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Fresh for everyone. Hey

1:03

everybody,

1:05

it's

1:07

not

1:09

Tuesday,

1:11

it

1:13

is

1:15

Friday

1:17

for

1:19

Bombcast

1:21

Revengeance.

1:27

I'm your host Jeff Grubb from giantbomb.com.

1:30

Joined by two very special people

1:32

from Giant Bomb, T'Mour Hussein and Lucy

1:35

James. How's it going, Tam? Going

1:38

well. I'm excited to be

1:40

on the Revengeance. Glad

1:43

to have you. We are going to have you catch

1:45

us up on Urd Tree. Give us

1:47

some more thoughts on that. And

1:50

then Lucy, meanwhile, how them hobbits, what them

1:52

hobbits do? What them

1:54

hobbits do indeed. Yeah, I played some

1:56

of Tales of the Shire, so I

1:58

can tell you all about that. I also met Hobbit

2:00

recently, so this is a very Hobbit-y episode

2:02

for me. I'm excited.

2:05

And then I decided for

2:07

like for the second section instead of like doing

2:10

like some game. What I wanted to do was

2:12

a Mount Rushmore of UK 1980s

2:14

and 1990s computers. Maybe

2:17

if you guys think it's a good idea. Because I'm really what

2:20

I want is I want you guys

2:22

to tell me what computers you grew up with. And if

2:24

I were to like go back and look into this, what

2:26

I should do. No, dog. Pimp. Pimp says

2:28

don't do it. You're considerably older than us. I

2:32

don't remember what I did.

2:34

I had something with Windows 95 on it. Then

2:38

98. Okay.

2:41

I definitely have like that too. Okay.

2:44

Okay. The conversation is it's like I'm

2:46

going to text my. Okay. That's

2:49

fantastic. But really what I want to talk

2:51

about is like what you guys

2:53

were playing while I was playing Nintendo. Were you

2:55

playing Nintendo or was there like something else that

2:57

was like big in your place instead? No, I

2:59

was playing Nintendo. Maybe

3:01

let me text dad James. Man,

3:05

you know, considerably older, Tam? No,

3:07

I was missing. No,

3:12

it's all good. All right. Let's

3:14

let's start with Elden Ring. Elden Ring Shadow of

3:16

the Earth Tree. It's out now launched basically yesterday.

3:18

Today's really the launch day. Whatever. Everyone's playing it.

3:21

It is being described by many people as Elden Ring

3:23

2 in a lot of ways. Tam, do you think

3:26

that's a fair descriptor? I do not think that's a

3:28

fair descriptor. Very interesting. Okay.

3:30

So how would you how would you describe it

3:32

to people? I would describe it as DLC for

3:34

Elden Ring. That's pretty

3:36

silly. That's you

3:39

sound you sound like a real asshole right now. I

3:42

feel like the way I say is that the

3:45

way I tell people is like they put a

3:47

Dark Souls game in Elden Ring in terms

3:49

of like how. That's interesting.

3:51

What it's what it's I feel like

3:53

that's the best encapsulation of what that

3:55

game is because it feels like it

3:59

feels like. Elden Ring, but it's tighter

4:02

in the way that a Dark Souls game

4:04

would be. The major difference between

4:06

it has, you know, a field area and

4:08

overworld, if you want to call it that.

4:11

But the specific areas that

4:13

you go into, they feel like

4:15

interconnect. Instead of having like, you

4:18

know, pathways that connect each area, there's

4:20

still instead it's just all on like

4:22

the the main map and you just

4:25

move between them. So

4:27

there's like a there's more tissue in

4:29

between. OK, the kind

4:31

of various muscles of the weird.

4:34

So denser. Yeah, it's denser, denser. But

4:36

in terms of like also how it's

4:38

played or like how it

4:40

plays out, it's roughly 30 hours,

4:42

which is about the amount of time

4:44

you'd probably be playing a game like Dark Souls for.

4:48

And yeah, it feels more like a. They

4:52

added a kind of major expansion, I think

4:54

of it like closer to something like a

4:56

World of Warcraft style expansion, minus all the

4:59

online stuff, where it's like, you know, it's

5:01

it's me. It's got a whole new area.

5:03

It's got new enemies. It's

5:05

got, you know, items and stuff like

5:07

that. So for me, it feels like more

5:09

of an expansion, but we just don't use the

5:12

word expansion much anymore these days, unless it's outside

5:14

of MMOs. MMOs still get expansion. Yes,

5:16

I was just thinking that as well. Yeah.

5:19

So that's pretty much how I describe

5:23

it and present it to other people.

5:25

A Dark Souls in Elden

5:27

Ring. And

5:31

we talked about this on game this morning today, like

5:33

a lot of people are finding it very difficult. I'm

5:35

it was like challenging for me, but I had to

5:37

do this thing. So I thought I

5:39

had a save ready to go. And apparently

5:41

I did start New Game Plus and I just forgot.

5:44

And I did. I must have played it for like

5:46

a couple of hours. So I started up and I'm

5:48

like, huh, why don't I have

5:50

any of these? The sites of grace unlock. There's two

5:52

sites of grace here. That doesn't seem like enough. And

5:55

then I realized I did the New Game Plus thing. So

5:57

I went and grabbed a save file and had to do

5:59

this whole thing. thing to like inject it into

6:01

the game. It wasn't too difficult. That is on,

6:03

um, if people are like wondering if there's a

6:05

shortcut to do that. Yeah. It's on the, like

6:07

some mod sites. I think, uh, gamers and nexus

6:10

or whatever it is. Uh, yeah. Yeah. It's fairly

6:12

easy to do. And I say, yeah. Do

6:14

you still get achievements if you do that? Yeah.

6:17

Cause it's like, it's just the same. Yeah.

6:19

It's just a safe. Well, it it's also like,

6:21

it doesn't ping any servers or anything like that.

