Slay the Spire 2, a Big Hole, and a Resident Evil 9 Spoiler Chat!

Summary

The Besties – Episode Summary

Episode: Slay the Spire 2, a Big Hole, and a Resident Evil 9 Spoiler Chat!
Date: March 20, 2026
Hosts: Russ Frushtick, Chris Plante, Griffin McElroy
(Justin McElroy is out this week on family spring break)

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Episode Overview

This “grab bag” episode sees the (three) Besties get weird, poignant, and deeply game-nerdy as they tackle hot video game topics and ends with an in-depth, spoiler-filled discussion of Resident Evil Requiem (Resident Evil 9). Along the way, they break down their impressions of Slay the Spire 2 (Early Access), the quirky game Berry, Berry Berry, and offer thoughts on the new Marathon. Plus, they slip in a Pokémon localization sidebar and share recommendations.

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Slay the Spire 2 (Early Access): Impressions and Analysis

Begins at 05:53

What Is Slay the Spire?

• Griffin explains it's the “quintessential video game deck builder” (“I would say that Slay the Spire is the quintessential video game deck builder.” – 07:31), describing the basic structure: choosing a class, ascending through branching acts, fighting enemies, random events, bosses, and drafting/deck-building with card and relic upgrades.
• “It dialed in the format…in terms of video game representations of that stuff,” says Russ (08:49).

Why a Sequel?

• Chris: Was a sequel needed or is this content that could be patched into the first game?
• Griffin: Sequel status is justified—systemic and subtle changes would be hard to add to the original; cites significant structural differences.

What’s New in Slay the Spire 2?

• Random events offer "truly wild" variety with meaningful ramifications. “I don't know that I've seen the same random event twice…They are truly, truly wild in their variety and the impact that they can have on your run.” (12:41, Griffin)
• Deck management is improved: greater opportunity to curate/minimize your deck through branching events.
• At the start of each act, new major NPCs offer unique, themed boons (e.g., wax relics that melt away, instant shop buyouts that can actually 'wreck' your deck).
• New timeline progression system: unlocks not just via class progression but through various contextual objectives (e.g., beat 15 elites with a class), unlocks art, NPCs, cards, and areas.
• 2 new classes:
  • Regent: “All about casting spells with a secondary energy pool and summoning a giant floating sword.” (17:06, Griffin)
  • Necrobinder: “Can inflict doom on enemies…works like setting a death point on their health bar. Also summons a skeletal hand minion—a shield and weapon.” (17:39, Griffin)

Early Access State

• Huge content already; some charming “doodles” for not-yet-finished unlock art.
• Timeline marks some content “straight up isn’t here yet," but there's enough meat already. (16:30, Griffin)
• Co-op: Up to four players; each with their own deck, can buff each other—sounds wild, but not tested yet (19:07).

Final Thoughts

• All agree it's poised to be just as influential as the original.
• “First impressions are f****** through the roof.” (19:37, Griffin)
• Risks: Chris worries about its “all-consuming” factor but is tempted to try.

Notable Quotes

• “I have played the original Slay the Spire about 19 different times on 19 different platforms.” – Griffin (06:49)
• “That formula…cemented Slay the Spire’s place in the cosmos.” – Griffin (07:31)
• “It’s in so many ways a direct, sort of mechanical successor to Slay the Spire 1, the things it does differently would be hard to pinpoint if you didn’t play a lot.” – Griffin (11:15)

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Berry, Berry Berry: A Bizarre and Addictive Incremental Game

Begins at 19:50

What Is It?

• Title involves a pun: “The first Berry is the fruit, the second is like you’re digging a hole, and the third is the fruit again.” (20:09, Russ)
• A first-person, offbeat incremental game set in a bright-yet-dystopic children’s-TV-style room: “somewhat off-putting”; squiddy “Squid Game” vibes (20:46).
• Main goal: Put blueberries in a hole. As it progresses, you automate berry delivery with berry-friends, unlock tools (like a vacuum), and eventually can expand the map and suck up almost everything for upgrades.

Key Features & Vibes

• Set Expansion: Smash surrounding sets with a sledgehammer (once unlocked), revealing larger play areas and more to vacuum up (“…you now have control of where the hole is at any given time.” – 23:14, Russ).
• Mashups: “Sort of a Hole.io situation” but first-person; also evokes Slime Rancher and “the backrooms” internet horror.
• Narrative comes through found cassette tapes, suggesting a weird, dark story under the goofy surface.

Playability & Endorsements

• “People are f****** nuts for this legit. The top reviewed game of 2026 right now on Steam.” (26:21, Russ)
• “It’s a good afternoon killer.” (27:22, Russ)
• Around 7–9 hours to complete (“That’s a f****** dream,” Griffin, 25:50).
• Quick note: Early stages are rough on controller, but rapidly improve as you gain tools.

Notable Quotes

• “If you had a hole in there and the hole wanted berries, would you not put berries in the hole?” – Russ (21:42)
• “I want to hear about Marathon. Please, please give me Marathon.” – Griffin (27:22)

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Marathon (Bungie’s Extraction Shooter): Early Thoughts & Expectations

Begins at 27:25; (More In-Depth Next Week)

Why Are the Destiny Fans Not Playing Marathon Yet?

• Extraction shooters make Russ and Griffin anxious: “They stress me out because there’s a really good possibility of me wasting…20 minutes and then lost everything.” (28:13, Griffin)
• Difficulty of committing to a time sink; extraction shooters differ from pick-up-and-play games they prefer currently.

Chris Plante's Experience

• On a mission to reframe expectations: Don’t treat it as a battle royale. “You lose more often than you win…But it’s way friendlier than a battle royale.” (30:04, Plant)
• Roguelite progression: XP/goals persist even if you die.
• “Just play to fill XP bars and hang out with friends.”

Classes & Gameplay

• Thief class: Grapple hooks any surface, visor highlights high-value loot, drone scouts and can even steal from players discreetly.
• Other classes include “assassin” with smoke/invis, etc. Offers plenty of non-combat approaches too.
• Game feel is “delicious” and reminiscent of Destiny—especially the gunplay and “plasticky clap” of 3D-printed weapons (36:06, Plant).
• Story is “full-on Dune s***” with rival future corporations like Cyber Acme (Cyac) and New Caloric (Monsanto/McDonald's analog).

Platform Notes

• No Steam Deck (Linux) support, similar to Destiny.
• Plante volunteers as in-game tour guide next week.

Notable Quotes

• “You might want to be an assassin…you don’t even need to get in fights. Just go do your run, exfil, and you’re gravy, man.” – Plant (33:34)
• “It’s basically no different than deciding to play a battle royale…hang out with some friends and also fill XP bars” – Plant (31:41)
• “The actual moment-to-moment shooting is just so delicious. So much like Destiny.” – Plant (36:06)

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Spoiler Chat: Resident Evil Requiem (Resident Evil 9)

Spoilers start at 39:21

Structure and Impressions

• Episode resumes after ad break with a full-spoiler debrief on Resident Evil 9.
• All hosts have finished the game. Russ now agrees with Griffin’s earlier critique: “The first half…a 10/10 Resident Evil experience. One of the best…After that, the wheels start to fall off.” (40:12)
• Transition point is the action set-piece and arrival in Raccoon City—game shifts to an extended, more generic action grind with repetitive routes and bland level design.

Gameplay Gripes

• Overstays its welcome: “I think it overstays its welcome in a major f****** way…Around the fifth or sixth go round, I was like, I am so ready for the next part. I have been killing the same f****** guys.” – Griffin (41:32)
• Second half is too long; third act, “The Ark,” is described as “genuinely some of the most boring s*** in the entire game.” (47:02, Russ)
• Dissatisfaction grows as time splits between Leon (action) and Grace (stealth/survival), but Grace’s later segments are dull.

Narrative Analysis

• Climax features fanservice galore: clones of Hunk, Wesker, and other baddies are manufactured indefinitely in the Ark lab. The gang debates the “infinite Hunk” theory.
• Plant’s take: the game trilogy tries to “reflect on the series then let go and do a new thing,” but this finale is bogged down by too much Resident Evil “mythos.”
• Russ’s take: “I think what they wanted to do here and they kind of accomplish it is say, I never want to hear the names Wesker or Umbrella Corporation ever, ever again. That’s the end of it. Shut the f*** up.” (52:42)
• Griffin: Wishes the split style (Leon/Grace) had lasted, and that the game’s storytelling didn’t slow to recap series lore: “…the payoff for that story, that is bad.” (51:10)

Endings (Spoilers!)

• “Good” ending: Cure released, password = “hope” (“That’s good. The password is hope,” – 55:55), Grace raises mutant-girl Emily; Chris Redfield’s agents help with escape.
• “Bad” ending: Elpis cure destroyed, Leon is mercilessly killed. “You see Leon’s head explode in ways you’ve never seen it explode.” (56:38, Russ)
• Final boss: Described as “kind of a wet fart.” (55:33, Griffin)

Final Thoughts on Resident Evil 9

• Amazing production and polish, but disappointing second half.
• “Half great, half not so much.” (59:07, Russ)
• Plant’s advice: “Play it up until really the sneaking around the police department and then just watch a video of the ending and you’re good.” (55:00)
• Grace is a standout character—finally someone in Resident Evil repeatedly asking, “what the f***?”

