Episode 259: We've Been Where?: Let's Catch Up!

This week we are chatting and catching up after an (unintentional) summer hiatus!

What We're Playing (Selections)
Peak
Expedition 33
Tiny Bookshop*
Discounty*
Birdigo*
Metaphor ReFantazio
Cult of the Lamb
Repo
Final Fantasy I and II

What We're Reading
Brindlewood Bay TTRPG
Yellowface by R.F. Kuang
Pet by Akwaeke Emezi
Katabasis by R.F. Kuang
Japanese Books (Genki 1; Kanji Look and Learn; Practical Japanese 1)
Steering the Craft by Ursula K. Le Guin
Writing the Other by Nisi Shawl and Cynthia Ward
Faeries (25th edition) by Brian Froud
Good Faeries and Bad Faeries by Brian Froud
Faeries on the Faultlines by Iris Compiet
A New Dictionary of Fairies by Morgan Daimler

What We're Drinking
Boulevard Brewing Co. Wood Baron Barrel-Fresh Ale
Cherry Hard Cider
accidental raspberry lemonade slushie *Code received for streaming and review purposes

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:33):
Hello, and welcome to episode two hundred and fifty nine
of the Not Try Mama's Gamer podcast podcast, where we
talk about living, working, playing, and just existing in and
around the games industry, and we do so from.

Speaker 2 (00:47):
A feminist perspective.

Speaker 1 (00:48):
My name is Smith the Blackman, and I'm an associate
professor here at Purdue University in West Loafi at Indiana,
and I am joined tonight by my two fabulous co hosts.
That has been far too long since I talked to
and and that is all my fault. And those two
co hosts are Jordan Lukomski and Victoria Bragger.

Speaker 2 (01:08):
Hey, y'all, how you doing?

Speaker 3 (01:12):
It's not your fault. And to answer the question existing.

Speaker 4 (01:17):
I think existing is a good word.

Speaker 3 (01:20):
It is.

Speaker 2 (01:21):
Okay, it's totally my fault, but not intentional. How's that? Okay, okay, okay,
I'll take that. I'll take that.

Speaker 1 (01:30):
So we'll start with our usual what we're reading, what
we're playing, what we're drinking.

Speaker 2 (01:38):
And Jordan, how about we start with you? What have
you been reading lately?

Speaker 3 (01:44):
Well? Thanks, I got the huge list. So I'm reading
a lot of different things for different reasons. All of
them are interesting and fun for me, but they're not
reading for fun and in terms of novel narrative, so
I'm mostly reading Japanese language books, writing and crafting writing books,

(02:12):
and just fairy compendiums. The fairy compendiums, I just got
a bunch of books on because I've been interested in
fairies for a long time and I'm like, I don't
have any fairy books.

Speaker 2 (02:27):
Why not?

Speaker 3 (02:28):
So I just bought a few Fairies twenty fifth edition
good Fairies Be Fairies, which were both written by a
guy named Brian Frowd who helped work on The Lord
of the Rings Labyrinth and The Dark Crystal. And these
books are really nice because there's lots of pictures, there's

(02:50):
lots of descriptions on how the word fairy came about,
the local lore, how that's developed, and you can definitely
see in his drawings why he was chosen to work
on those certain projects, because his style is very distinct.

(03:13):
And then from there I got a few other books, Uh,
Fairies on the fault Lines, which is a book that's
basically the same thing at compendium with lots of pictures,
some writing, but that one has more watercolor based images.
So I've just been reading through those learning about different

(03:34):
stories local legends and fairies in different cultures. And then
I've been reading a couple of writing craft books. The
first one is Steering the Craft by Ursula k LeGuin.

(03:56):
This book, if you open it and just look at
the chapters in it, it comes across as like just
an intro to writing description books. It's got punctuation and
grammar sentence like and syntax, repetition, adjectives, all that stuff.

(04:17):
But this book is not an intro to writing. It
really kind of dives into different examples, conversation pieces, and
is a more advanced take assuming you already know the
basics of writing, the rules all that, and she really

(04:41):
goes into these are the rules around writing, and those
are important because we have a certain structure that conveys meaning.
But also every writer is different and you should to
break those rules sometimes. So it's really just about trying

(05:06):
to find your voice and seeing when your voice changes,
what things you find come easy to you while you write,
what things find difficult. So I'm just working through that
book because it's kind of fun. And then the other
one is Writing the Other a Practical Approach by Nissi
Shaal and Cynthia Ward, And this book is a product

(05:31):
of and kind of a summary of one of their classes.
They're both writers, but they also teach academic courses, and
in one of their courses, they were talking about diversity,
intersectionality and how you write from different perspectives, different viewpoints,

(05:55):
how do you write a character or parts of a
different culture that you yourself are not necessarily familiar with,
And one of the students responded, while you could do
a lot of harm if you're not careful, and so
I don't think that you should try to write different

(06:18):
people or backgrounds into your story at all. So this
was kind of their response to it. They created a
new class on well, we think that's kind of the
easy answer and still adds to harm in its own way.
So this book steps through the main points of that
class and brings different examples into conversation. It goes over

(06:42):
culture appropriation. You will make mistakes. Here's how you deal
with that what they define as the other And even
though it sounds very very academic, which is it's still
approaches it in a very i'll say broadway, but an

(07:07):
easy to consume way. So anything that they break down,
there's lots of examples. There's not a lot of academic
jar into it, and that's been really interesting to read through.
And then the last bits is just Japanese language books

(07:30):
because I'm trying to learn Japanese.

Speaker 2 (07:35):
Oh cool, that's interesting. That's interesting.

Speaker 1 (07:38):
I was going to ask if you were if you
were reading about like tinkerbale fairies or scary Murder you
murder Fairy Ring fairies, and you do you had the
book about good fairies and bad fairies. Also interesting was
the the book about the book by the dude who
helped write Lord of the Rings. Because one of the
things I did this summer while I was sick of

(08:00):
while I was healing was, uh, my mother and my
daughter had never seen the Lord of the Ring. Well,
I think my mother saw one of the Lord of
the Rings books like the Very First and the Lord
of the Rings, not books movies. She saw the Very
First in the Lord of the Ring series, but that
was the only one. So while I was sick, once

(08:23):
we started watching them, they made me watch all three
Lord of the Ring movies and all three Hobbit movies,
so I definitely had my.