6:24

So you won't get banned for it or anything

6:26

like that. Exactly. There are definitely mods out there.

6:28

I could have done this instead of, uh, killing,

6:32

killing the little Mogren palace. Yeah.

6:34

But I feel like if you're, I

6:37

recommend it if you're someone that has

6:39

played a bunch of it and feel

6:42

confident. Yeah. If you have, that

6:44

was my issue. Yeah. If you haven't and you

6:46

just grab a save file and go in, you,

6:48

you'll, you have, you've

6:51

cheated yourself and the game where you don't know what

6:53

happened to me. Yeah. Even as someone who I beat

6:55

the game, I played 150 hours. I

6:57

played really in two years and I'm playing a completely

6:59

a character that is very different than the character I'm

7:01

used to. I had a magic casting character and now

7:03

I'm in there with, with very much

7:06

not that a strength build, it seems like mostly.

7:08

And I was like the first mini boss that came

7:10

across. I was really struggling. Cause I just like couldn't

7:13

get the, I could get the timing down on it.

7:15

Yeah. So it was rough. You want, you want the

7:17

muscle memory to kick in again and warm up, you

7:19

know, the, the sharpness around how to tackle and

7:21

also like the mentality. It's a different way to

7:23

play games. Um, and I feel like if you

7:26

just jump in after not playing for, you know,

7:28

since the, the, the original release, you

7:30

will get kicked about a bit. Um,

7:33

so like if you're, if, but if you're the

7:35

kind of person who's like, I have played these

7:37

games, I'm very confident in this, I just accidentally

7:39

went into new game plus, or I lost my

7:41

save file, then it's, then it's fine. Like, and

7:43

this, yeah, there's files out there that are like,

7:45

Hey, I've collected every single thing in the game.

7:48

Um, I've, there's, that seems to be what

7:50

this, yeah, there's a bunch of larval tears

7:52

that you can also just respect by going

7:54

to Renala in Ray La Correa. And

7:57

then you're good. You've got, you can set up your own build

7:59

and you're good to go. Yeah. Well,

8:01

someone said that they didn't add any

8:03

achievements in Urtree. Why not? I don't

8:05

think so. I don't remember anything popping

8:07

up while I was playing on PC.

8:11

Oh yeah, yeah, didn't have achievements. So that

8:13

means I still got my Platinum Baby. Because

8:17

I wondered, as I was playing, if

8:19

they just hadn't turned the one yet because we were playing

8:21

pre-release. Yeah. I don't

8:23

think they have any. I don't know if they have any on... Isn't

8:27

there a prerequisite, pre-requisite on PlayStation or something?

8:29

Yeah, on console I thought it's like, well,

8:31

maybe not for DLC. Yeah, maybe not for

8:33

DLC is what it is. How

8:35

they get around it. It's definitely expected

8:37

by a lot of fans, I think. So there

8:39

will probably be some people wanting about that. But

8:42

yeah. Yeah. I'll say that

8:44

once I started to get the hang of things, though, there

8:46

at the end it did take about an hour of playing

8:48

after I finally got the thing installed and got past that

8:50

thing. I was like, okay, I'm

8:52

feeling this. I could also just tell this, it is

8:55

kind of difficult. This is challenging, more challenging than I

8:57

was expecting. Even on Elden Ring I definitely consider to

8:59

be a challenging game. I could see them really... And

9:01

it's the way you described it, Tam. It's not just density

9:04

of content and that connective tissue. I

9:06

think they're just like, they really want to give you

9:08

the difficult Dark Souls experience right away

9:10

and they're not going to hold it back. But

9:13

I'm excited by that. That is something

9:16

I'm finding very enticing. Yeah. It

9:18

still has a very manageable difficulty

9:20

curve. Difficulties relative.

9:22

I'm the kind of person that never has

9:24

completed these games or you don't get on

9:26

with them. Nothing's changed. But

9:29

even though it's difficult, if you have

9:31

played the original game or played Dark Souls, you'll be fine.

9:35

They don't just crank up the difficulty and leave you to

9:37

it. It's hard

9:40

because of that. There's actual thought

9:42

and design put into the way

9:44

the difficulty works and it's reflected

9:46

in the way enemies ramp up.

9:49

There's a whole delicate science to

9:51

the way these make these games. They

9:53

make these games that goes far beyond

9:55

they just made it harder. They

9:57

made it harder, but they do that knowing.

10:00

how to do it while making it achievable

10:02

for pretty much everyone as long as you're

10:04

willing to persevere and engage it in the

10:07

way that they kind

10:09

of outline they want to create the

10:11

template for. The

10:15

95 on Metacritic, not that it matters too much,

10:17

but I was pretty impressed by that. You think

10:19

it earned that? You think it's like one of

10:22

the highest rate of games of all time? Yeah,

10:24

I think the thing that's going to be the

10:26

discussion this year is, is it legible for game

10:28

of the year? Yeah, it'll happen. Yeah. And like

10:32

I, from my personal perspective, I don't see why not.

10:35

I think we, we talked about cyberpunk

10:38

when Phantom Liberty came out

10:40

as potential. It was in our

10:42

top 10. Yeah, it was in our top 10, but we discussed

10:44

it as if it could have been, you

10:46

know, it was in the running to potentially get game of

10:48

the year for us. So from a

10:51

game spot perspective, Elden Ring, Shadow

10:53

of the Urtery is going to be in contention.

10:55

I do wonder if it's the same for

10:57

like, you know, the one that people

10:59

really think of like as prestigious and the

11:01

others like, you know, the game awards and

11:04

that kind of stuff. Yeah, that one's a

11:06

bit trickier. I think if they go based

11:08

on, if we go based on like previous

11:10

years, I don't think they

11:12

accept the

11:14

DLC as a game of the

11:16

year. I can't remember. Yeah,

11:18

cyberpunk cyberpunk with ongoing game. Right.

