078 - Moncage, Tempopo, & Slay the Princess — The Pristine Cut (Guest: Matt Storm, AKA Stormageddon) - Underplayed

Episode Transcript
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(00:03):
Thank you for pressing start on episode 78 of Underplayed, KZUMS
indie video game podcast. Today we have two secret games,
a discussion with Matt Storm AKAStormageddon, and a review of
our featured game Slay the Princess, The Pristine Cut.

(00:28):
Here on Underplayed, we review indie games of all kinds, the
games with small budgets but bighearts, the lesser known
experiences with imaginative ideas.
I'm Bo Po and I'm joined by another.
He's got the platinum in going under.
It's one of his numerous claims to fame.
He's the obto your IB in a cooperative game.
He runs like a pony. He loves pepperoni.

(00:50):
It's the one and only Disco Cola.
What's going on? You know, I wasn't totally ready
to be here, so I tried to turn around and go home, but I found
myself right in front of the studio anyways, so here I am.
How are you? And you're here to slay me.
I'm doing just fine. My internal voice of the
smitten. A voice that is smitten by indie

(01:12):
games. Those are references to our
featured game Slay the Princess.The Pristine cut, the first
featured game of season 8 of Underplayed.
Welcome to Season 8. Yes, let me tell you, I am
smitten with that new rhyme. Damn my dude, that was a good
one. Thank you, I spent nailed a
little more time on that one than others.

(01:32):
Wow, well it shows and I love it.
And way to get pepperoni in there.
Like what an achievement? That's one of those rhymes where
you'd think he used pepperoni. He totally built that whole
thing around pepperoni. Pepperoni came last, my friends.
No way. In that whole you're lying to me

(01:53):
construction pepperoni. Actually, I was like, what
rhymes with runs like a pony Pepperoni, It's perfect.
It's perfect. I just, I was so pleased.
For the audience, this is a truefact.
About me is my love of pepperoni.
It's not just a it's a word thathe grabbed for a rhyme.
That's right, I have received pepperoni as a birthday gift

(02:16):
from BOPO on more than one occasion.
That's true. That is a fact that is.
A true fact. Yes, and you're, you're known
for having secret salamis in your trench coat or whatever.
Yeah, Can you imagine a fourth grader with a trench coat?
What a what an odd way to start off the season, but it is season

(02:38):
8 of Underplayed. We should talk about how
Underplayed works for people just jumping onto the show.
Do you want to share about Underplayed Disco Cola?
Yeah, I can do that. So in Underplayed, you hear our
clown ass voices talking about indie games.
Each episode. Both of us will have played a
game in secret and indie game insecret.

(02:59):
We don't tell each other about it ahead of time.
So I have a secret game that I'mready to review, and Bopo has
another one and I have no idea what it is.
So we'll review both of those and then at the end we will come
together to review. This episode's featured game in
this case is Slay the Princess, the Pristine Cut, and that's

(03:20):
kind of how every regular episode goes.
Yes, so we're glad you're here. Thank you so much for pressing
play on our podcasts. It is always super exciting to
start a new season. Here's what we have coming up
this season. We've got featured games and
guests here in this episode as Disco mentions, we have Slay the
Princess, the Pristine Cut with our guest Matt Storm, AKA Storm.

(03:43):
Again, our next episode will be on Sable.
That will be our featured game. Our featured game after that
will be Dorf Romantic and we will have our guest.
Hey, it's Haley, a friend of ours who is very passionate
about that game. After that, episode 4 of the
season will feature Rogue Legacy.
Episode 5 of the season will feature Blueprints and we will

(04:05):
have a guest for that episode. It will be Kara, a writer from
Patch Magazine. The 6th episode will feature
Moonlighter. The 7th episode will feature
1000 Times Resist with our guestLucy Blundell, a game developer.
Our eighth episode of the seasonwill feature Human Fall Flat,
our Co-op game of the season, because we always have one of
those every season. And then our ninth episode of

(04:28):
the season will be featuring Cross Code with our final guest
of the season, Proto Dude. Our 10th episode of the season
will feature Bomb Rush, Cyber Funk, and all those episodes
will premiere over the course ofthe next several months, but
basically through most of the rest of 2025.

(04:49):
Yeah, I think our last episode of the season is like November
20 something basically. This is a journey that we're on,
an episode every two weeks from this points and if you want to
join along with us and share your thoughts on the games, we
have links in our show notes to our social media accounts.
If you ever want to get in touch, message us about the

(05:11):
games we're playing and your thoughts on them.
We'd love to hear about that. Now Disco, I am wondering what
have you played since the last time we checked in about non
underplayed games? Like this isn't necessarily AAA
games we've played. This could just be game any
games we haven't discussed on the show.

(05:33):
The last time we did this for real for real would have been
the beginning of season 7. So I'm kind of opening it up to
the last 5-6 months. Oh my goodness.
If you want but no pressure to share that much, what have you
been playing? One of them, one of them you
shared in that little rhyme. I finally finished going under.

(05:54):
Oh, let's. Go.
I got the platinum and then it took a lot longer, but I did
finally finish all the trophies for the DLC, which was quite
difficult. And you said you had been
working on this a little bit. Yeah, Yeah.
At the end of last season I was working on that.
That's very cool. And how long did it take to get
this done, would you say? I mean in like in terms of hours

(06:17):
played or in terms of like PSN says it took you 2 years to
finish this. Oh no, I mean like hours played
for. A lot like over 60.
Wow, maybe 70? Wow, that is a lot.
It was a lot. The DLC is really hard.
I bet Dang well, because you gota platinum trophy in going

(06:40):
under. I got a little something
something here. I'm excited.
That was a little disappointing,wasn't it?
Yeah, after all that work. Yeah, I know.
There you go. There it is.
That's so pretty. There you go.
So congratulations. Thank you.
But yeah, in terms of like over all of Season 7, as well as like

(07:02):
anything that wasn't part of theSeason 7 lineup, I played more
Ghost Game, I'm only a couple, or Ghost Game, Ghost Song, I'm
only untitled. Ghost.
Game. There's also a Digimon season
called Ghost Game, so it's just anyways, I'm only a couple
trophies away from that platinumat this point.
Chipping away Iris and the Giants, I played some FAR loan

(07:25):
sales a couple weeks ago to try and clean up some trophies.
I've noticed you've done this thing called.
I'm not going to have the right term for it, but it's like a
grab bag of variety pack. A variety pack.
Yeah, on stream. When you stream, it's been kind
of fun and but as anyone who haswatched the variety pack stream
will tell you, the first game isthe only one that is really

(07:46):
random. And then after that, Disco just
plays what he wants. OK.
So yeah. So you go in thinking it's all
going to be random. Well, I assign so I I do it with
a a die roll and like some gamesare assigned to more than one so
they have a higher chance of being picked.
OK, so the first game is usuallyrandom, but then like, like
after I played Farlon Sales, I think it rolled for the one I

(08:10):
wanted to play the least. And it was just like, I'm just
gonna play down. Well, yeah.
And then that's just what happened.
Fair. OK.
But yeah, I played some Farlon Sales.
Still didn't finish it yet, but I'm working on it.
And I played a game called Desert Child as part of that
variety pack. I've heard of that.
I actually I think I might have that in my backlog.

(08:32):
Yeah, I think I got it for a couple.
Bucks yeah, I got it super cheapone time and I was like this
Pixar. It looks great.
Yeah, sign me up. It goes on sale all the time.
Yeah, so that I grabbed that. Nice.
This, I mean, that's, that's most of it.
Everything else was like cleaning up Season 7 stuff.
So that's that's it. Nice.
For me, I'd I have to selectively pick some things

(08:55):
because some things I didn't finish.
Yeah, you play a ton of stuff all the time too.
Yeah, and I've played a lot of stuff on stream, but I'll call
out some things. Earlier this year I played
Rusty's Retirement, which is an idler, and I put in so many
hours into this in just a matterof days.
Like I think I have over 20 hours in this and it's an idler.

(09:16):
This takes place technically in the same world as Haiku the
Robots. OK, because Rusty, this is Mr.
Morris Games who made Haiku the Robot, and this is a very
different game from Haiku the Robot.
Yeah, I almost, I took that withme on a road trip recently and I
was like, this is the one I'm gonna play.
I didn't end up playing it. Oh.
OK, I hope you do play it. Yeah, but if you play it, you

(09:38):
might also want to check out Rusty's retirement because it's
got all the same characters, butit's a side character from Haiku
the robot Rusty, who is now retiring and has a farm.
And it's an idler game where youcan totally just let it sit.
It sits on the bottom third of your screen.
It was a very innovative indie game from last year.
A lot of people have already kind of copied this idea, but I

(10:02):
was actively playing this idler game.
I was I was like waiting for thenext opportunity I could have to
plant things, the next opportunity I could have to see
a new shop selection. I.
Was going to ask as a joke if you like got really into it but.
I got really into it and I it wasn't such an idler game to me.

(10:22):
So yeah, I think I mentioned this on the podcasts maybe last
season, but I did play through Mists earlier this year.
I played Real Mist Masterpiece Edition.
I'd never played Mist. It's a first person puzzle game
that's a classic and I'm glad I got to play that.
And I get it. I get why this is such a big

(10:42):
deal. And I really want to play Riven
now, which is the sequel. I did get to replay Donkey Kong
Country on stream not too long ago, maybe like a couple months
ago. And I did that after they
announced Donkey Kong Bonanza for the Switch too.
I was like energized to play a Donkey Kong Country and I wanted
to play Donkey Kong Country two and three.

(11:04):
Still haven't done that, but hopefully sometime soon.
You and I played Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart with friends
over at my house for like a springtime party get together.
We also mentioned this at the end of last season.
Another one I mentioned at the end of last season was Crypt
Custodian. I got to play through all of

(11:26):
that on stream in like early May, and then you and I more
recently did something for your birthday.
Oh yeah. Yeah, do you want to talk about
Shredder's revenge? Yeah, so on my birthday, I don't
like to all. All I really want for most of my
birthday's is to just have some Buffalo wings without any shame

(11:50):
or regrets. Just be like, yes, I have
permission to go get Buffalo wings.
It doesn't matter that the rest of my family's not going to eat
the same thing as me. So that's like what I usually am
just like all about. But this year I was like, you
know what, I want Bopo to come over and I since my kids are
really into Ninja Turtles right now and they are starting to

(12:10):
kind of sort of be able to play games.
I want to play Ninja Turtles with my kids and Bobo.
And that's what we did. Yeah, that was, it was really
fun. It was a lovely time, Yeah.
And you got your wings afterwards.
I did and the kids couldn't hangthey they even they quit.
My 5 year old quit around chapter 4 I think.
That's OK. We we had some, we lost some
stragglers, but you and I made it to the finish.

(12:32):
We did. We finished the game, yes, which
I didn't expect to do necessary.It's a pretty short game.
You can finish it in 2 1/2 threehours.
And we just, yeah, we marathonedit.
Yeah, yeah, it was nice. Was so bad.
Oh, sorry. I have one question.
OK, what is your go to wing flavor?
You know, I, it depends on the place, but like, generally I'm

(12:54):
just like original Buffalo as long like if there's like a
difference between like a mediumand a hot, I'll get the hot one.
But some places it's just like Itried this new wing place, you
know, when my family went out oftown recently and I got there,
you know, traditional hot, it wasn't hot enough for me.
So it depends. You kind of have to live and

(13:16):
learn just the the thing that matters the most when you try a
new one is like, am I getting value for the money that I'm
paying for it? Because wings.
Wings can be expensive. Wings everywhere are pretty
expensive, even on the low end, so you have to make sure that
first of all the wings are like big enough to like OK I can
experiment because it's worth the money.

(13:38):
True. So I love when they let you pick
a couple different sauces with one order.
Sometimes you can't do that right, or sometimes you have to
order the certain size that allows for that.
Very cool. Glad you got your wingies.
You put wingies in your. Mouthy, one of the timeless
lines. And then another thing that that

(13:59):
anecdote reminded me of is when I was really young, there was a
family gathering and my uncle said something to my cousin.
That was such a dad gamer moment.
And you didn't do this? I just want to make this
abundantly clear to the audience.
Disco Cola doesn't act this way when playing with his children.

(14:21):
Actually, he's a very accommodating, patience, awesome
team member with everybody he plays with.
But here's the bad example, right?
I'm really young. I'm at a family gathering.
There's anes set up in a basement at whoever's house we
were meeting at. People were taking turns playing
Super Mario Brothers. And it's it's world, like one

(14:44):
one or something. And my uncle is playing, he's
hogging the system, right? And my cousin, his son, is like,
dad, dad let me play. And he said I'm the dad and I'm
playing. And he just wouldn't let his son
play. Oh, no, don't take a page out of
his book. Yeah, I don't know.

(15:07):
That's one of those core memories.
I wasn't trying to play or anything.
I was. I was just there.
Yeah, I have to, I have to admitthat if it's like something on
my profile where I'm trying to collect the trophies, there
might be a little bit of that inthere.
You're the dad and you're playing.
Yeah, but I did set up profiles for both my kids.
That's very nice. So now they they do have

(15:27):
PlayStation profiles. We were earning trophies for
your kids. That's right.
Yeah, because we had they had tolog into their profiles to be
able to play Co-op. That's fun.
Another thing I wanted to just quickly mention is I've had the
chance to play some games that was provided keys for the past
few months. Some of these include Mika and
the Witch's Mountain. Is this game trying to kill me?

(15:51):
Karma. The Dark Worlds Bahamits in the
Walk Walk tree which I talked about in our PAX East episode.
Despolote and Rat Shaker. I actually I saw a lot of those
and many of those are a riot in one way or.
Another, I know I don't and I'm,I'm not even trying to like only
get the games that are riots, but these were by and large very

(16:13):
fun games, very fun games to stream.
And I I was very thankful for the opportunity for that.
So those are some other indie games I've gotten to play and I
could go in depth on so many of them.
We could keep talking here at the top, but we do have two
secret games to review and we'vegot to talk to our friend Matt
Storm AKA Stormageddon, and we've got a review, Slay the

(16:33):
Princess, The Pristine Cut. So we're going to move on, but.
We have a timeline. We do, but before we move on,
there are a few very easy ways to support Underplayed.
They cost nothing, they take almost no time at all, and we
would really appreciate you doing these things for us if you
haven't already. So one, give us a follow and a
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(16:54):
Podcasts. That makes us appear more
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Two, you can follow us across social media using the links in
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by reposting our stuff on socials and telling your indie
game. Having friends about us means
the world. That's the best one.
That is such a kind gesture and it's so easy to do.

(17:16):
And as always, we love you. Thank you for listening.
It's time for our secret games. In Secret Games, we each review

(17:38):
an indie game we've been playingin Secrets since our last
episode. We don't discuss what we're
playing in advance. I don't know what Disco Cola is
going to review today. He doesn't know what I'm going
to review today. And we can choose any indie game
as long as we haven't reviewed it before on the show.
We'll start with you, Disco Cola.
Let the mystery be no more. Reveal your secret game for
Episode 78 of Underplayed. My secret game This episode is a

(18:03):
puzzle narrative ish kind of game from opt illusion games and
that game is called. Oh, the one before while waiting
potentially it's I'm drawing a blank, I can't remember what is
it? It's called Mon Cage.
Mon Cage. Amazing.

(18:45):
And so that is my secret game. That is awesome.
Cool. I got to talk to the folks at
the OPT Illusion booth at PAX East about all their games, and
they did mention Mon Cage a few times and I got to look at the
Steam page for it, but I haven'tplayed it.
I haven't ever played this one. That's so cool.
So I honestly I don't remember hearing about Mon Cage in that

(19:07):
in our PAX episode and I don't remember how I came across it if
I'm honest. It's pretty recent discovery for
me. I think I might have just been
like a recommended YouTube trailer or something.
But anyways, in Mon Cage you are, you don't necessarily seem
to be playing as someone specific, but you do play the

(19:28):
game by rotating this cube. And five sides of this cube are
showing scenes and or objects from a man's life at various
times. And the main thing about Mon
Cage is that certain objects will match up with other objects
on different sides of the cube, and linking these objects

(19:48):
together to create a fuller object will trigger some sort of
change in one or more of the scenes.
So for example, on one side of the cube you might have a scale
on it in like an office setting or in just like a on a table.
And another side of the cube will have maybe a crane, and you

(20:09):
will link these two objects together, lining them up
perfectly. And now the scale is actually
reaching across two sides of thecube, and it functions like a
scale in that other image as well.
And because in this other image the sun is lined up perfectly in
that perspective with the crane,the sun is now like acting as a

(20:32):
heavy object on the scale. And that's how you change the
time of day in that second scene.
That's so clever it it's kind ofreminding me and you tell me if
this is inaccurate, but it's kind of reminded me of Gora Goa.
There's a lot of Gora Goa vibes in here and you'll if after a
couple there's like one puzzle in particular, I'm like, Oh my
God, this is like that Gora Goa puzzle.