Notable Quotes

• “It’s coherent and that immediately puts it ahead of most Resident Evil games.” – Chris (51:28)
• “I never want to hear the Spencer name again. We’re done.” – Russ (54:08)
• “If for whatever reason people are listening to this and they have not played the game but they're still thinking about it...play it up until really the sneaking around the police department and then just watch a video of the ending and you're good.” – Chris (55:00)

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Sidebars & Recommendations

Pokémon Popopia Localization Chat

Starts at 59:13

• Listener Cece gives insight into how Pokémon speech patterns and personalities are localized from Japanese to English (e.g., Magikarp’s "yo!" is a reflection of its less-polite speech style in Japanese).
• The hosts, as well as their children, are still deeply enjoying Popopia, praising its possibilities and customizability, especially in the palette town area.

Show and Tell / What Else We’re Enjoying

• Delicious in Dungeon (Netflix anime): Russ praises the English dub, especially Senshi’s performance by SungWon Cho (ProZD) (64:12).
• Screamer (Game): Plant previews an anime-styled, story-focused racing game with unusual drift controls, recommended for newcomers to racing games (65:01).

Patreon Thanks

67:24

• Shout out to supporter names.

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Next Time on The Besties

• Next episode: Deep dive into Marathon (extractive shooter).
• Plus more “bracket battles,” “Resties,” and ongoing community content at Patreon.

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Memorable Moments

• [01:33] Russ about a precocious British kid: “Who the f*** do you think you are? Five-year-old child saying, ‘Dude, I just saw the flutter of a wing. Like, you’re a f***** poet.’”
• [17:39] Griffin on Necrobinder: “So instead of having to deal a bunch of damage, you can just make their like death point lower. He also gets a skeleton that she summons, a little skeletal hand that you can like buff up...It's so, so great.”
• [30:04] Chris Plante, reframing Marathon: “It’s way, way friendlier than a battle royale in my opinion, because everybody in theory could extract.”

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Wrap-Up

• The episode is both encyclopedic in game nerdiness (especially the Slay the Spire 2 analysis) and filled with classic Besties banter (“That's the Chris Plant way…”).
• If you want a taste of deep genre exploration and inside jokes, or are looking to keep up on the latest and weirdest in games—this one's essential.

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Shouldn't the world's best friends play the world's best games?

Transcript

[Ross Freshnick]

I can't stand small British children.

[Griffin McRoy]

Wow, man.

[Ross Freshnick]

I'm sorry if I'm coming in hot.

[Griffin McRoy]

It's just, it's the first thing people hear when they turn on their device and they pick besties. The first thing that they expect to hear is like, mario's got a new hat. And then. But then you come out here with,

[Ross Freshnick]

I can't stand small British children. And here's why. Yeah. Who do they think they are? Who do they think they are?

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Okay, okay.

[Ross Freshnick]

Sitting at breakfast. I've got an anecdote all lined up to prove to you.

[Griffin McRoy]

To prove that all British children are bad. You've got an anecdote lined up to prove that every British child is bad?

[Ross Freshnick]

Yes. I was sitting at breakfast with my family. British family comes and sits next to us. That's all fine. I have no problem with that.

[Griffin McRoy]

Thank Christ.

[Ross Freshnick]

That was such a. We were looking out the window of breakfast and out the window was a hummingbird. Fantastic. A moment of pure nature visiting us in the world.

[Griffin McRoy]

Was it zip, zooping around or was it like, still kind of like looking at British?

[Ross Freshnick]

Well, it was healthy.

[Griffin McRoy]

Was the bird British as compared to.

[Ross Freshnick]

I don't believe so. It was flying on the other side. Okay, here's the thing. So we're all excited about it. The British family's excited about it also. Totally fine.

[Griffin McRoy]

If this story does not end with the child going outside and eating the bird out of the air, you are not going to prove to me that this anecdote has anything to do with all British children being bad.

[Ross Freshnick]

The mother turns to the daughter, who is probably like five or six, and says, did you see the hummingbird outside? And the daughter, who again is like five or six, says, no, mommy, I just saw the flutter of a wing. And I was like, who the fuck do you think you are? 5 year old child saying, dude, I just saw the flutter of a wing. Like, you're a fucking poet.

[Griffin McRoy]

You got me, dude. That was exactly what I needed. And you got me and you got me there. And the whole audience agrees, dude, that was exactly what I need. The flutter, flutter of a wing.

[Ross Freshnick]

Jesus Christ.

[Griffin McRoy]

Jesus Christ.

[Ross Freshnick]

Uh oh, Sylvia Plath. Over here.

[Griffin McRoy]

Wait. Yes, let me open the door. Eee.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Sir, sir, what's a young man. May I have some video games?

[Griffin McRoy]

Okay, so was the E sound there? The door? Or is that just kind of how you start your sound?

[Ross Freshnick]

That's how his bones work, sir. Video games.

[Griffin McRoy]

Oliver. Oliver. Never before has a boy wanted video games. My name is Griffin McRoy. I know the best game of the week.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

My name is Christopher Thomas Plant, and I know the best game of the week.

[Ross Freshnick]

My name is Ross Freshnick. I know the best game of the week.

[Griffin McRoy]

And welcome to the besties game of the year club. And you, my friend, by listening. I remember Justin is absent this week on a spring break voyage with his wife and children. But the three of us are not on voyages. We are landlocked, and I don't think Justin's on a boat, so I don't know why I said that. But we've been playing a bunch of games this week, and what we like to call a grab bag episode. We call it that because you grab it, you upend it, and a bunch of stuff falls out. And you never know exactly what that's gonna be. But, Chris, let's go ahead and tell them exactly what that's gonna be like, what games we're gonna be talking about.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

We're gonna be talking about so many games, and one of them is marathon. And I bet you can't guess which of the three of us is the one talking about that game.

[Griffin McRoy]

Spoiler. It's not me. We've also got slay the spire two and a little game called Barry. Barry, Barry, Barry, Barry, Barry. Which I'm very excited to hear. I'm Barry, excited to hear more about after this quick break.

[Ross Freshnick]

This episode of the Besties is sponsored by Lisa. Oh, boy. Lisa is really freaking great. Here's the backstory. I've told this before, but bear with me. My son was aging out of his toddler bed and needed a legit bed. And it was around this time that Lisa was like, hey, you want to try one of her mat? And I was like, well, I've got a mattress, but my son needs a mattress. And they were like, okay, we'll send a twin mattress to you guys, and you can try it out that way. Here's what happened. The mattress came, and I rested on it to test it before he tried it out. And holy crap, this is a damn comfortable mattress. Somehow my four and a half year old son is in a more comfortable mattress than I am in, and I am very, very jealous of him. It came in a box. It was very easy to set up and unpack. I didn't need a lot of help. And if that's something that sounds good to you, you should go to Lisa.com for 20% off, plus an extra $50 off with promo code besties, exclusive to our listeners. That's L E-E-S a.com promo code besties for 20% off plus an extra $50 off. Support our show and let them know we sent you after checkout. Lisa.com, promo code besties. Where do we want to start? Because we have quite the range of games to talk about today. What are people most excited to hear? I think Slay the Spire is the talk of the town.

[Griffin McRoy]

I think Slay the Spire two up front, then bury Berry Berry and then we finish with the marathon kind of kicker.

[Ross Freshnick]

That sounds good.

[Griffin McRoy]

That would be a good rock. Okay, well, I've been playing slay the spire 2 a bunch of did some traveling. We did a live show up in Amherst last week, week before last. And then I was in Boston like three days later to promote Stowaway out. Now 10 bucks. Get it.

[Ross Freshnick]

It's a great book.

[Griffin McRoy]

And while I was traveling. Thank you, Russ. While I was traveling, I played slay the Spire 2 pretty much constantly and had myself a great time doing it. I will say this because I weighed this, I weighed a lot whether or not to actually play it now. Cause it is in Early Access and I really had a rough experience. I feel like getting into Hades 2 full launch after, you know, we played the shit out of the early access.

[Ross Freshnick]

We all remember the catastrophe that was last year in Hades ii.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah. And so like I didn't want to do that to myself. Splay the splier. But then I remembered that I have played the original Slay the spire about 19 different times on 19 different platforms. And so maybe this game would be somewhat amusing to that effect of me spoiling my dinner. And I still feel that way after playing, I don't know, maybe a dozen hours or so with it. And I think I've reached a point where I'm like, okay, I have seen what is going on here and it's fucking rad. But I am going to, instead of getting deep into the Ascensions game, I'm gonna call it here, I finished a run with all of the classes and was like, okay, this seems like a pretty good, good place to stop. You guys are both familiar with Slay the Spire, I imagine.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yes. Do a very base long term that might be joining us.