Speaker 2 (08:33):
Feel extended editions, yes, excuse me.

Speaker 1 (08:38):
Extend the extended the extended versions. Yes, they would not
watch the short ones. So they were all at least
three hours long. It was well two and a half
plus hours long, all of them. Yeah, that's that's what
I had to do. And for those of you who
don't know, I don't like to watch TV. And I
was being kind of held hostage almost because I was sick.

Speaker 2 (09:00):
It wasn't like I could get up and leave. Oh no.

Speaker 3 (09:04):
And here I was last week thinking I got into
my Lord of the Rings, watched.

Speaker 4 (09:07):
Through right, I was thinking that too. I'm like, I
have to do my yearly Lord of the Rings.

Speaker 2 (09:12):
But do you watch them all at once?

Speaker 1 (09:13):
They were making me like literally we were watching them
like every night. At one point we had watched so much.
My mother came and she was like, Okay, are we
going to watch the next movie tonight?

Speaker 2 (09:22):
I was like, no, leave me alone.

Speaker 1 (09:25):
Let me sit here with my book for one night
and we will watch the next one tomorrow.

Speaker 4 (09:34):
I feel like one to night. Yeah, oh my gosh,
to back to back.

Speaker 3 (09:38):
I've done all three in the day.

Speaker 4 (09:41):
Oh my gosh, all during the day. And you get
food that's like centered around it, m ho it lifestyle.

Speaker 1 (09:50):
That's like eighteen hours. That's like eighteen hours of media.
I don't watch that much TV in a month. I
probably don't watch that much.

Speaker 2 (09:58):
TV in two or three months.

Speaker 1 (10:01):
So to do that all like back to back was
kind of overwhelming. That's kind of overwhelming. I play Look,
I read books and play video games. That's what I do.
I read books and play video games. But it wasn't bad.
It wasn't bad.

Speaker 2 (10:21):
And then my mother and I my mother and I.

Speaker 1 (10:25):
Sat and watched the recorded the vide of my playthrough
of South of Midnight because she had seen South of
Midnight on the TV at the lab, and she was like,
would you play that? Because she had I think she hasd
pe to play it. And Pete was like, no, I'm
not playing that, and she not that she didn't want

(10:46):
to play it, but she was like, you need to.

Speaker 2 (10:48):
You need to have mama play that for you so
she can tell you about everything. She's like, because I can't.

Speaker 1 (10:53):
Me and my whiteness can't handle that, so she was like,
could you. I was like, will I cannot play that
right now because that was after my surgery, so everything
from my neck to my hips was hurting.

Speaker 2 (11:06):
I was like, I can't really play video games right now.

Speaker 1 (11:09):
I was like, but I do have all those vies recorded,
so I was able to go back. It was twenty
something hours to go back, and we were and we
were able to watch the playthrough and have a conversation,
which was really interesting. And now I have a really
interesting idea about writing an academic piece with my mother
about South and Midnight because we have familial history that reflects.

(11:33):
That gives us the opportunity to reflect a lot on
what went on in South and Midnight.

Speaker 2 (11:37):
So I have this idea.

Speaker 1 (11:39):
I haven't run the idea by her yet, but my mother,
my mother might ask to be first author.

Speaker 4 (11:44):
If I do that, you should definitely do. I would
read that. I think that's a great approach to writing
an academic article. I think Benjamin Byron Davis, who is
the voice for Dutch and read De Redemption. His mother
is an academic and she's an ed. She's an education

(12:06):
and she had never done anything video game wise. But
when her son started, you know, this game came out
and everybody was raving about it and everybody was saying
how emotional it was, she played it through with her
son and they wrote an academic article take on it together.
And so I think that is a great approach to

(12:27):
academic articles, and you should do it. You should convince Dana.

Speaker 3 (12:29):
To do it.

Speaker 2 (12:30):
I did.

Speaker 1 (12:31):
I wrote an article with my I think it was
about twelve or thirteen at the time, my nephew about
grand theft auto back in the day, and gave him
and gave him a.

Speaker 2 (12:44):
Co authorship.

Speaker 1 (12:47):
Which I think was really interesting, which I think was
really interesting. So yeah, I'm thinking about that. I'm thinking
about that.

Speaker 3 (12:56):
Now.

Speaker 4 (12:56):
I want it to happen.

Speaker 2 (12:59):
Just put it out in the universe. I did. I did.

Speaker 1 (13:02):
I should have kept it to myself yet.

Speaker 2 (13:06):
I haven't even asked her yet. She might say no.
She might say no. I don't know. We'll see.

Speaker 1 (13:12):
If she says no, I'll make Pee ask or she can.
She can't say no to p for some strange we say,
but I.

Speaker 2 (13:20):
Was sigying daughter.

Speaker 1 (13:21):
Uh huh. That's a one hundred percent. That's one hundred percent.
All right, Victoria, what about you?

Speaker 2 (13:26):
What are you reading? I haven't looked on it.

Speaker 4 (13:29):
Go ahead, I'm reading through the Brindlewood Bay. It's a
tabletop RPG and I backed it on Kickstarter a while ago,
and I really just want to get people to play
it with me. So it's a murder Mystery RPG and
the the the group is a group of little old

(13:49):
ladies and like, yeah, and you're you're like this little
old lady club solving murder mysteries in your town, and
your skills are based on like little old lady skills
like needle point and crochet and bird watching. And I
was like, this is excellent. So I just had I
just have to convince four people to be little old ladies.

(14:13):
I think it's because I'm a little old lady inside,
like I just want to be home with my blanket
and doing my crafts. And I like bird watching, like
I have bird feeders, and I really wanted like there
there's like bird charcoutery that was going around on TikTok
for a while and they just put out these like

(14:35):
plates of seeds and nuts and like little fruits and jellies,
and I wanted that to like work from my backyard.

Speaker 2 (14:47):
But I have so.

Speaker 4 (14:48):
Many freaking squirrels m and they are a problem.

Speaker 2 (14:55):
Yep, because they gotta steal all the birds eat.

Speaker 3 (14:58):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (14:58):
Yeah, they build some kind of contraption to keep them off.

