1Upsmanship: Friday the 13th (Feat. David Bell)

Bar your doors and hit the floor Shipheads, cause this game’s about to rip off your jaw - in a good way! Joined by fellow maniac David Bell (Gamefully Unemployed), our heroes navigate the pros, cons and sometimes thongs of your favorite camp slasher turned asymmetrical multiplayer murder simulator! It’s a love letter to cinephiles and just a damned good time, in the sense that it’s utterly terrifying and Adam and Dave enjoy donning a hockey mask while they podcast. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Oh I love them. Cock. Yes we're creeps. We're creeps.

(00:30):
Day we're creeps. Yes, we're absolute creeps, coming at creeps.
The music, the music fades out suddenly and then suddenly, madam,
we're there. We're right there, right there, just telling right
into your nightmare. We passively tear your jaw off of
your head. That It does feel like a gentle act sometimes,

(00:54):
doesn't it It does. It really feels like he's trying
to help. He's just trying to help. Yes, he does
us and you and I will have I'm sure a
wonderful conversation about that on this episode of One Upsmanship.
Hi everyone, I'm one of your hosts, Adam Ganzer, and
with me is my special co host. Oh. Hi, I'm
David Bell. I am man, I'm a co host. I

(01:17):
consider that responsibility. I was in guest mode. Oh I
given you a key, give you a key to turn
the ignition today? Yeah you have. I know, man, this
will teach Mike to never go on vacation again. Right,
So I'm going to ransack this show. I know you are,
I know. So for those of you who are wondering,

(01:39):
Mike is uh, you know, just a couple light personal issues,
and we record many one upsmanships together, so this might
be sprinkled I don't know where in the running order,
but fear not. He missed a weekend and he will
be back and we're excited for that. But for today,
we have just a gorgeous co host and an expert

(01:59):
in the game we're going to discuss today, right thirteenth. Yes,
Oh it is, Yeah it is. This is a long
time coming, long time coming. This feels very cathartic already. Absolutely.
I broke woke up this morning. I literally was like,
this is a big day for me, Like this is

(02:20):
this is like you know, like you you never think
about it on the day when you're doing something historic.
H this is that for me. You know, I graduated
high school today. Man, yeah, this might be the greatest
thing I've ever had to do. Because we've been playing
this game for how long. Well, it came out in
twenty seventeen. As you probably are going to tell us

(02:41):
during the tell me like I made bid sexual. I
wasn't we gonna tell you when it came out. I
was not going to do that. So it came out
in twenty seventeen. We were we were early adopters, like
we were on that game. Yeah, right out of the
Kickstarter there pretty immediately. Yeah, we're playing it while we
were still correct and that is a very long time

(03:01):
ago at this point, absolutely, and like, yeah, you can
see it. We really have our finger on the pulse
with this one. But it was it needed to happen.
We needed to talk about this game, and the only
way to truly talk about the game is to play
it on and off for about five or six years.
And we feel that we've done that now and now
it's time. It's time for us to talk about it.

(03:23):
Although I suspect we might also talk a little bit
about the phenomenon of this. Uh this you could consider
this part of a franchise if you really want to.
I wanna. Yeah, I have a hot take on this. Yeah,
and it is I'm not dependent on our experience, if
that makes sense. I'm excited to hear it in the
rand sections, sir. But for now, I'm going to cross

(03:45):
our very first checkpoint, and I'm going to introduce our
first segment called tell Me Like I Met Bit, in
which Dave the Special co hosts and Magical Boy of
the Afternoon is going to give us a very brief
introductory or of what this game is. For those of
you who have not played it, don't you mean tell
me like I'm eight bit Jason, because that is a player?

(04:08):
Thank you? Yeah, all right? The Friday Friday the thirteenth.
The game is what do they call it? Asymmetric multiplayer, yes,
survival horror game where eight people play per round. Every
map and character is based off various elements of the
Friday the Thirteenth series, the original series. As you can expect,

(04:29):
the maps are based throughout from like two through one
through five that Jason's are two through nine, and then
some extra Jason's. The counselors are also based off the characters.
In each round, seven of those players are selected to
play a counselor and one is selected to play as
Jason Voorhees. The goal of the counselors is to escape

(04:50):
the map through various tasks that they must complete. The
goal of the Jason is, of course, to kill every
counselor or as many counselors as he can before the
before they escape or before the time runs out. The
dynamic here is pretty obvious. It's it's cat and mouse situation.
The Counselors are generally fast and hard to find during
the match. They are allowed a variety of weapons to

(05:14):
give them a slight edge. However, Jason is practically an
unkillable and if he finds you, he can pretty much
dispatch you pretty easily. You don't want to be caught
by Jason for the most part. Uh So, yeah, it's
a it's a cat and mouse. However, I should note
that in with the correct series of events, the counselors

(05:35):
do have a slim chance at killing Jason and ending
the game that way, but there are many pasta victory
and above all outs every rule in detail has been
crafted perfectly to match the tone of that original Friday
the Thirteenth franchise, and that is my summary of them.
And you did a wonderful job, thank you. You know.

(05:56):
An interesting fact that may come to bear a little
bit here is this is probably the lowest rated game
we've ever covered wild this game. This game received, depending
on what format, somewhere between like low sixties. On Xbox One,
it got a fifty three out of a hundred on Metacritic,

(06:18):
which is pretty abysmal, but I think is in part
because they had some really bad bugs when they started,
and they've corrected that, Yes, this was one of this
was an exceptionally bugging game game like when it came out.
So we're not going to address bugs on this episode
because well, frankly, I just don't We're not close enough

(06:40):
to the release to accurately describe them. I would say
I barely remember them now exactly. That's that's really why,
and because I think part of the reason we're covering
it from this vantage point is that we've played through
many seasons of this game and want to talk about
it now that it's kind of in its final form.
So that's what we're gonna do. So if you were
really pissed off that it's launched because it was Buggie,

(07:00):
I acknowledge you, and I get it, and we're just
not going to spend a lot of time on that.
I remember the pack anak bug where you could hide
on the roof. I remember all that. I still enjoyed
the game from start to finish. I did too. I played,
I played every second in this game. I played the
Jason Cabin puzzles. I was very excited when they're going
to bring the Jason X map in, but they couldn't