(20:53):
I can't believe it. I wonder if one influenced the
other maybe? Well, I think Goragoa came out
quite a quite a bit of time before this one, so there I
wouldn't be surprised. In many of the scenes you will
also have designated points which you can zoom in or zoom
out on. So not only are you changing
perspectives by rotating your cube, you're also changing

(21:16):
perspectives by zooming in and out, all the while trying to
match up objects across different sides of your cube.
And then solving all these puzzles will trigger some sort
of animation on your current side, which will possibly grant
you even more depth to zoom in on, or access maybe closets or
drawers that you didn't have access to before.

(21:38):
And in many cases, puzzles that open doors or curtains will
completely change the scene on one of the opposite ends of the
cube. So like that scene that was
there before you're done with it, you're moving on to
something different. And then the last bit of Mon
Cage that's worth mentioning is the picture album.

(21:59):
When you're zooming in and or solving puzzles, you will be
able to collect hidden Polaroidsand these kind of act as a more
straightforward storytelling mechanic.
Without these Polaroids, you canstill maybe piece together some
sort of story from the scenes you're observing, but when
paired together with the collected Polaroids, you get a
much clearer picture of with theevents that are being portrayed

(22:23):
on the sides of the cube in Montgage and vice versa.
But that's the gist of it. It's really pretty
straightforward, but it's also amysterious kind of game too at.
The same time you're learning about someone's life, and
there's no quick way to communicate that.
And that kind of a story can take place over a long period of
time. So you could see lots of
different vignettes here. So it takes time to unravel, I

(22:45):
imagine. Yeah, vignettes is a great word
to use in in this case. So yeah, like I said, that's the
gist of it. As far as things I like, this is
definitely one of the most unique puzzle games I've played.
It reminds me of, like you said,Gora Goa.
It also reminds me of the first time that I saw a viewfinder
footage. I won't say 1 is or is not more

(23:09):
creative than the other, but theidea at the very core of this
game is just endlessly fascinating.
Like, that's so clever, but it'salso so surprising at the same
time that no one's done it before.
Yeah, you do see the camera there at the end of the trailer.
I'm looking at sort of revealingafter seeing a carnival scene.

(23:29):
So very evocative of that. Yeah, on a similar note, I kind
of, I love the art style in thisgame.
It's a very minimal color use. Faces that are portrayed in the
Polaroids kind of remind me of Mutazione, where you don't
really have a lot of facial features presented, if any at
all. Everything just looks really
sharp, kind of like construction, papery at times.

(23:52):
There's just like hard corners and edges.
Yeah, that's a good way to describe it.
Other thing I like is getting the Polaroids just in general so
that I give context to the context of the cubes.
I just think it's a really elevated way to tell the story
of this person's life. And I, I just feel really
cerebral the whole time I'm playing this game because I'm

(24:14):
solving these cool puzzles and I'm getting story in such a
unique way that still feels grounded in the very bizarre
world of cube puzzle solving. Another cool thing related to
the Polaroids is that your perspective as a player is in
this really bizarre, like domed room, and as you collect the

(24:36):
Polaroids, they fill in to theseempty frames in the background,
but they're really obscured too,so they're not like taking
center stage. But there's a small sense of
progress that's sort of a reminder of what you've done.
Exactly. But at the same time, eventually
once you notice that that's happening, you will also notice
that your pictures like move andsway as you're rotating the

(24:57):
cube. So I had a bit of like cocoon,
like green inside green kind of curiosity about like, am I
inside this cube too? My gosh, AM.
I in a picture in a picture. Maybe.
Yeah. Another thing, I did play a lot
of this on a laptop in a car with other people during a road

(25:17):
trip with loud music. So I didn't get to hear the
music for the first half of the game, but the second-half of the
game at least had music that shifted appropriately with the
scenes as they changed. So I do want to point it out.
I don't know that it's what I heard was radio listening
necessarily, but it did elevate the the story that I was trying

(25:38):
to piece together. And lastly, I want to point out
that a good number of these puzzles were just really plain
fun to solve. There's something, it's like the
spot the difference pictures. It's kind of the same part of
the brain where it's like, wheredid the two things connect?
It's kind of fun to just like shift your perspective a bunch

(26:00):
of times and and just like finally find that thing as it
pieces itself together. Lots of place, yeah.
It's very satisfying. On the flip side, however, there
were also a good number of puzzles that I couldn't solve
without support. Luckily, this game has a built
in hint system that will give you like small incremental hints

(26:24):
and then eventually just give you a video of the solution if
you decide that those hints weren't enough.
So you're never going to get stuck to the point where you
can't finish the game. So you can add that to the pros
column, But there were a few toomany where I was like, I just, I
never would have come up with this, you know?
And in some cases it was like I could see the two objects that I

(26:47):
meant to line up. But, you know, sometimes I would
have to do something else in order to trigger my ability to
actually line those up. Or sometimes I just didn't line
them up just right and I wouldn't know for sure whether I
was missing something or I just wasn't trying hard enough until
I had like waited for the hint system to finish.

(27:09):
This cool down sometimes you hope like sometimes games have
the the snapping system. There's like a magnetism
magnetism. That that's in this game, but it
just was like sometimes the the margin of error for it's really
small. Gotcha.
So sometimes it would be like, oh, no, I, I was, I did it
right. I just didn't do it right, you
know? Sure.

(27:29):
But another complaint I have is related to the Polaroids, and
maybe this will seem petty to some people because like I'm I'm
pretty sure I understand what's going on.
But we have someone who I would consider the main character of
the story and compared to all ofthe other human characters in
the Polaroids, they have a very distinct hair color.

(27:52):
But then that character seemingly starts to age and
seemingly eventually that hair color changes over time, which
is the thing that happens in real life, of course.
But eventually there's another character in the Polaroids that
has that same hair color. And like this hair color thing
is very intentional and I'm veryconfident that the main

(28:12):
character's hair color changes over time, but I'm not 100%
sure. So like whether it does or not
changes the impact of what we see in the Polaroids and then
ultimately in the ending. Each possibility is a good
ending, but it's like, who is this other person that has that

(28:34):
same hair color? Is it a different person?
Is it the same person and I'm just misunderstanding?
Yeah, there could be something poetic there where maybe it's
two sides of one person, you know, I played.
But I imagine that that has to be a consideration when making
kind of like a little bit more of an abstract game about
someone's life. And I imagine too, that the cast

(28:55):
of characters is small enough that it's, it would be kind of
odd for that to just be a coincidence.
There's that's probably always that thought in the back of your
head as you're seeing this happening.
So like I said, I'm I'm very confident I understand what the
Polaroids are portraying and it's still a great ending.
But it's just like, I'm not surebecause if our main character's

(29:16):
hair color is changing, it changes enough to a point where
it's pretty drastically different.
And then I'm not sure that our Polaroids are actually telling a
chronological story. And so I'm just, there's just a
little bit of confusion there. But I'm very confident that it's
just like no army characters hair color is changing as they
get older and this other character with the same hair
color is a new. Character, they just have,

(29:38):
they're older and it's just thatcoincidence.
Sure. And then my last but maybe
biggest complaint is that I don't really love controlling
the game. The concept is incredible and
the controls are pretty much a direct result of that game's
concept. And it it I don't see how it
could be controlled in many other ways.
Maybe with an analog stick it still kind of works.

(30:01):
But what I would say is that definitely don't try and play
this with a laptop touchpad. But even when I did get home and
tried to play it with a proper mouse, I still didn't totally
jive with it. So I don't know, if you do play
it and you play it with a mouse,I recommend at least trying it
with above average sensitivity because rotating the cube can be

(30:24):
really slow, at least it was forme.
And I'm pretty sure my computer's sensitivity is just
like the default setting. So maybe try and bump up
sensitivity a little bit if you do try to play this.
But at the end of the day, the concept of Mon Cage is a breath
of fresh air. Even having been, you know, out

(30:46):
for more than five years at thispoint, it's a pretty short jog
and it's still worth the time. I think you will get out of this
game the more you put into it. There's a touching heart at the
center of Mon Cage and I'm not going to try and influence your
decision one way or the other. Bo PO.
But looking at the rest of the games I have planned for the.

(31:06):
Season. Oh no.
This has a good shot of being your jealous game because this
is definitely a Bo PO game. It looks like one.
I was going to say, this is likejealous game material.
Yeah, for sure. As for me though, I'm soured by
just a few puzzle solutions and some of the controls.
So for Disco Cola this is an 8 point O out of 10, but I expect

(31:27):
that you will like this much more than I do.
Yeah, this has been on my radar for a bit.
I didn't discover it that much earlier than you, simply because
I started doing research on OPT Illusion when I was playing
while waiting earlier this year.And then when I knew they would
be at PAX, I looked into Mon Cage.
And I did hear a little bit about Mon Cage from their booth.

(31:49):
And I just find that it's interesting that there are
parallels here to their other game.
While Waiting. You've got a puzzle game about a
man's life. You know, it seems like you're
looking at a long stretch of time.
It's an unconventional idea for a puzzle game.
The controls are a little rough.Like, there are so many
parallels here that I, you know,I think that maybe While Waiting

(32:12):
wouldn't have been possible without the success of Mon Cage,
I think this did pretty Dang well for being one of their
earlier games. And I'm a fan of OPT Illusion.
I am not exactly sold on Pick Me, Pick Me as an idea because I
haven't played around with it yet.
I'm not sure if that's the styleor genre of game that I'm going
to gravitate toward, but I do like that they try something new

(32:35):
with everything. They do, yeah.
They might have thematic similarities, but they're trying
a different style of puzzles every time they make a game.
And I want to offer immediately a correction.
I thought that I saw this game came out in 2019.
It came out in 2020. 1/20/21 So it's been out for about four
years. Yeah, cool.
So apologies. No, that's good.

(32:57):
Cool. And then at the end of this, I'm
just curious, maybe without spoiling and it might be hard to
not spoil, but how do you feel about this man whose life you've
just experienced? Like what kinds of emotions
bubble up for you as you experience this guy's life?
I will say that if I again understand the story correctly,

(33:20):
it's not a new story. There's like one or two details
that are a bit different from this kind of same story that
I've seen multiple times. But I would say what I got from
it was a story of finding purpose and then redemption.

(33:42):
That is getting me even more interested.
It seems like the kind of game Iwould want to just play late at
night before bed. And I might check it out very
soon. I you know, I had plans after
this recording to go home and just, like, sit on the couch or
sit in bed and play a game. Maybe it's not.
Well, maybe I'll play this one. Yeah.
Cool. Well, thank you for sharing

(34:03):
about Mon Cage. It is time for my secret Game.
My Secret game is also a puzzle game.
My Secret game is also from a developer that has another game
that we've reviewed before on the show.
My Secret game is also 7 letterslong.

(34:24):
Whoa. But it's not my cage.
My secret game is Tempo PO. Hey, I know this one.

(35:01):
I wasn't sure when it was going to show up, but I had a.
Feeling yes. Someday, Yes.
So Tem Popo is a 2025 music puzzle game.
It was developed by Witchbeam, the creators of We Know Them,
creators of Unpacking. It was published by Cult Games.
The game synopsis from the Steamstorefront reads quote.

(35:22):
A psychedelic soundscape in the sky.
Puzzle through the seasons by conducting chaotic Tem Popo to
rescue musical flowers. Design and populate your melodic
garden, then let the music play.End Quote, I want to thank Neon
Hive for providing me a key to play and review the game.
They actually did that on release week of the game a while

(35:44):
back and now I get to review it on underplayed and I'm very
excited because I think this game is very special.
I'm kind of spoiling my overall thoughts but I've been looking
forward to this for a while and this game kind of feels like
which beams. I don't know if like blank check

(36:06):
game is the right term for it, but like you know when it.
I've never heard that term before, but.
Well, so in in movies, a director who makes a movie that
does really well, they might geta blank check movie where they
get to make whatever the hell they want.
Like Damien Chazelle made Babylon, which is a very
experimental, very polarizing film that is super ambitious.

(36:29):
No studio would have ever greenlit it had he not made Lala
Land and other things. So I'm kind of stealing that
concept and bring it over to thegame world.
Tem Popo, I imagine is not the the largest budget game in the
in the most ambitious game, but it is a game that feels like

(36:49):
it's a very specific concepts and we really want to do it.
And we made unpacking. We can do whatever we want.
Let's do Tem Popo and I just love that.
So in this game, you play as Hannah, a girl who is gifted at
conducting and music. And this takes place across
islands in the sky where you seespring is in bloom.

(37:13):
Hannah decides to put on a concerts in the sky and a gust
of wind carries her musical flowers away.
But there are these pink magicalcreatures called Temp Popo who
agree to help her gather the flowers back.
And you do this by going into island levels 1 by 1 and placing

(37:33):
instructions down on the ground for Tem OO to take so that they
can collect the flowers and reach and exit.
So Tempopo are very eager to help, but they can't do things
on their own. They need Hannah's instructions.
And so you're placing these things on the ground, maybe
instructions to smash, to turn into a block, to push things, to

(37:57):
lift other tempopo up with a short gust of winds.
And it feels like Lemmings meetsa rhythm game meets grid based
puzzles. You have to watch out for
chompers that chase and eat yourtempo PO.
In some levels there are always ledges you could fall off.
And there are other dangers as well.
And each level is specifying thedirections you're given.

(38:20):
So when you go into a level on the default difficulty, like the
normal difficulty if you will, you're given a preset set of
instructions that you have to figure out where to place.
There are other difficulty levels where you're just given
the freedom to put any instructions anywhere.
You know, it's so it's kind of this, you can choose how much

(38:41):
you want the game to guide you as far as what you're allowed to
put down. And you can rotate the levels.
You can zoom in and out. You can also get hints if you
get stuck. So I can monkey.
There you go. And the game takes you across
all Four Seasons, each with 15 levels before you get credits.
And then there are challenge levels after that where the game

(39:02):
is actually technically twice aslong as I expected it to be
because you go through spring, summer, fall, winter, you get
credits. And then it's like, OK, all
those seasons now have each have15 harder levels.
And it's like, whoa, OK. And I didn't do those challenge
levels, but I did get credits here in Tim Popo.

(39:24):
So what I liked is that now, because this is a rhythm game,
this is a music based game, the music is something I have to
point out here. First and foremost, the music is
lively and insanely boppy. It's so good.
Each level has various versions of the same theme going on, so

(39:48):
you'll hear a thinking version. This is where you're placing and
planning things. Then when you try out the
strategy you've just placed down, when you want the tempo PO
to actually start moving to the music and take your directions,
you hear the action version of that theme.
And then if you get all the flowers successfully and you

(40:08):
bring them to the gates, you getthe success version, which is
even livelier. So it gets, it starts kind of
out relaxed and it gets livelierwith each of these themes.
And I think that's so fun because it feels very cohesive
within one level you start. At this place where I'm just in
this is Zen puzzle solving mode,now I'm in the investigation

(40:31):
mode of did that work? It's a little more lively.
And then it did work and it's sotriumphant when it works.
And it just has upbeat jazz, tons of horns, lots of really
fun percussion. So big props to Jeff Van Dyke
for composing, and to Anatetti Turnbull, the voice of Hannah,

(40:53):
who sings beautifully whenever you complete a season.
You actually get to hear her conduct a little concert at the
end of every season, and her voice just resonates so well.
And Jeff Van Dyke is also the same composer from Unpacking,
which is impressive considering what I've heard from Tempo PO
seems very different. Very different, yeah.

(41:14):
Incredible range. Incredible, Yeah.
So I I think he is incredible and he works with the Witch Beam
team super well. I can't think of another game
that sounds so celebratory with its music when you succeed.
That's probably the biggest praise I can give to Jeff.
I love the puzzle solving in this game.
It is very rewarding in two styles of puzzle solving.

(41:38):
There is looking at the big picture of a level and what it's
about, and then there's the micro level of fine tuning your
approach. So an example of this or just to
expand on this a little bit more, each level you could argue
might have a pitch that you'd give about what the concept is.
Like this is the level where you're running away from a bunch

(42:00):
of chompers and you have to always be out running them.
Or this is the level where you push blocks into gaps to make
bridges. Or this is the level where you
smash a lot of stuff, right? You can look at a level and kind
of get what The thing is. From there, you feel this
intuition for where to place instructions.

(42:21):
So you get into the rhythm of OK, if this is the level where
you're supposed to smash stuff, I should probably put the
smashing instruction in front ofsome of the blocks that seem
like they'd block a path. And from that you see how it
works out and you see what mightnot work.
And from that you fine tune. You start at this macro level
and you slowly work your way down until the tempo PO are

(42:43):
doing exactly what you want to do.
And the way the game guides you from the macro to the micro
level is making you feel so smart.
I mean, I genuinely do give myself props for being, you
know, smart enough to figure outmost of the puzzles on my own.
But because the idea of the level is so clear, sometimes it

(43:06):
sort of tells a story about whatyou should be doing before you
start doing it, and I love that design here.
Levels can look intimidating at first, but the two facets of
that design allow you to really start with the big picture and
work your way down. I think this game is incredibly
polished. The presentation is gorgeous.

(43:26):
The game has rules that always work.
Florida State. The mistakes are always your
fault, not the games. It all runs so smoothly.
This game feels perfect to play.It's just so polished, and we
don't give this praise that often.
I think a lot of games we play are polished.
When you play a game that's thispolished, you have to call it.