Speaker 4 (15:03):
Not only and I had this massive back window in
my kitchen so I could sit at my table, and
I could like look over the porch and the like birds,
you know, on the railing. I put the like charcoterie
on the railing, and the squirrels got to it, and
this like young squirrel steals it and is like looking
directly at me and peas on the charcouterie board. And

(15:26):
I was so upset, and I was like, you gotta
be kidding me. And you know those like giant suet balls,
like they're about sides of a baseball. That squirrel put
it in his mouth and tried to run with it,
but it was bigger than him, and so he just
tripped down the porch with it and like down the
porch stairs. In my answer, you get what you deserve, squirrel.

Speaker 2 (15:51):
Damn it, squirrel.

Speaker 4 (15:53):
Made Nick throw it all away. I was like, the
charcooterie failed. We have to go and get actual bird
feeders with squirrel cautions.

Speaker 2 (16:01):
Yep, because Brindle would bay. I want.

Speaker 4 (16:05):
I want a little group of t t RPG little
old ladies hang out with me and be little old
ladies together solve and murder mysteries.

Speaker 2 (16:13):
Mm hmmm nice.

Speaker 3 (16:16):
Does it have to be in person?

Speaker 2 (16:18):
No?

Speaker 4 (16:21):
Oh, are you are? You might be willing to be
a little old lady.

Speaker 3 (16:25):
I have a wig already and outfits, and I look
around my lots of crafts and I'm like, this makes
me feel more powerful.

Speaker 1 (16:36):
Right, Yes, Jordan's like I could even cosplay the part.

Speaker 4 (16:43):
Jordan is prepared. Maybe we'll have to talk.

Speaker 3 (16:46):
Yes, Look, I looked it up and read some of
the titles. Mm hmmm uh, the Great Brindle would Babe
bake off jingle bell.

Speaker 2 (16:55):
Shock, Gosh, I know it's so good. Well, I can't
wait to hear about it. I can't wait to hear
about it. Well, I can't guess.

Speaker 1 (17:11):
I can tell you what I've been playing, I mean,
no reading, reading. Well, nobody cares what I'm playing, talking
about what we're reading. So I didn't read a lot
while I was sick, because I was, you know, sleeping
a lot. I was healing and you know, payments and
all that other good stuff.

Speaker 2 (17:31):
But I did I have been reading. I have to
find my list.

Speaker 1 (17:34):
There we go, So I'll talk about the last three
things that I well, two things that I read, and
what I'm reading now. I had to finish. I had
to read yellow Face, had to see Rosie Agrees. I
had to read Yellow Face by our Quang for book
group for book club, which I really enjoyed. It was

(17:55):
one of those books that I think I read that
book in like one day. I read that book in
one day. I started reading the book is I love R. F.

Speaker 2 (18:05):
Quong's work. And I will say spoilers.

Speaker 1 (18:09):
If you are in book club, if you're in Big
Club with me and we haven't had book club yet,
don't listen to the next thirty seconds. There were a
couple of chapters near the end that I felt like
were just filler, that they were like this books too,
that somebody told her that her publisher or editor told
her book was too sure she had to add because
I was like, uh, this is unnecessary filler kind of feeling.

(18:30):
But as a whole, the concept of the book was
so absolutely riveting that I had to see what happened
at the end. I had to see what happened at
the end. So I read it all in one day.
And then I also read pet and Yellow Face. I

(18:50):
have had for probably a year and it's been in
my TBR pile. Then it got chosen for book club
and I was like, oh, I wish I would have
read this a long time ago. The other book that
I've probably had for I don't know, several years, because
somehow it was a book that I hadn't read. And
I generally don't put books on my bookshelf until they

(19:10):
are read or in the bookshelf in my office, because
if I put them on a bookshelf in my office,
that means that they're read, and I don't go back
to them unless I'm looking for a particular book. So
it ended up on my bookshelf in my office, and
then I was looking for a book and I was like.

Speaker 2 (19:28):
Why is this here?

Speaker 1 (19:29):
I haven't read this, So I pulled it down and
I started reading it, and it was pecked by Oh,
I'm gonna I'm gonna slaughter.

Speaker 2 (19:37):
His name I kaway Ki Mzy.

Speaker 1 (19:41):
And it is about a teenage girl named jam and
her best friend and they live in a world where
monsters don't exist anymore, and monsters very loosely defined, right,
So it's not just the monsters that we I think,
monster under the bed, but monsters that exist in the

(20:02):
world every day, right. And her mother's an artist and
she paints this picture and one day a monster comes
out of her not a monster, a creature comes out
of her mother's painting, and the creature tells her that
it's searching for a monster, and that's how the story starts.

(20:27):
So I started reading the book Monday, and I had
to teach. So I started reading the book Monday Monday
morning because I was, like I said, I was looking
for a book for class. I grabbed it and I
read it for a couple of chapters.

Speaker 2 (20:39):
It was early in the morning. I didn't teach until afternoon,
and I was like, oh, this book is good. So
but I went and I taught.

Speaker 1 (20:45):
Then I came home and you know, made dinner for
my kid and hung out with my kid and stuff.

Speaker 2 (20:49):
So I didn't read any more of it. Then I
started reading Tuesday, and I didn't have class on Tuesday.
I started reading Tuesday night. I was like, oh, I'm
just gonna.

Speaker 1 (20:58):
Read a couple of chapters of this before I go
to bed. It's a short but it's only like undred
fifty page or.

Speaker 2 (21:03):
Something like that.

Speaker 1 (21:04):
So I said, I was gonna read a couple chapters
of this before I go to sleep, right, So I
started reading in.

Speaker 2 (21:08):
Bed six am, four point thirty in the morning. I
finished it.

Speaker 1 (21:19):
I hit a point in that in that book I
was like, Okay, there's no sleep tonight. There's no sleep
tonight because I cannot There's no way I can go
to sleep without getting resolution because some shit happened in that.

Speaker 2 (21:37):
Book that I was like if.

Speaker 1 (21:39):
I was like, if I try to go to bed
at this point without knowing how this all resolves, I'm
gonna have nightmares.

Speaker 2 (21:48):
So I was up until four thirty in the morning.

Speaker 1 (21:50):
I if you haven't read this book, it's a very
short book.

Speaker 2 (21:54):
Please read this book and retrigger warnings if you need them.
Re trigger warnings if you need them.