(07:23):
couldn't behind the Yeah they lost. We'll talk a little
bit about that because I think that does matter. But
first we will pass our next checkpoint, which means we
are now going to the gamer rants, where each of
us has our scorching hot takes about this game, uh
and maybe the game type even Uh. Typically I would

(07:45):
go first, but I want to offer you, as co
host Dave, the opportunity to to go. This is hard
because I do have a hot take. I want to
hear it. That's why I'm doing that. But is it
more dramatic for go ahead? You have it? Go alright? Yeah? Yeah,
I guess mine is if you know me, it's it's
less surprising like this has. This game has a very

(08:08):
clunky appearance. It got very bad reviews coming out, as
you noted. Uh, despite that, I think this is the
best of this genre and the genre I mean asymmetrical
survival horror such as Dead by Daylight. I think Dead
by Daylight nothing against that game. I think it's got
nothing on this game though, And I'll explain why. Number one,

(08:31):
oh size, map size and escape roots. Um, it's the maps.
You can do small map options, but there are large
map options and when you're playing a full game, there's
nothing quite like it. It creates a situation where you
could if you want to hide for a lot of it. Um,

(08:51):
there are many ways to escape. You can call the cops,
you can fix up the cars, you can fix up
the boats. You can kill Jason, which is a series
of events. You can run out the clock um like
I said. But the thing about it is that each
plan has various skills that you need and various risks,
and so if you were to try to hide from Jason,

(09:11):
you're not guaranteed to hide from Jason the whole game.
It really depends on the game. And that is actually
the big second thing is why I think this is
a great game, which is the balance. I think this
game is exceptionally well balanced. I think all the counselors
and their stats allow you to escape in various ways.

(09:34):
While the Jason um like, the Jason is formidable but
not godlike like, Jason is going to kill at least
some counselors during the game, even someone who's new. Um.
But there's always a chance of escape. I've never played
this game and felt like it's always hopeless. Every now
and then there's a really good, Jason, You're like, okay,

(09:55):
I bet we're screwed here. Um. And while the game
is very balanced between Jason and the lers more than
most games, it is also extremely like varied within that balance,
and that creates a situation where if you play this
alone or as a as a team with friends, you
can try that you can escape just as equally depending

(10:16):
on how you play. And that's because of the next thing,
which is the attention to detail in this game. And
obviously the game is like the maps and the characters
are pulled directly from the film. It was made lovingly
is it is behind Alien Isolation, I think one of
the best visual adaptations of a movie series. But the

(10:37):
other thing is that unlike games like Deadlight Dead by Daylight,
where you can like play as different movie monsters, but
they all more or less play the same, this one
is so unique to Jason Vorhees, and not just Jason Vorhees,
but the different versions, the different movie versions. Each Jason
plays different based off the characteristics from the movies. For example,

(10:58):
one of your powers is that whenever you nearby, the
audio kicks in, like which counselors know Jason is going
to be there. Because of a horror soundtrack, you have
a power that is ability to cut that soundtrack out,
and what that essentially creates are jump scares. Just like
Jason Voorhees in a slasher film. Every power is sort
of based around trying to make it feel like the

(11:21):
character Jason Vorhees, not a generic monster. That character. The
counselors are the same. If you're the loud, preppie kid,
then you get scared more easily, but you have better luck.
If you're the nerdy, quiet girl, you are quieter and
better worth repairs. Everything is very balanced in like the
balance within the game is very detailed to each character's

(11:44):
personality in a way that encourages you to play like
that character. If you play like the preppy kid, you
play more like a coward because that's what you have
to do. And because of all those variations, the main
reason I think this rules way more than any other
is that my final point, it's very unpredictable. I think

(12:06):
every match is kind of different from the last. You
start a match with one plan, and you most oftenly
abandon that plan. You never know if you're going to
die or not again. Some matches you survive, some you don't,
and you might do the exact same things or do
everything right. It doesn't matter because of all the variables.
Every every single match is chaos. When you play as Jason,

(12:30):
you're basically hurting cats and so you know you have
to go around and juggle these counselors and try to
kill them and make sure they don't escape. And so
because there's so many cool variables, so many ways to escape,
and plans go arise so much, this is one I
would consider this up there with other party games like
Mario Party or Gangbies or among us. This is a

(12:51):
party game and it is a blast, and it's extremely
replayable for that reason. Is it scary? Not really, But
I would argue none of this genre is scary unless
you're playing like Fastmophobia or Devour, But those technically aren't
this this genre actually because you can't play us the Ghost.
That's my rant. Well done, I think great rant. Than

(13:13):
Really it really really was so player too, Adam Ganzer
plugging in listen, I really agree with you about this.
I do. I think this is um I think this
is the best of this little genre of asymmetric survival games.
In fact, I think maybe it might be the best
for just asymmetric multiplayer games that I can think of offhand,

(13:36):
and that includes a lot of other stuff like Evolve
or other game types like that. I feel like Friday
thirteenth has managed to distill that down to a very
basic experience that is fun. So I'm going to guess
that and I don't want to put too many words
to people's mouth, but not having read a bunch of
these reviews, I'm guessing that a lot of people were

(13:58):
put off by the sort of jankie feeling or appearance
of this game because it does control in a way
that you might consider clunky, almost like a Resident Evil
game used to right before they've sort of updated them.
Like the characters aren't super responsive, and sometimes executing commands
gets to be a little bit of a just not

(14:19):
very crisp, you know, like like there's like it doesn't
feel like it responds to the buttons that sharply. And
I've thought a lot about that, and I think that
actually that might be part of the dialing in process
that these game designers are doing. Like I think there's
something almost Tetris like about this game, in that there
is a very fundamental perfect loop that's being created with

(14:40):
all these elements that just works, and it works on
like a primal level, and that primal level is I
gotta escape, right Like. It gives you the horror movie
feeling every time because of the variety of elements that
it throws at you. No matter how expert you get
at navigating maps or at navigating Jason, or at you know,

(15:05):
tact decks or teaming up or whatever, the horror experience
basically stays in tact as long as you're playing the
game without cheating. And there are people who cheat, you know,
who like find ways to like mess with your Internet
and stuff. That stuff exists, but I'm not really worried
about them, and I think that is pretty cool that,
like this move, this game delivers the fundamental horror movie

