Deep Space and Dragons
Follow the Nerd duo of Richard and Karl as we explore what grabs our attention each week on Deep Space and Dragons. Submit your random question of the week or dragon question to win your free E-copy of the Waltz of Blades Deluxe. Like what your ears see? Support us by clicking the little heart on the top right <3
Deep Space and Dragons
From Classics to Bonanza: Exploring the Donkey Kong Legacy
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We take a nostalgic deep dive into the Donkey Kong franchise, ranking games from the classic Country series to the upcoming Bonanza, while exploring what makes them stand out from other platformers.
• Karl shares his experience watching the live-action How to Train Your Dragon, comparing it to the original animated film
• Richard has been researching JRPGs by sampling classics like Final Fantasy 1 and other PlayStation 2 era games
• We debate why Donkey Kong 64 was critically acclaimed but seemingly led to a decade-long hiatus for 3D DK games
• Diddy Kong Racing had features that Mario Kart has taken years to implement, yet never achieved the same success
• Retro Studios revitalized the franchise with Country Returns and Tropical Freeze, delivering some of the best platformers ever
• The upcoming Donkey Kong Bonanza for Switch 2 promises destructible environments and seems built on the Mario Odyssey engine
• We provide recommendations for shows, manga, and games that excel at worldbuilding, including Fullmetal Alchemist and Chrono Trigger
Check out our second podcast where we play Daggerheart, just Google "Richard and Karl play Daggerheart."
Follow all things Richard and Karl, and check out "The Minuet of Sorcery"
https://linktr.ee/rajkevis
Hello and welcome to Richard and Carl Presents Deep Space and Dragons. I contemplating, doing a bit where I said I was Carl this week but we would mess it up. So I'm Richard.
Speaker 2:And I am Carl, carl Good old Walking Dead reference right there. I don't even like the Walking Dead, but you know.
Speaker 1:I could have liked the Walking Dead, but it kept going and never ended, which I'm told is the point. But no matter how elaborate metaphor you're being, that was still bad. Like when someone tells me the point of the media was it was supposed to be bad. I'd be like congratulations, you made something bad that doesn't retroactively make it good.
Speaker 2:No, it does not.
Speaker 1:So happy Canada Day. What's new with you?
Speaker 2:Well, I guess, first things first, my obligatory mini movie review.
Speaker 1:Stopwatch has started. I'm going to drain this, since it didn't sponsor us. Just generic orange-flavored soda WotC mini review. Alright, stopwatch has started. I'm going to drain this, since it didn't sponsor us. Just generic orange flavored soda WotC mini review Dance class Well.
Speaker 2:How to Turn your Dragon. The live action version.
Speaker 1:Okay, I'm actually deeply invested in how that turned out, because the original oh, such a good movie.
Speaker 2:Oh, so good. The original is a really good movie. Uh, the remake uh is actually done by the same director and I almost feel like it's the movie he wanted to make the first time around. Um, well, almost like uh, oh.
Speaker 1:Toothless end up? Did Hiccup end up surrendering Toothless to Child Protective Services at the end?
Speaker 2:No, no, no, it's almost a shot for shot remake. They managed to add about 20 minutes of content, but that 20 minutes of content was basically giving every single character that has a line of dialogue and a few that don't uh more depth. So it's like every every character is more well-written. Um, the pacing is about the same. I don't know. I kind of feel like maybe the pacing is a little bit better in the original, but, um, all in all uh, you can tell that the original director uh is still very passionate about the project uh, and I think he's hoping to go forward uh into uh making the sequels uh, because they did a lot more focus on uh hiccup's mom and how she was like killed by dragons, probably worse, and I've never seen.
Speaker 2:And I've never seen the second. I've never seen the second one, but apparently Hiccup's mom shows up as a dragon rider in the second one, so that could be like a little bit of a teaser for them. Redoing the sequel. Okay. So, all in all, I think objectively, the remake was probably actually a better movie because, like I say, it's the same movie but every single character has more depth it's kind of funny, like my instinct was to preemptively hate this.
Speaker 2:But it's not Disney my only thing is and this has been a problem with all the remakes like the remake leaned in more to the gritty realism of being live action, which is that's the strength of being live action over being animated. But that does also mean that it's less fun. It is a really good movie and I think it's really going to hit its target audience. And Toothless and all the other dragons are the character models are spot on, uh, and it's still going to resonate with with little children. But there's way fewer quips and jokes. It's less colorful, um, and then, besides that, it's. It's basically the same movie, so it's. It was a solid movie in the first place. Basically the same movie, so it was a solid movie in the first place. It's made by people who were passionate about the original movie and they did a good job adapting it to live action Probably one of the best live action adaptations I've seen. But still, maybe it's nostalgia, but I prefer the original because it's a little more fun.
Speaker 1:What's kind of funny is like the classic who Is this For debate? Where it's like more fun. What's kind of funny is like the classic who is this for debate? Where it's like if this movie came out and the original didn't exist, it'd probably be my favorite movie of all time. Still, right, like the concept of Viking finds and befriends dragons.
Speaker 1:It hits a spiritual speed spot for me, right, and it's like it's just my own mortality because it's been long enough that, yeah, making a new one because the old one is aging. I think if I didn't have nostalgia vision, it's not like the original was made in 4k, right, like the idea of like, oh, we're just going to redo it and update it for the new generation is fair game. But I think I've given this speech on this podcast before and it's kind of not really a hot take, more like the center of a hot pocket where it might be cold, it might be hot, who knows, don't know, until you bite into it. Take right, right is that I think the worse the original was, the better it is to adapt.
Speaker 2:So it's like the live action full metal alchemist failed right, but that's because the the source material was 10 out of 10. No notes like right. How can you actually improve on?
Speaker 1:right and live action avatar failed. You know what was actually such a good liveaction remake that no one even noticed it was a live-action remake the first Transformers movie, because G1 Transformers was bad, yeah. So when they're like, rewrote 90% of it and Transformers stands, try to be like the OSJ is stupid. It'd be like the Oster's stupid. It's like watch Transformers, the animated movie from the 80s, and watch the first Michael Bay movie. I'm sorry, but the Michael Bay one is in fact a better movie. Is it a good movie? Hard to say.
Speaker 1:But like there is a lot. They had a lot more freedom to do whatever they wanted. Like oh, we're going to put some Marines in the desert fighting a robot scorpion. And it's like, yeah, the original had a scene where a conservation mask doesn't exist and the main villain turned into a gun to be held by the sidekick to be shot, while they fired energy beams to turn gasoline into fuel cubes. Like yeah, you could just throw a lot of that out and be fine. And it's like it's a weird thing where it's like to throw compliment and shade at Batman, kind of. Is that the Dark Knight was? Like, yeah, I'm just gonna adapt random chunks of Batman All of them do that. But Batman's comics as a general rule aren't that good and it's like when you adapt to the good ones you're going to have some problems, because if they tried to do Batman Year One, which they really did with Robert Pattinson's newish Batman movie- it was less good than Batman.
Speaker 3:Year One, the animated one Batman Year One was so good.
Speaker 1:And I'm like, yeah, because he tried to adapt something good and then decided to make the Riddler a VTuber. Like what are you doing? The Riddler wasn't even supposed to. Like, just do the gangsters. You don't need a supervillain in a Batman movie. If you're doing Batman year one, I agree. So how to Train His Dragon is weird because that movie has no reason to exist. But it's also good.
Speaker 1:Now, if you adapt something that was bad the first time, you kind of give it a reason for your adaptation to it. One Piece is my favorite example. The One Piece adaptation is good. One Piece's first two seasons were not good. Come at me, the entire world, they weren't. If you sit down and watch the first 50 episodes of one piece which is 12 episodes of netflix and tell me it's good, you can tell me there's good moments. I believe you if you tell me the sanji leg thing is a good moment. There's also 40 minutes of usopp yelling into town at bell-peppered hair kid that the butler is evil, while PVNG slide across the screen. Don't tell me it's good. I was there.
Speaker 2:So that's my video. The other thing that's new with me I actually I have have. Hopefully this won't take too long to go through my story here, but see Before you tell me the story.
Speaker 1:I'm going to ask an honest question and you have to answer me honestly, or else you get a stress point. Okay, Is the topic you're about to dive into worthy of being an entire episode, because it's such an unhinged story?
Speaker 2:no, no, I mean it is unhinged, but it's not worthy of being an entire episode, unless you want to talk about vampires kind of.
Speaker 1:But all right, I'll put a pin in that we'll see where this goes, because our original topic could get thrown out, depending where you go with this. No, no no See.
Speaker 2:Last year in the wintertime I came across some vampires that were migrating north for the winter. I, like you do, I mean you know why would you not want to spend the winter in the Arctic as a vampire, where it's night, all like, for like six months of the year? That sounds perfect.
Speaker 1:That would be wild. So we have a pact about just yes, anding each other, but our podcast hasn't had that in effect up until this moment.
Speaker 2:But please continue I do battle with, with these vampires, uh and uh, I fend them off, uh, but apparently, apparently, one of them cursed my spleen and so I got a condition called ITP.
Speaker 1:That was the best segue of all time and I'm sorry I interrupted it. Please continue.
Speaker 2:I don't know what ITP stands for, but the gist of it is that my spleen is magically transporting my platelets to this vampire so they can recover from our battle. It's such a oh man.
Speaker 1:You know I'll go into the what's new with me after this, but I'm just going to make some mental notes as you continue.
Speaker 2:But anyways, apparently this vampire magic was quite strong because the medicine I'm on, prednisone it wasn't working effectively enough and they actually had to give me a shot of some stronger medicine. And then I was back on the prednisone and then they're like that's still not working effectively enough. So they gave me a different medicine and now they think the second medicine, michael Fenolate not to be confused with michael phelps I thought it he was not my medicine.
Speaker 1:That is immediately what I thought. I just want you to know this well, I actually.
Speaker 2:I went to, uh, the the pharmacist and I was asking him about getting refills for the michael phenolate, uh, and he also thought I said michael, but he wasn't sure what the last name was, um, and I was like no, that that's my medication, my colphenolate, my colphenolate, anyway, but the prednisone, I was initially taking 75 milligrams, which is one and a half pills once a day, so I literally had to take a knife and cut one of the pills in half every day.
Speaker 1:Why.
Speaker 2:But so now, since the prednisone, or since the Michael Fennellite is doing his job, they're weaning me off the prednisone, because if you take prednisone for too long it'll damage your magic circuits and that's not good.
