Games for Breakfast Feat. Joe Scott! | Ep 75 | Gaming News

[music] GOOD MORNING, MATT. [screaming] A
GOOD MORNING, JOE.
GOOD MORNING, WILL.
And good morning to all of you.
Welcome to Games for Breakfast, the only internet talk show we talk about this week's gaming and tech news, but also where we tumble out of bed into animated kitchens, pour ourselves some Martinelli's ambitions, and yawn and stretch, AND WELCOME A JOE SCOTT.
HI, BUDDY.
I cannot match that energy. for if you inject me with plutonium, I wouldn't be able to match that energy.
Let's go everybody. First of all, hello Janet. Welcome. Welcome. Hello to everybody. Uh this is the wonderful, the mythic, the legendary Joe Scott of many different fames. How are you, buddy?
I'm all right. How you doing?
We're good. We're good. Thank you so much for for being, as we said in the pre-show, wheeled in on the old cart that we move our TV into our kitchen for. that one wobbly wheel.
It was loud.

Um,
Joe, for for folks who who foolishly don't know who you are or what you do, can you give everyone a little bit of a breakdown of that?
I should be better at this by now, but uh I I'm sort of like an enterainment YouTuber. Um, I do comedy, but also uh history. I do science. I I stopped calling myself a science communicator because I do more than that. I get more into the history and stuff like that now and mystery content and whatnot. Uh with a with a with a heavy dose of existential dread. This is my branding at this point. I think
I think that's where I fell in love with you. Um [laughter] specifically the existential dread. Um also uh for folks either watching on Nebula, thank you very much for that once this is a VOD or uh who have Nebula subscriptions for later, uh Joe has a phenomenal original up there called The Oldest and Newest Places on Earth. Uh, can you tell us a little bit about that as well because I flipping love it.

Yay. It's not the most cleverly named uh film in the world, but um it started as I was just going to do like a big challenge YouTube video, right? Like, you know, it's like I I traveled to the the most remote restaurant in the world or whatever. You know, it was like one of those things. And somehow I landed on could I travel to the oldest and newest like could I stand on the oldest and newest rock formations on Earth? and I started looking into it, talked to some people, found out, oh, this is actually a place you can go to, you know, um and um set about doing it and it took me like four years because u one of the the oldest places way up in North Canada, it's like near Yellow Knife. Um, and uh, I think it was 200 2023 was the year that we were going to go up there and that was when all those wildfires I mean they have them every year now, but they like everything was like Yellow Knife had to be evacuated entirely because they thought that the city was going to be taken over. So,
um, anyway, it just took me forever to get it done and uh, it came out that's

in December of last year. It's been almost a year now and um
it it it like I said it started as a YouTube video and then by the time we got to the end we're like this is actually like a feature documentary. I accidentally made a real documentary, you know, and and uh I'm super proud of it. I think it came out really well. And uh yeah,
nova says uh newest rock formation. You mean an active volcano?
Yes. So that one was arbitrary. That one was fully arbitrary. There's like 23 active volcanoes around the world at any given moment. Um, we decided to go to Kilawea because uh it's, you know, uh it's it's a US territory or US state. It's got national park there. You know, you don't have to do currency exchange and all that. So, uh could have easily gone to Iceland and I hope to someday, but uh but yeah, we we we went to Canada. We talked to some uh geologists from the Smithsonian Institution. They were doing some studies up there. uh went to Hawaii, talked to some USGS geologists and volcanologists and uh uh

got to go up to a lava formation that wasn't it again we didn't quite get to the newest one because it was erupting at the time but you can't you can't go there. It's like off limits and
there's you know things like poisonous gases and stuff like that. So you know
sounds like you're not very dedicated to this [laughter] if you're not worried if you're not willing to inhale poisonous gases for a YouTube video. Come on, Joe. [laughter]
Put some effort into it.
What up, fam? Today, I'm gonna be huffing rocks.
Yeah, [laughter] exactly.
But we got some really cool footage of the top of Monaloa and um
it's gorgeous. It's a really, really wonderful piece. Uh so, and I will say this, but I will spoil nothing. Surprisingly emotional.
You don't think that what we just described or what Joe just described, even though it would be cool, would like be emotional, and it kind it is. It's very, very well done. One of my favorite lines in the whole thing, I was talking to um Jesse, one of the geologists in up in Canada. He said he said, "You think about things bigger

than rocks when you're sitting on these rocks, cuz they're they're literally 4 billion years old, and they've just been sitting there for 4 billion years." And when you like start to process that, I think it honestly it it sort of it [snorts] I still carry that with me a little bit. Like it's it's kind of shaped the way I see everything now.
Yeah.
Just just sitting there and and reflecting on that. Actually, here's the here's a piece of that rock right here. [laughter]
Dang.
Yeah. Keep it on my desk.
That's crazy.
As a reminder of the temporality of life. [laughter]
And this is why I fell in love with Joe Scott. Um, all right, Joe. This is a uh uh technically a gaming and tech news uh show we do every week to sort of just go over what's been happening. Can you give us and this any answer is the correct answer. Can you give us what your like what your gaming u is? What what you do? How you engage with the medium if at all? My gaming omelette, if you will. [laughter]
There's one right here.
That's the breakfast part.
Yeah, it's two eggs sunny side up, Matt.

[laughter]
Hey, but is it is it a salad or is it a
No, no. Is it a sandwich or is it a
I screwed it up already.
This was bad. We should have never brought We should have never brought Joe into this madness. Are are are Sunny Side Up eggs an omelette or is it alcohol? I'm sorry. I'm just like
If you fold a Sunnyside egg like a taco, is it an omelette? [laughter]
Oh, there you go.
A little like sprinkle the bacon egg taco.
Somebody's going to do that now.
I want tacos.
Wait, back to games. Joe, do you [laughter] mess with them?
That is the best answer I can give you on games. So, when I uh Okay, look. When I was growing up, my parents wouldn't let me have like a Nintendo or anything. And my cousins had one because they lived out in the middle of nowhere and there was nothing else to do. So, I would go like play with my cousins and they would just annihilate me on whatever it was that we were doing to the point that like I couldn't even, you know, and I'd like throw the remote near the the controller

down. And then my [snorts] parents like, "We're certainly not giving you one now. You get violent whenever you play them, you know." So, uh, that that's how it all started. And I just never really got into gaming, honestly. So, like I have games on my phone that I play when I'm
when I'm bored. I actually So, like a couple years ago, I bought a PS5.
Okay.
The first gaming console I've ever had in my entire life.
Mhm.
And uh, actually, I've I've got one of the controllers here just collecting dust. There we go. But like I'm so not used to like controlling a camera with one thumb and the character with the other and there's like 87 buttons on this thing and like honestly just the muscle memory whatever was just something I didn't have and and like it's hard to say like when you're starting from that far back it just feels like you're climbing up a mountain just trying to learn how to play the games and it was kind of hard for me to Anyway I I have a PS5 but it's not getting used very
There we go. No, but you're Oh, well,

I I was going to say, have you heard of our Lord and Savior, Bolatro?
No.
Oh, okay. Yeah, we'll we'll talk one more time.
We'll So, uh you should you can get it on your phone.
I am horribly miscast for this show, guys.
No, you're the best for this show. Great.
Batro [laughter] is um if you download it and play it, I think it's probably like five bucks at this point. It is super fun. Uh it [laughter] is a card game. It is a nightmare.
Oh my god. will please don't [laughter] from chat just
uh to Joe Scott's YouTube audience. I apologize for the delay in the next video that I have just caused. [laughter] Um
Oh yeah,
it is my it is my fault. You may blame me. Uh you may leave a comment blaming me to help engage the algorithm.
You're welcome.
There you go. Um, no. Joe, to your point about like uh the sort of it's either there I think there's a better word for either institutional memory or like muscle memory of like knowing how to control a character and a camera at the

same time in 3D space. That's not something that like
when you've been playing games as long as Will and myself and a bunch of people in chat have like you just think it's sort of like again you kind of take advantage or you you you you um you
for granted
take for granted thank you the the ability to do that because it's not. You hand a controller to anybody who's never touched it. And it's one of the oddest feelings in the world.
I tell this story I tell this story often. Um we got an N64 because uh there was me, my my little brother, my mom, and my dad. And they had four controllers and we could play Tetris with all four of us, but we could also play Mario Kart. And um my dad, my little brother, and I have more experience than my mom does. And mom's initial inclination was to turn the controller like a steering wheel.
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. do that.
Which is really funny because when the Wii version came out where you actually turn the controller like a steering wheel, she started kicking our butts. [laughter]
Oh, that's funny.
Yeah. Right. Like it is.
She'd been practicing that whole time. She knew it was coming.
Right. Exactly.

No, it is.
Little whipppper snappers are in for it when she was ready. She was basically doing what Super Saiyans do when they train and all that extra gravity.
Yeah. Right. [laughter] Yeah. Exactly.
All right.
She started calling me Kakarot, which is really weird.
Weird. That's very strange.
Um, you might want to might want to check our power level. Uh, all right. Let's [laughter]
So, Bellatro is a game I need to play is what you're telling me.
Yes. Although, I will say Evan did say, "Do not Batro. It will destroy your productivity." Three cry faces.
It is a
Oh, and also, sorry, there's actually a game that came with your PS5 that could actually help you a lot if you were interested in getting better with not the
control the little guy.
Yeah. Astrobot.
Astrobot was fun actually.
Astrobot. There is a full version of that game, not just the demo, which is a huge demo.
Yeah.
And it was one of the best games of last year.
The last year or two years ago. Um it is phenomenal and uh absolutely wonderful.

Look at me writing this down. Yeah.
Two years ago because it won
best game for
um last year which was
Expedition.
Yeah.
Okay. Gotcha. All right. Well, speaking of all the games that we'd love to own physically and put on our shelves, let's get into our main story, Will, shall we?
We shall [music]
jazz hands. So, so, um, Joe, we talked a little bit about this in the pre-show. How familiar are you with the tom [ __ ] that is going on with uh [laughter] that's my one swear for the day. Um uh that is going on with PlayStation uh and physical media currently.
Uh with PlayStation not that much, but I know like there's a there's a whole uh movement back to physical media for multiple reasons.
Yeah. Uh essentially, uh PlayStation announced a couple weeks ago that they

were that the not only right hot off the heels of GTA 6 announcing that it will not be releasing a physical version, it will only be digital. Uh PlayStation then said, "Oh, by the way, we are winding down physical um physical copies of games at the end uh starting in January of 2028. And after that, you will only be able to buy digitally or a plastic box with a code in like a big box store." And this has many problems. Um they they they cite essentially that like oh 80 something% of game sales are done digitally and PC gaming uh is produ is almost 99.9% digital at this point because um there's no Yeah. And we don't like no PC that I've owned in the last 10 years has had a disc drive. Um but the the problems with this are overreaching. uh they this destroys a secondhand market. This um this hurts libraries. This hurts uh games preservation. It does a lot of bad things. And PlayStation has been taking

it on the chin, not saying much, and kind of digging their feet in the sand and just not they're saying it's not going to affect their bottom line. It's just going to they're going to keep rolling forward. PS6 is not going to have a disc drive and we're all going to have to go to the company store if we want to purchase. And I I'm sorry, not purchase, license uh our games. We were talking before the show, Joe, about a a movie you had on iTunes that you had licensed and then they took away and now you cannot get.
Um what was the name of it? Michael Keaton movie.
Oh, Johnny Dangerously.
Johnny Dangerously. Um
very old movie. [laughter]
Yeah. But Xbox on the same day on the same day that PlayStation emailed every PSN members reminding them that their purchases are not actually purchases and are licenses. On the same day that email went out at Gamescom, Xbox, which has been I won't get into the details, Joe, we've been talking about it for weeks of the show. Also been effing up quite a