(43:47):
Yeah, yeah, it's not something I'm always thinking of.
It's like, oh wow, I have no complaints about this.
But then if it's like, Oh no, they thought of everything.
No, Yeah. And sometimes when a thing is
working so well, you don't even think about how good it is
because it's something you take for granted.
Like something that doesn't break is technically a good

(44:08):
thing, but you're not going to call it out all the time.
But in Tem Popo, it's so polished that I have to comment
on it. I love that there's a
significant amount of content here.
There are those 60 levels that Iplayed.
Then there are dozens more of those challenge puzzles.
This game also has moments of Zen where we can go into
Hannah's Garden or the Melody Garden and we can place flowers

(44:31):
and create our own songs. I'm not someone who immediately
jumps to doing that kind of thing in these games, But as you
collect these flowers in the levels, that gives you an
inventory of flowers you can then place in Hannah's Garden.
And it's almost like you're showing off your trophies of
what you've collected in a way. And you're.
Yeah. And as you're placing them, the

(44:53):
way you place them creates a different song.
And so then you can play that song, and that's fun to play
around with. And then I love the
accessibility and approachability features.
There are those difficulties that allow for a wide variety of
players to enjoy this. And I really love the hint
system. It is perfect for giving you a
clue without holding your hand. So I asked for hints several

(45:16):
times in this game and all it would do sometimes is just point
to a tile and it would say something goes here.
It doesn't doesn't tell me why it goes there.
It just says something goes here.
And then I can go, OK, that gives me the next level of
knowledge I need. Or it might say an instruction
does go here, but not this one. And I love that it's just the

(45:38):
perfect amount. It doesn't hold my hand.
It gives me just a little tip and I was able to still feel the
satisfaction of finishing a level a lot of the time, even
when I was doing hints. I do have dislikes for Tim Popo.
It can be hard to see the relationship of tiles through
walls and around corners, like how adjacent something is to

(46:00):
another thing that can sometimesbe obscured.
And so you have to do this thingwhere you rotate the camera in
some levels quite a bit. The game is also surprisingly a
little too hands off with how the rules work sometimes.
This is a very wholesome game. It's a very kind game, a very
colorful, bright game. You'd think that along with

(46:23):
that, the game would like maybe be a little bit too much in your
face with explaining the rules. And to its credit, it leaves a
lot of that discovery up to you.But sometimes mechanics I
thought were just a little mysterious and I just had to do
trial and error to figure it out.
And sometimes my learnings were accidental.
I wasn't actually aware that there was something to learn.

(46:47):
I just happened to learn something.
And maybe that's just like 4D chess level game design that I
don't understand as being 4D chess level game design.
But I just thought maybe a few things could have gotten some
explanations. And then there were there were
occasional times where the game suddenly quite advanced in

(47:07):
difficulty and I did have to usehints a few more times than I'd
liked. But overall, Temp Oppo is super
polished. It's super lively, it's kind
hearted. It has some of the best music of
2025. The puzzles are so satisfying.
It's easy to both marathon this game and put it down when you
need to. I think rhythm and puzzle fans
need to play this. I'm going to rate it 9.5 out of

(47:31):
10. I called it.
Nice, and it's playable on PC which is the version I played,
Mac, Linux, Switch and Xbox series.
Well, cool. Yeah, I don't have a lot of
questions. I will say that I was not
necessarily like super stoked for this game.
I think mostly because of what you said that like looking at

(47:53):
the levels can feel overwhelmingand like I kind of that's kind
of where I am. Like I'm I'm OK at rhythm games,
but not great. And then also you're like in
this 3D Captain Toad looking space.
So I was like, I don't know about this, but the way you

(48:14):
described the macro to micro like sections of a level reminds
me of how my brain kind of dealswith troubleshooting when I'm at
work. And that's kind of one of my
favorite things to do when something goes wrong.
I. Just you always turn to the temp
popo at work and they help you. Yeah.
No, but seriously, I love the like, OK, this piece of

(48:38):
equipment isn't working. Yeah.
And so I investigate like down the pathway, like, OK, which?
What piece of equipment is causing this to not function?
Is it this literal piece of equipment?
Is it this cable? Is it, you know, something
inside this other piece of equipment?
And that's kind of the way you described it kind of reminds me

(48:59):
of that. And I'm I have a natural kind of
troubleshooting talent. Actually, and I do credit you
there too, like I I can back youup on that.
You are a great troubleshooter and I think troubleshooting is a
very interesting way to describethe puzzles in this game.
I think that's a super accurate description actually, and it's
one that I haven't seen people use.

(49:19):
When you try something out and you're tempo pick up flower one
and then they pick up flower 2 and this one is lifting this one
up and then this one over here is turning into a block,
allowing this other tempo to cross a gap.
You're like, it's working, I'm so smart.
And then you get to the very end.
You're watching it for like 60 seconds.
You get to the very end and one of the tempo PO misses a flower.

(49:41):
And then this tempo over here that has a flower, it just
jumped off the Cliff so it can'tgo to the gates.
And so, Oh no, I can't get all the flowers.
I almost made it. I need to troubleshoot what
happens. And then you've got most of it.
You're almost there. It's almost like you're solving
a series of small puzzles that add up to the big thing.
And when you go into a level, it's already giving you the idea

(50:05):
of what the level's about just by giving you the name of the
level. Like my favorite level in the
game is called Slide Surfers. You can imagine that one's about
sliding in some way, and it's going to be about slight
spoiler. That one's about a tempopo
getting on a block, and another tempopo pushes that block, and
that tempopo on the block is surfing in a way.

(50:28):
In the air. And that's how they get to a
gate at the end of the level. Now, I didn't tell you how to
get all the flowers in the level, but that's the idea.
And the name of the levels always up in the corner.
So it's always this reminder of,hey, you might be stuck, you
might have no clue on where to start.
But remember, the name is calledSlide Surfers.

(50:48):
That's like a little hint systemin its own.
And I think that's super cool too.
Yeah, that's pretty dope. Yeah.
So I am still a little bit overwhelmed just looking at it,
but that that encourages me to like maybe try it at least.
I think the early levels, the springtime levels are super
approachable and I think if people are kind of interested

(51:11):
they could maybe try those springtime levels.
I don't know if the demo is still available on Steam, but
try some springtime levels if you pick up this game.
And then beyond that, you might have the itch to go on to summer
and then autumn and winter. Now, how much of this game did
you finish? And I imagine you ran credits,
you did the 60s. I did the six, I did the like

(51:33):
base 60 levels and then I playeda few of the challenge levels,
but I didn't do much beyond that.
I tried a little bit of the music making but not a ton.
OK. And how long did that take you?
On steam I think I have about 7 1/2 hours in this game.
Oh, that's surprisingly fast forsomething that you'd for
something that has levels where it's like you have to watch the

(51:53):
dudes do the thing. You do, but nothing is ever that
painfully long to watch. I mean, you're always enjoying
listening to the music, but yeah, you're iterating so much.
You can also watch an attempt and decide to just restart.
You can decide to stop that attempt to fix something real
quick. You don't have to sit there
waiting for failure. And there are also really nice

(52:16):
touches, like when you accidentally get into a loop of
temp popo going in a a circle tothe beat of the music, because
that's how you've set up the level and they're not going to
get to the end. Hannah is always in the corner
like conducting and she'll startto like look exhausted Her her
facial expression tells you how you're doing.
So if you're picking up all the flowers, she's happy.

(52:39):
And then if someone picks up a flower and then falls in a pit
and dies, she's like, Oh no crap, you know, So she gives you
this visual feedback and she is super expressive.
So I love Hannah. She's great.
She's a great little girl character that is just kind
hearted and has a beautiful voice and I just love it.

(53:00):
I, I, I think this game is a complete joy and I think more
people need to play it. It has surprisingly few reviews
on Steam. For instance, quote appalling.
Right. So I think more people should
play this, and that's part of the reason why I wanted to pick
up for Underplayed, too. So those are our secret games,
Mon Cage and Tim Popo. Let's move on to our discussion

(53:23):
with Matt Storm AKA Stormagdon, this episode's special guests.
You are listening to a podcast. The name of that podcast is
Underplayed. In underplayed are reviews for
two secret games. After those secret games is a
featured game. That featured game is Sleigh the

(53:46):
Princess. Don't tell Matt about the secret
games. What?
Why not? It's funnier this way.
It'll throw them off their game.They'll be listening close to
other games, they get mentioned,ever wondering.
It'll drive them crazy. I really don't think Matt will
care that much. Wait, the secret games are done?

(54:11):
That's not right. This is supposed to be at the
beginning of the episode. Says who?
The boys haven't ever done this before.
There's no rules. We can all do whatever we want.
Well, no. Whatever we want.
The episode has to move on at some point.
If you all keep talking, we'll never get to hear the new rhyme.

(54:35):
I could do the rhyme. Please don't.
Disco didn't give Andrew enough time to record this part.
We have to move on. Or maybe Andrew should rhyme
record. What are you on about?
No, but yes. Can we please get on with the

(54:58):
show? Well, I'm ready for this rhyme
you're all talking about. That sounds exciting.
Before anyone else can cause delay, Bopo cuts this skit and
introduces this episode's special guest.
Who's that appearing on our waveform?
In our opinion, they're a perfect storm.
They Co host a wonderful podcastincluding passionate discussions

(55:21):
with their bestie Jeff Moonen. It's the side quest slinging,
Buster sword swinging DJ. Who's Groovin?
Matt Storm, how you doing? Welcome.
I knew it was coming and yet still delighted and like it's
just every episode when you do discos intro and then every
guest it's just it's a blast. I'm so excited to be here.

(55:44):
This has quickly become one of my favorite indie pods and I'm
excited to be a part of it. That means so much.
Coming from you very generous words.
Thank you. Thank you.
Thank you so much. Welcome.
So you're here because you picked one of our feature games.
We really wanted to have you on and we've kind of collaborated
with you in the past. We've both done side quest

(56:06):
episodes, which, you know, we'renot sitting down and doing a
podcast with you, but you did invite us to do those episodes
and we were super grateful for the opportunity.
So it's great to do this in response.
Yeah, totally. I mean, I love when folks do
side quests. It's my passionate project.
We'll get more to that in a minute.
But like it, it is a collaboration.

(56:27):
But you're right, there's no like there's communication via
e-mail or or DMS or whatever, but there's no like proper chat.
It's just you send me a monologue and then I edit it and
make it sound even better than it already does.
Yeah, it's great. It's magic what you do, Matt.
Tell us about yourself. Describe some or all of the many
things you love to do, because you love to do many things.

(56:49):
Like, yeah, we, if we really went through the breadth and
depth, we'd, we'd be here a while.
So I'll do the short, short version.
But yeah, I am a podcaster and aDJ.
I've been, I did the math just before the show because I knew
we'd be talking about it. So I've been DJ ING for 14 years
which makes me want to turn to dust and podcasting for 13
years. Funny Games has been around for

(57:11):
about 8 years I think if I'm correct.
But I started as a music podcaster with a show called
Crash Chords that ran for many, many years, although I think
it's over longer than it ran at this point.
But that was my like start. And then I started an interview
series as a spin off that ran for a long time as well.
I used to do a movie podcast with the incredible Rachel Shank

(57:31):
where we brought guests on to talk about the latest thing we
watched, which is a lot of fun. Did that for a long time.
And now I am a podcaster, mostlyfocused in video games.
And yeah, I, it's funny, like I,we were talking off the air that
I've always had in the fascination with radio stations
and D JS. I did a little local radio in
college, but not much. But I've always loved the idea

(57:54):
of like talk radio and that kindof thing.
And like back back in my day when you started a podcast, it
was literally you, me and an iPad talking into the open iPad
mic, which you can imagine how terrible that sounded.
But we. Did it's all you had?
It's all you had, just, you know, an iPad and a dream.
But yeah. And so that those are the main
things I'm known for around the Internet.

(58:15):
That and thirsting over the Hades cast and being obsessed
with Mass Effect, Chrono Trigger, Yakuza and many other
franchises. Yeah, such a diverse set of
interests, both with hobbies andgames.
It's super fascinating. Yeah, there's some parallels
there with some of our stories. Yeah, yeah, a lot more than I

(58:36):
expected as well. Can I clarify something really
quick? When you say that you've been D
Jing for 14 years, this does have like two different
meanings. So is this like you're, you're
spinning some vinyl in front of some folks that are dancing kind
of DJ ING or you are on the radio playing music for people

(58:56):
kind of DJ ING? I'm so glad you clarified.
So it's the former not the latter though.
Not spinning vinyl these days because they are heavy and take
up a lot of space. It's all digital, but I've been
DJ ING weddings, private events.I used to DJ burlesque shows
also for a while in New York andI've been doing a doing that for
a long time. I do it less now, but like every

(59:17):
so often, like I stopped giggingfor it.
I used to like do every Friday night or whatever.
And but now it's mostly like if a friend of a friend recommends
me or if like a friend recommends me for a gig or like
or a friend is getting married, that kind of thing.
I will do those kinds of events and then in during the pandemic
when Fuser came out, which for those who don't know was a

(59:39):
harmonics game where you could mix tracks on the fly, didn't
require any peripherals. I met that the devs of that at
packs before it came out and then we all went to lock down.
But when the game came out, I connected with their PR team and
their social team and became a featured streamer.
That's how like my streaming really took off during the
pandemic is. I would do DJ sets on Fuser and

(01:00:01):
so now every so often when I canI will instead of because I
don't DJ live anymore as. Or as often at least, I will do
DJ sets for an hour or two on Fuser.
And now that Fuser is basically done, someone figured out how to
upload custom tracks to Fuser. And so like now I have the
Persona 5 soundtrack and I have all of The Lonely Island songs
and like Weird Al and a bunch ofother stuff.

(01:00:23):
So it's been my go to. Like if someone's doing a
charity stream and they're like,Matt, what can you bring?
I'll be like, I can bring Fuser and we can dance for two hours.
So yeah. And so yeah, it's it's always
been the music spinning kind. I've been obsessed with music
since I was a little kid, which I got from my dad.
He used to lay in our living room with big can headphones

(01:00:44):
listening to his vinyl player with the headphones plugged in,
like, just loved music. And so I picked that up from
him. And I basically love all kinds
of genres. And I've kind of been obsessed
with music since. I still listen to full albums.
I still listen as an efforted activity.
Like when I get a new album froman artist I love, say, Taylor
Swift, I sit and just listen to the album.

(01:01:04):
I don't do anything else. I just take it in.
So yeah. So.
But thank you for that clarifying question because,
yeah, I've always wanted to be adisc jockey in the sense of the
radio host, too, because I was obsessed with those folks, like
the local New York ones when I was growing up.
I would listen to like K rock radio in New York, which I don't
even think exists anymore. Like to go to sleep every night
so. Well, I, I have some community
radio connections, so if you ever get that urge, I can send

(01:01:26):
you all the, the, the stations that that qualify for like all
of the community radio team memberships.
I want to follow up on the musicreal quick, if that's all right,
to deviate a little bit. Most of my nostalgic music
memories come from music that got played during housework.
So I guess I want to ask you, what did your dad play during

(01:01:51):
housework if anything? But like what made the most
impact on you and those types ofactivities?
Such a good question. So my dad's my diverse taste is
because of my dad's diverse taste while mine is more diverse
than his. He loved everything from 70s and
80s and classic stuff to 90's rock to boy bands to basically

(01:02:12):
everything but country and even some country like Sheryl Crow or
Shania Twain. And so like for me, I think my
go to would probably be Billy Joel because that's like the
music I was raised on. It was the first concert I ever
went to with my dad. But then other things that come
to mind is stuff like the B50 twos or like a selection of

(01:02:33):
cheesy 80s music. You know, I wear my sunglasses
at night. Aha's take on me, you know?
Never going to Give You Up by Rick Astley.
I'm one of the few people who actually knows Rick Astley's
discography because I liked him as an artist before he became a
meme as a kid because my dad wasa big fan of his.
So yeah, that kind of stuff. And then for me, when I do
housework now, it's often a podcast actually, because I am

(01:02:55):
also a podcast obsessive. Who knew someone who makes
podcasts also listens to them. But but often I will listen to
whatever the latest thing is. Like right now I've been
obsessed with a band called Sleep Token.
They are a heavy rock outfit that are like a mix of hip hop
and R&B and pop rock, and their singer is masked.

(01:03:16):
I think the whole band is what for sure the singer is.
So it's like the mystery identity thing, which we haven't
really seen since Slipknot all took off their masks.
So I've always been fascinated by that.
And so that's kind of what I've been jamming to the most lately
because they go from like deeplymelodic and depressing to like
really over the top and like aggressive and heavy, like a
motive stuff. Yeah, you you list some of your

(01:03:38):
favorite artists in your bio in places like Blue Sky.
That really shows how music is important to you.
Yeah, I mean, also, I want people to know very quickly how
queer I am and how much I love apop girly because I just, I if I
turn off all the straights, we're like, you know, Taylor
Swift. First of all, if you think
Taylor Swift has no talent, thenyou have no talent because.
It's just not true you. Cannot, you cannot like her.