11:21

Yeah. Yeah. I don't think that here's

11:24

your best on. Does either. BAFTA got

11:26

like the community one or something. Yeah.

11:28

Yeah. Yeah. That is like for me,

11:30

I think that's I said the same

11:33

with cyberpunk

11:35

was like it's the

11:38

scale of things these days are so significant

11:40

that I think that we need to reassess

11:42

what DLC really is and consider each one

11:44

in its own mirrors. I think that this

11:47

is the thought in these kind of scenarios

11:49

is very outdated with DLC is still treated

11:51

as you know, we've added

11:53

another gun or we've added some

11:55

armor to it or you know, that kind of thing.

11:57

Whereas this is a game that was.

12:00

made across multiple years

12:02

and features a significant

12:05

content edition injection. And

12:08

even has a little bit of an overhaul on

12:11

the previous content. So I would think like

12:13

that would warrant and merit looking

12:17

at it as its own thing again. And

12:19

like I said, I thought the same for

12:21

Cyberpunk as well. Yeah. Lucy,

12:25

so you've been playing how deep into the

12:27

DLC are you? That

12:30

is difficult to say. I have done

12:33

more than I did in the three hour

12:35

preview session. Right. But

12:38

I spent a lot of time at the very

12:40

beginning because I felt I was underleveled. I just

12:42

explored a bunch. So I definitely found a couple

12:44

of areas that I was not supposed to. I

12:49

think about 10 or so hours in, I, because

12:52

I was, I started a new save

12:55

on PC in my, because

12:57

I'm afraid I'm an elite gamer now.

13:00

And I'm, of course, yeah, I'm afraid

13:02

of that too. Sponsored by NZXT. Genuinely

13:07

I'm playing on my industry machine. I haven't had

13:09

a single problem. I restarted

13:12

it a few weeks ago before we did

13:14

the preview session. So I already

13:16

had a run and I have my

13:18

little fucker build on

13:21

my Dex bleed

13:23

poison rock build.

13:26

So I've been kind of working my way through that, slaying

13:29

Albinorix right

13:31

now. I don't want to say where I am,

13:35

but I've, yeah,

13:38

I'm, I'm, How many bosses have you beaten? There's

13:42

a 16 total bosses in this

13:44

or something. Well, let's say who counts as

13:46

a boss and who is just like, Yeah,

13:48

I mean, 16 I think is, is including.

13:50

Yeah. I've

13:52

eaten four that have a big health bar. Mm

13:56

hmm. Okay. Yeah. Those are the main bosses. I

14:00

don't think no, I don't think I have because

14:02

I've explored. And

14:05

one of them was definitely not like I didn't I did not

14:07

have to be that dragon. Oh, yeah, no, you don't

14:09

you don't have to fight all of them at all.

14:11

Yeah, there's going to be some optional bosses. Yes, there's

14:13

only a beating for the big health

14:16

bar. But I don't. Because

14:19

like I won't be able to

14:21

see it as a linear kind of like my

14:23

the way that I've tackled the game linearly until

14:26

I finished it. So I really have no idea

14:28

where I am and I know. Right. I think

14:30

there's like 10 core bosses that are like, hey,

14:35

these are linked to story in a meaningful big way.

14:37

And you don't have to be all of them. You

14:39

can it's the same as with, you know, the main

14:42

game. You don't have to get you. You

14:44

can only you can defeat two of the the

14:46

main game was like 100. And it's like mad. Yeah,

14:49

like like big health. But one

14:51

of them, though, I will say was I

14:54

basically had a Godzilla let them fight moment

14:56

because I found a

14:59

big dragon and he was getting attacked by a

15:01

bunch of boys. And I literally just sat on

15:03

the cliff and watched. But

15:05

then I felt really bad because I thought the dragon

15:07

was going to beat all the little boys and then

15:09

the dragon glitched and

15:12

was just stood still. And so there was

15:14

this one soldier just hacking away at the

15:16

leg. Took like 10 minutes. I was texting

15:18

Tam and it was like, I don't feel

15:21

good about this. No, it

15:23

counts, though. It does. Yeah,

15:25

it's fair. So

15:27

safe to say you're enjoying it. I love it. Yeah,

15:29

God, I I tweet

15:32

out when the embargo was up, but I was like, I

15:34

one thing I was worried about was that I

15:38

think playing Elden Ring more than anything

15:40

else, like I know people will say

15:42

the same about Breath of the Wild, but I actually felt

15:44

the Breath of the Wild in comparison that

15:47

weren't huge, the

15:49

beautiful, like distinct

15:51

environments and like that feeling. Not

15:53

as many as. Yeah, certainly not

15:55

as many as Elden Ring. And so I didn't feel I was

15:58

worried that I wouldn't get that sense of wonder. And

16:01

then I was playing and there's a point where

16:05

I saw this castle and

16:07

there was the tree at the top of

16:09

it and there was like a big fire

16:12

golem. Like and it just

16:14

looked like a painting and I was like, oh

16:16

my god, I get to explore that and I

16:18

get to, you know, exist in that. And I

16:20

yeah, I've been obsessed. Yeah,

16:22

that's great. Um,

16:25

all right. So then if I if I like

16:28

were to ask like for some pointers about how

16:30

to get through this first little bit right

16:32

now, I am I got that the blasphemous

16:35

sword and I am trying to go light

16:37

armor so I can dodge and kind of

16:39

get in there, do some swings and occasionally

16:42

do the big fire attack with that sword. It

16:45

seems to mostly be working. I'm I'm worried that I'm going

16:47

to get like to a point where it's like, no, dodging

16:49

is not going to help you here. You need to

16:51

rethink your entire strategy, but I don't know. I don't think

16:53

so. I think you're good. Like as long

16:56

as you the weapons

16:59

that you pick will scale up. But

17:01

well, your damage output will

17:03

scale up depending on the amount of

17:05

scatter tree fragments that you find. Do

17:08

you explain that for people? Because I

17:10

just I just got the hang of

17:12

that, too. So scatter tree fragments are

17:14

like basically leveling up in the DLC

17:16

and only the DLC is basically right.