bit lately for different reasons. Uh, but with their new CEO and and sort of people running the show, they're trying to get Xbox back on track. Xbox at this point is kind of the the the loser of the console generation at this point
um for a myriad of reasons. But, uh, they announced a new program that they're calling essentially disc to digital, meaning on a Xbox Series X or Xbox One, I believe, over a thousand games to start and they'll keep adding them. If you have a disc of a game and you put it in your Xbox, it then puts a digital license of that game to your account, meaning you don't have to keep putting the disc in the thing. You could also play it on other systems that could play the game, uh, etc., etc. And then if you were to sell your disc or or or or give it away or lose it or whatever, someone else puts it in, they can then claim that digital license. So it's not a way to like share a library. It's a

way that it's it essentially is giving you a physical object for that license, which has a much stronger pull in what would essentially be any legal ownership of a thing, right? Um,
it's like Providence thing.
Yeah. Yeah. So, this is um kind of essentially PlayStation and Xbox have gone back and forth over the years kind of giving each other uh crap in this place. In fact, there was a uh two generations ago, Xbox was kind of touting the all digital, you can't let people borrow your games and PlayStation did a silly video where the like because it got so complicated and convoluted how you were supposed to be able to let friends borrow Xbox games digitally. They PlayStation literally did something with their developers like here's how you let someone borrow a PlayStation game. And the other guy took it [laughter] and he's like thanks. and like it was just everyone lost their minds and now it's weird that it's the other way around.

So, this feels like them to me, Will, and I'm curious what you think about this as well. This feels like to me that they're sort of like grasping at straws to do something good that PlayStation is dropping the ball on because I think we could all agree every company would prefer moving to digital if they could,
right? Well, uh, interestingly, Xbox is about 90% digital as opposed to PlayStation's about 80%. Um, they are, it's PC, then Xbox, then PlayStation in terms of digital percentage. Uh, and I think it's very interesting that they're doing it at all. Um, especially because this is not the most expensive project, but this clearly took dev time, right? That they like spun this up. Um, I don't know. It feels It feels like it's probably a good move, but I think there are some loose ends and edges to this that I'm

like not thrilled about to be honest, right? Like first and foremost,
it's still a digital license and this is still at the whim of the publisher and the whim of Xbox, right? like the publisher. The the reason that it's not launching with every Xbox title isn't that they can't do that. It's that they legally won't do that because of uh agreements with publishers. So like that's a whole part. Um and the other part is uh and this is like a little old tinfoil hat. Um they they tip their hand on something and I don't know if a lot of people were aware of this. This means that every Xbox game is fingerprinted. Because if they can tell whether a disc a copy of Gears of War 5 has been used in multiple places, that means that Gears of War 5 disc is already unique. And if this is true going backwards, this is means they've always been unique.
I think but I think that was kind of

known, right? Physical discs have always had a always had some sort of identifier or I won't say serial number, but
it's not has been a an object of public conversation to the same extent. uh it might have been known but it's not as like it's not a big part of the conversation and I just think this reinjects that as like an inevitable part of the conversation because I think there is some concerns about like
well like we we run into
like you could ban a disc right from this program right you could say that that disc number you know 8675309 9 is
whoa Jenny's disc
right um
for a good time
right [laughter] is is banned right the disc itself is banned which is like a weird idea I think
sure I I I agree with that I my I never want what what's the phrase

don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good is that the
right
well I'm not saying this isn't a good thing I'm just saying that like it's good and I also have questions Right.
Like I think I'm trying to think and this is sort of for all three of us. Is there like a precedent? Is there something else in our adult lives, children lives, whatever that like feels like this weird little battle that some of us are in right now? Like I this this this process of like this process of pretending like false ownership buying Johnny Dangerously on iTunes but then not owning it like feels like a new a a new problem cuz before before things were digital like you kind of had you know I bought this and this is mine and I'm holding it and like yeah it could be stolen but like uh it couldn't be turned off and like given me non-acess And in this world of like

like cars like new cars now have subscription services for like heated seats.
Mhm. Yeah. This is what I've been thinking about this whole time as y'all are talking about this.
Like have have you had to deal with that at all and anything you've I I'm in the city. I don't own a car. Uh
yeah.
Uh
I haven't dealt with it, but I know there's some Yeah, I think uh BMW has a new one that has that kind of thing. I I know that like well Tesla with their self-driving features have always been like a subscription thing, but
um but it's kind of creeping into things like you want air conditioning, it's it's $5. Everything's turning into uh into JetBlue, you know, or Frontier Airlines or shitty one is
No, it is. And and it's
Spirit Spirit is actually [laughter]
Yeah. Yeah,
but like it's it just feels like subscriptions are coming for everyone and everything and this kind of thing while good. Here's the other here's the other uh caveat I think cuz look, I'm

happy they're doing this. I think it's worthwhile. Xbox has had a history of of trying not hitting the ball always out of the park, but trying to deal with game preservation in an okay way. I like it. Um, the thing I'm wondering because I haven't seen this anywhere and Brad and Janet say in the chat if you have seen this somewhere and please shoot me the link. We'll allow it to come through. Um, whenever anyone's talking to Asha, the CEO, or um, anybody at Xbox, I don't believe anyone has asked if they're planning to have their new console code named Project Helix have a disc drive. Because what this could also be is them using this console generation to essentially wean people off of discs. Get them used to so like I buy all my Xbox games physical, right? And then I'm Yay, I have them. No, I have a digital license. This is great. I don't even have to go get my case anymore and and put my disc in. This is cool. Oh, I can

play it. I can stream it over on my computer or my phone. Awesome. Oh, well, the new game came out. Well, I don't even pick up my discs anymore. Like, I guess I'll just buy it digitally. Like I'm talking about like people that don't think about this stuff as deeply as we do. Like it feels like uh a convenient bridge to wean people off of this while also having the good feelings and spin of like game preservation. Does that make sense? in the in the announcement it it kind of tracks because the thing that they kept bringing they kept bringing up during the announcement which I thought was kind of weird was they kept talking about like their collector edition statues like more than their physical games. They're like, "Yeah, I got this big collection of physical games AND I GOT THESE BIG STATUES THAT LOOK OVER MY PHYSICAL game collection like some kind of argonath and like you know [laughter]
that just went hyper nerd for a second there."
Yeah, you're good. You're good. You're among friends. It's fine.
Yeah. Right. Right. Right. But like they they kept [laughter] Right. Thanks. Thank you. Um they kept bringing that

up, right? And it was it was kind of weird that like that was what they were focusing on with the idea of physical media was that they like they had a physical object that was almost like an object of art. Like this collection was its own purpose and not to like play the games.
Yeah.
Right. They like viewed playing the games as like ancillary to owning the physical media like the physical collections and the cases and the everything. So, I don't know. That might be part of it.
Evan just asked to then how does Project Helix different from a Steam machine without the disc reader, a disc drive reader. Yeah, like that would be the al So, Project Helix is essentially the the code name of their new console, Joe. And they're talking about how it's basically going to be a PC.
It's going to be a PC that can play Xbox games and has a native Xbox like uh operating system, but like also you could just use it essentially as a PC. Um, I'm wondering like I'm just wondering how far this commitment to this bit is going to go because if they don't have a disc drive in Helix that

would then inform us that this is just a short-term PR stunt because they're kind of floundering, right? Like
wouldn't you think if this was your initiative,
you would be singing from the rooftops like, "Yep, we're doing it here. You could put all your stuff digital. Helix, it's gonna have a disc drive, so you're gonna be able to do it there. Like, and maybe there's a bunch of reasons legal, uh, promotional elsewhere that like why you couldn't do that, and it's not that simple for a a freaking ship of a company that's large enough as large as Microsoft that you just can't turn on a dime. Um, but like if I was in any part of that PR and that was the point, I'd be like, "Yeah, and make sure to say that the next console will do it, too." I wonder if it wasn't going to and now is
right. Yeah. I wonder if they weren't going to do it and then they saw that PlayStation offered up their spot in the console races to to to Xbox on a silverplated platter

by aiming some double buck at their own feet um with this whole like NO WE'RE NOT GOING TO do discs anymore and Xbox like gets free mileage out of well we weren't going to but Now,
yeah,
now we could be we could be the place that does like the you can play all your Xbox games forever because
unlike PlayStation, which I think has changed its core operating system a couple of times over the course of PlayStations, Xbox has always just been a fancy PC running a different version of Windows because why would it not be? Because it's owned by Microsoft, right? That's the reason that original Xbox games can be played on PC pretty easily and um like Fable and Halo and like a bunch of the other ones. They they they are easier to port to PC than a lot of the original PlayStation games are
because Xbox has always just been a fancy computer that runs Windows,

right?
So they they have an opportunity here to like tie up that corner of the market.
I guess this is a this is an exercise even outside of games. This is an exercise in the value proposition of what PR can do. Like a lot of people are vocally the vocal minority online are pissed at PlayStation for doing this. Do I think that that's actually going to stop and PlayStation doesn't think this. Do I think that's going to stop people from buying PS6s? I mean, I'm probably not. I I don't feel the need to. I'd like if there's an option to support something that does support physical media, I'd like to support that thing. But I don't think I'm in the minority or in the majority here. Like I think people will just kind of roll through and that's what PlayStation is banking on. Um so like I I wonder what ex like but [clears throat] like the the the noise of it like Joe you would even said you hadn't even heard of this right like in your corners of the internet which are vast just different from here. This didn't cross your desk. the Project Helix thing

or or or PlayStation dropping physical discs,
right? No.
Like, so I feel like
But it's a trend that's happening everywhere, so it's it's not it's not a surprise. No,
but I wonder like Well, actually, here's Oh, side question then, Joe. Did Did the Did the the Staten I forget what it was. It was just kind of a fun thing that like vinyl is now having its largest year in like 30 years or something like that. Did that cross your desk?
Yeah. Okay. So, so do you all have kids?
No.
No.
No. No, no,
just just the wonderful people in chat right now.
Sure. Okay. So, so a couple years ago, we had an exchange student stay with us. We never had kids. I'd never gone down that that path, you know.
Um, but something that that just really stuck out to me was how much
she was just fascinated about anything mechanical, anything physical. These are these are people that have grown up with everything on screens. This this world that we are sitting here lamenting, they're like, "That's how it's always been, isn't it?" Like, they just don't know any different. You know, I'm I'm I'm applying a a broad brush to a lot of people here, I know, but but like she we

we went into some um I think it was an art studio or something and they had these like typewriters set up where you could like type a note and leave, you know, tack it to the wall or whatever. She was fascinated by typewriter. She just never seen one before. She was like clicking it. And I think that like young kids like they're they they see the physicality of the stuff that we used to have and whatnot. Uh well, there you go. It's I do see a typewriter in [laughter] the background of Joe's camera which says on Thursday media. Exactly. Exactly. So um good eye by the way. [laughter] Um
there it is.
That's that's like tiny behind me and it's tiny behind you.
Yeah.
It's in inception tiny. Anyway, [laughter] um but my point is like uh like going back to cars just real quick, like um Tesla started the trend of everything being on a big screen in the car and it wasn't because flexing technology necessarily. It's because all those little switches, the little air vent things and stuff like all that has to be engineered and and like all like every single button has to be able to be pressed like

10,000 times without breaking and some of them are safety critical and you can't screw those up. So like it's just a lot easier to put it all on a screen and and we are we're at this weird place now where like like touchscreens highdeinition touchcreens are so cheap. I was I was saying to Scott Manley I was at a thing um do you know Scott Manley the YouTuber? Um, no. We were just like uh um at something in Austin and we were having that discussion about like something that I did not expect as a kid is that like we're going to have screens bloody everywhere in our pockets and on like our vapes and stuff like just everywhere you go there's a freaking screen. And it's like it's so ubiquitous and so cheap that now like the physicality of of things is unique and and different. And I think um it doesn't surprise me at all that vinyl is making a comeback. And I think that that physical media in general is going to make a comeback for all those reasons.
Yeah. I just I I between everything that you just said and the fact that we cannot own any

piece of media anymore outside of it being on a disc or on a you know that's the majority of the way it would be at this point, right? But like or and I guess vinyl would technically be a larger disc. Um it is I think between those two things it will become as as more and more stuff gets taken away that we've bought. Um I think that we'll hopefully move but then I'm also I I worry that it might also be too late and we'll just be sort of like in it. Does that make sense? Someone actually did just say one other thing here. I missed it real here. Uh uh Junderer said uh could physical BD be saved to become more popular? took the route of the speculative market like Magic the Gathering and Pokemon cards. I would hate that.
Um I know that some companies have [snorts] some grading companies like they do comic books and trading cards and and Magic cards and whatever. Uh have dipped their toes into grading video games.