Speaker 1 (22:01):
I won't offer them because some people don't like trigger
warnings because the trigger warnings can be spoilery. Just so
you know, trigger warnings can be spoilery. That was an
amazing book.

Speaker 2 (22:14):
That was an amazing book. Like I said, I four
thirty in the morning, I finished the book. I was
so mad.

Speaker 1 (22:21):
I was like, why did I start this at bedtime?
I do that way too much. Started at bedtime, and
then then I said, and then I end up standing
up all night crying.

Speaker 2 (22:30):
Into a book.

Speaker 1 (22:33):
No, yeah, I've done that several times.

Speaker 2 (22:36):
I've done that several times.

Speaker 1 (22:38):
But highly recommend ten out of ten would definitely read again,
even and even if it meant, I didn't go to
even if it didn't mint.

Speaker 2 (22:44):
I, even if it met, I didn't finish until four
thirty in the morning. And then yesterday I started.

Speaker 1 (22:55):
Rif Quong's new book that just came out this week.
It came out Tuesday. I had already or ordered the
special edition of it, so it didn't but mine didn't.
Mine came Tuesday night, like late Tuesday nights. So I
didn't start to till yesterday. So I Kwang's new book. Okay,
So some people say Katabasis. Some people say Katabasis, and

(23:18):
it is about graduate students who make a trip to
Hell to retrieve the soul of their dissertation director. And
I said, from now one, when a student asked me
if I will direct their dissertation, the first question I'm

(23:38):
going to ask them is if they would go to
Hell to retrieve my soul if I if I died
before before they finished their dissertation. No, I want them
to go, even if they finished their dissertation.

Speaker 2 (23:52):
I don't want to. I don't want to be completely mercenary.

Speaker 1 (23:55):
I want to know that they would go to retrieve
my soul, no matter what and if they can, you
can't answer that in an affirmative.

Speaker 2 (24:01):
I'm not directing a dissertation. I'm just playing. I'm just playing, y'all.
But yeah, so.

Speaker 1 (24:09):
I'm only a couple chapters into that because I just
started yesterday.

Speaker 2 (24:13):
And yesterday was a teaching day for me. So that's
what I'm reading.

Speaker 1 (24:21):
And a bunch of like little snippets of fifty books
that I put in the lab, in the little free
library in the lab over the last couple of weeks
because some of them have been twenty years since I read,
so I had to go back and like read snippets
of them to be able to make the if you

(24:41):
like the if you like this game, you like this
book cards for them because it had been so long
since I read them that I needed a refresher. So
I don't count those though, but lots of snippets, all right.
So next up is what you're playing, Jordan? What are
you playing?

Speaker 3 (25:03):
I am currently playing Beat Saber because we finally finally
went through the apartment and have everything set up. And
what I mean by that is we've been here for
three and a half years and I finally have a
functional office. So when we were going through everything, we

(25:29):
found some of the VR headsets and I'm like, we
should set this up. Finally get all our stuff together.
So we set that up and I've been playing some
Beat Saber, but then outside of that, I've been playing
at Peak with my partner and that one has been

(25:53):
a lot of fun because we didn't know much about it.
It's just we heard it was popular, we heard it
was a co We were looking for a co op
game and we jump into this cartoon.

Speaker 4 (26:10):
Based world.

Speaker 3 (26:11):
I'm like, oh, this is fun, this is cute, and
then we figured out the pain that is Peak of
climbing these different levels of mountains and dying over and
over and over again, and when you die you have
to start. Well, you can help resurrect players, but if

(26:33):
you both end up dying, for the most part, you
have to start completely over. And the levels are generated
differently every twenty four hours. So that has been a ride.
But we have really liked that game.

Speaker 1 (26:56):
That game has been ridiculously popular in content creator circle.
Like lately, I haven't played it or really watching a
gameplay of it, but I hear people absolutely love it.
And also, let me tell you, okay, it took three
and a half years. Perfection takes time.

Speaker 3 (27:12):
It's fine, short, That's what I'm telling myself, Doll, I
have my stuff together. I'm on top of it.

Speaker 4 (27:23):
I really enjoy Peak too. Did you see a couple
of weeks ago when they posted that on social media?
I think it was on Twitter that the map that
day was indeed impossible to get through. Oh wow, I
was so angry because I've been trying like all day
to solo and I'm like, there's no possible way I

(27:43):
can get through this jungle. Turns out there was no
possible way to get through the junk.

Speaker 2 (27:48):
Okay, So for those who don't know, can y'all tell
us what Peak is about.

Speaker 3 (27:55):
It is a solo to four player game in which
you have been stranded on this island, and together you
have limited resources. Although you generally find a good chunk
of resources, the biggest difficulty is how much you can carry.

(28:21):
So you can have a backpack that holds stuff, and
your person has pockets in their shorts I guess, so
they can hold some stuff. But you are trying to
get to the peak to signal a flare to be rescued,
and there's like five levels. In each level is a
different biome and adds a different type of difficulty, and

(28:46):
so over time you are trying to combat your level
of stamina with your level of health, level of hunger,
and then different status effects that limit how much you
can move. So as you're climbing, you and your uh
well again, you can play solo, but either you or

(29:08):
the co op players can help each other. But I
find it is easy to get lost.

Speaker 2 (29:13):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 3 (29:14):
So basically a climbing game with resource management both on
yourself as the player and with the items that you have.

Speaker 2 (29:25):
Okay, so sounds interesting, y'all.

Speaker 1 (29:31):
Y'all try to make y'all always make me buy games
that I don't have to have to play.

Speaker 4 (29:39):
This one doesn't have a horror aspect, so I guess
there's that.

Speaker 2 (29:42):
Well, hey, there we go.

Speaker 3 (29:45):
Are you're afraid of heights and you fall down and
gets footy palms?

Speaker 2 (29:49):
I am afraid.

Speaker 4 (29:50):
Unless you don't like the idea of cannibalism.

Speaker 2 (29:55):
Oh my gosh.

Speaker 3 (29:56):
I we were playing two days ago and went on
the pause screen and all of a sudden, my partner
was like, cannibalism is automatically enabled, and I'm like, what
we have not run into that? I don't know what
that is in terms of this game, and I don't

(30:17):
want to find out.

