TechStuff Gets Cozy With SMNTY

Samantha and Anney from Stuff Mom Never Told You, pop by to talk about the cozy games genre. How did this casual category go from being an afterthought to big business? And why are “real” gamers so salty about it?

 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:04):
Welcome to Tech Stuff, a production from iHeartRadio. Hey there,
and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland.
I'm an executive producer with iHeart Podcasts and how the
Tech are you? Yes? Our cavalcade of special guests continues today.

(00:26):
My dear friend and next door neighbor back when we
were working at Pont City Market, Annie and her co
host Samantha from Stuff Mom Never Told You are here.
Welcome to the show.

Speaker 2 (00:39):
Thank you so much for having us. This is very exciting.

Speaker 3 (00:42):
Yeah. I love that we finally get to work together.
It's been years since we've been in the same network,
and now I get to officially work with you. Amazing.
I'm so excited.

Speaker 1 (00:52):
I'm excited too. Like I've seen Samantha, we've met in
person a couple of times, but we have never had
a chance to work on a show together. Will I
was listening to stuff Mom Never Told You recently with
I think it was Joey who was on talking about
dating in New York, and it made me laugh so
hard because Joey's younger than my marriage is. I'm in

(01:14):
my twenty eighth year of being married and so listening
to like the trials and tribulations of dating in the
modern age. I was sitting there thinking about back before
I was married and what dating was like. And the
funny thing is I met my partner online, but it
was in a telnet chat room, which anyone out there

(01:35):
who knows what a tellnet chat room is welcome to
being old.

Speaker 2 (01:41):
That's amazing.

Speaker 3 (01:42):
I really kind of want that story now.

Speaker 1 (01:44):
Oh well, tell you why you have me on your show,
and I'll tell you all about it, Okay, because here's
the thing, I got no tech stuffs left to talk
about this kind of stuff. I'm out on January tenth.
January tenth, I am gone. And just so, just so
y'all know, I mean, I don't think you even are
aware of who the new hosts are, but certainly my
listeners aren't because I haven't told them yet. That's going

(02:05):
to be a New year reveal, So it does. Have
you not done the email? Oh no, you're starting off
with a Chad GBT savior or demon demon? No you
know it already. Uh No, Today you brought forth a

(02:29):
topic that I was so excited by because, as it
you discovered once our notes started to fill out, it
turns out I'm a big fan of this particular genre
of video games. You wanted to talk about cozy games?

Speaker 2 (02:44):
Yes, yes, indeed, And I think this is gonna be
really fun because I think we're all coming at this
from different experiences, so we're really excited to talk about it.
One of the reasons we wanted to talk about it
is one because Samantha's had like an amazing cozy journey.
But to as you kind of alluded to with chat GPT,

(03:04):
we were trying to think of a tech topic that
wasn't going to be very depressing, and it was a
little difficult because right now is a high stress time
a lot of us maybe are looking for some relief,
especially as the year comes to a quotes, So we
thought cozy gaming, that's that's a good topic.

Speaker 1 (03:22):
Much better than let's talk about Elon Musk. So I appreciate.

Speaker 3 (03:27):
It, right. I mean, we definitely went in to talk
about we could talk about deep fakes, Oh no, that's
really sad. We could talk about you know, all those
other AI ventures. But coming back to cozy games, which
is something that I have found joy in in the
last few years and really have had Annie and even
our super producer Christina navigate me through this world because
gaming is not something that I would typically would say

(03:50):
is something that I do up until recently, and the
cozy gaming world really has made it so much more welcoming,
I think, especially for people for us and loss people
who are jumping into gaming.

Speaker 1 (04:02):
World absolutely and even old fogies like me like I
reach a certain point where my hand eye coordination isn't
what it used to be. I don't have the twitch
skills of the young ands out there. I was raised
on games like the pac Man's you know, and the
Gala is not so much the call of duties. And
also I never really like competition. I always preferred collaborative

(04:26):
and cooperative games. Even with board games, I much prefer
that style. So cozy games speaks to me because I
like an environment that fosters joy and wants all the
participants to experience that joy, not joy that one person
feels at the expense of everybody else. Not that there's

(04:47):
anything necessarily wrong with that kind of gaming, it just
doesn't appeal.

Speaker 2 (04:51):
To me right, And I know all the gamers in
my life enjoy cozy games, whereas people who like cozy
games the same isn't true about non cozy games, so
I feel like they're very welcoming to people, and I
guess that brings us to the question, just to start off,
what is cozy gaming. I know you've talked about it before,
but we like to have a good solid definition here,

(05:14):
and people disagree. People like to disagree about what exactly
it is. But they're often described as something that's somewhat
mindless but still involved. They usually don't have violence or
competition in the same way non cozy games have them.
Players can't really lose or feel guilty about letting someone
down like in a multiplayer game. They usually have soothing

(05:34):
in pretty graphics and music, fairly simple task and controls.
They're inclusive and safe for all. They're low stress and
sort of a vibe, sort of a feeling, and after
you play them, you generally feel calm and happy.

Speaker 1 (05:48):
Yeah, there's some overlap with the genre of casual games,
but I feel like the term casual games is almost
like a kind of like it's like shade right, people
quote unquote real gamers will dismiss something that falls into
casual games. And certainly there are bad casual games out there.

(06:11):
There are bad games in every genre. It would be
disingenuous to say every game that falls into the cozy
or casual bucket is great, but the same is true
for any other genre as well. And I think the
quote unquote true gamers, well, there's a lot of air
quotes I'm doing, which is weird for an audio podcast,
but I think that they would paint all of them

(06:34):
with the same brush, and I think that's unfortunate, it's reductive,
it's not surprising for at least certain segments of the
gaming culture. We'll get into more of that later as well,
but yeah, I think there's certainly a real place for this,
particularly in a world where people are trying to find
ways to reduce anxiety, to be able to take their

(06:59):
mind off things that might be troubling them while not
engaging in an activity that is just inherently harmful to themselves.

Speaker 3 (07:08):
And I think it's interesting because when we have these
conversations about gaming in general, the biggest money maker out
there and people really want to discredit it, is mobile gaming.
And that was one of the big conversations we had
when we talked about cozy gaming and what they want
to qualify as true gaming. And again, you kind of
talked about this with the real gamers quote unquote, but

(07:28):
the level of competition that's there. But when you look
at what is making a dent in capitalism, which you
know that counts for more for anything else, right, it
is mobile gaming. It is the number one money maker
for that gaming industry. So it's interesting when we have
this conversation and the amount of women and marginalized people
who actually have access to something that is easily there

(07:51):
and really great to take your mind off things. Is
playing five minutes of what used to be snake y'all
remember that game? Oh yeah, you know, like those types
of games that have come back a little bit, and
it helped with dementia and help with like everyday warplay.
It's actually a really great way to go. But people
want to dismiss it so quickly because they don't want
to say this is true gaming.

Speaker 1 (08:11):
Yeah, and yet these are the games that often can
go viral across all demographics. Like I wouldn't necessarily say
that wordle falls into the category of cozy game, but
certainly a casual game. And I don't know if you
guys remember this, and I apologize for guys. I don't
know if you folks have remembered this, but about four

(08:31):
years ago, there was this little bug that was going
around and like a lot of us were like stuck
at home, and then it seemed like this game called
Wordle brought everybody together in a way. And back then
before it was x X was this thing called Twitter,
which wasn't terrible. I mean it was bad, but it
wasn't as bad. And I just remember, like so many

(08:54):
of my friends would their Twitter status would just be
their Wordle score for the day, Like for the first
like three weeks, I was like, I don't know what
the hell these boxes mean.