I do I do not like it. Uh what will what you got?
Can I soap box real quick? Just
Yeah. Oh, please. Oh, yeah. The soap box is yours. [laughter] You mean the scams? You mean the scams? [laughter] You mean the people scamming people by arbitrarily assigning a perfection grade to an inherently imperfect consumer product? You mean the people who are trying to build like numbers of circulating copies of things with like no real basis for CL like what? Oh, we say that there are only 10 tens in the world, that they coincidentally belong to people that we like. It's all arbitrary. It's all subjective. They gave the one of one ring a nine. The one of one ring. There's only one magic card, by the way.
There's only one copy of this card. It [laughter] is a unique magic card
based on Lord of the Rings.
Based on Lord of the Rings.
And even it couldn't get a 10.
It could not get a 10, right, bro? What?

Like, no. [laughter] It's all a scam, right? Slab your cards if you want to cuz they're it's fun and cool to like have a slab, right? But like my roomy has slabs of garbage commons. She got like slabs of like graded 10 commons that just like make her happy cuz she's got a slab, right? But like it's a scam, right? It doesn't actually do anything other than preserve the item. The score is meaningless.
But I like darks. But hold on. counterpoint. We just got graded as a 10. So I now like
we've always been a 10. A 10 is low for us. We're like a 12 out of 10. We're all 11 out of 10 and Joe is plus one.
Is that Is that a 10 out of 100 though or
Yeah, it might be. I don't know.
Anyway, another scale.
We could keep talking about this or we could move on to another story that is tangentally tied to this cuz we spoke we spoke the juggernaut's name. Let's get into our uh Oh, this is our bad news section, isn't it? This is this is

unfortunately some
Wait, was the other section not the
Okay, that's funny.
So, uh, GTA 6 has been having It's so funny. My first thing I was like, "Oh, GTA 6 has been having a bad week." No, it hasn't. It's been having the best week it's ever had in its entire life.
They crashed Twitch. They crashed Twitch yesterday
for what? From what? They showed gameplay footage and it crashed Twitch for like an hour. Like no one could start new streams or do anything.
Can Can I as somebody who does not pay attention to gaming, I've been seeing GTA 6 like live play clips coming across my everywhere. So like even I am being you know by it.
This is the largest this will be in my opinion and it's and not just mine. And I think almost everyone who judges these things thinks this will be the largest piece of media ever launched.
Wow.
Um
I just had to bring this up.

One bring one if one to bring them all into the darkest grade them nine out of [laughter] 10 in the land of Mor. [laughter]
We love our audience so much. Thank you.
Okay.
So that's good.
So GTA is going to be releasing on November 19th purely digital. We won't talk about that end of it. But what has also been happening, Joe, is someone or a group of leakers um has essentially somehow gotten a early build of the game and has been not only drip feeding footage of the game out in little drops, but also watermarking it with their logo and a QR code to buy their crypto so they could use that crypto to vote on what the next drop is. And I they just recently, I believe, essentially cashed out. Um, as of as of now, unless I'm reading this wrong, uh, they dropped like 15 or 16 clips at this point. This is all breaking before uh GTA had a big Netflix deal, weirdly enough, where they were going to show 26 minutes of gameplay footage on Netflix 6 hours before they

were going to play it on YouTube. And I bet you the numbers killed.
I watched it yesterday. Uh, it looks
Oh, it's out.
It looks pretty good. Uh, there's no there's no ifs, ends, or buts. If they can make it run like it looks on that thing, and they said it was all captured on the console, I don't know. But um basically I think they were these leakers were essentially trying to cash in before that because after the super polished version of the stuff comes out. I don't know how much the leaks sort of have a
well they definitely weren't selling as much advertising space on their leaks afterwards which was another thing that they were trying to do. They were trying to sell advertisement space in GTA 6 leaked footage. Talk about rampant capitalism. Like, [laughter] I have stolen this thing and I will drip feed it unless my demands are met. But also, while I drip feed it to the public, would you care TO PURCHASE AN ADVERTISEMENT SPACE IN MY STOLEN

PRODUCT? YEAH, it's um they had these hackers, Joe had a list of demands, which sound good on paper, but they're also like they they truly did not care about any of these things. It was like ensure that physical media everything gets released on it and also like get me a pony and also like it was like all the but like you know based on the crypto scam that that wasn't really what they were doing,
right? Yeah. It's it's it's Robin Hood now sponsored by CocaCola, right? Like [laughter]
uh and and at the end of the day, none of this is hurting GTA in any way. I do think it sucks for the devs. It sucks for people that have worked really hard on this and they're not getting they're they're the first look of for people like the die hards are getting like garbage things with like a cartoon leak on it with a QR code to buy a crappy piece of crypto like that sucks for working on it for like 10 years or whatever. Uh but Rockstar as a company,
I mean this is only advertising for them. This is not this is not hurting

the sales of GTA in any way, shape or form,
right?
Everybody's talking about it.
Yeah. uh including the three of us. But here's like I guess my point. Oh, what you got?
I was just pointing at my ceiling. No, but is it is it possible that they're behind it because they are getting all this PR? Like is it is it a switcheroo or
So there's been a tinfoil hat thing about it. I think the blowback from Well, actually, I don't know. So this is I thought this initially. I don't think it anymore because the leak character, the like the leak uh little like graphic looks like similar art to like the fake companies in a Grand Theft Auto game and I was like this feels like something that could have been pumped out of the GTA art department and like they are punny with their graphics like oh it's a leak of a video game. Oh so it's the vegetable a leak right? M
um they have not found the person that has done this or the group that has done

this, which also would point towards that conspiracy theory, but the crypto grift of it all would be a real bad look for a company to do.
Um so I if it if there was no crypto scam, I could see this being a PR move. Mhm.
I think that might be a red herring to prevent people from saying that it's a PR move.
But you how how pissed off would people be?
Yeah. But they're never going to say that it was them. They're never going to claim it.
Oh, so they're never going to come out. They're never going to come out and say it.
No. Right. Well, and and there is one corroborating piece of evidence, which is that they claim that they were working to try and get um the information from Discord about who the leaker was, [clears throat] but Discord hasn't received a subpoena. which is also weird.
Yeah. Strange.
That's that's the that that is like the number one weird thing for me is that they said that they're going after Discord, but Discord says they haven't,

which is weird, right? That's the hard part.
Yeah. I It's funny, Joe. It's funny that you bring this up because my gut now because you just can't trust anything on face value at all anywhere ever is always like, "But what if?" And then I'm like, "No, [laughter]
no. Yeah,
we're there now. This is this is where our minds go. Anyway,
with the AI everything and the kayfabe everything, like I just I just don't I just don't trust anything anymore. I swear it's awful.
It's it's it's rough. Uh but hey, we'll be able to do uh virtual crime on November 19th and that will be great.
Yeah.
All right, moving on to some more bad news. Uh we're going to have a little bit bit of a repeat here. Um, this is I guess our immemoriam section,
right? Yeah. Right.
Sorry, Joe. This was not pl we we booked you like weeks ago. Um,
you just picked a week of so so much depth.
Yeah.
Well, I mean, Lindsay Ellis.
Yeah, we'll get to that. We'll get to

that when we get to Dolly. All right.
Yeah, cuz that's Yeah. Well, it's
the timing on that was insane.
Insane. Um, so three we lost three really great uh people in the entertainment industry this week. Uh, the first here being Peter Cullen, most known for being the voice of Optimus Prime for the past 40 something years. Um, I I can speak to it's funny out of all three of these, oddly, I think, and I don't get hit by celebrity death a ton. Uh, I think this is the one that gets me the most because it's it's tied to a
like a cartoon character, which should feel ephemeral. And they're not going to stop making Optimus Prime stuff, so they're going to try to have to find someone to sort of match or whatever. Uh, Optimus Prime for me and a lot of kids growing up was like for a, let me be clear, for a show that was designed to sell your kids toys after Reagan de deregulated the entire space.
Yeah.
They took this they took that

opportunity and did that, but also gave every kid like a second dad.
Yeah. Like it's like there's there is a a real um sense of weirdly family that Optimus Prime gives. Even down to and I just bought my tickets for this too. There's a 40th anniversary screening of the animated Transformers movie where famously, spoiler alert, uh Optimus Prime dies and kids back. Yeah, Joe, I'm so sorry. Um
there's been enough death this weekend.
I know. uh kids actually in so much so that like parents and children wrote in and they reversed it in the cartoon like it was not like they were just trying to move the next gen of toys.
Yeah.
But I don't know this this is a and it was great even in the Michael Bay movies whether you like him or not. Um I still think the first Michael Bay Transformers is excellent. Um I having his voice there and in all of the subsequent terrible ones uh actually meant a lot for that sort of keeping that that

spirit alive. And he's been he did a ton of other stuff too. He was uh also the voice of almost every kids action figure commercial who's like from Mattel like that guy. He did a bunch of different he was on um Goosebumps. He did a whole bunch of stuff. He was just he was prolific in a lot of different spaces. Um and uh he passed away uh I believe at 85
I think it was.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Uh also passing this week uh was the the someone very important to the naming convention of this channel uh Tim Curry uh passed this week uh after many health complications in his 80 years. Uh, and I think the the highest praise that can be spoken of Tim Curry is that uh he was deemed to be the the the the cast's favorite honorary muppet. Uh, which, you know, I think that says a lot about Tim Curry that he was a muppet in many ways.