Speaker 4 (30:19):
So there was an exchange on Blue Sky, I think,
and their post was guys, we are not we are
absolutely not adding cannibalism. And then like two days because
somebody had said cannibalism when and they're like, we are
absolutely not adding cannibalism. And then like two days later

(30:39):
they're like, oh, and they there was a screenshot of
their update that all it said was cannibalism added.

Speaker 2 (30:46):
Wow. Wow, y'all trying to set me up.

Speaker 1 (30:55):
Y'all try to set me up. You know, I have
no self control. Zip Zeal's dilch and then I'm gonna
end up buying it, and then I'm gonna be I'm gonna.

Speaker 2 (31:06):
Be like traumatized forever. No, Okay, maybe I'll try it.

Speaker 1 (31:13):
I think it's probably I think I probably put it
on my wish list. To be perfectly honest, I probably already.

Speaker 2 (31:17):
Put on my wishlist. We'll see, we'll see, we'll see
what we gave.

Speaker 3 (31:24):
Yeah, it's a lot of fun. I haven't played by myself.
I've only played it as two players, so I don't
know if there's like a big difference that you've noticed, Victorian.

Speaker 4 (31:38):
No, I don't think so. I've played solo and up
to four, and we also got a mod to play.

Speaker 2 (31:48):
Six.

Speaker 4 (31:49):
Six was a little rough because there is indeed only
so many resources on the map.

Speaker 1 (31:56):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 4 (31:58):
But yeah, especially food. Food is the limited resource. It
feels like, oh my gosh.

Speaker 2 (32:08):
Yes. And then cannibalism.

Speaker 4 (32:10):
Now, I guess cannibalism I encountered yet or seen what
it does. I do know there's a badge for it,
because I think it's like named to have a little
snack or something like that, and I was like, that
must get a cannibalism catch.

Speaker 3 (32:29):
If it is as described. I don't think we'll run
into that because usually when my partner falls down or
I fall down, we're like falling thousands of feet and
I'm like, I'm not coming to get you by Oh,
but yeah, that caves a lot of fun.

Speaker 2 (32:46):
Sounds like fun. And then the only.

Speaker 5 (32:49):
Other game that I have played or have been playing,
which was my number one look forward to game from
one of the podcasts earlier this year, which is Claire
Obscure Expedition thirty three.

Speaker 2 (33:03):
Oh right, and how are you liking it?

Speaker 3 (33:10):
Oh my gosh, I think it's one of my favorite
games ever. Oh, the environment and art is beautiful. The
soundtrack is wild. Like most open world games that take
in between anywhere from like forty to one hundred and

(33:31):
fifty hours to complete, I've found are three and a
half to four hours with around fifty to sixty tracks,
this game has over one hundred and fifty tracks and
over eight hours, and all of the music is very,
very good. The writing and the story is so good.

(33:56):
It is very heavy, though it does a good job
after you get past the beginning between the characters and
like some light moments, some humor, and then going back

(34:17):
to some of the more difficult moments. But I don't
think I've played a game where I've loved all of
the characters so so much and when I got to
the end of this game. But that giving away spoilers.
Our living room is set up so that we each

(34:39):
have our personal computers in there, but then we also
have the TV with the main console, and from our
computers we can see if someone's screen on the TV
if they are playing a game, but we can't see
the person because they're in a chair facing a TV.
And my partner looked over at one point saw that

(35:00):
the credits were rolling, and he's like, oh, how did
you like it? And I didn't respond for like a
solid two minutes, and he's like, ah, I got it
because I couldn't respond because I was crying so hard
and like I wasn't making any noise. It Oh my gosh.

(35:25):
I just I love the story, I love the characters.
It hit so hard. I want to go back and
finish all the side content. I've never wanted to, like
go back and play New Game Plus, but I want
to with this game. And again, there's a lot of

(35:48):
I was told this, and there's a lot of discussion
online around this without giving too much away about the end.
There's a lot of talk on hey, when you get
to the end, and you will know it, go straight
to the end, don't do a bunch of side content.
And I did a little bit of side content, but

(36:10):
I followed that advice, and part of me wish I
wouldn't have, because there is something with the characters and
something with you as the player that becomes clear if
you play the game how you want to play. And

(36:31):
it's really hard to describe what I mean without giveaway spoilers,
but if you want more of a challenge at the
end for all the final bosses, and you, as a
player find that more rewarding, you should go earlier. It's
not like a perfectly do this or do this if

(36:52):
that's something you generally like, do that if you want
to discover something about how the game bridges understanding and
emotion between you as the player, and something that happens
with the main characters that you find you now directly
have done the same thing as play how you want

(37:14):
to play, even if that means playing a bunch of
signed content and being over leveled for the final boss.

Speaker 2 (37:24):
Good to know, Good to know? All right, what about
your victoria? What you've been playing?

Speaker 4 (37:35):
I am still playing my standard games Fall Up seventy
six and Black Op six and Repo, and I've been
playing Peak recently, complete kind of completed Cole to the Lamb.
We completed the like the story all the way through,

(37:57):
and then it resets and you have to do it again,
and I don't know if I have it in me
to do it again, and so it's just been kind
of sitting right now because I honestly I don't I
don't know if I have it in me to do
it again and to make the villagers, you know, to

(38:19):
breed the villagers so I have enough villagers to unlock
certain things, and I just I don't, I don't know
if I have it in me to do it again.
It was cute and it was fun, but.

Speaker 2 (38:33):
Yeah, I don't. I don't know.

Speaker 4 (38:36):
Recently we bought the pixel remaster for a Final Fantasy
one through six, and so we've been playing that together,
like just passing the controller back and forth like it's
the nineteen nineties. And we completed one hundred percenting, so
we one hundred percented one and now we're onto two

(38:58):
and it's it's interesting, like the things that you forget
and then the things that you remember.

Speaker 2 (39:02):
Mm hmm mm hmmm, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 4 (39:08):
Like that, Like when going through certain parts of the map,
I was like, oh yeah, like right here is where
the chocobos are going to be in number two? Is
jocobo in two? And then being annoyed in one when
there are no chocobos because it didn't exist yet. Yeah,
And I was like, this clearing in the forest is

(39:31):
fantasticly circular. No choco bos yet.

Speaker 2 (39:36):
No chocol bols yet. I'm sorry, got you buy it too.

Speaker 4 (39:40):
Did you buy it too?

Speaker 2 (39:41):
I did.