(15:27):
experience every time, and I think that's admirable and really interesting.
So another thing that it does, and Dave mentioned this
is because it's a party game, it actually encourages role playing.
And I think that a lot of people are looking
for role playing out of video games, you know, obviously
that's what RPGs are, and this game very naturally encourages

(15:52):
people to do their version of Jason, their version of
you know, the nerdy kid or the or the the
chat or whatever. You know, like they find their version
of this person and they play it out like that
because number one its advantageous. Number two, it's a thing
we're all looking to do and games allow us that.
Like when I play a game with Dave and he's

(16:15):
he's Jason, he turns into a real whispery creep but nightmare,
and I hate it, but I also love it, you
know what I mean. And when I turned into Jason,
I'm like a screaming, you know, unhinged maniac h you know,
like very authoritarian figure. And I feel like it's just
a natural almost exuberation of what makes this game work,

(16:37):
you know, and everybody's having a good time because of it,
because it knows how to create the tension that's not
demanding enough of your attention that you have to focus
on it. Like you're allowed to sort of like kind
of tease your friends and like have a good time
in an ancillary way with this game, like you would
a Mario party, you know, like like it's it's loose

(16:59):
enough you can do that and still be like having
a conversation with your friends or whatever, like Dave and
Tom and I have had like talks about life while
playing Friday thirteenth, you know what I mean. So it
has like enough room to be a legitimate social interaction,
the way that watching a football game might be, and
I think there is something strategic about that. As a
game designer. It's not probably what all of us are

(17:22):
expecting out of our game, you know. I think we
all want our game to be as moving and transfixing,
as like a Red Dead two or something. But this
game has decided to occupy something very different, which is
like appealing to the movie fan, appealing to the party atmosphere,
and I think it's extraordinarily successful and that it's possible

(17:43):
people miss that when the game first came out. I
have some other points of contention with Dave, but I'm
going to leave those for the rants, when they'll be
a little bit more interactive, which means that's the end
of my rant here, and that'll carry us right into
the break. So stay tuned for after that, when Dave
and I will finally start slashing at each other the

(18:04):
way you hope we would. Oh yeah, we're gonna die,
and we're back for the third attempt at returning from

(18:24):
the break I was doing as B didn't appreciate it.
I have a composer who makes like good music for us.
But Dave's like, nah, now that i'm host, what if
I did a club beat and that it's You're right,
you should do a club remix of the theme. Yeah,

(18:47):
I know this one. I really need to think about it. Yeah, yeah,
we'll pass that through our committee. I'm sure our producer
will have thoughts. Anyway, let's pass our next checkpoint and
right into game on because clearly we need help U
and clearly things are about to get dire over here. Oh, Dave,

(19:09):
how big of a Friday the thirteenth fan are you?
In general? Before the game and everything? Like, are you
a big is this a big franchise for you? I
was a tiny fan. I was a bit of a
fan before the game. Yeah, this game made me a
bigger fan. I agree. I completely agree with that. That
is actually one of the things that made me realize

(19:30):
it's a great game. Yeah that, Like, I don't like
Friday thirteenth. I think it's dumb and hokey, but I
but as a movie franchise, but as a game, I
think something about that the interactivity of it made me
appreciate the little nuances of the franchise more. It's one
of the biggest assets of this game. You're right, because

(19:51):
that doesn't just make it the best of this genre.
It's one of the best in terms of an adaptation,
because a good indentation should make you come out of
it going I love the thing they adapted more. And
that's what this does because it's such a love letter
to Friday thirteenth, and it points out what's so fun

(20:12):
about those movies, and then when you by the time
you're watching the movies, you're like, man, they were right.
This is a blast. Well, like they have this, like
they have the difficulty of like continuity errors and gaps
between different installments of Friday thirteenth, And because a very clever,
thoughtful game design, it actually enhanced the game experience. Yeah,

(20:35):
what do you mean by continuity errors because the timeline
matches up. I mean continuityers like Jason has slightly different outfits,
slightly different like abilities and stuff between movies. Well, yeah,
I mean that that plays into the fact that the
first couple of movies he's a human. He gets murdered
and then he gets brought back from the dead and
then he's a zombie. So there's like, yeah, when I

(20:57):
say continuitier, I don't mean it in the movie sense.
It's like they made a mistake within the world of
the movie. I mean it like, as a character, Jason
goes through a lot of different manifestations which are somewhat
contradictory to each other. Yeah, and the game really smartly
uses that as a different way of setting the board,

(21:19):
so to speak, Like you know this Jason has this
set of abilities, which means the game is going to
play x way. You know it's it's Yeah, there's good
parts two through nine. Obviously they didn't do one right.
They even did I think it's Part five is the
one where it's technically not Jason Vorhees spoilers. They were
originally going to do an among Us style where it

(21:41):
was like one of you amongst you was the murderer
and you couldn't tell, but they never got around to
doing that. They have a retro Jason, and then they
have a thom Zavini Jason, so that's ultimately you know,
eight nine, ten, Jason's The thom Zavini Jason is terrifying.
Retro Jason is kind of terrifying Onto because he has
a different music, but they knew to have some fun

(22:04):
Jason's in the mix there. But it's amazing how two
through nine are really based off of like their weapons.
For example, like if you're Part six, Jason, you start
with a fence post, because that's what Jason starts with
in that film. You are, I think the first version
of the zombie. As you play the other versions, like
by the time you get to part eight, you are

(22:25):
like more degraded and you're that version. You know, some
of them at axes, some of them have hedge clippers.
It's all depended on what did they kill the most
with in that And of course part two you have
the bag over your head. You don't even have the
mask yet, that's right. Yeah, It's like so I think,
like to cover that in a more general way, like

(22:48):
this is absolutely the most faithful, loving adaptation of a
movie property that I can think of offhand. Well, I'm
talking like there's been Star Wars games where they spent
lots and lots and lots of money and and like
you know, got a lot of the sounds and details
and everything just right. But like that was about imitating

(23:09):
Star Wars. This is this is about experiencing and celebrating
a movie franchise in its weird eccentricities. And it's really
successful at that. Yeah, And I think part of it
is obviously, again it can stresses enough when you play
the levels. It's very clearly that they watched the movies
and mapped out the levels to be as as close

(23:32):
to each movie as possible. You watch it and you're like,
I recognize those things. I recognize the things on the tables,
you know, right, Um, But like, and that's great, that's
the I mean, obviously that's an accomplishment. But what this
brings us above and beyond is, for example, I play
as Chad Kensington. I do He's yeah, but the thing

(23:54):
about Chad is that so I should note that every
every counselor has seven attributes Stealth, composure, repair, speed, strength, luck, stamina,
right and those and you you you know, it's it's
sliding bars to effects by the way, to varying effects.