[Griffin McRoy]

I would say that Slay the Spire is the quintessential video game deck builder. You play as different classes climbing up a series of acts they're called, which is basically about a dozen or so encounters. And you choose some branching paths. Some of the encounters will be fights against enemies, some will be random events, some will be shops, some will be boss enemies. And you get to choose which direction you're going. So you can kind of tailor what the run's looking like based on what you need at the time. After every fight, you draft a card from a selection of three and you build a deck. Every turn you draw some cards. You have a certain number of energy points you can spend to play those cards. And you want to win fights and not die and reach the end of the run the whole time. You are also collecting relics which imbue you with sort of upgrades that are not tied to your cards. Like, this type of card now does more damage, or now you start with one extra energy or what have you. And that formula was enough to sort of cement Slay the Spire's place in the cosmos. I don't know if it was the first game of its type, almost certainly not. Right. But it is the one that I think everyone who has made these types of games afterwards have used as the, you know, the identikit.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yeah, it dialed in the format. Obviously it owes a lot to the Gathering and a few other games, but in terms of video game representations of that stuff. Yeah, dialed in the format, yes.

[Griffin McRoy]

There were different classes in that game and each one sort of had like, different types of strategies that it could employ. And I believe a couple of those classes were added sort of like after the fact. So that's Slayerspire1, one of my favorite games ever. Probably one of the games I've spent the most time playing across my whole history of playing games. It's really, really fantastic.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Before we go into two, did you feel like, oh, this game is great, but we need a sequel?

[Griffin McRoy]

It felt like it was going to happen.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Right? Sure.

[Griffin McRoy]

There's an argument to be made that you could just keep adding stuff to Slay the Spire one, but there are some surprisingly subtle kind of systemic changes in Slay the Spire two that I think would be very difficult to sort of retrofit onto Slay the Spire one. As for, like, whether it could use a sequel, I don't know, man. So many different places have made this exact type of game so many times, and a lot of them absolutely rip ass in a good way. And I kind of like, I don't know. I was stoked when they announced the new game.

[Ross Freshnick]

I also, like, I know Chris doesn't really care, but I also like when hardworking game developers are able to sustain their business.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah, Chris hates money. Famously hates when game developers are able

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

to sustain their business. I'm not asking that. I'm asking, like, there are a lot of games where they just keep adding onto it and then they keep making money by adding onto it. And from what I understand as an outsider who is not like, this is not my number one genre, part of what makes it a sequel is the multiplayer. Is that right?

[Griffin McRoy]

Oh, I don't know. I think that's. Oh man, I don't know.

[Ross Freshnick]

There is co op.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah. I did not do that at all. So that'll be a fun. I played it on airplanes almost exclusively, so I don't even know how that would have worked.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Yeah.

[Ross Freshnick]

I am most curious specifically about the systemic stuff because, you know, unlike a Fortnite or something where everything gets added on, but realistically, the stuff that's being added are like cosmetics and things like that. You can't constantly add gameplay altering cards without there being some sort of major long term impact, whether that's skill curve growth or things like that.

[Griffin McRoy]

Power creep. Yeah. There's a lot of different things that

[Ross Freshnick]

ends up kind of killing these games.

[Griffin McRoy]

So I'm scratching. Yeah. I love the fact that Slay the Spire one is its own. Like it's gold, right? It's like cemented in, locked in. It is the game that it is. And there's not going to be. It's not going to become like Hearthstone, which is not a bad game by any stretch of the imagination. But like, I can't play Hearthstone if I tried to play Hearthstone. Now. Every time I see people talking about the new Hearthstone expansion and they put up a card and it's like, oh, well, this card has Fitness 9. It's like, I don't know what the fuck you're talking about, man. I don't know what that means. Slay the Spider II again, surprisingly doesn't change so much of the fundamentals. You are still drafting a deck. You are still going through these branching pathways and drafting cards after fights. It is in so many ways a direct, sort of mechanical successor to slay the spire 1. The things that it does differently I think would be maybe hard to pinpoint if you did not play a lot of the original. It is things like adding way more variety to the random events. Right. These represent maybe half of the things that you're going to be doing as you're moving through the map. And I feel like I saw all of them in the original Slay this, but like there's a ton of them. But they would all boil down to like, you know, some sort of devil's bargain. Right. Like you're going to lose half your hp, but you're going to get these Cards that heal you or you take damage, you might get into a fight. And here's a low percent chance to get a relic like stuff like that that would either just like, it was like a chance card in Monopoly, it's either gonna help you out a decent amount or it's gonna just totally fuck you over. Or sometimes it's just a treasure chest or a surprise fight or whatever. Right. In this game. In Slay the Spire two, I don't know that I've seen the same random event twice in all the time that I've been playing it. And they are truly, truly wild in their variety and the impact that they can have on your run. You are making some pretty major decisions while you are going through. And it is stuff that can really make or break your build or force you to kind of change your strategy. There is one event where you're going across a rickety bridge. I lied. This is the only one I've seen twice. You're going across a rickety bridge and your two options to go across are lose this card that we pick out for you, or you're going to take like five damage and we'll pick another random card for you. And then you can decide if that's the one that you want. So, like, that's a really good example of a very smart event. Right? Because a big part of these types of games is thinning out your deck. Maybe you do want to, like, lose that card and that's awesome. But maybe that's like a card that is sort of important to your build. So you take a little bit of damage. Now all of a sudden you're removing a different card that is chosen at random, but you still get to confirm it before it goes. Right. That is the kind of stuff that is like, so great. Certain things that are really important strategically, like deck management. You get so many more opportunities to do that across these different events and, you know, the shops and everything. And so, like, it does. I have not had the experience so much that I had in the original Slayerspire, where, like, I would be halfway through Act One and I'd be like, this isn't fucking coming together. Like, I'm not getting. I'm not getting the relics I need. I've taken way too much damage. I'm not getting the right cards. I'm just going to scrap this.

[Ross Freshnick]

You're trying to get a build going and it never comes off the ground, basically.

[Griffin McRoy]

Right, Exactly. That has not been happening as much in this run. Another thing that's different sort of Structurally is you start each run off by talking to the big whale. He's back. We love big whale. And he gives you a few boons that you can choose from. But then at the start of each additional act, you are talking to another major NPC who gives you a different choice of boons. And they are themed to what that guy does. There's one who is. All of his stuff is wax based. And so there's a relic that's like this will last only for this act, but you'll have an extra energy the whole time. Or you will get five relics randomly, but they are made of wax and one will melt after every other combat encounter. Right. One of them is all about wealth and opulence. And it's like the next vendor that you go to, you are going to automatically buy everything that they have at their stock for free. And I picked that one. I was like, fuck yeah, baby, let's go. And it ran. Wrecked my deck.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

It ruined my deck because I picked

[Griffin McRoy]

up all these cards that I definitely did not want.

[Ross Freshnick]

That's very funny.

[Griffin McRoy]

There's so much more variety in that stuff and that is to me the big kind of the selling point for it. There's a new method for unlocking stuff in the original, say the Spire. You are playing as the different classes, leveling up those classes individually and then unlocking cards and relics sort of related to that class. Now there is a thing called the timeline, which reminds me of more recent Mortal Kombat style purchase walls. You're not spending currency each little block on the timeline you unlock by finishing acts as the different classes or getting through a run. But then there's other ones that are more context sensitive. Beat 15 elites is this class or whatever. And those are going to unlock new NPCs that you meet at the beginning of the acts. They unlock new cards, new relics, new like areas for you to go down

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

as far as an early access game. This sounds massive.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah, it is huge. The early access stuff actually shows up a lot in the timeline because each thing you unlock has a piece of key art. And I would say about 75% of the key art in it is just straight up five year old fucking doodles. Genuinely played, I think a little bit for laughs. And I've hit a couple things on the timeline like unlocks that are like this straight up isn't here yet. But the things that are there are amazing. The other big thing is there are two new classes. There's three returning classes, the Ironclad, the Silent and the Defect. I believe that's the one with orbs and stuff.

[Ross Freshnick]

Orbs, yeah.

[Griffin McRoy]

Then there is the Regent. The Regent is one of the new classes who is all about casting spells with a secondary energy pool that you can kind of manage and also summoning a giant floating sword that you can kind of empower as you go through the fight, which is very cool. My favorite is the Necrobinder, which is probably, I think, going to be everyone's favorite class, which is like a Necromancer style class that can inflict doom on an enemy, which is like, it covers up their health bar and if their health reaches that point, they die instantly.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yeah. Cool.