Speaker 1:The weird compartmentalization going on here is beautiful.
Speaker 2:But the prednisone tastes awful. I thought it was because I had to cut it in half. But instead of taking one and a half pills once a day, I'm currently taking ten pills once a day, because there are only five milligram pills, which is good. Good, because that means I don't have to try and cut this 50mg pill into 10 pieces. That would be ridiculous, especially since a cut will kill you. Apparently I'm still low, but not dangerously low.
Speaker 1:I'm just going to say for the cause of death to be, you need to cut your anti-blood-sending medication in half and you cut yourself during that process to die.
Speaker 2:Just saying that would be very ironic. But I've discovered that it's not because I was cutting in half that it tasted awful. These just like prednisone. I do not recommend tasting prednisone but because I have to take 10 little tiny pills, it's so hard to get it like if I take a bunch of them. It's so hard to get them swollen without letting them touch the rest of my mouth, because it doesn't matter if they touch my tongue or the roof of my mouth or like the side of my mouth. It's like suddenly my whole mouth's just like.
Speaker 1:So one of the advices I got for this exact situation is you actually need to do to like protect yourself from tasting terrible medicine is what you want to do is eat a pb and j sandwich first, so it like coats your mouth a bit, so then the pill doesn't actually contact you directly because the oils are there Chili oil also works.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay, okay, but I digress. Anyways, I just I thought it was weird that it's like they're tapering down on my dosage but I have to take more pills at a time.
Speaker 1:Interesting. I don't know the science on that one.
Speaker 2:Well, I mean, like I say, this week I have to take 10 pills a day. Next week it's 8, then 6, then 4, then 2, then 1, and then I'm done with the prednisone, because I guess the vampire is weak to Michael Fennell.
Speaker 1:8, so Michael Phelps, vampire hunter. Oh fuck, but yeah, michael Fennell 8,. So Michael Phelps, vampire Hunter.
Speaker 2:On Fox. But yeah, that's mini movie review and little health update for well, mostly for you there, richard. I mean, I hope that our listeners enjoy my anecdotes but I don't really know the knowledge I have.
Speaker 1:The market data, yes, like as we do a two-hour episode on dagger heart and the number one comment is I enjoyed the pizzeria anecdote says a lot about our show. It was like I saw a book review earlier today. That's like the first thing to say about the book is it's beautifully bound. I'm like, oh, this review is not going gonna be good.
Speaker 2:So what's new with you there, richard?
Speaker 1:So at the start of the month I went to a lot of author things, events and stuff and now I'm like I don't feel like doing that. I'm on summer vacation so as part of like researching to work on TTRPG content, I've been like sampling a bunch of JRPGs.
Speaker 1:So I've been sampling a bunch of JRPGs. So I've been going through all the Final Fantasy games. So Final Fantasy 1 is just a D&D campaign, down to the classes and the spell slot system, yeah, okay, and I just finished number one. And then I played a lot of the start of a bunch of PS2 JRPGs, like Final Fantasy X, xeno Saga, final Fantasy Tactics, a couple of the Star Oceans. So I've just been playing enough of these games to sample the mechanics a bit, to get a feel for them and click the nostalgia vein. But I am planning to go through all the Final Fantasies in order, starting at number one. Right right.
Speaker 1:But I did make it to the final boss, realized I didn't have enough items, exited the last dungeon, went back, got Excalibur because I forgot to grab that Stockpile up. So I've almost beat number one. I just have to go back down and kill him. I don't know if I actually have to follow through to bother doing that or if I'm just going to be like yeah, I think I've completed this game enough.
Speaker 2:I'll keep that in mind. Yeah, I don't know. Final Fantasy 1 is definitely like that's the Final Fantasy. They honestly thought that it was going to be the last game they would make.
Speaker 1:It is funny that it literally has Tiamat the Kraken, Like. I'm looking at these monsters being like. These are all in the first edition player's hand Monster manual. You're not even trying to nominate, Just a straight up D&D game. The classes are literally the D&D classes plus Red Mage.
Speaker 2:Right, but yeah, so I played through the original Nintendo version of Final Fantasy.
Speaker 1:That one was the original Nintendo version was very difficult. Yeah, I'm playing through them on the Pixel Remastered Collection, which is basically cheating. So here's what they added to that game A run button Okay. The ability to switch your characters on the overworld map Okay, fixing all the glitches on the overworld map.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:Fixing all the glitches. So your intelligence stat actually ups your magic damage, okay, and there's an option to turn random encounters off and increase your experience in gold you get four times. So the idea is that I don't have random encounters, but they put all the fixed encounters as so. Whenever the game would have forced you into a random encounter, because there's a bunch of spots where it makes you do one, they put those encounters on treasure chests or as overworld monsters that physically block doorways. So it's like.
Speaker 1:I have no random encounters on because I'm playing through every Final Fantasy game, so I'm getting more golden experience and it's kept me on curve where all the boss fights have been felt appropriately challenging. Ie, I lost the final boss and have to go get some more stuff. But I just click a button to turn the random encounters on and off. If I want to grind, I just click a button. And is it cheating?
Speaker 1:Yes, but also they remixed the music to be orchestral, so it's not chiptune, it's like actual music, and they formatted it to fit the width of my screen. So it's been a very pleasant experience. But you were about to say something there.
Speaker 2:That was just like. Obviously, the original was incredibly innovative for its day, um, and very successful, uh. But you are right that they do just get better right.
Speaker 1:well, it's kind of funny because it's like the quality of life improvements helped a lot, because there's not a ton of story in that one, and if I had to grind and fight every random encounter between each location like, it would definitely get tedious. And it's a particularly mean one too, where it'll be like yeah, 12 enemies spawned in and you can't run. So it's like there's moments where, like even with like playing on super mode, I still get my ass kicked. Also, it uses spell slots, which I found really funny, like unreasonably funny yeah.
Speaker 1:It's been a long time since I played that one, so I don't don't actually didn't actually remember that, but that is funny and to kind of like the tangent that was gonna wrap into the carl dying story. So I'm doing ghost writing things right. I can't go into too many details, but part of what I'm doing involves listening to transcripts and then trying to construct the story out of them.
Speaker 1:Doing additional research, my first thought when he started telling me the story is oh man, if I had the Carl version of all these events, the novel I could write out of being like because it's like you did this weird, surreal, pan-elaborate thing of just straight up fiction as a way of denial for your medical Like. I'm like that's a fascinating way to tell any story. Like that's like such an art house ass movie. To be like I get attacked by a vampire is how your brain processes bad medical news. But like actually showing the vampire attacking you, like oh, that is some Toronto film festival bullshit right there and I kind of live for it. But it's funny like my brain's just like loaded with medical information right now and I'm like building up my tolerance.
Speaker 2:I did spend all afternoon crafting that story to make it a more interesting story because Beautiful, new, and crafting that story to make it a more interesting story because beautiful, you know.
Speaker 1:Going from one and a half pills to 10 pills, it's like, yeah, that's not that interesting of a story, but add vampires and suddenly yeah, I've mostly been like so due to the power of procrastination, I have two projects I'm working on campaign crap slash, writing down dagger heart adventures slash like dagger heart homework content and writing an actual ghostwriting job. And then I guess my third job was this research project. My brain is always wanting to work on the thing I'm not currently doing, so like I'll be like up to three in the morning working on a D&D adventure that I've never had to like follow through to do while Daggerheart adventure because I know I should be working on my actual job. And then, when I'm working on my actual job, I'm like when I'm like I need to finish this campaign prep, so then I'll work on my actual job for 600 interrupted hours.
Speaker 1:It's just a funny thing where it's like my brain is always thinking about the other thing I should be working on and it's keeping me productive that is pretty funny so, like other than the fact that I gave myself a four-day weekend, which is really funny when you're working on flexible time to be like oh yeah, I'll just load up the rest of my week with intense work to take these candidate A off for no particular reason.
Speaker 2:Actually speaking of unfinished projects.
Speaker 1:My new strategy class I'm making for Daggerheart.
Speaker 2:No, no projects um my new class I'm making for dagger heart. No, no, um my my grandma uh actually turned to 95, 95 recently, um within this last week actually, and she didn't have netflix as a kid she was born in in 1930, so you know she didn't have much as a kid.
Speaker 1:I mean it'll probably be a future episode topic, like when I had a friend of mine ask me what shows I should watch to know more about worldbuilding and it's like what's Fullmetal Alchemist? And I'm like, oh no. Anyways, their first video game they played was Dark Souls 3. That's strange. Think about the timeline for a second and you'll realize it would have been like 1015. This is an adult. This is like a 24 year old adult, and one of their first video games was Dark Souls. That's rough, that hurt.
Speaker 2:I'm still recovering, it's fine anyways, um went and visited my grandma on her on her 95th birthday. Uh and uh, she has a copy. No, she has a copy of phase 10 dice, which is a game that you can't play anymore.
Speaker 1:I mean, I think I know how to make that, but mixed quality results. I'm not the best vendor of board game stuff.
Speaker 2:No, I mean we might, but that was the unfinished project because we were definitely going to order up the dice and just make my own set and then not sell it for profit because that's copyright, whatever.
Speaker 1:I'm not even sure it is.
Speaker 2:Anyway. So we played Phase 10 Dice, and after I finished all my phases and everyone else was still going through theirs, it was just dumb luck for me, but I managed to win by one point in the end, which was awesome for me.
Speaker 2:But after we went through all the phases then I was thinking about it. I was like man, like you know, 7, 8, 9, 10 are all on the same die. So if you're going for 10s and 9s, you're like number of possible dice. There aren't even six possible dice that can get you three 10s and three 9s, so you'll have to use a wild. And then I was like, oh man, like you can't just like sit there in the middle of the game and inspect the dice and decide which is the best statistical probability of getting the highest score. If you should go for, like, sixes and tens trying to get the highest score, or like, and each phase would have its own like probability of ideal hand, but like surprisingly complex I mean as someone who's been looking at like average damage outputs versus damage thresholds to balance things.
Speaker 1:I feel you I really do Like, if I was a billionaire, I'd make you go through game studies courses so you could come back and help me work on things Just send you to school against your will. I'm like here, I've enrolled you in school. For what this? Specifically because I need an editor and a game designer. You're like do I get a choice? I'm like no, you do not.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, I just uh. Firstly I thought it was interesting that she actually had a an official Phase 10 dice game and then, secondly, it was like actually playing it. I was like, huh, it's not complicated, but it is complex.