Speaker 3 (09:05):
I had that moment a lot, and I will say,
you know what, for those out there, this was a
pickup line. One dude, you's a chill group of us
talking about Wordle. So it opens up so much when
you talk about these mobile games.

Speaker 1 (09:19):
Yeah, yeah, it's a great unifier.

Speaker 2 (09:22):
It does. And that's kind of going back to what
you've said about preferring those kind of cooperative, collaborative games.
A lot of these are really fun because when the
pandemic happened, we were looking for both stress relief but
also some companionship, some way to connect to other people,
and these games were great for that. Yeah, you go
on Twitter and see someone's wordle score and you're like, oh, Like,

(09:44):
it was just a really fun way when we couldn't
hang out in person necessarily and share these experiences. And
I think that is a big part of cozy games
as well. I am kind of shy, so I usually
played cozy games by myself, but it is a big
part for some people that you can connect with other
people online in this way.

Speaker 1 (10:04):
Well, And even though I'm an extrovert, I am like you.
I often for most of my cozy gaming I'm playing
the single player version of that. I mean, I love collaboration,
but there's so few games out there that I connect
with that are also collaborative and I feel like I'm
welcomed into that community. Sometimes you get into a game
pretty late, and it's like if you're the first new

(10:25):
friend in an established group of friends that have been
established for like ten years, and they're all joking and
using references that the rest of the group knows and
you do not, and you're like, well, this is a mistake.
I should probably go somewhere else. And that's kind of
how I feel for some of these online communities, and
it's no shade on them either. They're having fun with
their established communities. It's just sometimes it can be hard

(10:46):
to make an inroad. But the games themselves, the things
that make a cozy game cozy, that welcoming sense of joy,
that's something that I certainly could use more of in
my life, and I love that we have. I have
lots of different examples that we'll talk about, and you know,
not that much crossover, although there is one game on

(11:07):
Annie's list that I have to a billion percent back up.
But it's also the game that you can't talk about
because to really enjoy it, you need to go in
knowing nothing about it. Gone Home is the game. Oh yes,
so good, but you can't. Don't don't look anything up,
don't read about it, just play it because I cried

(11:31):
at that game. That one made me cry. But yeah,
I want to. I want to chat about some of
the examples we have here, Like you you have some
of the popular examples with Animal Crossing. I mean that
one went crazy popular in the pandemic. It came out
just as the pandemic was creating lockdown, and like it
was like it became a pop culture moment in circles

(11:52):
that I follow at any rate.

Speaker 2 (11:53):
Oh yes, oh yes, it came out at like the
right time. And I think this is actually a great
segue into talking about how we all got into cozy games,
because I remember when that came out. Animal Crossing New
Horizons is one of the big examples people give for
cozy games. The other one is Starty Valley. But I
kind of going back to your original point, I didn't

(12:14):
start playing Animal Crossing until two years later, and it
was because Samantha was like, you got to try these
cozy games.

Speaker 3 (12:19):
So I was trying to use her for fruit.

Speaker 1 (12:23):
Oh of course, yeah. I mean those turnips aren't going
to grow themselves, right.

Speaker 2 (12:28):
Samantha was using me, But she's been my real like
open door into this world. So I thought we could
all talk about how our experiences and how we got
into it, starting with you, Samantha.

Speaker 3 (12:38):
Yes, I have to put a big caveat on the
games that I play. I am not really good with
my hand eye coordination, as you were talking about, it's
not great. I am that one person that when we
play Mario Kart that I continuously fall off the track
like that is my ra And you're gonna know about

(12:59):
it because I'm like I'm off, I fell again, I'm
off again, and I'm always last place. So for me,
trying to just stay on track is my thing, and
that's that's kind of the theme through everything. So with
animal Crossing, even though is I love the fishing part,
I love the collecting and swimming. I just did it recently.
The new thing right now with the Christmas being around,

(13:21):
which we just had an episode about holiday themed animal crossing,
you can build a snowman. I was like, oh wow, okay,
I want to do this. I have dropped every every
snowball off the edge of something or crashed it into
a house, and I'm very upset about this.

Speaker 2 (13:37):
I want you to know.

Speaker 3 (13:38):
But like I'd love the trying to find the peoples
to come to my island. It does feel like I'm
starting a bit of a cult, and then also just
keeping a campground, like like that's my whole experience is
to collect all the fish, collect all the fossils, which
I've done y'all, but I haven't gotten all the art pieces.

Speaker 2 (13:55):
I have.

Speaker 3 (13:57):
Any made sure to brag to me about that island.
It's kind of sad because it still again looks like
a campground. But I'm like that's what I want. I
want to be a retreat into the campground, not.

Speaker 1 (14:07):
Like not like, hey, let's turn this into a bustling metropolis.
Is it Animal Crossing where the snowman will criticize you
if you don't get the balls just right? Yes? No, yeah?

Speaker 3 (14:19):
Yes?

Speaker 2 (14:19):
Is it trying to give me like, oh, it'll be
like you tried your best?

Speaker 1 (14:22):
Yeah, the judgment so like if the head is too
small or too large in relation to the body, and
the Snowman's like, what are you even doing?

Speaker 2 (14:31):
See?

Speaker 3 (14:32):
Yeah, now now I'm even more upset. And I even't
even done it. I haven't even I can't even get
it together to make one.

Speaker 1 (14:37):
So I haven't played Animal Crossing. One are the YouTube
video channels I watch outside Xbox did a whole thing
about it. When I saw that, it made me laugh
so hard. They're talking about how you know certain games
that that neg you when you when you when you
when you mess up a basic thing in the game.
But like, legitimately this is challenging to dude, get it,

(14:59):
just because it's hard to judge in the game when
you're at that level. But overall, Animal Crossing certainly checks
all those cozy boxes so you got into that. That
was kind of your your journey into cozy gaming.

Speaker 3 (15:14):
One of the things that happened is my partner is
a gamer and loves to play games, and he's been
trying to get me into gaming in general. So Overcooked
was his beginning with me. Huge mistake. Again, I'm not
competitive yelling at me about cooking something just right, yea
all over the place. We did not fight, I will
give you that. So our relationship is strong. I've determined that.

(15:38):
But he then like I said, let's try Animal Crossing.
I think you'll like this, and it did the trying
to find the again, like finding the biggest fish that's
worth the most amount of money. Let's do this getting
the singer to come onto our island. I love it.
I don't know if you know, Like you said, you
haven't played this, Jonathan.

Speaker 1 (15:56):
I haven't, but I've I listened to a lot of
shows of people who have played it, so I feel
kind of like I've semi experienced elements of the game
just through osmosis.

Speaker 3 (16:08):
I think you should try it. I would be interested
to see what kind of village island you create. Like
I have a good friend who's made his entire island goth,
but like chic Goth, I don't understand how that happened.
He has displays everywhere and Annie, well, Annie, you need
to talk about your island obviously, Okay.

Speaker 2 (16:29):
So basically what happened was Samantha went.

Speaker 1 (16:33):
Any story that starts with basically what happened.

Speaker 2 (16:36):
Basically, Samantha went from like, I'm not a gamer to
hear all these games you need to play, and she
was like, we're going to do an episode. It's research based,
so you need to go play these cozy games. And
she gave me all these recommendations. One of them was
Animal Crossing. And the funny thing about me is that
I'm a completionist. I want those achievements. So I knew

(16:58):
That's why I didn't start playing Animal Crossing, because I
knew it never ends really, so I was like, I'm
just going to be trapped in some hellscape where I'm
checking the mail, like I don't want this, but she
convinced me to do it, and I of course made
mine very Star Wars semed. It's got a Star song,
it's got a Star Wars flag. Everybody says Star Wars slogans.
But because I'm such a completionist. I completed that damn

(17:20):
museum and I quit.