[Griffin McRoy]

So instead of having to deal a bunch of damage, you can just make their like death point lower. He also gets a skeleton that she summons, a little skeletal hand that you can like buff up. And the skeletal hand takes damage before you do. And it can also attack for its damage value. So you want to like fucking boost it up. Get it. Super. So it can be both a shield and like an insane weapon for like. It's so satisfying. It's so, so great.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Okay, so here's my problem. Here's my big problem with everything I'm saying. It sounds real good and I've done a good job of not playing these games again. It's not even that I don't like them. I know that they will be all consuming. I know that when I sink myself into something like this, it will take over my very being.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

But at the same time I'm like, maybe it's time to start, you know, like, maybe it's time to just let go.

[Griffin McRoy]

I mean, yeah, man, I think so. Maybe wait for full release. I don't know when that's gonna happen, but like, it's a fantastic game and like, it is. I don't know. There is enough there for me to feel pretty confident, like this is going to be just as big as the original Slay the Spire. And I would recommend it, I think, you know, even if you don't want to wait, Chris, I think it would be a fine jumping on point. I don't know that there's like a ton of. A ton of stuff that is going to like really fundamentally change it. Still yet to come, but it's. It's fucking solid, guys.

[Ross Freshnick]

It should be noted, I also looked up, while you were focused on your own experience, what people might experience in co op and it sounds like every. So it's up to four players in co op and every player has their own deck and you can like buff other players. The complexity of that sounds, I can't

[Griffin McRoy]

imagine, through the roof crazy. Yeah, I mean, there's a whole element of this game that I don't know yet, gang, because I just kind of. It was my airplane friend.

[Ross Freshnick]

But no, I think we're gonna come back to it certainly at 1.0.

[Griffin McRoy]

Oh, my God. I mean, of course we are. Like we're gonna be talking about this game for a very, very, very long time, but first impressions are fucking through the roof.

[Ross Freshnick]

That's very exciting.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah. How about Berry, Berry Berry?

[Ross Freshnick]

Okay, so we have a bit of a homonym issue with the name of this game, so I'll do my best.

[Griffin McRoy]

This game, I saw you, I heard you try to sidestep that in the way that you told us this morning the game you were going to be speaking of.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yes.

[Griffin McRoy]

And you hit Boo.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Boo.

[Griffin McRoy]

Okay, you sound like an old southern lawyer.

[Ross Freshnick]

Do declare. This game is called Berry, Berry Berry. And so the first berry is like the fruit and the second berry is like you're digging a hole and putting something in it. And then the third berry is the fruit again. That's the title. It's a good title. It's a good title. Berry, Berry Berry is an incremental game. It is in first person and your primary goal is to put blueberries in a hole. This takes place in a small, very colorful, somewhat off putting environment. Like a children's, like, TV show set.

[Griffin McRoy]

It looked like a squid game.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yeah. But it's clear that there's like a dystopian bit of a saw thing going on. I have not seen any clear violence in it, but it does have that undertone, like in between days, like the day runs out and you start over again. There's like a VHS tape overlay thing that just makes the whole thing feel very creepy. But I was mostly just enjoying the berry part of it, which is this flower is spewing out these blueberries. And you pick them up and you put them in the hole. And like any good incremental game, obviously new elements get added. Pretty soon you're able to buy little berry friends that will scramble around the environment randomly spewing out berries on their own. And you can pick those up and drop them in the hole. Obviously it keeps going from there. You eventually.

[Griffin McRoy]

Where's the hole go to? Who's benefiting from this whole process in the hole? Is it the devil?

[Ross Freshnick]

I mean, if you had a hole in there and the hole wanted berries, would you not put berries in the hole?

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah, but does it Talk to you. The hole, is it like more berries?

[Ross Freshnick]

No, because that's the devil, dude.

[Griffin McRoy]

And I'm not gonna get the hole

[Ross Freshnick]

does spew out money when you give it berries, so that seems like a good win win situation. It's kind of a mutual response thing. You eventually get a vacuum, increasing the berry speed as well. You eventually get a methodology for upgrading your berry friends. You can have them start spewing out strawberries or eventually kiwis, which I don't even think is a berry. Maybe it's a berry. It's got seeds in it. And so you're upgrading that way, and obviously those count as more money. Where the game starts getting weird is you eventually, within the first half hour, unlock a sledgehammer. And now. Now, Griffin, I'm gonna ask you. Yeah. If you're given a sledgehammer in this environment, what would you do with the sledgehammer?

[Griffin McRoy]

Jump in the hole, kill the devil.

[Ross Freshnick]

Okay.

[Griffin McRoy]

Set everyone free from the burden of sin.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

That doesn't seem like the right thing to do.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah, I solved it.

[Ross Freshnick]

Well, if you jump in the hole, all that happens is you lose the money that you had on that day and then you start the next day. So that's not an option. So you've still got this sledgehammer.

[Griffin McRoy]

Okay, I squish. I guess I gotta squish the berries.

[Ross Freshnick]

That's terrible, Griffin. How could you do that? What you should be doing is knocking down the very small set that surrounds you to reveal an even larger set that has all sorts of furniture and little garden gnomes scattered around it.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

I guess that makes sense.

[Ross Freshnick]

And from there, the game changes pretty dramatically because you now have control of where the hole is at any given time. You can move the hole around the map and suck in elements of the map, like different furniture pieces, which in turn will grant you stars, which in turn will allow you to upgrade your berries faster, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

[Griffin McRoy]

So it's sort of a hold on IO kind of situation at that point.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Right.

[Ross Freshnick]

But it is, I guess, first person was hole IO in first person.

[Griffin McRoy]

I don't know, man. It's like a mobile game.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yeah, probably not. I don't think they've figured out first person in mobile games. So from there, how are they going

[Griffin McRoy]

to get another stick on there? You can't.

[Ross Freshnick]

There's a very interesting strategy that goes on where you're trying to move the hole as much as you can. It moves faster if you're feeding it berries, but then the bigger the map gets, the more Scattered your berry friends are. So you have to sort of wrangle that component to it. Eventually you get a pop gun to shoot the stars, to upgrade the berries fast, etc. You know, kind of a classic incremental thing. But you're also finding these cassette tapes that reveal that there's a narrative going on. The vibes I was getting was like, what's that?

[Griffin McRoy]

It seems slime ranchery.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yeah, it feels very slime rancher. That's true. I got vibes for Slime Rancher. I mean, narratively speaking, the vibes I was getting was like, what is it? The back rooms kind of felt like that.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Okay.

[Ross Freshnick]

Where there's like an undercurrent. Yeah.

[Griffin McRoy]

The A24 movie that's not even out yet. How the fuck do you know?

[Ross Freshnick]

From the zeitgeist. I don't know how it ends. I haven't beaten it yet. I'm several hours in. I find it very compelling and probably a disturbing, unhealthy way, but it's very satisfying to shoot berries down a hole and upgrade the berries. And I like the idea that you get into this weird situation where like the hole isn't quite big enough to fit like the parasol that you want to suck in the hole to get more stars to upgrade the berries. So you have to come up with like fun physics based ways to like force things down the hole.

[Griffin McRoy]

Okay.

[Ross Freshnick]

So that's cool.

[Griffin McRoy]

I'm downloading this. It's been a while since I've had a. I don't know, an incremental game. Absolutely. Kind of wreck my shit.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yeah. I will say early on, like in the first 10 minutes, it's kind of miserable to play in a controller just because you were individually picking up the berries.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah.

[Ross Freshnick]

But very quickly, like any incremental game, it gets much easier because you get

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

a vacuum and seems like it's not too long. I'm looking at the Steam reviews. Looks like everybody has played for about like between seven to nine hours.

[Ross Freshnick]

That's a fucking dream.

[Griffin McRoy]

That's actually, I would say for an incremental game, that's a good. That's a pretty good chunk of time.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Yeah, yeah, it's good. Sometimes you get an incremental game and it's like, oh my gosh, 40 hours.

[Griffin McRoy]

Well, I mean there's, there's so. Especially on iOS, like games as incremental games and those, those, those just. They don't do it for me.

[Ross Freshnick]

I will say how I found this game was I frequently when we're looking for games to play Will go on. I think it's Steam, the Steam database website. And just sort by reviews of games that came out recently and this is.

[Griffin McRoy]

People are fucking nuts for this legit.

[Ross Freshnick]

The top reviewed game of 2026 right now on Steam.

[Griffin McRoy]

Amazing.

[Ross Freshnick]

And I was like, I guess I'll try it. It's pretty fucking fun. And what is it? Eight bucks? It's like really reasonable. So if you're looking for something that is like a time limited, you know, incremental game. It also reminded me of Dig the Hole. That one. You have to. You have to dig the hole. Indeed you do.

[Griffin McRoy]

Was that the name of the game? A game about digging a hole?

[Ross Freshnick]

Yes.

[Griffin McRoy]

I was thinking of you have to build a boat.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yeah.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Different understandable that you got this mixed up.

[Ross Freshnick]

There is a match three element in this game that I haven't quite figured it out, but I'm sure people have.

[Griffin McRoy]

That is such a huge endorsement for me to get excited about this. Yeah, it does.