(24:15):
I would argue they're not that effective, but could continue
well like, well, no, I'd say some of them are
very effects. Some of them we can talk about some
of them. Chad, for example, his composure is low because
the idea and composure is what makes you more visible
to Jason. The more scared you are, the more visible
you are. If you've played one of these games, that's

(24:35):
not you know, that's not unusual. So Chad gets scared
easily as a Chad would. His luck, which is his
ability to find good items or his weapons to um
like break and stuff like that, is really high because
he's a rich kid. He's lucky, but he doesn't have
it together. He's very fast, he's slimy, he's a worm.

(24:57):
He gets away, but he's not like he's for example,
he's bad at repairs and he freaks out all the time.
It really matches the character that you're that they're that
they're imagining, and it's an archetype from the Friday thirteenth.
In some cases the characters are one to one. Shelley
is a character, Tommy Jarvis is a character. There. Yeah,

(25:18):
but like the fact that the fact that they do
that makes it just so much more to me a
love letter where you are again where it's like, Okay,
when you're playing his Chad, you're not going to try
to repair a car. You're not trying to repair a boat.
You're going to try to hide and find and find
moments where you can leverage the situation because that's all

(25:41):
you can do. Lay you have to because because your
repair is so low. The idea of repair is it's
how fast you can fix a car or a boat,
and that's one of the only ways out. Everything requires repair, right,
even the phones um and so chad basic like on
a basic game game play loop levels, so people probably

(26:01):
do need to know this. Like basically every character is
trying to put all the steps together that allow them
to either run out of the map into like an
escape or drive a car off the map, right, you know,
so that they can get You also can roll for
perks that make your character better so you can get

(26:22):
a higher repair. One of them is called my Dad's
a cop, and that means when you call the cops,
they get there faster. It's again, all the perks and
stuff are framed around horror tropes or slasher tropes or
you know, thirteenth troops. So yeah, Like so for example,
with the car, you need to get to car to work,
so you need to find three items on the map.
You need to find a gas can, find a battery,

(26:44):
you need to find keys, and whoever holds the keys
kind of holds everything. And it's a it's a fucking
to do if you can't collaborate with people yep. Which
it has created some of the best moments I've ever
had in a video game. Drove off without me or
I can drove off without something. It's incredible. It's because
at the moment, the beauty is that the cars only

(27:05):
hold so many people. Yep. It's not never enough people.
And that's a key part which is like each other
yeah yea. And if you are playing is Chad, your
best bet is to wait for others to do the
work and then get in there, either as a passenger
or if you find the car keys, you can just

(27:27):
grab a car and that other people have repaired and book.
It's because, yeah, that's a fun thing about the game
that like they designed so many ways that are fundamentally social.
The yeah like like because I mean again, I really
think this the joy of this franchise is the social
aspect of it, right, because they create these dilemmas where

(27:49):
number one, you're probably playing with people you know, not necessarily,
but you probably are, so like just the fact that
you're murdering your friends already, that's pretty great, right, But
then number two, when you're supposed to be collaborating to
get the car to work, or to get the boat
to work, or to get the cops the cops called,
or whatever it is, and somebody fucks up a step,
somebody gets caught, somebody betrays you. It's just such a fun,

(28:12):
great moment that would happen in a movie. Yeah, you know,
it so changes everything, Yeah, I would. I you probably
haven't played this game solo that much a little bit
play I played it, Okay, I played it solo, and
what I learned is that because everybody's sort of once
you know everything, it plays out whether or not you're
playing with strangers. You walk up to a car, right

(28:32):
and like, say you're the jock who's fast and and
ken like, has high strength and is not good at repair.
The jock might have found the battery, and he walks
up the car and drops it, and you automatically know, okay,
we're looking for like Shelley Yea or or or Debrah,
like the nerd girl, the nerd girl or the nerd kid.
They'll fix the car for us. That if Jason comes,

(28:54):
then guess who's handling Jason. It's the jock. He's gonna
hit Jason with the beck because that's what he does
be they strategically team up like that. Well, the strategy
is like natural in the characters. Yeah, yeah, if your chat,
if your chat or one of the little creeps, all
you can do is kind of be a fetch boy
because chat is fast, right right, right right. So if
you're like, oh, here I'm getting the gas can, I'm

(29:16):
getting in the battery. Here, I'm distracting, Like there's a
few Tiffany's like that too, where the high stamina is
like I'll distract him, I'll run away. So the dynamic
is clear, and then the car is repaired, and guess
what happens. Not everybody can be in the car. So
like you have the nerd, the hot chick, the jock,
the Weasley guy, and then suddenly it's who's gonna get

(29:38):
in the car first? What happens It turns into who
can grab it first? And that's right, that's such a
pleasurable game. Also, the car is nearly impossible to pilot
correctly because Jason has just the right set of abilities
to either stop right in front of the car all
of a sudden, which is a great horror trope, or

(29:58):
to terrify you so much that you crash the car,
creating another set of timers where like now Jason grab
anybody from the car while they're waiting to get it
to start again. So like it's well, it's it's a
great game insofar as they keep finding reasons that are
fundamentally social to create game tension that is similar to

(30:20):
how it would play out in a horror movie, and
it's really fun. They've also figured out ways for it
to be unpredictable. For example, when I'm Jason, if I
saw that dynamic I was describing, Ye, guess who I'd
go for? Go for the shelley. No, I'd go for
before they repair the car, You go for the one
with high repair because suddenly, because everything could change in
the second So if Jason kills one of these people