Speaker 1 (39:42):
I bought I bought a physical I've been buying more
physical stuff lately because I'm tired of companies taking their
taking their stuff back and be like, you didn't really
own that game, you just owned the right to pay
for it. So I'm back to doing a lot more
physical collection than I had been for a little bit.
But I haven't had a chance to play it yet

(40:03):
because it was one of the things I was going
to play this summer. And then I did something else weird,
but I'll tell you about that later, but go ahead.

Speaker 2 (40:10):
I'm sorry.

Speaker 4 (40:12):
And then you watched all Lord of the Rings, and.

Speaker 2 (40:14):
Then I watched as Oh my God.

Speaker 4 (40:17):
Which coincidentally is probably about the same amount of time
it takes to one hundred percent Final Fantasy one.

Speaker 2 (40:27):
Oh my God. Yeah, probably probably.

Speaker 4 (40:32):
Yeah, we're just and then this we're patiently waiting right
like other Oh we're playing Grounded Too. I forgot about that.
But Grounded Too is going to be one of those
games where it's on and off because it's in pre
release and so they're releasing they have a roadmap of
content over the next year, and so getting too deep

(40:56):
into it, they're going to change things and update things.
But I wanted to play it because I wanted to
write ants, like I wanted to write the bugs, And
now I am writing an ant and the next thing
I will be writing is an orb weaver.

Speaker 2 (41:08):
He had a bug mounts. Oh, I don't like bug mounts.
I don't like bugs.

Speaker 4 (41:13):
I don't like bugs either, but I like Grounded for
whatever reason, I get it. And I only scream a
little bit when I see a wolf spider where I
see like, what I feel like is a bug like
leg appearing on the side of my screen. And bugs.

Speaker 2 (41:29):
Yeah, no, I'm a pass on that. I'm a pass
on that, but I feel like it.

Speaker 1 (41:39):
We would be doing an extreme disservice to not mention
the fact, since we have been probably been talking about
this for the last five years, that we did finally
get a release date for Silk Song. Yeah, and you've
been wishing for that game since forever and saying that

(42:04):
it was gonna be it was your most anticipated game
of every year whenever we do the Beginning of the
Year episode and then and then.

Speaker 4 (42:13):
This year, I was utterly defeated instead of it was it.

Speaker 1 (42:15):
Didn't put it on your list, right And now we
have it, and now we have a release date for it.

Speaker 2 (42:21):
A lot of people are still a little skeptical, and.

Speaker 4 (42:23):
You clipped it and release it. You're like, look, how
sad she sounds. I'm like, I do sound sad. I'm
just utterly defeated.

Speaker 2 (42:30):
Tim Cherry, Yeah I am.

Speaker 4 (42:33):
I'm I'm not skeptical. It's going to happen. It's going
to happen. It doesn't It doesn't matter that there is
no like pre download button, even though there is one
for the other games on the Game Pass, like Outer
Worlds too, and just it doesn't matter that this just
it doesn't matter. It's going to be there. It's going
to be there on the release day. And I think

(42:55):
that's not this weekend, but next weekend, next Thursday.

Speaker 2 (42:58):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (42:59):
Yeah, yeah. The students asked me if I would be
canceling class on Friday, and I was like, nope.

Speaker 2 (43:07):
You yeah, they were hoping.

Speaker 4 (43:09):
I told them I am of age where I can
be an irresponsible adult and play games all night and
still have to show up the next day to my job.

Speaker 2 (43:17):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 3 (43:19):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (43:19):
We don't get to We don't get to do that.
I felt like we had to. We had to. We
had to mention that at least, but uh so, I
guess is are you? Is that it for you?

Speaker 4 (43:36):
Or yeah, that's it for me?

Speaker 2 (43:38):
Okay me?

Speaker 1 (43:39):
What I've been playing not a whole lot, because, like
I said, I had abdominal surgery, so sitting up and
like playing video games and holding the controller or handheld
in certain ways was causing pain. So I didn't play
a lot of video games. That's why I was watching

(43:59):
the full run of Lord of the Rings and a
full play through of Soth Midnight on the TV. But
then as soon as I got felt well, I was
feeling better and gaming was not painful. I did start
to play some games that were not necessarily not very stressful, right,
just kind of chill out games. I did play a

(44:20):
little bit of Call of Duty here and there, but
I went like a full month or more without playing
any Call of Duty, which is big for me because
I play Call of Duty generally just about every day.
But I played Tiny book Shop, which is kind of
like the perfect little game because I get to drive

(44:41):
around this like coastal town and sell people books and
it's a lot of fun.

Speaker 2 (44:48):
I know, it sounds like.

Speaker 1 (44:52):
It's like, why would anybody want to play that game
kind of thing, but it's a lot of fun, and
you get to recommend people books, and the books that
are are in your inventory, and the books you get
to recommend people are actual books, like for real IRL
books with for real IRL descriptions, And it kind of
feels like a cheat being an English professor and playing

(45:14):
that game because you've read I've read all those books,
so I don't have to take the time to read
the descriptions in order to recommend them to people. All
I have to do is like zoom past to see
all the titles. If somebody's like, I want to read
an epic poem written by you know, a dude who
goes on a voyage, and I'm like the Odyssey, There

(45:38):
you go, you know.

Speaker 2 (45:39):
So it's kind of easy to do that, but it
also makes.

Speaker 1 (45:43):
It more fun because it's like a little challenge, like
how well do I remember all this stuff that I
read twenty thirty forty years ago kind of stuff. But
it's been a lot of fun playing that. One Discounty
is another one that I've been playing.

Speaker 2 (46:00):
It's like.

Speaker 1 (46:02):
A farming sin without the farming, which sounds weird, meets
a shop management game where you are pretty. You know
what it is. Here we go for everybody who's ever
played Stardu Valley, it is the Jojo Mart simulator.

Speaker 2 (46:22):
You get pulled.

Speaker 1 (46:23):
Into this by your aunt who lives in a small town.
But what she has done is opened her own branch
of Walmart. And so you come in and you're trying
to grow this corporate conglomerate in small town wherever you are.

Speaker 2 (46:44):
And it's called discounty.

Speaker 1 (46:45):
And some people will love the idea in town and
some people will hate the idea in town. But there's
also like stories going on, you know, people having their
own lives, like having relationship problems, going through divorce, like
all kinds of stuff. There's like there's a and there's
a mystery afoot and it's and it's been a whole

(47:07):
lot of fun.