(01:04:00):
That's totally legit. Like I get not liking her music
but saying she has no talent is.Just I don't know how you can't
be in awe of that. Yeah, yeah, totally.
Matt, let's talk about Fun and Games podcast.
This is the podcast you do one of the one of the many things
that you're known for. Tell us about the journey of fun
and games. Oh boy.
It's funny, I've told this storyso many times and I feel like it

(01:04:21):
just gets more elaborate. But the gist of it is I met Jeff
Moonen and his spouse Sarah Moonen through the burlesque
scene and my spouse also being named Sarah.
We all the four of us became fast friends and hung out a
bunch. And I found out that Sarah and
Jeff like video games and so we would often talk about video

(01:04:41):
games. And then I remember we were in
our apartment one day and I don't know if this happens to
you, but as a nerd, when I get excited about something, I get a
little lymphatic and a little loud.
And so totally uncommon amongst nerds, never happens
passionately geeking out about things.
But Jeff and I were on one side of the apartment talking and the

(01:05:02):
Sarah's were on the other side and we were just getting very
loud. And at one point Jeff, Sarah
basically said something along the lines of God, will you guys
stop? Why don't you just go start a
podcast or something? Yeah.
Basically, yes, and and I'd already been podcasting for a
bit and Jeff was a is a has beena voice over artist for as long

(01:05:23):
as I can remember as well. And so like we had like ideas,
fun fact about the podcast. So I think one of our first
episodes or our second episode is about the Nintendo Switch.
It was supposed to be a pre release.
Like here's what we expect. But it took us so long to like
get a library of a backlog and prep everything and launch the

(01:05:46):
show that it it wouldn't. We weren't able to launch the
show till after the switch released.
So instead what we did is use itto then comment on ourselves and
be like, what did we get right? Let's explore this this this
archive's footage as we and for the switch to.
I wanted to do something like that again too, because I
thought it'd be fun, but we didn't get around to it.
But like one of our earliest episodes was basically like,

(01:06:08):
well, we can't use this for predictive, so we could just
like make fun of ourselves a little and go, well, what did we
get right? What did we get wrong?
And kind of review the content which which was a lot of fun.
Yeah, that's kind of feel like amilestone to be close to the
beginning of your podcast journey, talking about a certain
system. And now here we are in 2025,
you're still doing the podcast. We're talking about the sequel

(01:06:30):
to that system. Like, that's just a testament to
how how long of a game you're playing here.
Yeah, well, and like that's how I remember how long the podcast
has been around. Basically it's been around the
life cycle of the switch, so 7-8years.
But yeah. And so like after that challenge
and I never they're down from a challenge.
We started the podcast. We started with this idea of

(01:06:52):
wanting to be topic based because every other show from
every other major outlet, although there's less of them
now, we're doing like what you play this week, what's in the
news. We wanted to be Evergreen and we
didn't want to be beholden to like what everyone else is
doing. Because if you had to choose
between say a Game Informer show, which thankfully is back
now, and our podcast, I would not begrudge you to choose the

(01:07:13):
Game Informer show. They've been doing a long time.
They know what they're talking about.
They have more access than we do.
And so the, it was very early onthat we decided let's do topics,
it'll be more Evergreen and thenwe can bring guests on.
And like it evolved, like the coverage of conventions, like
packs came much later. Once we got access and we're
able to get press badges, you know, all of that stuff came
later. And we've done live panels at

(01:07:35):
conventions and things like that.
All of that stuff we kind of like found as we went.
But the goal was always from thebeginning to talk about games in
a positive life light and keep this like safe space, this fun
space fun. And the reason people ask why is
fun in quotes. Fun isn't quotes mostly because
the word fun is meaningless in the sense that fun means
something different to everybody, right?

(01:07:56):
Like what I find fun may disco, might find absolutely
irritating, like say maybe a fishing game, except in Dredge
like and so call back and so like for me, that's why we put
it in quotes. It kind of both killed our SEO,
but also put us at the top of everyone's podcast list like in
their library because of the quotes.

(01:08:16):
But it's this idea that fun is for fun is different for
everyone, and we want to discover with you what fun means
for you and talk about it. Basically, that's why we're all
doing this like it's, it's fun, it's fulfilling.
Going back to just meeting Jeff and Sarah, it's interesting that
you met the through burlesque shows.
I imagine you were deejaying andthey were, they were either

(01:08:38):
doing burlesque themselves or they were attending.
It's an interesting quick momentof your interests sort of
crossing over. Maybe you didn't start bonding
over games immediately, but doing that thing allowed this
friendship to flourish and this podcast to flourish.
I just love seeing the connection of those things.

(01:08:59):
I love seeing where things come from.
I'm just curious if you've seen your passions overlap in other
ways, if you can think of examples.
Oh, totally. So it's funny, like so
burlesque. We didn't.
We actually first met at the wedding of a cosplayer and
burlesque performer that I was DJ ING for and we were sat next
to them at like the showbiz table with another burlesque

(01:09:21):
host who's also an actor that Sarah had known.
And so we just got into chatting.
But also IA lot of the shows I did were nerd Lesque, which is a
nerd focused burlesque, often theme shows around on Marvel or
video games or The Simpsons or whatever, Lord of the Rings.
And so like we really dug deep for that stuff.
And Jeff and I have a lot of unique interest that over

(01:09:44):
intersect. Jeff is also a musician, has
played music for many years, written music, both the side
quest theme music and the main show theme music.
Jeff wrote and composed on a on a Game Boy, like on one of those
carts that lets you make music. I love those that that takes a
lot of work, a lot of work 'cause you're going like note by
note, channel by channel. And so he he created both of

(01:10:08):
those themes. And yeah.
And so, like, our passion for music overlaps.
I am a big fan, like I said, of all genres.
But one genre that was close to my heart 'cause I knew a lot of
artists in the scene was nerd Core rap, MC Frontalot, of
course, making a famous, as wellas Magaran.
But there are tons of other artists in the space.
And a lot of them I'd become friends with.
And Jeff had known some of them too.
But like sharing nerdy songs about video games and TV and

(01:10:31):
movies, there's a song that lives rent free in my heart from
Michael Kill. It's called The Moon and it is a
rap about like thanking folks and looking for the positive in
light. And the sampled theme is the
DuckTales moon theme from the NES game that he punches up with
a beat. I'll send it both to both of you

(01:10:52):
after the call. But like, it's just like that.
That's the kind of level of intersection of nerdiness that
like I aspire to live in the space of.
And that's kind of what brought me and Jeff close together.
And while we do talk a lot aboutvideo games, we talk about
movies and books and other things too.
We have a lot of artistic interests that overlap.

(01:11:12):
Yeah, that's great. It's it's not just bonding about
games. It's it's everything in life
that you encounter. So we're, we're familiar with
side quests, of course, having each done one at this point.
How did that come to be specifically?
And then how does it feel to allow others to express their

(01:11:32):
love of those games? So Syquest is purely born out of
me hating how toxic the Internetis.
Back when Twitter was a place wedid hang out on, I would
constantly see negativity in that space, people naysaying and
like going after folks for liking a thing.
And I think the inspiration, if not the Inception .1 of the

(01:11:53):
early Inception points was when Paper Mario, the Origami King
was coming out. Like we were starting to see
some of the screenshots. There was one of the screenshots
with him fighting a stapler, which I thought was incredible,
or maybe it was the colored pencils.
But like I remember seeing someone reply to a tweet of a
photo going, oh man, this game'sgoing to suck.
And like I just got so angry. I was like, how do you know this

(01:12:14):
game is going to suck from a picture?
Like you could say it doesn't look good or the graphics look
funky, but to say the game sucks, first of all, it's short
minded. If you say anything sucks
without any kind of like exploration or elaboration, it's
meaningless, right? It doesn't have weight.
But that things like that drove me so nuts.
Or like what? I would share a game that I love
and the first comment would be, well, I didn't like that game.

(01:12:36):
OK, great. This is not a conversation for
you. You can go be upset about it
somewhere else, but I want to share this my joy of this game.
Why are you naysaying it? And so all of that frustrated me
so much that I was like, you know what, I'm going to create a
space where people can just unabashedly share why they love
something. And I just finished Control at
the time, became obsessed with the Remedy verse, played Alan

(01:12:56):
Wake shortly after that. And I was like, you know what,
I'm going to do the first episode about Control.
I'd haven't listened to that episode in a long time.
That's like 380 something episodes ago.
But like, I do know that I talked about Control for like 10
or 15 minutes without saying basically a word about the plot
because I didn't want to ruin orlike give away anything.
Sure. Because that's my favorite thing

(01:13:16):
about that game is like there's one moment in that game that if
you've played it, you know what that one moment is.
And like, I never want to give it away, but like, and I just
made this thing and then I talked to Jeff about it.
I was like, hey, I want to I want to produce the series and
it came from something else. Also, we were a very long form
podcast and you guys have listened to it.
It typically an hour, sometimes an hour and a half.

(01:13:36):
Can't really share that in a clip.
You have to like curate clips ifyou want to share it.
So I wanted something more bite size, more shareable.
That was also the inspiration for Psyquest, like a short 5 to
15 minute thing that's easy to listen to, low investment.
And so I chatted with Jeff aboutit and I said, look, I'll take
it on. It'll be my project, I'll edit
it, I'll produce it, I'll keep up the schedule.

(01:13:56):
And we were originally like, allright, well we'll alternate it
every Friday with the main show.And I was like, OK.
And then like I got a flood of episodes and I was like, what if
I backlogged it? And we did three times every two
weeks, every Monday and every other Friday.
He's like, if you think you can keep it up then.
Sure. And I've missed some episodes
here and there. I'm only human.

(01:14:17):
But for the most part, it's beenrunning all this time.
We're coming up on our 400th episode.
And then quickly before I answerPart 2 of the question, once we
hit 5th, we were getting close to the 50th episode, which felt
like a big milestone at the timeI went.
We need to do something right? What if we did a longer form
version of this template, but with me and you, Jeff and a

(01:14:37):
guest. And we like still do the kind of
deep diving on why we love something unabashedly and
uncritically, but do it with a guest.
And so we did. And I think the first one was
Shovel Knight with my friend Nate.
And then we've gone on to do many other milestone episodes.
We did Chrono Trigger with Chrono Katie.
We did Persona 5 Royal with Ken Shepard.

(01:14:59):
Tons. We did Sea of Stars with Sarah
Moonen. Did Super Mario World with Brian
Shea? I listened to that one recently.
Yeah, that one was a blast like that.
That was one of those that was like, we've been trying to get
Brian Shea on the main show for ages and scheduling wouldn't
work out. And then we were like, well,
let's do Super Mario World. Maybe Brian wants to do that.
And he's like, are you kidding? Totally.
Yeah. Talking about the world, that's
awesome. And so, yeah, and it's just

(01:15:21):
grown into this thing. And so like, move towards the
second question, how does it feel?
It's the project I'm most proud of, and I don't say that
lightly. I love fun and games.
I love Reignite, which is the play Along podcast I do that's
focused on BioWare. I love both of those shows.
But there's something about giving people the freedom to say
whatever they want and like, nothave to worry about what others

(01:15:42):
will think. It's curated these moments that
make it wholly unique because asyou both know, but the listeners
may not. The rules for Sciquest is there
are no rules other than you haveto introduce yourself at the
beginning. You have to talk about a game
you love and why you love it, and then you have to sign off
with happy gaming, which is our catch phrase.
That's it. You can design the episode

(01:16:03):
however you want and it is givenbirth to such a wide array of
formats. Like Leon, who covered Pokémon
Snap, talked about how they never owned a copy of Pokémon
Snap, they loved it through rentals and transient
experiences, and then finally got a copy as an adult and why
that journey meant meant so muchto them.
We had someone do an episode about Rim World and instead of

(01:16:27):
just talking about the game, they talked about the narrative
they created within their playthrough of Rim World and
talked about that story. I very recently, I lost my dad
at the end of last year and I had thought of this then, but of
course was in no condition to doit last October.
But then earlier this year I decided my dad didn't play a lot

(01:16:48):
of video games. I loved showing him the new
graphics. Like every time a new wrestling
game came out, I went, I went look how real they look or
played a basketball game becausewe both love basketball is like
look how really look. It looks like an actual game.
But one of the video games we did play together when I was
very young was Tecmo Bowl on theNESA, very mediocre arcade
football game that I loved and we would play together.

(01:17:09):
He was very bad at it. I would beat him most of the
time, but we'd have a good time.And so once he had passed, I was
like, all right, I'm going to doan episode of side quest that I
can dedicate to him and talk about that game, which I did and
I've gotten a lot of positive response from, which is the best
part. Not the part that like I make
this thing, but that people seemto relate to it so much.
We've had guests that we're the first thing they ever recorded.

(01:17:32):
They sent me an iPhone voice note.
I think of one of our hosts Andrew, who is like a fan of the
show and someone I'd interacted with on Twitter a lot was like,
can I do 1? And I said absolutely.
And he sent me a voice memo. I cleaned up the audio and it
was a great episode. Like it, it can be touching, it
can be goofy. Dead P Punk has a bit on his own
show where he has like 3 different voices and he hosts in

(01:17:54):
those like these three naysayingvoices.
He did his side quest in that same way, playing these three
voices up and down and then his voice kind of arguing with
himself about a game that he loved.
Like people really have taken itand run with it.
And I've had incredible people do the show, like folks who are
like legends within the gaming space to like like like I said,
people who've never been or doneanything on the Internet that

(01:18:16):
wanted to share their story. And I think that's I love
creating that space. All of this has born a new
saying for the show which Jeff created, which is every video
game is somebody's favorite, Good, bad, doesn't matter.
The quality of the game is irrelevant because people can
love anything like movies, like anything else, the quote UN

(01:18:36):
quote quality is irrelevant. Every game is somebody's
favorite and we want to share those stories.
And that's a big part of what Syquest is.
Yeah, I love that. There's no barrier really.
It's just you need to love a game, and so many people love
games, and it's also interestingto hear that so many of them are
not necessarily someone's absolute favorite game.

(01:18:59):
What the show reveals is how games can hit us at a very
special time in our lives, or they can help shape who we
become when we're young. I've heard very nostalgic
reviews. I've heard more modern reviews.
I've heard people's, you know, this is my favorite game of this
year. Hearing those stories and how
games make an impact on us in a certain time of our lives,

(01:19:23):
that's something the show celebrates time and time again,
and it's really, really cool. Thank you.
As I guess like a follow up, you're almost at 400 episodes of
Sidequest. In doing that, you have talked
to so many people, you've emailed so many people, you've
received so many different kindsof file types.
You're getting the iPhone voice memos, you're talking to me in

(01:19:45):
Disco. We're sending you stuff.
You have to sometimes get in there and edit it.
I know you already said you're only human, but how, like how do
you do that? How do you do this thing called
Sidequest? It's funny, your incredulous
face you just gave me that the listeners can't see I've gotten

(01:20:05):
for a very long time. And the reason for it is I'm
actually doing less than I used to do.
So about six or seven years ago,or maybe yeah, about six years
ago, I was between jobs, I was working like, you know, contract
gigs, and I was also doing a lotof contract work in podcasting
space. And at one point I was hosting 4
podcasts. Editing for podcasts and

(01:20:28):
producing a podcast. Some overlap between the shows
so I was working on an insane amount of projects.
I eventually almost had a nervous breakdown and had to
scale back. Luckily some of the projects I
was working on were for friends so they were very understanding.
I helped them find replacements and then some stuff went away
without my consent, like the Game Informer show when it first

(01:20:50):
died. You know, I, I was contract with
them. I wasn't an employee of, of
GameStop or Game Informer. So that's kind of vanished.
Screensnark ended up ending because my Co host went on to
become a wrestler and it's incredible and they're awesome,
but just we didn't have time. the IT just wasn't meshing

(01:21:10):
anymore in the way and I didn't want to do that show without
them. And so we decided to end it.
But now only doing only, I say, only doing funny games, both
side quests and the main show and Reignite, it feels more
manageable. Now.
That said, I've taken up other things like now I write, I've
been writing an article a month since January, all indie games
so far, which will probably staythat way in the short term, just

(01:21:32):
because I feel like it'll be when I talk about Rusty Rabbit
and no one knows what I'm talking about because no one's
heard of that game, it'll at least get more reads because
it's one of the three articles written about that game, which
happened to be fantastic. So I've started doing stuff like
that. Jeff and I have been creating
like Patreon bonus content for like, like it's funny, the kind

(01:21:53):
of show we said we didn't want to do for the Patreon bonus.
We do exactly that. We talk about what we've been
playing, what's been in the news.
Like we put that behind the paywall because we figure it's
personality driven, right? And if you really like us and
want to throw money at us, you would care more about that
personality driven stuff. A lot of it.
A lot of it is just like spending that extra money to
support them, but then also you want to spend that extra time

(01:22:15):
with the people you love listening to.
Yeah. And so I've been doing stuff
like that. I've been thinking about
starting a podcast series where I revisit games from my past and
see if they hold up to me. Not by standards of the of
society, but kind of playing as a spin off to Sciquest called
Retroquest. This idea of me revisiting my
past games that I loved and seeing if they hold up from what