[Ross Freshnick]

I'm curious what you think.

[Griffin McRoy]

Slot Machine. I don't know man. There's rpg. I don't really understand how hard I

[Ross Freshnick]

don't get into these usually. I like the fact that everything you're doing is in game. You don't have the thing where it's like check back in three hours and you're thing will have exploded. Like it's all stuff that you're actually doing. So yeah, I've been enjoying it. It's a good afternoon. Killer.

[Griffin McRoy]

I want to hear about Marathon. Please, please give me Marathon.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

I want to tell you all about Marathon. How did this happen though before we do that? Because you two are my destiny boys. And yet I'm the one here talking about Marathon before we do like a full big episode of it next week. What went wrong?

[Ross Freshnick]

Yeah, well, a couple things. Even before we jump into why I haven't personally played this game yet. Which is a valid question. I do want to clarify the record a little bit. I think I misspoke previously when I said that there was an AI generated art controversy about this game. No, it was a plagiarism issue. And apparently they did credit the plagiarized

[Griffin McRoy]

artist in question and paid money.

[Ross Freshnick]

And the artist is happy now. So we dig it all for that. Hum. Okay. Why haven't I played the game Extraction Games scare me.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Yeah.

[Ross Freshnick]

Simple.

[Griffin McRoy]

I don't want to waste my time.

[Ross Freshnick]

Well. And they stress me out.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah, they stress me out because there's a really good possibility of me wasting. I have played some arc Raiders. I don't know that we've ever talked about it on the show and it's like, cool. And it's like really, really, really a super solid game. And I've had some really fun encounters in there and I've also had times where I've played for 20 minutes and then lost everything.

[Ross Freshnick]

Oh, no.

[Griffin McRoy]

And it's like I simply. I know people bristle when I talk about not having a lot of gaming time. Our gaming podcast. But like my. Between the work and the kids and the self care and rest and everything, like, I just don't feel great about playing a game for like a chunk of time that I have to sit down and do and then, you know, not having any problems.

[Ross Freshnick]

And even if it was like fun, like spare time that I want, like, I want that spare time to also be used adequately. Yeah.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Okay, so I.

[Griffin McRoy]

It's faulty. Faulty reasoning, I admit. But also it's just kind of.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

No, it's totally reasonable. There's a huge difference between picking out a game on like a handheld and a game like this where it's like you need to know that you are sitting down for at least 20 to 30 minutes. You're getting.

[Griffin McRoy]

That's never like the only games I'm really playing these days are on switch to or my Rog ally X. Like, I can't sit down and say, well, I'm going to do this for an hour. That's not reasonable.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

So here's what we're gonna do. I'm gonna talk briefly about the game. We're gonna do a whole episode on it next week. We're all gonna squat up. It's gonna be great. But before we all do that, I'm gonna give you just like a reframing of your expectations that I think will help and put you in the best place going into this game.

[Griffin McRoy]

Can I tell you what my expectations are?

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Yeah.

[Griffin McRoy]

It's gonna feel great. It's gonna feel like destiny. And it is also going to be a stressful extraction shooter experience.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

No, no, that's what I'm gonna. That's what I'm avoiding.

[Griffin McRoy]

Oh, okay.

[Ross Freshnick]

Okay.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Those are your expectations. You gotta reframe.

[Griffin McRoy]

It's gonna feel so shitty.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

It's like you are gonna feel so good for two reasons. One, you already played Battle Royales, right? You're already used to the idea of playing a game where you don't keep any of the things that you get during it. And then also you lose more often than you win. So you already are doing great in that it's way, way friendlier than a battle royale. In my opinion, because everybody in theory could extract that is totally possible in these games. The other thing that you can help reframe yourself with is there are kind of roguelite growth, I guess like XP goals throughout the entire game. So you are going to go in from the beginning and it's going to say, hey, your goal is to go to this one area columns, you need to hack some terminal and then you need to like kill five robot enemies. And if you do that and you don't extract, you still complete that goal. So you've made progress and you're getting various unlocks. And then the biggest thing is if you are thinking of it as I am going into this game to get. I'm like going into a match to get great items and great guns and all that. Who gives a shit? Because you're just gonna play another round and then lose it all. Or you're gonna just keep it in your bank and never touch it.

[Griffin McRoy]

So you're saying this game has instilled in you a sort of zen like acceptance approach to what I have.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

It's basically it's no different than deciding to play a battle royale. I am playing this game cause I wanna hang out with some friends and then also fill the XP bars that give me new things to play with.

[Griffin McRoy]

So tell me about that stuff I want to hear about. Are there classes? What is the stuff?

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Let me tell you about my sweet, sweet Thief. So I play as a Thief and there are I think like four or five classes plus a character called Rook which we'll talk about probably more next week. Again, I don't want to ruin all of it, but I'm going to sell you on Thief. That way you can go in and

[Griffin McRoy]

give this a try.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Thief has the ability to grappling hook basically any point in the world. It doesn't have to actually touch anything, just zips them into the air. Titanfall style, right? And that's a recharge. But it's so useful because being able to get elevation and get onto the top of like a really tall building is huge for clearing out whatever your XP goals and also just avoiding people. Thief also has the ability to turn on a visor that shows you the top rarity color of anything around you. So if you walk in a room, there's like 20 boxes. You flip that visor, you see a purple pop up and you're like, God damn, that's the only one I need to go to. You can do it from outside buildings so you don't even have to go into things. Thief also has a drone that you can zip out into the world and basically scout out if there are any humans that you need to worry about. You can SC the robots that you need to worry about. And you can use that drone to steal shit from other human players and then just bring it back to you so you don't have to go engage with them.

[Ross Freshnick]

That sounds nice, but, like. But then people are using the drone against me to steal my stuff.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

That feels bad very rarely. Like, that's because there are other classes that people are more incentivized to use. You might want to be an assassin where you can drop smoke grenades and go invisible. And if you want to play that class, great. Like, you don't even need to get in fights. You can just go do your run exfil and you're gravy, man.

[Ross Freshnick]

Okay, but now people are using invisibility and smoke on me.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah, dude. I think maybe there's a fundamental nature of this format you're struggling with.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

The problem is you keep thinking that you're gonna come across humans, and that's not a guarantee. I exfo. I'm not good at these games. You played shooters with me. I expo way more often than I don't like. I am not running into trouble.

[Griffin McRoy]

It is the interesting thing about this type of game in that I think it varies from title to title based on how chill the player base of that game is. Where, like, in Arc Raiders, I had very few, like, really bad experiences with other players. Almost always they were cool and willing to kind of, like, help. And maybe that was just because I was so obviously new to the game, but they were more willing to help than they were. Let's fucking get this guy.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yeah.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Yeah. And everybody has different incentives and you're kind of aware of it while you're playing. Like, you might be playing for a faction that's full of chaos. And they're like, hey, you need to go out and you need to execute eight human players in a certain way. And you also might be in a class where it's like, you just need to go out and break 10 windows and kill three robots and don't worry about any humans.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

And because you know that the people you're meeting are also on that same page, there's kind of like a. I get it, man. You're in the middle of that run. Totally. You're gonna have to. You're gonna have to knife me.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yeah. Cause if you end up like. Yeah, I guess encountering people, like, is your general back and Forth like kind of a wave nod, let's go in our separate ways thing.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

No, it's definitely shoot them and don't even give them a chance to talk to me. So that's the other thing about this game is the time to kill is very short. So if you are bad at competitive shooters but you're good at strategy and you can get the jump on people, it's not like Halo where it's like I got the jump on you and you still somehow took that.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah, I like a shortcut. I'll take you seven times with the battle rifle to take you. Have you played enough Destiny and Destiny 2 to be able to compare it game feel? Because I stand by. Those are my favorite feeling shooters ever.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Yes. The actual moment to moment shooting is just so delicious. So much like Destiny. It has the sound as always is incredible. Everything is like 3D printed. So it has that weird like plasticky clap sound when you fire the guns. Just so good. Dudes. Yeah. I mean again I want you all to play.

[Griffin McRoy]

This all sounds very fun. I've been willing to.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

And the story's awesome. The story is like full on Dune shit. You're working for companies like Cyber Acme, which goes by Cyak, which is just the funniest sci fi shit. You're working for New Caloric which is just basically McDonald's in Monsanto. Merged. Okay, good. Video games.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yeah. There is a caveat. Griffin, you should know this caveat going in. It will not run on a Steam deck.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah, no, I figure, I mean for

[Ross Freshnick]

Linux specifically, like it won't run on Linux because the kernel. So if you're running Linux on any

[Griffin McRoy]

handheld, I mean that is also true of Destiny and yes, it's a Destiny. No, I mean this feels very much like a. If I'm playing a multiplayer shooter like this, I'm probably going to want to do it. You know, I'll have to stay up past my bedtime.