Speaker 1:Fair, I'm going to be weirdly bitchy about a YouTube review I saw earlier today. Oh, so one of these D&D YouTubers I follow, who will remain nameless for this, gives his Daggerheart review right and he was complaining. It's like yeah, daggerheart doesn't is not simple as in D&D. It takes as long per fight. I'm like, what game were you playing? And I'm like, how is that possible? And sometimes it's just like a lot of times people will go into a new product and they'll say they're giving it a fair shot, but they're like, while playing it, actively looking for things wrong with it. But I'm just like, every once in a while I play a game. I'm like like ever want someone to play a game and be like I don't like this game. And you wonder if they actually even knew how to play it in the first place. Because, like I can't fathom how it would take you longer a turn than the game was. Action, bonus, action, reaction.
Speaker 1:And I find like some of my friends are just like unwilling to try new games and will just come up with reasons why they don't like them when the actual reason is sunk, cost fallacy and the things they already like Right, like Magic's such a prime example. Like someone would be like uh, I don't. It's like oh, this new card game's just the odd. It's like oh, it's just so much more random than Magic. Like Magic has land, yeah. So it's so interesting to me how people like skew data, just so that way they don't have to learn things. That tangent had nothing to do with anything, but I was just so salty being like there's lots of reasons to not like this game. How are you playing it slower?
Speaker 2:you know what else? There's lots of reasons not to like Donkey Kong 64.
Speaker 1:So for a bit of context, why this is a fun topic. Ec Myers, one of like my streamers, slash mentors I actively watch and enjoy, is doing his summer of Nintendo 64. His last one, spring into Sega. Spring into Sega was objectively the fun name, the one before that was we into when it was like winter of we or something, okay, and he's playing Donkey Kong 64. Objectively the fun name, the one before that was we into what was like winter of we or something, ok, and he's playing Donkey Kong 64. And I'm going to give his remarks before I give mine in your remarks. Ok, his remarks.
Speaker 1:If you had just got a Nintendo 64 and it's summer and this is the only game you have, it is a great game. The dialogue is whimsical, the graphics are fun, the atmosphere is good. As a person with deadlines and a job, I do not have time to beat this game Because it is unreasonably slow and you see where the ideas were good, but it just doesn't feel fun to play, even if it is one of the founding fathers of the collect-a-thon genre. So that's a third-party review of this game. How are you feeling about?
Speaker 2:it Right, right. Well, see, a lot of people have nostalgia for the 64. I've never really liked the 64.
Speaker 1:This guy- was the worst one. I had nostalgia for it, but objectively it was what I'm trying to think of. Like the video format it'd be equivalent to like the HD DVD of consoles, or like the idea of having one of those gear shifters that has the pedal, but it's an automatic but you have to push your foot on the pedal like it was a rough place.
Speaker 2:I mean, nobody had really figured out 3D gaming at that point, nintendo least of all with their interesting controller design.
Speaker 1:But I have a hot take about that. So I actually think that game controllers around the.
Speaker 1:But uh, I have a hot take about that. Donkey Kong Pause first. So I actually think that game controllers around the 360, we hit the 360 controller. It's the new standard controller, right? That's also the Nintendo Pro controller. That's the DualShock 2 controller, right? I think, with the weird shape of the buttons where the A button's a thumb rest and you roll to B, x and Y easily from a central point, that the GameCube is actually the better engineered controller, but did not catch on as much.
Speaker 2:Well, that's because they just made it so small.
Speaker 1:Because I'm just thinking like the blank space between the button layout that's standard now, where the GameCube literally like lined up its buttons so it wasn't the blank space on it and you could just roll your thumb to the other three buttons, is actually a better design. Yeah, it just needs to be bigger for grown-up hands.
Speaker 2:But so I never actually played Donkey Kong 64 in period. But going back and trying to play any of those early 3D games, they are so clunky and slow and I've always hated the 3D graphics from that generation because everyone was just starting out and everyone thought it was so awesome then. But they just don't age. Well If they made a Donkey Kong 64 remastered, which I don't think they ever have, Nope, nintendo doesn't remaster things from the 64 era.
Speaker 1:It's like they didn't save the source code.
Speaker 2:They've remastered Ocarina of Time like 15 versions.
Speaker 1:Here's some fun thing about Ocarina of Time and its remasters. The GameCube release of Ocarina of Time was not upscaled or enhanced, it just was packaged on disk. Ocarina of Time on the Wii was a direct port. Ocarina of Time never made it into the Time on the Wii was a direct port, okay. Orchery of Time never made it into the Wii U, except it was a direct port and it was never upscaled on Switch. The only upscaled version of it is the 3DS version, okay, which would have been set to 3DX things. There is no remastered Orchery of Time, despite that being the highest rated game in history.
Speaker 2:I thought Master Quest was at least slightly enhanced.
Speaker 1:Not really. They just use the original and move things around and things.
Speaker 2:So Master Quest?
Speaker 1:definitely they redid the dungeons yeah, but like it wasn't a remaster, it was like it's like you played on hard mode instead of regular. Dlc on a modern game. Hence that's what they did for Hero's Quest on Zootaboot.
Speaker 2:The.
Speaker 1:Breath of the Wild. Yeah, but back to DK64. Did you know it had minigames for two to four players, including a deathmatch.
Speaker 2:No, I don't think I did.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you could run around and shoot each other Like it had a GoldenEye 64 mode, basically, which is where the good memories of the game come from for me in the kong battle multiplayer, because I believe it was zero punctuation put this so eloquently. A lot of people like to tell me games are better with friends, but so is cancer, and you might get a free skydiving trip out of that.
Speaker 2:In any event, donkey Kong 64 didn't really manage to capture the spirit of the platformers, the same way that Mario 64 managed to capture the spirit of Mario platformers and with its clunky 3D controls. The same way that Mario 64 managed to capture, in the spirit of Mario platformers and with its clunky 3D controls and, honestly, mediocre graphics, I just it's no wonder that they haven't managed to make, or haven't decided to try and make, another 3D Donkey Kong, since the thing is like Up till now they had to make like it's kind of funny, as mechanically I could see how it would have translated to 3D.
Speaker 1:You know what I think is a hot take for one of the things that dropped. Well, it dropped the ball on a lot of things.
Speaker 1:The first was it made you have to switch characters to collect things at switch points. Where there's a mod of the game where you can hot swap characters, that cuts like three hours off the run time for the game. Yeah, okay, and like, I think the big thing and I think this is I don't know if you'll agree one of the key components of donkey kong country one, two and three was that you were climbing a mountain on the overworld so you went through each zone. But you're going through those zones to like head to the top in a way like right the map. Yeah, super mario world's map felt more open where donkey kong's map found like I'm going through a very specific obstacle course and it gave a sense of progression.
Speaker 1:64 was just paintings without a castle and I cut. Spyro and crash were too bad for this too. I'm like I think open world games are pretending to be new, like Zelda Ocarina of Time wasn't, but every stage in that connected to make an overarching game To feel less like a series of vignettes. So I think if it was like structured, that each stage built on itself more and you were progressing through on this adventure even with the same clunky, awful gameplay, it would have felt like you were building skills to things Rather than going through a theme park.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay, yeah, yeah, okay, yeah. But 2D Donkey Kongs have always been super awesome, like Donkey Kong Tropical Freeze. Return to Donkey Kong Country Returns.
Speaker 1:They got so artsy on some of those levels, like the tie-in hat silhouette level KC artwork.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I absolutely love the newer entries to the Donkey Kong platformer series and obviously Donkey Kong Country 1, 2, and 3. I mean, Super Nintendo is peak Nintendo in my opinion.
Speaker 1:There's a toss up. So for my birthday I was gifted an analog pocket. On this analog pocket I have normal nintendo, super nintendo, some 64 games, playstation 1, the sega consoles, game boy, game boy advance and a couple ds games. I kind of work on it. Through playing all these games on a handheld, I have reached the conclusion that it's either the Super Nintendo, the Gamecube or the GBA. That's the best console and it might be the GBA, because you know what all three are. That work perfectly fine and clean on the GBA, all of the Donkey Kong Country games yeah, so it's like the GBA, has all the good sets all of the Donkey Kong Country games, yeah.
Speaker 1:So it's like the GBA has all the good sets of SNES games plus its own software.
Speaker 2:The GBA was basically a Super Nintendo in your hand. It was incredible.
Speaker 1:It was a Super Nintendo in your hand with new games.
Speaker 1:It's still incredible. Like I am a grown-ass adult with a Nintendo Switch and someone handed me a functional GBA and I'm like. And with new games, it's still incredible. Like I am a grown-ass adult with a Nintendo Switch and someone handed me a functional GPA and I'm like, oh my god, it's the best thing ever I can put my feet up and listen to like bad improv comedy while playing Donkey Kong Country. Yeah, you bet, I played Donkey Kong Country for a while before this episode. It was great.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, and then, if you happen to have the Game Boy cartridges, you can play Donkey Kong Land as well.
Speaker 1:Holds up less great.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Donkey Kong Land is Not quite so tasty.
Speaker 1:So if we're tier listing this, and since we'll never bother to have more graphics in the background card until you guys like subscribe and buy my book so we can afford an editor, I would put 64 at the bottom of the tier. I like what it was trying to do. It was charming. The dialogue was amusing. It simply didn't handle well. Right up next to 64, one tier above it, I'd put Land.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's pretty. It's kind of bizarre. Actually I didn't look too much. Donkey Kong Land 1 versus Donkey Kong Country. Apparently it was just going to be a straight port, but then they're like nah, just make it, do something else new. But they even reused stage titles in Donkey Kong Land 2 specifically.
Speaker 1:They also used them in 64. It's still Jungle, japes.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, good old Jungle Japes.
Speaker 1:Also original Donkey Kong arcade isn't really worth going into in much detail.
Speaker 2:Same with.
Speaker 1:Junior 3, jungle Fever Banana Kingdom, banana kingdom, yeah, yeah, we get it I guess there are a lot of non-platformer donkey kong games.
Speaker 2:Let's be honest.
Speaker 1:But there's donkey kong games you're thinking about country at all, like you don't think mario and go jump man. You don't think donkey kong Matt. Yeah, let's be honest.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, and like nowadays, for sure those more arcade style games are basically just mini games.