[laughter] uh
famous for things like Frankenfer, for it, for um Long Done Silver, for Clue, for just everything. Uh and of course
for getting to the one place that capitalism hasn't yet reached
space.
Space,
right? Yeah. [laughter] Just what an absolute legend. Uh
yeah, total legend. And uh I I think I saw an interview with uh with him that was um about how he felt about the fact that despite his long and illustrious acting career, many people would always remember him as Dr. Frankenferter
and he was like that's a thing to be remembered for, right? That is a character [clears throat] who is unabashedly themselves and short, you know, and that's great. And I think uh every one of us will be rocking out to Anything Can Happen on Halloween uh in about a month. Uh a song I you cannot convince me otherwise that Tim Curry just made up the lyrics for on the spot. I don't think that was written. I think he just freestyled that. Um

also Yeah. Uh also in video game space, he was Count Diviculous in Brutal Legend. And uh in uh related to a story that we'll talk about later, Double Fine did give away Brutal Legend for 666 minutes in his honor. Uh because they they do that. They That's a thing that Double Fine does.
That's really good.
Yeah, I like it. Yeah.
Yeah. My My biggest Tim Curry thing is Clue. Clue is just like one of my favorite movies. So I I uh I turned 50 a couple years ago. I know I look like I'm my 20s, but I know.
Um, no, I I I did a clue themed party.
I literally rented out an old mansion and we like peppered it with clue like um Easter eggs and stuff. I put I put a a candlestick like above a door frame, you know. Um we start brains. Yeah. Nobody got pet. But um [clears throat] yeah, I was watching I watched it the other night after he died. I was like,

"Fuck, I gotta watch this." So
yeah,
he just he just like that is his movie
like especially toward the end when he's like recreating everything. It's just this the Tim Curry show at that point and it's it's unbelievable.
It really is.
Absolutely.
Um uh so passed away at 80. Another one. Uh it's crazy. It's nuts.
Cardinal Risheloon. My favorite version of Three Musketeers. I'll have to watch that.
There you go.
The the Oliver Platt one. Yeah.
Don't be so stupid. Of course we intend to resist you. Just give us a moment. Yeah. [laughter]
Yeah.
Yeah.
Uh and and then of course uh
Dolly Parton. Um Joe go into the story you had mentioned about what our friend uh Lindsey Ellis sort of the timing of this uh
dude. Yeah. Um apparently she'd been working on what like a three-part Dolly Parton series.
I think it's two-part. Um
yeah.
Uh but for like for months she's been working on this.
Yeah. and she went to Dollywood and she got all this footage and stuff and and then like well the day that it happened

she dropped it on YouTube which normally she'd post on Nebula first at least first anyway and but they uh kind of worked it out and she's she did a fundraiser with it
but um
or I think maybe it was a Nebula it was only on Nebula but then because she died they might have released it on YouTube as a charity. I don't know the order.
Yeah, I think it's only Well, I could be wrong. I thought she only released it for like a day or so just I have no idea
do a fundraiser but
but it came up and I watched it and it's amazing like everything Lindsay does but
uh
yeah like could you like she was literally in tears and I'm like could you imagine if you were working [laughter]
on a on a video about Dolly Parton for months and then like the the week you were releasing it she dies. That's just insane.
Yeah. Uh, of course, one of Dolly's um, in addition to her music, one of Dolly's uh, later in life projects was the Imagination Library. Um, and her family requested that in lie of flowers or or other um, you know, inmemoriams that people donate to the Imagination Library. Uh, unfortunately for them,

they forgot to beef up the web servers and the internet proceeded to hug the Imagination Library donation page to death.
Do we know if it's back yet?
I believe it's back.
We should make sure that the link to that is in the show notes. Yeah, because that's that's a really cool uh if if you're unfamiliar with the work that it does. It provides free books to parents of small children um before they get to school to foster a love of reading. That's that's the goal is to make sure that parents have books to read to kids for free. Great.
Also, on that note, what it does that's sort of special in that space is there is no financial requirement. mean you do meaning you don't have to prove that you cannot afford X to get it because there's often times a lot of shame that comes along with that and people don't sign up for it. So you can actually limit yourself into the reach that you have. And so I there's some I think there might be some minor limitations based on state and based on charity law.
Part of it is funded by state governments,
right? Yeah. She works with

places. Yeah. So there's things when that occurs, but um yeah, I mean it's it's so insane how like I urge you to go watch Lindsay's video on Nebula or on YouTube. It's phenomenal. It's going to cover everything that we obviously cannot hear, but she went from country music star to pop star to actress to sort of like um
icon
icon like but also like she had that time of like the butt of jokes like because of her, you know, her boobs or whatever. Like there's like but she always like she it always felt like she was in control of that conversation and she was always the most charismatic human being that was ever in a room. And then when she moved like then there was the Dollywood of it all which again in Lindsay's video she goes into the history of that which is fascinating. And then the imagination library. Not only that she was shadow producing and funding a bunch of shows and things that she just liked including Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
She I didn't know about that.

Yeah. She she was a silent producer and helped fund the original uh series of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and she I believe kept doing it for the majority of its run. Um, like there's so much stuff that this woman has done that we'll I almost feel like never know because again the the one thing I'll give away uh as sort of a through line in Lindsay's video, I don't think it's going to spoil anything, is Dolly Parton was never a billionaire,
but that does not mean that she could not have been.
Yeah, she very easily could have been. She chose to not be a billionaire. And look at how the world has responded to her passing.
Yeah.
And I and I hope this is a reminder to actual billionaires. Who am I kidding? They're not They [laughter] don't give a [ __ ] But like like you want infamy, you want to be remembered forever.
Not the metaverse, son. It's it's doing

good for people in communities that you're around. And when you're that rich, almost everyone is your community if you want them to be.
There was a there was an immediate spontaneous memorial uh at the statue of her in Severville. Um which is one of the which is her hometown and one of the places that she helped rehabilitate from being very not well off to being a a thriving community. Um
that she used the I will always love you royalties to to boost it was like it was like a black community.
Yep.
And she took no credit for it at all. like nobody even knew about it for like 30 years or something like that.
Yeah.
Uh tons of amazing stuff. You can see it all on Lindsay's videos. I believe the second one looks like Dolphin says just dropped on Nebula. So there's more there too uh to catch up on. Very sad. Very sad week.
Just real quick, something else that this made me think of was remember when George Michael passed.
Yeah.
And everybody like all these things that he did just sort of in private and anonymously started coming to light that he did all this charity work and like helped out all these people and stuff

and nobody even knew about it. He didn't take any credit for it. He didn't want anybody to know. He just did it to do it, you know?
Yeah.
It's that kind of thing.
It's It's one of those like if I won if I won the the lottery, I wouldn't tell anybody, but there would be signs and it's just like [laughter] a picture of all of my friends like school debt and medical debt just being gone, right? Like Yeah. That right. Just do do
Oh, yeah. And we forgot this is the last thing. There's so much stuff with Dolly. We're not going to hit it all, but Dark hit it too. Don't forget her her work on getting the co she donated a million dollars to the co you know research uh which actually oh my gosh does that transition us into our good news segmented in Indeed it does. So I believe that it is [clears throat]
thanks Dolly
for some good news.
There we go. Uh Joe, you brought this story to us and I've read it and I think I understand it. [laughter] uh talk to us about what's going on in in uh possible uh possible at least

trials of cancer vaccines. [snorts]
I'm tired of being right. [laughter]
Are you though?
While Joe's tired of being right, I'm going to step away real fast. I'll be
sure.
Cool. So, when uh when COVID happened and I was doing youtubing and the whole mRNA vaccine started coming up, I was making a prediction. Hey, wouldn't it be great if this like spurred research into cancer vaccines? Because the whole deal about cancer is that it's not a bacteria, it's not a virus, it's it's your own cells getting wonky and spiraling out of control and your body um I mean sometimes there's spontaneous remission, but a lot of times your most of the time your body can't fight it because it thinks it's your own cells. you know, like it's it's different, but it's different at like a nuclear DNA level and not at a you know, surface antigen level or whatever.
And a we cracked the genetic code with the human genome project and were able to

sequence DNA that became uh I love how somebody once I saw it on a chart. It was like the first DNA sequence that was done cost like a hundred million dollars to finally get there, right? And it's it's just gotten cheaper and cheaper and cheaper over time.
Yeah. until we can get to the point where like your individual DNA sequence can be done and a and a vaccine can be created specific to your body that can protect you against cancer cells. So uh when uh basically the only way that we could really fight uh COVID you know five years ago was this mRNA vaccine. And it was like, okay, now we have the technology to create mRNA vaccines. And yeah, it came out this week that um Madna has a cancer vaccine for melanoma. And it's it's gotten through like phase three trial and uh it's kind of passing with flying colors. And like this could be the first domino to fall in terms of like finally having real solutions and real vaccines for cancers.
Yeah, that is uh insanely good news.

possibly the best news we've ever talked about on this show. [laughter] Um yeah, like
and and as and as a melanin deficient human that is really important to me.
Right. [laughter] Right. Um we'll have the the link to the article in the show notes from uh nature.com. It was the best one that we could sort of find here and it the one that sort of like laymaned it out enough for me to sort of understand. But um the like this does this does kick open a lot of doors in that space like as soon as like I'm trying to do you know off the top because I don't like so it passed its third its third trial is that what the it's like far along in the trial process and I don't know what the full gamut of those are.
Yeah. Yeah. Um, I'll be honest, I don't really either. [laughter] But it says, uh, it was,00 people, and this was in Australia, I believe. Yeah. Um, so yeah, it says the study

enrolled around, 1100 people with advanced melanoma that had already been surgically removed. So that's kind of part of this is like they already had the recision or whatever,
but this is like making sure that all those scattered stray cells that could pop up somewhere else have been wiped out.
Um, so anyway, it says they Excuse [clears throat] me. They either receive the vaccine combined with amunotherapy drug called pembbrolunab
of course
pimbrlymab.
Who who amongst us isn't that isn't their favorite pharmaceutical.
Uh it's it's a sparkling pimbralismab.
Yeah. Only if it's from that region. If not it's just drugs.
Yeah. Exactly. Uh anyway, so that's that's something that already exists. But they receive that or like placebo, right? um says the people they announced on Wednesday that the people on the combined treatment survived for longer without recurrence than those who received only the pimbrillab um and I think there's still some more information to come out.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Still this is phenomenally good news and

uh feels like uh a very prominent uh Joe Scott was correct stone to kick over. Um, [laughter] you're you're
Well, it's it's it's good when I'm right about things that are good,
right? [laughter] You know,
right? Um, yeah, I like it.
But but like cancer is just so many different things. There's like thousands of different types of cancer. And I think that we're just I I used the domino analogy earlier, but that's kind of what it is. It's like this is sort of like a proof of concept.
Yeah.
And it could just get adapted and adapted to more and more deadly and harder to treat cancers. And maybe eventually we'll get a pancreatic one. Actually, there was there was a pancreatic cancer um some kind of breakthrough that came out. I just saw the headline for it. I didn't dive deep into it, but there's a lot of good cancer stuff happening right now. Yeah.
Outside of Dolly dying from it, but
Right.
Yeah.
Yeah. Good stuff.
Well,
all right. Uh
uh you know, oh, let's see if let's see if I can do this transition. Hold on. This is going to be hard. So, like we're

we're talking about cancer and really getting rid of it. Obviously, any kind of blood cancer is some of the absolute worst cancer that you could have. And if there could ever be some sort of uh cure for that mixed with this or something else, uh that would be hugely hugely wonderful. Uh something that also has to do with blood and is wonderful.
Um did I do it? Did I do it? I got nothing.
THAT WAS THIN, BUDDY.
OH, IT WAS THIN. OH, it didn't it didn't coagulate properly. Um
sponsor transition. Yeah. Yeah. [laughter]
YEAH.
AND NOW HELLOFRESH. UM,
so Dusk Bloods is uh there was a this is a game Joe uh from the people that make you might have heard of the name Dark Souls. Has that name ever crossed your Yeah.
Uh so this is a multiplayer PVPVE meaning it's essentially player versus player versus enemy meaning you can fight other players or enemies at the same time. This is being released exclusively on the Nintendo Switch. And