Speaker 1 (17:25):
I'm done this and no further.

Speaker 2 (17:27):
Yeah. But it's just really funny because I know I'd
like have the exact opposite experience with cozy games, where
I'm like, no, I'll play my like horror game a
million times and it's great, But a cozy game, I'm
so stressed because I where's the end?

Speaker 1 (17:43):
Yeah, I hear you. Yeah, there's certain ones where you
can theoretically reach the end of the content, but even
those occasionally will get massive updates and it'll you know,
it's it's like the Mafia. Just when you thought you
were out that you get pulled right back in. And
So I have a whole bunch of games that are
listed on this section, but I'm just going to talk

(18:05):
about one and maybe mention the others when we chat
about some of our favorites. But Starduck Valley is the
game they got me into cozy games. Now. Stardu Valley
has some elements to it that also include, like if
you're going into the minds, there's combat and stuff, but
that's not the prime focus of the game. That's one element.
Most of it is about setting up a farm and

(18:27):
creating relationships with all the villagers that live in the
little town, and maybe even finding yourself a match. There
are certain members of the town who are romancible. You can,
if you're a jerk, get into a committed relationship and
then ruin it by flirting with somebody else. It's it's

(18:47):
such fun. Concerned Ape is the name of the guy
or the handle of the guy who created it. He's
got another game that's that's been in development for years
now that I am highly anticipated, called Haunted Chocolate. Cannot
wait to see that. It sounds like it's going to
have a lot of sort of shared DNA the Stardoo
Valley but yeah, Stardio Valley. I literally have more than

(19:09):
one hundred hours of game time in that game because
I would start over and try different things, like well,
what if I start a relationship with this village or
instead of that one? What happens? Can I fix him?
The answer to that last question is no. Just like
in real life, like I had never done any video

(19:29):
game modding. I've been playing games since I was a kid,
and I'm fifty. So when I say when I was
a kid, I was playing games like River Raid, which
by the way, developed by a woman, Carol Shaw, phenomenal
game that was on the Atari twenty six hundred. But
I've been playing games since I was a kid. It
was the cozy games I started playing really with Starduo Valley.
I got to the point where I was modding it,

(19:52):
which added new villagers and new areas to explore, and
just recently this past year, Concerned Ape released a huge
update to the game to make it one point six.
So even in a game like that where at first
it feels like there's a beginning, middle, and end, and
then you can continue past the end, but the story's
pretty much over, it's never a guarantee because some of

(20:12):
those cozy developers just figure out, hey, I want to
add a little more to that world I created, and
next thing you know, you're right back in it. And
it's crazy too, because of course, the sale in the
case of Stardu Valley has already been made. It's not
one of those games where it's like a subscription based
thing where you've you know, you're paying every month to
play this game. You purchased it already. Concerned Ape has

(20:32):
no obligation to keep developing this title, and yet he
continues to do it, So U a true hero, I would,
I would say, but yeah, that was the game that
pulled me into it, and since then there are countless
games I would argue fall into the cozy category that
I have, I have explored and I can't wait to

(20:53):
talk more about coziness. But my producer is holding up
a knife and pointing it at me, so I think
we need to take a quick ad break or else
things are going to get an awful lot less cozy.

(21:14):
All right, we're back, and my producer has given me
the friends symbol of smashing two wrists together, so I
think we all know what that means. It means it's
time to get back to talking about cozy games.

Speaker 3 (21:28):
Never part of gold, Yes, but yeah no, I was
wondering because Stardoo Valley, Animal Crossing and I have another game,
Cozy Grove are all real time games I have. Like
my partner loves Started Valley again. Our executive producer, Christina
loves Stardoo Valley. If you let them go, do they

(21:51):
like start like all their food rots? Does that all
that happen? Does all the crops and all that they've
worked so hard? Do they go away?

Speaker 1 (21:58):
Crops will stay ready for harvesting until you harvest them
or if the season changes. So each season is twenty
eight days long, and so once once spring turns to summer,
for example, any spring crops you had that were either
still in the growing phase or were unharvested, because you know,

(22:20):
some crops take longer to grow than others if you
don't plant it out properly. I mean there are people
who make spreadsheets with this stuff. I never got that
tactical with it. Let's say you plant something that takes
you know, eight days to grow, but you did it
on three days before the end of the season. Well,
then once the first day of summer starts, all of
those crops are now dead and you have to clear

(22:42):
them with a scythe and then start over with summer
crops because spring crops won't survive into summer. With a
few exceptions, there's some crops that do span two different seasons,
So if you plant them early in season one, they'll
go all the way through season two, and some of
them will continually generate vegetables or fruit, depending upon what

(23:05):
the crop is. So like corn, corn keeps producing, but
if it's something like a melon, once you harvest it,
that's gone, you have to plant something new in its place,
or just say that's it. So the nice thing is
about this game is that you can be obsessive and
use spreadsheets and everything to plan everything out. There's nothing
wrong with that. That's a legitimate form of gaming. Or

(23:26):
you can be like me where you're like, whoopsie, Daisy
shouldn't have planted that. Then could have held on to
it till the next year. But whatever, it's summertime. Let's
plant some other stuff. And that's what I love about
the game is that there's not a right way to
play it. I mean, you can men max, but I'm
just not that type of player. I've never been a
men maxer, so I don't sweat it and it helps

(23:48):
me a lot.

Speaker 3 (23:49):
Okay, you know, I think when we talk about games
now start a value. Yeah, they had the seasons, it's
not like real time of seasons. Yeah, but games like
Animal Crossing. Specifically with Animal Crossing, it gives you a
new venture because you can visit each other's islands. I
still love the Elijah Wood story about Animal Crossing. That
really pushed it to an element of like, oh, there's
a celebrity let's go, let's see if we can get

(24:12):
him to come to our island type of conversation. But
it really opens up where during that pandemic era where
we were all quarantined or trying to people were able
to actually still have fun, Like you don't have to
be right next to each other. I have visited Annie's island.
I haven't visited recently. I need to see the finished product.
You can do dream states where you go and visit

(24:33):
people's island without interacting with people, but it's actually people's islands.
Like this level of gaming is such a different, unique perspective.
It could be dangerous if you too get a different way,
but wind in appropriately. It's so fun because I have
brought people back into Animal crossing, just like Annie after
the fact, because I am real slow in catching up
with the times and like what the fads are and

(24:56):
I get to interact with them and they get to
show off their island, even not right next to each other.
Like it's a fantastic way that this level of community
is able to attach to a game like this, And
I think that's a big part of what makes these
appealing is that safety, that safety that it kind of
brings as well as that soft, warm feeling that we

(25:16):
talk about when it comes to obviously cozy. So this
is such a great opening for so many people who
just want to occupy some time once again without having
to remember how awful things can be or agree well.

Speaker 1 (25:31):
And it gives you a chance to see into other
people's approach to creativity, which I love. I think of
it equivalent to there's a concept within tech about open source, right,
this idea of you are creating something and you're leaving
it open for other people to be able to see
how you're doing it. They can actually contribute to the development.