Speaker 1:There's not enough content to actually sell that for more than like five bucks, to the point where Donkey Kong original is a mini game in 64. So yeah, donkey Kong Country 1. 64. So yes, donkey kong country, one geek game. But the big reason why number two is my favorite is the secrets in number one didn't do anything. They were there, they were cool, they didn't do anything. They gave you a percentage. But it wasn't until number two where they're like we're going to give you reward coins that unlock more game. And I'm like game changer, because the big difference between Donkey Kong Country and Super Mario World, in my opinion, why Donkey Kong Country is the superior game, come at me, is the secrets were simply more clever in the country series and the gameplay was less cheesable. In super mario world you could cape your way through an entire level donkey kong country was not giving you that privilege.
Speaker 1:Also, it had the better co-op like why is it no other platform? At the idea of letting you hot swap?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I do wonder about that, because no one's been able to really figure out how to do simultaneous platforming gameplay effectively, but the hot swapping. So it's like if you need a secret and this character is more like can actually get it, then you just watch the character, they can get it, and then they can play for a while Like it's. It's so genius and the friendship.
Speaker 1:Ruining glory of your buddies biffs it. So you take over cause they suck and then they can come back later when they've earned it. It's like because, like Mario and and luigi was weird, like you wouldn't even be on the same stage as each other, like it felt really disconnected, knowing. It's like because I take over when you die, I have to be paying attention to what you're doing. Right, like one of me and one of my good friends went through one, two and Returns and he was just really good at the game and I was not. But like it's definitely a more you're more invested in it than the Mario ones I find, where you can just bubble.
Speaker 2:Well, honestly, I've tried to play Donkey Kong Country Returns with another player and most often the other player just ends up riding on my back because I'm better than them. It was me.
Speaker 1:I was the other player.
Speaker 2:A lot of the stages have very specific jumps that you have to jump off the enemies' heads and bounce off them, and if both players don't jump at the same time, then one of them is just going to fall to their death and you can't bubble in Donkey Kong because like you say it's not about being cheesable.
Speaker 1:Splitting up, though, for fighting bosses was useful. You know what game completely nailed it, though, and no other game will ever nail it as well. Kirby, by its design, is the most co-op-friendly platformer. That is true Especially Superstar and Return to Dreamland. I think all of them have solid co-op. If they have co-op, it works well, because the game is slow as shit and it's not that hard, and it's mostly about doofing around and there is no precision.
Speaker 2:Well, I mean mean until you get to uh the hard mode on kirby, return to dreamland, yeah, but even then.
Speaker 1:It's not precision, it's like persistence. It's kind of weird. Like you can never play like a megaman x co-op, it just wouldn't work. But like kirby you can because it's like, okay, the fights, having multiple people is useful and the platforming is reasonable. But yeah, to loop back to like tier listing Donkey Kong countries, I'm going to put original. Instead of rating them, we'll do like a relativity tier list.
Speaker 1:Donkey Kong Country is the baseline, ok, ok, we have Donkey Kong. 64 is the bottom. Right slide Okay, okay, we have Donkey Kong. 64 is the bottom, and between Country and 64 we have Lands 1, 2, and 3. Sound about right. Okay, sounds pretty fair. Donkey Kong Country 2, better than Donkey Kong Country. Yep, I think it'd be hard for us to find someone who disagreed. Diddy and Dixie are more interesting characters with their deep lore. Hmm, I think it'd be hard for us to find someone who disagreed. Diddy and Dixie are more interesting characters with their deep lore. It's considered one of the greatest 2D platformers ever made. Graphics, artwork, sound physics, mechanics, puzzles. They had collecting coins to get to the Lost World, visiting the Kong family members Like just good Kong family members, like good stuff. Yeah, frankie Kong being back to popular demand. So Donkey Kong Country 3 is weird. It came out, if memory serves, after the 64 came out.
Speaker 2:You might be correct.
Speaker 1:So it's the least played one, to my knowledge. Like I didn't actually have it originally at this point, it was like Mario 64 was a thing and Kitty Kong is stupid. I hate him unreasonably so, but where do you think? 3 falls. Or is it like me where you're just like, yeah, I haven't really went through that one for some reason? Probably because by the time you finish two, you're done with the franchise for a few months okay, so donkey kong country 3, uh came out in 1996 and the n64 came out two months before the release date, the N64 was also in 1996.
Speaker 2:So yeah, donkey Kong Country 3 would have been one of the final games released for the Super Nintendo. I would definitely say that is kind of a similar category. That's the one that I've played the least.
Speaker 1:It's like the stages in that one felt more maze-like to me. I recently was going through it on the virtual majigger on the Switch. It's like I was in this maze and I had to go to the third floor and break doors to drop down. It's like it felt almost over-designed to me, like the overworld map had like these crystal puzzle things you had to solve. I don't know, it just didn't quite hit right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, I would definitely say Donkey Kong Country 3, it's probably objectively better than 1, but it's just, you're right, it doesn't sit quite right for some reason, probably because the stupid Cousin Kong.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I'll put it directly between 1 and 2? Yeah, so. I'll put it directly between one and two. Yeah, yeah, okay. Because two had a lot like I think part of it's sad dressing too. Two was like number one was like we're going through regular mountains and then the ruins, and then two's like lava volcano to theme park world. Right, Alright. So next we have the game that should have taken the place Mario Kart did, but didn't Diddy Kong Racing, Objectively the best game on the Nintendo 64.- Diddy.
Speaker 1:Kong Racing. So I don't understand to this day. So here's things Diddy Kong Racing had in it, right. So I don't understand to this day. So here's things Diddy Kong Racing had in it Right. We had 10 playable characters, 40 tracks, an overworld map connecting the tracks with secrets hidden on it, boss battles, hidden keys and stages that you had to go off the stage to get the key to complete the stage, to unlock bonus stages, a password screen and a plane car boat. Mario Kart has taken till now to have the features of Diddy Kong Racing.
Speaker 2:And it still doesn't have all of them.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because Did kong racing had the we drive between the tracks, the roster, like I? I worry that everyone in the world is dumb but me because, like you, had to defeat the antagonist whiz pigs through fighting the races. I'm like this game should have been the four-player racing game everyone played, not Mario Kart. I don't know what happened.
Speaker 2:Well, Donkey Kong 64 happened.
Speaker 1:This game. First it was Parkinson's 1 with the console yeah, it came with the console, really yeah uh, that's probably what happened.
Speaker 1:Everybody got Mario Mario, super Mario 64 yeah, but like I'm still going with the like huh yeah, banjo and Conker from Conker's Bad Verde and Banjo-Kazooie in it. I'm just saying this game is terrifyingly underrated. It had Banjo and Conker from Conker's Bad Verde and Banjo-Kazooie in it. I'm just saying this game is terrifyingly underrated, is all I'm saying. Like if more people were aware of what good and bad was, this would be really high on the list. But since no one does, I'm going to put it between land and world, sorry land and country as a side note.
Speaker 1:I don't remember following and writing a tier list and then it won't mathematically work.
Speaker 2:I don't remember what two series they were trying to connect, but it was like Mario to Donkey Kong kong, then donkey kong to diddy kong racing, then diddy kong racing to conqueror's bad fur day, and then there was like yeah, and there's a xenomorph in conqueror's bad fur day, so mario and the xenomorphs are in the same universe, uh poor diddy kong racing.
Speaker 1:I just find it funny because, like I do legitimately and this isn't just me being nostalgic I think Diddy Kong Racing was better than Mario Kart. But more parents played Mario Kart with their kids because it was easier. It's like Mario Kart was a less complex game so more people played it.
Speaker 2:Mmm, you're right, that could be another factor, the first factor being that less people played it. Mmm, yeah, you're right, that could be another factor, the first factor being that less people played it because they just got Mario 64. And then the second factor being that no one, including the potential customers, the gamers, no one was used to 3D gaming, so a simpler racing game probably just felt more intuitive.
Speaker 1:It's just it's rough man, because it was objectively interesting, like I think what gets me is whenever I see the book, yeah, you turn to a boat in the water and hang glide. I'm like it's city con racing. You wish you were. You wish you were because, like I give this rant all the time so at at some point through like evolution or game design, people have taken games that had rich one-player modes and multiplayer and stripped out the one-player, and I'm a firm believer that a one-player campaign is what trains people to play multiplayer and it's a mistake to cut them, but their data analytics showed more people played multiplayer. But their data analytics showed more people played multiplayer. My favorite example is Smash Bros for the Wii U, where it's like most people would not have played through the story mode of that because there wasn't one, but I played through the story mode of Smash Bros Melee, smash Bros Brawl and Smash Bros Deluxe Plus, ultra, ultimate. There we go and I enjoy that.
Speaker 1:But I find like ps2 era fighting games would have full story modes and then what would happen is you and your friend would go play through the story modes on your own and then when you fought each other, it wouldn't be a one-sided beatdown because you've played the game a bunch, and even shooters like goldeneye. If everyone goes through the goldeneye campaign on their own, then then comes over to play 64, they have practice on the game and the game's kind of taught you how to play it Right. So when I play Diddy Kong Racing and they're like actual boss battles and bonuses and a full campaign, and then you play Versus, practicing Mario Kart to play with your friends is just playing less fun Mario Kart. That's true. You just go through and clear the cups and then there's too easy, kind of easy hard. You should probably net deck and it's like they could have a fun story mode with boss battles, events and things. We have the technology, we've had it for 20 years. But they're like, nah, you just race your cars and we get to this open world Mario Kart one and people are like, yeah, we're Nintendo fanboys and this is awesome, like I'd be in the evidence man, because like, where's the stuff. It's not like you're going to be playing through the open world of Mario Kart and then Bowser's Island's gonna drop as a meteorite and you're gonna have to do a death race like you don't get to do Fury Road through it like you did. The bare minimum, guys, that's.
Speaker 1:My hot take is I enjoy games you can beat and I hate open worlds that have nothing in them, that are just there for the same thing. Open world to the point where in retrospect, I think Breath of the Wild actually is like in third place for my favorite Zelda game. It's like it has some of the best gameplay physics mechanics I've ever played in my life, like the logic in that game of the fire sword to keep you warm in the ice and the ice sword to keep you cold in the desert, and like following the farticle effects of the torch. Like mechanically, instead of using physics, they just did things that were fun, right, and then, like the shrines were like have more HP. These are really clever puzzles.