(01:22:37):
I felt about them. Not necessarily are they the
industry, industry standard? Cause who cares?
I haven't gotten anywhere with that yet because I've been busy
doing 80,000 other things. But it's something in like my
brain space that I've been ruminating on.
And I've read in a lot of placesthat if you can't stop thinking
about a thing, a project for like a year, then you know it's
meant to be. If it fades away, then it

(01:22:59):
wasn't. And so, so we'll see.
But but yeah, the the answer to your question of how, I don't
know. Should I just do?
It's funny, I like this experiment.
Power for it, but like the reality is my probably
undiagnosed ADD or whatever I'm going through when I really push
myself to focus on a thing, if Iforce myself to focus on a

(01:23:20):
thing, I don't bounce off, I lean in.
And once I can do it a few times, it just becomes habit.
It just becomes rote. Doesn't mean that I'm not
overworked or sometimes forget or sometimes don't.
Like many a night where I've edited an episode of Sciquest
the night before, it's supposed to air because I forgot to the
last minute. But yeah, I don't know.
I've just had this kind of drivethat if I really lean into
something, I can get a ball rolling and then keep up with

(01:23:42):
it. Cool.
Well, Speaking of retro quests, something we always like to ask
our our gamer guests is what what are your gaming tastes?
Where do they come from? What's your What's your origin
story? So this is going to make me
sound really old, but the first video game console that I had
was an Atari 2600. Now kids before Nintendo company

(01:24:05):
called Atari, they made cartridges.
Yeah. So I had an Atari 2600 that was
gifted to me from my mom. She loved playing Pong, but
quickly, like, it became kind ofan obsession.
So she was like, I don't want this anymore.
And so I played games like the bad Pac-Man port and Mousetrap,
which was a bad Pac-Man RIP off.I had ETI, had Superman, I had

(01:24:28):
all of these games, some better than others.
I had Adventure. And so my early days of playing
games was more toy like. And it was with the Atari 2600.
I got an NES not long after that.
And that's when I start to like have tastes and take notes of
games. I don't think I really had like
a, we could consider myself a capital G gamer, as we say,

(01:24:48):
until the SNES, Sega Genesis era.
Sonic became one of the first franchises obsessed.
I obsessed over Mario was shortly behind that.
Had played Mario three, love to Mario World, basically had all
of the Mario games on Nintendo. But I think the game that really
changed everything for me and isstill my favorite game of all

(01:25:08):
time to this day, if you know anything about me, is Chrono
Trigger. And the first time I played that
on the SNES, I went, oh, games can do this.
They can make me cry, they can have stories.
And I became obsessed with Chrono Trigger getting every
ending. And this was back before the DS
version where you could track the endings.
I was just figuring it out, looking up on game facts, all

(01:25:29):
that stuff. But loved, loved Chrono Trigger
and played it obsessively. Became a huge fan of Super Mario
RPG shortly after that. And that like, kind of started
my love of RPGs. I've gone on to love a variety
of different game genres and like, my game tastes have grown.
Like, it's funny because there'sthis.
It was kind of middle period around the Xbox 360, PS3 era
when I wasn't really playing a lot of video games.

(01:25:50):
I had the 360 it. Was towards the end of the 360
life cycle, but between the waning years of the 360 and the
launch of the PS4, when I kind of jumped back into things for
those few years, I really didn'tplay anything.
And when I jumped back in with the PS4, which My spouse and I
got as a wedding present, along with Arkham Asylum, which can
kind of put a date on it, I, I became obsessed with games again

(01:26:14):
in this way of like, I can't believe games can do this.
I want to know more, I want to dig in.
I remember going to a panel at Comic Con that the year Arkham
City came out and the lead singer of Coheed And Cambria was
there because he had done a songthat was like Joker's theme for
that game. And like just realizing, oh,
composer. And I'd always been obsessed
with voice actors since I was a kid.
Like Steve Bloom has done every anime under the sun, you know,

(01:26:37):
very lowenthal now who's been a guest on the show.
Like I just obsessed with voice acting.
And so that also like made me dive deeper.
Like now whenever I play any newvideo game that has voice
acting, he's like, oh, who's thecast?
Who's in it? Who's playing what?
Like, I want to know. And so those kinds of things
have kind of dictated my trajectory.
And now I'll basically play any game to try it.
I'm very a much more experimental.

(01:26:59):
I kind of mostly turn my nose upat military shooters.
They're just not my thing. I've played a variety of them.
But like anything else, basically, I'll give a try.
And yeah. And like my major franchises
these days of course the Mass Effect trilogy in Andromeda.
I love the Dragon Age franchise.I'm a big BioWare fan.
But also the Yakuza series I became obsessed with during the

(01:27:20):
pandemic playing Zero and then just played my way through the
whole franchise and now I'm current as of the most recent
spin off. I haven't played pirate Yakuza,
but I crave deep stories. I like a lot of other things.
I like arcady games, I like platformers.
I like a lot of stuff. But deep narrative making me
feel something is kind of why I come to games, which will

(01:27:40):
explain a lot in a few moments And so, but I think it's the
thing I love most about games. Like I'm an easy cry, the right
song, the right moment. I'm an empath and I'm a very
emotional music listener especially.
So it's not hard to get me to cry.
But some of my favorite games are the ones that have just kind
of punched me in the chest in a way that like, I really felt

(01:28:00):
something. And so that's why I tend to lean
more towards narrative than likeother things being important.
All of it's important on some level, but for me, narrative is
what drives me to keep playing video games.
Yeah, and games can just do it unlike any other medium.
And some stories just only work in games too, especially ones
that allow you to make choices. Like.

(01:28:21):
Our feature game today. Now we're talking about an indie
game with you in a moment. You've been writing articles
about indie games. You've played tons of indie
games in your life. When you look at indie games
from the past few years, and youcan define few as however many
years you want. But if you look at indie games
that you've experienced for the past while, what do you notice?

(01:28:45):
And which ones have really left an indelible mark on you?
It's funny because I played video games from a time before
there were indie games, althoughtechnically you could argue like
smaller studio stuff on the old school consoles were sort of
indie. But like I think we can all
agree that the indie kind of revolution started with the Xbox
Live Arcade and the access to beable to publish games without

(01:29:07):
being attached to a major studio.
So I think about games in the early days, like the MA by
Behemoth or Braid or Explosion Man, like all of these games
that were just kind of fun. Arkady had a sense of style,
were designed really differently.
I mean, you look at the art style of just those three games
alone, and they look like anything else that was on the

(01:29:28):
market at the time. They weren't going for gritty
realism. One of them was incredibly
cartoony and I think that that'sthe biggest trend I've seen is
like whatever AAA is doing, indie games are going to go the
other direction. There are plenty of indie games
that try to hit that like that AAA shine.
You know, we're in an interesting place with like
Clare Obscure Expedition 33, which isn't really indie, but

(01:29:48):
it's not really AAA either. It's a new studio and they're a
smaller studio. I feel like there's a freedom in
the trend of indie games where they can kind of lead with what
they want, which is why I mentioned Expedition 33.
The the lead dev often talks about how because because they
weren't on he wasn't at Ubisoft anymore.
He had gone under his own umbrella.
They could make the choices theywant.
No one was telling them don't dothat.

(01:30:09):
That's not going to work. You need a a store or a battle
pass. Like they could do whatever they
wanted. And I think that's the freedom
of a lot of the Indies that I see.
As far as ones that left there indelible mark.
I mean castle crashers to me feels like the reason we still
have beat em UPS. I love beat em UPS.
I've been playing beat em UPS since I have the Sega Genesis,
streets of rage and even the turtles games, the old school
turtles games on NES. But like, to me, the modern beat

(01:30:32):
em up a lot of it can be traced back to castle crashers and its
success and then the things thatcame after.
And then like the re re resurgence of like the Scott
Pilgrim game and streets of rageforward and the River City girls
really kicked it up to another level.
Whereas now tribute studios are basically just a beat em up
studio. And like when I tell you how
loud I screamed when I saw the trailer for the new Scott

(01:30:54):
Pilgrim game That's going to be an original story where Brian
Lee O'Malley. Another thing I'm obsessed with,
like Crash crashes seems like one of those games for me.
The other big one, and one that you could probably get drunk
drinking to fun and games we mention it so much is Shovel
Knight. Shovel Knight and Yacht Club
games I think are the best studio doing it right now.
I'm endlessly excited for Mina. And so like Shovel Knight, I

(01:31:17):
think not only did it revolutionize platformers, but
it revolutionized soundtrack style.
I mean, what Jake Kaufman did with that soundtrack is unlike
anything else. I think of Way Forward and I
think of the Shante series, right?
Something that could have died on the vine on the Gameboy
Color. And now many years later, they
got to go back and finished an abandoned game for the Gameboy

(01:31:39):
Advance, which is an incredible game.
You just don't see that in AAA spaces.
People going back and finishing an unfinished game like now
through digital clips and some other things, documentary style,
we do see some of that, but likeunheard of and then like the
studio that made mouthwashing, I'm blanking on their name now.
Wrong organ, wrong organ like they're ones to watch.

(01:32:00):
Like I still haven't played how fish is made.
I downloaded it because to free download and I do want to play
it. I know it's only like an hour
and I've I know how it works. I watched a Jacob Geller video
on it shadow Jacob Geller, but like mouthwashing to me still it
like it wasn't even my game of the year that year, but I it's
still a game. I can't help but think about
having played it all the time because it just how it goes, how

(01:32:22):
it ended, like everything in it,how it was designed.
Talk about choosing an aestheticand then sticking with it.
That PS1 style style graphics, like, yeah, stuff like that.
And I think like the tastemakersof future indie is going to be
companies like Rung Oregon who are just kind of making weird
things to make weird things. The studio that made Signalis

(01:32:43):
there another one? Right?
Like they made such an incredible homage to Silent
Hill, but made it its own thing.I could talk about Indies
endlessly. It's funny, Jeff and I mostly
focus on Indies, on fun and games when we talk about games
because the AAA studios don't need our help.
Look, if Capcom wants to give usa code for Street Fighter Six,
I'm happy to take it, stream it,talk about it all day long,

(01:33:04):
happy to do it. But that's not the focus cuz I
think we believe that a rising tide raises all ships and indie
studios can benefit from that the most.
And we've partnered with a lot of studios and gotten to talk
about their games and creativelydeveloped these friendships and
relationships because I just want to see them all succeed.
Even games I don't like. There's plenty of indie games I
don't like or that aren't for me, but it doesn't mean I don't

(01:33:25):
want to see them succeed. And so yeah, I think I've
rambled on long enough about indie games, but clearly I am
passionate about the subjects. Yeah, it is very clear.
And I got to listen to your Fun and games episode covering PAX
East recently where you did yourtop threes of the show and it
was just so diverse with what you were picking, but largely

(01:33:47):
indie games. And just like the presence of
indie games at events like that really shows the diversity of
what's out there and how just one or two people can make
something amazing that really blows you away and blows away
hundreds of other people going to a big event like.
That, I mean, that's my favoritething about PAX East and PAX
West and going to those conventions is especially once
we got the gear to do the more professional recordings, it's

(01:34:09):
like I want to talk to these people.
Other stuff is cool. Getting to see Dragon Quest 1
and 2 two DHD was awesome and getting to talk about that after
the fact and like it gets us to a whole new level.
But the things I care about is like talking about the one guy
who made Gigasword and like JackBreen who's awesome and like why
it's awesome and that kind of thing.
Like that just is my favorite thing.

(01:34:29):
I've met so many cool indie devs.
Seth who works who more recentlywe talked to about the Gex
Trilogy remaster was the the solo dev of CDI Entertainment
payment that made our Zet which I was one of my favorites of
last year. Like and get to see him continue
to go on and work on other things and like know his next
project. Like all of that stuff.
It's great. Yeah while PAX East and things

(01:34:50):
like that weren't why we startedthe show, it's why it continues
because I love that one-on-one space.
I got to meet you in person. I got to meet the No Small Games
ladies in person and so many other folks and like the
friendships and the community. Like that's what the indie scene
is to me. Community, just like the indie
podcasting scene. Like again, a rising tide raises
all ships and it's not a competition.

(01:35:12):
We can all exist in the same space.
Not every show is for every person, but we can absolutely,
like lend each other strength tomake something better.
Yeah, I recently said this to Jacob Price from the pre-order
Bonus podcast. Love Jacob.
Yeah, Jacob's awesome. We'll have him on the show
someday, probably next year, because we already planned out

(01:35:32):
all of Season 8. But Jacob, you're going to be on
the show at some point. Spoiler alert, shocker.
But I was talking to him about this concept too, just about
content creators and people in the indie content space.
And I liken it to an orchestra. In an orchestra, you have many
parts, you have many people playing their instruments, and

(01:35:52):
sometimes people will get solos,their opportunity to do
something really cool. And it just feels like everybody
lets them have that moment and everybody celebrates that moment
with them and everybody gets that.
So everybody gets to be the first chariot for a moment.
And that's just what it feels like, this big community of
people that love on each other and just love the thing that

(01:36:12):
we're all interested in and thatwe have a fulfilling time with,
which is games. So just before we move on to
slay the Princess, one more thing we want to check in with
you on. We know we already heard about
Retroquest, but is there anything else that you're
looking forward to doing, whether it be in gaming and
podcasting, in music? Plans for dessert after

(01:36:37):
tonight's show. My dessert choices have been
boring lately because I'm tryingto be healthier.
So mostly frozen fruit, fruit, ice pops.
But but on a serious note, I like so I would love to get
retro quests off the ground by the end of the year.
I think it'd be fun. I mean, and I'll say this
publicly because I've said it said it to his face.
I love Dave Jackson but I'm so jealous of his setup.

(01:36:58):
Like I could never do the game aweek thing but like he does it
so well. But then when he launched on his
Patreon, the way backlog where he goes back and plays games he
missed because he didn't play a lot of retro games, I was like,
that's such a good idea. I can't outright steal his idea,
although I could and and he would take it gracefully.
But but but using that as an inspiration.

(01:37:19):
I was like, but what can I do? That's personal to me because
that's why people are paying thePatreon money, right?
Because they care about us as creators and they want to
support us. And that's where I got
Retroquest, which is this idea of like revisiting games, no
specific time limit, I think notrecent years, but like anything
five years old to all the way back in like the first game I
ever played. Revisiting those games and
seeing do they still hold up from what I to remember of them?

(01:37:41):
Because like often, like we always say when we talk about
old school Nintendo or SNES games like Shredder's Revenge
plays like how I remember Turtles in Time play, not
necessarily how it did play. Same with like Shovel Knight.
Shovel Knight plays like how I remember Duck Tales playing.
And so like I want to go back and explore that.
I want to do more. Writing one article a month has

(01:38:03):
been a lot for me. I'm really grateful to the crew
of editors who continue to help me edit those because grammar is
my enemy. Or to that end, like I'm just
not great with grammar. And so ideas come quick.
Grammar, not so much. And so grateful for my editors.
But that's been a lot of fun to.Like, I started as a writer.
I used to write articles and like I've been printed in
magazines for like music reviews.

(01:38:25):
And it's like I wanted to get back to that, those roots
because I grudgingly admitted that I like to write and I am a
writer. And so I want to do more with
that. I don't know what shape that
will take. My early writing on the Patreon
was like thematic articles with like a big question or like a
big theme to explore. And then I pivoted to reviews a
because I was getting more review keys and I wanted to way

(01:38:45):
to use them and BI wanted to seeif I could look critically in
that way. Because a lot of what we do on
fun and games is non critical islike we critique the industry
when they're doing bad things like laying off entire studios
for no reason other than wantingmore money.
But like, we don't critique games in that fine-tuned way
because that's we're broadly talking more about topics.

(01:39:07):
And so it has been fun to explore that.
As for what's next for my podcast, we we don't really have
any major plans. Jeff and I, there's currently a
vote as of when we're recording,but maybe not by when this airs
of what the next console retrospective will be.
As of when we're recording, our next episode is going to be our
3DS retrospective, which was a lot of fun with Jared from the
Play Along podcast. But you know, Jeff and I are

(01:39:30):
always trying to think of ways to expand and grow the show.
We have gotten more AAA gaming contacts in the last year or so,
which is exciting. Getting codes for AAA games more
frequently, which is exciting. And so finding unique ways to
work, work those into topics to cover them instead of just doing
a review because everyone does reviews for Reignite.

(01:39:51):
We're always looking to grow that show.
You know, Frankie and I love talking about the choices we
make in those games and the relationships we build.
Personal those choices. And we're currently playing
Dragon Quest 2. We're of course going to do
Inquisition and the Veil Guard. We haven't made any decisions
about what we'll cover after we finish.
This BioWare pantheon, older BioWare games, different

(01:40:12):
franchises. I think the core of that show is
always going to be, can Frankie and I create ourselves in the
game and then make choices as ifwe were those characters and
then discuss why we made those choices and more importantly,
what aliens or fantasy characters we wanted to romance,
'cause that's what. That's what that's.
What everyone that's. What everybody wants.
I've been judged for my choices on many occasions, but you know

(01:40:33):
what? I don't care.
I stick with them. But yeah.
And so that's kind of what's coming up.
You know, I, I fantasize about starting another podcast, but I
think my spouse would defenestrate me and throw me out
of the window. I'm exaggerating.
But like I, I have so little time as it is and I've started
to finally have some free time that like starting another
podcast would be too heavy of a lift.

