GameStop's Revival, Pokémon Cards, and Nintendo Nostalgia - Game Junction Podcast

What if the gaming landscape as you know it is about to change forever? Join us as we explore the latest industry shifts, from Minecraft's impending VR departure to the curious case of Redbox morphing into Pokémon trading card machines. We'll celebrate the milestone of 25,000 downloads with gratitude to our loyal listeners while diving headfirst into the ever-evolving world of video games, collectibles, and everything in between.

GameStop's quest for relevance in a rapidly changing retail environment takes center stage as we dissect the strategic moves that could save this gaming giant. From hosting community events to tapping into niche markets like card grading, find out how GameStop can become a mecca for gaming enthusiasts. The intrigue continues with Pokémon trading card vending machines popping up in select states and the critical reception of adaptations like Sonic X Shadow Generations and the Yakuza series, showing us the delicate dance between critics and user reviews.

Marvel fans, prepare for a nostalgic journey as we discuss the highs and lows of cinematic ventures, including the Fantastic Four and X-Men films. Dive into the enchanting world of musicals, ponder on Bernie Sanders' surprise Twitch appearance, and unravel the mystery behind next-gen console upgrades. Whether you're a tech geek weighing AMD against Intel or a nostalgic gamer longing for a lost Donkey Kong title, this episode promises a treasure trove of insights and surprises to keep you on your toes.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Streaming Versus Physical Media Debate
• 9:57 Gamestop and Pokemon Trading Cards
• 19:35 Critical Reception of Yakuza Adaptation
• 29:40 Japanese Adaptations and Gaming Updates
• 41:53 Marvel's Fantastic Four and X-Men Films
• 46:11 Marvel Daredevil and PS5 Pro Upgrade
• 53:52 Next-Gen Console Upgrade and Digital Sales
• 1:03:45 Console Hardware Testing and PS5 Edition
• 1:10:17 Nintendo Leak Fallout and Security Concerns
• 1:20:09 Ubisoft's Beyond Good and Evil 2
• 1:31:16 CPU Performance and Overclocking Discussion
• 1:34:45 Game Preservation and Donkey Kong Leak

Transcript

Mark Trobough: 0:00

Hey everybody, how's it going, brandon, what's?

Brandon Hurles: 0:04

up.

Mark Trobough: 0:06

Yeah, this is the last episode before Halloween.

Brandon Hurles: 0:10

I know 106 man Definitely excited. Cool stuff.

Mark Trobough: 0:13

I think it's going to be quasi Halloween, though I believe we're doing a for the actual Halloween. We're doing a pre-recorded for the Game Junction, but the Anime Junction cast will be live. Yes, so definitely a lot of stuff. Yeah, for once I just wanted to give a quick little shout out. You know, Mr Coffee over on Twitch saying Happy Halloween.

Brandon Hurles: 0:33

Happy Halloween.

Mark Trobough: 0:36

Right around the corner, but hey wanted to welcome everybody in. Whether you're listening live after the fact, watching this on any of the audio platforms, we definitely appreciate and appreciate everybody's support. Obviously, all our socials link down below. Uh got a lot of good stuff to talk about Um, Venom, last dance reviews, some gaming it's always gaming controversies. Uh cancel the Tendo game. Uh, we just had a new video drop on the PSvr2 over on the game junction youtube page yesterday. Uh got some more shorts up today, some andy news and you know a bunch of other stuff definitely to talk about.

Brandon Hurles: 1:13

It's gonna be a action-packed episode, yeah like it always is, there's, there's a lot this week kind of surprised, but interesting stuff to talk about for sure I think it's also a surprise that we were able to go live on time. Yeah, we went live on time, isn't that crazy?

Mark Trobough: 1:28

For those actually watching live, obviously, if you're watching this after the fact, one of the audio platforms that they were able to go live for, you know once, and God knows how, long it's been a while.

Brandon Hurles: 1:36

I did want to also shout out real quick that we just hit 25,000 downloads yesterday. Thousand downloads yesterday, which is pretty crazy on the audio platform, so that was really cool to see we love our audio listeners for sure yeah, but I mean I guess, talking about obviously you just talked about the PSVR too.

Mark Trobough: 1:57

You got a video everyone should go obviously watch, but we got some news that Minecraft is losing it's VR support in March of next year.

Brandon Hurles: 2:06

It's pretty interesting because we just talked about this a few weeks ago, do you remember? I feel like we did. We did yeah, because you said you tried it. I hadn't tried it.

Mark Trobough: 2:15

I didn't care for it.

Brandon Hurles: 2:16

Yeah, I mean I don't care for Minecraft. I've been pretty open about that, but it would be cool to check this out before. But I don't really have a way with PSVR 1 not being backwards compatible PSVR 2, which is really dumb, but you can't play those games. But I will say Minecraft did just get the actual PS5 release. You can get the story now for $30. I saw it yesterday, so the actual native ps5 release just came out.

Mark Trobough: 2:46

it's kind of interesting yeah, but I mean I guess like this makes sense because it's pretty much just verifies it wasn't popular enough to verify them. Keep putting you know work into it yeah which means it's not like an impossible.

Mark Trobough: 2:58

At the very least, people probably have mods for it. You just play an older version. I don't know if they're just completely getting rid of it outright or it's like you have to play these older versions of it, but I could see most people just not caring for it in vr, just because it kind of it's. It's a neat experience, but you're only going to probably do it a handful of times, for for most of us me included uh, because it's just if you actually want to actually play minecraft, it just makes a lot of stuff super tedious and it's just easy to play on a keyboard and mouse or on a controller on a console.

Brandon Hurles: 3:24

So Mojang said that people who played using the PS4 or PS5 peripheral would still be able to access their previously created worlds, as well as items they had purchased in the marketplace. So at least things you may have spent money on in the VR mode, you at least still have those, I guess.

Mark Trobough: 3:43

Yeah, and I guess hey, they're giving you like a 6 month heads up on. Hey, this is going away, yeah, so what's it about? 5-6 months give or take?

Brandon Hurles: 3:52

yeah definitely interesting for sure, but it's kind of a bummer to see another thing go. But it just keeps happening. We have more to talk about definitely.

Mark Trobough: 4:03

I just wanted to ask did you ever get a chance to play Among Us in vr?

Brandon Hurles: 4:07

no, is that on the psvr2 in vr?

Mark Trobough: 4:10

I'm not sure because I had it on ps5 yeah, it fits, but it was brought up in the chat by mr coffee. Now I was like I, that's a good one, 100 haven't? Yeah, I played the. I've only played the game like one. Yeah, it's not but it's fun.

Brandon Hurles: 4:23

Now I could see us like if we streamed or something, I could see us having fun playing with other people, but if I'm just playing by myself, it's just. I don't like that, you know, with people. I don't just playing with people.

Mark Trobough: 4:34

I don't know at all and no way to talk to them or anything, or yeah, so based on something that was posted on reddit like a year ago apparently is on psvr too.

Mark Trobough: 4:43

Okay, all right I guess there's always the possibility you could try to check it out yeah, yeah, I definitely like to try it, at least no, yeah, yeah yeah, yeah, I can't sing, sounds terrible, it was terrible uh, but I did see this a little bit and I think I kind of forgot about it. But apparently, uh, some stores are replacing their red box with uh trading card machines for pokemon yeah, I thought this was pretty cool.

Brandon Hurles: 5:13

I I figured it'd be a cool thing that something that'll actually probably make money compared to nobody rents stuff. Everything's all streaming anymore yeah, nobody, I mean the red box. I think isn't a thing anymore, right? I it still is, I've oh, there's, I thought it was gone it's not near me.

Mark Trobough: 5:29

It's like feels like it's almost like a two-hour driveway, but it's actually 90 miles. There's like a, it's like a um not, I guess it's just the 7-eleven convenience store. There's a red box right outside and I've been talking to people like do you think that actually works? They just kind of forget that it's there.

Brandon Hurles: 5:43

I forgot it. Well, here's the thing I actually used to use Redbox a lot, quite a bit. I mean it's been several years. At this point, probably like the last rental that I had was I mean, I was racking up the points and everything because I still, you know, I like the physical media and it's just much better than streaming. So there was stuff that I would get there, but, yeah, screaming uh. So there was stuff that I would get there, but yeah, I just just just no reason for it anymore. I forgot that. I forgot it was there when you know it was sitting there for a long time and but you brought this up and I had to pull this up just to verify.

Mark Trobough: 6:17

South park did a halloween special about, uh, dealing with the red box. I don't know if you've seen that one. No, I haven't it kind of dealing with the Redbox, I don't know if you've seen that one?

Mark Trobough: 6:24

No, I haven't. It kind of spoofed the Stanley Kubrick's, was it? The Shining, shining, yeah, yeah, where Randy Marsh buys Blockbuster for $10,000. It's going to be great and he just slowly loses his mind until it just recreates that whole movie as far as the Randy arc. But there's another subplot where some people are trying to like, go to like red box machines and steal the money out of them, but there's no money there and obviously that leads to, you know, hulu shenanigans with the boys and stuff like that. But even back, this came out in 2012 and they were already working on.

Mark Trobough: 6:53

Uh, obviously, by then blockbuster was out. Streaming was like the new hot thing and they were just mocking, even with the, with the red box nobody uses, then yeah, this came out in 2012.

Brandon Hurles: 7:04

No, I mean. What about the streaming, though? Was there streaming in 2012?

Mark Trobough: 7:08

Oh yeah, there was. Yeah, this came out after we graduated high school, streaming was 100% a thing. I think Hulu and Netflix were huge at that point.

Brandon Hurles: 7:17

Those are the only two big ones. I don't remember watching man. Maybe I'm an idiot, I'm just misrememberinging, I don't know.

Mark Trobough: 7:27

okay, I don't know, maybe it just wasn't comment or something so technically Netflix, according to Google on the Wikipedia in January of 2007 is when Netflix started streaming wow, okay so that kind of adds, because I worked at Blockbuster until it closed down.

Brandon Hurles: 7:45

They tried to do the Blockbuster streaming thing after they turned down buying Netflix. You know about that whole thing, right? Yeah?

Mark Trobough: 7:53

oh yeah, because between Netflix. What a bad move dude. Well, I can't imagine their regrets today yeah, according to Wikipedia, blockbuster essentially closed between November of 2013 and January 2014.

Brandon Hurles: 8:08

Yeah, we closed the end of 2013. But I mean by 2012.

Mark Trobough: 8:12

You kind of already knew Blockbuster was on its way out. A lot of stores already started closing. They were constantly selling movies.

Brandon Hurles: 8:18

It's still my favorite job like that because it just fit for me. Getting to watch the movies early, getting to rent the games a few days early, you know, before the street date, it's just cool. And then just talking to people about the movies man was always cool, it was a fun job.

Mark Trobough: 8:34

Sometimes because I remember, obviously big on the childhood for running stuff. But sometimes I wish because by the time I would have been old enough to actually get a membership, they were already. Essentially, who cares sometimes I wish I was old enough to actually have better experiences in the blog post before it actually closed down. Not just being a kid, you go there with mom, dad, maybe some friends, you know we're in some movies in that scene not really talking with people there yeah, no, I.

Brandon Hurles: 8:56

It was cool to get to know people, um yeah, and just talk about the movies. Like people would be returning their movies and talk about what they thought in their movies. You'd do a little movie discussion there. I love that stuff. Obviously, you got a lot of anime in there, got all the big games. All that stuff was really cool. It was just the whole culture around. It was really fun. There were people that were holding out to the very end. There were people coming Now out to the very end. There were people coming Now that I think about it. We actually didn't close down until April of 2014 because it was a franchise.

Mark Trobough: 9:35

I think the one in Bend Oregon lasted super long because it became a franchise. As long as the owner can keep it up.

Brandon Hurles: 9:45

He couldn't keep it up, and then he tried to open a video rental store of his own right after. So he bought out a bunch of the blockbuster stuff. Um and uh, it didn't. It didn't work out obviously.

Mark Trobough: 9:57

I think it's kind of like a year you talk about game companies kind of struggling or, I guess, box stores. I think it's kind of like with uh, with gamestop. There's still an audience but you need to find other way. You can't just have games be your main attraction. You need to find other ways to bring people in, whether that's offering other stuff that you can buy and not necessarily having to buy it online, or try to have a more community focused. You know events that you do just to keep the store, you know, vibrant and stuff like that, which I think uh, gamestop can, to some degree, probably write it ship. They're already trying to now with the, with the retro stuff, but they need to be a little bit more aggressive with, you know, addressing the issue, trying to find out, hey, what can we do to kind of turn this around?

Brandon Hurles: 10:41

I was going to mention. Gamestop just announced that they're doing um card grading. Now I don't know if you saw that, but you can take your cards there and they'll send them in. They take pictures of them.

Mark Trobough: 10:50

Oh yeah, I did see that because yeah, I actually saw that with pokemon cards. Sometimes they'll just sell like individual cards. Now they're out sitting out, not protected. It's not the best way to store them, but it's a. It's a neat thing.

Brandon Hurles: 11:00

They've been kind of going semi-heavy on the cards.

Mark Trobough: 11:02

Yeah, but that's kind of neat but I mean like half the figures that I got, they're like what 20, 30 figures? I'll get them there periodically and they're decent for what you're paying for. It's a nice little figure. It's not terrible. So I go there for other stuff, it's just but, as much as there's like physical media store. That's the problem and the problem is the game stop.

Brandon Hurles: 11:22

Retro thing is like like kind of a joke because it's not a retro store. They got like a little tiny section. I've seen so many pictures now.

Mark Trobough: 11:30

I like what they're doing, but they have to be a little bit more aggressive. There's a niche market where you can't be charged like $300 for games. I mean the small mom and pop stores that do that don't necessarily make a lot of money off of those expensive retro games.

Mark Trobough: 11:47

It's a mixture of new games, more available retro games, maybe refurbishing, but a lot of them that I've seen also do. They'll host other events like hey, come in every Friday night or something like that. We'll host like a Pokemon or a trading card game tournament yeah, it just kind of gets people in the story.