Speaker 2 (47:08):
It's been a whole lot of fun.

Speaker 1 (47:09):
I haven't played in like a week because they patched
stuff like a week ago and.

Speaker 2 (47:17):
It broke.

Speaker 3 (47:18):
Uh.

Speaker 1 (47:19):
It broke an element of the game that gives you
like narrative bits about people in town. Right, so you
see something and you can click on that when they're
standing near it, because it'll be something that's related to them.
Like you'll go into the to the bank Guy's bank.
The bank guys get bang, You're going to the guy's bank,

(47:39):
and like on the counter, there'll be a little a
little file.

Speaker 2 (47:42):
If you click on it, it gives you more information.

Speaker 1 (47:45):
About like him and his family and the issues he's
having with his family.

Speaker 2 (47:49):
But that the.

Speaker 1 (47:49):
Last update broke that, so I was like, I don't
want to go in and like play this game and start,
you know, and like and have like just break it forever,
and I don't get those narrative bits. So I haven't
played at all, And then I hadn't heard anything else.
So I checked today and apparently they pushed a patch

(48:12):
yesterday or the day before yesterday that fixed it, so
I can go back and play in Discounty now, which.

Speaker 2 (48:18):
I've really been enjoying.

Speaker 1 (48:20):
And then the other game that I've been playing a
lot of is called Birdigo.

Speaker 2 (48:26):
Now.

Speaker 1 (48:27):
Last year Blotro had me in a choke hold. I
also love word games. Birdigo is Blatro meets word game.
It is a roguelike bird migration word game simulator, and
it's got card based mechanics, so.

Speaker 2 (48:50):
You get more points for words that you make.

Speaker 1 (48:54):
It's like kind of like almost like Yatze meets Bulatro.

Speaker 2 (48:59):
And it's so fun. It's so fun, and.

Speaker 1 (49:06):
I absolutely love it, and I absolutely love it. If
you like word games, I highly recommend Vertigo.

Speaker 2 (49:12):
Some people are like, it's kind of expensive. I think
it's twenty bucks, But you know what, I actually got
a code for it. I did get a code for
that discounty and tiny Bookshop. Did I get a code
for a tiny book shop?

Speaker 3 (49:26):
Yes?

Speaker 2 (49:27):
So, but I did get a code for it's way bucks.

Speaker 1 (49:29):
They could have had my twenty bucks three times over
for the amount of time I've spent playing Birdigo.

Speaker 2 (49:34):
I played that game every night.

Speaker 1 (49:35):
Before bed and then so in addition to just like
the kind of regular roguelike continuous element of it, they
have daily puzzles and stuff like that. And Victoria, I
saw that you were typing in the discord. Yes, I
know how you were a Bob Alatro. You should play Burtigo.

(49:56):
You should definitely play All I need.

Speaker 4 (49:58):
It's an obsession.

Speaker 2 (50:01):
You should definitely play Birdigo.

Speaker 3 (50:03):
Well, good news. It's only ten dollars on the steam
right now.

Speaker 2 (50:06):
Is it gonna see you?

Speaker 4 (50:08):
No?

Speaker 2 (50:09):
No? Is that the regular price? What it was?

Speaker 1 (50:12):
I think it was twenty dollars? Did they lower the price.
What the hell am I making that up? Maybe it
wasn't twenty dollars it had to be.

Speaker 2 (50:20):
Maybe they lowered the price.

Speaker 4 (50:21):
I know you don't talk.

Speaker 2 (50:26):
Well. Ten dollars, hell go buy you ten dollars.

Speaker 1 (50:31):
Go by two. It's a lot of fun. It's a
lot of fun. That's been my That's been my bedtime game.
I always have a bedtime game, a game that i'll play,
you know, for twenty minutes or half an hour before
I go to sleep at night. And Birtigo is it,
and Bertigo has been it lately except for the other
night when I decided to read. See that's why don't

(50:51):
I don't decide to read when I'm going when I'm
supposed to be going to sleep, because I'll get to
a point and I'll be like, well, I know, I
got three hundred pages left in this book, but I
got a find out what happens. So that's why I
do something like play Burdigo instead, because Burtigo.

Speaker 2 (51:05):
Won't keep me up until four thirty in the morning.

Speaker 1 (51:10):
And then I restarted Metaphor Refantasio because.

Speaker 2 (51:17):
I have a friend Trey Andrea Rushworth. Y'all may know her.
She's been on the she's been on the podcast before.
She's also a game study scholar.

Speaker 1 (51:29):
But Trey had an obsession with Final Fantasy, Final Fantasy,
Lord Have Mercy, Fire Embleom three Houses and has a
ridiculous amount of time in Fire in Boom three Houses
and was looking for like a new game to play
and couldn't find anything, so she was trying a bunch

(51:51):
of different stuff. She's like, I tried this for a
couple of hours, didn't like it. Tried this for a
couple hours, didn't like it. Tried this for a couple
of hours, didn't like it.

Speaker 2 (51:58):
I'm just gonna go back and play Fire Emblem again.

Speaker 1 (52:00):
And I was like, no, no, you have like four
hundred hours in Fire Emblem.

Speaker 2 (52:04):
It's time to play something else.

Speaker 1 (52:06):
So I got her to try Metaphor Refantasio.

Speaker 2 (52:12):
And then she was cursing my soul.

Speaker 1 (52:15):
And then she was like, I don't have anybody to
talk to about this game because this game came out
like a year ago. Nobody's playing it now. So she
was like, you have to replay this game with me.
So I went back and I found a save that
was about where she was.

Speaker 2 (52:34):
So I was about thirty.

Speaker 1 (52:34):
Hours in at that point, and I went back and
started from about the same point she was and started
to replay metaphor Refantasio, so that we're playing about the
same time.

Speaker 2 (52:49):
So it's been kind of fun to do that. It's
been kind of fun to do that.

Speaker 1 (52:52):
I've always threatened to do because I like book I
like book clubs. Sometimes sometimes I've always threatened to do
like a game club where we, like I could get
a group of people together to all play a video
game together at the same time so that we could
talk about it.

Speaker 2 (53:06):
So it's been pretty interesting to do that, to do that.