(01:40:55):
But I've, I'm always in talks with other people who want to
start a thing. And if I can be a, a rotating
chair on something and jump on, it's always fun to like stretch
my muscles that way. But I don't think I'm going to
be creating any new original contact anytime soon.
Like the pie in the sky thing I'd love to do is become a video
essayist. I watch a lot of them on
YouTube. I love those kinds of

(01:41:16):
conversations, but it's so much work.
I don't have a ton of skill and video editing.
I'm not a scriptwriter. Like there's so many steps to
that. But I've done some short videos
on YouTube Shorts and TikTok, and I'll continue to explore
that a bit. But maybe someday, in my 50s or
60s, I'll get to being a video essayist.
That's always, yeah, that's always something you can work
toward. And you're doing the small steps

(01:41:36):
that I think are prerequisites. Yeah.
When your joints and your hands no longer work, then you can
video edit. Yeah, there you go.
Exactly. Totally.
Yeah. So we can and definitely will
put links to your stuff in our show notes.
Is there a QikLink that you can pitch to people about where to
find all your contents? Yep, if you go to
djstormagenon.com it has all thepodcasts I do, my merch store

(01:42:00):
where you can get some cool T-shirts and mugs, the Patreon
for fun and games, my socials, all of that is there.
And then you know funny games pod.com is how you get to fun
and games. If you Google reignite pod you
will find reignite. But like if you want a one stop
shop for everything I work on, djstormagen.com is the place to
go. Perfect.

(01:42:21):
Well, Matt, it's been wonderful to catch up a little bit and to
let people get to know you. We're going to move on to our
next segment with you, which is reviewing the game you chose
from our lists. Slay the Princess, The Pristine
Cuts. It is our featured game.
You already know why you're here.
You already know what you need to do.

(01:42:42):
Yeah. If we don't slay the Princess,
the world ends. All of it we know.
Then why are you hesitating? What are you doing?

(01:43:16):
You don't have to be afraid. We can both get out of here
together. Slay the Princess The Pristine
Cut is a psychological horror choices Matter visual novel
released in 2024. The original Non Pristine Cut
version was released in 2023, isdeveloped and published by Black
Tabby Games and also published by Serenity Forge.

(01:43:39):
The game synopsis from the Steamstorefront reads quotes.
You're here to slay the Princess.
Don't believe her lies. One of the that's short.
One of the shortest game synopses we've ever read, and I
think that's really appropriate.I don't think we need to know
more than that. I think that is alluring.

(01:44:00):
I think that's enticing. I think that's intriguing, and I
think we can just leave it at that.
But we will set up more of the story and setting and the
gameplay here. So just before we get into what
this game is about, I do want togive a general content warning.
Good call about what you can find in the game.
This is going to be broad. You can go to Black Tapy's Games

(01:44:23):
website to see a full comprehensive list of content
warnings like it is comprehensive.
And I'll give you a content warning about reading that list,
because some of those, like descriptive words, might be just
a little bit upsetting. Yes, I won't even say some of
them, but the the level above that just the general content
warning I would give. I would give a content warning

(01:44:45):
for horrific imagery for gore, violence, self harm, anything
else you would just at a broad level warn about.
Even like upsetting audio. Yeah.
I think it's worth mentioning for audio files out there or
just like people that are sensitive to sound.

(01:45:07):
Yeah, so those are just kind of the general ideas you can find
permeating throughout this game.This game has very little
framing, setup or context for what's happening when you first
start it. But it's got this hand drawn
style, as I understand it. It's entirely drawn by one
person, which is very impressive.
It is a visual novel where you find yourself on a path in the

(01:45:29):
woods and a narrator voice tellsyou that there's this cabin at
the end of the path. And in the basement of the cabin
is a Princess chained to a wall.And you must kill her.
You must slay her or else the world will end.
And you have the voice of the hero in your head who acts as
kind of like a voice of reason and is speaking thoughts.

(01:45:51):
Moralist. Yes, and you can hear them
proposing ideas and options of things to do.
They remain with you for most ofthe game, and your goal is to
make a choice about what to do. Do you approach the cabin or
not? Do you take the pristine blade
that's found inside the cabin? If you go into the cabin, you

(01:46:13):
choose what to say to the Princess and whether or how you
might slay her. You choose all these things when
it comes to what we do gameplay wise.
Disco Cola. What's going on here?
Well, for controls you you do very little.
You select the response from a list of responses and that's
pretty much your only active input.

(01:46:33):
You do have access to a history log which will show you the
history of your dialogue going back to, if I'm not mistaken
it's the beginning of that chapter.
You also have different auto dialogue settings to cycle
through, which also includes a skip button that will skip
previously observed dialogue. Sometimes it goes a little bit
further than I would like when you do activate that, so be

(01:46:57):
cautious if you do turn that on.And then you can access the
memories log, which will show you all of the different
versions of the story you've encountered, I'll say very
vaguely for now. And then within those different
variations, multiple different stills from those chapters that

(01:47:19):
you've seen based on actions that you took or didn't take or
choices that you made. Yeah.
And you can see different, I'll just say it, you can say
different versions of the Princess and and those scenes
will play out in a variety of ways based on dialogues or
actions that you chose in that current chapter or maybe picked

(01:47:41):
in previous chapters may have animpact as well.
Yeah, so it goes without saying,this is a story heavy game.
We might spoil things here and there.
We're not going to spoil everything that's in this game,
but. I think we can do a lot of work
without spoiling. Yeah, I think so too.
There might be some phrases thatwe'll have to use that will be
like, I don't know what that means, but it sounds important

(01:48:04):
in the story and you definitely don't see it till the end.
Right. Yeah.
So it's it's both easy and hard to spoil things.
I don't think people who haven'tplayed Slay the Princess, the
pristine Cut will, you know, getterribly spoiled.
But since it is a story based game, we do encourage you to
play the game if you're interested in it before you move
on with this conversation. And then for history and

(01:48:27):
significance, this is a game that originally came out a few
years ago. Last year, just this past year,
it got the Pristine cut, which has some differences.
We have new roots and chapters. We have revamped and expanded
sections of the game. We have that memories gallery
that was mentioned. We have a new ending and new
art. Maybe other subtle differences.

(01:48:48):
I don't know if either of you are familiar with other
additions in the Pristine cuts, but that's what I could find in
my research. Yeah, I didn't get a touch it
till the pristine cuts, so maybeMatt, if you know something.
Right. Just what you've mentioned, I've
played the game several Times Now and we'll get to that.
But there are differences and I did notice some of them and then

(01:49:10):
others could have been new, but maybe I didn't see that version
of the Princess or what before. So I don't know the broadly the
things that you mentioned posts are are what have changed or
have been added. And then Matt, tell us why you
picked Slay the Princess, the pristine cut from our list.
We gave you a list, a long list of options of otential featured

(01:49:30):
indie games. You did give us like a short
list, and from that we really nailed down Slay the Princess.
But what stood out to you about Slay the Princess in the list?
Well, before I answer that, I'm going to hijack your show for a
second. And talk.
Directly to the listeners, because I wouldn't be me if I
didn't do that. If you are listening right now
and you have not played this game and you want to experience

(01:49:51):
it completely fresh, going into this game completely unknowing
of what it's about is the best experience you can ask for.
And it's how I've pushed this game on other people and my
story of how I discovered it. We'll get into that.
But if you are listening right now, listener, you've not played
it and you are curious even in the slightest.
It's not a very expensive game. Go buy it and go play it and

(01:50:13):
then come back. I would say I would even say
check out the trailer because like I have this in my notes
later but like the trailer got me hyped for this game for like
more than a year before it came out or something.
What about the trailer just. The trailer in general, but
mostly like the great narration and the way they set up the
story and the art style. Like all of it.
All of it. All how it all comes together,

(01:50:34):
yeah. Very cool and, and why I picked
this is kind of wrapped up in how I first discovered the game.
So I first discovered Slay the Princess at PAX East in 2023.
It was in the PAX Uprising booth, which is in the center,
near the center of the show floor.
A bunch of games that are like really featured and I just
remember walking past it and like there was a crowd around
this game and like something happened and it went.

(01:50:56):
I was like, what is? Happening So I went over and I
watched it. Next thing I know I'd lost like
30 minutes because I just stood there watching and I went, OK,
I'm coming back and playing this.
And so on the last day I was there, I went back.
I met Tony and Abby who are wonderful and lovely.
I adore them. And they told me about the game.
I sat and played it, played it through and like the first, like

(01:51:16):
the, the end of the first chapter, my jaw was on the floor
and I went I, I love this game and they're like, that's great.
And like we talked and they're like, so where are demos on
Steam right now? It's the same demo we have here.
And this is when we first started awarding game of show
for events. And I basically on the train
home, said Jeff. Play this demo, but it's getting

(01:51:37):
game of show. And you hijacked your show in
that way to. Say that right, But like Jeff
then wrote me back while I was still on the train going Oh my
God, Matt, this is incredible. Like I just knew that they would
love it also. And so so I immediately and so
we got Game of show and so I'd been watching it and then it
came out and I was lucky enough to get a review code for it and
just devoured it. I was obsessed with it, loved

(01:51:59):
it. And then the pristine cut came
and went and I was lucky enough to get a key for that for the
PlayStation. And I meant to stream it and
just never got around to it. And, and when I saw it on your
list, I went, oh, well, this would give me an excuse to
replay this game because I've been wanting to anyway.
And I want everyone to play thisgame.
And if I pick it, they have to play it.
So basically that's what broughtme to it.

(01:52:21):
But I was, I love the game so much.
It's easily in my top ten games of all time now.
And I wanted you both to experience, but also your
listeners to hear about it because I think I think it's
well enough known it's done pretty well.
But I want more people to know about it because I, I just think
it's quite fantastic, Fantastic.And I was excited to bring it to
you guys. Nice there There is that nice

(01:52:44):
excuse you sometimes find yourself in when you're doing
content and you're given the opportunity to play a game that
maybe you passed up initially. And like, Disco and I, you know,
we've wanted to play Slay the Princess, and we missed it when
it first launched. But then when the pristine cut
was announced, it's like, oh, there was a reason we waited.
Well, I, I was pretty sure. I was pretty sure a physical was

(01:53:07):
coming too. I was like, oh, this is special.
I know that there's going to be a physical at some point.
So even though we did wait a fewyears, I'm glad we waited for
like what you could call the definitive version, I guess in
the pristine cut. And now, Matt, that you've
played the original, you've played the pristine cut, you've
experienced this game several times.
What are your thoughts on this game?

(01:53:28):
So I think it's a perfect video game and I don't use that as
hyperbole for what I want out ofa narrative experience.
I think it is absolutely flawless.
This game design wise, it's someof the most beautiful hand drawn
art I've ever seen. A distinct style, so many
variations. The music, it's basically
variations on the same track constantly with some other

(01:53:51):
ambient stuff. The music is incredible.
The voice acting, it's brilliant.
The script, the writing is unbelievable.
Like I just for a game where youare, as disco said, literally
just clicking or pressing the X button, if you're playing it on
PS-5 like I did for this playthrough, like you're not
doing a lot and it didn't matter.

(01:54:13):
I was engrossed, enraptured, youknow, I, I I don't really have a
ton of dislikes. I I really, really enjoy it.
I think that it's one of the strongest narrative in video
games. I think it plays on a trope in
an interesting way. I mean, even the like banner art
is evocative. It says slay the Princess and
then has the Princess and it says help me like the whole like

(01:54:36):
everything about it. The description you read leaves
you wanting, right? Like, I love games like that.
I mentioned mouthwashing and thepreamble.
That was another game where I saw the trailer, knew nothing
about it, and was like, all right, I'm going to play this
game. I was told to play this game and
I was glad I didn't know anything.
I disagree with some people. Some people like, oh, you can
talk about a game without spoiling it and still invest

(01:54:57):
people. And that said, I knew everything
about Undertale before I ever played it and still loved
everything about it. Like I was completely spoiled on
the genocide run on all of the narrative.
And then when I played it myself, it was still a magical
experience. So I I do believe that even if
we spoiled all of slave the Princess right now, people could
still get a lot out of it. But I think it's special when a

(01:55:20):
game that's so unique is this, you can kind of go in with no
expectations and just kind of fall into it.
I would struggle to come up withdislikes like the the thing
where you can set it to skip dialogue that you've experienced
already. I agree with what Disco said
before. Sometimes it can overshoot and
that's a bummer. But I mean I've played this game

(01:55:40):
multiple times and I still basically listen to everything.
The performances are just so good that like I have no
interest in skipping a lot of it.
It's replayable in a lot of great ways.
The the twists and turns are unexpected.
And look, I love visual novels, but a lot of the visual novels
I've loved over the years, indiegames especially like Boyfriend

(01:56:02):
Dungeon, for example, there's a lot that you do besides the
dating stuff and the visual novel stuff.
There's the dungeon crawling. There's, you know, crafting
other things. This doesn't have any of that.
It is a true visual novel where you are just basically reading a
book in video game form. And it's funny, I'm not actually
experienced with older visual novels, but like that's what

(01:56:25):
they were for a long time beforethey grew as a genre and like
expanded and incorporated datingSims and other things and other
mechanics. But they started as you were
basically just reading. And I, I love how this game
doesn't waste your time. It has a great narrative hook
and like you can easily get veryinvested in the characters.
Like I, I really would have to dig to figure out a dislike for

(01:56:48):
this game. I can't in this moment think of
1 like you can even. I don't know if either of you
guys tried this, but either using the analog sticks or with
the PS-5, the motion control sensor, you can move the scenes.
The scenes are not 2D. Yeah, it's like they're
breathing. Yeah, they're actually 3D.
They're layered, and if you rotate them, they move a little

(01:57:09):
and you can see things and like,it makes the space feel real,
like you're standing in it. It's really a a a beautiful
touch. That's awesome.
What would you rate slay the Princess the pristine cut out of
10? I think I know the answer.
It's a 10 out of 10 and like, I don't give those out easily.
And I do understand that even games you love or great games
always have room for improvement.

(01:57:30):
But I sit here genuinely unable to think of a thing I don't like
about it or to critique about it.
And like, that's rare for me with a video game.
Even some of my favorite games of all time are not perfect.
Chrono Trigger is not perfect. But this game, I think, is a
perfect example of what a video game can be, what a visual novel
can be, and what a great story can be.

(01:57:50):
So it's a 10 out of 10 for me. That's incredible.
We'll we'll talk more about the landscape of visual novels and
what stands out about this titlea little bit later.
But first, Disco Cola. Let's hear your thoughts.
It's my turn. I mean, yeah, I I knew that I
was going to love this game. Like I said from the trailer,

(01:58:11):
like 1st and form, well I wouldn't even say foremost, but
like the very first thing that drew me in was the art.
I think the hand drawn art looksincredible.
It's very minimal which I think makes it even more creepy.
I'm thinking back to the clips that I saw from Never Ending
Nightmares that you played in a previous season.

(01:58:32):
Yeah, I was reminded of that game time and time again.
You've got just this black and white, but whenever there is
color, it's like that color is doing some work and so.
And we see some of the same horrific image, like the same
gore and violence, like, recreated here.
Yeah. So it's I was, I was on board
for that. By extension, all of the

(01:58:54):
different designs that we get tosee for the Princess as we
progress through our story, eventhe different designs for the
cabin, it's just the amazing creativity that went into that.
And then on top of that, like how those designs match not only

(01:59:17):
the personality of the Princess in that moment, but how that
personality and that design alsomatch choices that we, the
player made in a visual way. It's like you're reading my
notes. Yeah, it's so incredible.
Like Matt said, the music is beautiful.
A lot of it is variations on thesame that we heard earlier, but

(01:59:43):
sometimes maybe it's warped and sometimes maybe it's slow and
subdued and sometimes maybe it there's just like a soft one
instrument version of it. It's just really cool.
All the different scenarios, they're just, they're
incredible. I think there's only like with

(02:00:06):
the exception of 1. Pair of princesses.
I don't really feel like any 2 princesses are anything like the
other. Like they're all so unique from
each other that like each chapter doesn't blend in with
another one. It's just like, this is a new
and unique experience for me every single time.

(02:00:27):
Yeah. And then even though I was drawn
in for the art style, it might be my favorite thing about this
game is the voice acting like, holy blip, my dudes.
It's just, it's so good. It's so good.
And the way that lines are repeated brings this like,
grounding sense to every single chapter.

(02:00:50):
But then the way those like repeated lines get changed
because of some certain situation or some variable
changes, those off repeated lines, you're like, oh, this is,
you know, it's, it's just so incredible because it, it shapes
your expectations or shatters them.
And it's so it, it's so intelligent.

