told me we're gonna show off Control Resident again, I'm like, okay, well, it better be better than the last one was. And it was seeing all the different boss fights, seeing the cool kind of weapon swaps and things of that nature. It could just be that maybe you're not super sold on melee combat, But I thought it looked great.

[Mike]

Yeah, it's probably just not a combat system for you then. Yeah. If you're not hype on that, I.

[Blessing]

I think you won't really know until you hold the controller in your hands as far as how it feels like make that impact.

[Andy]

Yeah.

[Blessing]

I think all the weapons and all the style and all that stuff looks good to watch but I, I feel the idea of okay, but like, you know, combat systems and you know, when I'm tapping square, like square square, triangle or whatever the control scheme is. Don't know. But like I don't think you actually know how that feels until it's in your hands. But I'm not for me, I'm not too worried about it.

[Andy]

I would say would I prefer having the service weapon floating, throwing. Yes. I still would prefer to be Jesse Faden or if somehow you know, Dylan got the, got the the service weapon. But I prefer that third person style more just of how awesome it was and it's like I want more of that control feel. But I'm not in any way like bummed out that this is the direction because it still looks sick as hell.

[Blessing]

Yeah, let's see. Okay, let's hop into super chats because we got a lot of super chats in here, starting with AK who writes in and says Horizon Hunters gathering coming out this year is great because it ensures that Dust Bloods will come out a week later. Not a hot take, but just a fun little comment there.

[Andy]

We did have a little confirmation from Jeff Grubb and some good news about listening to the Katakawa investors call. Jeff Grubb. Check it out on game mess minute Ms.

[Mike]

Mornings.

[Andy]

No, but game mess minute for the TikTok channel talking about the Katakawa investor call how Elden Ring Tarnished edition on Switch and Dustbuds are both confirmed and slated for 2026. It will both come out before the end of the year.

[Mike]

Okay, okay.

[Andy]

Could they get delayed? Maybe, but that's what the investors are saying.

[Blessing]

Omega Buster writes in and says let's be Honest, those Sony PlayStation gamers just say they want innovation but just want copy and paste. Sony third party. Sorry Sony third open slash semi open world action games. Embrace change, love you kind of funny

[Mike]

sound like Snowbug Mike the Xbox fan.

[Blessing]

There he is. Like the spirit of Mike the Xbox fan entered Omega bus. You guys want is your PlayStation the console wars again. I see over there halfway through the PlayStation PlayStation State Play yesterday I almost called it quality slop but I was like I I want to end the slop. I'm tired of. There's so much slop and I'm just tired of it. So we got one more I'm going to pull in. But from who though?

[Andy]

From who?

[Blessing]

A lot of good ridings here. El Capitan 2293 writes in and says God of War remakes will either be one big full priced game merged together or three 40 to $50 games. Keep in mind the Norse games each take about 30 hours to beat. The OG trilogy is about 30 hours combined. This I find interesting.

[Andy]

I don't think you separate them.

[Blessing]

You think it's going to be just one big game. Yeah, God of War one through three.

[Andy]

I mean, I don't think that collection like, I think you have a menu that has like. Oh, I see. I don't think that they just continue on, but I, I think it'd be weird to kind of package them separately.

[Mike]

What about selling them as a collection and selling them individually for less price?

[Andy]

Yeah, maybe I could see that. Like 70 bucks for the collection or 40 bucks for each one because you make more money that way. Whatever. Yeah, I don't know.

[Mike]

I don't see them coming out at different times.

[Blessing]

No, I don't think it's gonna be like Final Fantasy 7 Remake.

[Mike]

No, this is a one and done situation. This is. We've remade the three games. Here they are in one big collection. Or you can buy them individually. But I don't see us piecing that out over nine months to a year plus of like, here's here's one. Now here's two, here's three. That would be insane.

[Blessing]

The crazier things have happened. Business, business, big business business, man. Because what if, listen, if you, if you parse them out, you can charge the 40. You know, you can, you can get away with that.

[Mike]

Line goes up.