they did a network test of essentially like you can download what they have of the game for free and at certain times last weekend you could play this game to give their network a good kick in the pants. Um it so on this channel we are very big fans of a lot of FromSoft games. Will is just getting through uh Elden Ring right now which you may have also heard that name kicking around somewhere. Um, I am uh in my like eenth playthrough of Dark Souls 1 right now. Uh, and I play a ton of a game they demade called Night Rain, which is a multiplayer version of this as well. Um, this play test was super interesting. Uh, friend of the show, uh, Jay and Jess from Second Wind actually were in New York last weekend and they came over and we set up a second TV uh, and we played together like in the same room during the time uh, that this was going on. And it was, if anyone hasn't, if anyone hasn't sort of seen what this game actually is, it is the hardest thing. It's the hardest video

game I'm I think I've ever had to attempt to explain how it works. I'm going to try it right now to the two of you uh fine folks, Will and Joe. But essentially, [clears throat] there are eight players that get put into a match, a big gothic horror looking like Bloodborne map. Um, it is littered with things like enemies or items or or other uh sort of weaponyy type uh upgrades and things along there. You pick different characters and you are looking to up not only your experience to become more powerful with experience points, but something called valor, which you also get from like a hundred different ways. I think it's six. Um, you can get valor from killing enemies. You can get valor from at certain points uh like signs stake into the ground and then areas will become places where you can get valor for killing other players. Um you can get it from finding things. You can get it from being like in a very like Settlers of Katan way. There's things like if you've killed the most enemies or collected the most items at the end

of the round, you get a bonus much like in Katan like longest road or biggest army. Do you know what like that sort of element of it? Um, but the my point here is there Oh, and it plays like FromSoft made a fighting game. Like the the the it feels faster than normal FromSoft games and the combat between player versus player is some of the fastest that I've experienced that the this developer has done. With all that said, it's broken into three rounds and the the the the three people in the first round and then the two people at the second round that all have the lowest are cold. They're just gone. And then you get to an end state, which in the demo it was a a free-for-all, three versus three or sorry, three every man for himself fight, but they're going to have other ones that are like versus big bosses or other things, etc. You can also summon people to help. You can do a bunch of stuff. I'm just rambling at this point. This game is like a hundred games. It's so strange. I really liked it, but I guarantee you

this is not everyone's cup of tea. This is this is such a specific to to for it to be so broad in its mechanics. It's its user base is going to be very small. I think I don't know how this is going to play. Um and I know everyone's eyes glazed over as I described that and that's okay. Uh but I I guess I just wanted to report that the play test super fun. I really liked it. I will be playing this on stream when it comes out. I think my guess is probably by the end of the year. Um, uh, yeah, that's it.
So, I I was actually, uh, in the play test and played none of it. And here's why. And, and this relates to a question that chat had. It's switched to exclusive.
Yeah.
And I never reach for my Switch to by default. Like, I it it's not a thing that exists in my like conscious like level of thought of like a thing I could do. Um, I pretty much only use it for

content. So, I'll probably play it with Matt when it comes out, but it wasn't something that I like
I signed up for it and then just never got to it,
right? Cuz like it just it's weird. It's it's a weird thing.
Net Code was solid. I never experienced anything, at least on my end. I know that's arbitrary. And uh I got two W's. I won twice. So, uh I it and it felt like everyone was a skin of your teeth thing. Like it did the FromSoft thing. Joe, I I don't know if you've ever even touched Dark Souls ever.
No, I mean, I've heard of it.
Yeah, it's notoriously hard. And it's it's it's the thing that is special about Dark Souls is it feels like a heist. Like, you always feel like you just got through the skin of your teeth, like you shouldn't have been able to do it, but holy moly, you did it. Like, it's just like you you slam your face into a wall until suddenly you start being Neo in the Matrix, just like blocking everything, and then you just you win.
This had that feeling, but with other people. Um, and it was very interesting. So, uh, that's my report.

Excellent. Thank you for your book report.
Yeah. Uh,
what I did last weekend.
Um, okay. Uh, [laughter]
happening this week was Gamescom. Um, and at Gamescom, which
did I give you a Gamescom graphic?
You did. It's after this. We're going to do this first.
Ah. Um, one of the things that happened at Gamescom, which we'll get to in a second, was the most hilarious story I think I've seen this year in gaming. So, I had to bring it up. They re-released Heroes of Might and Magic 3, which is a classic of of the the heroes the Heroes of Might and Magic genre, and it's much beloved. And and they, in this case, is Ubisoft. And they re-released it, and they were like, "Hey, you can buy it right now on Steam." And so people did.
It's a game from 1999,
correct?

Except Ubisoft forgot to put the game in the game. So when you downloaded it, it was an empty executable file that just said this is a dummy executable that was like less than 50 kilobytes. So they patched it, but like [clears throat] [laughter] bro it's Ubisoft. Like you make billions of how could you like you had one job.
Oh, did we grab the wrong Did we Is this not three? Did I grab the wrong one?
I think this
Mag Magnolia is saying it's the wrong one.
No, this should this is three.
Oh, pretty sure it was three.
Um,
yeah. So, uh, it's been a minute.
Yeah. Yeah. When your day one patches the entire game. Correct. So,
the wrong game was just the executable file.
Yeah. Right. So, good job Ubisoft. Uh you've you've given us yet another reason to mock you for your various failings. This among them. Excellently done. Thank you.

It's very on brand.
Yeah.
But Gamescom was this weekend or Gamescom was this week. Uh so we're talking about a bunch of games that we thought were interesting from the two main shows, Opening Night Live and Future Games Show. However, when we're talking about Gamescom this year, we do need to throw a flag on the play, which is that there is um there have been extensive accusations of unreported AI usage in trailers in games in uh games that are listed on Steam that don't have their AI disclosures, but devs have confessed to using AI either in Discord or in forums elsewhere. Like, so if you're waiting into Gamescom news, do do some due diligence. I've looked at the ones that we've brought up and so far I think they're all without AI, but
I think
I I think but we could be proven wrong at any point on any of these games. Okay. So, like do take do take everything out of Gamescom this year

with an unfortunate dump truck worth of salt. Um,
so, uh, shall we begin?
Sure. are and we'll describe. Let's so let's talk through what these games are and then at the end of them we ask Joe if he thinks they sound cool or not.
Okay, great.
Can I Can I start with a dumb question? When you're talking about the AI stuff, is that just like fake gameplay or is it like
It's a really great question.
Gameplay footage that people look at like, oh, that was AI or is it like AI actual in the game?
Great question. Um, so usually, uh, when we're talking about it, it's that assets for the game were generated using generative AI. Um,
that's the that's the big that's the big one that instead of hiring backgrounds and the characters and stuff,
right? Instead of hiring an artist or in in one case, they have generative AI built into the game so that players can
do user generated content off of generative AI, which is weird. I don't That's I don't Okay, great. Awesome.

We have to wedge AI into there somehow,
right? WE JUST GOT TO CRAM IT IN THERE TO GET THE SHAREHOLDER VALUE, RIGHT?
WELL, it's it's so ridiculous because I mean, we're seeing this in every industry obviously, of course, but like the essentially when when I feel like when we bring up all of the negatives of AI, specifically in the gaming space, it is essentially when it is actively destroying uh jobs and making slop. I mean, that's kind of it, right? And but then this other thing too, like before this nightmare boom, [clears throat] when you said AI in the course of a video game, you're usually talking about like how the the enemies are controlled. Like there was the slang for, you know, and so it's it's all over the place. Uh but here it would be like, oh, they didn't hire artists, they just slopped out a thing, right?
Yeah.
Um
Okay. So, uh I'll I'll I'll go first.
You go first. So my first game is a game called Laughsong. Um Laughofong is a um

beautiful, absolutely gorgeous, very surreal musical and visual puzzle game that is that follows the journey of this little this little red character in a very stark and weird world. It gives me lots of vibes. It's giving Journey. It's giving Monument Valley. It's giving a lot of those sort of feelings of a very minimalistic puzzle game that has beautiful vistas and beautiful music and very beautiful puzzles. Um, and so that's why I'm really excited about it. Uh, it it feels like it's going to be a game that really needs to be experienced. Uh, I don't imagine that this one's going to be terribly long, but I am definitely looking forward to it when it does come out.
Yeah, it kind of reminds me of Gree. Yep. Also, yeah.
Joe, do you do like on on the phone games and things, do you do any puzzle type stuff?
I think so. What What defines a puzzle game?
Puzzle game like uh I think the like the one that I'm thinking of, which I believe is on mobile at this point, is

uh Witness, but like there's a ton of them. Um
Monument Valley is one that's best on touchscreen. Um and if you haven't played it, I highly recommend it and all of it.
Monument Valley is supposed to be very good.
I'm literally just writing down names AND YEAH. [laughter] YEAH.
ALL RIGHT.
SORRY.
The YouTube channel is dying tomorrow.
Yeah, that's right.
But no, if you're going to be doing more Twitch stuff, find some things that are fun to do on Twitch. Um, all right. My next one was something I didn't expect to be excited about. Uh, it's Valor Mortise. Uh, the vibe of this one felt like what if Bioshock but Napoleonic. like it just I I don't even want to say too much more about it other than that it just had like a really interesting sort of dark art style and felt like what if Colombia but from Bioshock Infinite but France and Napoleon and I was like I think this is speaking my language. Um, I'm very much looking forward to hearing more about this game and I I

don't know the name of the art style that I feel like this and Bioshock and a couple other sort of shooters sort of live in, but it's like it's not realistic and it's not cartoony. It's got like a sheen of of I don't even know what to call like I don't know maybe maybe uh someone in chat knows what I'm talking about. Um like
and also I'm a sucker of course because I watched Muzzi at least the commercial as a child. So this
um yeah that's what I'm Yeah.
This is a longunning call back Joe. We will not explain it. Just know that he's not bringing this up for no reason.
No. Uh I I just thought this looked really cool and it was one of those things that like when I'd heard about this game I think this is why I wanted to mention it. When I'd heard about this game I just brushed it off like a million of the other game. I'm like okay whatever. And then I like accidentally watched the trailer and I was like, "Oh, like, oh, you're you're you're ready for a higher level of war. I'm I'm here." So, uh, yeah, I was very excited about this one.
It's so beautiful.