Brandon Hurles: 12:01

tabletop games too, and they bring people in like they do a thing every week, and so you're bringing people in there and they're looking at your merchandise. You know what I mean and that's what you gotta do. You get eyeballs on your stuff, so bring people together and that's how you you know build a culture.

Mark Trobough: 12:16

I think, at least maybe in my area, pokemon cards are what physical for the most part? Yeah, as well as it. It just, you know, it's another way to come into the store and do other stuff, because I mean I'll say, this card app just came out, so for maybe if you live in a big city you have options, but if you live in a smaller rural town, or even you know some, some urban stuff you may only have, like a walmart, which you know it's, it's crap.

Mark Trobough: 12:49

You're not going there for that stuff. But your only actual game store slash card store may be a game stop. That's it. If they was, that was the close down. You essentially have to buy everything online.

Mark Trobough: 12:57

You wouldn't have the option because in the big city at least you have within a really reasonable driving distance mom and pop shop, but those aren't everywhere, because they just maybe can't survive in a super rural area, because I'm pretty sure some game stops in the rural area are probably somebody subsidized with larger stores just to have the presence, you know, because you're trying to cater to as many people as possible yeah, I agree with that, thanks yeah, because I think I saw it on x, but it may have been from a snapshot on reddit about a store over in oregon, was it?

Mark Trobough: 13:31

uh, yeah, in portland oregon, but apparently the? Uh it can be. They say it can be found in 14 different states. I don't know exactly where they are, what in the. What the states? Uh, you'd probably have to all right, never mind if I can actually read properly uh, the states with this vending machine in, and this is just the state, I don't know where it is, the stores, there's probably not a whole lot of them, but this, uh, the 14 States to have these vending machines is Arizona, california, colorado, georgia, illinois, indiana, kentucky, michigan, nevada, ohio, oregon, texas, utah and Washington. So there's one in Ohio and then the closest to me is, technically, utah. Where I guess Colorado as well.

Mark Trobough: 14:18

Now that I'm curious. I'm thinking, at least for me, probably Columbus. If it's in Utah, it's probably somewhere in salt lake city. I'm like I want to find these, just to be able to say I found it. I don't know what I'm gonna be. Well, sometime in november I should be down in salt lake city, so I might try to figure out like where this is at and go there, take a picture, just to say I used it.

Brandon Hurles: 14:36

That would be cool.

Mark Trobough: 14:36

Yeah, I would like to do the same but yeah, also this is apparently these are owned and managed by the Pokemon trading card company. Like they own these directly, they're just sitting in a storefront, so it's like an official officially licensed. Nintendo thing. I think it's a decent. Pokemon. Pokemon is really popular. I mean, you just look at online, there's people who their whole stream is just opening up cards and talk to Chad.

Brandon Hurles: 15:00

I was like I don't have the promise, like I'm cards, like every day.

Mark Trobough: 15:03

I. I was like I don't have the cards like every day, I don't have a setup for that. I see them like that's it. You have to make it money like those cards are expensive. Yeah, the amount of packs some of them open them, because even they get like a uh booster pack with like 10 cards, you're talking like 50, 60 bucks.

Brandon Hurles: 15:15

Realistically, oh yeah, yeah, I mean, one pack is like seven bucks, right seven to ten dollars somewhere in there.

Mark Trobough: 15:21

Yeah, I'd say round up. So you're thinking probably after tax is about ten dollars a pack. Why I mean it's not, it's not terrible if you're only buying a handful every every there. But if you open up all those cards, it's crazy like some of those people that do it also are farming for certain cards that they're going to turn around yeah, probably get graded and then resell right, yeah also, you would open that many cards.

Mark Trobough: 15:42

So I, if you open that many cards, you could probably just start selling different sets and just bulk as far as like just random cards.

Brandon Hurles: 15:49

Yeah, I'm sure they're making their money back somehow. You know, on some of that.

Mark Trobough: 15:54

As well as you're streaming it. So you've got like a few hundred people streaming. You're making money off that People are like. You know it's in money while on a stream and stuff like that. Yeah, after a while. But I was like that's great, I would love myself to be able to do it.

Brandon Hurles: 16:06

Get a second camera and make it an occasion thing or something to get that second camera to get your hands.

Mark Trobough: 16:14

Doesn't Twitch have a whole section on that?

Brandon Hurles: 16:17

Yeah, I think so. I think they do yeah they do, they do for sure.

Mark Trobough: 16:23

I don't know if I meant to talk on that for like forever, but it's alright, it's a whole good topic to talk about. Why not? Yeah, good topic.

Brandon Hurles: 16:32

Uh, I know it was announced that the Sonic Shadow Generations already hit a million copies sold in one day, on the day of its release, and the other game sold 1.85 in the first six months.

Mark Trobough: 16:45

This is going to outsell it by next week. It's the original version. Yeah, oh yeah, probably 100%. Are you planning on getting this game?

Brandon Hurles: 16:52

Yeah, I am. I'm a little disappointed on some of the weird stuff they've done, like clothing up Rogue more. All she was showing was her back.

Mark Trobough: 17:03

I think they completely covered up whatever little cleavage she had as well. I know there was a whole discourse on Twitter about that, which was crazy and funny to watch, but you get both sides of it. It's not a big deal. But if it's not a big deal, why are you making changes?

Brandon Hurles: 17:18

Yeah, that's what I'm wondering. And then they changed some of the dialogue too, which I'm not sure what dialogue, but obviously something in there was not holding up in 2024, apparently I just saw the dialogue. I don't know what exactly was removed, but I mean I'm excited to play the game. It got a 9 from IGN, which I was shocked. I mean you got to remember this is a 3D Sonic game. They usually don't score well with critics, so you know, I really don't care what critics say, but I've heard from the people that I've talked to everybody loves it. So I missed out on the limited run games collection edition that came with the statue, but I'm just getting standard edition. I got to grab it.

Mark Trobough: 18:02

So yeah, I thought it had to do with them changing something about Amy with her dialogue from what.

Mark Trobough: 18:09

I saw Changing her from not being super obsessed with Sonic Because some people were saying that's her whole character arc and they're making certain changes to it. Then again, I don't care about the whole modern audience. I think if you're just remastering a game, you shouldn't change anything outside of graphical think. If you're just remastering a game, you shouldn't change anything outside of graphical fidelity. If you're doing like a remake or remaster, but, uh, that's, that's just a personal opinion. I never played the original, probably not. Well, I'm not gonna play this new one because I'm just not a sonic fan. But I mean I'm out there. Yeah, he's out there. They're probably small changes at the grand scheme. It's not the biggest, but I mean the internet's gonna internet on a lot of things yeah, there's always something you can understand both sides of the argument, you know.

Mark Trobough: 18:53

But at the end of the day I'm sure a lot of people are like, well, I'm still gonna play the game and enjoy it, but also kind of complain about the changes yeah, I'm gonna.

Brandon Hurles: 19:00

I'm like I'm excited to check it out. I'm glad that it's grading well, getting good reviews and stuff yeah.

Mark Trobough: 19:08

It's so surprising to see. Did we talk about last week issues with IG and how they're rating certain games?

Brandon Hurles: 19:15

What was the thing, oh?

Mark Trobough: 19:17

yeah, thanks, mr Coffee Quietly just posted it. They gave Sparkling Zero a 7. The same thing with Concord, yeah, and they're giving this a 9.

Brandon Hurles: 19:29

I guess, since we're talking about, we can move on to the one topic too that talks about the score. But Sonic X Shadow Generations has an 80 on Metacritic that's a decent score.

Mark Trobough: 19:42

I don't know if I'd give it a 9 out of 10 as a remake, but an 80 seems like a solid score.

Brandon Hurles: 19:45

I don't know if I'd give it a 9 out of 10 as like a remake, but an 80 seems like a solid score across the board if you ask me, that's really good for 3D Sonic, because you know a lot of them are very hit or miss for people and they never, they never review well, ever so you're never gonna let.

Mark Trobough: 19:58

Let y'all forget the. Was it Sonic 06. I mean basically it's such an infamous game it truly is and cause I think yeah, I think the first time I saw that game. Never played it, but I think I watched videos of like uh, back when game grumps was actually it feels like they were relevant. I watched them some of their- playthrough of that game anymore. They are. I haven't watched them in like five years but so a couple of things.

Brandon Hurles: 20:25

I guess we'll talk about both of them. But Like a Dragon, yakuza Season 1 has scored a 48 on Metacritic, with only four reviews right now, based on four critic reviews. And then Venom, the Last Dance, is at a 41. And so this is for critic, 5.5 for user score. So not good, not a good, a good score yeah, there's no audience score for it.

Mark Trobough: 20:48

On the rotten tomatoes it's sitting like a 57, but like I need, I actually need to go and watch this now uh because, it's on prime and I have x, I've got easy access to it. I actually forgot it, kind of came out yeah, I know, but then again like now. I'm curious why they didn't like it for the most part.

Brandon Hurles: 21:06

Well, I mean, there's a couple of things there I think. I don't know if there's any type, Is it just?

Mark Trobough: 21:10

not. Is this just critics being critics, or is it actually bad? Or is it just not saying the things they wanted to say?

Brandon Hurles: 21:17

With games media.

Mark Trobough: 21:18

You've got no idea.

Brandon Hurles: 21:19

Okay. For instance, ign gave it a 40. They said there's so little of this that there's very Yakuza in tone and so limited in inspiration from the games that there's hardly much you'll recognize from them. There's great character work from some of the cast, particularly Kento Kaku as Nishikama, but sadly nothing very interesting for them to do. Looper said the story just doesn't have enough meat on its bones to fill six 40-50 long-minute episodes and keep the viewer's attention. There was a it looks like user score. It came in at 10 just a little while ago. A strong performance from the cast, filled with people experienced in other Yakuza films and series.

Brandon Hurles: 22:06

The drama't follow the game and that was great as a plot. The first game is very weak. The changes were positive. So it looks like, based on what we're seeing here is it doesn't follow the games and, uh, it kind of does its own thing, which could be good, could be bad depending on the person. For me, I would rather see a new story. I really don't need the. I've always said I really don't need the games translated word for word from the game, because I can just play the game. To me that's boring.

Mark Trobough: 22:36

So I kind of like this as long as it ties into the games. There's a grain of salt here. This was pulled from Reddit, but it seems like a lot of people are critical of it because of that or simply to say it just didn't look good, even from the trailers. I thought the trailers were fine, Obviously you can.

Mark Trobough: 22:53

You're always going to find people that like stuff, don't like it. The problem is, if I watch it, I don't know I've played like an hour of the first game. I don't know any of the source material, so I could go in and think it's a decent show, but it could be, absolutely a terrible adaptation.

Brandon Hurles: 23:08

You didn't play Shenmue, have you? No, you didn't play the first game. You gotta play Shenmue 1 and 2 though.

Mark Trobough: 23:15

I'll just start with the original Yakuza game I messed up. The problem with me is I want something more than just the critics.

Brandon Hurles: 23:24

No, there is user score at a 5.3.

Mark Trobough: 23:27

Okay, so just minimally higher. There's 20 user ratings for critic reviews when are?

Brandon Hurles: 23:34

you pulling the?

Mark Trobough: 23:35

user rating from.

Brandon Hurles: 23:35

Metacritic, so there's more user ratings than there is, and it's still not good. So it's interesting.

Mark Trobough: 23:45

Because I was trying to find like.

Brandon Hurles: 23:47

I could only could only find critic scores. Yeah, it's got both on there, but yeah, yeah, I was trying to pull it up. No, you're good. Yeah, a little little interesting, but it looks like. Yeah, it just looks like it just did not fare well, which is kind of disappointing. Um, I trust the user score more and it's still not good.

Mark Trobough: 24:08

I guess you're going to see some people. Obviously, even the people that liked it says it doesn't follow the games from some of these reviews.

Brandon Hurles: 24:13

So for you that's going to be like whatever, because you haven't really played the games, so to you it's not going to mean someone's not played them, it doesn't mean anything.

Mark Trobough: 24:25

So you can kind of maybe go into it a little different, not knowing any of the stories for the games and stuff like that yeah, because I guess this is weird though, because, at least far as the, because there's only 20 user reviews, so it's a really small sample size, pretty much split between positive, negative yeah, there's like mixed middle really there's seven positive, five mixed, eight negative.

Mark Trobough: 24:43

Uh, most of the ones I saw around the mix were like it's okay, it's better than I thought it's serviceable from what most people kind of seemed to agree. The ones that hated it I was trying to find just outright didn't care for it or they were like super fans of it.

Brandon Hurles: 24:57

One person gave it a 6 and said basically just stick to the video games. Yeah. Another person said could have been better. It's alright. I guess Next season I hope it improves and again, this is one of those different shows with the recognizable IP. So I mean, yeah, you've seen some of what people are saying. It's pretty much all the same thing.

Mark Trobough: 25:16

Yeah, there was a user review on Metacritic from Lost Moss. I don't know how you say it, I probably butchered it from the 24th. If you know nothing about Yakuza, it's a 7 out of 10. If you know Yakuza, 4 out of 5, or 4 to 5 out of 10,. Essentially, this person gave it like a 6. It's not bad. The issue is you change the original plot with a new plot, doing a retcon to the original. The new plot and story does not make any sense to me. The correct way was to do as they did with the Ichiban and the games just a parallel universe. This person can't type character and once stylish, just had to cure you in the mix. So it just seems like they. That's the problem with adaptations. Do you completely do something different or you just do the same thing that the games already did, like that's a fine line to walk it is.

Brandon Hurles: 26:07

It's going to be mixed depending on the person, like I don't need to see the game translated on the screen the exact same story.

Mark Trobough: 26:14

I don't need that to me that's the problem, because useless, then they change it and then you're going to complain about it, but it's always going to be on one side or the other it's. It's kind of why I've gone the way, because sometimes I rather them stick close to the original story. But to me, whether it's a video game or it's an, anime.