Speaker 1:I trade all of that for a linear narrative that makes you feel like you're getting better at the game and the ability to feel like you've completed it Because Orc Arena of Time like I got this heart container by playing these frogs in the woods was so much less disconnected than I went to this island. That put me into a dungeon where I had to do a park war maze. There definitely was a huge disconnect there um but to continuing along donkey kong games, because I have a list and they're not as extensive as some of these list episodes we've done looking at you yeah, okay okay, star wars, all right.
Speaker 1:so next we have the donkey kongas for the gamecube. Did not play those. I love the concept of special DK bongos, but I never played those. I see why they would be fun.
Speaker 2:I also never really played those.
Speaker 1:Like you're right, they can be fun, but also like a rhythm game, just inherently doesn't have that much depth so like how much of a flop was donkey kong 64 for them to not release another donkey kong mainstream name game that wasn't minigames till 2010? So between 2000, 1999 and 2010, the only game first, only donkey k Kong games that were released on this list of Donkey Kong games were Kongas and Barrel Blast.
Speaker 2:Barrel Blast.
Speaker 1:Apparently it was a kart-style racing game for the Wii Shows how much I cared about that game. Yeah, apparently it was designed to be controlled with the bongos as a racing game. Why you would want that. Like, I'll let them have that. So donkey kong country returns is so much better than the new super mario bros console. Uh, concept like it was the same core concept of new super mario bros.
Speaker 1:Let's go back to basics. Yeah, but retro studio, the metroid prime, donkey kong people, decided to just understand what they were doing. Also, I'm looking for the list of games that Retro Studio has made and it's Metroid Prime, prime 2, prime 3, hunters, donkey Kong Country Returns, tropical Fairies and Mario Kart 7 for the 3DS. What a successful track record. Yeah, there isn't a single. Not only is there not a single bad game on there, there isn't a single game that drops below 90 on Metacritic on that list. Apparently they're also going to do a Star Fox game, a Zelda game and a game called Raven Blade, but those projects got canceled. I'm like, give these guys more stuff to do. What are you doing? Although, to be fair, they spent the last seven years working on Metroid Prime 4.
Speaker 2:Hmm, so Metroid Prime 4.
Speaker 1:Five dudes in a basement who are really good at what they do. Who knows, However? So I'm taking those last Donkey Kong drum type games and just not putting them on our list.
Speaker 2:Well, maybe we can put them below Donkey Kong 64, because they're not exactly even in the same category.
Speaker 1:Alright, we'll put them at the bottom, but Country Returns. This hurts me to do. It goes in first.
Speaker 2:Do you like Donkey Kong Country Returns that much.
Speaker 1:I think I did. I 100% did that game. Did you play Tropical Freeze?
Speaker 2:Hmm, okay, that's fair.
Speaker 1:So I never played Tropical Freeze, Hmm. However, Returns compared to 1, 2, and 3 had everything I liked about 1, 2, and 3, had co-op. That was good at that hot swapping I could play with a friend. Had Wii motion controls that didn't make me use them. Bonus points for them, being optional, had those fun artsy levels, good music levels.
Speaker 1:I would have it like I think I actually have it between Donkey Kong Country 1 and 2. Like same spot as Donkey Kong Country 3, probably Possibly above that. How are you feeling on returns? I'm also kind of giving a bonus point for like being a return to a franchise that tried.
Speaker 2:I think I would put it above number 2. Because, like you say, it has everything that number two had and more.
Speaker 1:It actually is a 21 improvement it didn't fuck it up because a lot of games have tried that since, and just kind of dropped the ball on that.
Speaker 2:I do really like the foreground background thing, but it is true that a lot of games don't know how to do it. Kirby didn't do it well, and it was.
Speaker 1:Kirby.
Speaker 2:I don't mean 50-50. There were a couple cool foreground-background puzzles, but I'm just saying it's way better.
Speaker 1:Like it was just like it just did a good game better for the most part, in my opinion, Hmm, and yeah, like yeah, I have no other real notes other than game. Better for the most part, in my opinion. And yeah, like I have no other real notes other than some of those stages, I'm like oh man, the background, lighting, the music, the vibes, nailed it, really nailed it. Tropical Freeze sir.
Speaker 2:I do think Tropical Freeze has better level design and is otherwise on par with Donkey Kong Country Returns. I would say Tropical Freeze is the best 2D platformer Donkey Kong.
Speaker 1:I can accept that because if it's Donkey Kong Country Returns, but that because if it's Donkey Kong Country Returns, but better. Yeah, I think it's funny. Like I don't really have a retort to that, I'll take your word for it.
Speaker 2:Well, I mean, yeah, I've played both. I haven't actually successfully 100%ed both, but I've gotten like 95%-ish on both of them and they're both excellent games. But I think, gotten like 95%-ish on both of them and they were both excellent games, but I think I like the stage design for Tropical Freeze more.
Speaker 1:All right, and I'm just kind of going through the handheld list because they weren't in the console list. But it's like Donkey Kong hockey doesn't need to go on our list. We didn't play things on the Game Watch, so I'm just going to ignore the Game Watch titles.
Speaker 2:Well then, those aren't really the platformers either. Those would be like the minigame-ish ones.
Speaker 1:Land wanted to be Donkey Kong Country. It wasn't.
Speaker 2:I mean, I loved Donkey Kong Land because it was so close to being Donkey Kong Country that I could just have it in my pocket, but it was slightly inferior in pretty much every way.
Speaker 1:There's a game called Donkey Kong King of Swing, but that was like a puzzly type thing. I'm going to put that at the bottom. I wouldn't even try and play that. Let's see the Mario vs Donkey Kong series, not counting Mario's name's there. First and lastly, the terrifying CGI Donkey Kong Country animated series. Triple S tier is Triple S tier. It is a nightmare abomination with the worst voice acting, animation, writing and plot imaginable. And that makes it worth a watch. It's worth a study.
Speaker 2:The real reason that we've done this episode on Donkey Kong at all is because of the newly announced Donkey Kong Bonanza. That's what it's called, right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so it's been what 25 years since Donkey Kong 3D games came out.
Speaker 2:Something like that.
Speaker 1:You know, I really didn't think Donkey Kong 64 did that bad on launch. I really didn't think Donkey Kong 64 did that bad on launch. I really didn't think it did that bad. But apparently it did so bad that they didn't even try and do it for a decade. I thought it had a critical acclaim. Like I'm looking at the reception, it's like 90 on Metacritic critical acclaim but apparently not reception.
Speaker 2:It's like 90 on metacritic, critical acclaim, but apparently not well again. I mean looking at it at the time. I mean the 3d graphics were amazing and you know, donkey, car it plays somewhat similar to mario 64, which, uh, people do actually enjoy that game. The 64 version is the worst version to play, but that's neither here nor there, but it just doesn't capture the spirit of Donkey Kong.
Speaker 1:Well, it is fundamentally a collect-a-thon. It has more in line with Banjo-Kazooie than anything which is the same studio makes sense.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:So yeah, bizzanza. So my initial thoughts watching the trailer where they decide to make Angrier Donkey Kong with Paulina as a sidekick and they're doing like a I don't know, this is my hot take and it kind of loops back to the start of our episode. This feels like a Disney reboot of Donkey Kong 64, and I'm not here for it.
Speaker 2:Uh, you think so. So, because it's the same studio that did Mario Odyssey, yeah, but, and Mario Odyssey is empirically the best Mario 3D platformer.
Speaker 1:Ugh, I hate that. You're right. So Mario Odyssey, I mean yeah, so I'm shocked that Mario Odyssey wasn't truly open world. By the way, I am literally shocked that it didn't just connect the areas. I'm not sure if that's good or bad.
Speaker 2:It just feels like they would have at that point in their death cycles that is an interesting quirk, where it's like it didn't even have an overworld map. It was actually more of a menu, where you go onto the ship and then you select which world you want to fly your ship to what's funny too, is like there's paintings that connected stages.
Speaker 1:You could warp through them, but I wonder if it was supposed to be and they just chickened out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, maybe, or ran out of time for that, because that would be more so icing on the cake. The general gameplay and stage design are top-notch and I'm excited to see them bring that to Donkey Kong, because Mario Odyssey had this cool roll-and-dash jump where you could ground-pound and then flip and dash and jump to try to get on your head.
Speaker 1:The movement game in Odyssey was unparalleled, despite my quips with Nintendo Switch 2 and their. If you buy Nintendo Switch 2 and their. If you buy a Switch game and we shoot you, you can't sue us all in their legal agreements. That's actually there, by the way, what If you die at a Nintendo theme park and said yes to terms and conditions on a Switch 2?
Speaker 1:you cannot sue them for lots of life Also they can break your console if you use third-party piece of equipment with it. Sheesh, yeah, they can remotely irrevocably destroy your console you bought with your money if you clicked. I agree to this license agreement that you can't not click to if you do something that displeases them. So, like holistically, I need to dunk on nintendo conceptually, right now I have to. I'm not even saying I wouldn't get a switch to and play it if I had money, I probably would. But I'm obligated to point out that that is toxic, anti-consumer behavior and they should feel bad. You're listening, miyamoto. You can hear this. You listen to this podcast? I saw kirby at a ride game. You're listening right now. This is a bad user agreement and you're being mean well, I mean you.
Speaker 2:You might be getting mad at the wrong person, but that's not really the point.
Speaker 1:I feel he knows the person to yell at. Like no, he didn't yell, but I feel like he, like, could get in the room where it happened. I like the emoto, that's why I'm reaching out to him. I'm not going to reach out to literal Doug Bowser. That just seems like that won't work.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's funny.
Speaker 1:But yeah, what I've seen for it so far is like the sandblocks, underground world, punching, sla, slapping, beating people with trees, collecting gems to transform your animalities like there's a lot that it could be a sick game well, and like I was getting to with the like the rolling jump thing, that was like what I was getting to with the like the rolling jump thing.
Speaker 2:That was like what really set Donkey Kong Country apart from Super Mario World was that you could roll off a cliff you could roll off a cliff and you could jump, and you could. There were more movement options in Donkey Kong Country.
Speaker 1:Donkey Kong. Country has such sick to watch speedruns.
Speaker 2:So to give a mini -tangent yeah, go ahead.
Speaker 1:So I watch a fair number of speedruns because some of my good friends enjoy watching the GameStop quick marathons right, I don't like glitch speedruns because they feel lame. To watch Mario speedruns are like you cape through most of it. Right For Mario Super Mario World. Aim to watch mario. Speed runs are like you came through most of it. Right for mario super mario world. Doggy kong country. Other than like the levels they're like. Yeah, you can just skip this level. And then one of the categories is you can't. Those speed runs are like they're not glitching. I'm knocking off five bees by using barrel like you have to. Like, you have to try.