It's so beautiful.
Okay. Uh, my next one is Exterminance.
What the hell's that?
Uh, what if you and your friends could be bug exterminators together? Great. Excellent. What if the bug exterminators were alien bugs?
Okay.
Okay. Great. What if what if it was like a weird extraction like PvE kind of deal where you fought bugs and got loot and finished jobs? It feels like very blue collar extraction shooter vibes, right? Where like you're there to destroy bugs and like fix pipes. Um which I'm kind of about as a as an overall theme. It feels like it's one of those great not friendlop idiots together games. Um, and I I do love me an idiots together game. Uh, which is [laughter] uh Joe, that's my affectionate name for games where the point is that you boot it up with your friends and you run around like screaming idiots for like an hour and it does not matter whether you win or lose

or whatever. The point is that you all get to be stupid together. Uh, and that's that's the magic of
I might be good at that kind of game.
Yeah. You know what game you might also like, Joe? uh and you could play it very easily on almost any uh PC is uh Peak. Peak is essentially a friend slop game where uh you and three other people are like cartoon boy scouts that their plane crashes on the way to a camping trip and you have to climb to the top of a mountain in order to be rescued. And it is
I was wondering if it was peak p e k or p e a k but you said mountain.
Yep.
Uh it is absolute super fun. Yeah, there you go. And uh it is so silly and it has spatial audio so if like you get farther away you hear your friends less or if like you're in a cave it echoes and if you fall you hear like
like [laughter] it's just
it's very very fun.
And if you die you get to haunt your friends which is one of the most fun parts cuz then you get to watch them play but you also get to haunt them which great.
I also like roller here [laughter] peak.

Yeah.
Perfect.
You have peaked my interest. Uh, next up, next up on mine is Silent Hill Townfall. Uh, I did not play Silent Hill F. Alas, not yet. Um, but this one actually grabs me a little bit more. Um, I think this one leans into the stuff that I really really uh love about Silent Hill. essentially uh when so when Silent Hill can get into not only social commentary but social commentary based on history that I think I understand like this has a lot of like this is the one where it keeps talking about like the town is angry uh and based on the protagonist and based on a couple other things I'm really hoping they lean into uh some reasons without saying too much why a town might be angry about a specific specific kind of protagonist. Um I I I hope that they they don't drop this

football and actually do some social commentary on on classism and racism and a bunch of other things.
F has a bunch of social commentary. So I feel like they're they're headed in that direction.
Like that felt to me, but like that was something that because it was uniquely uh Japanese like I got but I didn't get get like this feels sort of very American. Uh, and so I'm very much
during COVID and everybody's mad cuz he's not wearing a mask.
Yeah. Yeah. There you go.
Mhm. Yeah.
Uh, I just I just think I just think this is I'm I'm glad to see that this particular franchise is going in the directions that it is. So, I'm very excited for this one.
Yep. Uh, okay. Uh, my last game from the opening night was Lego Skylines. Hey. Hey. You know how there's never been a Lego Citybuilder? Fix that.
That's true.
That's the pitch. There's a game where you build a city out of Legos. Problem solved. That's it. That's all there is. You don't need anything else. You get to build the really expensive city that you

could never afford out of Legos in a video game. Great. Cool. That there might be other parts to it, but like good. Great. There there needs to be nothing else.
I think since the Lego movie, it's been very clear that like and all of the different Lego video games, which have been wonderful, all the different IP grabs that they've done. I think this was just sort of like this was the last the last Infinity Stone of LEGO digital entertainment was doing an actual like Sim Cityesque thing but with Legos.
Um, did you I I used to play It's funny. I used to play so much Sim City and then Sim City 2000 back in the day. Um, I don't know if either of you ever touched any of those, but
I was busy playing Sim Tower, aka an elevator. Uh, so this is this is true. Sim Tower is built around code from an elevator analyzer program that was designed to optimize elevator usage in tall buildings and they made it into a game where you could like put different

kinds of amenities on different floors to like maximize profit from your tower. But the most important thing is of course how you transport people to and from. So like it taught you kind of how like elevators work. Um, which I just thought was like a really cool uh part of it. So, I I was busy playing Sim Tower.
Well, then
yeah.
Or did anyone play The Sims?
Gosh, no. I I I looked at that Abyss and went, "No, I'm I'm I I don't I No, I'm good. I would collect all the DLC. It would be so bad. There's so much DLC. There's like a thousand dollars of DLC for The Sims. It's awful. It's so wild.
Yeah.
All right. Uh, let's move on.
I feel like I've heard of Lego Skylines before.
It did just did they just announce it or has it been announced for a couple weeks now?
I think they just announced it, but I could be wrong.
Um, I made think of something else. It sounds like something that's been around for a while.
There is a game called City Skylines.
Oh, okay. That's
Yeah. [laughter]

Um, and then the last game on our Gamescom is uh something a bit near and dear to my heart. Uh, Dungeons and Dragons is taking a stab at a different kind of game other than a Balders's Gate. Uh, this is the first and I imagine what they hope to be a series of games based on the classes of Dungeons and Dragons. And this is called Warlock. Uh, something I also didn't expect to be excited about until I actually watched it being played. And this looks like [snorts] if they pull it off, if it feels as good as it looks to play, like you can use all of your different spells and abilities, not only to fight, but in very creative ways to traverse an open world and figure things out. You have a little impion and a very evil patron that's talking in your ear. Uh, all things right up my alley. And uh I I was so Yeah, Eldidge Blast Spam, Christopher, that is exactly right. Uh, but like they do this thing where like um uh I forget the name of the tendril spell, but like there's like gooey black

tendrils that are the spell in D and D. Um someone in check
something like that where like you could use it to like grab a an orc's club and pull it down so it can't fight, but also while they're traversing the space, they like levitated a stone and then threw it at a wall with that thing and made a platform. Yeah. Arms of an arm. Um I don't know. it it uh this felt like a good way to me to move on and past because I didn't want to cuz uh cuz um Larry and didn't want to work on a D and D game again. Uh sort of move their IP beyond what Balders's Gate was. Now, if this is good and it works out, great. And I bet you we'll see Paladin. I bet you we'll see Rogue like you know other games in this sort of series of action adventure open world class-based things which would be fun.
Yeah, absolutely.
There's also Evers Black Tentacles also Aqua. That's correct.
Yeah.
Uh and then uh so that was all opening night and then the next day we had the

future game show. Uh
let's speedrun these because we're we're we're going through we're going through
Yep. 100%. Uh we agree on two games. a short quest uh which is appears to be a phenomenal um sort of short handgenerated [snorts] RPG quest thing that's just full of charm. I just think it's going to be great. And uh D and D Long Rest Tavern. I think we like this for different reasons. I like this because it's the shopkeeper game of my dreams. I will be playing this. Uh, one of my uh, desires, Joe, is to have a game where I can play a humble shopkeeper and like tend to the needs of adventurers and not actually go adventuring. Um, I think that like that role in games is very interesting. Um, and so Long Rest Tavern feels like it's going to be that, but Matt is also interested in it. Cool.
Yeah. I I just I just like the flip side of like Joey, have do you play D and D? I can't remember.
I've played Well, done one campaign.

Okay. Okay, cool. We gota at some point when you're in the city or something, I'll I'll run you a onehotter if I'm ever out your direction. But the um
No, the the guy that cuts my hair is like super into it and has like the the table that's a big display and moves things around. I was just like, "Holy shit."
Yeah. Yeah, that's me. I'm your barber. Uh yeah. Um, but the the thing I you know you you realize if you play enough of it is like so much interesting stuff happens in the tavern or happens in the sort of little starty area thing. And it just be really cool like to Will said just to sort of be like you're not the hero. You're making sure that there's enough drinks in stock for the heroes when they come in. Like it's just there's something something calming about that
cuz let's be honest, that's who we would really be.
Yeah. Oh yeah. None of us are being the No, no. fighting orcs and stuff.
At best, we would be any sort of jester entertainment on the little stage lit by torches dancing for copper. Um,

yeah. So, I'm very much looking. And then Will, you were pumped for We were here tomorrow. What the heck is this? We were here tomorrow is a uh twoplayer asymmetrical co-op puzzle game
where uh that's built on communication and uh having access to different information and it's very much like um some of the other puzzle games like uh keep talking and no one explodes. Yeah.
Sort of that sort of isometric or asymmetrical um information thing where like your ability to communicate with your partner is like the big thing. um that uh like rewards you and gets you forward properly. So,
and then you were very excited about uh pod racing.
Now, this is pod racing.
Pod racing.
Uh this is the newest sort of uh stab at uh back in the day there was Star Wars uh I forget I always butchered the name, but like when episode one came out and

it's been re-released a bunch of times, Star Wars Racer I think it was called, but it was basically pod racing. Uh it was a crazy fast, insanely fun uh simple racing game. This is seems to be insanely fast, but also sort of like they're they're calling it like a campaign racing game. Like you level up different skills of your stuff, like you're you're they're trying to go for like more single player replayability in a racing game, which I appreciate. So it's not just like online races or trying to get the best time. Uh, also they in there there's obviously pod racers and speeder bikes and land speededers, but they invented with Lucasfilm a new type of vehicle for this game. Uh, it's called the skim speeder and essentially it is a hardline piece of like if the if the pod sort of thing is here and your engines are here, it does a turn that then hooks you like it kind of like turns and pulls you along like you they call it knife's edging. Like so it does it's very good at turning. and the the breakdown they did at the future game show, it's only like three minutes long, is just really really

uh it it it it piqued my interest. Uh and so I was very excited for it more than I am now and I'm looking forward to when it drops.
Excellent. All right, now we're done with talking about those video games. Let's talk about a a a different thing in video games that I think is really cool. Double fine. So, uh, recently Xbox has had a a a bad Xbox has been having a bad year. Everything we said with the the the digital thing, great, fine, whatever. But they've also been downsizing a lot and
layoffs as far as the I can see, Joe.
Right. Just everywhere. One of the things that happens was they let go uh they were going to lay off the entire Double Fine studio. Um, Double Fine is the company that makes Bird Legend and Psychonauts and Kiln and a bunch of other very weird games. They're all really weird, but they're beloved cuz they're weird. Um, and Double Fine has now said that they are once again the arbiters of their own destiny. That

[clears throat] they have reacquired the rights to all of their IP and they're going to go off and do their own thing, which I think is kind of cool, but also it makes me kind of sad that like we have to celebrate that, right? That we're at the point where like a company can separate from another company. We're happy that the company that's separating doesn't vanish in a puff of smoke.
Yeah. Like I I don't know like
I mean I'm trying to think of is there any industry where this happens that isn't gaming
where a company was a part of a bigger thing and then got bought up and then gets spit out again. I think not without government oversight like I'm thinking about like Ma Bell like I'm trying to think Joe is there any like
more of an anti- monopoly.
Yeah. Right. Like that's the government coming in and saying you're going to break up into a thing. Not like we bought this thing, never mind, you're free.
Was this a government thing?
No, this was not. Uh but basically it was a after all of the mergers and

acquisitions that Microsoft did, uh they realized, oh, wait a minute. Uh this is not profitable. And then they did what all large mergers do and they laid off a ton of people. And what they were going to do was just shutter and lay off this entire studio. um
they just want the IP basically
I think but then they just like I don't know if Double Fine bought the IP back or whatever but basically on their they've made some statements saying that they're in full control of their Destiny and they like they're like so if you buy our games it still says Microsoft but it's not anymore and it will go to us like I think I think Microsoft might be in a because like I don't know if one or two of these things is just going to be a rounding error for them. I think they're just an a oh this will be a good PR move let them go this defects nothing like that's like they might save 0003% on something by like keeping the IP and laying everybody off but like this is a specific like smaller studio that

is beloved because of the people that make it and run it like and so you get rid of those people I think Micros and and none of their IP is big enough that it feels like it's transferable to someone outside of that like who their creator. So, uh I think they're just like, "Yeah, sure. Go for it."
But I don't think like I don't know if there's anything outside of gaming like that does this on the regular. Like Bungie had this happen to them um
from a few places.
Yeah, it happens repeatedly to Bungie, but that's cuz Bungie bounces back.
Wow.
Anyway, let's talk about this picture.
I got it. Let's talk about this picture.
What a segue.
Let's talk [laughter] about this picture.
Bouncing. [clears throat]
Yeah.
Spider-Man's fist bouncing off this guy's face.
Yeah, correct. So,
holy moly.
So, you ever you ever wish that you could get pictures of superheroes doing superhero things? Hold the picture of