[Blessing]

I really don't know how you, how you package these. I guess it depends on what the scope is because if they are what I'm talking about, which is I boot this thing up and it looks like God of War 2018.

[Mike]

Yeah.

[Blessing]

These will be three different games and it will be like Final Fantasy 7 Remake Trilogy. But I don't know if I'm expecting that. Oh my God. We got a special guest in the building.

[Andy]

Oh, God.

[Blessing]

Flew in.

[Andy]

Wow.

[Blessing]

All the way from Malta.

[Mike]

Whoa.

[Andy]

Wow. Oh, wow.

[Blessing]

Wow.

[Andy]

He's here, everybody.

[Mike]

Do you want to play some tennis with me later?

[Andy]

Wow. Johnny. Johnny Ace. Johnny Ace is here, everybody.

[Blessing]

The Ace is wild. Thanks, dude.

[Mike]

Malta has the best coffee. Tanis is on, baby. Stay tuned. Aces up. That's gonna do it for us today, ladies.

[Blessing]

Johnny Ace is looking all good.

[Mike]

Podcast. That's it for games.

[Blessing]

That's it for a game. We'll close from a write in from Tom Blackburn who says that chicken game looks like busy work. That brings.

[Mike]

Oh, is he calling it Biomutant? He's Calling him. He's calling it Biomutant. He's. He just called the chicken game bio.

[Andy]

I don't know if anybody on the planet like there was only one person on the planet of you know how many billion? Six billion billion. How am I to live on earth? Eight billion.

[Blessing]

Eight billion.

[Andy]

Around the amount of. There was only one person on planet who said little Biomutant and it was Snowbike Mike.

[Blessing]

I was trying to think of jokes this morning just regarding the chicken game cuz I was we were saying a lot of yesterday and I was like what would be the best pun and the best one I could come up with because he's big burly, looks like the rock was Dwayne the Johnson.

[Andy]

Oh I like that.

[Blessing]

Okay. See I was nervous about it. Were we saying a lot of jokes or.

[Andy]

Yeah, there was one person who said it.

[Blessing]

I think it was.

[Mike]

I think it was us in the

[Blessing]

slack and it wasn't Andy and that was disappointing. Yeah. I like all ups and chats is

[Andy]

not you like Kevin likes the way I say it.

[Blessing]

Jen, of course this what Andy.

[Andy]

Say it. No say it.

[Mike]

Say it.

[Andy]

Say the show.

[Blessing]

Say it. I'm not into the show till you say it.

[Andy]

God.

[Mike]

It's just a word. There we go.

[Blessing]

I didn't say with confidence.

[Andy]

I know.

[Mike]

He didn't. He didn't.

[Blessing]

Of course this fun at all.

[Mike]

He reveres the big D. It's been

[Blessing]

kind of what a games cast. Each and every day we get together and talk about the biggest reviews, previews and topics in video games. Live on YouTube, Twitch and on podcast services around the globe. If you love what we do, support us with a kind of funny membership over on Patreon, YouTube, Apple or Spotify to get all of our shows ad free and get a daily exclusive show. Enjoy. Right after this. Mario Tennis Fever.

[Mike]

Party mode is back.

[Blessing]

Party mode is back and it's about to be a good time. I want to be swinging.

[Andy]

Did Roger play to unlock more stuff? We'll see.

[Mike]

I love that Andy before this episode looks at me goes do we have someone that can unlock some people? I'm like Eddie, we're the only ones in the office.

[Andy]

Greg's gone. Tim's gone. Kevin's running the show.

[Blessing]

The vibe is nice though. You know Greg and Tim should leave more often.

[Andy]

Yeah, it's more laid back.

[Blessing]

Everybody's having fun. Until next time.

[Mike]

I miss him.

[Blessing]

But our pleasure to serve you.

[Mike]

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[Stassi Schroeder]

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[Blessing]

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[Blessing]

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[Andy]

It's good to be Hawaii. Hey, new girl.

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[Andy]

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[Mike]

seed has to die.

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[Andy]

Close your eyes.

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[Andy]

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[Andy]

And breathe.

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[Andy]

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