(02:01:11):
It's so brilliant. Amazing.
Do you have any? Dislikes.
I like Matt said, I have to dig just so that I have something
here. There's one version of the
Princess that I've just like. I'm only doing this to finish my
library basically because I didn't really enjoy that one so
much. But like small complaint, not

(02:01:34):
even a long version of the Princess to have to sit through
that I don't enjoy on consoles. It's jarring to me that I'm not
automatically in my list of choices when it's time for me to
make a selection. I understand why they did it,
it's so that you don't accidentally pick the top
choice. But like having to hold left or

(02:01:57):
having to hold down to get into my list of choices when it's
time just a little tedious smallcomplaint.
And it's probably better that that is the case.
So this may be a situation whereit's like better to play a
visual novel on a computer because they're designed to be
played on computers. But and then my maybe my other

(02:02:19):
complaint is that when you do decide to see more than your
original playthrough, if you're trying to finish that memory
log, which normal players probably won't do, you are going
to retread a lot of ground. That being said, there's still
tons of options as you're retreading that ground and in

(02:02:43):
many chapters you still see something new even if you're
there for like the 6th or 7th time.
But I do still, I did still end up with like chapter 1 like
every scenario possible outcome memorized at at the end of it.
But that's the nature of playingChapter 1, what, 20 something
times like I did? And like, I still want to

(02:03:05):
listen, like what Matt said, I still want to listen to the
voiceover every time and the those opening words like you're
on a path in the forest. And at the end of the path,
after you go through this enough, it starts to just kind
of hit differently. Even though it's verbatim the
same, tonally, it's the same. Just the weights of what's going
on and what you've experienced. It changes the meaning of that

(02:03:29):
stuff sometimes. Yeah, good point.
I guess if I had to nitpick one more thing, just sort of off of
the like trying to complete the the memory log, there are a
couple of scenarios that are extremely fragile that like you
have to pick the just right thing at just the right time to

(02:03:50):
make it happen. And at the same time, there
might be some of those scenariosthat are really hard to build
to. And you get like several of
those explorer options, but you only get to pick one before it
moves on. So it's like, I do want to hear
what all the different voice lines are, even if the outcome

(02:04:11):
is ultimately the same small complaint.
So trap it up. Like I said Slay the Princess
was something I was looking forward to well before its
release. The premise set up by the
trailer just it captured me and what I got in the end was even
better than I could have hoped for the first time through the
game I was amazed at how the game was basically reading my

(02:04:33):
mind like I streamed this and I was like how is this happening
right now? I even like did a YouTube search
earlier and one of the results was psychologist plays slay the
Princess subtitle. How is this game reading my mind
so much? And that just like goes to show
you how well done the writing isfor this game.

(02:04:55):
And then because of that, so much of my first play through
were voices that were just like the voice of the contrarian that
joined me the first time was just like, they're there right
now in my real life. Like, that's that's me.
I'm no love expert, so I can't speak to how realistically these
different styles of relationships are portrayed in

(02:05:16):
slave the Princess format. But I did hear several familiar
refrains. And I did reach a loop ending
that ultimately reduced me to tears because I was like, I
might be living this one, you know?
Yeah, I've I've completed the game and I still think about it
all the time. And even after completing it, I
still want to play it. Right now I'm basically floored

(02:05:39):
by everything this game is visually, orally, narratively
and artistically. I came with two scores.
I'm going to go with the higher one.
This is also a 10 for me. Wow, wow.
I kind of expected it. I think I saw like I was looking
up trophies for this because I played it on PS-5 and you know,

(02:06:01):
on PSN profiles it shows who's who in the world has played the
game recently. And I saw Disco called his name
and he had a 100% like the othernight.
I don't know when you got 100%, but I was like, oh, he cared
enough to do that before the recording.
He probably loves it a heck in time.
I yeah, I wasn't when we picked this.

(02:06:23):
I wasn't married to completing the game because I figured it
probably would take a long time.I just wanted to do it.
Amazing. You love that feeling.
Yeah. Yeah, I I love hearing about
that. I love hearing both of you gush
about it. I am going to have a slightly
different perspective because I haven't done all of the endings,
I haven't done all the chapters,I haven't done all the vessels.

(02:06:45):
And we can talk about this later, but I felt like my
selection of choices throughout the game was very personal and I
wanted to hold on to my selection for now and maybe go
back later and chase the other. I don't know what it is 16 or
so, 17 or so, I mean vessels that I haven't encountered.

(02:07:08):
To be fair, that is essentially what I did.
The first time I played this wasback in October.
Yeah. So where I'm at right now is a
very particular moment in what Ifeel is a timeline of my
experience with this game. So a lot of what you both have
experienced I have not seen. So I'll be very interested in
learning even more about what there is to look forward to.

(02:07:31):
But I think to play this game isto demonstrate what you're going
through psychologically. Like you said, like I streamed
this and I felt like I was suddenly in this very public
psychological evaluation that I didn't even sign up for.
And depending on what I was feeling that day, that week,

(02:07:53):
that month, I, you know, I mightchoose something different from
another day, week or month. And so that really impacted how
I played this game. This is a game that you're going
to play differently depending onwhere you are in life, depending
on who you are as a person. Everybody's going to have a
different journey. And I love games that allow us
to do that. I love games that allow us to

(02:08:13):
express ourselves through the choices we make at a particular
time. And my journey is going to look
different from Matt's Discos is going to look different from
mine, and so on. I think the voice performances
really sell the story. If you take out the voices in
this game. If this is just a game where you
read, it's not going to land. I I tried to imagine what that

(02:08:34):
would be like and I just can't. This is probably closer to my
original feelings on like Kentucky Route 0.
That's. Probably how it would have felt
for. Me too, and I love how the story
plays out for many of the reasons you both have said.
Starting over and making new choices, you know, it means
we'll each have a different journey.
There's that cause and effect storytelling that puts so much

(02:08:55):
responsibility on you, and you're immediately feeling so
much conflict in a lot of the choices you're making.
And so you feel like you're the responsible one in crafting what
happens. And that feels like, you know, a
really important role that they're giving me to be able to
play this game and make those choices.
And then taking the implicationsof your interactions and

(02:09:19):
bringing a visual metaphor to life as a response to it.
I'll make a choice in a chapter,and then in a following chapter
I will see the ramifications, the effects of that represented
in a way that I might not have expected every time.
But immediately I'm like, that makes so much sense.
And that's so poetic and so genius.

(02:09:41):
This game is brilliant. I really connected to one of the
stories that focused on themes of trust and forgiveness.
I felt like I was on this epic exploration of this love story
for about just 40 minutes or so between all the chapters that
played out for this particular story.
So I look at some of these chapters and some of these

(02:10:03):
storylines, and some of them really jump out at me as being
emotionally resonant. There's this constant thrill of
not knowing what's going to happen next.
I feel like this game coerced meto do horrible things which then
led to more horrible things. This game has gnarly visuals.

(02:10:23):
There are grotesque, horrifying,shocking, scary things.
And I know I've only seen like a1/4 of what's in the game so I
can only imagine. And I've read the content
warning on Black Tabby Games site so I like I know it's in
the game but I haven't seen it yet and so that makes me
interested to revisit if I get to dislikes.
I would point out some things actually I I had audio issues in

(02:10:47):
this game unfortunately on PS5I had dialogue sounding chopped at
the end of lines. That happened to me too.
OK, it didn't bother me a ton because it was like less than a
syllable in most cases. Yeah, it it's one of those
things where it's not ruining the entire line of dialogue, but
it was happening enough that I would notice it and I'd be like,

(02:11:09):
oh, there's that audio thing again.
There's that glitch or whatever it is.
I don't know if that happens on every platform.
So I'm not saying this is a universal thing because I
haven't played all the platforms, but for me on PS-5,
the pristine cut does do that. Not every line, but sometimes
this game can be pretty oppressive and hard to stomach

(02:11:30):
in long stretches. That's why I didn't feel the
energy to marathon all the the storylines in the chapters.
But I do want to see them. It's just I really need to space
things out for this game, both because I want to sit with my
particular choices that made my journey unique and also because
it can just be heavy. It can be a lot.

(02:11:51):
So that's why again, I say I'm on a timeline with this game.
I feel like I'm on a journey andI haven't reached the end of my
journey with this yet. You're not at the cabin yet?
I'm not at. The cabin.
You're still in the woods. I am still.
In the woods. It can be really heavy for me.
I didn't mention this earlier but I am incredibly emo.
Like I grew up listening to My Chemical Romance.

(02:12:11):
Like that's my safe space. So like the sadder and more
depressing games get sometimes like I just want to live in it.
But I totally get it being like AI need a minute and because it
can be a lot. And I love that for you too.
Yeah, I'm kind of similar, but in the more like I used to watch
just like gory movies as a smallchild.
So it's like, I'm really into the upsetting, disturbing kind

(02:12:35):
of looking stuff. Yes, and I Disco and I know so
you talked about movie podcasting earlier, Matt.
We have a movie podcast here at the station that Disco and I
used to do and we have friends who do it now and they're like
really into horror. And sometimes I guessed on that
podcast just because they need another chair and I have to step

(02:12:56):
up and talk about horror sometimes.
And I love horror movies, but I'm not one of those people who
can marathon horror movies like all weekends.
You know, I, I like a horror movie, you know, every few
weeks. Maybe so, So that's just one of
the reasons why I can't like constantly play this game and
see all the endings and the the chapters back-to-back.

(02:13:17):
And then when we get to the deeper layers of the back story
and what's going on, like truly going on so far, I don't get a
ton from the conclusion and likethe the complex layers of this
game. And it could be because I
haven't taken the time to think about it.

(02:13:37):
It could be because I haven't processed it yet.
But I am not sure about what allI'm supposed to take forward
from this game. If anything, you probably know
what I'm talking about when we get to.
I mean, I think we can say thesewords without spoiling anything.
What the long quiet represents and what the shipping mound

(02:13:57):
represents. I also don't totally grasp what
those mean necessarily either. And this is a me thing, partly
because an abstract sort of layer to storytelling doesn't
always sit well with me because I like just understanding.
I, I, I understand that part of the responsibility too is given

(02:14:18):
to the player to interpret. And I think right now I wasn't
looking for that. So there might be more that I
just don't get. And again, I'm on like a
timeline, so maybe I don't understand.
Is there something you wanted tosay in?
Response I just wanted to add that that's totally legit, but
it's someone who loves Doctor Who and watch it and like loved
control and like likes The X-Files.

(02:14:39):
Like I'd like not knowing. I like sitting in the what's
going on way that I don't understand.
Oh, now I understand. And like, I don't even think I
who has played this game at least three or four Times Now
and still haven't seen every route.
I don't even completely understand the picture, but that
just makes me kind of giddy because it's like, I don't get
it. I want to keep going right?
Like, but it's totally fair to feel the other way.

(02:15:02):
I mean, I'm also the same personwho like every yak is the game
in the last chapter has a giant twist that most people can
probably see coming. But every time I'm like.
Wait every time. Actually floors me every time
hook, line and sinker. So like I also like getting
duped and and like discovering those surprises along with the

(02:15:23):
audience so that those kinds of mysteries don't bother me 'cause
I know that eventually I also aman avid video essay watcher.
So like I didn't understand signals at all when I finished
it, but I listened to like 4 podcasts and watched a video
essay and I was like oh now I understand and I like doing that
extra research too. But it's absolutely good to walk
away from the game and go, well,I don't get it and I don't want

(02:15:45):
to do any other work right now because that's totally valid.
You're saying that that that excites you and that also you
have confusion. That's validating.
And it's also just really exciting because it shows like
how we each absorb games. And that's why I also point out
that this part of this is just me and like every review is
particular to the person giving the review.
It's not a universal thing. I'm not pointing this out as

(02:16:06):
like a universal criticism and it's just a personal thing that
I have with it. And another thing is like, I
could have looked up a bunch of video essays about what all this
stuff might mean, but I tend to avoid that before recording a
podcast episode because I don't want to be too influenced by
other people's imaginations and thoughts too.
So as part of my timeline as well, I am going to be looking

(02:16:28):
up videos now. Now that we are going to have
this recording in our back pocket.
Now I can go do that stuff and Imight get something out of it.
And that's exciting to me too. And then I think that's pretty
much it for likes and dislikes. So overall, I think this is a
ride. I, you know, I'm still trying to
figure out what I take away fromthe whole thing at the end of
the day. But I'm not sure that's the

(02:16:48):
entire point. I think this is just a gnarly
experience. It is a psychological evaluation
when you play it. And I think that is highly
interesting. I love hearing both of you talk
about it. I think it's well written,
terrifically acted, emotionally resonant.
I'm going to land on the higher of two scores.

(02:17:09):
I was kind of between. I'm going to go with a nine out
of 10. First slay the Princess, The
pristine cut. Nice.
Yeah, I was kind of between those two.
I think you 2 kind of convinced me.
To go off on it and when you started, I had the other score
down, so I was like perfect, I know you.
Yeah, OK, so how does Slay the Princess, the pristine cut stand
out in the visual novel genre? I think both of you have pointed

(02:17:32):
out some really good points, butif you were comparing this to
other similar games, what would you point out as like Oh yeah
that only happens in Slay the Princess?
I've I've only got 3 under my belt now it's this Doki Doki and
Kentucky Rue zero. That's that's pretty much it.

(02:17:54):
So this is definitely somehow the most violent, even though
we. Oh my God, yeah.
I mean, Doki Doki is no walk in the park either.
I love that game too. God, that game is just a wild
ride. Also in a different way.
I I think what makes this uniqueis the horror aspect, right?
It's not a horror game per SE. There are some routes that are

(02:18:16):
not horror at all. And then there are routes that
are horror, like hardcore. And I think that it's not afraid
to just genre jump and like kindof be all over the place.
I also like that it uses horror tropes in the choices, like if
you follow the hero voice long enough.
This is a small spoiler so if you don't want any spoilers skip

(02:18:36):
ahead like 30 seconds. Or you follow the hero voice
long enough. Eventually you get a list of
like 30 options and almost all of them are slay the Princess.
Yeah, and like, you can't. Click anything else unless you
scroll all the way down. And like, there's maybe one
other option. Tropes like that I think other
games have, like you mentioned, Okie Dokie has done some of that

(02:18:56):
kind of stuff too. But like I think, I think
honestly for me, what makes thisunique in the visual novel space
is that it's fully voice affected.
Every line is voice acted, whichnot every visual novel has, and
the voice acting is required. I would argue that most visual
novels, if you read them, you could probably still get a sense

(02:19:16):
of the voice and you could probably from this too.
But the voice acting is what makes it stand out as an actual
novel because it's such unique work by the two leads.
And so that would be like my bigstar for like, why this one
stands out. Yeah, because you don't
necessarily have voice of the hero and voice of the contrarian
and voice of the cold without knowing that they're hearing

(02:19:38):
that they're the same actor withthe same pitch, essentially.
But just like reading lines in atotally different way, that does
change the game. Yeah, yeah.
The tone shifts in the voice, just one person's voice.
That's so incredible to me when it comes to the choices of what
you can say. I love that sometimes things are

(02:20:00):
verbose, like you know exactly what you're saying.
And in some games where you're picking dialogue, maybe it
doesn't happen as often. And just like visual novels,
maybe it's. You know, if I think back to
Mass Effect, just because that'son my mind, because you
mentioned it, sometimes in gameslike that, you are picking an
idea like it's a abbreviated version of what you're going to

(02:20:21):
say. But you never quite know exactly
what you're going to say verbatim in this game.
Not only because it's a visual novel, do you know, like what
you're going to say precisely. But this game is unafraid for
what you say to be long and detailed.
And I love that I did not mind scrolling through all the
options and being like, OK, thisone's like a paragraph.

(02:20:44):
But essentially I what it means is I'm going to leave the
Princess. I'm just going to like, say,
forget you. I'm going back upstairs.
But what I'm saying before I take that action carries this
very particular meaning of like,well, I don't trust you because
you just said this. You know, it's a response to
what she might have just said. Right.

(02:21:05):
And you'll have maybe 3 different options that have the
same ultimate outcome. Like you're going to leave her.
But yeah, you get to. And you get the sense that those
actually matter. Yeah.
And then also there's this loop between all the chapters and the
vessels that starts to announce itself.
This loop of not just you start in the woods and that you're on

(02:21:26):
the path to the cabin and she's in the basement, but down to
like you go into the cabin and you always have a moment where
you're hearing from your voices and the the narrator.
And then there's also the momentwhere you start to descend down
the stairs. And maybe this doesn't happen
every time, but for me it happened every time.
Most of them, yeah. You see you see the character of

(02:21:46):
the cabin even more just in the stairs and there's always that
moment where you hear the voice before you see her.
It like that loop starts to announce itself, even though the
branding of it changes, you know, like, oh, this is the part
of this chapter. And so there's familiarity and
there's something new, too. And I love that balance, yeah.
Yeah, I think also, like most, not most, a lot of visual

(02:22:10):
novels, especially in early days, were also very synonymous
with dating Sims and often had some kind of romance or
protagonist at a high school. Can only date one girl, but
who's going to be the lucky winner?
Like, you know, it started in that, especially in the Japanese
space, but like they have evolved to mean a lot of things,
but they do still revolve aroundthat.
A lot of American ones that I think of are like, you know,

(02:22:30):
dream daddy and and and boyfriend dungeon, you know, all
campy and fun. This game, it says in the very
beginning, this is a love story and it is, but it is not a love
story like other visual novels. And that's what's fascinating to
me too, and I think makes it stand out from others.
And I can't say why because I don't want to spoil it.