Speaker 2:There's no jake, you just have to be badass oh, but, uh, when I feel like when they tried to transition donkey kong country or the donkey kong platformers to 3d, uh, that, that range of movement options, it was really difficult for them to translate at the time because nobody knew how to do 3D, but they ended up paring it down to being basically just another Mario 64, but Mario 64 does all the same aspects but better.
Speaker 1:So what's kind of funny is.
Speaker 2:Than Donkey Kong 64.
Speaker 1:So Mario 64 is objectively a collect-a-thon as well, right, the first collect-a-thon, really, because you're in 3D space and what do you do? You hide objects for people to find in the 3D space, right? Donkey Kong 64 went to the ridiculous extreme of every character has their own bananas to collect in the same area, so play through it eight times, right. But Donkey Kong Country, as I was kind of alluding to with my mini-rant and back when me and my friend were going through them all, is a speed-run, optimized game. In a way it's like we would call it speed-run tactics and the idea would you can't let go of run, you hold forward and you just jump and go.
Speaker 1:And the game was kind of set up. You could get away with that. Like, a lot of the stages there's very few, you had to wait. If you just went for it, you'd almost be better off a lot of the time, right. And yeah, 64, its problem was it was a collect-a-thon where, if they'd made them 3D stages but designed them more of a how fast can I get to the end of this stage? It would have been great.
Speaker 2:But like that's kind of what I'm looking back to. I will say that. I will say that it definitely does look like the collect-a-thon is more focused.
Speaker 1:Well it's going look like the collect-a-thon is more focused. Well, it's going to be a collect-a-thon, because journalists are calling it the Mario Odyssey sequel, and I'm 99% sure it's built on the Mario Odyssey engine.
Speaker 2:It's the same studio.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like they literally started with. Here's our physics engine for this and we're going to do Donkey Kong Also. It's like destructible environment I have I think it was like a PS2 red something or Mars shooter game. It's the only one I've seen in a while like destructible environments are such a cool consummate game.
Speaker 2:No one ever actually does because there has to be limits. No there doesn't and it's hard. Are you actually going to let someone destroy the stage to the point where they clip out and die?
Speaker 1:Yes, cowards, so we love hand-holding games in this world. Right, if we go back to Worms. Worms, you could literally just kill yourself by blowing up the stage and you lose. That's true.
Speaker 1:I'm weirdly on board you're gonna go destructible, make it destructible. So, like if we go back to gundam versus zeta gundam on the ps2 all the buildings are blowing up, but the rocks are bulletproof. You can't laser the rock to death. And I'm like with modern technology, surely we can make it that if I hide under a mountain, I can shoot a beam cannon through the mountain and hit you by blowing up the rock. Why are we not doing this? You cowards? Blow up these.
Speaker 2:Like.
Speaker 1:The really sad ones are the LEGO games, where everything's made of lego but it's not all destructible or rebuildable yep, although man, oh man, the last lego game, lego horizon dawn, where they decided so under city and other lego games would use like generic terrain but all the buildings and people would be lego and horizon. Everything is lego from like they use, like the lego movie engine where, like the rivers, would like be the loose blue tiles streaming down them and like everything is.
Speaker 1:Lego and it made me so happy, but yeah, maybe I should pick that up for my Switch. I am a firm believer that if you're going to have destructible environments, don't be cowards. And I think they're going to be cowards Because the saying here is like in the trailer smash almost every surface and destroy terrain. I'm like until you can't, until you hit the bedrock.
Speaker 2:Well, they do have some sort of power-up-your-punch mechanic, so I feel like there may be some hidden secrets that you have to like. You progress through the game and your punch gets strong enough that you can go back and re-smash the terrain, but there definitely will be at least one tier of terrain that is unsmashable, no matter how strong your punch is. I feel like you're correct on that.
Speaker 1:I'm fine with that. Like even Minecraft, like okay, I feel like you're correct on that. I'm fine with that. Like even Minecraft, like okay. I understand that you need a bottom of the planet, hmm, but I'm saying a lot of people are cowards with their instructional environments is all I'm saying.
Speaker 2:I do wonder if they're going to go all the way to like the bedrock level of Minecraft, or if they are going to just actually have invisible walls that annoy you.
Speaker 1:So here's my mini rant on invisible walls. It's going to be a weird one, so a lot of games will use invisible walls and you won't know they're there until you hit them. Mario. Odyssey implemented invisible walls in places. Sonic Adventure 2 and 1 did not have invisible walls on their stages, and what that meant is there's parts of stages where you could jump off a clip, literally land on what looked like a background detail, jump down and hit a ground rail and skip a chunk of the stage.
Speaker 1:That is so good for stage replayability when you can just see something and go there and not be stopped by random acts of god so, yeah, with modern computing, yeah, we should be able to just render the entire map and have you explore it without getting hit by the force yeah, and I mean like, um, at the very least, like all of these stages kind of seem to be um kind of abstract chunks. Uh, it looks like it's almost like a mind going up, kind of thing well, I think it's a mind going down.
Speaker 2:Is the I would have to re-watch the nintendo direct, but it's pretty sure it's a mind going down.
Speaker 1:Right, right, and your idea is to kind of like break your way down through. But I will say so. I think part of what blocks Donkey Kong games is like Rare owned the Donkey Kong Country games in a way and, like I don't know, there were some things they had to figure out there. That's true. True, apparently you can use your game share where someone on a regular nintendo switch can control pauline for some kind of co-op and like this could be a really cool game control.
Speaker 2:That makes sense, uh, because so mario odyssey, uh top tier best platformer for mario. 3d platformer for Mario. I always want to, um, actually you, but like I can't well, the only um actually you might be able to get me is that the Bowser's Fury, which itself is basically just a stage in Mario Odyssey, with cooler mechanics.
Speaker 1:3D World was so good and its co-op actually worked.
Speaker 2:That is true. 3d World does give Mario Odyssey a run for its money, and if they did a 3D Country, a Donkey Kong 3D Country, that could be pretty excellent.
Speaker 1:But I will say like, like it's less 3d, like mario, like though it was more closer to like a isometric game than a straight up 3d game to make 3d world actually work at all, and did suffer a bit from uh, this game isn't actually better with multiple players, that's true. Oh, I think we did use multiple players to actually beat Challenge Road, anywho. Odyssey was definitely the better game, so I can't. Um, actually, you, I want to, but I can't.
Speaker 2:But so Bowser's Fury had Bowser Jr as a controllable partner that you could co-op with and then you just fly around and paint things to get coins and whatnot Didn't really actually add anything to that game in particular, but it was very similar to how Cappy works in Mario Odyssey, and I feel like Pauline is probably going to be in the same category, where the co-op player is basically free to go wherever they want and they can help you find secrets and stuff, but they're not actually going to be a real full-fledged player.
Speaker 1:Man, I'm almost salty that this game doesn't feel like it. How can I put this? It's such a reboot that I feel like it's not gonna have a lot of like references and deep cuts to the previous one, where donkey kong 64 was actually really funny in dialogue, like you literally see a character being like I'm a ghost because I didn't survive through donkey kong country 3 through Donkey Kong Country 3.
Speaker 1:Okay, so like I'm curious to see how this goes Because, like Donkey Kong's, a weird franchise where the humor has always been like kind of off-the-walls whimsical, right, and Mario's humor has always been non-existent. It's not funny. It wants to be, but it's not.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, I mean Mario just basically has no real plot or anything to it.
Speaker 1:Right where Donkey Kong's objectively the villain of the Donkey Kong Country franchise. Yeah, I've hoarded all of the food. Someone stole it to distribute it and I'm going to go sink his empire of the food. Someone stole it to distribute it and I'm going to go sink his empire. Being a good person has never been the objective of those Donkey Kong Country games.
Speaker 2:No, it has not. Anyways, I mean, both of us are not in a position to actually get a Nintendo Switch 2. So it's unlikely that we'll be able to play Donkey Kong Bonanza at launch. But that Nintendo Switch Direct made me feel like the Mario Odyssey engine is the way to capture those movement options that were present in the original platformers and remakes.
Speaker 1:I agree, like it's not even a quip. It's more like I'm curious to see if it is just Odyssey 2 or if it feels like a Donkey Kong game, because there is no 3D Donkey Kong games really to build off of.
Speaker 2:So it's like we're kind of reinventing the wheel. It doesn't look like there's going to be a lot of swinging and climbing either.
Speaker 1:Yeah, swinging and climbing.
Speaker 2:They're using weird. They're using weird like building with sands and like this focus does seem like it's going to be the destructible terrain.
Speaker 1:Which I'm kind of fine with. But it's like I wonder if I would be more excited for Donkey Kong Bonanza if it was an original IP, if they just give it, if this was weird. Take Dig Dug Bonanza and was the dig dug guy, I'd actually be more on board.
Speaker 2:Okay, now I'm actually curious uh, are there any?
Speaker 1:there's probably zero 3d dig dug games I'm sure there will be actually let's see. Hmm, really I don't know why, I just have a feeling 3D game.
Speaker 2:Let's see.
Speaker 1:Dig Dug Deeper was the 3D remake of the original Dig Dug Deeper. Looks real bad, I digress. I'm not saying Dig Dug Guy was the answer here. Looks real bad, I digress, I'm not saying Dig Dug Guy was the answer here. Bomberman might have been A fully destructible open world Bomberman game in the style of Bomberman 64.
Speaker 2:Bomberman 64 1 and 2 were so ballin' yeah.
Speaker 1:And some of the weird Super Nintendo ones.
Speaker 2:Well, I mean the weird Super Nintendo ones just had cool powers and stuff. But like Bomberman 64 and 64 2 were both just, they were just objectively like better versions of the original Bomberman games. Like they were great.
Speaker 1:I don't know what other women would be like when we're talking 3D platformer collect-a-thons. Bomberman 64 was really good because you were doing puzzles like a lot of these collect-a-thons. But instead of jump and pick up the thing, it was strategic of blowing shit up. Right and I could get behind a puzzle that you solve by dropping a bridge on someone and then like blowing up to get security cards and a base Like Bomberman 64 was great. I don't really have a hot take, it just was a cool game.
Speaker 2:Well, and then. Bomberman 64 2 was just a straight-up improvement over the first one.