Brandon Hurles: 26:31

They don't need to change the story necessarily, but they can follow their own path with it. You know what I mean. They still need to change it.

Mark Trobough: 26:40

That's hard, without trying to anger it, because usually stuff like this games or anime that get live action adaptations you're trying to go after technically a different audience, but you still need that core audience there. That's a hard line to. The problem is, even if you're a diehard fan, it doesn't matter how good the show is, you're still always going to say, play the original game, watch the original. That's what you're going to prefer. So it's kind of a hard juggling act that they have to do. If you don't know what you're doing, you're going to essentially flub it.

Brandon Hurles: 27:09

The Japanese adaptations never do well. They attack on Titan, all of that Bleach, freaking Death Note. The adaptations.

Mark Trobough: 27:22

What's the worst adaptation that you've watched, then, from either Japanese or Hollywood? What's the worst adaptation that you've watched, then, from either Japanese or Hollywood, it's definitely gotta be.

Brandon Hurles: 27:26

Dragon Ball evolution for sure, yeah, it's gotta be. And you've got Avatar.

Mark Trobough: 27:30

Then you've got the then you got Death Note. You've got. You got two separate Avatar adaptations now.

Brandon Hurles: 27:35

Several Death Note that are all bad. We got an American one and we got the Japanese one. Both are bad.

Mark Trobough: 27:41

You got the Attack on Titan, one which is like the worst CG I've ever seen in my life.

Brandon Hurles: 27:45

That's what I'm saying. They have no budget ever. These Japanese adaptations never have like a budget.

Mark Trobough: 27:51

If they do, it's very low, I mean they don't know how to work within their budget.

Brandon Hurles: 27:54

Attack on Titan. That is one of the worst things I've ever seen in my life.

Mark Trobough: 27:58

Like, even better off just putting a dude in a suit and filming that.

Brandon Hurles: 28:01

That's what I'm saying better they, and they're good at that. They're good at practical effects, but they're never good at cgi, which is crazy because you saw what they did with uh, with uh, what's it?

Mark Trobough: 28:13

uh, minus one that's about to come back in limited theaters I don't think it's my local one, unfortunately in november with extra added length and stuff like that. What they did with a really small I mean granted it probably a bigger budget than some of these adaptations got, but it's still compared to a lot of like hollywood movies, it's like what a 10 million dollar budget and what they did with the limited cg, but what they had to work with it looked amazing. You gotta know what you're doing and work within your budget really well and just have to, you know, essentially play that juggling act and maybe sometimes I think this is an issue I'd be curious to know is CG really saving you time and money or is it just convenient and easy compared to actually doing practical effects?

Brandon Hurles: 28:55

Yeah.

Mark Trobough: 28:57

Could you find a mix there that looks better with limited budget, Because I think practical effects?

Game Junction: 29:03

even if it doesn't look 100% really good CG you can make it look really real but like looks better with limited budget because I think practical effects even if it doesn't look the way 100 like really good cg you can make it look really real.

Mark Trobough: 29:09

But like there's a charm with practical effects from like the 90s to like the 50s.

Brandon Hurles: 29:14

Yeah, it's just different.

Mark Trobough: 29:15

It's like a different thing, um, because sometimes it's people use it as a crutch. I'm like, at the end of the day, it doesn't matter what, what your practical effects look like, like the, the story is going to carry the day, yeah, and then you just need your effects to be at the very least, serviceable to the story so it doesn't look completely like a.

Brandon Hurles: 29:32

C tier movie yeah.

Mark Trobough: 29:34

Like a straight to TV movie.

Brandon Hurles: 29:35

Yeah, no doubt I'm with you. We talked about it before when they announced this these Japanese adaptations just never do good Ever, which is a bummer because they do a lot of stuff good, but for some reason the movie and TV show adaptations are usually pretty dreadful. The best one I think I've seen in a long time was the Rony Kenshin one. I mean legitimately that was.

Mark Trobough: 29:59

There's not a whole lot of CG of any of that movie.

Brandon Hurles: 30:01

Yeah, there's not much CG, so they didn't mess up there I lot of cg of any of that movie.

Mark Trobough: 30:08

Yeah, there's not much cg, so they didn't mess up. Because I mean, could you either we talked about it before? You look at cg today in television movies and you look at what's 10 years ago and it looks like it's kind of gone backwards, like yeah, it's getting lazy with it. Really does.

Brandon Hurles: 30:12

Yeah, I don't know what, what the difference is with. I mean obviously japanese I mean it's more of hollywood and so even hollywood. It's like trained with that CG to really do it right, I think.

Mark Trobough: 30:25

Even if you can, they just don't care to. They're like eh, save money, cut some corners, just chug it out, we don't care.

Brandon Hurles: 30:31

Yeah, there's something going on there.

Mark Trobough: 30:33

I'm not sure you could complain about that literally all day, yeah, no doubt, but I guess staying with Hollywood movies. Doomsday apparently has a date that it's going to start filming, spring of 25, with a 26 release date window.

Brandon Hurles: 30:47

Yes, that's kind of interesting.

Mark Trobough: 30:50

Because this is the one with Dr Doom. Yeah, I believe, right, yeah.

Brandon Hurles: 30:55

Yeah, so it looks like. Yes, so we're going to look at like a year production I mean filming and production, that's what they're saying that seems like a pretty quick I mean filming and production, that's what they're saying that seems like a pretty quick turnaround for movies of this caliber and budget. Like one year, that doesn't seem like enough time.

Mark Trobough: 31:14

If you ask me I assume the filming itself probably isn't going to take more than three months realistically for the actual practical filming and they're probably stuck with just under a year to actually cut it. Do the actual visual effects and stuff like that?

Brandon Hurles: 31:27

because they also noted like a three to four years cycle of working on the movies.

Mark Trobough: 31:32

I thought, but yeah, could be wrong because they gave us a release one for the next two avengers movies. So avengers doom day has a tentative date. I'm gonna say tentative because these dates could change of may 1st 2026 and then avengers secret war, may 7th 2027 it's interesting it says they're not filming them back to back either, like they did infinity war and endgame.

Brandon Hurles: 31:52

So that's definitely interesting that they're not doing it like that. So they're filming them separately.

Mark Trobough: 31:58

So you're probably going to look at again a year for the other movie in production yeah, so you assume it's probably gonna have a film date probably around the same time, spring of 2026. So as this movie's coming out, they're going to start filming the next one.

Brandon Hurles: 32:10

Yeah, it's interesting man. I'm looking forward to watching it. We liked Wolverine Deadpool.

Mark Trobough: 32:18

That's like the last one I saw in theaters. I think I saw Wolverine, deadpool, and then it was Spider-Man no Way Home, I believe, with the last two Marvel movies Before that. Oh man, I think it might have been Winter Soldier, the last movie I saw, the last Marvel movie I watched and actually saw in theaters Way back. Yeah, I think Winter Soldier was the one before those two, which is crazy.

Brandon Hurles: 32:43

That is kind of crazy. When did Winter Soldier come out? No, no, no, it wasn't Winter.

Mark Trobough: 32:45

Soldier was the one before those two, which is crazy. That is kind of crazy. Yeah, I did that. When did Winter Soldier come out? No, no, no, it wasn't Winter Soldier, it was Civil War. Was the movie that I saw I didn't see. Winter War 2016 or something I think around there yeah, it was 2016, so before no Way Home it had been 2016, since I actually watched one, because I watched uh winter soldier, but I didn't watch it in theaters gotcha, that's been a while did you? I mean I watched, I watched civil war.

Mark Trobough: 33:16

Before I watched in game no, I technically watched them infinity war is easily the best one it's what everybody says, but I know a lot of people that after those movies came out they just I'm good, I might watch them, but I didn't care.

Brandon Hurles: 33:34

I haven't watched any other TV series that came out.

Game Junction: 33:37

I do plan on watching Fantastic Four they can never seem to get right.

Mark Trobough: 33:43

A lot of people are like all the superheroes that I care to watch. I've already their story's been told. They're talking to bring up other other superheroes and stuff like that. But I don't care about those superheroes, so I may watch it, we'll see. I'm not like gonna like make time to go out of my way like they did from Iron man to Infinity War.

Brandon Hurles: 33:59

Yeah, I don't know, they kind of lost me there for a while. But it gives me a little hope with Deadpool Wolverine.

Mark Trobough: 34:14

Yeah, yeah, oh, mr Kavi says yeah, I don't really need to see, they did a great job, just ending the three characters. Yeah, yeah, I definitely would agree. But I guess, going back to some game talk, apparently EA is shutting down the PGA Tour January 16th of next year yeah, so this one is Rory McElroy PGA Tour, so I haven't played.

Game Junction: 34:40

This came out 2025, so a single golfing game or sorry, it's shutting is Rory McIlroy PGA Tour. I haven't played this. It came out in 2025.

Mark Trobough: 34:44

That's a single golfing game.

Brandon Hurles: 34:45

Sorry, it's shutting down January 16, 2025. Not sure when it came out. What I found interesting about this myself was they are shutting down the Simpsons Tapout, which is EA. The other thing is they've got an ongoing list that EA is keeping. This isn't even other people. Ea is keeping an ongoing list of all the games that are going to be shut down. They keep it active. So they just got this list of games that are just going to keep shutting down over and over and over. You can find the list on EA's website.

Mark Trobough: 35:19

You know this is crazy. They're saying this game launched July 14th of 2015.

Brandon Hurles: 35:24

Oh, wow, it's got a 10-year life cycle. Yeah, 10 years support.

Mark Trobough: 35:29

That's crazy for a golf game. Then again, to be fair, the only actual golf game I played outside of the Wii games were like the Mario Golf.

Brandon Hurles: 35:35

Yeah, same, those are the only ones I cared about. I still think those are fun too.

Mark Trobough: 35:39

I've never cared for golfing sports games. I mean, that's just me.

Brandon Hurles: 35:44

Wii Sports and Mario. That's where I'm at with golf.

Mark Trobough: 35:47

Oh, don't forget Wii Sports Resort.

Brandon Hurles: 35:49

Wii Sports Resort even better.

Mark Trobough: 35:53

But no, apparently some other stuff. The Day One Xbox Game Pass is getting apparently a co-op game next year, the end of January, so apparently you can play Sniper Elite. Resistance is the one they've got coming out on January 30th. I don't know anything about I played a few of them.

Brandon Hurles: 36:13

I've got two of them on the PS5, I believe, or it might be PS4. Yeah, no, no, that's cool day, one game, january 30th. I'll check it out on me for free. I'll at least try it.

Mark Trobough: 36:27

I usually try it too, if it's of any interest to me oh, are these the games where I pulled it up on Steam real quick? The ones where they have the bullets that do those animations that goes through the body?

Brandon Hurles: 36:38

uh, yeah okay.

Mark Trobough: 36:40

So I think I've seen certain clips of this uh, but I've never actually played the game myself. So yeah, it's developed by rebellion. It's got a launch date of january 30th 2025. Um, I, you can pre-purchase it. Apparently you could. The pre-purchase is 50 bucks, unless you wanted the uh, at least on steam, the deluxe edition with, you know, early access for two days, and that's like 80 bucks, so it's almost double the price interesting, mmm, the deluxe editions ban but I mean it's surprising to see a $50 game release. Yeah.

Mark Trobough: 37:17

I don't know exactly how much content is in this game? Looks like a World War II era sniper.

Brandon Hurles: 37:22

They seem to always be more budget titles. I'm pretty sure they're always cheaper, but they're fun. I mean for what they are. Obviously it's a sniping game, but I think they're pretty fun and especially in short bursts, something you want to throw in and play for 15-20 minutes I think it's pretty fun.

Mark Trobough: 37:42

We laughed Like oh wow, $50 is now a budget title Right, isn't that crazy. Yeah, because I was looking through some of the requirements on PC. As long as you've got a 2060 equivalent or better, you can play the game.

Brandon Hurles: 37:54

Oh, okay, cool.

Mark Trobough: 37:57

Ah man, the day we're starting to see releases where the 10 series is just too old to do anything can't do it, no more time. I picked the right time last year to upgrade for my 1060Ti yeah, you did.

Brandon Hurles: 38:09

You got a.

Mark Trobough: 38:10

What a 4070 yeah it's 4070, which it'll last me for probably six years, like the 10th.

Brandon Hurles: 38:18

I'm not a true gamer.

Mark Trobough: 38:19

I have a 4060 negligible probably it's too old no, I said it's negligible unless you're trying to do like 4k gaming trying to do 4k at 120 8k because, according to the steam, this is for pc gaming. According to the steam hardware surveys that they do, majority of people still play at 1080p and the 1440p is definitely jumped up a lot too.

Mark Trobough: 38:44

It's much more popular than it was, but it's far more accessible for don't play it no, to be able to be able to get the the 1440 uh at like 60 frame, 60 fps. It's far more achievable with hardware and affordable compared to 4k gaming no especially when you have like dlss and the ai upscaling stuff like that.

Mark Trobough: 39:02

Yeah, it makes it because, like, yeah, you get 4k gaming. No, especially when you have like dlss and the ai upscaling stuff like that. Yeah, it makes it because, like, yeah, I get 4k. But the problem is most people don't have the hardware to be able to play at 4k, even at like 30 a stable 30 fps, and at that point you're better off just downgrading and having a higher frame rate because it just, you know, it's a smoother experience sure yeah I think most of what I tend to game is a good sweet spot, and I prefer performance mode in games myself.

Mark Trobough: 39:26

Yeah, so I care I mean you're still a huge yeah, huge nintendo fan and even though that had 4k, the difference between 4k and, you know, essentially 2k, the 1440p, you're not really going to tell because of the art style hides a lot of that stuff. So you just rather have a a smoother experience, even if the the overall graphical fidelity is lower. But that's, nintendo just seems to be fine with that, that mid range of graphical yeah, cause they're going with an art style kind of with the wind waker, that regardless, regardless of where it goes, like it's not never going to look bad. They found, like a it's never going to look bad, they found an art style that just works and regardless it'll always look good.