(25:53):
In some cases, they are free to take what you
did and build upon that, maybe in a brand new way.
And I feel like elements of that philosophy are inherent
in some of these cozy games as well, where it
is this openness. And one of the best things about
open source, in my opinion, is that it allows for

(26:15):
people who otherwise never would have been able to participate
in that particular project to take part in it, and
the project benefits from their participation. Because if you have
a closed project, you might have some really smart people
working on that they're really really smart, but you're limited
to the people who are in the room. When it's open,

(26:35):
it's practically unlimited. I mean, as long as someone has access,
they can contribute. And it doesn't matter how big that room,
that closed room was, you're still going to find the
best ideas in that open environment. Same sort of thing
with this approach to cozy games, where you're gonna see
stuff that Whenever I see any of these videos of
people who have meticulously crafted their islands and animal crossing,

(27:00):
I just sit there and think, like, how many hours
does that represent? I mean, it's phenomenal. You've done an
amazing job. I don't think of it as a waste
of time. I think of it as an incredible expression
that you know, you took these tools that were meant
to be a game and you turned it into art.
That's kind of phenomenal, and you're sharing it for free
with people, or maybe not for free, maybe they got
to bring a turn up or two, but they still

(27:20):
get to go see it.

Speaker 2 (27:22):
Yes, And I think there is absolutely a reason why
they're so popular and why they are so popular right now.
And the pandemic was a big one, and during the
pandemic they really took off because we were looking for
this way to connect to find stress relief, and that
has translated to so many new games, and so many

(27:44):
of them that are so interesting and new, which we'll
talk about, but also a lot of money, like an
estimated three hundred and twenty billion dollars by twenty twenty six,
and a lot more gamers three point two billion gamers
worldwide by the end of twenty twenty three. That's a
lot of people. And with that, coinciding with the rise

(28:06):
of cozy games, we've seen the rise of women and
non binary people and trans people who are developers. I
haven't found anything that's a direct link, but it's pretty
telling that we're seeing a lot more of these games,
and then we're seeing a lot more women and non
binary people and trans people in the development space. Because
we also have talked to some developers on our show

(28:29):
who are saying, you know, it's easier to get in
in the cozy gaming space as an indie developer doesn't
have a big studio backing her. And so I think
when we're talking about that, when we're talking about people
in the gaming world, this creativity of seeing what someone
does on their island, but also the creativity of having

(28:51):
more developers in the space and seeing what comes of that.
I've just really really enjoyed. I love seeing a game
that doesn't have the traditional like this is victory model.
I love seeing the different ways people are redefining games.
It's just so fun because games are such a great
storytelling medium, or just even a pretty space where it

(29:15):
feels nice and safe and you can connect with people
that way. There's just so much vast fertile ground for
new types of games, So I have really loved that
coming out of this.

Speaker 1 (29:26):
Yeah, I think there has been a real convergence, both
with the rise of the popularity of cozy games and
the welcome trend of more women, non binary, and trans
game developers getting traction in a space that traditionally has
favored men. I mentioned River Raid being made by Carol Shaw,

(29:48):
and of course that's not the only example of an
early game developed by a woman. Women have been involved
in game development since games have been a thing, right,
whether you're talking about video games or just games in general,
but more often than not, their stories were kind of ignored,
are just simply not not addressed. While you would hear

(30:12):
about you know, Nolan Bushnell or something you know, you
hear about all the men, especially the business leaders responsible
for establishing game studios and that sort of thing. And
I like the fact that that women and non binary
and trans game developers are having a moment, you know, like,

(30:33):
and I'm hoping it's just the beginning of a moment
that lasts from here on out, so that we're not
telling the same heterogeneous story over and over and over again.
And it's also nice to be able to talk about
something that isn't a terrible story, like toxic work culture
at a company like Ubisoft or Activision Blizzard, like anyone

(30:56):
who's done any research into gaming, Ultimately, you're going to
come across those stories. The nice thing is it doesn't
have to be like that. It's not like that everywhere,
and there are stories of people who are in a
safe space to be creative and to develop games and
to create things that speak to a very wide audience.
And you know, I'm living proof, Like I'm a straight

(31:19):
white man who loves cozy games. It's not like these
games aren't meant for you so you can't play them.
They're so welcoming that even a demo like me gets
to go and play with everybody's toys and I love it.

Speaker 3 (31:34):
Yes.

Speaker 2 (31:34):
And you know, when we first started talking about cozy
games on Spinty, Samantha did all this research to see
like what's up here, and there was a lot of
like our women, Is it more women playing cozy games?
And there was some research that suggested that, but it
was mostly like pretty small percentage wise. I think it
was just because the narrative has so long been this

(31:59):
is what a game is, but women, wait a minute,
they're playing this, and they're playing mobile games, and that
goes into what we've been kind of alluding to, of
that discussion of what's a real game and what's a
real gamer. And in my opinion, like I read somebody
wrote it like that's like saying somebody who reads a

(32:22):
children's book and a different book, Like they're all books.
At the end of the day, they're all books. Like
why are we casting one is not a real game
or it's lesser, And oftentimes it's because it's seen as
something more feminine. There's like a lot of gender essentialism
of like, oh, it's more like social and empathetic, that's

(32:43):
more for women, But plenty of women like violent games too.
I'm somebody who likes all kinds of games. I don't
know why. Well, like I do because on the show
we do, but we always have to gender things in
this way. It's unnecess yeah, unnecessary.

Speaker 1 (33:01):
Oh yeah, no, like anecdotally, like some of the creators,
like the content creators that I follow, who are you know,
they're not developers, but they're players in the space. A
lot of the women that I follow, you know, they're
playing incredibly competitive you know, triple A title, violent games,

(33:22):
you know. And I find all the pigeonholing and stereotyping
to be really frustrating. It also does not help that
there are video game developers out there who are trying
to capitalize on a female audience, and so they're making
a game they think women will like, which is the

(33:42):
equivalent in the tech space of hey, let's make this
thing pink and then women will buy it. It is
the most insulting, reductive thing you can imagine. And those
are some of the games I would say are bad games.
They're not. Maybe the gameplay is fine, but the presentation
is so pandering and and insulting that I can't stand it.

(34:03):
It's insincere, is what it really comes down to. And
I don't want that game.

Speaker 3 (34:08):
Right, And even though cozy gaming is not new, like
the term is fairly new obviously. And then the understanding
and kind of the I guess industry in itself with
people trying to jump on board again like big corporations
like you were talking about, and I found it like
really reassuring that we see more and more independent companies

(34:28):
coming out because of games like this. I know you're
gonna mention one of the games that you love that
I haven't played yet. I'm gonna it's unpacking. And the
way that it had developed was through a female, a
women creator, Rin Bryer, and she worked with an independent
company in Australia to make this happen. We see when
things like this. It won so many awards, it has baftis,

(34:51):
it has all these awards to it because it is
one of the biggest games out there, but it couldn't
have happened without it actually being developed with an independent
gaming company. And I think that's really important to talk
about that we are seeing more opportunities, Thank goodness, because
of this. We had a creator on named Renee Gittens
and loved her. She was fantastic and she is a

(35:12):
director of Stumbling Cat Studios, which is an independent company,
and she talked about the struggles of releasing her own game,
which by the way, is Potions, and it's a really
cool if you like Stardu.

Speaker 1 (35:22):
Valley, that Potions was fantastic.

Speaker 3 (35:24):
Did you play it?

Speaker 1 (35:25):
Okay?

Speaker 2 (35:25):
So good?

Speaker 3 (35:26):
And she did such an amazing job in creating this
that the marketing part was kind of shaky and she
really had to push forward through outlets like TikTok in
order to have it out there. And I think she's
things fairly successful now, thank goodness. But like it's independent
companies like this that really help create a better platform
and a better results in gaming through their companies.