17:18

Yeah. So they are a separate stat,

17:21

a series of stats, which you go. If you go

17:23

into your status screen, you'll see yellow ones there that

17:27

this they depending on how much you get of them.

17:30

That goes up. But the moment you

17:32

return to the lands between that stuff

17:34

isn't in play anymore. The weapons are

17:36

fine. Any like core levels that you've

17:38

done are fine. The

17:40

scatter tree and the the

17:43

other stuff that you collect on there,

17:45

go the spirit, the dash blessings won't

17:49

come into play there. So it's basically

17:52

specific to this DLC to make

17:54

sure that you don't go back

17:56

overpowered and like kill everything immediately.

18:00

Yeah. Am I going to be finding

18:02

those in like pots? Like, so they're actually

18:04

like the majority. A significant

18:06

number of them are around the

18:08

Mikolas crosses. So,

18:10

you know, the the kind of symbol that they

18:13

tell you to go and look for to

18:15

show where Mikolas pathing has been. You

18:18

find a bunch there. There's

18:20

also remember

18:23

that pop character that we just told you to

18:25

go and attack and

18:27

you went the other way instead. Some

18:29

of those, some of those will have them as well. And

18:34

then there's certain enemies that won't say

18:36

what they are. Animalistic

18:39

enemies that you'll encounter at some point

18:42

that will drop them as well. Beyond

18:45

that, yeah, beyond that, it's just kind of

18:47

like you find them here and there after

18:50

you defeat enemies or just like

18:53

hanging about in certain areas. There's

18:55

not you reach the point where you have

18:58

to like collect three, I think it is,

19:00

and then they become a singular upgrade. So

19:03

if you got you got to hunt them down, I think you can

19:05

go up 20 levels. Scatter tree levels, I

19:08

believe it is. OK,

19:10

that's if you collect every single one. And

19:13

it's like it does like scale like you were saying, like,

19:15

like, yeah, my first one was like just one and then

19:18

it's like, well, now go to the next level. You need

19:20

two. And I'm assuming it's going to do that each time.

19:22

It's three and then four. Nice. I think it stays at

19:24

three after after three is where it caps out. OK.

19:27

And even if you get like every single one

19:29

of them, the bosses don't become

19:31

trivial at all. Now, like, yeah,

19:33

it continues to be rough. If

19:35

you if you heard you can't

19:38

cakewalk it, you have to actually play the game

19:40

properly. And then the

19:42

spirit ash blessings are the they do

19:44

the same thing. So they upgrade

19:47

your attack power. The scatter tree wants

19:49

to upgrade your attack power and damage

19:51

negation for yourself. The spirit ash

19:53

does it for torrent,

19:55

your steed and also any spirit ash summons.

19:57

So if you if you're summoning a. a

20:00

spirit ash, it will be more powerful if you

20:02

collect the spirit ash blessings. Those

20:05

are those are found more in the world, I think.

20:07

OK, yeah. The

20:10

the summons, I wasn't able

20:12

to summon. And that was just because I was like

20:14

in a dungeon that wasn't allowing it. Right. So I

20:16

was like, oh, yeah, I could summon things. And then

20:18

it wasn't working. I'm like, wait, I just think that's

20:20

just because no, man. Yeah, there's certain areas which you

20:22

can summon. It's usually around like big

20:25

boss areas, boss areas and enemies,

20:28

areas with lots of enemies nearby. Usually

20:31

you can see if it's going to be a big

20:33

fight or a scrap. They'll let

20:35

you summon there. OK.

20:37

And it's kind of similar for, you know,

20:40

summoning other players or specific areas where you

20:42

can summon the best place

20:44

for it. And

20:47

for both of you, how do I beat the

20:49

black jail knight? I haven't done it. I

20:51

ran away. I ran away. Now I saw that fucker

20:53

in the preview and I tried him like three times.

20:55

I said absolutely. If I remember correctly, you

20:57

run in, immediately run to the left and

20:59

let him spray his bullets, close

21:02

the gap, attack twice, pause. And

21:05

when he pauses, he'll backstep. The moment he

21:07

starts his backstep, jump forward and strike and

21:10

do two attacks again and he'll backstep again. And

21:12

you basically caught him in a loop. So

21:15

just keep jumping towards him. And

21:17

like when he tries to create space, don't let him

21:19

have it. And then

21:21

if you remember. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. If I

21:23

remember correctly, there's a bunch of those. It's

21:25

not going to be. There's

21:28

a bunch of those lads that are they will

21:30

behave a bit differently as well. Great

21:33

news. They have Twitch

21:35

drops that Elden Ring and they've got

21:37

the little like eel thing. And

21:40

so I got it. Yeah,

21:42

I got him. And what's the other one?

21:44

There was another one. It's

21:47

the wolf night.

21:49

I think it's a badge, though. I don't

21:51

think it's an actual emo. But yeah.

21:53

I've got him. Yeah, it's fun. I

21:56

want the pool pool noodle lad. They're really they

21:58

can be deadly if you're not careful. Yes,

22:00

I accidentally got fucked up by one of them and

22:02

I was like, yeah, please. I didn't mean to hit

22:04

you. To begin with, they only attack you

22:06

when you're like hitting them. And

22:08

then you get some other types as well

22:10

later on that are a little more aggro, which is fun.

22:15

I did see a little bit of Maximilian

22:17

dude, I believe, was streaming this in 4K

22:19

on Twitch. And

22:21

I was like, oh, we're there. We're finally there.