Brandon Hurles: 40:05

Who knows, maybe in 50 years it won't yeah, I think we both definitely care about performance more than the visuals, but if you're trying to look at something on your character, you gotta have that 4k.

Mark Trobough: 40:19

I see a lot of people do stuff with 4k what's it called the game with eve oh, a stellar blade. So you gotta play that in 4k I mean, I I would pull 4k just to it for it to look nice. Would I've actually played at that, probably, but if you're just going for, below 8k, we're talking if you're just doing stuff on like photo mode. You can max out your graphics because it doesn't matter how crappy your frame rate is, as long as you can take the photo, that's all that matters.

Mark Trobough: 40:49

You see that that one snapshot you stop that you stop that game the whole time you're playing it.

Brandon Hurles: 40:55

Oh, we gotta take a picture right here. Look at this photo wasn't?

Mark Trobough: 40:59

there when I played the game, unfortunately, unfortunately, and I haven't played it. Well, I gotta go back and play it, because they're at the with the new, not Stellar Blade, but the Nier Automata crossover DLC.

Brandon Hurles: 41:13

Which is really interesting. I'll probably pick it back up. I don't think we talked about that.

Mark Trobough: 41:17

I think we mentioned it.

Brandon Hurles: 41:18

I don't know if we know a whole lot about it, other than it's happening at some point well then I thought it was funny the director's like this is happening, but go check out Nier Automata because it's good hey, man, like the grind is really when the game came out in like 2017 the game is so good.

Brandon Hurles: 41:35

I think that game came out around the same time that Breath of the Wild did yeah, it did it might have come out the same year, I mean I I re-bought it on the switch, the whatever edition and like it's good on there, it's good, it's got all the content and it's got extra stuff I own three versions of near automata.

Mark Trobough: 41:53

I've got on switch, I've got it on ps4 and I've got it on pc, on steam, see, I played about that game three times over yeah, I played on ps PS4.

Brandon Hurles: 42:00

I don't have A physical of it, I played it digitally. But when I played it again started on Switch, I was like, oh, this is actually really good, like Switch is probably the worst way to play it, but it's old enough where it can work on that hardware. It wasn't bad For what it is. I played it in handheld and it was like playable.

Mark Trobough: 42:18

I don't think it's that bad because it's not a useless crap on screen for the necessary to render. It's like a Japanese game where they don't put a bunch of particles and stuff, because some of the buildings are just bare bones. But it also makes it easier to render the game pretty far between.

Brandon Hurles: 42:35

like there's a lot of space, you don't have like a hundred enemies on screen at once.

Mark Trobough: 42:38

Technically you kind of have the pop-in, but it does in such a way where it looks kind of natural but they're not rendering out super far, you know, just to help the game run better, but for sure. But I I felt like that when I played it on playstation. So yeah, yeah, definitely yeah, but apparently I guess todd going back to marvel about the fantastic four, uh four steps apparently filmed in the uk. So are they currently filming or did they already finish their filming?

Brandon Hurles: 43:04

They're filming now. As far as I understand, we just got a couple photo teasers, so it shows what the outfit's going to look like and you can see those on X. The outfit looks good, so maybe this has potential to be good. This is a disastrous series when it comes to live action they've got it wrong every time every time. I would love to see them do it right though, because fantastic four is really good. Ip I mean really good marvel characters. I mean you got the thing.

Mark Trobough: 43:33

You got human torch, like classic characters and I've got to ask you this is the first time marvel is touching this because I believe, believe. Sony did at least the first two movies. Are there two or three, because I know you had the original one and then you had Silver Surfer were done by Sony.

Brandon Hurles: 43:49

And then in 2015 you got Fantastic Four is what they called it. Yeah, I know they did a reboot, but I didn't know if.

Mark Trobough: 43:55

Was that like a Sony thing, marvel, was it kind of like a mix between both of them?

Brandon Hurles: 43:59

it was so at that point it was sony, just like the spider spider-man films, uh, the toby mcguire and then the uh ones with uh, whatever his name is yeah, I know they get a lot of crap for the x-men movies I guess x3 probably, you know.

Mark Trobough: 44:14

I mean fair enough, but for somebody that never actually read the comics, doesn't know the source material, I enjoyed at least the first two uh-Men movies.

Brandon Hurles: 44:22

I liked them too. I mean I watched them when they came out. I was young. I thought they were good, so I got a little attachment to them. I mean I got toys from that when they came out. It was like a big deal for me. And my dad liked X-Men too, is this?

Mark Trobough: 44:37

or is that or is it? They can't do the. Was it uh? Is this or is that or is it? They can't do the? Uh. What's the rising phoenix saga? Just seems like the one issue that they struggled to adapt properly. Yeah, does the old animated series fine. Everybody the people that were fans of the source material liked it. But in the live both live action versions, they've tried it I've seen nothing but like negative reception to that specific arc with what's gene gray or something or something like that.

Brandon Hurles: 45:00

Yeah yeah, not sure what the issue is there. There's a lot of quote-unquote bad X-Men films, Like you mentioned.

Mark Trobough: 45:07

X-Men Origins Wolverine Wolverine by far is the worst.

Brandon Hurles: 45:11

Even as a film.

Mark Trobough: 45:12

It's just bad.

Brandon Hurles: 45:14

Yeah, the one that came out a few years ago that went under the radar, that literally nobody watched.

Mark Trobough: 45:19

I can't even remember what it's called I think it's just Wolverine, which I think deals with him in Japan. It starts with him in World War II, which I think got a decent reception. And then it's the one with Old man Logan.

Brandon Hurles: 45:31

Yeah, it's just called Logan.

Mark Trobough: 45:33

Both of those, I thought, got decent receptions, but I think it has more to do with the actor that plays Wolverine than probably the writing, with the actor that plays Wolverine than probably the writing. It's, of course.

Brandon Hurles: 45:44

I'm blanking on his name Hugh Jackman.

Mark Trobough: 45:47

Yeah, hugh Jackman, I couldn't think of his name. I just think Hugh Jackman fits the role so well of Wolverine he does? He can make a six into an eight as far as a rating on a movie.

Game Junction: 45:57

Yeah, he's so good by just his acting, maybe not all the time, but he's just a really good act.

Mark Trobough: 46:06

He just fits that character so well.

Brandon Hurles: 46:06

Don't like him in any of the musicals he's done, but I just don't like musicals. So, yeah, he's definitely done some different characters for sure it was like la miserere, or? Something like that, some french musical, so my parents loved it I'm like I can't watch.

Brandon Hurles: 46:16

That came out when I worked at blockbuster. It was like the big movie for the week. I'm like, oh my God, this is. I took it home to watch it a couple days before it came out. I was like I can't do it. I just can't watch this. Did you ever? Watch the Pokemon musical. Have you ever watched it on YouTube or anything?

Mark Trobough: 46:36

I didn't know that was a thing.

Brandon Hurles: 46:37

Yeah, looking up, since I was pretty rough man.

Mark Trobough: 46:43

I mean a thing, yeah, yeah, looking up, since I was pretty rough man, I mean we're going off on that tangent with movies, but I think there's only actually one musical that I didn't uh, viscerally hate, and that is the sound of music.

Brandon Hurles: 46:51

It's probably the only musical that I can actually stand to actually watch. You can kind of say the wizard of oz is too, which I like.

Mark Trobough: 46:56

It's pretty much a musical the stage play is and I guess the uh, the stage play they turn into a movie is a musical. The original movie I don't think was a musical from like the 50s or something like that.

Brandon Hurles: 47:07

I've never seen the other movies, I've only seen the original.

Mark Trobough: 47:10

I watched it once, didn't care for it, but I don't think it was a musical, but I just don't care for the story.

Brandon Hurles: 47:14

Yeah, they do a lot of singing in it maybe it is, I don't know no.

Mark Trobough: 47:19

I think you're right. It is a musical.

Brandon Hurles: 47:21

You're talking about a movie I haven't watched, but I didn't even know it was a musical for like a long time, until somebody pointed it out to me. I'm like oh yeah, you're right, it is a musical. I guess there is one I like.

Mark Trobough: 47:31

Naruto, the musical is also another one. Oh god, is that an actual movie?

Brandon Hurles: 47:35

I'm sure it is because we were looking last. There's Bleach stage plays.

Mark Trobough: 47:41

I do know Japan has one but I think that's just like a I don't know how well those stage plays turn out to adaptations. I guess by its nature it has to be a musical, or stages are always musicals.

Brandon Hurles: 47:51

The whole category. That do you remember? We talked about it might I think it was off the podcast, but there's a whole category in Japan of musicals where it's all females only, so every character is a female and there's a bunch of series Rony Kenshin. That's why we brought it up. But also, what else was there? One Piece, all female.

Mark Trobough: 48:11

Hashtag Yuri apparently.

Brandon Hurles: 48:14

Yes, I don't know what to do. It's like a whole category where it's just all straight up females, even if it's a main character.

Mark Trobough: 48:22

You got Femme Naruko, let's go. I know you put this in here about some Bernie Sanders on Twitch.

Brandon Hurles: 48:34

I think I saw this.

Mark Trobough: 48:36

I didn't, I didn't care for it. I don't think it's funny though. Oh yeah, because it's a pokey main in Sayoko to Twitch streamers. I don't watch. But I don't know, I don't think it's funny though. Oh yeah, because it's Pokimane and Sayuko, two Twitch streamers. I don't watch.

Brandon Hurles: 48:45

I don't know, I don't even know who they are.

Mark Trobough: 48:46

It surprised me.

Brandon Hurles: 48:47

I just thought it was interesting. Bernie Sanders was on Twitch, that's all.

Mark Trobough: 48:55

Oh my God, I don't bring it up. This is Game Junction. I'll talk to you after the fact, but no, got some leaks about the Daredevil born again. A lot of Marvel stuff coming out. This is Marvel right.

Brandon Hurles: 49:15

Yeah, it's kind of interesting, huh.

Mark Trobough: 49:16

This is like what a Netflix series I don't know how well it was originally a Netflix series and all the Netflix MCU got cancelled.

Brandon Hurles: 49:22

I don't know how well. So it was a Netflix series and all the Netflix MCU got canceled. I don't know if you remember that, but they canceled them all at the same time and now they're bringing this guy back from that Netflix. I mean, he already came back in Deadpool Wolverine, Did he? Yeah? Didn't he show an appearance in that? Or was it the oh yeah?

Mark Trobough: 49:41

I watched it. Didn't he show an appearance in that, or was it the uh? Yeah, he showed his eyes in it, right? I watched the movie back in july so, like some of the finer details, I remember the three main one with uh, with blade, it's uh. One of the one of the x-men, the the juggler or whatever it is, it's uh gambit yeah, yeah, it's gambit. Uh, the, what's the? The samurai chick from early Marvel it was terrible from 2006, or something like that. You know what I'm talking about oh Elektra.

Mark Trobough: 50:07

Yeah, they had Elektra. I remember some of those characters being in it, but I don't remember Deadpool, and he showed up at the end, or I just missed him.

Brandon Hurles: 50:14

I thought he made an appearance, but I could be wrong.

Mark Trobough: 50:18

I probably just might be forgetting.

Brandon Hurles: 50:19

It's been a while since we watched the movie, right, but I mean, no, the whole trailer leaked there and it looks pretty good. I loved the Daredevil Netflix series. I thought it was fantastic. I loved the whole thing. It was like a mystery. It was kind of like a crime slash obviously action show. Like he works at an attorney's office and that's his day job. There was a lot of crime stuff that was going on. It was kind of like boots on the ground sort of Marvel. It was a different type of Marvel. It pretty much ignored the rest of the universe. It was kind of like its own thing. Until he teamed up with what was the other character that got a Netflix series? I cannot remember what his name is, but yeah, I mean it looks. It looks cool. I'm glad to see him back. He's. He's definitely the best daredevil that we've had in live action.

Mark Trobough: 51:13

Yeah, cause it didn't wasn't the first daredevil a movie. Originally yeah With a bit Cause, yeah, with uh, was that like I? Because I was, I don't feel like I was. You know, middle school, high school, and that came out. Do you know if that was received well or good or bad? Because he's like the only daredevil I actually remember I don't think it was received well.

Brandon Hurles: 51:29

I liked it for what it was, uh, but it definitely wasn't a good like great movie by any means, and lecture got a movie too, and it was really bad, like really bad. Yeah, I remember like just yeah, no, nothing about it, but like this just looks bad it was a really bad movie and obviously it's supposed to tie in the daredevil, since there's such close characters.

Mark Trobough: 51:48

Um, but yeah rough no, that's always funny, but no as far as the. The latest game to get a ps5 pro upgrade, helldivers 2, unsurprisingly announced that hey, it's, it's getting an upgrade.

Mark Trobough: 52:03

Off the list of what 20 30 games at this point that are getting upgrades though I don't know I'd be curious to see an actual side by side on the actual hardware of like, how much of an actual upgrade are we gonna see like we're at the points where you're getting diminishing terms, where you have to play in person because of it, in person because you're streaming, watching the video.

Brandon Hurles: 52:24

So how are you going to make that comparison?

Mark Trobough: 52:26

Well, either you're going to have to stream 120 frames per second, or whatever it is. Either it's going to be image-to-image type thing or you watch a YouTube video where they just record the hardware.

Brandon Hurles: 52:36

You can't over a YouTube video. When you've got compressed video, you can't see. I feel like we're at that point where you have to see it in person now.

Mark Trobough: 52:43

But that also feels like it's such a negligible upgrade, though I mean it's obviously an enthusiast console.

Brandon Hurles: 52:50

You've got to really love PlayStation or be like you know. Got all the hardware. You've got a nice 4K 120 TV with VRR and HDMI 2.1.

Mark Trobough: 52:59

My TV doesn't have HDR and it's not 4K. I think it's 1440p at best, probably realistically.