Speaker 1:So that's kind of my weird take for Bonanza is it doesn't feel like Donkey Kong, because Donkey Kong doesn't really have a flavor Fair when Returns is like oh you got the energy perfect. But this one feels like Donkey Kong could be subbed out with any Nintendo character and it would be the same basic premise of a game.
Speaker 2:Hmm, yeah, you might be right.
Speaker 1:I mean, aside from the flavor of bananas, well, like if it was Odyssey 2, it would just be Odyssey 2, but you'd have to give Mario some kind of like rock-punching power-up. And then Kirby had a chance. The 3D Kirby game had a chance to do something cool and innovative and just didn't uh, yeah, the Forgotten Lands.
Speaker 2:Forgotten Lands felt like it could have been that exact game on GameCube.
Speaker 1:That's my problem with Forgotten Lands, for the number of stages, the level of the 3D, the boss, spice and design. That could have been a GameCube game.
Speaker 2:It felt a lot more like 3D World, which itself is a great game, but like Mario Odyssey. If you wanted to play a 3D Mario game, play Mario Odyssey.
Speaker 1:Nintendo's in a weird space where some of its games feel like they're in a different generation than other ones of its games on the same generation. It's like for the Switch, half of their games were 3DS games and the other half were Wii U games, so it's like Odyssey felt like it needed to be on the Switch to function.
Speaker 2:3d World didn't Right, Because I mean it straight up, didn't?
Speaker 1:And a lot of their games, even if they were both designed for the same system, kind of had that feeling where it's like this game easily could have been a Game Boy game. It doesn't feel like it pushed the needle of that genre forward, like we'll take like Pokemon, diamondaker, let's go. It's like, yeah, that would have ran on 3ds fine. Oh, scarlet violet maybe. Like uh, legends r system. Like, yeah, that felt like a, you evolved your game, so it's like like you were actually like.
Speaker 2:You're actually taking advantage of the software, of the hardware, to make it a technically superior game.
Speaker 1:And what's funny with Returns is, on the Wii Returns was a high enough quality 2D platformer. With the way it had backgrounds, music effects like cannonball shooting the backdrop, and then that making a bridge into the background, kind of things. It didn't feel like a previous gen game Like Returns, didn't feel like it was going to be running on the gamecube, despite being a 2d platformer. Rayman also had that effect. Where it's like, this is like yeah, it's a 2d platformer, but it's a. You've tried really hard on this 2d platformer I mean, I love rayman Origins right.
Speaker 1:So when we get to this bonanza, being like, okay, this feels like a next gen Donkey Kong game, but it also feels like it's Odyssey 2, which is both it's curse and it's blessing. But I have yet to see a Switch 2 game come out that feels next gen. That couldn't run on a Switch 1. Fair, because Mario Kart, as I mentioned, wasn't more technologically impressive than Diddy Kong Racing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I do wonder. Do you think they're ever going to port down versions?
Speaker 1:I don't think so they like money.
Speaker 2:I mean that's true, but if they port down versions they could make more money.
Speaker 1:Why would they do that when they can buy a new console to play a Mario Kart that's worse in some ways than the current Mario Kart. It has less tracks and worse characters.
Speaker 2:Worse characters. It has more characters, it has every character. You can imagine pretty much they cut can imagine pretty much they cut characters what they cut characters. Yeah, how did? Now I'm confused. I mean, I haven't really looked too much into it because I don't have a switch to, so I'm like I don't want to be in. I don't want to look at it and be like I really want this and then impulse buy it even though I shouldn't.
Speaker 1:Kirishu did not make it into the new Mario Kart game, despite them adding a bunch of dumb characters like cows and fish, diddy Kong, funky Kong. Petey. Piranha, dry Bowser, dixie Kong King, bob-omb, larry Lemmy, roy Wendy, iggy Morton, lugwig, paratroopa Kimmick and Donkey Kong Jr. Huh See, it's not that they cut characters, it's that. Why would you possibly need to cut characters Also Link and the Animal Crossing and the crossover characters? Well, in the crossover characters.
Speaker 2:Well, in the crossover characters, it makes sense that, like, as stupid as it is, licensing issues make it difficult for them to have those characters available that long. I know they're Nintendo characters, but even still it's like um.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna use my F-bomb. Fuck that Nintendo. You absolutely could have kept Lincoln the new one. You own Lincoln, you own Mario and it's like well, the fans would break them. What are you talking about? There is literally no reason to undo that, unless you're planning to sell it back to us later, like they probably are. Like I like, it's just I'm mad at that one because it's like OK, there's no actual reason for you to have this game have less content. It has less tracks. Why would it have? What possible reason could you give me to not have every Mario Kart Deluxe Ultimate track in the new launch title for your new system?
Speaker 2:Hmm, yeah, I do.
Speaker 1:That is bizarre that they cut content Because it doesn't look that much better. If your argument is like, well, we'd have to upscale the old tracks, I'm like yeah, okay, Sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean you really wouldn't, yeah, but in any event, Donkey Kong Country or Donkey Kong Bonanza, looks really awesome. You are right that it doesn't exactly look like a next-gen game. It looks like it could just run on the Switch, because Odyssey runs on the Switch. Yeah well, but we'll see.
Speaker 1:So if it's truly destructible environments that could justify the new hardware, I'll let them have that If it really does feel like. Because you know, in Breath of the Wild blowing up trees was deeply satisfying. Breath of the Wild would have been so much better if you could mine your way through any rock in that, if that game was fully destructible, except when the blood mood came and respawned everything that would have been amazing.
Speaker 1:You could just bomb it and you're like, oh, there's a shrine on the other side of this mountain and one of your options is just shoot, bomb arrows until you tunnel through. Hmm, that would have been amazing.
Speaker 2:Do you like how it makes your problem with the?
Speaker 1:holy destructible environment being a design problem, is you just respawn everything on a red moon, completely fixing that problem? Unless you bomb, arrow yourself into the ground until you go so deep into the map you can no longer climb out and you die and suffocate there. Game has quick travel, so you can just teleport out. Don't be a punk, don't be a punk, all right. So we do have a random question of the week that was submitted to me earlier today.
Speaker 2:OK, OK.
Speaker 1:Like two hours before our episode. Ooh, what show, manga and video game would you recommend to somebody new to, respectively, animation, manga and video games, who specifically wants to learn more about world building? So they're a writer friend of mine and they want to be a better world builder. They want to make better TTRPG content. What show would you make them watch? I see, what comic or manga or book would you make them read and what game would you make them play? I'll start with mine for comic. So remember recently how we mentioned they put Fullmetal Alchemist on Webtoon and phone formatted it. Right, yeah, I gave them Fullmetal Alchemist. That's a great way to read that. It's already phone formatted. You can read it on the toilet, but Fullmetal Alchemist, yeah.
Speaker 2:That's definitely the top tier choice for comic slash manga. Yeah, so I gave this so good, no, no, I would choose the same thing. That's like the gold standard take a conversation.
Speaker 1:Just cause I sniped the best one doesn't mean you're like yeah, you're right, I know I'm right, the internet knows I'm right. For about a week Freedron was a competitor, but for world building Freedron was a competitor, but for worldbuilding. Freedron's worldbuilding is good, it's not as good.
Speaker 2:I mean, the plot of World Trigger has derailed, but that is also top-tier worldbuilding, such a different direction.
Speaker 1:But I agree and like I was also thinking for world building, like it's not Bleach. Bleach's world is some bullshit. Naruto has some pretty solid world building. Until it doesn't Right right, dragon Ball is all over the place. I can't in good conscience recommend Dragon Ball, especially for world building.
Speaker 2:No, definitely. Dragon Ball is not good for world building because Akira Toriyama just did whatever he wanted.
Speaker 1:Lucifer and the Biscuit Hammer is a good one for world building on a grunt-type grunge. Hmm. But let's go animated series next so.
Speaker 2:I suggested.
Speaker 1:Avatar the Last Airbender, because I'm a bastard you did just snipe another good one yeah, these are like I have a book on world building, and those are like their first two examples for a reason. Okay, first two examples for a reason.
Speaker 2:Okay, do you think the Digimon series has some good world building?
Speaker 1:It's too mixed, can't do it. I want it to be, but I can't, can't do it. So it's like you drop these kids into this island and you're like boom world, boom world, boom world. But it's a little too close, it's too inconsistent, right Like random shit just happens. The Digimon World game where you explore File Island piece by piece, would be easier for me to recommend than the show you know actually also you can use to recommend than the show.
Speaker 2:Hmm, you know actually also you can use live action in the show category. Fair, fair. Use live action in the show category. Let's think about that.
Speaker 1:I mean, that's just not my specialization so it would be useless to me. Hmm, I wish Gundam Se seed had better world building because it's like a gundam like. There's a few gundam series where you're like all right, especially the ones that are like side stories of like we need to set up a political intertwined war immediately very mixed results, on which gundam series act like. Gundam wing has truly terrible world building. I didn't realize until I re-watched it, like last year, where it's like none of the factions in the world make actual logical sense and then they're like yeah, we're going to unite to the world government because this one rich guy told us to, I guess, and they keep talking about conflicts around the world and never named them. Hmm.
Speaker 1:And then Double O's like aliens somehow, and I'm like thanks 00.
Speaker 2:Oh hmm, Show with good If I had to go live action.
Speaker 1:I'd probably put Stargate SG-1 on there. So each week, week, I go to an alien planet, but then it all pieces together coherently. After six seasons I don't know.
Speaker 2:Okay, so I I don't love the Isekai genre for the most part, but I did rather enjoy the wrong way to use healing magic.
Speaker 2:Okay, I mean a lot of you can say I love to borrow settings but well, yeah, but the part of the world building is that slow roll of like you know, oh, people have magic, and then you're focusing on this guy's magic and then, once you focus on him for a while, then they kind of show other people's types of magic and they, they show him going out into the wild, doing wilderness training and different animals, and it's a nice slow roll that is kind of scenic at the same time, and I think that is one way of effective world building. Is that slow, scenic, like Freerun?
Speaker 2:Freerun's so good, but Freerun is really good, that's true. Maybe I should just say Freerun, because Freerun is probably the second best option.
Speaker 1:Fair enough, I want to go sci-fi or fantasy, or try and mix it up. Man, though, like Freerun, does such a good job because it's the only one that shows before and after snapshots of each area, which is such a unique approach to world building embodiment of that slow roll, scenic world building where these concepts are just being introduced really slowly and you don't think you're even learning anything and then suddenly it all comes together.