[Ross Freshnick]

Oh yeah. But I am enticed. Like look, I was very skeptical going into this because Chris Plant, like realistically you're right. Like as you were saying at the beginning of the show, like Griffin and I would be the one trying to convince Plant that he wanted to play this. So it is interesting having it flipped back on us. So I am open.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

I will be your tour guide of Tau Ceti iv. Just let's perfect a time and a place and I'm gonna walk you around.

[Ross Freshnick]

Okay.

[Griffin McRoy]

All right, let's take a quick break. When we come back, we're gonna be talking about Resident Evil Requiem getting into spoilies. We will make sure to edit in a sort of time code you can jump to in order to avoid those spoilies, if you're not interested, but that's the plan. We'll be right back.

[Ross Freshnick]

This episode of the Besties is sponsored by Lisa. Oh, boy. Lisa is really freaking great. Here's the backstory. I've told this before, but bear with me. My son was aging out of his toddler bed and needed a legit bed. And it was around this time that Lisa was like, hey, you want to try one of her mattress? And I was like, well, I've got a mattress, but my son needs a mattress. And they were like, okay, we'll send a twin mattress to you guys, and you can try it out that way. Here's what happened. The mattress came, and I rested on it to test it before he tried it out. And holy crap, this is a damn comfortable mattress. Somehow my four and a half year old son is in a more comfortable mattress than I am in, and I am very, very jealous of him. It came in a box. It was very easy to set up and unpack. I didn't need a lot of help. And if that's something sounds good to you, you should go to Lisa.com for 20 off, plus an extra $50 off with promo code besties, exclusive to our listeners. That's L E-E-S A.com promo code besties for 20 off, plus an extra 50 off. Support our show and let them know we sent you after checkout Lisa.com, promo code besties.

[Griffin McRoy]

Okay, and so if we're about to do our talk, if you want to skip ahead, go right ahead. Have you guys both finished? I know Russ finished the game. Chris, how close did you. How close did you get?

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

I'm just so relieved that Leon did not shoot any of Emily's vital organs.

[Ross Freshnick]

You know, that sounds like he made it to the end there.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Yeah. Made it to the end.

[Ross Freshnick]

Good worker's plant. I'm very proud of you. I want to take a step back for those that didn't listen to the first Resident Evil Requiem episode, which came out a couple weeks ago. At that point, Griffin had been the only one that finished it. I was probably about a little over halfway through, and I think plant was pretty close to where I was at that time.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah.

[Ross Freshnick]

And I will say from.

[Griffin McRoy]

Well, are you changing your opinion based on having completed the second half?

[Ross Freshnick]

Yeah. I will say from my side, Griffin. I was a little bit tough on Griffin because he was really pretty down on the latter half of the game. And I would now concur with his assessment of the latter half of the game.

[Griffin McRoy]

Oh, that's good.

[Ross Freshnick]

Here's. And again, we're going to go right into spoilers here. The first half of the game is, in my opinion, a 10 out of 10. Resident evil experience. One of the best Resident Evil experiences I've had. That. When I say first half of the game, I mean everything through the like helicopter action sequence with fucking Leon kicking people in a church, all that shit. Fuck rules. Great stuff.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

So you're saying the bloody, bloody Raccoon City, right?

[Griffin McRoy]

That is where the wheels start to

[Ross Freshnick]

fall off for me a little bit. Yeah. So I would say, okay, so we had this 10 out of 10 experience. Loved it. Leon now arrives in Raccoon City, the outskirts of Raccoon City, and the game turns into something a little bit different. The game turns into an action game where you're earning points to kill zombies and you use those points to upgrade weapons. And to be honest, I liked this part. I thought it was fine. I enjoyed myself playing it. It's like fun gameplay, combat. I like upgrading guns, things like that, but I did not think it was as exceptional. I'd give it like a 7 out of 10 if the first.

[Griffin McRoy]

I think it overstays its welcome in a major fucking way. I think that you. I think that it is. It very intricately sort of designed the sort of routes that you're going to be going through. And there's like a whole chain of like you need the gasoline to power the generators, to get the crank to get the thing to get. And so you're constantly looping back around, which is like cool to an extent. Around the fifth or sixth go round, I was like, I am so ready for the next part. I have been killing the same fucking guys.

[Ross Freshnick]

There's like two enemies in that area. It's also a drag. Cause from an art design standpoint, that era looks straight out of army of two. It's like all grays and brown.

[Griffin McRoy]

Primo brown. Xbox 360 shit.

[Ross Freshnick]

Just a weird choice. I know. Plant. You like that area quite a bit.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

I mean, I get what you're saying. I don't think it's so different than the Resident Evil formula in general of go on Easter egg hunt and go back and forth and back and forth. You do that earlier. I think two things are different. Like you said one aesthetically, because it is this big open space, it doesn't have that. Oh, yeah, I'm walking back and Forth. But it's in this really cramped and, like, very visually dense building, which is cool and exciting. And I've, like, learned the space. I'm just going through these big warehouse areas. But I think what it does well is each scrimmage and fight that you have is its own idea. So, oh, hey, we're going to go through the mortar sequence where these giant mortars are being fired at you. And eventually you get to turn the mortar shelling on the zombies. Or the sideways skyscraper sequence where you're shooting out glass from underneath zombies.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yeah, that was great.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

I think each of those on their own is really interesting. The. The problem is, for me, not that whole sequence. I think that sequence is largely good. It's maybe, like 30 minutes too long. You do all of that to then get on a motorcycle and leave, and then you go and do another action sequence that's weaker than that.

[Griffin McRoy]

Hold on one second. I need to make sure. I need to clarify that you're not saying that the motorcycle fight is a weak action sequence.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

No. Okay.

[Griffin McRoy]

So here's because it's fucking the highlight

[Ross Freshnick]

of the game for me.

[Griffin McRoy]

I can't. I think.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

I'm definitely not saying that. I think that there is a complete Resident Evil game if you actually just keep this part. Because this is what Resident Evil games do. They start out really small. They get big. People get grumpy about it. But I enjoy, like, the silliness of it. I still think it's really fun. I think the action is really strong. And such is the build of a Resident Evil game. I really don't have much beef with this second half. I think it is made worse because there is a third sequence that is utterly bizarre.

[Griffin McRoy]

Is that the lab? The lab sequence?

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

That is, yes. The.

[Ross Freshnick]

Where are you starting that third secret? That third act, if you will. Where do you start?

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Before we get into that, is there any other, like.

[Griffin McRoy]

I mean, the big issue for me is, like, you spend the first half of the game changing perspectives between Grace and Leon every hour, and then this marks the point where Grace is not going to show up again for a very fucking long time. And it's just so bizarre to me. I cannot think of a justification for that.

[Ross Freshnick]

I mean, I would be fine with it if Leon was given more interesting things to do. But after the motorcycle fight, you get through that period, which is a fun little.

[Griffin McRoy]

You go to the Raccoon City police station. That part's cool.

[Ross Freshnick]

Well, I actually don't think that part. I think it's bad.

[Griffin McRoy]

Oh, okay. I mean, I think it's neat. Like getting chased around by Mr. X again and then having to fucking fight him. And like the flashback scene at the Armory shop with the dad and the daughter.

[Ross Freshnick]

Some of it is my bad because what I ended up doing in the Raccoon City Police Department was spending like a good two and a half hours trying to figure out this fucking photo puzzle that requires you to do it in a very specific order of steps. And if you don't do in that order of steps, you're just gonna be wandering around like an idiot for two and a half hours. Like me. I did appreciate that. The Tofu guy shows up in the middle of the police station. That was funny. But I kind of killed all of that.

[Griffin McRoy]

That's in the lab, I believe.

[Ross Freshnick]

No, the tofu. Well, maybe he shows up in two places. Definitely in the police station.

[Griffin McRoy]

Okay. Yeah. And again you do this big puzzle and the thing that you get for it, which comes back to another one of my big complaints from the first time we talked about this game is like, you'll get a charm that's like. And this makes your thing a little bit stronger. And it's like, that's not fucking even a little bit exciting. Where's my fucking Resident Evil 4? You know, auto shotgun? Like 12 barreled monster shotgun. Like, I don't know. The power fantasy there is just like during the Leon segments.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yeah. Weird.

[Griffin McRoy]

It's just like, not a weird thing.

[Ross Freshnick]

I like the Mr. X stuff. I actually don't mind any of the fan service stuff. I think that's all fine.

[Griffin McRoy]

I think it's great.

[Ross Freshnick]

Whatever. There's Hunk, wherever the fuck that is. And there's a big spider. Like, that's all fine.

[Griffin McRoy]

Oh, I got Hunk and Tofu confused.

[Ross Freshnick]

The issue that I have. And Plant you were kind of getting to. This is like rcpd. Whatever. That was a little bit my bad for being an obsessive weirdo trying to figure out a puzzle. The Ark stuff is genuinely some of the most boring shit in the entire game.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

So explain what the ARC is for people.

[Ross Freshnick]

The ARC is the, like, major scientific home base where this thing that they're trying to get the whole game called Elpis, is being developed. And you mostly play in the Ark as. What's her name? Grace.