Speaker 1 (35:49):
I love hearing that a lot. Like that's good, such
a nice contrast to some of the stories you hear
from the big established companies, where like there are women
who say, oh, my time at like Activision Blizzard was
actually great. I got to work on some fantastic things,
but there was also this incredibly toxic culture that I
also had to deal with. And of course there are

(36:09):
women who said the toxic culture defined their entire experience
of working at these companies. So hearing about these chances
for people who don't identify as straight men. Having a
chance to be able to build in this space is
really encouraging to me, because I mean, there are entire

(36:33):
experiences I never would have had if it hadn't been
for someone taking a chance on a person who doesn't
fall into what is considered the mold of video game
designer or you know, video game director or whatever it
may be. And that's a real shame because you know,
we would be without some really kick ass games if
that were the case.

Speaker 3 (36:54):
You said you do potions. How far along are you
at the beginning.

Speaker 1 (36:59):
Smell, I'm still very early on, still very early on,
so but I want to I'll give a shout out now,
but I'll probably shout her out again later. There's a
content creator who goes by the handle gab Smolders. Gab Smolders.
I found out about gab Smolders because I'm an old guy.
I was extremely late to the game of discovering this

(37:19):
one content creator and not irishman. Top of them. Martintolia
is how he started off all his videos. His name's
Jack Septic Guy. That's his handle, Jack Septic Guy. He's big, big,
big news like huge content creator. I came late to
the game. Found out his partner is gab Smolders and
he had her on for a streamer too, and I
was like, Oh, this person's really cool. And then they

(37:39):
mentioned that she had her own YouTube video channel, so
I went and subscribed to that, and so she started
playing Potions and I was like, yes, so I just haven't.
I have so little time and so much of it
is dedicated to Stardu Valley in Disney Dreamlight Valley that
I have only played a little bit of it.

Speaker 2 (37:58):
Okay, well, okay, this is a good segue into a
couple of things for me.

Speaker 1 (38:03):
Well, I know, Annie, you have to say something because
you started and then Tari found another knife. We took
the first one away from her. This one's bigger, So
I think we're gonna take another quick break to think
our sponsors. Tari's staring daggers at me, but the actual

(38:28):
literal dagger is no longer in her hand, so I
think it's safe for us to start the episode.

Speaker 2 (38:31):
Oh good story. Well, okay, yes, I do have a
couple of things I wanted to bring up because after
all of this was coming out, maybe more women are
playing games. What does that mean? People were trying.

Speaker 1 (38:47):
To women, they're a thing. Did you know?

Speaker 2 (38:51):
Did you know we could have been making money off
of this whole demographic. Oh my gosh. It's so frustrating because,
like you said, women have been creating gays what they've
been playing games forever, but there was a whole like
gendered marketing thing that happened in the eighties. And yep, anyway,
there was a lot of what's going on here. Obviously,
one of the things that came up was casual games

(39:15):
and cozy games are easier to pick up, they're more accessible,
and women we've talked about recently on a recent episode,
they have less leisure time, So it's quite possible that
that is one of the reasons is like I can
just pick this up whenever I have time. I don't
have to go through the tutorial of how all of
this works, Like it's pretty simple. In between all the

(39:38):
other things you've got going on. Social media for the
first time was actually marketing games towards women. In some
cases very problematically so as you were mentioning, but it
is one of the first times where these games were
being marketed towards women, and things like content creators and
social media also helped but I think we do have

(40:00):
to emphasize as well that it has been when you're
talking about things like Activision, Blizzard, when you're talking about
online harassment, it's been a space that has often been
very hostile. And even if somebody didn't outright experience the hostility,
just the reputation of it was enough to be like, oh,
I don't want to I'm not welcome in that world.

Speaker 1 (40:22):
Yeah. So this episode overall is all about joy and
acceptance and accessibility and celebrating connectivity and all this sort
of thing, but we have to address a very awful,
terrible elephant in the room. So yeah, I wish I
could say that the gaming industry and the audience for

(40:46):
games in general all came to embrace and celebrate the
fact that there was a more diverse group of gamers
out there then typically gets represented. But no, that's not
the way it unfolded. There were trash people who mostly
gathered on eight chan. If you don't know what eight
chan is and you've heard of four chan, eight chan

(41:07):
is four chan but worse, and they got together and
created a coordinated smear campaign that was targeting women in games,
whether they were women creators like developers or they were
in the gaming media industry where they were reporting on games.
And this ended up getting the name from the actor

(41:30):
Adam Baldwin. You might remember him from Firefly, a show
that I used to like to watch. And gamer Gate
became a thing in twenty fourteen, and on its surface,
the perpetuators of gamer Gate set it was all about
addressing and unfair and biased practices in media, in games media.

(41:51):
In reality, what it was was a harassment campaign that
specifically singled out women and non binary people in the
space and tried to run them out of it. And
this extended beyond just online harassment to things like swatting,
where they were sending swat teams to people's homes or
sending disturbing male or sharing ad you know, doxing people online.

(42:16):
And it was a perfect catalog of all the worst
behaviors that you would hear about on the internet, all
directed at women for having the temerity to be both
women and people who like to play games. And it
was the worst and it lasted for like two years
until it kind of died down when enough people said

(42:38):
that they were no longer buying the cover story of
this is about games journalism because it's so clearly was
not so much so that even Wikipedia, if you go
to Wikipedia and look up Gamergate, it actually has i
think in brackets it says an online harassment campaign. So
it's Gamergate online harassment campaign, like that's what they It's not,

(42:59):
you know, championing ethics in game journalism the way that
they were claiming. So that was super ugly and for
someone like me, as naive and idiotic as I am
being not having that experience like I have not had
the experience of being confronted with this kind of stuff
in my day to day life, seeing it so bare

(43:21):
like an undeniable out there was a real wake up
call that was long overdue for me, honestly, because it
was undeniable what was happening, and that the fact that
it was happening in the open, it was one of
those things that I thought was really disturbing. This would
eventually dovetail into the Me Too movement and you would
start to see more and more people come out and

(43:44):
support women and the stories they had to tell, not
just in gaming obviously, but in all venues, and in
some ways I think ultimately it's a good thing, but
it was such a truly brutal time online and in
the gaming industry and general.

Speaker 3 (44:01):
Trying not to be the negative Nancy, and we were
trying to do very positive. I wish we could say
that was the end and everything has changed for the
better and everybody accepts everyone into this world. But since then,
we've had incidents in Twitch where deep fakes are made
of female creators. We've seen people attacking trans creators like

(44:22):
nobody's business people, attacking influencers who say they like a
certain game like I definitely love Following, like you were
talking about different YouTubers and TikTokers who talk about cozy
gaming specifically like that's now part of my world, and
them having to do every like every six months, a

(44:42):
video saying please stop harassing me, please stop telling me
I'm not a gamer, please, like having to do something
that seems so needless and so honestly like, good for them,
I hope they're making making money off of that video,
but the fact that they have to take their time
and do another video to call out the haters, essentially,
because it seems like it's a constant basis every time

(45:04):
I've ever seen and again it maybe because Twitter has
changed so vastly in the last few years, but even
before it did change hands. I remember looking at one
specific group, a nonprofit feminist frequency. Yes, their whole thing
is to try to educate as well as advocate for
women and non binding people in the community, in the

(45:25):
gaming community. Every time they would post something, I swear
about seventy percent of the comments to them were literal
dick picks. Yeah, and that was after the fact. So
there's so much And again though back to there's so
many people that are like you, Jonathan, who were like,
what is going on? Why would you do this? This
is silly? Why can't everybody be a part of this?

(45:46):
This seems unnecessary. So there's definitely people who are have
become more and more supporters, but there's still that negativity
that still have people and a lot of marginalized people
questioning should I even try?