Spider-Man doing Spider-Man things.
[laughter]
Also, so this is at uh how do I even describe this? Uh the there was Minneapolis protests uh with noted racist Jake Lang and Co. Uh and there was a bunch of counterprotests. One of them was Spider-Man. Um and Spider-Man uh at one point leapt and uh beat the crap out of Jake Lang before Jake Lang ran away. Uh, and I have to give props to not only that person in the Spider-Man suit, but also the photographer that got easily like nine classic comic book cover photos like this one.
Yeah.
Um, I want to see if I can find their name because it is too good to not give credit to.
I feel like this is while Matt's looking. I feel like this is
uh Christian Jun.
Yeah. Uh, one one of the this is one of

the really cool things about um about like our our superhero symbols and Spider-Man in particular uh is that anyone could be Spider-Man under the mask.
Yeah.
Right. And I feel like this is this like really embodies that. I also really do like the idea that this is a classic um this is a classic sort of comic book cover thing that we're seeing like return in our culture. um of Spider-Man setting up and doing the right thing. Good job.
And uh yes, Red Spider-Man did get roughed up by the coppers afterward. Not like beaten up or anything, but they did like drag him and put him into a cop car, which is an image of its own thing, but there is this. So, it's so funny. So, they put him in the cop car. They like lift him and put him like four people put him in the cop car. And then on the So, the camera the video camera is looking at that side where the door is on the side that the camera is. So, they put Spider-Man in the cop car and then there's a part there's a like no no cop is watching the other side of the

cop car and Spider-Man starts sliding out of the window of the back of the cop car on the other side, but he's still in cups. So, he's like doing the fish. He's doing like this [laughter] sort of thing and then a cop notices and puts him back. But, it's just like the someone cut together a very funny video of like, is he going to escape? and they like put music to it and everything and it was just at the end of the day it was uh an awful awful awful uh thing but that people shouldn't have to uh run these racist fools out of town but it also reminded us that uh you know and they say that a hero can save us, right? Like that's just sort of uh you know keep it going.
It'll also help you avoid those flot cameras.
Yeah. Right. Yeah. There are my my favorite flock camera story. Are you at all a fan of 3D printing, Joe?
A fan. I mean, I guess I don't know.

Um, one of the one someone has created a 3D printer file of a bird feeder in the shape of a flock camera.
Oh,
with the bird feed going where the lens should be. So, you can teach birds
how to get bird seed out of flock cameras
to block them
or just to smash the lenses
or to peck at the lens
to peck at the lens to try and get the food which I just think is
fantastic. Just absolutely fantastic. Uh, okay. There is, by the way, a GoFundMe for that Spider-Man's legal um uh defense uh if you are interested and I'll put it in the show notes. Here we go. Next up, uh, we got to talk about the law, which, you know, I don't know.
Spider-Man's above it. Pastries.
This is [laughter] I don't know. I got nothing. [music] [laughter]
All right. Uh,

we have fun here,
Joe. So much you have a a thing for it.
We do. It's so stupid. This is what gaming news has come to, Joe. It's all lawsuits and [ __ ] and it I just want to talk about Astrobot with you for an hour, but we [laughter] can't
because there Well, yeah.
Until Astrobot gets sued.
Yeah. Yeah.
So, [laughter] um,
you'll be hearing from my lawyer.
Meta has reached a settlement over stuff. God, I can't even.
Wow. Okay. I I almost got Matt. Beta has agreed to pay $18 billion um and add stronger. Matt jerked. I'm now afraid. Um, Met has agreed to pay $18 billion and add stronger child safety measures to Facebook and Instagram as part of a legal settlement um over social media addiction and uh settled claims file uh

filed by almost every state in the US. So $18 billion is not nothing.
It's also not a lot for them. What are they? 209 billion,
right? Also split 50 ways. And are they spending $600 billion a year on data centers and stuff?
Yeah. Like it's Yeah. Also, is money not real? Uh, [laughter]
that's the secret. Never has been.
Um, so there's a there's a weird So, at on the surface, great, right? Good. The there should be stronger protections for kids and and social media addiction and a bunch of other stuff there. That's all good. Uh, one, this this turns into another thing of like that's just the cost of doing business. like it's just sort of like what they're doing and they're just going to pay it and be fine. But the other thing and I had this open and well I think I hiccuped because I opened the app news uh thing and like there's 90 pieces of video on it so my internet tanked so I'm not going to open it again but I did read somewhere in

there that it's really 9 billion until Google and Tik Tok I think it's Google and Tik Tok also agree to do on their own the exact things that that Meta is doing here for the lawsuit.
30% 5.3 billion. Yes.
Which does Meta get to do pick that? Like
never heard of anything like that before.
Doesn't that seem strange? Like, okay, you're fined this uh but only if the other people that aren't involved in this lawsuit do it, too. And it's like, I someone smarter than me in this legal eagle ease. Anyone who's read this, please chime in in the in the comments or message us on Blue Sky or comment right here because I was so confused by that element. Um, like
I hadn't heard that part before.
Yeah. Isn't that strange? Like I just

don't understand. Uh oh, well actually Youngstown saying something interesting here. So Legal Eagle friend of the show also said uh that the a major point is that this opens up the pathway for follow-up lawsuits. This might not be the end of Alphabet's legal jeopardy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So like this is sort of setting up other things and maybe Facebook
precedent I think that is the most uh
yeah alarming or whatever.
Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. I guess dogbert is correct. A settlement can agree just about on just about anything as long as all sides agree. But this is like dragging in the other companies. And maybe the play here is this is the best t this is the best terms we're all going to get. So let's play ball right together. But I don't know.
I have feelings, but they're big feelings, so I'll sit on them for a while. [sighs and laughter]
Um,
do do you think though that like what happened with the tobacco industry is sort of a a good analogy to what we're starting to see here?
Possibly product.

Yeah. Kind of.
Yeah. I think I think it's a good analogy because at the end of the day, what happened with the tobacco industry uh still benefited the tobacco industry in a in a lot of different way like like
essentially
Yeah. Like [laughter] the the um what was it? I'm trying to remember the the campaign, but like essentially they didn't they regulate them like you couldn't do this. They couldn't make cartoons and all that stuff and that's good. But then like they had to like put so much money towards antismoking campaigns.
Yeah.
And then but the ones that they made many times
campaign.
What was it? Yeah. Truth. Yeah. The truth campaign
was purposefully arbitrary and artsy and weird. So they're doing the thing and they're paying for the thing, but it's not as effect. It's like they didn't the efficacy of what they were making was never in any of the the deals that was

made, right? Like
so like at the end of the I hate being negative about all this stuff, but I guess precedent is just beating it into me. Uh it's like I do think this is very like that, Joe. I also think there's going to be like 90 different ways that they weasel out of doing anything that actually helps. Um,
yeah.
But
yeah.
No, I think that's a good I think that's a good analogy.
Speaking of people getting sued for weird stuff and probably getting what they deserve,
you remember you remember when we talked uh two weeks ago about Twitch opting in to do AI opting everyone in to train AI on everyone's channel. Joe, did did you did you hear about this?
So, I'm so brand new to Twitch. Uh I like the people that follow me have been sending me things about like do this, do that and one of them was like you got to click the thing to turn off the AI scraper or whatever.
Yeah.
So that's kind of the extent of my knowledge on it. But but I didn't know

if that was something that was always there or I guess maybe
brand new or or they just told us that it was doing it.
Yeah.
Well, you didn't get a notification. Someone in your community had to tell you.
I might have. I don't pay attention to my email. [laughter] I I'll I'll answer this one for you. You didn't cuz no one did.
Okay.
Which is the subject of a class action lawsuit because Twitch by default opted everyone into this but didn't tell anyone that they were being opted in.
It had to people had to
grassroots like the the information that you had to opt out, right? which is like that's not how that works or at least it shouldn't be how it works especially when they're altering the way that they are um that you've agreed to like give consent to have things done to your content.
Um and that's the allegation that's leveled in the class action lawsuit that's now being filed against Twitch.
We'll see where it goes. I hope it goes somewhere good for

uh this to not keep happening because I know they're desperate to make Twitch profitable because it is not.
Um but Amazon also big. So hang out and subsidize your little streaming platform. It'll be fun.
Yeah. Uh we're going to skip my story so that we can get to our guest side quest.
So uh Joe
Joe,
this is a long-standing tradition. all the time.
Every every guest who's come on Games for Breakfast has been um
gifted.
Yeah. Gifted.
You could say subject. I say gifted.
Yeah, that sure. Yeah, 100%.
A game.
A Yeah, a game by us uh to you. So, I think it's time for us to introduce you to your uh guest side quest. [music]
[laughter]
Okay, Joe, we know and we talked about this beforehand. We've talked about this. In fact, the the game that you and I bond over is Walkabout Miniolf. We'll play that from time to time and just

hang out in VR and discover weird things in the basement of that hut. It was odd. Um, but I know. But um because you know gaming is not your your field of expertise and you don't engage with it a ton. We didn't want to make like a game that was uh super super in like indepth in the weeds of video games. So instead we crafted a game uh that I would I guess call is it a Joe or is it a Scott? And what we're going to do here is we're going to show you a picture of a video game character and you're gonna tell us if that video game character's name is or contains Joe or Scott.
Okay.
That's what it is. If you win, you win.
Yeah. Yeah. And if you lose, nothing bad happens. Tell you what, if you win,

if you win, you get to do you get to lead us in our end of the show. Um, uh, goodbye. And if you lose, you just have to sit there and be confused.
I'm good at that.
Okay.
Okay. Great. Excellent. Are you ready though? Like you guys were like,
"Oh, we don't prepare anything for this show. We just we just hang out." And you've got this whole like script and all these links and everything. You created a game just for me. Like I don't put this effort into like taking a shower in the morning. [laughter]
We said you you didn't have to do anything.
We kind of poo pooed yourself though as well. Well,
I I do spend all day Thursday prepping this show. Yes.
Yeah. [laughter] Yeah. This is a
take credit for it. That's what I'm saying.
Uh okay. So, uh first up, this character, the the the one the one gesturing uh in the background of Punchout. Uh he's
this is the newer Punch Out. You might remember this game from the NES.
Sure.
And this was the the first character you end up fighting.
Yeah. So, is this character uh a Joe or

a Scott?
Well, I I happen to know that's Glass Joe.
Boom. Indeed, it is. There we go. Exactly. So, you've already got the you've already got the game down.
You got the flow. I'm going to keep score in my notebook.
All right.
You were just calling it Punch Out, though. Is it not Mike Tyson's Punch Out anymore?
YOU SAID YOU DIDN'T KNOW GAMES, JOE.
I've been alive. I mean,
but most people wouldn't know the difference. Or maybe maybe they would
because of how ubiquitous Mike Tyson was.
Sure. Yeah.
Mike Tyson's Punch Out. Yes.
Also, that's a that's a big throwback. That was like 30 years ago.
Yeah.
When I was a bit more in touch with stuff, I guess.
There we go. All right. Next.
Uh, this is a character from the one in the green shirt. Yeah, the one with the green shirt in the front
from a game that is based on a movie and a manga and a show.
Right.
Is this a Joe or a Scott?
That is Scott Pilgrim.
Thank you. See? All right. You got the game.
You calibrated it. We're here now. This is
At the beginning, I didn't know if like