(30:43):
who is balancing out your group, suddenly you're like, okay, shit,
I guess I'll due repairs, even though I'm bad at repairs,
and so on and so forth. There's that element or yeah,
like when Jason stomps the car, it becomes a situation
where everybody has to scatter, Jason could maybe get one
person out of the group, and then Jason has to know, Okay,
anybody can get back in that car at any point,

(31:06):
so you have to start jumping around the map. Yea. Yeah,
and you have to remember, like got to keep checking
on the car because they're going to keep circling back. Yeah.
Jason like to be really good at that role. Which,
by the way, if you're good at that role, you're
never going to have more fun in a video game
than Jason at that role. We're okay with it. Yeah,
We're okay at it. It becomes a little bit of

(31:26):
like how can I manage these three or four like
pressure points on the map where people are going to
have to go to either get a car or to
get the police thing or whatever, and then like laying
traps there so you know if somebody's there, and then
sort of it's patrolling, right, you have to patrol each
of the areas. It's strategic, yes, but it is really

(31:46):
rewarding because you can also, Jason, everybody has like you know,
most games have this, which is you get XP and
the more XP you get, the more you can get
fun little side things, new outfits, new abilities, Jason has
that two in the form of different types of kills,
and so they have so many kills for Jason. I
feel like each Jason has like twenty to thirty kill options.

(32:10):
And that's on top of the fact that we haven't
even mentioned there are environmental kills throughout right. You can
toss somebody through a window or drown them. You can
drown them in the toilet. You can take a spigot
and impale them. You can take a bird feeder and
smash their head. You can hang them on hooks. They've
worked in so many if there's a camp fire around them,

(32:34):
if they're in a if there's ones where there, if
you can hide in a tent and guess what, Jason,
can they tell you in your sleeping bag and slam
you against a tree. They basically like spent all the
time after they released this game, uh, first of all
debugging it and then like just expanding and expanding and
expanding the kinds of things you'd want to do in

(32:56):
this world, so that eventually it really became a slasher
Fick playground. You know. It's really satisfying. By the way.
I just want to talk very briefly, like a little
behind the scenes stuff about how much these guys cared
about this project. So, like if I'm not mistaken, elfonic
Is is the game studio that created Evolve, So Evolve

(33:18):
sort of predates all these a little bit, and it's
one of the first big asymmetrical multiplayer games. But Friday
and thirteenth had to If I'm not Mistaken, had to
get kickstarted, like it wasn't a studio project. It also
didn't start as a Friday thirteenth game, right, That's right.
So because they basically they couldn't get the rights, and

(33:40):
then the creator, the person with the rights, saw what
they were doing and was like a hundred They basically
had like a meeting, right where like the creator was like,
oh okay, it's very clear that you need the rights
to care about it, and like, and they did care
about Like they got the original not maybe not the original,
but several of the original actors to add stuff to

(34:02):
the game, including the guy who played Jason Vorhees. He
added some emotion and stuff. Fore Hotter, Yes, Kane Hotter, uh,
And they got I want to say, one of the
Tommy Jarvis is to come in and stuff. They like,
this is one of the only times that this is
that a game was not just a cynical cash get

(34:25):
grab with the movie licensing, but like they wanted to
make something that was a love letter to Yes, the franchise,
And you don't see that very often, honest. And I
would argue one of the biggest tragedies in game history
is the fact that when the rights were reverted or
whatever happened, whoever owned them them should have immediately been like,

(34:45):
you keep going, it was good for the franchise. Why
would they They're going to do a Chiason X level?
And I have dreams about what that could have been,
dreams they had been allowed to keep expanding, they would
be still adding stuff today. Agreed. Yeah, And I feel
like it's the kind of game that actually deserves to
be alive forever, Like it deserves to be a repository

(35:09):
for the franchise and things related to the franchise. Yeah,
because it's a good arrangement for everybody, and it's a
fun experience. Now, all that said, Dave, I do want
to have a slightly more balanced episode here and talk
about a couple of problems with it if we can, so,
sure can I I want to start and this is
me being as as generous as I can because I

(35:31):
love this game. To me, this game is perfect, right,
But I understand that this game has low, you know,
reviews people don't like. I'm so glad by the way
West Keltner, who is one of the co creators. I
think he worked at Gun. We follow each other on Twitter.
No big deal. He's the one. He's the one, and

(35:53):
I think Gun are the one who is moving on
to the Texas Chainsaw Massacre game, which I guarantee is
going to be next this Like, don't get me wrong,
Like I loved the Evil Dead game, per Hunting Grounds,
the Alien Fire Team, which I don't think had anything,
the Ghostbusters game. There are a bunch of spinoffs that
came of all these companies. Of these this crew except

(36:16):
for the Evil Dead, seem to have come from this crew.
Yeah yeah, and they all kind of come in with
that same energy. But I think the Texas Chainsaw game, again,
it's not against them, it's more that those games are different.
There are different types of game. The Texas Chainsaw is
going to be different, but I think it's going to
be the closest thing to Jason that's more polished, and

(36:37):
that is of course, the first thing with this game
is that the Friday thirteenth game is not polished. It's clunky.
It's really JANKI it's like it breaks still pretty regularly. Yeah,
opening and closing doors, doing like doing any basic task.
I personally love that about it because it makes it

(36:59):
more fun to me that you're playing a game that's
like kind of awkward and that like I, I as Chad,
I only exclusively jump through windows. I do not. I
do not walk through them. You can open that. And
when you do through windows, by the way, you hurt
yourself and if you do it too many times, you
start limping and eventually you die. Ye. But I love

(37:19):
it because the animation is so silly. The dancing is
really silly. We didn't even mention that Chad can be
in a thong. Well that's your that's your favorite thing.
It's very The game is not afraid of making itself silly,
like it's it's a it's a It doesn't take itself
as seriously as most games do, and it kind of

(37:39):
it kind of leaned into a trope in horror games
that is no longer true, which is I'm going to
make the experience scarier by making it hard to control,
Like that's a thing that Resident Evil did, perhaps by necessity,
and then has moved away from it and remade a
bunch of their games to stop that from being true.
This one Chid was like, mad, we're gonna go back

(38:00):
to that, and I that's a problem. I would say,
that's a problem. That was the only other thing I have,
which is that the learning curve. The controls for this
game are not intuitive. Yeah, they're not, that said, once
you get them, I can play this with my eyes
closed now, But both controlling Jason and the counselors, there

(38:21):
are certain like combinations of things you have to do
that are not are not like immediately uh natural and
like so you have to kind of get over that
hump well and some sort of very hard like for example,
locking a door and opening a door are very similar.
One is to press X, the others to hold right.