Speaker 2:you know, and I do feel like the wrong way to use healing magic is another reasonable example.
Speaker 1:Now we want to go in a weird direction. You know what would be kind of an interesting one, samurai Champloo, although in a weird direction. You know what would be kind of an interesting one, samurai Samplew, although that one's like it's not so much filling out a world so much as filling out a toad Like I'd probably give that one more for a vibe study than a world building study. Ghost in the Shell's pretty solid world building. If you want to just do the opposite and throw someone in head first into a brick wall, the opposite and throw someone in headfirst into a brick wall.
Speaker 2:They're like, okay, so what's our next category? Animation comics Video game. Video game for world building.
Speaker 1:So the answer I picked and this time I'm being less of a bastard because it's not objectively the best one, it's just one I really enjoyed is I gave them Fire Emblem Awakening Not. Fire Emblem Awakening. Sorry, I gave them Fire Emblem and the Sacred Stones.
Speaker 2:Why specifically Fire Emblem and the Sacred Stones?
Speaker 1:Logistics more than anything. So the Game Boy Advance Fire Emblems are simply shorter and easier to play.
Speaker 2:Okay, okay.
Speaker 1:And any given Fire Emblem where it starts with your character, a banished royalty. You meet people along the way and, through your support conversations, learn more of the world. Every Fire Emblem follows that structure. For the most part of you find a prince or princess and you're given like your nation's being invaded for a reason Right.
Speaker 1:And then you have to work and meet people from the various nations to build up and as you're meeting them you're learning their customs. For pure worldbuilding it was probably actually either Radiant Dawn or Awakening. I give first place because Awakening has that sick time skip where your kids come back from the future.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay, or the Super Nintendo one's really good for that too of you literally travel has that sick time skip where your kids come back from the future, yeah, okay, or the super nintendo one's really good for that too of you literally travel across the continent, but I don't think fire emblem yeah, people other than me would be like this is the best world building. And my second place one is final fantasy 10 specifically. I like it's world building. Okay.
Speaker 1:Because Bob Fancy tends a love story and your character is the summoned ghost of a football player who ends up on this continent. And he's not the amnesia protagonist, which is such a shorthand for world building. Instead he's semi-ecocide. He's time travel, ekosai, where he gets back to his hometown and it's just destroyed Because he got pulled from the apocalypse. But the quest is you're on this journey.
Speaker 1:It's almost Freeran-like, where most of what you learn about the world is through your party members being casually racist or talking about how their brother died in the attack or how one of your party members was actually engaged to another party member first brother, and then they have awkwardness because that brother died on a mission same with the other brother. It's like a lot of the like, locations and things are being taught to you through the characters, interactions, like you see people racist to the fuzzy blue guy on your squad, and that's how you learn about the fuzzy blue people, right? So it's more my vein of world building where fall fantasy 7 just throwing crazy shit at you for four discs straight. Why is it a city? Why is it cyberpunk? Why does the city build a tm? We siphoning the play the age, ancient alien creature. Final Fantasy 7 was like, written by like the Boreto author. I swear.
Speaker 2:Well, so I uh keeping on theme with time travel, chrono Trigger also is a pretty solid world building, because it is really interesting to see.
Speaker 1:That is the game I should have given them. You win that one. Like objectively, you're right, nice, I can win at least one category. I thought about it. The reason I gave them Fire Emblem, not Chrono Trigger, is literally time to beat.
Speaker 2:That's true, especially seeing as there's so many different endings.
Speaker 1:But it should have been. You're right, it should have been Chrono Trigger and we might do this as a full episode topic later, but that was our short question. So what I should add to the homework I gave them is I've already given them Full Metal Alchemist, avatar and Fire Emblem and, if I'm following your list, I should give them Free Rin World Trigger. Free Rin World Trigger.
Speaker 2:Up to the Exam and Up to the Exam Chrono. Trigger. Yeah, alright, those are all pretty solid world-building options.
Speaker 1:Agree, I wish I could recommend One Piece to people. I wish that was possible, but it's not. It simply isn't. Also, I have to say Zelda OOT best world building on the N64, but that bar is on the floor, yeah, just non-existent, like world building on the.
Speaker 2:N it just feels unfair as a category. But with that, I guess, unless there's another random question.
Speaker 1:Uh, yeah, but this is coming from me to you, ooh, okay, have a question for you is where would you take somebody on a second date?
Speaker 2:where would I take somebody on a second date?
Speaker 1:ask it for no particular reason, huh okay, um since you seemingly won and got further in relationships than I have.
Speaker 2:You're currently winning laughing, laughing um, well, see my, my fiance was pretty easy, uh, because she like, really likes movies. So going to see a movie was always a viable option. Going to movies is actually one of my least favorite forms of dates because it's not particularly interactive. But for a second date, I don't know.
Speaker 1:I mean, I guess it really depends what kind of vibes you're going for, but I mean, I'm sure you've got like a plethora of like theme mini-golf courses that you could find, which is why I can't give you hints or info, because I kind of want to know what you come up with in a vacuum.
Speaker 2:Well, I was thinking, like I say, some sort of theme, mini golf, if you can find a theme that's like on point for their tastes.
Speaker 1:But then it's just mini golf. It's a pretty solid one. And our last random question, and then we'll wrap up this episode what is the weirdest thing you've ever Googled?
Speaker 2:The weirdest thing I've ever Googled the weirdest thing I've ever Googled.
Speaker 1:So for me I don't know if this is going to count because it's kind of on brand for me. I'm going to go with. What are the exact damage number calculations in Pokemon Red for Hit Race?
Speaker 2:But that's not really that weird for me, that's just the kind of thing I'd look up. I mean, that's just a specific thing to look up, that's true.
Speaker 1:I mean recently, it was probably what material was made of the mask that people wear when clapped to the ground for radiation therapy. Yet again, not weird in the context of being me.
Speaker 2:Right, right, that would be a pretty weird search. Now see, the thing is like D&D and other creative endeavors similarly in creative endeavors does bring up some very odd questions. I don't know that I've ever actually like had to Google them, but it's like I watched a video where it was this DM they're at. They called into the office at work and they're like yeah, why did you Google? How many children does it take to fill whatever space or something? It's like I've never personally looked up weird D&D stuff like that to get specific answers, but D&D related queries get very bizarre answers, but dnd related queries get very bizarre.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, like it's kind of funny as my brain's like more going to mundane things. I've searched for dnd like what is the process to becoming an older man? I needed to know this, it came up. Or what are the dimensions of a stone boat to successfully float? Definitely look that up.
Speaker 2:Oh, the fact that it could actually work.
Speaker 1:I don't know what that one for my answer is. What are the? Could a stone boat actually float with these dimensions? Hmm, yes, yes, it can. Much to the terror of catfolk. Much to the terror of catfolk. Actually, this is a weird one. This is probably more traditional. What they're asking for for this question Would pickle beets blend in with beef and chili and go unnoticed. Oh yeah, that's pretty weird. I had pickled beets and didn't have enough beef. I was trying to see if I could turn the pickled beets into more beef. I think the actual search was can I turn pickled beets into more beef?
Speaker 2:Well, I mean, if we're going food related, the peanut butter ramen burgers that we tried to make, that was searching up the recipe for that and then it's like they try to tell us that we need to make it in a ramekin, and it's like we're like pretending to be broke college students, because we weren't actually college students at the time, but we were, for all intents and purposes, broke college students.
Speaker 1:Like, just because we worked at Pizzeria doesn't mean we weren't early 20s splitting an apartment, effectively being broke college students.
Speaker 2:And they expect us to have a ramekin.
Speaker 1:I mean I do now as an actual broke college student, which is funny. I absolutely have ramekins and arugula and springform pans now, but like Although, to be fair, unrelated to all things and probably a waste of like our episode count. So I was looking for pizza places that had Canada Day deals, right, okay. Or just any place that had Canada Day deals because everyone's patri, or just any place that had Canada Day deals because everyone's patriotic during election season, but no one's giving me discounts today, okay. And the pizza place I ordered from, specifically because what they named is their Canada Day sale oh, it was a reverse tariff sale where you got 25% off your order to reverse the tariffs, and the concept that, a they're reminding people that this trade war is happening and, b celebrating that we're not going to take it or gonna like the fact they're like I'm giving you a discount because these tariffs are bullshit, was just such a like. I wasn't expecting such values out of a pizzeria like this redacted pizzeria I didn't think were cool like that. Huh.
Speaker 2:You know, one of these days we're gonna find a place that's literally called Redacted Pizzeria.
Speaker 1:No, no, we're gonna open a place called Redacted Pizzeria. Think big Wow.
Speaker 2:See, I don't know if I want to open the Pizzeria. I'd rather open the pizzeria, I'd rather open the amazing steakhouse.
Speaker 1:I'm just saying redacted pizzeria, pizza arcade. Redacted steakhouse, but we haven't been using that for 100 plus episodes, so it loses the bit. Why would I ever open a business for you that didn't help some kind of bit? Why would I ever open a business?
Speaker 2:for you. That didn't help some kind of bit. Well, maybe because of the awesome adjustable labyrinth in the basement.
Speaker 1:No, no, I'm on board with that one for a different bit. Like I'm not saying no to this amazing steakhouse, I'm saying that the redacted steakhouse wouldn't, help us, because there's no bit there, although I think I have actually mentioned a redacted steakhouse a few times, but it would not be a good advertisement.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's true. You definitely have mentioned redacted steakhouses before.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think my exact words is steak as a food is a scam and you shouldn't pay for price for it. Not the best advertisement for my own steakhouse. Like you go into the menu board it's like not worth it, absolutely not worth it. You're being scabbed and there's a different tiers of cuts of meat and like in the being scabbed tier it's like Kobe beef tomahawk chicken scabbed here and it's like Kobe beef tomahawk chicken and like an asterisk under Kobe beef it just says some ground beef we found on sale in like brackets under it. The steak is so smooth it's like someone patted ground beef into a steak shape and grilled it. It just melts in your mouth. With that one I ended our episode. Thanks for tuning in. Watch Richard and Carl present Deep Space and Dragons Occasionally try and push stuff. We also have a second podcast going where we play Daggerheart. Check that out. Just Google. Richard and Carl play Daggerheart Googleard occasionally and you can probably find my home address. Love you, bye, bye.