(02:22:53):
It's very fair. Can you talk about your various
playthroughs? You played the non pristine cut
version first? Can you talk about the different
choices you made, whether they were different, why they were
different? So because I played the game
about two years apart, it's harder to remember the specifics
of my original playthrough. I do remember the first Princess

(02:23:14):
I ever got, and it's the same Princess I got in the demo,
which is the tower, which says alot about me.
And I've accepted that. But you know, I know the ending
I got was very different and I was frustrated by that ending.
I don't want to say why, but like, it was very different.
And I know that they expanded the endings in the Pristine cut.

(02:23:36):
They'd always wanted to do more and there are multiple endings,
but the starkest difference for me is the ending I got on this
playthrough and the ending I gotin my original playthrough.
I got a variety of different voices.
I don't know how many were new but like I got 8 voices on my
first playthrough and then I also got 12345678 princesses

(02:23:59):
which sounds right but I got a bunch of princesses this time
and outcomes that I've never gotten before.
Like there's an outcome for not going to the cabin for walking
the opposite. Direction.
I got that too, yeah. I didn't think there would be
and that outcome is wild. Everything results in suppose
the supposed end of the world but does it.
But like I think what the biggest difference from my

(02:24:22):
original playthrough in this oneis this one.
The paths felt more fleshed out that they were in the original,
but I think this takes them to their ultimate conclusion,
especially with how the shiftingmound works.
Worked for me this playthrough and I think that's really
interesting. I need I didn't on this second
playthrough then go get all the different versions.

(02:24:44):
I was tempted to, but like you Bo, I wanted to sit in these
choices. Like my second voice was the
stubborn, which also says a lot about me in my 40s.
And so like I felt like because it feels like a personal
journey, I wanted to savor it before diving in.
I might I don't get a lot of platinums, but I might this one
because I I like the experience of going through it and if I

(02:25:07):
wait three months, I'm not goingto remember anything.
My memory sucks. So I'll go back in and probably
enjoy it all over again. But like those are the things
that stood out the most. I think some of the animations
were different and like touched up, but I can't promise that
because again, I originally played it on PC on my desktop
and then on the replay was on the PS5I didn't have any of

(02:25:29):
those voice line issues, which is interesting.
Or maybe I just didn't notice them.
But it's hard to really rememberexactly what I got because
again, I did I what I should have done is play the Pristine
Cut on my on Steam because it would have had my previous
playthrough in the memories gallery, but I didn't do that.
But I made sure to write down every Princess and voice I
encountered because I knew I wasgoing to remember them off the

(02:25:50):
top of my head. But those are the major
differences that stand out to me.
I don't really think you're losing anything by not having
played the first version. I'm glad I did because I loved
it so much and it was kind of impossible for me not to.
But I think people playing the Pristine Cut are playing what
Abby and Tony always have envisioned, but they just needed
more time to get to. That's always nice when the

(02:26:11):
second version, the definitive version, isn't really like
different. It's just more so now like
everybody who buys this on Steamis going to get the pristine
cut. If you look up Slay the Princess
on Steam, it's the pristine cut.You can't choose the old
version, so. I love I got the pristine cut
automatically on my steam version because it's a free
upgrade. Amazing.

(02:26:31):
It just didn't exist on the other consoles.
It was released on the other consoles.
And it's funny because I have iton Steam and PS-5, both digital.
I don't have a physical copy of it yet.
And you know, I mean, it'd probably be fun to play on
Switch. I'm just saying.
Yeah, in in bed like under the covers, yeah.
Any advice for Matt from you disco on like getting a
platinum? Definitely plan your routes and

(02:26:57):
then save. Use the save and load feature
'cause like you, you can get a lot of the screens just by
visiting each Prince. You usually have to visit most
of them twice at least, but someof them you can like save and
load to get all of them, but some of them you can't.

(02:27:18):
So planning your routes helps a lot.
And there are there are a lot ofuseful tools online and I can
send you those if you ever decide you want to pursue that.
Yeah, cool. There are a lot of save slots.
That's very useful. That's true.
Yeah, so this one was especiallyimortant for me to ask, what are
your favorite voices from all ofyour paths?

(02:27:42):
Oh, I mean, I, so I love the hero because I, and I've said
this on multiple podcasts, I have a superhero complex.
I'm better at about it now, but as like a teenager and young
adult, I really did have a superhero complex in the sense
that, oh, someone's in trouble. I have to help.
Or like more specifically, my friend's in trouble.
I need to fix it. Which anyone who's an adult and

(02:28:02):
grown and been through experiences knows not everybody
wants their problems fixed. When they're talking about them,
sometimes they want to vent, Sometimes they just want to be a
feel heard or feel seen. When you rush in to try and
solve it, they look at you like you have an 18 head.
So like, I resonated with that voice a lot.
But like on this playthrough, I also really loved the smitten.
I don't know if either of you got the Smitten.

(02:28:23):
I got that was my. That was my very first one.
Is that right? It was interesting, yeah.
I love that one because I've read a lot of fairy tales, I've
seen a lot of characters like who the smitten isn't like this
larger than life hero who fightsfor love 1st and love is the
most important thing. Like it's just so cheesy and
it's the voice performance that I feel like is the most

(02:28:45):
different of the. Other yes, it's so I thought it
was a different voice actor. Yeah, that's how different.
It is. Oh God, you blaggard.
Yeah, sorry. He's like, like who needs a
weapon when we have the power oflove on our sides?
Like a lot of the voices that I point out in this question is
like, I like them because of just how much they contrast with

(02:29:09):
the rest of the game. So the voice of the smitten is
in my list as well. I would also point out the voice
of the broken. This is the voice that
accompanies the tower, and it's just such a good foil to the
tower who's dominating over you.And I want her to step on me and
I meet. Everybody.
Else and I meet she says, like she says like drop the knife and

(02:29:31):
I'm like, yes, ma'am, I will drop the knife and then she's
like kneel and I'm like right away and I immediately kneel and
I was streaming the game during that moment and people were just
cackling it like how how much I was giving in right, But then
the voice of the broken is thereand they are just like just do
it already. It will feel so much better to

(02:29:52):
do as she says and it just sounds so defeated and I just
love that pairing. See, for me, this I'm sure will
shock you. But the voice of the contrarian
was the one that I connected with the most.
I loved him. And so, like, in that situation,
I would have been like the voiceof the contrarian.
Like, no, yeah, I'm not gonna kneel.

(02:30:13):
And like, no, I'm gonna throw the knife out the window.
Nice. Forget this whole game.
Oh yeah, this was this was alongside the stranger.
Yeah. The vessel, yes, yeah, yeah, I
got that one too. Yeah, he he shows up in a couple
places. Like they all show up, I think
in multiple places. But yeah, he, he and the skeptic
were the ones obviously I connected with the most.

(02:30:34):
They were my favorites. Amazing.
I think I also really like the opportunist.
I got it with the beast because the opportunist is basically
they want the fight, right? And the beast version of the
Princess also wants the fight and that one can go round and
round for a while because you basically, I won't explain how I
don't want to spoil it, but likeit could.
It can be its own confined loop outside of the larger loop,

(02:30:56):
which is really interesting. And the opportunist is basically
just talking about no, you got to go for the right.
No, take a swing. You can't leave an opening.
Like just really like combative.It was really, really excellent.
Again, all the same voice actor,but so many different versions.
I found this YouTube that does slay the Princess animations and
I already told Bopo about this but I can send you a couple

(02:31:19):
because there's one that has theopportunist that's just
hilarious. I.
Would love that. Yes, please.
And I can send that to you. That's I I would be overjoyed
because it's one of the favoritemoments in the game now.
The storyline that I just love that I was referencing earlier
was the one that happens with the thorn.
And this is the one where we hear from the opportunists and

(02:31:42):
the cheated. And I just loved this story
because of what we're doing withthe Princess and how it's about
forgiveness and trust, which arethings that are popping up in my
life a lot right now particularly.
So that's why it's really resonant for me.
But then also the way the opportunist and the cheated have

(02:32:02):
this dance that they're doing onthe side.
And I at a certain point I'm trying to almost like just tune
them out, like because I'm just trying to focus on having the
Princess forgive me or let me just take the step that I want
to break a cycle of violence that we're having.
But then the opportunist and thecheated, they have stances on
things and sometimes they switchsides.

(02:32:23):
It's just there's so many layersto it.
Yeah, I I like that the voice, the like the simplistic version
of this game is the voices wouldbe siloed.
They'd say, they're saying and then you'd move on.
But the fact that they interplaylike I, the hero and the smitten
got into a huge argument in my playthrough because like the
hero, like who is chivalrous, eventually got fed up.

(02:32:43):
Like this is too much, right? Which is so fun.
Like I love that the interplay is what really makes it work
because if they were just cannedlines, it'd still be kind of
cool. But like, the fact that there's
interplay and every loop adds another element to the pot that
just stirs it up more really is what sells it.
And even just the rules of how conversations should play out in

(02:33:05):
so many games, those are broken in this game.
Like when I got the voice of theparanoid with the nightmare, the
voice of the paranoid was speaking lines over and over,
like saying the same thing on repeat underneath what other
voices were saying. That design was incredible.
And like the the fact that without spoiling it, the reason

(02:33:26):
that the paranoid is doing it isto basically allow you to
progress and like every time youinterrupt, it drops from the
background and the thing happensand then it starts up again
because yeah, it's just yeah, masterful.
That's so good. That's a that's a really unique
situation that I don't think that I didn't experience
anywhere else in the game. Yeah, that's so cool.

(02:33:50):
Amazing. I guess we kind of know what we
each accomplished, We know how much we did, and we could go
into what we want to do next. But like, I guess I'm confused
about how many endings there are.
I guess that's the thing that's sort of the Gray area for me is
like, I know how many vessels there are that I haven't seen.

(02:34:11):
It's most of them. So I could like go and explore
that. But then like at the end, I feel
like there were so many options for dealing with what happens
before the, the credits, if you will.
And so I just have no perceptionof like how much there is there.
Is that are you asking rhetorically?
Well, I don't know, as maybe I don't wanna be spoiled, but it's

(02:34:34):
just an observation I have that there's a layer that I just
don't even know how big the layer is.
That's valid, yes, yeah. Yeah, all I can confirm is I got
one ending when I played the original version and I got a
very different ending when I played it for this podcast.
And so I won't even know until Igo back again.
But I assume they are, that there are multiple endings and

(02:34:56):
I'm honestly hoping I can get back to that other one.
If it was removed completely I might be sad because it was one
of my favorite results. Of the loop without.
Spoiling it but like I'm just excited to see the other paths
regardless. I don't know that I'm going to
replay it anytime soon just cause mostly I have a laundry
list of games I'm trying to get through.
I got a review code for Pipistrello and the Cursed yo-yo

(02:35:17):
which is phenomenal. It is unbelievable.
And then I also got a review code for date everything, which
I'm going to try and stream because I'm a visual novel nerd
and publicly horny on this guy. So it feels like a good match.
But but I do want to go back andreplay it again because I do

(02:35:37):
want to get the platinum and more importantly, I just want to
see those other paths because they're all so cool.
Yeah, I, I'm looking forward to exploring more and I this I
don't get to have this relationship with this many
games where I can think of what I did as like the first step in
the journey and I just want to keep taking it.
So I'll probably keep sipping onthis game at least for the next

(02:36:00):
few weeks or months when I have time.
So yeah, I look forward to that.Anything.
I mean, you said you could just replay it.
Now, yeah, I'm going to, I'm going to play a little bit of it
tonight when I get home just to see, to evaluate my psyche and
how I'm feeling today. So what's going to happen
tonight? I'm going to measure my mental
health and Princess. My gosh, when I go to therapy my

(02:36:24):
therapist is just going to spendthe hour watching me play this.
Yeah, exactly. That's how therapy is going to
work from now on is I'm just going to bringslay the Princess
and be like, all right, so here's how I'm feeling.
Yeah. I'm OK with.
That it looks like you want to be stepped on again.
OK, sounds good. Shocker, we know this.
That's something that's. You don't have to pay me for
this BOPO, we all know this. Amazing.

(02:36:46):
Well, we will call it there, butMatt, one more time, can you
remind people where to find yourcontent?
Sure. So the best place to find
everythingthatidois@djstormagdon.comor link dot TR it's link dot TR
EE/DJ Stormagenon it I have it linked to the URL.
So DJ, if you search DJ Stormagenon or if you search

(02:37:07):
djstormagen.com should come right up.
My podcasts again are Fun and Games, which I host with the
incredible Jeff Moonen, which isa broad topic based podcast
where we either talk about specific topics in gaming like
is grinding worth it in RPGs or signposting in games, or we do
retrospectives for video game consoles or franchises or

(02:37:29):
genres. We also do incredible interviews
with developers, either one-on-one on the show long form
or in much shorter format at conventions and other things.
One that I'll flag just because it's our most popular episode by
volume is we interviewed the Vimof Vim's Lair, one of the most
famous emulation sites on the Internet.
He was a wonderful chat. We talked about game
preservation. It was a really great

(02:37:51):
conversation. We did the record of this I
think last year. I don't know times the lake,
it's hard to remember. So go check that out.
Also with that fetus side quest,both Bobo and Disco Cola have
done episodes and you can bet your ass I'm going to harass
them to do more because I like bringing back my favorites.
So check, definitely go check those out.
And then I do Reignite with Frankie Bradley the strange.
It started as a mass fuck play along podcast where we wanted to

(02:38:14):
walk in the shoes of Commander Shepard but discuss why we made
the choices we made. We went on to play Andromeda,
which I had never played before the series, which was a lot of
fun, and now we are doing the Dragon Age franchise.
We're currently in Dragon Age 2IN Act 2 as of when we're
recording, so we will probably wrap that up by the end of this
year, early next year and then move on to Inquisition.
And then if you want to find me online, the best place is Blue

(02:38:36):
Sky. I'm djstormageddon.com there.
I'm also somewhat active on Instagram DJ under SCORE
Stormageddon and then on twitchalsodj_stormageddonbutagainallofthoselinksare@djstormageddon.com
Perfect, Matt. Thank you endlessly for being
our guests on this episode and for sharing about yourself and

(02:38:56):
for sharing about what makes Slay the Princess so special.
It's just been a wonderful time.Thank you.
Thank you, I I had a blast and I, you know, all true praise.
I love the show. I love your chemistry.
I love the guests you have the games you talk about the way you
talk about games that you basically assume people haven't
played, but want to try and get them to play them right.
Like especially the surprise games, like I love the hidden,

(02:39:20):
the secret games that you bring because you describe them in a
way that makes them enticing to I like I have a laundry list at
this point, just listening. To the show.
Cuz all everyone knows we have nothing to play and nobody has a
backlog and nobody has downloaded a bunch of games they
haven't played yet. But like, I love the format and
I was honored to be a part of it.
I'm happy to come back anytime and it was a blast.
And thank you for letting me bring one of my all time

(02:39:41):
favorite games, and I'm glad youenjoyed it too.
I loved it. Thank you so much.
Before we go, we have another special thank you to give.
We want to thank Andrew Valentine.
You may also know him as the host of Dialogue Tree.
He turned around that vocal recording voice, acting as the
narrator, the voice of the contrarian, the voice of the

(02:40:03):
hero, and the voice of the cold.And he did that in less than
like 3 days. Just turn that around so quick.
So, our endless gratitude. To Andrew, check out Dialogue
Tree. If for for my money I compare
Dialogue Tree to the Radio Lab of video Games podcasts.

(02:40:23):
It's it's my favorite new show that I've discovered and that
has recently started. And yeah, Andrew's great.
Thank you, Andrew, Thank you so much.
All right, that is our review ofSlay the Princess, the pristine
cut. You can play it on PC, Mac,
Linux, Switch, PS4, PS 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series.
Matt rated it A10. Disco Cola rated it A10I rated

(02:40:45):
it a nine. That's the end of this episode
of Underplayed. You can find more of our
episodes at kzum.org/underplayedand on common podcast platforms
like Spotify or Apple Podcasts. Our music was composed by Jack
Rodenberg. Our art comes from Oni Mochi.
Check out our show notes where you can find and follow us
across social media. Underplayed is on Blue Sky,

(02:41:07):
Instagram and Threads. You can find my links down below
as well, and I stream a variety of indie games on Twitch.
And I am at Disco Cola in many of those places, including
Backlogged, where both of today's games that I played are
in my top 100 indie games list. And Slay the Princess is quite
high on that list and something we don't talk about a lot, but

(02:41:29):
Underplayed is also on YouTube. So if you prefer to get your
podcasts on YouTube, we are Underplayed podcast and you do
have to dig a little bit unfortunately to find us, but we
are there. Next time we will have two more
secret games to review and our featured game will be Sable, an
open world exploration game developed by Shedworks.

(02:41:49):
Until then, everyone keep on play.

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078 - Moncage, Tempopo, & Slay the Princess — The Pristine Cut (Guest: Matt Storm, AKA Stormageddon)

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}078 - Moncage, Tempopo, & Slay the Princess — The Pristine Cut (Guest: Matt Storm, AKA Stormageddon)