Speaker 1 (45:58):
Yeah, it suggests to me that there's some deep things
that go well beyond the gaming sphere that are contributors
to this kind of behavior. I mean obviously, because like
I think anyone could say that, well, if you don't
like those kinds of games, and you don't consider them games,
why don't you just follow the people who like the
kinds of games you like, And then you know other

(46:20):
people can enjoy this thing and it doesn't like the
fact that it exists doesn't mean you're required to enjoy
it or engage with it. Go and do the things
you like to do. So why do you have to
Why do you feel the need to engage in a
negative way with this world that doesn't speak to you?
Just go do the thing that does speak to you.
And I think the answer to that question is, Oh,

(46:43):
I see, there's a deeper level of like misogyny and
transphobia and tribalism that's at play, that is driving these behaviors,
and this is just an easy way for that to manifest,
and in some ways has been treated as an acceptable
way for it to manifest, because again, gaming, for so

(47:06):
long was perceived to be the domain of young male
leisurely activity. And maybe that's a whole lot of armchair
psychology and none of it is supportable. It's entirely possible,
But from my own observations, it's the implication I feel
pressed upon me when I see these kinds of things unfold.

Speaker 2 (47:26):
Yes, And if this were a different episode of Jonathan,
I would unpack so much of that, like the history
of dudes feeling maligned because they were nerds, and now
nerd is cool, and they don't the gatekeeping.

Speaker 1 (47:42):
They don't want anybody in the pedestals.

Speaker 2 (47:45):
Yeah, yes, and the reason like it's a real game
and not a real game skill level, and you could
never obtain this skill, which yes I can. But anyway,
one of the things that really upsets me about all
of this a lot of things, but one of the
things that really upsets me is that games are fun

(48:05):
and they are a good stress reliever. As we were
talking about, there's been scientific studies into all of the
things that they can help with. We've had listeners right
in that say it helps them with things like PTSD.
It can like it can relieve your your stress, your anxiety,

(48:25):
it can lift your mood, it can foster connection. It's
being used in all kinds of treatments for things, and
so obviously that's there's a lot going on there. There's
been a long standing narrative about games and mental health.
But it's really unfortunate to have like a whole demographic

(48:48):
where it is either they're missing out on it entirely
because they don't feel welcome or it's a stressor because
they're gonna get harassed if they play Yeah yeah.

Speaker 1 (48:58):
Yeah, No, that that's sucks. If any of my listeners
out there ever find yourself tempted to like criticize someone
for the things that they like, if those things aren't
hurting anyone, just think twice about it. As I often
stress this show, the underlying philosophy is a combination of

(49:19):
critical thinking and compassion. That compassion piece is important. I
say over and over again. If you are compassionate but
you lack critical thinking, you're a dip. And if you
are a critical thinker but you lack compassion, you're a jerk.
Don't be a dip or a jerk. Combine the two together,
and then you can be you know, or at least

(49:41):
try to be a good person. It's a good step.
It's a good start, a foundation. Really. But yeah, I
completely agree with everything you said, Annie. I mean, like
my listeners know this, but this might be news to you,
and I apologize. But earlier this year, I had a
a massive medical emergency and nearly died and spent quite

(50:04):
some time in the intensive care unit of a local
hospital here in the Atlanta area, where everyone was super nice,
and a part of that medical emergency was due to stress.
My blood pressure had reached level of two sixteen over
one point thirty, which is in stroke territory if you're curious.

(50:25):
And so I had to do many, many, many things
to try and find ways to change my lifestyle to
improve my stress levels. And I did lots of stuff,
like I reduced my workload, I started to eat better,
and then the holidays happened, but anyway, I was eating

(50:46):
better for most of the year. And these games, these
cozy games, were one of the ways I would manage
my anxiety and my stress. When I would feel them
coming on and I had a little extra time, I
would play these games. I would let me focus on
something that was not stressful. There were no real like
there's like steaks, but they're all very low level stakes.

(51:10):
You know, will Emily agree to go to the movies
with me in Stardue Valley or I'm not gonna have
to go back to Sandy and boy she's a pill, Yeah,
you know, and so like low stakes. So I but
I found them like I again, this is anecdotal, but

(51:30):
I found them very therapeutic. And to me, when you
have an experience like that that that you feel directly
benefits like your life and is potentially keeping you alive
or at least helping to you know, when you when
we tell these stories about people who feel turned away
from the hobby or they're criticized for liking a certain

(51:53):
type of game because it's not a different type of game,
it really is upsetting because I'm like, y'all, these games
kept me from going insane and having blood pressure to
the point where I had to go back into the hospital.
I think this is something that is worth experiencing, or
if you don't want to experience it, just let other
people enjoy what they're enjoying.

Speaker 3 (52:15):
I'm really glad you're okay.

Speaker 1 (52:18):
Yeah, I mean, well, okay is a really broad term.

Speaker 3 (52:22):
We're gonna say, yes, okay, are you are you feeling better?

Speaker 1 (52:27):
My blood pressure is lower, Okay, the surgery I had
to have earlier this year went well.

Speaker 3 (52:33):
So glad to hear it. We're glad that you're okay,
We're glad you're back with us, and yes, let's to
there to the workload. Yeah, good on you. I know
that's something hard for you. I might not know you well,
but I know that you do work a lot, so
good on you for falling back. But here's the other

(52:53):
thing to this too. Not not only is it, yes,
all the stress relief because I'm with you, because I
need that as well. I found out I've got a
perfect game for that has an ending, but it's beautiful.
It's very stress relieving. But one of the things this
is a money making industry, and not just for developers,
not just for companies. But we talked about influencers. It
opened the door for so many people to be able

(53:15):
to be a part of this industry which seemed geared
towards men. So even in Twitch, twitch streams and Twitch creators,
people have been making bank and you rarely see women
in there, but when you do, it's pretty cool to
me to see so many being able to play any games.
It's not just cozy games. It's all these games. But
even more so, like we were talking about with TikTok,

(53:37):
we're talking about with YouTube like being able to make
money off of content. That's something that wasn't previously done before.
So we have creators like we've talked about. You talked
about gab Smolders and which I want to hear morebout
her because I'm go'n have to follow her. But Cozy
Kay is one of the ones that really got me
into finding these different games. And she makes this aesthetic
like the whole thing is the aesthetics of it all.

(53:59):
She loves the game, don't don't play, she loves the game.
But like with her aesthetics, she's being able to make
a living through this content and she does an amazing,
amazing job. She's gotten sponsorships through these games. She's gotten
sponsorships from blanket companies and candle companies because again, it
goes along with that cozy vibe. And this opens up

(54:20):
so much more for marginalized people to be able to
be a part of an industry they thought they could
never be a part of previously because yeah, maybe their
thing is not playing I'm sorry any but last of us,
because they don't want their heart to be torn out
of their chest every few days, I'm sorry, relaxing like

(54:41):
you see so much more like. And then we have
people like Milady Confetti, who is another creator that she's
on a podcast, her podcast, Nerdy Magical Girl Podcast, where
she gets to talk about her love of cozy games
and gaming in general and just all things nerdy, But
this really opened up a door for her to be
a con creator that she couldn't have been previously or

(55:03):
may not have had the opportunity previously. So this is
such a moneymaker for not only again the creators are
the developers, but so many more people out there. And
I think that's amazing. Yeah, because we need more content
like this.