(38:42):
And there's little things like that where you often where
it's like I didn't want to do that. I was
trying to do this. Where it's like dropping an item.
You can drop like you hit down on the dpad
for specific items, or you like you hold it down
for an other items. That's a bunch of weird, little
subtle things that you have to do to make big changes.

(39:03):
They make a lot of loops based on the idea
that you can control things better than you can. For instance,
almost every one of the repair loops is about pressing
the button at the time, like the button when they
show it in a quick enough interval before it disqualifies you,
a thing that's in a lot of games. But when
the programming is a little jankie, it feels unfair. Yeah, yeah,

(39:26):
the quick time, like yeah, just button mapping stuff. And
the same thing with like we mentioned earlier, driving the car.
Now it's a little bit fun that the car is
hard to drive in the way that when you were
in high school and they made you drive that car
that stimulated what it was like when you're drunk. It's
kind of fun, but like, yeah, it does pank tye.
It does feel like the game the programming is intentionally

(39:48):
tying an arm behind your back, and that's a frustrating experience.
I think. See, I think that that I was about
to say, that's the asset because the idea is obviously
the more like we we talked about, can fosure of
the characters, um if you get more scared, it gets
darker on screen and harder, and you stumble more. On
top of that, it's the horror movie trope where it's

(40:09):
like trying to put the keys in the car, but
and it's the simplest thing, and you're watching the movie,
you're like, just put the goddamn keys in the car.
But in this it's hard and awkward. Right, they're creating
a trope that's a horror trope. But to achieve it,
they've created they've made the controlling clumsy to simulate that reality.

(40:30):
And like, I think a movie fan, a fan of
the movie, will appreciate the idea behind it, but I
think the gamer in me and the gamer and most
people is like, yeah, but find a way that doesn't
feel like I'm being cheated. Sure. The car is the
most fun to me because you can literally get in
the car, start driving, an instantly crash. It happens all

(40:52):
the time. Yeah, it's right out of a horror movie. Also,
you don't you don't have you have a you can
have a map, you have to find physically find maps,
and so like when you're trying to drive your car out,
it's really easy by design to get lost and that's
part of it as well, where there's two exits and
you have to figure it out. Same with the boat.
Um I love that. I mean there are very few

(41:14):
games that consistently create the feeling of elated tension that
this game does when you get a car working or
a boat working or whatever. Yeah, like, yeah, I should say,
it's a real countdown to destruction. It's like, how am
I going to get through this? It's especially the boat
because Jason is naturally good in water. He's like a

(41:34):
little dolphins. It's like, well, because that that's what he
is in the movie, right, it makes sense being Jason,
and like appearing right in front of a car or
swooping in and taking someone off a boat and killing
them right before they were going to get free is
one of the most viscerly thrilling things ever. Yes, it

(41:55):
like you let a roar of triumph every time you
do it. For me, it's the the morph I believe
it's called, which is like the fast travel is Jason,
where you're like zipping. It's it's it's to approximate the
idea that in the movies, Jason Voorhees just shows up
right and you're like, how do you even get there? Exactly?
The best, the best for me, the most satisfying thing

(42:15):
is to go out of that immediately into a grab
because the way that works, Yeah, the way that works
is it's really again by design, it's imperfect where you're like,
it's hard to coordinate when you're moving that fast where
to land, and you get caught on some of the environment.
So when you nail it, it's just like, oh, this
is the best feeling the world. If you're playing with

(42:36):
your friends, you will create for them the movie Scare.
They will get the movie Scare in this like and
it's very viscerally like, it's so great and satisfying when
you can get it. You can literally create a situation
where someone is in a house and they go around
a corner or around outside of house, go around the corner,
and suddenly the music comes in and Jason's standing right

(42:59):
in front of you, and you're like, shit, we didn't
even mention that you can hide under beds and in
closets and stuff and hold your breath, which creates a
whole new dynamic for Jason. They'll you can wait, if
you're Jason, you can see that someone's in the building,
but not where, not where in the building. Yeah, they
they've they've tailored all of his supernatural abilities in a

(43:21):
way that feel consistent with the way he acts in
the movies, but in a way that also like creates
lots of running, like hiding and like is he going
to figure it out? Stuff? And it's great. Um, I
kind of want to. I want to visit this because
I think it's gonna matter for our the end result
of this podcast. So like, there is a continuum of

(43:42):
creating frustration with the basic experience for the gamer and
like making it feel like super crisp and funny enough.
I'm gonna I'm gonna use two games by Hideo Kajima
to illustrate this. So like, on the one end is
what I'll call the death stranding end of the continuum,
which is intentionally making basic acts hard to create tension

(44:05):
and emotional release when things are successful. That's that's death stranding.
I think you could also somewhere on that end is
Red Dead two, you know, and then they're interesting. There's
the metal Gear Solid in particular five end of the continuum,
where controlling his buttery smooth and crisp like boom, he
does every single thing you want him to do perfectly,

(44:27):
And lots of game designers decide where on that continuum
they want to be, and they do it for narrative reasons.
I cited Red Dead two because that's a decision to
make several steps out of a thing that's normally gamified
with a single button press, right, yeah, And that's that's
as a big fan of crafting survival games, that's kind

(44:49):
of the whole bread and butter there where when you
play Valheim a game, I'm sure you'll cover at some point.
I'm sure you can't just like eat a you can't
just eat a health bar. You have to cook meals
and eat kneels and have balanced meals. Where it's the
idea of how much do we want to stretch out
certain processes. If you're playing Doom, I'm perfectly happy just
running into a little fucking plus sign medikit, you know.