22:23

We're like, that can actually work. And boy, the

22:25

game looks just really good. It's

22:27

that that's the first thing that hit me when I got

22:29

back in. It's like, oh, yeah, the best artists in the

22:31

world working on like one of

22:33

the biggest games ever. And it's just such a joy

22:35

to look look at everything. The

22:38

big fire guy that's right at the front. When am I

22:40

going to be able to beat him? You can fire him

22:42

immediately. If you want to. You

22:44

can. That's not what I am. I mean,

22:46

like he's he's doable immediately.

22:48

OK, like hashtag doable. All right. Yeah.

22:50

I mean, the thing that you have

22:52

to be careful about is you will die a bunch of

22:54

times to learn this attack patterns and

22:57

its attacks are quite like aoe fire stuff.

22:59

So you have to

23:01

be very precise with like dodging his

23:03

fire. And it

23:05

can be tricky. Even I

23:07

struggle with it still like I've beaten a bunch

23:10

of them. And sometimes I'll get like the arena

23:12

will fuck me up or I'll just like didn't

23:15

predict the right attack there. Right.

23:17

The fire's got a much bigger area than

23:19

I was expecting. Yeah, they are worth doing,

23:21

though, because they give you the tears that

23:24

you can put into your physic

23:26

and they have some cool new

23:28

new tears that mess with properties

23:30

in a very fun way. So they are

23:32

they are tricky to do. You

23:35

can like once you've gone up a few scattatory levels,

23:37

maybe try one. But

23:39

they're fun. Last

23:42

thing, did either of you try the there's

23:44

like some new ways to fight? I believe

23:46

there's like a hand to

23:48

hand combat. It's a bigger thing. A bunch of that. You try

23:51

that. Yeah, yeah, it's it's fun. The

23:53

hand to hand stuff is is good

23:55

for like one view ones and the

23:58

certain a bit like the. has

24:00

a good like, not AOE, but it's good

24:02

at crowd control to a degree. I,

24:06

especially like if you put like a bleed effect

24:08

or something like that on the stuff like the

24:10

beer claw or whatever, it can be handy. I

24:13

just, I think they're fun. I

24:16

think they're designed to be in there for freaks

24:18

who want to be like, I'm going to stream

24:20

myself completing the entire game using only punches and

24:22

kicks, which is like, right. Yeah,

24:25

exactly. Okay. It's

24:28

definitely viable. I just don't find them to

24:30

be particularly, that

24:32

much better streamlining. Yes, it's good. You're

24:34

going to have a rougher because the

24:36

range on attack is very small. You

24:39

have to be up close and personal,

24:41

which means you're in danger way more

24:43

and your ability to dodge is way

24:45

more put to the test. If

24:48

you screw up, mistime something and get hit, chances

24:50

are you're going to die. And

24:52

you can't also panic attack your way out of

24:54

things. Some people do that where they're overwhelmed. They'll

24:56

just start swinging. So

24:59

I started blasting that kind of approach, but

25:01

you can't really do that with, do

25:04

that well with a hand-to-hand style.

25:07

I think the stuff that is really, I think a

25:09

lot of people should try and give a go is

25:11

the projectile weapons, which are new. Like

25:14

you can, if you search, like there's

25:16

a forge knocking about where

25:18

you can get like, for example. Forges are so cool. Yeah,

25:21

they're mainly puzzle, not puzzle, but it's like

25:23

traversal focused and you can get, for example,

25:25

an axe that you throw and

25:28

it's unlimited and you just keep throwing it from

25:30

a distance so you can just keep lobbing axes

25:32

and stuff like that. Those

25:34

are fun and you get like kunai and things like

25:37

that. Yeah, I've got like a sphere

25:40

blade thing. Yeah,

25:43

those are fun to do. And

25:47

I think there's a lot of new

25:49

like sorcery and magic stuff, which is

25:51

really cool. A

25:54

lot of like the holy stuff is

25:56

fun. I think it is the

25:58

way people combine it as well with other. of things

26:00

is going to be where the real mileage is.

26:03

I'm excited to see people grab

26:06

all that stuff, go back into new game plus and then

26:09

power through it with all the new abilities and such.