Brandon Hurles: 53:04

Your TV. It's 1440p. I've never heard of that before.

Mark Trobough: 53:07

I've had this TV since probably 2017, so I don't even know it's 4K.

Brandon Hurles: 53:11

I've got all that except they don't have VRR. That's the only thing I don't have, which I can't check off all the boxes on the Xbox, which is frustrating.

Mark Trobough: 53:19

My computer displays have HDR, but my TV doesn't have HDR. But my displays are so much newer, it's like a year old. Yeah, 1440p monitor same time I was going to say it was easier for the PS4 Pro upgrade because we kind of talked about it before. It was the same price for the Pro. They lowered the original PS4. At that point it's like the pro is worth it. If you're buying, you're in the market for if you don't have a ps4 yeah, but with how expensive the ps5 pro is going to be much more.

Mark Trobough: 53:47

I don't even know if it would be worth it, unless you're just that enthusiast or you're already in the market for a console. So what's an extra 100 200 dollars that you haven't yet to spend?

Brandon Hurles: 53:56

it's gonna be a hard one to justify a lot of people buying and upgrading to it. You've got to have the right equipment anyway. You've got to have a display that can even handle all this. If you don't have the display which? Isn't cheap you're wasting your money. You can't even take advantage of what's going on there. You're going to get minor, real minor upgrades if you can't even see what the upgrades are on your display.

Mark Trobough: 54:21

So I'm like oh, what is this? The equivalent of going from maybe a slight upgrade on your gpu, a few extra cores, and then you're going from like what? A 3070? To a 4070. So like, yeah, you can see an increase, but like it's probably going to be negligible, especially if your display can only do so much. Yeah, but I I guess at this point you'd have to wait and see. I don't trust the critics they're just shills that are getting a paycheck. But actual people's reviews that have played both and can say, hey, these are my thoughts on playing the original version of this game and the pro upgrade. Is it even worth the money to upgrade or are you just fine with the original?

Brandon Hurles: 54:56

The biggest thing is obviously the DLSS. That's going to be the big thing, but we talked about this. They have to make these games work on the base PS5 too, so your upgrade is going to be negligible.

Mark Trobough: 55:09

They're getting developed for the PS5. Like we just recently got games only developed for the current Gen Con, like the PS5.

Brandon Hurles: 55:15

Right, it just started. I mean we're still getting some releases.

Mark Trobough: 55:17

That are getting ps4 releases too still yeah, there's a lot of games like essentially they're getting developed for both, which means their core has to be the four they're developing it for the four and then it's being poured over to the five with a little bit more, you know, or it's the same game on both. It's just better. Hardware can just display it a lot better which means it's essentially the same game obviously means you're not getting the ps5.

Mark Trobough: 55:38

Really, you know which is why I think they're announcing the these pros specifically because it means they have to do some kind of porting and upgrading. That's specific to this hardware. Yeah, you know, I'm just kind of curious, but I mean only time will tell.

Brandon Hurles: 55:52

I mean we got like roughly 30 games. That launch was pretty good.

Mark Trobough: 55:55

If you ask me like I would have expected to be like 70 games or something to be fair, they're pretty much all like first party or playstation exclusives, because I know stellar blade is another one and that's essentially, you know, a playstation exclusive. I don't think the this sony doesn't own the studio, if I'm not mystery or misremembering but it's exclusive to it.

Mark Trobough: 56:13

So you're getting like big titles that are exclusive to this, that are getting it, but are you gonna see a lot of third parties gonna even waste their time with it and be like it's just? Not worth our time. It's not worth the money that we're going to get on the install base.

Brandon Hurles: 56:24

Isn't there for it, right, like they're not going to, you got to get that install base there.

Mark Trobough: 56:31

So but yeah, I mean talking of the, I guess the PS5, there's a report that came down from Insider Gaming dot com that, uh, disc edition of the ps5 makes up 82 of all ps5 console sales, which is insanely high. If we're talking about them wanting to go to digital, the amount of people that like want the disc drive because you're paying extra, I'll say this if you, even if you have any physical media for the ps4 or you want to buy a movie, because a lot of people, the way they're watching movies, if they're not streaming it, it's still through a console- yeah it's just an easy way to plug in, uh like a blu-ray or dvd or something like that yeah so there's like it's still the the double-edged sword, because, yeah, you might stream most of it, but you still may have physical that you want to go back and watch.

Mark Trobough: 57:16

Yeah you might buy one or two physicals a year 82.

Brandon Hurles: 57:19

That's huge. I mean that's a huge amount of people still buying no physical and we just got with this happening. I guess I'm going to bring it up because it's we just got word that series x officially passed the series s, which is a digital only console. So the same on the xbox side, sales for the series x are higher than the Series S, which is a physical console.

Mark Trobough: 57:43

So it's physical versus digital deal there so this was reported over on by Matt Piscotel over on. He posted it on Blue Sky, the massive thread but it said 40% of PS5 hardware unit sales in September came from the digital console. And they said digital consoles now compromise 18% of total life-to-date unit sales with ps5 hardware. I don't know if we have actual numbers for the hardware, but like, if that's true, that not even 20 of what you're selling is digital, like yeah, can you even go all digital? Is there going to be a pushback? Because it clearly shows that there's an option most people want the, the disk drive and I mean so you're gonna either force people to go to the all physical, or you continue to do this, this physical, uh digital split.

Mark Trobough: 58:27

But, like I, if this is true, I'm curious about how much pushback there would be, say, the next gen's digital only like, would you have enough of an outcry at at launch? That forces them back to the drawing board. Delay the launch, release a physical as well, and I'm curious if that would actually happen? I'm very curious Because, like the PS, probably another three, four years away from an actual announcement for next-gen hardware. I think we're three to four years tops, because what this has been out for what four?

Brandon Hurles: 58:52

years now.

Mark Trobough: 58:53

Because it's launched in 2020 in the fall.

Brandon Hurles: 58:55

Yeah, November 2020.

Mark Trobough: 58:58

So we're on the almost at exactly four years.

Brandon Hurles: 59:02

This is curious.

Mark Trobough: 59:02

I think most people would assume the digital would be closer to like 50-50, 60-40.

Brandon Hurles: 59:08

Right, and most people actually would probably expect it to be higher. But the one problem is there is one problem with that too is that you couldn't find the digital consoles when people couldn't find PS5s. You never saw the digital. It was so rare when it came out. You never saw the black box ever.

Mark Trobough: 59:27

You think that was done on purpose. They know they made more of the physical than the digital, but the way the sales sound is oh, more people are buying the digital. That was some intentional manipulation on Stoney's part. Obviously they wanted to be they were trying to by having less sales at artificial scarcity, trying to make it look like that's the popularity, until somebody actually comes out and says actually, most people want the physical, because the digital wasn't even a thought in my head.

Brandon Hurles: 59:55

it's like it's physical or nothing I mean it makes sense with buying used games and things like that. Like you know, I still buy a lot of used games and I want to be able to have that option and you have the option to sell it if you don't want it anymore.

Mark Trobough: 1:00:07

So, like you, get some money back too but you throw this onto what California was doing. I think it's led into probably what some of the, at least in the U S, the FTC, the federal trade commission uh with them, With them forcing to say you can't, if you're buying it digital, you have to on the store page say, hey, this is a, you're not buying the game, you're getting a license to the game. Yeah, Like you think that will have a negative impact on the digital sales moving forward, the more people truly understand, like essentially, they can revoke access to this TV show, this movie, this game at any time. And if you spent 60 bucks and they take it away, you know you're so well, you sign the agreement.

Brandon Hurles: 1:00:42

Yeah, I think it's pretty much I think if people get aware of the situation, it's made aware like on a bigger scale, because a lot of people don't know or understand that still, um, I think people would have a pushback at that point when they realize, oh I, I don't own it. When I've got these 500 digital games, I don't own any of these.

Mark Trobough: 1:01:02

Um, yeah, and I'm curious like are most people buying these, the games digital? Do people split um? I feel that's another curious because some people could get the physical but they might still buy most of their games digitally. So there's a a weird little crossover there there is and I think the digital sales overall for the game. The software is higher, so is this just a thing where people want they like the multimedia access of it for games, old games, movies and other stuff. But people just want the option to go physical or digital.

Brandon Hurles: 1:01:30

Yeah, I feel like it is just having the option there. Like you know, if they find a PS5 game in a yard sale, they can play it.

Mark Trobough: 1:01:38

There's no yard sale, or it's used. Maybe you're not buying it new, but hey, you wait and it's 50 bucks used or something like that, or 60 or something like that.

Brandon Hurles: 1:01:44

It's it's worth the money to go by a lot of times. Physical ends up being cheaper, you know, and the longer like if you're, if you're willing to wait.

Mark Trobough: 1:01:51

If you don't buy a game at launch, eventually it's going to be on sale, unless it's a nintendo title yeah, you wait, I mean that's like, that's what a lot of people in the PC community do. It's like well, my backlog is so big. This new game two years later it's on sale. I get it for like 20 bucks.

Brandon Hurles: 1:02:04

Right. So like, why are you buying it 80 bucks at launch? When it comes to digital, yeah, it's always going to end up going on sale. That's the thing.

Mark Trobough: 1:02:13

That is an interesting take, because outside of Nintendo games which just wait a year or two years. You can get it super cheap, like a fraction, like a quarter of what it launched as Assuming it's not a game, because it's kind of how it is for me, unless it's like a handful of games that I absolutely do want to play at launch. There's no, I can wait to get the game later and. I can get it like half off or something like that.

Brandon Hurles: 1:02:36

I feel like that drives a lot of people.

Mark Trobough: 1:02:39

Yeah, I think so good there yeah, I thought it did not want to come out, but we had some news. I know you were unable to get into the Nintendo play test, but apparently it goes live and there's issues with people leaking stuff and then Nintendo's banhammer kicking people out yeah, what would you think about this? This is why are they doing it?

Mark Trobough: 1:03:08

you knew this was gonna happen because people want clout, like oh, here's this new thing, not thinking about the long term, but nintendo had to known something, this was gonna happen. So they have to be like ready to pull the trigger like a moment's notice and then kick people, find the people that are the bad actors and then kick them out now before you release something that's like, so you essentially have them play test essentially non-spoiler stuff or stuff people don't care about to find the people that are going to. You know, yeah, but I assume even with this, what you're going to have access to is going to be extremely limited, because Nintendo knows, you know, the risk of a leak is extremely high if you give the public access to anything.

Brandon Hurles: 1:03:45

I guess what we don't know is what it's for, though we have no idea.

Mark Trobough: 1:03:48

It's just this random kind of it feels like a hardware, Probably hardware software testing and maybe certain games Like here's a small little section to a game we're not going to tell you that you can play.

Brandon Hurles: 1:04:01

Yeah, because it's like a no-name. There's nothing on the. You know what I mean. It's like a no name. There's nothing on this. You know what I mean?

Mark Trobough: 1:04:07

It's like kind of a blank play test. They're going to give you a blank. You could be playing part of a new Zelda game but you're not going to know that because they're going to strip so much away from it that they don't want you to see. Or they'll give you access to an area but it's non-spoilery so you can play congestion. So server congestion, yeah, that would be nice. More server hardware upgrades and stuff like that.

Brandon Hurles: 1:04:31

Yeah, I think it's got to be. So they're testing that. I think it's 10,000, maybe Right around there, which should be more than enough.

Mark Trobough: 1:04:40

Everyone's hopping on one server, testing one game at one time that could work in theory, trying to test their current infrastructure with this. You know deal with dinner, uh, different internet accesses because how people access it from, or different. You know server points, you know certain amount of lag, different types of hardware that they have with the switch, as well as you know the hardware that the internet connection is going through to test. I guess I don't know enough to. Really I could be completely wrong on that, probably completely am, but it's a possibility outside of just server congestion.

Brandon Hurles: 1:05:11

Yeah, that's all I can really think of, but it'd be interesting to see what this turns out to be. I feel like it's probably like an MMO or something like that, where it's like it's very server heavy. So they're definitely testing that. It's something along those lines yeah, so they.

Mark Trobough: 1:05:29

When I was reading through this um ig and article they did mention something about you know, uh, the gameplay showed some bizarre third-person mmo. They say something like a between a minecraft and a dragon quest builders. But that's probably a super stripped down down game and maybe, by the nature, they want a bunch of people in one area that they can control. So you know it needs to be server based anyways. Yeah, but is it actually an MMO or is it just how they want people to interact with certain stuff?

Brandon Hurles: 1:05:55

it's hard to say. Like you said, it could be the next Zelda game. Like we have no idea, it could be a Pokemon MMO for all we know Zelda MMO.

Mark Trobough: 1:06:01

I don't know how that would work.

Brandon Hurles: 1:06:02

I don't know how that would work. I don't know how that would work either, but could you see a Pokemon MMO? That would be so sick.

Mark Trobough: 1:06:06

I could see that, as far as like Nintendo IPs, that'd be like the one that would make the most sense.

Brandon Hurles: 1:06:11

First, yeah, for sure, for sure.

Mark Trobough: 1:06:17

Yeah, I don't know if you've had the chance. I know I think this got shared out on the socials over on Twitter, but there was an announcement for the PS5 that the Monster Hunter Wilds is getting a Japan's getting an exclusive DualSense and a PS5 cover coming in February 28th with Monster Hunter Wilds in Japan, which I saw, and it looks amazing at least the DualSense and I wish this was coming out in the US, or I hope maybe it still does. I don't, and it looks amazing At least the DualSense and I wish this was coming out in the US, or I hope maybe it still does.

Brandon Hurles: 1:06:50

I don't see it leaving Japan, but I'm going to try to get it. Either way, I'll import it.

Mark Trobough: 1:06:55

Yeah, so the actual tower it's just like a small. It's like a black covering with a small logo, but on the actual controller it's essentially a red controller with stuff on the sides and on the touchpad it looks amazing yeah, it really looks good.