Speaker 1 (55:16):
Yeah, yeah, I like. I love the creators who would
engage in the cozy and also the silly like. I
like creators who are who don't have that ego or
being and they're not being silly like in a prankish
way where they're constantly pranking each other. I don't like
the pranks like this one. So many pranks are clearly

(55:36):
prearranged and not actually pranks. They're just performative and y'all
that's just not cool. But two like, they're usually mean spirited,
and I'm not big on that either. My friend Shay
would say, well, it's because you're a cancer. You just
want everyone to be friendly all the time, Like, yeah,
I do want I don't believe in astrology, but I
do want people to be friendly all the time. Gosh

(55:57):
darn it, But so I to cancer. But but yeah,
Like I like the people who they They love the cozy,
they love being silly, they love laughing. Like that's the
vibe I yearn for when I'm going on to watch content.
So like gab Smolders, who I did mention earlier, she

(56:19):
does a lot of different games, like not just cozy games,
she also really really and any you dig this, she
loves creepy, spooky, supernatural horror type games, so those are
like the two categories she typically does. And you never
know if it's gonna be a cozy game or if
it's gonna be a this thing's going to eat your
face off your face game. Typically not an action oriented game.

(56:41):
It's usually more like like Japanese horrorse aesthetic going on.
She does a lot of games from Itchyo.

Speaker 3 (56:48):
But.

Speaker 1 (56:50):
I love it whenever it's cozy, because she she herself
will make herself cozy. She has a cat named BIB
and BB is a big, old, fluffy tabby cat who
who very frequently will interrupt her videos and BB just
becomes part of the video and like BB has BB's
own fan club. But yeah, potions is how I learned

(57:10):
potions from gab Smolders. I've watched your play Stardo Valley.
I've watched your play lots of these cozy games, including
the ones that have sort of a creepy element to them.
So that's why Annie, I think you definitely need to
check her out. She's originally from the Netherlands, now living
in England, and her accent is also adorable. It's not

(57:34):
super strong, but it's one of the many things that
I actually find very comforting when I'm watching these. It's
almost to the point of being ASMR without being ASMR, Like,
it's not intentionally you could argue unintentional ASMR unless she's
playing one of the really super wacky games where it's
just way too much laughing for it to be relaxing.

(57:55):
It's just very fun. But yeah, highly recommend gab Smolders.
Her content is great. If you go to her channel,
say I sent you. She doesn't know who I am,
it'll just be fun.

Speaker 2 (58:07):
Who was this?

Speaker 1 (58:07):
Yeah, exactly? Who's Jonathan from text? Who's this guy?

Speaker 2 (58:14):
Well? I mean that's such a useful There are so
many video games. It's so useful to have someone who
you trust to recommend or not recommend in case maybe, so,
I do think that's really valuable I found a lot
of horror games through people where they're like, oh, have
you seen this someone else playing it? And kind of

(58:35):
to the getting with the cat and the blanket, A
lot of people say, like for them, the cozy game
is that is like you get in your blanket, you
get your pet, or you get the warm drink. And
that's why a lot of cozy games are on portable
things like Switch.

Speaker 1 (58:51):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (58:53):
Yeah, So I do think that's important part of this
conversation as well, the rise of portable gaming system. I
also read some people describe it as being meditative and
that's why they kind of feel that health benefit when
they play. But I do think unfortunately gaming, and it

(59:14):
specifically cozy gaming, is often dismissed as like there's no
value in this or in fact it's doing you harm.
But beyond the high stress times we live in, and
there have been studies that show these do help. They
are also when we're talking about why it matters, it
matters that we're looking at different ways games can look

(59:36):
based on who's creating them. It matters when we're talking
about like how we define the structure or what is winning.
When we're talking about inclusivity and storytelling, our creativity to
give us these better stories, these more varied stories, and
just women, having more women and marginalized people in gaming

(59:56):
and redefining what a gamer is. So we can hopefully
one move on from that conversation and we can move
on to like improving in a different way. I'm tired
of being stuck on this one part. Yeah, let's let's
talk about like why these cozy games are so valuable
and why people love them, and let's stop dismissing them
as useless.

Speaker 1 (01:00:16):
Yeah, or not real games. Yeah, yeah, I think. I
think if everyone were to play Gone Home Sincerely, Like literally,
you sit down, you play Gone Home Sincerely, and you
can't talk about that game because it ruins the game.
But you get to the end of Gone Home, and
the by the end of Gone Home, the game has

(01:00:37):
turned out to be not what you thought it was
when you started, Like, I think it's safe to say
that it is different. And if you are not moved
by the end of that, just you know, like maybe
maybe keep your opinions to yourself, because for the rest
of us, it would be really nice if we could
all just celebrate something that like tells such a beautiful
story that unfolds in such an amazing way and has

(01:01:00):
a killer soundtrack that you know, we can all celebrate
in something and maybe for someone like me have a
chance to see the world from a perspective entirely different
from my day to day experience. And that, to me
is one of those really valuable elements of this is
that one people who have largely been underrepresented or not

(01:01:24):
even represented at all within video games get to have
an experience that reflects their reality. That I think is
invaluable by itself. The added benefit is that people like me,
who have been catered to for my entire life get
to have an experience outside of what I normally get
to live, and it just it opens up your eyes

(01:01:46):
and it's a beautiful thing.

Speaker 2 (01:01:47):
Yes, the power of storytelling in games because it's you
playing like there's a part of you in it. I
think that is so if you genuinely allow yourself to
be moved, if a game good, you will be moved. Yeah,
And I think that is incredibly, incredibly powerful, And honestly,

(01:02:07):
I'm kind it's kind of tragic because the people who
are dismissing cozy games could really use them.

Speaker 1 (01:02:11):
Oh yeah a lot.

Speaker 4 (01:02:12):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I do think it's funny that you
said the Last of Us is instinmant that you said
the Last of Us is Annie's cozy game.

Speaker 1 (01:02:24):
It's so not a cozy game in any way, shape
or for it. We'll say however, Episode three, I think
of the Last of Us TV show is perhaps the
best television I've ever seen in my entire life. So
if you haven't seen the HBO adaptation of the first
Last of Us game, you need to see that because
it's probably the most beautiful love story.

Speaker 2 (01:02:46):
Yes, tears, so many tears.

Speaker 1 (01:02:48):
Oh my gosh, I cried for days. I cried my face,
I cried. I cried describing the episode to my partner,
who did But my partner never played the game, had
no interest in the show, and I was like, I
have to tell you because I have to talk about this.

Speaker 2 (01:03:08):
I've got to share it with so much.

Speaker 1 (01:03:11):
Like I love Nick Offerman so much more, and I
already loved him as much as I thought I could. Hey, there,
this is Jonathan from the future. Hey y'all know how
this works. This means that we kept on talking and
the show kept getting longer. So Annie and Samantha, who
are still on the call, with me. Now have to

(01:03:31):
listen to me throw to more sponsors, so we'll be
right back. Let's sort of move out toward the end here.
We've been chatting for quite a long time, and there's
so much more we could say. Obviously, this is a

(01:03:53):
very important topic. It sounds silly to say cozy games
is an important topic, but it absolutely is for all
the different reasons that we've listed, from the benefits to
the increased representation to the entrance of people with new
perspectives in the world of video game development, which ultimately

(01:04:13):
benefits everybody. Even if you don't play the game, it
benefits you. Just chill out, you're gonna get the benefits.
Let's talk about some recommendations that we each have. We've
mentioned some of them already, but Samantha, let's let's hear
your recommendations for some cozy games.