26:11

The builds are going to be wild. Baroque

26:14

and I can't wait. Yeah, I'll be

26:16

excited to see that, absolutely. All

26:19

right, we'll be playing more Elden

26:21

Ring on the website here in the next couple

26:23

of weeks. Probably talk about it more in the

26:25

bomb cast as well. In

26:28

the meantime though, Lucy James, what are

26:30

the tale of the Shires? What

26:32

are the Shire tales? I did, so I played-

26:34

What are the Shire tales? The Shire tales. No,

26:37

so I played Tales of the Shire, which is

26:39

coming out at some point this year, being made

26:41

by Weta, published

26:43

by Private Push, by Private Division. And

26:47

as a big Lord of the Rings fan, first

26:49

of all, kind of just say how nice it

26:51

is to have a game that's not set during

26:54

the War of the Ring, it's set beforehand. So

26:56

it's set somewhere in between The

26:58

Hobbit and Lord of the Rings. I didn't get the

27:00

exact year. It's a

27:02

weird one because it is a farming

27:05

sim, and I think the real fulfillment

27:09

of those games, not farming sim, sorry, but

27:11

like cozy genre. Animal Crossing kind of. There

27:14

is farming in it, there's animal crossing, there's

27:16

relationship building, so I'm using farming as a

27:18

generalized tool. Let's start you, Valley S. I

27:20

think people know what you mean. People get

27:22

it, I mean you can. Can

27:24

lay crops and everything and grow your own

27:27

stuff. So

27:29

it's very difficult to get across in half

27:31

an hour, just how that

27:33

game is going to come together and

27:36

see how relationships with The Hobbit's

27:38

form, or there's even a dwarf

27:40

in there, and Gandalf

27:42

comes by and I assume other

27:44

people, I heard someone reference Bilbo,

27:46

and I'm interested to see, hey,

27:49

is this gonna be around the time maybe

27:51

the Bilbo adopts Frodo? So

27:53

it remains to be seen in terms of story stuff. One

27:57

thing I think they definitely nailed, and this was from

27:59

like a very. limited hands on time with it, is

28:01

that like, the

28:04

Shire is this safe haven, like that's

28:06

how Tolkien always wrote it, it's like,

28:09

you know, the allegory that people use and Tolkien

28:11

hated allegory, but it's like, it's

28:13

England, it's green, it's lush,

28:15

people are like,

28:17

simple townsfolk, they have a community,

28:19

and like, I think that vibe

28:21

they totally nailed. The one thing

28:23

I would say is that like, everything hinges,

28:26

like they've done it in a very clever

28:28

way, where it's like, everything hinges around the

28:30

fact that Hobbits love food. So what's the

28:32

best way to increase your standing with other

28:34

Hobbits? Cook meals. And the

28:38

demo that I did first was like, there was a

28:40

lot of that. And there's different ways, you know, like,

28:42

they'll tell you they prefer it salty or like a

28:44

recipe calls for it to be salty, and you can

28:46

adapt, you know, which kind of, you

28:48

know, if you have a different this kind of mushroom will make

28:50

it a little saltier, but

28:52

then there's like a little graph

28:55

thing, essentially, where you're trying to get it into

28:57

the sweet spot. So every time you add a

28:59

new, a new

29:02

ingredient, you can move it closer into that zone to

29:04

try and get it perfect. And the better it is,

29:06

the more it will be loved

29:09

by the other hobbits is very cute. But the one

29:11

thing that I think, like I said, was, was

29:13

difficult to gauge is like how the

29:16

relationships actually going to work, because there

29:18

was very limited in terms of how

29:20

much I could interact with everyone, because I would walk around

29:23

like they basically give me free reign to run around Hobbiton.

29:25

And they were just like, Oh,

29:28

yeah, go, go chat to whoever. But

29:30

everyone didn't have dialogue for me, because

29:32

it was like a weird part of the

29:34

vertical slice. So there were only really

29:36

like two or so quests that I could actually do.

29:38

I couldn't, you know, it's

29:41

also I

29:44

get why, because of ratings

29:46

shit. But you can go

29:48

to the Green Dragon, but you can't drink

29:50

alcohol. There is no pipe. There is no

29:52

pipe weed. We'll

29:55

get the modders on this immediately. Exactly. 100%. But it was

29:57

really cute. I

30:00

think the one thing that I really liked about it was

30:03

they let me come back and I

30:06

was able to mess around with the

30:08

home decoration part of it. Okay.

30:11

Which was like, I was really impressed with the tools.

30:13

So as someone who's played a lot of The Sims,

30:15

like a lot of The Sims, especially

30:17

in The Sims 4, you have

30:19

to get really creative or you have to download

30:22

mods to be able to like,

30:24

position things in a way to have clutter. Like

30:27

clutter in The Sims building is like super important

30:29

to make it look less like

30:31

everything is attached to a grid and like to make

30:33

it look lifted. The tools

30:35

that I was able to use in

30:38

the Hobbit in Tales of the Shire

30:40

were really, really good. Like in

30:42

terms of moving stuff around, in terms of like

30:46

palette, in terms of, you could have, oh, you

30:48

can have a big arch in the middle of

30:50

your Hobbit hole and you could have

30:52

it be painted or you could have it be a different

30:54

kind of wood or you could have plants on it. So

30:56

it was like very- It's

30:59

like free form, but empowering.

31:02

So it was good. I think my main

31:05

concern is how it is all gonna come

31:07

together. There

31:10

were a lot of like really fun Little Lord

31:12

of the Rings Tolkien references in it without

31:14

it being like too overbearing. But

31:17

there was one thing that they didn't actually have an answer for

31:19

me. So when you name your

31:21

Hobbit, you

31:23

can select from a list

31:25

of Hobbit names and

31:27

Hobbit surnames. But,

31:30

so there wasn't Gamgee, but there

31:32

would be Sackville. So you couldn't

31:34

be in like Sam and Gaffer

31:37

Gamgee, but you could be a

31:39

Sackville, but not a Sackville Baggins.

31:43

And I was like, is that a story reason why

31:45

you can't actually be doing that?

31:48

Like, or is it just, you know, you

31:50

don't want someone to pretend to be Frodo's sister or

31:52

whatever. Right. Yeah, exactly.

31:57

Yeah, the Embracer group very protective of their

31:59

property of- of course. But

32:02

it was cute. Yeah, it

32:04

sounds cute. It sounds like, I get

32:07

what you mean about it all coming together because

32:09

I think I'm like, what do I want from

32:11

this game? Because I do find it enticing

32:14

in a lot of ways, this idea of like,

32:16

just come hang out with the hobbits in the

32:18

Shire. That sounds so pleasant to me.

32:21

It's always like my favorite part of the movies

32:23

is like when we see the stuff in the

32:25

Shire, that's definitely the stuff I always found most

32:27

exciting. So I'm like, okay, so once I'm there,

32:29

is it like, does it not

32:31

have a lot of momentum because there isn't a lot

32:33

of pressure on the player to change things or is

32:35

there? Well that's the thing. So

32:37

I asked about what is the quote

32:39

unquote central conflict here. And

32:42

it's basically the fact that this particular village

32:45

is not recognized by Hobbiton as being

32:47

a Hobbit village. So they- Oh,

32:49

okay, very cool. So they

32:51

want to basically like be

32:54

recognized by the other. Right. Oh

32:57

my gosh. Oh my gosh. Do

32:59

you have like this? There's going to be-

33:01

Yeah, so there's going to be, there's no

33:03

Nazgul coming. Gandalf

33:06

will obviously appear, like you can see him in the

33:08

trailer. I kind

33:11

of love that, like low stakes, relaxing

33:13

thing. Like, I just

33:15

want to go foraging. I could do this, I could do

33:17

that. Go

33:19

fishing. You can see how it'd be like

33:21

a sieve, like different sieve wind conditions. Like, can

33:24

you improve the culture? And then when? Can you

33:26

improve your diplomacy? Can you make yourself so like

33:28

the best beer and now they're like, doesn't have

33:31

alcohol, but they make the best food and then

33:33

the Humpden wants to be part of you. Yeah.