Mark Trobough: 1:07:08

I was shocked to see it, it's so cool yeah, and then they're saying what the for the, for the dual sense, it's the retail price, the msrp tax included. In japan it's 12 480 yen. I need now. It's just probably close to like what? 100 bucks, yeah. So what's it? 1240. So it's about 81. Oh, if you did that exact conversion today, it'd be $81.95. You know, right around the actual a little bit more expensive than the retail.

Brandon Hurles: 1:07:43

But the cover is retail in Japan. The cover is like, it's like minimal, but it's just like sleep, like it looks good yeah, I just want the controller really.

Mark Trobough: 1:07:52

No, I'm with you, I want the controller too. I think it's really really cool but I was like, of course, japan any. Anytime you get something cool and official, it's like this is staying in the Japanese market.

Brandon Hurles: 1:08:03

This ain't coming out here, dog.

Mark Trobough: 1:08:08

Man, yeah, it comes out that Friday. Yeah, there's a bunch of stuff. So there I was trying to figure out. So yeah, there's a bunch of package stuff for the covers, but yeah, it looks like the covers may be just shy. It's either cover the look, no, no, the games, like not in a 9900 yen. I don't know, I was trying to figure out the actual price. Oh, here it is, yeah, so the price for the?

Mark Trobough: 1:08:35

actual cover itself is 9980 yen okay. I gotta pull up the calculator that says about $65,. Okay, for just the shell on the outside. Yeah.

Brandon Hurles: 1:08:52

Yeah, it's cool, I want that controller though. Do you think there's a chance we might be able to import it from like PlayZ or something?

Mark Trobough: 1:09:00

Maybe the problem is is this like a limited time, like pre-order thing?

Brandon Hurles: 1:09:06

If it is, you're kind.

Mark Trobough: 1:09:07

If it's like that, you're probably screwed. You're going to have to buy it on eBay for like $200.

Brandon Hurles: 1:09:12

Yeah, that wouldn't be cool.

Mark Trobough: 1:09:14

It's like you have to go to an online store. That's pretty much impossible for you. Yeah, because there's a lot of stuff like if you buy something digital like this in Japan, they might want a Japanese address or something like that, which means, if you buy something digital like this in japan, they might want, like, a japanese like address. Like that, which means, if you don't live in japan, you can't actually buy it because there's certain like restrictions and stuff in the way.

Brandon Hurles: 1:09:31

We need some more like play asia to be able to carry it, but I don't know if it's going to be limited.

Mark Trobough: 1:09:35

I mean, they might something like that yeah, I don't know if they get a hold of it. They can like pre-order some and yeah, I guess that's the only thing is this going to be? Because I know it is a limited edition. But you know, a limited edition could just mean we're going to sell this for X amount of time. I don't know if that's going to be like we're only making like 500 of these. Yeah, yeah, apparently, yeah, apparently, they said the reservations for the product product begins on the 30th at PlayStation retailers and e-commerce sites nationwide in Japan. So nice, I guess. Check it in there and see if it'll let you put in a U S address or something like that. Yeah, but yeah, that was definitely cool.

Brandon Hurles: 1:10:15

It looks like we also got Morgan Luigi. Brothership has already leaked, yeah.

Mark Trobough: 1:10:21

This was early this week, I think.

Brandon Hurles: 1:10:23

Yeah, yeah, like Monday or something like that I saw about it.

Mark Trobough: 1:10:26

It was like really early in the week.

Brandon Hurles: 1:10:27

It comes out the 7th of November, so that's kind of crazy man. It's the earliest Switch title of the week. Now they just keep leaking. All of the new stuff has been leaking. But they're sending these to retailers way too quick, because there was somebody that posted a picture about a week ago of a box full of them in his hands. He's like, look what I got. Like why are the retailers getting it? That's the problem.

Mark Trobough: 1:10:51

Well, because they have a stock and stuff like that. Yeah, the problem is it's your fault.

Brandon Hurles: 1:10:56

The problem is it gets to certain retailers at a different time.

Mark Trobough: 1:10:59

Not every retailer is going to get it the same day. I think the problem is the retailer is not, you know, just allowing people to, just to grab stuff and take it.

Brandon Hurles: 1:11:10

See, they need to do something about the problem because it just keeps happening over and over and over. I feel like they shouldn't get them that early, Like there's no reason they need to have this more than two days earlier than the street.

Mark Trobough: 1:11:20

I mean technically. There is a way you could probably to some degree prevent this, but it requires you to.

Brandon Hurles: 1:11:26

I mean, all you gotta do is have the car dump it.

Mark Trobough: 1:11:29

I mean that's it well, no, that's the problem. Like you could force the game to have to talk to a server until it unlocks, but that also creates other problems as far as access to the physical game yeah, like that's the only way they could do that, but long term it's not accessible unless it just needs the whole initial internet connection. But obviously people are going to complain because well, if I don't have an internet connection I can't play the game, because it needs to talk to unlock this code.

Brandon Hurles: 1:11:54

For Switch. I think it's even more important than the other consoles, because it is a portable console.

Mark Trobough: 1:12:00

I don't know how early retailers get in games is normal though. Like a week or two weeks feels like it's like a normal time.

Brandon Hurles: 1:12:08

About three weeks early, if I saw the picture about a week ago, so that's like three weeks before the launch date. There's no reason for that Three weeks almost a month. You know that's. It's kind of their fault If you you're sending them out so dang early, that's I guess they gotta do something right, because they're all leaking now try to work it.

Mark Trobough: 1:12:29

So they only get it a week or two or like about a week or so.

Brandon Hurles: 1:12:30

I don't think they need one or two days earlier, like but I'm on, that's hard because hey, what if it delayed?

Mark Trobough: 1:12:36

yeah, I know, I know. So you need them to have it in time, just in case there's any issues. And by the nature of of shipping, certain stores are going to get it before others. There's just no way around that Stores along the coast are going to get it in the US before central US does, depending on shipping routes and stuff like that. Just by its nature you need that time, but you're getting it too early or the retailers themselves just don't care.

Brandon Hurles: 1:13:02

Well, they obviously don't care, because people are getting their hands on it. Yeah, crazy, are you picking this one? Well, they obviously don't care, because people are getting their hands on it. So, yeah, crazy are you gonna. Are you picking this one up? They're good rpgs they're good rpgs.

Mark Trobough: 1:13:17

I've got so many games I bought in the last year that I've not played a whole lot of time on, so I'm probably not gonna get this. I'll probably pick it up later down the road, hopefully on sale, but but at launch See that's sketchy.

Brandon Hurles: 1:13:28

I don't believe you. I think if you don't buy it now, you won't buy it at all.

Mark Trobough: 1:13:32

You have to buy it at launch, it's just messing.

Brandon Hurles: 1:13:36

I'm definitely grabbing it, though I already got it pre-ordered on Amazon. I'm super hyped for it.

Mark Trobough: 1:13:46

Yeah, but about the same time this launched. There's the same issue about a hacker getting access to I can't remember the actual site, but access to a bunch of game freak stuff as far as all their projects are working on, but it was also this was this came out earlier in the day, though that hacker claims they won't leak any pokemon, scarlet and violent info.

Brandon Hurles: 1:14:00

Uh, as well as uh, fearful leaking nintendo switch to info or will this get taken down?

Mark Trobough: 1:14:07

This was posted on the Gamer seven hours ago.

Brandon Hurles: 1:14:10

No, I'm talking about this podcast.

Mark Trobough: 1:14:11

I don't think anybody cares. I'm not talking about anything specifically. It's just the hacker saying he's not going to release this information.

Brandon Hurles: 1:14:19

Yeah, but it was I'm going to steal it, but I won't release it.

Mark Trobough: 1:14:22

One of the things they said about potential in--game events. But I think the other issue is this person seems to have got access to your stuff but, like, if I release anything, you know damn well, nintendo and their lawyers are going to come down on you with the hammer even now they find out who you are, they will be looking for you no, there's got to be like right now working on this, like there's a guy clearly seems to not be stupid.

Mark Trobough: 1:14:47

I'm not going to release this stuff because it just gives them more ammunition to come after me.

Brandon Hurles: 1:14:51

How are the leaks? How do we keep seeing new video and images almost every single day from the leak If he's not releasing anything?

Mark Trobough: 1:15:01

Well, he said Pokemon, scarlet information and then information that could potentially be about the Nintendo Switch 2. Gotcha, those were the two specific things, but from what I understand, he hacked into some server-based information, for Game Freak, specifically, was the one that had the leak. It wasn't Nintendo, this was a Game Freak hack, but obviously Game Freak has probably information. So obviously Scarlet and Violet ongoing games and the Nintendo Switch about to be launched, at very least you know that would be far more harmful to both nintendo and probably this person once they find out who it is yeah, I know I mean you know if they do it's, it's gonna be.

Mark Trobough: 1:15:37

You know the other thing is, if you start leaking too much, not only is it you already have a a target on your back, but where you release stuff. The more you put stuff out there on the internet, the more it probably becomes easier for different sites to to track you and stuff like that, depending on because I don't, I don't know if we know where this, uh, this hacker even is from. You know might be different, maybe from our country, that's not as bad. But this hacker, say, is based in japan. 100. They find out who you are, you're, you're screwed oh yeah, 100.

Brandon Hurles: 1:16:04

I mean, this is not going to be good for the person that did this. I feel like it's a matter of time until they find out. They've got to have an investigation team on this now.

Mark Trobough: 1:16:13

I guess it depends. Is this an internal issue, or is this person actually got access from the outside, and how well did they cover their tracks?

Brandon Hurles: 1:16:21

I mean, this is a huge leak.

Mark Trobough: 1:16:22

I think it's in one terabyte of data or something like that yeah, it was a lot because there was some potentially some sort of access like source code and stuff like that, like how do you, how do you release that? How do you release that information without really putting a target on your back and nintendo immediately ban hammer on anything that comes out about?

Brandon Hurles: 1:16:41

saying how you hide. You can't really hide from. Nintendo always finds out this stuff. They always do.

Mark Trobough: 1:16:49

Yeah, I mean you might find out about stuff that was cancelled and stuff like that or some other stuff. Regardless of the actual information of the league itself. This just feels like a huge problem for Game Freak and Nintendo as well.

Brandon Hurles: 1:17:00

Yeah, both of them. You know the Switch 2 name is in there somewhere too. You know what it's just going to be in the codes.

Mark Trobough: 1:17:06

I mean all these games. Some games they're probably working on are going to come to that. I just imagine Scarlet and Vi are going to come to the Switch 2. I guess now does this cause issues internally for Nintendo as far as do they delay certain things? Do they now want to speed up their timetable to try to get ahead of potential leaks as far as like switch to and other like pokemon games are concerned? Because when I understand there were the za pokemon za information was also part of that leak as well which is yeah, can we saw, I saw actual video of it yeah, so now do you?

Mark Trobough: 1:17:36

do you need to come out earlier than you? Then you wanted to? Do you stick to your timetable, I think?

Brandon Hurles: 1:17:42

do you get ahead?

Mark Trobough: 1:17:43

and be like okay, you want to like this game. Well, we're going to push this back here.

Brandon Hurles: 1:17:46

I feel like it's already out there. You got to just hold to your day. I mean, I don't want to rush game. I want the game to be finished because it definitely didn't look like.

Mark Trobough: 1:17:54

No, maybe not a maybe not a rush game, but you rush the announcement to try to get ahead of any potential leaks. Say for like the switch to show us more. At this point Do you rush up your original timetable, not the actual release date save for a console or game, but your original announcement timetable has to get changed because you're afraid of too much information getting leaked and essentially ruining the announcement that you want to have happen.

Brandon Hurles: 1:18:18

Give us a new trailer with actual gameplay footage.

Mark Trobough: 1:18:21

I don't know how much information was out there as far as what was leaked, what was accessed through this hack.

Brandon Hurles: 1:18:28

Quite a bit. I saw video, I saw images um I well I did.

Mark Trobough: 1:18:33

I do my best to avoid seeing stuff like this. I don't like I don't go out of my way to look for it, unless I just kind of accidentally stumble into it, but yeah, it just seems like a huge, huge problem. It's like one of the big things that came out this week earlier this week was this hack and you're like all these early game leaks and now this like yeah, you'll have a huge problem right now no, no doubt.

Mark Trobough: 1:18:56

I mean yeah, crazy yeah, but I yeah there was some stuff about this. I didn't get a whole chance to look into it, uh, but obviously there was some information released. As far as the the switch to, did you hear anything about that?

Brandon Hurles: 1:19:11

I actually haven't heard about any switch to stuff this week. I mean, I know we talked about I did.

Mark Trobough: 1:19:18

I didn't see this right away. Like I said, I didn't.

Brandon Hurles: 1:19:21

I was trying to avoid a lot of it and I was like oh, lot of it and I was like I didn't realize this all got leaked. Yeah, it looks like randomly random 67 on the family boards, uh, and a hidden.

Mark Trobough: 1:19:30

There's the other problem with these leaks is how much of this can you actually tell? Are people just starting to be like, oh, someone hacked this?

Brandon Hurles: 1:19:35

let me just be sensational and say hey, this is a leak yeah, yeah, it's always a possibility people want the clout for a minute, so his name's getting out we just read it off we've been hearing this for months now about leaks, for hey, this is when they're going to do this one.

Mark Trobough: 1:19:50

This is what do those?

Mark Trobough: 1:19:50

some stuff's right, some stuff has been blatantly wrong I know it feels like every week there's something different I think this, this also gives uh room for some people just to come out, start saying stuff and you're like, well, now this is harder to trust and verify, because who knows what this hack like, how much information you've gotten, what what people are saying is actually true, what is it false? Like does this person have a good track record and they're just playing the cloud game or do they actually know? You know what? What's actually going on? I know what's going on, yeah, yeah, because that randomly random said uh have access to shipping records from this is v switch manufacturer HVBG. They said you know, some of the key components were HDMI port testers, circuit boards, what he said, something called a game console external connection device, which means nothing to me. So of course, it's going to be like what are we doing?