(45:13):
I mean, it depends on the game. How much do
you want to gamify the game or make it realistic.
I think the key ingredient is that the audience feels
like the decision is intentional and they understand somewhere, either
emotionally or intellectually. The value of it. See I think,
like I remember from Red Dead two podcasts and just

(45:35):
reading reviews, everyone had that moment with Red Dead two
or like this is slower than I want it to be,
and then realizing oh that's meaningful and really enjoying it.
For that reason. Now, I could never get on board
with that decision intellectually with Death Stranding, which is one
of the reasons why I didn't like it. The problem
last of Us, I think, is a good example where

(45:56):
it's like, yes, you're a human, you can't really climb
or jump that high. That's the point, correct. I never
played Death Stranding because most of the people who played
it seemed to hate it. So I just I just
don't like what's his name. I don't like metal Gear either,
but that's a different conversationization. So like I'll I put
so there's another factor here, which is so there's there's

(46:17):
the intellectual decision of it, and then there's the feeling
like it was an arbitrary decision that was made either
because the developer didn't know what they were doing or
wasn't able to execute it, or it was there to
keep the entire system arbitrarily grounded, like it did in
God of War. Yeah, I always the yes I owe.
My comparison is always when I feel like I'm fighting

(46:38):
the game. Yes, It's the same with movies, when I
feel like the movie is fighting me. Where the writers
are like suddenly, I just feel the writing. Where a
game is like God a War is a good example.
Again we're not doing a God of War one, but
where it's like, oh, this feels just like irritatingly stretched
out as opposed to like natural or like yeah, where

(46:59):
a game where it's like I'd love to beat this level,
but they're making the controllers so obtuse that I can't
do it. Where it's like you're not making you're not
telling me what I need to do or the you know,
or it's just very confusing or weird, or like I'm
doing it but in the timing is bad. Yeah, where
you're like that's the clothes. That's quickest I'll give up
on a game usually, So for me, the problem with

(47:22):
this game is that it does not feel entirely like
it was made for creative reasons. It feels like it
was made because of budget reasons and like it just
wasn't designed in a snappy, clean way, and that's why
I'm really yeah, yeah, no, I agree, That's why I'm
really curious about Texas Chainsaw. Yeah, where I think that

(47:42):
this is like proof of concept, you know. But but
also I do think Texas Chainsaw is not as beloved
or hokey or fun as as Friday Thirteenth is. Okay, Yeah,
they are playing to its strength, like, for example, you're
not just Leatherface, You're the whole family there. It's very
clear that they're doing it the same way where it's
not going to be the same game, right, but it's

(48:02):
going to be the same game in the sense that
it's going to honor the movies in its own way.
And that's You're right, it's not it might not be,
like I said, like all the other games they've made,
I've enjoyed, but since it's not this dynamic specifically, I
haven't gotten as like into it, and I wouldn't want
all the other games to be that because the point

(48:23):
is to honor the source material, right, Well, I want
to come back to that, so but we have to. Yeah,
I want to talk about the controls real quick. We
have to hit a break soon, Dave, So we do, Dave,
So briefly, let me say I do not think that
the point of a game is just to honor source material.
I think the point of it is fundamentally to create

(48:45):
a fun experience in that world, and ideally it should
create a fun experience, and whether or not like so,
and I don't think every single even property is ideal
to be adapted for that reason. I think Friday thirteen
is go ahead and say you're thinking about the controls,
and then we'll go to the break. I was just
gonna say the easiest way to tell what the controls

(49:05):
is that, well, the counselor stuff is weird. The Jason
stuff is also weird sometimes, yes, and that shouldn't be.
And so that's why I agree with you that some
of the controls have to do with budget or like
you know, again, it's a it's a generally a little
clunky game. I personally like that about it. The same
way is something like Gang Beasts is fun because it's
a little like screwy Um that I actually like that.

(49:28):
There's some some of the some of my favorite ways
to beat Jason is to do the ring around the
rosie right where you run around an object in Jason.
That's the kind of thing it's like, Nah, that shouldn't
be able to happen in a game, I know, but
it's very fun because then it's like, why can't Jason
just climb over the table because he's not designed that way.
And that's some of my favorite moments of this game

(49:50):
is playing with that part of it, right, playing with
the limitations. No, no, and like, who am I to
say don't have fun that way? Like I'm I'm not,
But I would say, for me, as a person who
evaluates my opinion of the game's artistry, that's a problem,
you know. Yeah, But so I understand we have a
little bit more we're gonna talk about, obviously, but I do. Yeah, yeah,

(50:15):
thank you, thank you. You're you're a responsible host. So
what are we Let's let's cut to breaks so both
of us don't get fired and we'll be back, hopefully
still alive and employed after this. Now I can do

(50:40):
the beat. Now, I guess it. Guess I don't want it.
I guess I've given you the entire keys to this car.
I guess we're gonna ram into a tree. I guess
that's what's gonna happen to eat. Yeah, he knew what
this was I did. I don't know, like if there
was any friend that I had that like who I love,
who I would not want to be in the Frinday

(51:00):
thirteenth situation by the way back, Oh you have an
exceptional Jason. No, you're very good. I just yes, you're
very good. Yes. I rarely rarely does a counselor get away.
That's my tactic. I play as Jason eight. Yeah. What
I do is I trap all the locations first because

(51:24):
that injures them and you also get to hear that.
It's when the traps go off you say terrifying. Yeah,
I gotta go yeah, yeah, So that's what I do.
And that for because Jason A is slow, so you
have to kind of get ahead of that. That's what's tricky.
I'm a Jason two guy, and I would say I'm
not quite as good as Dave, but I'm pretty good.
You're pretty good, pretty good, like not as good as

(51:44):
Day but pretty good. And my trick is you have
to trap stuff, of course, right, but Jason two you
have a little bit more running room, So I like
to funnel people into like narrow corridors where I know
I can out run them. You know and like that's
it like having somebody yelp like I gotta get away
and then getting him with the grabs. A. Yeah, yeah,

(52:04):
it's so good man, it's real good. Hey, I guess
we're finally at the point where we need to pass
the final checkpoint and decide do we keep this game
on the celestial hard drive or do we shoot it
back into the ether for perhaps a remake. That's possible. Yeah,
they could remake this. Yeah, let me tell you how,