[Griffin McRoy]

Grace.

[Ross Freshnick]

You mostly play as Grace. And her sequences reasonably go back to like her just having a pistol and having some bottles to throw to distract enemies. And you're mostly. It's like a lot of stealth where you're sneaking around lickers another for a while.

[Griffin McRoy]

It Adds a new. Yeah, Lickers is like the main mechanic they add which are just like fast, creepy, tongue whipping zombies that you have to throw acid on in order to kill them. And so that's.

[Ross Freshnick]

And it turns into like use this computer to find this key to go back here. And in hallways, like you counter that to the environment of the first half of the game. In hallways that are like bland and white. They're just like white tubes and plan. I know you were saying that some of this is like, do they need to pay homage to the movies?

[Griffin McRoy]

Because, well, I mean there's an art, there's a. You end. I would say half the Resident Evil games at some weird kind of sterile lab environment.

[Ross Freshnick]

It's not a fun place to be in. I think if the second half of the game was about two hours long, it would maybe be my favorite Resident Evil game of all time. And that's the problem that I have is like whenever I think about the action sequences of Resident Evil games, there's a reason that they're about maybe 10% of the overall runtime here. It's like half.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

I think part of the problem here is action sequences. And I know that's like a thing that I've said before of yeah, the games, eventually they turn to action games and they kind of lose their luster. I would reframe it here that the series has gotten really good. When it is not about the series, when it is its own original story in the first five or six hours of each of these games is that. And then the further it goes and the longer it goes, the more it gets into like Resident Evil mythos. And sometimes I really like that. Something I've liked about 7 and 8 is that they are kind of reflections of previous Resident Evil games. I think that's a neat idea that they are working through. The challenge for this game is it is kind of echoing Resident Evils 4, 5 and 6 all in one game. And also feels like they want it to be the end, the conclusion of something. Because the title is Requiem, you ultimately learn about the man who started it all and its connection with the characters that you've been playing. And I guess the like big scientific thing that is happening in this lab is that they figured out how to clone basically everything. And you can buy these things. You can, you know, they are selling lickers or they're selling Mr. X or they're selling all these copies of it. When you see Hunk, it is presumably not Hunk. It is a clone of Hunk. When you see Wesker Wait, wait, wait, wait. It is not Wesker. It's a clone of Wesker.

[Ross Freshnick]

Wait, I agree about Wesker, but you're

[Griffin McRoy]

saying there's infinite hunks.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

I'm saying they're infinite hunks.

[Ross Freshnick]

I thought that was just hunk and you kill hunk.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Nope, I'm pretty sure it's not hunk. I'm pretty sure it's.

[Ross Freshnick]

Okay, well, TBD on that one, but I guess. Well, what's your point?

[Griffin McRoy]

What is the point?

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

My point is that it, I am ready for them after this three series of games of. Hey, we are using the games to reflect on the series to finally let go and move on and go do a new thing. I. I love metatextual stuff. This is truly the overload of it because that is why we end up having these three hours in a very strange flat corridor is because we need to basically recap. Here are all of the familiar faces building to this dramatic big conclusion. Cool. If that's the last time we do that.

[Griffin McRoy]

Cool. Also, I don't give a shit. Like, it's not good, guys. The story's not good. The story that you are telling that now we are slowing down for a few hours to make sure I really, really know who all these fucking people are. Cause I didn't play Resident Evil Outbreak. And the payoff for that story, that is bad.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

So like I will say this, it's coherent and that immediately.

[Griffin McRoy]

Oh sure, it's not the worst Resident Evil story by any stretch of the imagination. But like, I would push back at the idea of this game and the last two games being part of some sort of conceptual.

[Ross Freshnick]

You mean 7 and 8?

[Griffin McRoy]

7 and 8. Yeah.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Right.

[Griffin McRoy]

Because for me, 7 and 8 are like wild offshoot super hyper corrections of like the franchise's worst sins in Resident Evil 6. And then that was 7. And then 8 was just a bonkers self contained kind of Grimm's Fairy Tales thing where like there's not even zombies anymore. Now they're werewolves and shit. Like it was so out of pocket.

[Ross Freshnick]

I mean, they do end up linking it in with everything, but in a very light way.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah, of course they do. But in a very, very minor way.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

When I say they're tied, I'm not saying literally story wise. I'm saying 7 is a reconception of what Resident Evil 1.

[Ross Freshnick]

Correct.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Is like you go to a building, spooky, scary haunted house. You know, 8 is full considering of the weirder Code Veronica era and past that. And now this is like big corporations. The president might be Involved, which is very much fine.

[Ross Freshnick]

I think I'm going to play devil's advocate as someone who agrees with everything that has been said about the story of this game. I think what they wanted to do here and they kind of accomplish it is say, I never want to hear the names Wesker or Umbrella Corporation ever, ever again. That's the end of it. Shut the fuck up. And so what they do is they end the game by basically closing the loop. There's a cure out for everything that Umbrella ever made and there it is and you can use it if you want to. And they even end it with a 30 page text document that you can read through from Grace saying the entire story, start to finish regarding Umbrella and why you shouldn't care about that stuff anymore. And 7 and 8 do introduce, for lack of a better term, a mold that technically has nothing to do with the thing that Spencer made. He was just like inspired by it. So the Opus thing that they release the cure has won't cure the mold. So there's still going to be zombies running around, still going to be B O W S, whatever the fuck it is. But I think what happened was they were like, well, we got to wrap this up and we got to close every little loophole that we've ever had and we're going to include Mr. X and we're going to include the Spider and we're going to include whoever else so that we can put this to bed. And I think that's what they were trying to do here. I agree with mixed results but hopefully it means that they can kind of almost kind of start from scratch, moving forward. Maybe I never want to hear the Spencer name again. Like, we're done.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah. These games are so excellently made. They are like, they are so polished. It looks beautiful, it feels great to play. Yeah. And I don't know, I feel like the other games, the more recent games have benefited from that more than this one. But I don't know, for me the cardinal sin comes back to you had a really, really interesting dynamic. This like split between the Leon gameplay and the Not Ashley, the Grace gameplay. And I think of those two I enjoyed the sort of more stressful, more sort of resource conscious Grace gameplay. And then all of a sudden like you are going to take a big long break and then when you do come back to Grace, it is in the most boring environment in the whole game. It's just a really, really weird series of decisions.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

If for whatever reason people are listening to this and they have not played the game but they're still thinking about it. I do think you can play the game, get it on sale or whatever. Whenever that happens, play it up until really the sneaking around the police department and then just watch a video of the ending and you're good.

[Griffin McRoy]

That's the Chris plant way. Yeah, they call that the Chris plant.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Go for it. That's totally. I mean, what you get up until that point is better than most big budget video games.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

And I think it's like a very complete experience.

[Griffin McRoy]

Final boss fights, kind of a wet fart. I don't know, man. Like, if this is the conclusion of the. Of the, like this sort of arc of it, it's not a very memorable boss fight, guys. Yeah. So there's two endings. Whether you decide to release Elpis, which will then cure the whole world.

[Ross Freshnick]

That's a good thing.

[Griffin McRoy]

That's good. The password is hope.

[Ross Freshnick]

Not even an ampersand or like an

[Griffin McRoy]

exclamation point in there. Yeah, it's really shitty. You would think that they would not even allow him to, like, anything shorter than eight characters is like, what the fuck are you doing? And then that is the good ending. And then you have to. Then, you know, Zeno gets killed by the other guy and then he turns into, get this, a huge monster and he like, sucks up electricity and you just have to like, shoot him a bunch of times.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yeah, in his red. In his red bone.

[Griffin McRoy]

I don't really think there's much more to it than that. I don't know, man. Compare that. Oh, the bad ending is great. You destroy Elpis and then Leon gets fucking massacred.

[Ross Freshnick]

You see Leon's head explode in ways you've never seen it explode.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah. And then you just kind of. Then you just kind of leave and

[Ross Freshnick]

you're like, I kind of like that ending better.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

In the happy ending. There is a few more details here. You then escape the scene. You're saved by Chris Redfield's agents. Basically, Grace goes back to work. And Grace is like, you know, I'm just so sad that Emily, the little girl that turned into a giant monster that Leon brutally, like, shot like 5,000 times. I'm sad that she's gone. And Leon says, don't worry, I don't think I shot any of her vital organs. Even though the last time we saw this character, it had dead, literally melted into the floor.

[Griffin McRoy]

Pile of goo, turning goo.

[Ross Freshnick]

She was covered in giant mutant parts. There was no way to tell where the vital organism.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Well, what we learned is that the mutant stuff around her was kind of Like a cocoon.

[Ross Freshnick]

Oh, sure.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Yeah. And that she was in it almost like a mech. A biomech. And now Grace is raising Emily.

[Ross Freshnick]

That seems like a good.

[Griffin McRoy]

That's nice. That's great.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

I mean a really good idea.