it's like I'm determining whether or not this is a Joe or a Scott based off of how they look. But these are like actual Joe.
These are actual Joe's or actual Scots that you can get correct or incorrect. And you've gotten the first two correct,
right? That's probably where it's going to end. We're calibrating. We're calibrating.
We've calibrated. Okay. [laughter]
This was these are the questions on the polygraph that like, you know, what is your address?
Uhhuh. That's correct.
This proved this proved you could look at pictures.
Correct. That that's correct. Uh, this character from Heavy Rain
on the right.
On the right.
Does that look to you I know you haven't played Heavy Rain, but does it look to you like he's a Joe or a Scott?
He looks like a Joe. All right, let's see here. Is this a Joe? Alas, Joe, it is not. That is Scott Shelby.
Really?
His name is Scott Shelby. I was shocked, too.
He does look like a Joe.
He looks like a Joe.
Right. He looks
Joe tend to be more like workingass kind of chunky, you know, like monsters, you

know, like
Yeah, absolutely.
100%.
Just like me.
All right.
Yeah, right.
Well,
all right. This one shocked me to my core. It was a piece of information this next one that I had forgotten about this uh about this character's actual name. But
is this
the the main character
of of the video game Shinobi? Is that a Joe or a Scott?
This was also a a Sega Genesis game uh before like so pixy like it's old school.
Yeah.
If that helps you. But this was just the shot that Will
um I'm just going to have to say Scott because I uh I'm at a loss here. What what about what about him here makes you think that uh a ninja would be named Scott
because it's less likely a ninja would be named Joe.
See I think so so sadly Joe that is another incorrect. This is the character's name is Joe Mousashi. Now I think will we we might have done him a little dirty. I feel like let me just

see if this plays in in in our cultural zeitgeist. I feel like if we showed the Genesis Shinobi, like the sidescroller pixely stuff, that's from an era where like a lot of people were just like, "Joe, this like it feels like that might be Do you know what I mean?"
Yeah, that that one's on me. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Isn't that weird, though? Like cuz like more more more current graphics. I would probably guess Scott, too. But anyway, this is from a different time.
Things do definitely go through phases.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Uh okay.
All right. Uh, next up, uh, is this character from Resident Evils 2, 4, 6, and 9, uh, a Joe or a Scott?
Now, now, keep in mind, this is a part of his name. This is not I'll even I'll even say it's not his first name.
Yeah.
Part of his name, though.
Well, then, okay, then I'm going to have to go with Joe because there's a lot of like Billy Joe something. Well, think think also you could think middle names

too. It's not just necessarily like a connection of the name, right?
Yeah.
Do you want do you want to know his first and last name?
Okay. [laughter]
If that's helpful.
Okay.
Okay. So, this is Leon Kennedy, but his middle name is either Joe or Scott.
Yeah. Leon Joe Kennedy. Leon Scott. Kennedy. Well, you you I I already said Joe and you're like pushing back, so I'm going to go with Scott now.
Okay.
Okay. All right. All right.
That would be correct, but I'm also going to do the same amount of push back from now on no matter what you do. Just so we're clear. So, you did get that one.
I did get that one correct. Okay.
You did. All right. Okay. Cool. Uh what about this incredibly character uh in incredibly colorful character who could only be referred to as beautiful? Oh, excuse me. That's the wrong one. This
There we go. [laughter]
This character who can only be referred to as beautiful.

Beautiful. Is that what you're saying?
Yeah. V I E W T I F U L. Beautiful.
Wow. All right. Uh, [sighs] I got nothing. I'm just going to say Joe.
Indeed, it is. This is
Indeed is Joe. That is Joe.
Beautiful Joe from the video game Beautiful Joe.
Ah, okay.
Yep. It's a It's a GameCube game.
Like, this guy is a clown.
No, no, we we intentionally dug real deep. Like a lot of chat will probably have no idea.
No.
Like some of these, like the next one, I would be shocked if chat knew. Chat, do not say. Um, uh, but are we going back to the last one that we showed?
Yeah, we're going back to the last one. Uh, this character,
uh,
it's one guy rotated around.
Yeah, it's it's one guy. We're seeing all of his stuff from Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon the series. His last name is Mitchell. Is it Joe or Scott?
I think Scott Mitchell is a good name.

I'll go with that.
Scott Mitchell is correct. That sounds like you might have read a a Tom Clancy book at one point in your life. [laughter]
No, but I mean like when you when you come up with names for characters when you're writing stuff, you know, like it's just kind of like has Yeah. Right. Exactly. Exactly. All right. Next up,
let's move on.
This fine gentleman
from the video game Fatal Fury and a couple other different fighting games.
The Joe or Scott.
I'll go with Scott for this one.
That is sadly incorrect. It is Joe Higashi.
But so far,
fighters are Joe's. Have you noticed that?
Yeah. I think I think that also is probably a a theme is my guess.
Yeah. All right. Is this loudmouth sidekick?
There's two more. There's two more
of the king of duelists a Joe or a Scott.
How am I doing so far, by the way? What's What's my What's my record here?
So So this is the interesting part. You

can only You can only win or tie. You have five correct and three incorrect.
Oh. Oh, okay. Better than I thought.
Yeah.
Um Well, he's not a fighter. Doesn't look like he's a he's a gambler.
His last name is Wheeler, if that helps.
Scott Wheeler. Joe Wheeler.
I'm gonna go with Scott for this one.
Okay,
he's going with Scott for this one.
This is Joey Wheeler.
Joey Wheeler. It's now [laughter] five to four.
Yummy Yugi.
Okay, five to four. This is the last one, Joe. And I want to make it very clear.
It's also a little bit of a trick. It is either Joe or Scott.
Trick. [laughter]
It is. No, but I WANT TO MAKE I WANT TO MAKE IT CLEAR BECAUSE I I would like you to win.
You want me to have the glory?
Okay. Look at all of this character.
Oh,
and use all of your nerd abilities.
This is This is a skin for a character

who was recently released on Marvel Rivals, the Marvel uh uh hero shooter.
Is this a head or is that just light coming out of his eyes? That is light coming out of his eyes. I know it's hard to see. Is this a Joe or a Scott? And we will not be telling you anything else other than it is from a game called Marvel Rivals. But look at you use all of your nerdy instincts.
Chat, I think you you see why we picked this one.
Well, he's super muscular like me,
of course. Right.
Uh he has like metal armor.
Mhm. like me.
You like you canonically.
Yeah.
Uh I'm gonna go with Joe.
Joe. Final answer.
Sure. [laughter]
Alas, my friend, it is not.
It is. That is Scott Summers aka Cyclops in a different costume than he normally

has.
This is his This is his summer outfit.
This is his sexy summer his summer costume.
This is his Don't you want to lick those abs? I sure do. outfit. I mean,
yeah,
that's him in his [ __ ] glasses.
Correct. No, exactly. 100%. Yeah.
Well, Joe, you you tied you tied yourself in the game. Is it Joe or is it Scott? And actually, with your name, I don't think there's a better outcome than that.
That's true. [laughter]
It's a 50% first name, you know.
Yeah, absolutely.
This has been Is it a Joe or is it Scott? Joe Scott, thank you so much for coming on Games for Breakfast this morning. I'm very I'm so h I'm always thrilled whenever we get to hang out and chat be it IRL on virtual mini golf courses or in an animated kitchenet. Um
real quickly when you're talking about like I don't play a lot of games and stuff. I probably play more VR games than anything because I got the Quest and it was like this I don't know it was like an easier barrier to entry or something. I don't know. But like I
um have sound was

Oh, sorry.
Sorry. Go ahead.
I was going to say have you played Red Matter 2?
No. you would you would flipping love Red Matter 2 on the MetaQuest. Uh it is a uh it's a very goodlooking uh lost in space puzzle game that is not like scary or jump scary or anything. It's just like it's really really good and smart.
Okay.
Um you don't need to play one. You do not need to play Red Matter one. You could just go to Red Matter 2.
Oh, okay.
Yeah.
It it doesn't complete the story,
right? I It does, but like you don't need it. You don't need it. Um, Joe, where can people find you and all of the wonderful things that you do in the world and on the internet?
Yeah. Um, so I'm on, you know, just search Joe Scott on YouTube and you'll see my nerdy um, sciency, fun, educational things. Um, uh, I'm here on Twitch at Joe Scottwj because Answers with Joe is kind of my show on uh, on YouTube.
Uh, my little merch store is laughsmarter.com. I'd be a bad business

person if I didn't at least reference it,
of course. And um my documentary, Oldest, Newest Places, is over at uh Nebula.
Hell yeah.
Yeah.
Uh before Matt leads us in our in the traditional games for breakfast signoff that we always do that's the same every time. Uh brief programming note, there will be no talk shows next week. Uh it is the week of PAX West. Uh and so uh the crew is heading out. Jeff is heading out on uh Tuesday and Matt will be there later in the week. So we will have no talk shows next week. That does not mean there will be no content here on Twitch. I will be doing a variety of things including playing POW World, playing the new Rogike uh Ultra Pool, I think, and we'll have bonus streams later on in the week. Um, as well, uh, some of which you may vote on. Yes,
we have two panels at PAX West. One is a design club on the Assassin's Creed Black Flag remake. I may or may not be dressing as a pirate. You'll have to show up to find out. Uh, also we are

doing a first of its kind in an experimental panel with nine people including myself. Uh, we are calling it video game character fishbowl. If you've ever played celebrity or fishbowl at a party, uh, where you have to write down a name of a character and do various versions of charades. The audience is going to be able to participate. It's also a later night panel. I believe it's at 9:30 on Sunday. I believe design club is at 6:30 on Saturday. Um, I think it's in the Frog Theater or something like that. I don't remember which one, but they're both in the same ones. The 931 is going to get wild. It's going to I guarantee you it's going to feel more like a MagFest panel than an actual like PAX panel. And if you've been to our Magfest panels, buckle the heck up. Um,
unhinged.
I also believe at some point on Saturday we might be on the creator stage. Um, don't quote me on that. I know Jeff was talking to some people and we uh Jeff might we essentially we what we might be doing there is I've never played Slay the Spire and Jeff has never played Night Rain. So we're going to take a

half hour each trying to walk each other through these two games. Um so if that happens, we'll see if that happens. Otherwise, if you see me or Jeff or anybody or Cat at PAX West, please say hello. Uh we love meeting you all and it is obviously a delight. Um, with that, Joe, Will, Brad, Janet, Rocky, it is now time for the traditional um ending of Games for Breakfast. Joe, what we do here is we end the show the same, absolutely the same every time with no changes to essentially foster a feeling of camaraderie and togetherness as we go into the weekend with just sort of good positive vibes and stuff like that. And since I know that you have watched this show religiously your entire life, um I think that you should lead us in this and I'll I'll say it with you, but you have to start the ending of Games for Breakfast and we'll do it at the same time.
This is hazing, isn't it?
No, no, no. Are you ready?

Here you go. Joe, take us home. Every everyone, thank you for watching Games for Breakfast. And Joe,
it's been a great week. week.
We are getting ready to go into the weekend and now it is time to
say goodbye.
Say goodbye.
We love you all.
We love you all [music] and out.