(52:25):
Tell me how you're keeping it, Dave. They should, well,
they should do a they should do like a re
what's it called, not remake? Um? A repolishing remasters remaster?
Thank you? Um? Yeah, I mean Mike's not here, so
devil may care exactly I'm going to keep this. Here's
what I'll say is I was there was no condition

(52:46):
where I weren't. It wasn't going to keep this. I know.
I've had probably more fun from this game as any other,
and it's neck and neck with Minecraft in terms of
how long I've been able to play a game. This
game is so replayable for me. And maybe it's subjective,
but this game gets me. But let me is it

(53:08):
because all of our friends got into it and so
we all played it for years. Or do you play
it on your own? That's what I'm saying. It's I'll
play it on my own, took um. It's just fun,
and yes, it helps to have friends exists or play
it with. It's definitely makes the game ten times better.
In terms of the abstract, why show aliens this is

(53:30):
I actually think this is a healthy thing to show aliens,
which is to know, I'll explain why because if you don't,
if you don't explain aliens this stuff, this aspect, then
horror movies will be misunderstood. Like the idea of our
relationship to murder and horror and sadism is uh, you know,

(53:53):
obviously there are very bad people in the world who
don't have a good relationship with it. I would argue
slasher films are a good way to show when we
are able to kind of enjoy this stuff. Why we
have Halloween, you know, both the franchise and the holiday,
and this is a very good way of showing aliens

(54:14):
that aspect of humanity, like the joy and like a
level of sadism. Yeah, that has a safety there, that
level of safety. It will also make it easier to explain,
like BDSM to them like it's like that, you know,
I think it's the same princip very high on your
priority list. I'm sure exactly gotlain an alien. You gotta

(54:35):
get that clear number one, number one, because it's listen,
it's gonna come out, it's gonna come out, right. That's
that's that's high on Dave's to do list for sure. Yeah,
keep thank you. I think you've actually made a pretty
good case. I think another aspect of the keyed case
that really deserves to be explained in a little more
detail is that this is simple enough that it's a

(54:59):
pro coachable for almost anybody. And I think that subsequent
games have tried to add more steps in the like
checklist of what a round is, and I don't think
that's necessarily made any of them more fun. Like I
think almost every other asymmetrical game that this company has made,
including Evolve, including Predator, including probably even Ghostbusters, adds a

(55:24):
bunch of extra stuff you need to do to finish around,
and I don't think that's ever made it more fun. Never.
I think Friday thirteenth is simple and therefore fun for
all the right reasons, but all that said, I am
going to delete it. Sign No that keep. I could
have kept it because Mike's not here. No, I'm going

(55:45):
to delete it because I I Although I think this
is an important genre that has not that hasn't been
represented yet, I still think that it's not It needs
to have a fundamentally polished execution to belong. I do
think that's an important aspect of games. I've made some

(56:06):
exceptions for games that were like extraordinary, like I would
say Outer Wilds is not that polished or it doesn't
control that well. Because the story is amazing. This is
just a very good movie franchise adaptation, and it's very fun.
But I also think it's fun in the way Mario
Party is fun, and I think there's god keep Mario Party.

(56:26):
And I haven't covered it yet, but I gotta tell
you I don't think it's wrong. I think if we
kept a Mario Party, I would be okay with that.
You know, it's not my favorite games that I don't
own any of those games, but I understand where it
belongs there. I think this is better. I think better,
and that's good. I'm glad. I'm not gonna change your mind.
But my argument for changing your mind? Is that then

(56:50):
Michael comes back and he's like, you did what because
he I know, Michael for a fact, has barely played
this game, and I just think that's funny because then
he'd have to play it at more to get to
figure out why. Because you do the like year in later,
what can we bump off? Yeah, he's he's gonna, yeah, yes,
lay in a trap da because he's gonna have to

(57:10):
play the game more to then make an argument for
why it has to go. You have to bump it
off eventually. This kind of psychological shit is why Dave
is the best Jason, because he's thank you. He's like,
he lays little traps, he plans what's gonna happen to you?
It's real maniacal up in here. Man. It's also you
get really breathy when you're Jason, and I hate it.
I know, I really hate it. Thank you, Thank you?

(57:33):
All right, Dave, He's just he's just trying to he's
just trying to make friends, all right. Plug something, it's
just gun plug something. Listen, I'm over at the game.
Fully unemployed gam e f U l O y unemployed.
Uh just google that maybe with the word podcast and
you'll find a whole podcast network that you will also

(57:56):
find Adam Ganzer on free Point there. So we've done yeah, yeah,
we've many mini series is together about the Twilight film
and Blood Rain. Because I don't know, I legit don't know.
But if you go to game or Patreon dot com

(58:16):
slash Gamefully Unemployed, you can find some extra podcasts. For
just five dollars a month. You get access to Tom
and Jeff watch Batman and Fox Smoller's a Maniac, which
sounds exactly uh, you know, it's exactly what it sounds like.
We also do some stuff with the Small Beans, Star Trek,
the next Futurama spiel Boys. You must know the Small Beans.
At this point you should also another thing you must

(58:38):
know about. But I am the head writer over at
Some More News, So if you haven't watched Some More News,
check it out. Can always plug Some More News. Absolutely
a great program, I gotta say, and Dave did not
ask me to say this. Dave and his partner Tom
on Gameplan Employed are some of the hardest working podcasters
that I know, and they like. Dave works very hard

(58:58):
and he cares a lot about the podcast that he makes,
and I respect him for that. He makes a great product.
Thank you for real, you really do and I know, yeah,
and I didn't. I didn't tell you to or pay
you to say that, So that's real. I really appreciate it.
He did not VENDMMI money right after this to say that, Yeah, exactly, No,
I really appreciate that. I feel the same way about you.

(59:18):
Thank you, Thank you. We love each other before we
kill each great We're we're really great, really really sweet
and great creeps. Okay, I think that's enough for us.
We should play this tonight. Why aren't we playing it tonight?
Should we? I could play it tonight. I could play
all right, Well, maybe that'll happen. Uh cond of you
were invited to it. Sorry, but hey, we'll see you

(59:39):
next time on one upsmanship. Bye bye. Work complete