[Griffin McRoy]

They give us almost no time to like give a shit about that relationship. This is a young girl that we did need to solve one puzzle once and then rescue and like there's not a ton of. Not a ton of kind of buildup

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

of that they were like biologically tied together. But that's not true. We find out.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah, I don't think so.

[Ross Freshnick]

I also deeply resent the fact that that puzzle could have very easily been solved just by like elimination. And yet we needed to drag a

[Griffin McRoy]

blind girl through a haunted through zombie fucking where the world biggest zombie was like. Yeah, yeah.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

I mean I still. I still. Honestly, I still love this game minus that other part. The. The highs are just so high and Grace is such a good character. I just love hanging out with Grace. I just love that somebody is finally in the Resident Evil world. He just keeps being like, what the fuck? What?

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah, it's a fun sort of bystander representative of like.

[Ross Freshnick]

I think Ethan was that too in seven and eight.

[Griffin McRoy]

Ethan was definitely that in one. When he gets his arm sawed off he's like, what?

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

What?

[Griffin McRoy]

Then his arm's back on. He's like, holy shit. Yeah, I don't know, man. I don't know that I'm gonna be eager to replay this one in the way that I've been with other Resident Evil games as well.

[Ross Freshnick]

I thought it was half great, half not so much.

[Griffin McRoy]

Let's stop the talk here.

[Ross Freshnick]

We have one piece of reader mail here that I wanted to call out. This comes from cece. I have something to add about the way the Pokemon in Popopia speak. My spouse has been playing the game in Japanese for practice, I guess and I've been able to compare my own English playthrough with hers. Magikarp says yo in English because of how it speaks in Japanese using Chris Planet. Can you tell us what is written here?

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Because it's in Japanese English because how it speaks in Japanese using the su instead of daesu so it's like instead of a polite form it's using a slightly less polite form.

[Ross Freshnick]

Right. So they say that other slang that a teen or a part timer might use in fiction as far as I can tell, most of the Pokemon have stylized modes of speech that you've seen in manga and anime. Some are talking like young Boys, Tangrowth has a stereotypical older Professor Greedent is like almost like a middle aged woman vibe. Localizing these mannerisms is notoriously fraught, which I guess is why Kyogre, who talks like an old Japanese man, gets a thick Southern accent drawl in English. None of this is unique to the game or anything, but I mentioned the Magikarp saying yo thing, so Cece thought they'd write in. So thank you. That's good insight.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah, that is good context.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

I believe Bulbasaur speaks like Yadu, which is like a not quite Jersey Shore girl voice, but not so far off. It's like a very bleached hair, very, very bold makeup, and I love that Bulbasaur, is that going on?

[Griffin McRoy]

I will jump off this with my honorable mention, which is. I've been playing a lot of Pocopia as well, and I don't know that I have a ton to add to my thoughts, but it continues to get bigger in a way that is just kind of shocking. I think I have unlocked the last area and I am kind of getting close ish to wrapping up the storyline in that area and then I assume the storyline of the game. But it's a real special one, y'.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

All.

[Griffin McRoy]

It's a really, really, really super excellent game.

[Ross Freshnick]

You know what I like about it? Just to contrast it, I know we did a bit of this last week, but to contrast it with Animal Crossing is the tasks that you're given. There's like a very easy way to solve a task that you're given by a Pokemon. Like, the Pokemon will be like, I want a toy or I want a house or whatever. And you can do the easy way. You can just make the easiest toy you can make. But because the game is so open in terms of your creativity, like, if you decide you want to make a fucking ball or greenhouse for Bulbasaur to live in and like grow his plants, you can fucking do that.

[Griffin McRoy]

It's fun to build that shit. So much fun to like. It's fun and very easy to build cool stuff. Like, there's an area in the game called Palette Town that is basically not like story heavy. Nothing really going on there much at all. It's up to you to just kind of like customize it and do whatever you want. When you play multiplayer, like, Pallet Town is where you are doing your stuff. And it has become sort of a staging ground for Henry and I to like build. Like, oh, the town needs power. We could just like drop a water wheel here. Or we could build like a Big tall tower and put a windmill at the top of it and then, you know, come up with a solution from there. Or like, oh, we need a workshop where we can set up some sort of automated thing where this Pokemon drops iron ore and then this Pokemon will pick it up and throw it in a furnace for you. So there'll be iron bars waiting for you whenever you come back. Like, it's so much fun to design that stuff and have it look really great and very functional. And I keep coming back to it. There is so much other stuff competing for my kind of gaming time and attention and I just keep coming back to Bo Copia.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yeah, I totally agree. It's been a big hit with my son as well. And it seems like something that's gonna be a mainstay of like, oh, we can get in 15 minutes and do a quick build and have fun before dinner or something like that.

[Griffin McRoy]

It seems also very ripe for dlc. There's an event going on right now where you are picking up cotton spores that you can trade with Hoppip at the different Pokemon centers. And the stuff for that is not so exciting, but it's still kind of a, I don't know, a blueprint, I guess of like what, what events could be and what, how they could expand.

[Ross Freshnick]

I mean it's very like the game is very obviously designed to be very modular. Like you could easily just do, oh, here's a DLC and they add an area and it adds new block types and new missions or whatever. I'd be shocked if they don't just do like every six months, they just add a new area.

[Griffin McRoy]

Be smart.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yeah.

[Griffin McRoy]

What about you guys?

[Ross Freshnick]

I have been watching Delicious and Dungeon. I'm almost done with the first season. I think I have one or two episodes left. I watched it with the dub on and I know some people feel strongly one way or the other. I did want to call out sungwon prozd on YouTube, does the voice of Senshi in the dub and fucking crushes it.

[Griffin McRoy]

Like, oh, that's great.

[Ross Freshnick]

One of the best voice acting performances that I've heard in a long time. He's incredibly talented, but honestly everyone, like I find everyone incredibly charming and just like story wise and the art, it's just such a fully thought through project that is just executed to absolute top notch precision. I'm very. I don't know how long it's going to be until season two happens. It might be years, but season one is just.

[Griffin McRoy]

I watched this one a lot while I was traveling a lot and I Watched one season in the course of a couple weeks and then.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yeah, it's just really. They did a fantastic job. So that's on Netflix. It's delicious.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

In Dungeon Mine is a game, actually that we're going to be talking about on Restyz next week. But Screamer been getting into this. Do you know about this, Griffin?

[Griffin McRoy]

I do not.

[Christopher Thomas Plant]

Screamer is basically Dispatch, but with racing. So it's doing the kind of like, what if we have a big interesting story of intrigue and it has a very anime aesthetic and you are in the distant future where a mysterious scientist has created a vehicle that even after it explodes, both the car and the driver will be brought from. Brought back from the dead. Now you might be thinking, why are they using this technology just for racing? I don't know. I think everybody in the game is trying to answer that question. For real. Everybody's like, we gotta figure out the answer to this question. What's cool about it is the racing is sick. And you can dig into all of that if you have ever wanted to get into racing games and you're like, I just don't. I'm not good at it. I don't know how to do it. The campaign for this game is designed for that express purpose. It is, I mean, truly like piece by piece teaching you how to play a racing game to the point that if you are a hardcore racer, you might find the campaign a bit tedious. I find it to be, like, about the sweet spot. I'm overall enjoying it. It has a really super. But, like, it has a unique drifting style where you use both joysticks to create your drift. So you are. I almost recall it like how MLB the Show or those other games where they like, really focus on using sticks versus anything else to control movement. I dig it. And the story is overall pretty good. They, unlike Dispatch, were like 95% of the game's budget went into the storytelling and the visual sequences. And there's just like that, you know, there's. There's some game there, but that's not the focus. This is, I would say more like 50 50. So the animation is not as elaborate. There are more sequences where you're looking at static images of people with, like text, but everything is voiceover. There's great voice acting on it. And yeah, I'm enjoying it.

[Griffin McRoy]

This looks really sick. Cool. Well, that's it for the besties this week. Do we want to thank some patrons?

[Ross Freshnick]

You bet we do. I wanted to thank Niall M. Aaron M, Nick D and Inland Tangerine. Thank you for being patrons of the besties [e-mail] thebesties as Plant mentioned, we have a new Resties coming at you on Tuesday. We got bracket battles every month, all sorts of fun stuff coming at you. So, yeah, we appreciate all your support and everyone that backs the show really allows this to happen. So we greatly, greatly appreciate it.

[Griffin McRoy]

Yeah. Thanks everyone. Patreon.com TheBesties Go get it.

[Ross Freshnick]

Yes, there it is.

[Griffin McRoy]

Get up on there. Next week we're gonna be playing marathon and sharing more of our sort of thoughts on that. Maybe a couple other things, too. There's a lot. There's a lot popping right now. Yes, it's very busy, but I think mostly marathons. So join us for that, won't you, next week. And join us again always here on the Besties because shouldn't the world's best friends play the world's best games? Besties.