33:36

Ted Sandiman has nukes. I don't

33:38

know. Yeah, exactly. Very aggressive

33:40

with them for some reason. I don't think

33:42

you can go to, you

33:44

can't go to Bree or outside of,

33:46

there's a barrier. They

33:49

definitely want to keep you in Hobbiton. So yeah, I just need

33:51

to know how it all comes together, play more of it for

33:54

an extended period of time. But as

33:57

like a cozy

33:59

Hobbit. game. It's

34:01

ticking all the boxes for me right now, but yeah,

34:03

need to see more. I

34:06

also hate the fact that it's called

34:09

Tales of the Shire, A, the Lord

34:11

of the Rings game. Yeah, A,

34:14

the Lord of the Rings game.

34:16

That is bad. Yeah,

34:18

I understand why, but... Yeah,

34:20

I think I said the other day and it came out and

34:22

I'm like, OK, it's not as bad as I thought it would

34:25

be to say, but it's not great still. Not

34:27

fun. A, the Lord

34:29

of the Rings game. I think you have to say,

34:32

uh, instead of A. Yeah,

34:34

uh, you're right. The Lord of the Rings. A

34:36

Lord of the Lord. No, it's not. It's

34:38

just in the logo though. A, the Lord

34:40

of the Rings game. You have to like sort of change

34:43

your musicality of the Lord of the Rings. No, no,

34:45

no, no, no, no, no, Tam, you have to do it

34:47

like in the Elden Ring opening where it goes, uh,

34:50

rise. So, uh, the

34:52

Lord of the Rings game. Neat tarnished. The Lord

34:54

of the Rings. All

34:58

right. Uh, let's, uh, we're gonna take a quick break.

35:00

When we come back, we're gonna wrap up this episode

35:02

pretty quickly. I just want to kind of talk to

35:04

them, talk to these folks about some, uh, British games

35:06

and stuff like that. What that was like right after

35:08

this. State

35:10

Farm and DJ Dramos from Life as a

35:12

Gringo know that getting your money right brings

35:15

freedom, empowerment, and future success. It's like we

35:17

have to unlearn as we do in every

35:19

other part of our lives, but financially unlearn

35:21

a lot of the BS that we were

35:24

taught that holds us. So

35:37

the King's new lemonade lineup is

35:39

here. Name and a lemonade The

35:41

Smoothie King Way try strawberry. Guava

35:44

Lemonade ask refresher over ice

35:46

a power up in it

35:48

can energize, or a blueberry

35:50

lemonade smoothie lead it up

35:52

being. Made with

35:55

real fruit. Real juice for a

35:57

real sipping good summer. Yeah yeah,

35:59

Data is no Smoothie Kings New

36:01

lemonade lineup of for a limited

36:04

time. Who. Stars Day. All

36:07

right, and we are back. And let's

36:09

get into it. We actually decided we're

36:11

going to do a Mount Rushmore of

36:13

British game developers. I

36:15

definitely have some stuff that comes to mind at

36:17

me. Are we doing specific people? Are

36:21

we doing studios? So I was thinking studios,

36:23

but would you rather do people? I mean,

36:25

we can talk this out right now. No,

36:27

I think studios is the better approach. OK,

36:30

cool. All right, so I immediately

36:33

think of the most British game studio, which

36:35

I think is I think the British is

36:37

Signosis. Signosis. I think

36:39

the most British, I think the British.

36:42

Yeah, I think the British is like,

36:45

yes, OK, all right, cool. I'm going to get a doc

36:47

going here then. Yeah, whatever. I just

36:49

associate like I'm like, yeah, like it's like

36:51

that is European to me, but I'm pretty

36:53

sure they're British growing up. And now today,

36:55

if like you asked me to name a

36:58

British game developer, I would still say Signosis.

37:00

Are we are we limited to the four

37:02

faces that are currently on? Yes, the four

37:04

faces of Mount Rushmore. Yes. DMA design slash

37:06

Rockstar. Yeah, you got North

37:09

was originally. Yeah. Well, it was DMA. Why

37:11

can't they be like, why can't they be

37:13

like the Hawkeye get rockin' Naruto where every

37:15

time there's a new one, they add them

37:17

to the they chisel them into

37:20

the world. That's cowardly. You got to get

37:22

rid of one. And you got to play

37:24

favorites. Yes, exactly.

37:27

All right. Let me get this sheet. I

37:29

feel like I want to say this, but it's

37:32

the recency of it. It's

37:34

just not a great spot. Like I

37:37

want to say Rocksteady, but. Well,

37:40

they should they should be in

37:42

the conversation. Yeah, I think

37:44

so. But also like even I'm like,

37:47

man, that's what's that's what game, though. They

37:51

definitely lost some of their luster, right? That's how

37:53

I feel about them as well. Sumo,

37:55

super massive. Rare.

38:00

Oh, hello games. Hello

38:03

games is a good one. Yeah. Playground. Playground.

38:06

Let's see. Yeah, I

38:09

mean, oh, Cyrus, even says, thank goodness you're

38:11

here is extremely British, but is the developer

38:13

British? They are. They are. Yes, they are.

38:15

Two boys. Yeah. Two good boys. All

38:18

right. Are we counting like. Eidos.