Speaker 3 (01:04:29):
So kind of going on the storytelling ones. I've got
two and this one, Snuffkins, is probably one of the
most cozy. Like you sit and just look at the
scenery types. The drawings are beautiful, the music is relaxing,
the characters are cute, and there's a whole little story.
It is, like I think it only takes like a
few hours to finish up, because it is very like

(01:04:49):
from beginning to end. But it's such a great tell
you should take a chance. I actually said Annie a
picture of myself getting real cozy doing this and sent
her pictures of clips of the game because I was like,
you have to see this game. She hasn't yet, but
it's such a such a fun game. And then Coffee Talk,
which has a one and two. It's really interesting, kind
of goes into like eighties nineties graphics, but it tells

(01:05:12):
a whole story and you've got to make coffee throughout.
So I think those two are like two great storytelling games.
And then Cozy Grove, if you like a haunted Bear
Island is exactly what you think. I love it. I
love it so much and it does. It is also
in real time, so it changes with the seasons with
you and the day and the night. There's Donut County,
so if you like mayhem and chaos and raccoons.

Speaker 2 (01:05:35):
Go for it.

Speaker 3 (01:05:37):
I love funny.

Speaker 2 (01:05:38):
I love funny.

Speaker 3 (01:05:39):
There's little puzzles throughout you have to solve in order
to make things happen, whether catch on fire or put
into a hole. You just go with that, and then
Lemon Cake if you like to make and bake things.
I think it's a really cute graphics and it teaches
you different recipes about So those are my recommendations for today.

Speaker 1 (01:05:57):
I like how it could change tomorrow.

Speaker 2 (01:05:59):
I can't good it could mine. I'm gonna disclaim I
love horror so much. These are definitely not for everyone,
and some would argue they don't count. Also, we didn't
go into this, but there's an argument about your comfort
game and your cozy game. So last most two would
be my comfort game, not my cozy game. But so
mine are Oxen Free, which is just really pretty kind

(01:06:21):
of text based game. It's got a cool story. It's
very stranger Things Gone Home, which yes we've talked about.
I won't go into it. It's really good. And then
I also liked Coffee Talk, which Samantha had me play,
and it's just really fun. It's got like vampires and
wear wolves and you're making coffee.

Speaker 1 (01:06:36):
I love it. Holy cow, I've never heard of that before.
I'll have to look that one up. As for myself, well,
one I want to mention is a game called Pentiment.
I don't know if either of you have ever seen this.
It's a game where you're playing a artist in medieval
Europe and you are illuminating manuscripts, and all of the

(01:06:57):
dialogue is in word bubbles, and every character has their
own handwriting style, so like if you're talking to a monk,
it's super fancy type setting, and if you're talking to
a commoner, it's like more like chicken scratch. But then
murder happens, and you're essentially there to help try and
solve murders. Here's the thing about Pentiment. You're never told

(01:07:18):
what actually happened. You have to determine what you think happened,
and you come to your conclusion and you you present
your argument. But even at the end of the game,
you're never told if you were right or wrong. So
that's kind of a fascinating element that I had not
anticipated from such a game. Other suggestions, I mean, Stardo

(01:07:41):
Valley is always going to be a suggestion, but we've
talked about that, you know, ad nauseum, I would say
Disney Dreamlight Valley. If you're a total Disney nut. It's
very heavily branded to Disney, So if you're not into it,
it is not your thing, but it's very cozy, and
for the lovecrafty and horror fans out there, you should
play Dredge, a creepy deep sea fishing game, but it's

(01:08:06):
it's kind of cozy. You're like running a boat and
fishing in different areas, and it's not like Super It
doesn't have like a lot of twitchy elements to it,
and the story is really entertaining, but it does have
a lovecrafty and kind of weird horror energy going on in.

Speaker 3 (01:08:22):
That nice I'll have to look at that.

Speaker 1 (01:08:25):
It's fun. There's another game called Dave the Diver, where
by day you are diving to capture fish and by
night you run a sushi restaurant. And the funny thing
is Dave the Diver actually has a crossover with Dredge,
and they also did a crossover with Godzilla. Oh really, of.

Speaker 3 (01:08:42):
Course they did. That sounds that sounds it's just Japanese
because that's Japanese.

Speaker 1 (01:08:47):
Really, yeah, it's a Korean game, and it is. It
is wild. It is uh, it's the The local translation
is pretty good for Dave the Diver, but there are
little bits where you're like, oh, this was not this
was not Maid in America. It is is a fantastic game, though,
Dave the Diver and Dredge together, if you can play
the two of them, I would recommend playing Dredge first

(01:09:10):
and then Dave the Diver. They're great companion games. Well,
Annie and Samantha, this has been a great conversation. You know,
we talked about some heavy stuff, but we talked about
a lot of fun and joyful stuff too, And I
think that is the perfect kind of tech Stuff episode
right where it's it's not all grim and dour and dystopian,

(01:09:32):
but at the same time, we take the effort to
explore the maybe you know, the the more unseemly sides
of a of a topic, because only by addressing it
can we ever hope to make things better. That's at
least my own opinion. I realize that I may be

(01:09:52):
an eternal optimist.

Speaker 2 (01:09:55):
Well that's a good way to be. Thank you so
much for having us. It's has been a delight.

Speaker 1 (01:10:03):
Yeah, it's a great way to kind of run down
my run on tech stuff because I didn't reach out
enough to my fellow stuff podcasters. It can get so
easy for us to get into our own like routines
and the grind and just trying to create episode after episode.
I don't know how it is for y'all, but for me,

(01:10:26):
there would be moments like I would wake up in
the morning and I would just start the dread of
what am I going to find to talk about this
week would start to descend upon me, and that was
enough to prevent me from even just reaching out. I
now wish one of my biggest regrets is I didn't
reach out more to do collaborative episodes with my fellow

(01:10:48):
stuff podcasters, in particular, because I know we worked together
so well, Because I mean, Annie and I had to
She sat at my left hand side, and poor Lauren,
who sat across from us, had to endure just an
endless supply of puns. True.

Speaker 2 (01:11:07):
True, we owe her a lot.

Speaker 1 (01:11:08):
Yeah, yeah, apologies. Yeah pizza maybe I don't know, but
not on a delivery app service. We talked about that
and boy those no okay, but yeah, I thank you
so much for coming on. It was it was a
real pleasure.

Speaker 2 (01:11:23):
Thank you so much for having us. I'm glad we
got to do this. Before you hang up your tech
stuff coach chat.

Speaker 1 (01:11:30):
Yeah, you know what, I got so little merch after
running it for sixteen and a half years, you'd think
i'd have at least a hoodie, but I've got a
T shirt where most of the lettering has peeled off. Well,
if if my listeners out there haven't heard by now,
you need to go and check out stuff. Mom never
told you. The episodes are phenomenal. You tackle pretty much

(01:11:55):
any topic you can think of. Uh. The dating episode,
as I mentioned, it was so informative and interesting to
hear because again being out of the dating game for
more than thirty years now hearing how things have changed culturally, technologically, socially.
For one thing, I felt like I understood people better

(01:12:17):
because I'm rapidly descending into grouchy old man who yells
at Cloud's territory.

Speaker 3 (01:12:24):
I've been there.

Speaker 1 (01:12:29):
For some of us. It's life goals, honestly, Like you know,
you could be the person who's just like ah outside
on the front lawn and everyone's like, oh, that's Jonathan.
It's it's actually very freeing. For one thing, my social
calendar is wide open now. That's nice. Yeah, I like it.

(01:12:50):
Like it's like, hey, no obligations, I could do whatever
I want. Let's play some cozy games, y'all. And thus
my STARDUW Valley Hours played just grows and grows. For
all of my listeners out there, I hope you enjoyed
this episode. Go check out stuff Mom never told you,
and I will talk to you again really soon, but
only a couple more times. Tech Stuff is an iHeartRadio production.

(01:13:19):
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
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