Brandon Hurles: 1:20:45

Some yeah, I just I don't know what to do.

Mark Trobough: 1:20:51

Some information got, they're saying, leaked, but how much of this can you trust? So it's even more of an issue of people just saying stuff on the internet.

Brandon Hurles: 1:20:57

Right. Yeah, it's hard to tell, I mean, what's legit and what's not at this point.

Mark Trobough: 1:21:05

Yeah, I guess the best thing you can do is just stay off social media, close your eyes until you hear an announcement like hey, two days, here's this announcement.

Brandon Hurles: 1:21:11

You did mention before the podcast. You're kind of surprised that they haven't announced anything yet.

Mark Trobough: 1:21:18

Yeah, because I thought we heard decent stuff about something in October which would make sense based off of what the Switch did yeah, Now we're about to go into. You know, pretty since. Based off of what the switch did yeah, now we're about to go into.

Brandon Hurles: 1:21:28

You know pretty much going into november with no. I feel like we're going to finally get the now like the actual confirmation when it's for sale, all that stuff in november.

Mark Trobough: 1:21:35

I guess they technically said, sometime between, like what, october and like march. Yeah, they could just announce it in that window, but, like you'd seem to like, there's no way they're gonna wait till like next year to announce this.

Game Junction: 1:21:46

There's no way it's november, no way it's coming out like late, unless it's the.

Mark Trobough: 1:21:51

The release window is always later than we thought and it actually is like a september console release window, which then means they're gonna wait till like what? Quarter one, quarter two to actually announce it no which would drive everybody insane.

Brandon Hurles: 1:22:02

Next fall release that is so late. If that's, if we don't, if that's the case that'll make nine years, or I mean that'll make eight years If they don't announce it.

Mark Trobough: 1:22:11

I think if they don't this is just me. I think if they don't announce it before Thanksgiving, it means it's not coming out until after until fall next year.

Mark Trobough: 1:22:20

Yeah, I mean it's gotta be before the holidays, right, I think it has to be, because once you get to holiday season, well, you don't want to take any attention away from anything else you're doing. Yeah, some game releases. You're trying to like maximize what's already out there. You want to keep the switch keeps on. Because you come out right before holiday season, well, it's probably going to negatively impact your sales, so the closer you get, it's kind of a weird balancing act you have to make, but only time will tell. I'll figure out anything else, I guess, before we get into some of the main headline news, is there anything else you wanted to bring up?

Brandon Hurles: 1:23:01

Go follow us on social media. We're on Facebook X, TikTok, Instagram, all that jazz. If you're listening on the audio, there should be links in the description on all platforms, so definitely give a follow over there. I'm posting stuff every day.

Mark Trobough: 1:23:19

Oh yeah, it's definitely some good stuff, I guess going right into it. I don't know what to feel about this because it's Ubisoft, but apparently they're saying Beyond Good and Evil 2 is still in development. I feel like it's been development for years at this point, it's been development to hell. At this point, I don't even know I don't trust this game with Ubisoft. That's my problem.

Brandon Hurles: 1:23:42

Usually they're bad. I mean, if it takes this long, how many years? 12 years, it says. It was first teased. I was a 3 2008.

Mark Trobough: 1:23:49

Oh my god, that is like so what's 12? Years 14 yeah it's crazy yeah, that's. I was in high school when this game was announced.

Brandon Hurles: 1:23:58

I know it's crazy. They said that still in development. It recently passed an internal milestone, with positive feedback, whatever that means. So that was their confirmation to us. Yes, it's still in development. We passed a milestone, got positive feedback Like what does that even mean? How many engines?

Mark Trobough: 1:24:17

this game has gone through this is. We need to stop the bleeding somehow. Let's just hey, this game is doing good. We're shifting focus onto this game because we need, you know, not bad publicity.

Brandon Hurles: 1:24:28

Because this is one I actually want to play. I loved Beyond Good and Evil. I loved it.

Mark Trobough: 1:24:36

A 20-year gap. Can you trust this game at this point?

Brandon Hurles: 1:24:38

I don't think you can. It's restarted development like three times it has to.

Mark Trobough: 1:24:42

Outside of the ungodly long development time. Uh, I feel like you trust ubisoft at this point, because ubisoft is where they were in 2008, where they are now completely different companies. Yeah, dude?

Brandon Hurles: 1:24:52

no, absolutely not. I don't trust them, no way. One of the work I mean they're they're worse than ea. Now, who would have thought that you can get worse than ea?

Mark Trobough: 1:25:02

it was the first to do it they were the first.

Brandon Hurles: 1:25:04

They were the trailblazer for bad companies. They were rated worst company like three years or something, three different years Like worst company overall in the world. I can't believe it, like they. Whatever that thing is that rates companies, what's that called?

Mark Trobough: 1:25:20

The Better Business Bureau.

Brandon Hurles: 1:25:21

Yeah, so it was rated worst company like three years by Better Business Bureau. That's crazy.

Mark Trobough: 1:25:29

That is crazy.

Brandon Hurles: 1:25:30

Yeah.

Mark Trobough: 1:25:31

When did the first game come out?

Brandon Hurles: 1:25:33

Oh God Like.

Mark Trobough: 1:25:36

I'm trying to figure out the original 2003.

Brandon Hurles: 1:25:41

Okay, 2003.

Mark Trobough: 1:25:42

November 11th 2003. This came out on the GameCube. Yeah, yeah, it's a great game. Gamecube, PS3, Windows 360. Oh my God, that's so many consoles.

Brandon Hurles: 1:25:55

Yeah, I know that's crazy, and we haven't gotten a single other game in this year.

Mark Trobough: 1:26:00

That's essentially like a lifetime ago.

Brandon Hurles: 1:26:02

I know.

Mark Trobough: 1:26:03

That's what it feels like. That's nuts. Oh yeah, that was 21 years ago. That's wild 21 years between games. People that were born when this game came out are able to drink, or about to be able to legally drink in the US. Now it's crazy, isn't?

Brandon Hurles: 1:26:20

that nuts. That's so much time in between games 2008 already feels like a long time.

Mark Trobough: 1:26:25

Yeah, wild it has that's so much time in between games 2008 already feels like a long time.

Brandon Hurles: 1:26:27

Yeah, yeah.

Mark Trobough: 1:26:29

Wild. Yes, yes, it has been remastered a couple of times. But like what does that mean? If you're not getting a new game, you're just getting a remaster.

Brandon Hurles: 1:26:37

That doesn't do anything for me.

Mark Trobough: 1:26:40

Well, you go back to the original launch date. It just sounds so much better than saying oh, launch date. It just sounds so much better than saying oh yeah, I got a 20th anniversary like a few years ago or like earlier this year, something like that wild. No, yeah, because if it turns 21 this year, yeah, I got its 20th anniversary like a year ago or earlier this year yep wild blows my mind.

Mark Trobough: 1:27:01

Yeah no, my ubisoft is, ubisoft is just is SOL. We did get some leaks about the second Detective Pikachu movie. I still haven't watched the first one to be honest oh wow, you haven't no, I haven't oh my gosh, you gotta watch it.

Brandon Hurles: 1:27:18

It's really good.

Mark Trobough: 1:27:19

I heard good things about it.

Brandon Hurles: 1:27:21

I played pretty much every Pokemon game at this point outside of the spin offs, but there's a second Detective Pikachu game that came out on Switch, so it makes sense for there to be a second movie.

Mark Trobough: 1:27:30

You've got more story now to work off of. Was the first game even that good?

Brandon Hurles: 1:27:35

I enjoyed it. I thought it was fun. I haven't played the second one yet.

Mark Trobough: 1:27:39

There were two Pokemon spinoff games I played. One was a pinball game.

Brandon Hurles: 1:27:41

I'm pretty sure, and the other was going back to 2003. I'm pretty sure yeah, and the other was, you know, going back to like two thousand.

Game Junction: 1:27:56

Mystery dungeon is mystery dungeon. Okay, so I came out on the DS in GBA that was like what?

Brandon Hurles: 1:27:59

2005 maybe? Yeah, something like that. Yeah, I don't want spin-offs, is not even funny. Pokemon trot see Pokemon puzzle League. Oh my goodness, there's so freakin many.

Mark Trobough: 1:28:09

Obviously the Pokemon Ranger games, pokemon Conquest, which was a strategy RPG yeah, so Blue Rescue Team slash Red Rescue Team, which was the GB8DS thing, came out November of 2005 yeah, I love those games.

Brandon Hurles: 1:28:22

Did you get the one on Switch, the Mystery Dungeon? That's like the remake of those two games. I didn't know the.

Mark Trobough: 1:28:26

DX one. Yeah, the Mystery Dungeon. That's like the remake of those two games. I did know the DX one, I didn't it's good I should be able to still find a copy around here yeah, it's worth grabbing, I would say.

Brandon Hurles: 1:28:36

It's one that keeps going out of print, by the way, so it's going to hold value. They keep not printing the game anymore, so like you can't find it in big box retail stores, there were four other ones that I didn't even know or didn't bother.

Mark Trobough: 1:28:50

So what? 2009, you had Explorers of the Sky and Adventure Squad. 2012 you had Gates to Infinity and then in 2015, you had the Super Mystery Dungeon played them all. I've only played. Super Mystery Dungeon, sorry 2007 you had the Explorers of Time and Darkness, but I've only played Super Master Red. 2007 you had the Explorers of Time and Darkness, but I've only played the original Red and Blue. I think I had both games at one point really I had Blue. I think I've got one of them somewhere.

Brandon Hurles: 1:29:18

A lot of people love Red Rescue Team, though I mean they're essentially the same game because you have them put on both ends the original GBA.

Mark Trobough: 1:29:27

It just works better with the map system on the second screen.

Brandon Hurles: 1:29:31

Yeah, for a game like that where you're going through the dungeon, it kind of sucks to have to keep clicking start.

Mark Trobough: 1:29:36

So the DS version is just going to be better because it's actually using both screens.

Brandon Hurles: 1:29:39

Yeah, it really feels like it was made for that, honestly.

Mark Trobough: 1:29:43

I think it was and that honestly I think it was, and then like, oh, let's just try the two game thing, and then I don't think it worked out the way they thought it would. So either that was like the hype right around just after the high of the of the pokemon craze and stuff like that yeah, so they're probably still trying to adapt their spinoff games where they realize we can't really do these multiple copies on spinoffs they're just not gonna, you know, do as well. Yeah, just because most people care about the mainline games and stuff but I guess, what did you know about this leak for this Pokemon, detective Pikachu?

Brandon Hurles: 1:30:14

I mean just what I saw on here. So it looks like the first one came out in 2019. Um says it may have revealed Detective Pikachu 2's title, which would be, uh, have revealed Detective Pikachu 2's title, which would be the Great Detective Pikachu, and it's said to have been in development since 2021. It looks like the director of Kong Skull Island is working on it. Yeah, and that looks like that's what we know. So the Great Detective Pikachu apparently is what it's called, not Detective Pikachu 2. Apparentlyachu apparently is what it's called, and not detective pikachu too. So apparently 2021 is when it started. So I mean we're in 2024. It's three years.

Mark Trobough: 1:30:53

Seems like quite a bit of time, yeah yeah, like if you're working on it, it would make sense to expect something around the corner. Something should be coming anytime if it's gonna happen yeah, sorry, so I suppose the most of are you good, I got a new what's it a new? Amd Ryzen 7, 9800, x, 3d that's terrible names, by the way was.

Brandon Hurles: 1:31:21

I don't use AMD Ryzen, I use Intel personally, but apparently it's got decently high clock speeds for 4.7 to 5.2. Power dropped 120 watts for this.

Mark Trobough: 1:31:34

That's a lot of power for this.

Brandon Hurles: 1:31:36

Well, this one, the one I have, the T14.

Mark Trobough: 1:31:38

Do you know if this clock speed is like this 4.7 to 5.2? Is that standard or is that the overclock speeds? Do you know?

Brandon Hurles: 1:31:45

know, I think it's overclocked.

Mark Trobough: 1:31:46

Let me look on here it sounds like it'd be really high for like base yeah, it's pretty sure it'd be insane yeah, but at 121, like that's a lot of power, that's like maybe it's not 120 watts, I mean this draws 140, mine does the yeah, it may not be as bad. I'm sitting here. I mean it still sounds like it's a lot of energy to be fair, but like I mean the intel.

Brandon Hurles: 1:32:09

The i9 14th gen draws so much power. It's unreal like it. It is absolutely unreal. I'm pretty sure it's 140 watts of the intel okay I know it's, I guess it's bad.

Mark Trobough: 1:32:25

That's a big oh my god. You're like. Oh no, actually it's not bad, because the one that I have, the i7 140, it's 147k base power, 125 watts, but with max turbo power or if you overclock it and pull up to 253 watts yeah, so which I 100% can do for mine, because I think I don't think I have a like. I got like an 850 power supply.

Brandon Hurles: 1:32:51

Yeah, yeah, I think I got the one 14th gen, 125 watts and it can go up to 253 watts. It says and this thing runs hot pretty often Still feels like a lot of power.

Mark Trobough: 1:33:02

My 14th gen one, super hot Granted, the first one that I got didn't even last a month before it just crapped the bed. I had to send it back in and get it replaced. Because that's the problem with the newer CPUs At least, when they first came out they had reliability problems Because all of a sudden, overnight I lost half my cores just stopped working, which means I essentially couldn't play games without drawing it down, which means overall you're just losing quality. You can't process much stuff does this?

Brandon Hurles: 1:33:34

uh, do the Ryzen ones mean anything to you at all, or are you playing the old stuff with Intel? I don't know enough about.

Mark Trobough: 1:33:39

I've never used Ryzen. I've always used Nvidia and Intel as far as my, my PC goes, so I just don't necessarily know the equivalent. I'm not Linus over here, I can't just rattle stuff off left and right.

Brandon Hurles: 1:33:50

I thought you were Linus, I thought you were Mark. Tech Tips.