38:23

Because we can. Yeah,

38:25

because Eidos was there for a while. All

38:28

right. Eidos. OK,

38:30

what else did we say? We said

38:33

rare, rock steady. We could just consider

38:35

these. Media molecule. Yeah, media

38:37

molecule is the one I was going to ask you both

38:39

about. OK, media molecule. Creative

38:42

assembly. Yes, OK. Oh,

38:44

creative assembly is a good one. Traveler's

38:48

Tales. Team

38:51

17. Ninja Theory.

38:55

Nope. Ninja Theory. And

38:58

then Lionhead Codemasters.

39:00

Yeah, Codemasters. Where's

39:02

Rebellion? Rebellion's there, isn't it? Yeah, sure.

39:04

Yeah. They let me shoot Hitler in

39:07

the balls. Exactly. Do we

39:09

have the most British of activities? Yeah.

39:13

Oh, which one did you say, Lucy? Frontier.

39:16

Oh, Frontier. OK. That was even monkey slayer. Oh,

39:20

wait. So we got we have

39:22

we have a lot to choose from here. Do we can

39:24

keep adding more, but we've got to pick four for anything

39:26

else. I mean, Rockstar. Yeah, I

39:28

mean, like. Yeah,

39:31

because DMA design was also

39:33

like lemmings to. Yeah,

39:35

yes. Also very, very, very.

39:38

Yeah, Rockstar have to be on there.

39:40

Yeah. OK, so Rockstar is a lock.

39:42

Let's put them like lockstar. Mm

39:45

hmm. Lockstar. OK,

39:48

I like I said, I would go

39:50

with Psygnosis, but I'm willing. If you guys have three,

39:53

you will put up there before that. No, I think

39:55

we have Hello Games. Oh,

39:57

I didn't put Hello Games, but we can do that

39:59

right now. Psygnosis, I think. I would put them on

40:02

there, but I know how

40:05

many people of, you know, right now

40:07

would be like, I know. Yeah, but it'd be

40:09

like when we're doing these, I always feel like

40:12

legacy like, yeah, like George Washington, right?

40:14

Like, like, yeah, yeah. I feel like

40:17

Graham has to be on there. Right.

40:20

Yeah. And rare, it's like it's it. The

40:22

sensibilities are baked into the game. The British

40:24

humor is like a huge part of their

40:27

appeal. OK, well,

40:29

they only owned an entire like

40:32

generation, an era of Nintendo, basically,

40:34

where it's like they were the

40:36

only company. Yeah, they are the

40:38

only company that you

40:40

could mistake their games for being Nintendo

40:42

games, which is powerful.

40:46

Yep, absolutely. And that's, you know, I

40:48

even go back to their NES games,

40:50

which were pretty good. And

40:52

they're like one of the studios that really was

40:54

putting out stuff that competed with Nintendo itself. OK.

40:58

One spot left. We could put a

41:00

couple up and like try to whittle. What do you how do you all

41:02

want to approach it? We

41:04

have a Hello Games, Eidos,

41:07

Rocksteady, Media Molecule, Creative Assembly,

41:09

Traveler's Tales, Sumo, Team 17,

41:11

Ninja Theory, Codemasters, Rebellion and

41:13

Frontier. Hmm. Creative

41:16

Assembl. I

41:19

feel like Creative Assembly is a good

41:21

one, but it's good. Yeah.

41:24

But I feel like in terms of. Personally,

41:27

I would go for Rocksteady, but I am

41:29

very biased on that because

41:32

they made three absolutely

41:34

incredible Batman games. And

41:37

then they were like, we're

41:39

done. We're

41:41

not going to. We will not make any more

41:43

games. They did not make a single game after

41:46

that, which is a shame. But,

41:48

you know, it is what it

41:50

is. And I feel like Creative

41:52

Assembly has some decent ones. But

41:55

that's the thing. I don't play Total

41:57

War. Total War. But I

41:59

know. the audience. Yeah. Yeah.

42:03

Yeah. Alien isolation and

42:06

then hyenas. Yeah. Lost to. That's right.

42:08

Oh, yeah. Oh, no. Scroll

42:12

down a little bit. Sure. That

42:15

can just it cuts off a ninja theory. I can't remember who

42:17

we've got underneath. Oh, there we go. I like

42:19

rebellion. I like

42:22

I like I like rebellion. It does feel like. I

42:26

think rock steady, media molecule, creative assembly come

42:28

to mind first, even Hello Games come before

42:30

rebellion, but that may be. Yeah, I think.

42:33

Yeah. Yeah.

42:35

Team 17, Team 17, like obviously worms and stuff.

42:37

But in terms of that, yeah, in terms of

42:39

the publishing label, they've got, you know, they did

42:41

dredge. Yeah, they did. I

42:44

was doing developers of publishers. Is

42:46

there a distinction there? Do we want to make a

42:48

distinction? I guess we do. I guess we don't

42:50

have to make distinction, but we can. Yeah, because

42:52

dredge was made in New Zealand. I

42:55

feel like you kind of have to have

42:57

media molecule on there. Like

42:59

that. I'm like leaning towards. I

43:01

lean towards that. Those little big kind of games,

43:03

man. They were. They

43:05

start. I mean, even like dreams. Yes.

43:08

Incredible. Just like I can't like

43:10

I think of Sackboy as being synonymous

43:12

with the PlayStation three and. Some

43:16

degree for but when they were when

43:18

Little Big Planet was popping, it owned

43:20

everything. Yeah, it

43:22

was crazy. Like they start. It

43:24

was became a merchandising engine for

43:27

PlayStation, where the

43:29

original funcos basically where you could

43:31

make Sackboy look like anything and

43:34

they sure as hell did it. Yeah,

43:37

and it's very much also in that like art

43:40

style that I associate with like rare,

43:42

like just the cute character with just

43:44

like stubby little arms. I don't know

43:46

what three of those games were super

43:48

fun, like really, really fun. Yep. So

43:51

I feel like between

43:55

the Little Big Planet games and then also

43:57

like dreams like

43:59

dreams. And

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