Mark Trobough: 1:33:54

Isn't that right? I've never worked with hardware that much. I do watch a lot of Linus Tech Tips because I think he's a helpful channel.

Brandon Hurles: 1:34:01

I think he's decent. We got Mark's Tech Tips coming up next, but we got Mark's tech tips coming up next.

Mark Trobough: 1:34:05

Yeah, yeah, I wouldn't, I wouldn't recommend it. I, because I don't even deal with overclocking, so like I'm not really sure what decent overclocking speed is yeah, I just don't clock either I don't care to put that much strain on something. I need to last several years between upgrades, at least five to six years between upgrades, yeah, so like why? Why risk it for a marginable uh, marginable, marginable, marginal, uh, you know, processing important uh performance and graphical fidelity and stuff like that.

Mark Trobough: 1:34:35

It's just not it's not worth it to me for the extra wear and tear on the hardware.

Brandon Hurles: 1:34:38

That's what she said, giggity. All right, so alright.

Mark Trobough: 1:34:45

So it looks like the last thing we got is about the Donkey Kong stuff yeah, well, last thing, there's something else I wanted to pull after the fact, but we can go with that. I didn't see it until, like you know, a few minutes ago okay.

Brandon Hurles: 1:34:56

So we got leaked concept art. Uh, it reveals canceled Donkey Kong game from Vicarious Vision. So this is this is it's a rumor? Um, I don't know how believable it is, but I did see it pop up on x. And then there's an article here on game rant about it, uh, but it says it's alleged art um, that leaked online, sparking speculation. Vicarious vision was supposedly working on open world donkey kong game, co-named donkey kong freedom. Uh, the rumor game was scrapped around 2016 due to shifting focus to crash bandicoot insane trilogy so do we know?

Brandon Hurles: 1:35:33

if this came out this would have come out before after tropical freeze, then 2016 tropical freeze was done by 2014, so it would have been after yeah, so I guess that was the plan.

Mark Trobough: 1:35:44

I don't know. Maybe they just didn't did not sell as well. They just wanted to do something different with the studio, maybe, or yeah, I really don't know um there's like a studio decided to switch different games because I don't think Nintendo no, crash Bandicoot is what a Sony IP no, sony doesn't own Crash Bandicoot. It's come on a bunch of Nintendo consoles. So it's just a third party IP then. Okay, yeah, it's just a third-party IP then?

Brandon Hurles: 1:36:06

Yeah, it was just known for being a Nintendo exclusive back in the day.

Mark Trobough: 1:36:13

Obviously, we're finally getting Tropical Freezes on the Switch, isn't it?

Brandon Hurles: 1:36:19

Yeah, I got brought to.

Mark Trobough: 1:36:20

Switch. That's what I thought.

Brandon Hurles: 1:36:21

Yeah, because obviously we have the Donkey Kong Country Returns coming to the Switch.

Mark Trobough: 1:36:25

Yeah, in what January?

Brandon Hurles: 1:36:31

Yeah, January 2016. Have you played Returns?

Mark Trobough: 1:36:34

It's really good. The last legit time I played a Donkey Kong game it was on the SNES.

Brandon Hurles: 1:36:39

Oh, wow.

Mark Trobough: 1:36:41

Was it Returns on the SNES?

Brandon Hurles: 1:36:43

No Returns was on Wii 64.

Mark Trobough: 1:36:46

Oh, absolutely not, then.

Brandon Hurles: 1:36:47

Oh yeah, it's really bad.

Mark Trobough: 1:36:49

It was one of the side-schooler games. It wouldn't have been 64 and it obviously wouldn't have been GameCube, so it had to have been the SNES. The last time I legit actually put any time in to a Donkey Kong game.

Brandon Hurles: 1:36:59

Wow, that's been a long time, then, for you.

Mark Trobough: 1:37:01

I never really got into the Donkey Kong IP. Is it the original one? Is it just? Donkey Kong Country, then yeah, I think it's the only one that I've actually played. Then is the OG Donkey Kong Country. So, you didn't even play Country 2 and 3? I don't know, were those on?

Brandon Hurles: 1:37:17

the SNES, or were those on?

Mark Trobough: 1:37:19

I may have played those Because it has a very unique art style. Did this use the Super super effects card? On this nest? Does it had a unique?

Mark Trobough: 1:37:29

it had the same uh, yoshi's, was it yoshi story? Kind of art style to it that shimmered, clayish like sort of I remember I remember yoshi's island had that same kind of art style it had like a storybook sort of art style where it was yeah, but there was some stuff where, like some of the jungle stuff, it looked very similar to some of the Donkey Kong Country assets and it may have been reused.

Brandon Hurles: 1:37:52

It could have been yeah.

Mark Trobough: 1:37:54

So I mean, I guess technically the Donkey Kong games could have been on the 64, because Yoshi's Story was essentially a side score on the 64 and it played just fine.

Brandon Hurles: 1:38:02

Yeah, you know, returns and Tropical Freeze are both really, really fun. I highly recommend them, since Returns to Come to Switch is a perfect opportunity to check them out. They're like 10 out of 10 platformers. They're just absolutely perfect. Very perfected platformers, very fun. Really recommend them. If you like side-scrolling games at all, I feel like they're must-plays.

Mark Trobough: 1:38:26

Do we know know? Are any Donkey Kong games on Nintendo Switch online?

Brandon Hurles: 1:38:30

yeah, I think Donkey Kong Country 1, 2 and 3 are, I believe, and I think is Donkey Kong Land from Game Boy on there too.

Mark Trobough: 1:38:39

I was trying to find an actual nothing reliable felt like was coming up. I was trying to verify what was on there. Well, Nintendo's, what I'm pulling from Nintendo's reliable felt like was coming up. I was trying to verify what was on there. Well, Nintendo's, what I'm pulling from Nintendo is just hey, buy these games. It's what Tropical Freeze, Marvel, Donkey Kong and then the HD games was popping up when I was searching it, so I didn't know if it was on the NSO or not. Yeah, no, never mind.

Mark Trobough: 1:39:03

So yeah, country 1, 2, and 3 for the SNES are on there, and I guess the NES games as well, gotcha. So nothing past the SNES games.

Brandon Hurles: 1:39:12

Okay, yeah, 64 is not on there yet. I can't wait for them to add 64 on there.

Mark Trobough: 1:39:22

You think? They're going to let you get around to doing that.

Brandon Hurles: 1:39:24

I hope so. I guess I'll go ahead and say Banjo-Tooie is officially on there now, so you can play that yeah it is. So it feels like it's the right time for them to add it.

Mark Trobough: 1:39:33

So they've got both Rare games on there now.

Brandon Hurles: 1:39:36

Yeah, both.

Mark Trobough: 1:39:36

Banjo-Tooie.

Brandon Hurles: 1:39:37

So there's absolutely zero reason they can't bring 64 to Switch Online.

Mark Trobough: 1:39:42

Maybe they're just kind of waiting. I mean it would make sense around the maybe december, something like that around the donkey kong country returns. Put another one on there yeah it's like just just kind of keep the hype alive for the new game yeah yeah, it essentially comes out right after the new year, like a like two weeks after the new year, on the 16th right.

Brandon Hurles: 1:40:00

So yeah, I think it's.

Mark Trobough: 1:40:02

It's about time uh, but I guess this other thing and I kind of put in the notes for you that I saw this came down earlier today early afternoon Apparently the Video Game History Foundation lost their the DMCA decision. Apparently they won't grant exemptions for researchers as far as emulation goes. So the US Copyright Office has declined to grant a new exemption to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act that would allow libraries and archives to offer remote digital access to out-of-market games for verified researchers, which seems really disappointing.

Mark Trobough: 1:40:46

Yeah, that is very disappointing, because this was very specific because I get it so technically under copyright. For however many years there's, technically, they're still under copyright. But this is for a mixture of research. This is this is a way to to preserve games. Yeah, because some of these sure have a chance to come back. A lot of these games don't know without stuff like without legal stuff like this have a highly to come back. A lot of these games without legal stuff like this have a highly chance of just disappearing forever. Right.

Mark Trobough: 1:41:10

And it's sad that we can't get exemptions for certain people on stuff like this, the fact that these old farts in government don't care about game preservation because they obviously don't play these games.

Brandon Hurles: 1:41:21

They just don't care. Yeah, I mean, it's as simple as that. They literally do not care. They have no stake in the game, they don't play them, they're not interested To them. It is not like a film where it should be preserved. They're preserving films but they aren't preserving games. Another medium Doesn't make any sense.

Mark Trobough: 1:41:39

Yeah, but apparently the Video Game History Foundation came out and said we're not done fighting here. We will continue our advocacy for greater access and legal allowances for video game preservation and working with members of the game industry to increase internal awareness around these issues. We encourage members of the game industry who are disappointed by the Copyright Office's decision to ask their leadership to push for greater support for the work of libraries and archives within their industry. Because, I get it, the problem is for a lot of these games and nintendo is has a real problem with this as well as you're never going to really make money back on these old games that you've had. They've lived their life cycle, they've made their money. Even if you repackage it and resell it, it's just at best it'll make a fraction of what it originally sold for.

Mark Trobough: 1:42:23

But but the fact that so many people are more concerned with well, I guess we don't know because this is a copyright office but the fact that there's just a lack of game preservation, which means you can have the same issue with old media as far as, like TV shows and especially movies, is some of this older stuff, you know, if it's not properly protected by the community, it's just going to be lost forever and you're always going to have that library. Because a lot of the same issue with film. A lot of old films nobody cared to preserve, nobody thought about it, they just wrote it, they corroded, they got lost, they got thrown in the trash. I mean, who knows what happened to them?

Mark Trobough: 1:42:57

right, exactly, yep but I, I just saw this a little while while we're going I'm like, oh no, this absolutely needs to be brought up. Yeah, no, I, I didn't even know this was a thing going on neither I didn't realize that this was going on.

Brandon Hurles: 1:43:09

Right now it looks like um published last year, revealing that only 13 of classic video games published in the us are currently in release. 87 are currently unavailable.

Mark Trobough: 1:43:20

That is like most of the games I wonder how many of these games have been like, how many of these games are forever lost, how many of these games you have to emulate because the source code is just lost forever, like you'd have to rebuild this game from the ground up and it would never be the same as the original because the hardware is pretty much just lost. I mean, essentially, for a lot of these really early titles, emulation is going to be eventually the only way to play it outside of, because just recreating the hardware is just viably not a financially worth endeavor, unless you're making it in-house to just preserve games essentially. But I mean you talk about Nintendo got caught using emulation at their own museum for some of their games.

Brandon Hurles: 1:43:57

Yeah, I know they're emulating Wii games. Isn't that wild. They're actually emulating Wii games on the Switch.

Mark Trobough: 1:44:03

It's financially not viable to go back and reproduce old hardware that they probably don't even have anymore. That's crazy, they're emulating their own, so it's like we know they can do Wii.

Brandon Hurles: 1:44:12

We know it's being emulated by Nintendo.

Mark Trobough: 1:44:15

Nintendo didn't think long-term about it. So they might have, you know, some hardware, but not enough to where we could run this. But if it breaks, we've got no legit way of fixing it without spending way too much money on new parts to just sit there for a museum. For them it's financially just not viable.

Brandon Hurles: 1:44:30

I mean, these companies don't want this to happen, because they want to be able to repackage these over and over and over and sell them to you, but they're not doing it 87% of them are gone.

Mark Trobough: 1:44:42

Yeah, but I think that number is viable. This 87%, that's because those games will never be marketably viable again.

Brandon Hurles: 1:44:47

Most of those games will never be marketably viable again.

Mark Trobough: 1:44:48

Most of those games weren't marketable when they came out, they were probably lost money yeah, no, I mean it's crazy.

Mark Trobough: 1:44:53

I mean it's so much history of a medium that is just going bye-bye yeah, and I'm glad they're going to keep fighting for this because, at the very least because I'm not saying people aren't preserving these games, but in a very, in a legal sense where you can legally like, hey for sure, we can have access to these games in such a way, at least, at the very least, that they're preserved. How people could potentially play them, that's up in the air, but as long as the game is preserved, you always have have a way to get around to access in it.

Mark Trobough: 1:45:21

Eventually you can deal with the legal issues or you have to really say, hey, you go to a library and at least play the game there, which should be like you know what? 80% of these games are probably trash to begin with, Like let's, let's be real. A lot of games are just not good, but they still deserve to be preserved for for history's sake.

Brandon Hurles: 1:45:37

Yeah, they definitely should be for sure.

Mark Trobough: 1:45:41

Yeah, but I don't know if anything else you wanted to bring up. I just thought this was. I'm glad I caught this cause it's worthwhile, for sure.

Brandon Hurles: 1:45:45

I'm glad they're they're going to continue fighting on that. Um, I don't. I don't have anything else for the week, so I think we pretty much covered everything. Um, yeah, I guess. Be sure to follow us on social media again. Um.

Mark Trobough: 1:46:02

I guess. Uh, yeah, definitely follow our socials because we have what two Halloween specials coming out. So the one for this one will be prerecorded and then we'll be doing a live one for the Anime Junction cast. But everything's going to the times, locations, everything will be obviously finalized on the socials, but that should be published, you know, by this weekend, by Saturday, sunday, as far as time, and obviously where to catch, probably going to be on the same locations, well, at least the twitch, for sure yeah.

Mark Trobough: 1:46:27

I guess we'll figure out like what YouTube's we want to actually stream stuff to and some of the other platforms. But yeah, have some good Halloween stuff at the very least coming out. But yeah, wherever you're watching this, listen to this, leave a good review, like, subscribe, follow us, give us some comments.

Brandon Hurles: 1:46:41

Definitely appreciate every support that everybody gives us every week yep, definitely appreciate all the support and we'll be back again, of course. As every week, friday, 8 pm Eastern Standard Time, we're live on Twitch, youtube, tiktok and all that jazz, so we'll see you all again next week. Have a good one everyone, Peace out everybody.