Speaker 1 (53:11):
So she texts me like two, three, four or fifteen
times a day to curse my soul for something that
happened in the game, and it's been fun to you know,
and then also sometimes to say I need this thing
and I don't know where it is. But then because
I've you know, played it like twice at this point,
playing through a second time, is that I can tell her, like, well,

(53:32):
you're not gonna get that until like.

Speaker 2 (53:36):
In game three months from now, so you can hang
that up.

Speaker 3 (53:39):
Or it's great because no risk of spoilers with googling.

Speaker 1 (53:43):
Right right, and I and I'm because sometimes she'll be like,
will you tell me when I get my next party member? No,
if you don't tell me, I'm gonna google fine, because
I'm like, you don't want spoilers. If you google that,
you're gonna get a huge, huge spoiler. There's no way
it won't spoil you to know that this person joins

(54:06):
your party.

Speaker 2 (54:08):
So yeah, I have to. I have to tell her
at that point.

Speaker 3 (54:13):
I don't know too much about the game, but my
partner played it, so I saw a few things. And
again I don't know much about the game, but I
have most of the soundtrack saved on Spotify.

Speaker 2 (54:23):
Oh my god, the soundtrack is so good, especially the
rapping Monks.

Speaker 3 (54:27):
Yes, those are the top songs that I've saved.

Speaker 1 (54:34):
So yeah, I started replaying Metaphor refantaz yeut so and
that's been That's been a lot of food. That's been
a lot of food.

Speaker 3 (54:43):
I also love the the Book Club game group because
with Expedition thirty three, I played it right as it
came out, and for weeks and weeks afterwards, I was
talking to a bunch of different people in different contexts
and no one was playing, and I'm like, you don't understand.
I need to talk to someone about this.

Speaker 6 (55:04):
And I was trying to convince so many people that
I knew that would like it to play it, and
eventually one of my coworkers was playing it at the
same time.

Speaker 3 (55:14):
And then we went to a small like retreat wedding
with our D and D players, and two people there
were playing it, and I'm like, oh my gosh, thank goodness.
But it's been a struggle to get people to play it.
So I'm just like, I need that game club.

Speaker 2 (55:35):
We should start one. We should start one.

Speaker 1 (55:38):
I'm going to are you with my other discord, the
non podcast discord, you don't know? Yeah, oh okay, we
should start one, and so we could talk about whatever
it is. And I think it needs to be like
a single player story game to so that we can

(56:02):
all have our own playthroughs but still have that conversation.
Because it's been a lot of fun, even though I've
already played Metaphor, it's been a lot of fun, like
talking with her every day about it, right because also
I get to laugh at her because.

Speaker 2 (56:18):
She does she doesn't listen.

Speaker 1 (56:19):
I'll tell her, don't, don't do don't, don't wait until
the last minute, and then she'll come crying I gotta
go back to a previous save because because you waited
till the last minute, like I told you not to.
Oh yeah, so but it's been a lot of fun.
So I we can We.

Speaker 2 (56:39):
Should do that.

Speaker 1 (56:40):
We should do that, We should do that. I'm a
ping people. I'm a ping people.

Speaker 2 (56:47):
Victoria want to come plays a j RPG with us
or RPG with us? Victoria's second, I don't want to
play that. Maybe you're no pressure. I'm just playing.

Speaker 4 (56:58):
You don't have I'm about to play Silk Song.

Speaker 2 (57:03):
Well that's true, let it, let it happen.

Speaker 1 (57:05):
Yeah, well that'll yeah that that that that's fine.

Speaker 2 (57:08):
I forgot. Forgot.

Speaker 1 (57:10):
Silk Song comes out next week. I want to play
Silk Song. I've never played Hollow Night, but I want
to play Silk Song. But I also know that because
of my hands, I'm not gonna be able to play
very much at a time. You know, I'll be able
to play like a half an hour hour at a time,
because otherwise I won't be able to use my hands.

Speaker 2 (57:28):
So and we don't want that to happen. No, and
we don't want that to happens. But I'm excited for it.

Speaker 1 (57:34):
That's why I didn't play Hollow Night because I also
have a bad habit of picking up those kinds of
platformers and being like, oh, my hands feel fine, I'm
just gonna.

Speaker 2 (57:43):
Play a little bit longer.

Speaker 1 (57:44):
And then it's not until my thumbs literally sees up
and I'm like, oh that I realize I've been playing
for like three hours.

Speaker 2 (57:53):
So yeah, but.

Speaker 1 (57:55):
I'm gonna do better this time. I'm gonna set a
little timer. I watch y'all to hold me to that
when I come back. When I come back for the
next podcast, y'all ask me how my hands are and
I'm like, oh, they're both embraces.

Speaker 2 (58:06):
But it's fine. Team Cherry is fine. But okay, I
like that.

Speaker 1 (58:14):
See, Jordan is bad. Jordan is horrible at convincing me
to do things that I know I shouldn't do want
to do. And then she goes, oh, yeah, you should
definitely do that, and I'm like, well, see, apparently it's
a good idea.

Speaker 2 (58:29):
Jordan said it was.

Speaker 3 (58:31):
I never said I was a good influence.

Speaker 2 (58:34):
Jordan does that all the time.

Speaker 1 (58:35):
Whenever we talk about books, We'll be talking about crafts,
we'll be talking about anything, and I'll be like, I
shouldn't do that, and Jordan's like, why not, you should
definitely do that.

Speaker 2 (58:44):
I'll be like, fine, let's do it. Yeah, yeah, so
we can do that. We can do that, all right.
So that's what I'm playing. That's what I'm playing.

Speaker 1 (58:56):
I also just installed on my kids switch to the
Bravely Default remaster because she wants to play it, and
she wants to she wants us to play it like together,
So I'll probably whenever she gets ready to start, we'll

(59:17):
be playing.

Speaker 2 (59:18):
We'll be playing that together because she's never played it
and I played. No, I'm not gonna spoil this in
any way, shape or form.

Speaker 1 (59:27):
I played a lot of it when it when it
was when it was out one D, when it was
when it came out on three DS, but I did.

Speaker 2 (59:34):
Not complete it. And if you've played the game before,
you know exactly what I mean. If you have not, no.

Speaker 1 (59:44):
Spoilers, but it has bugged me enough over the course
of the last ten years or whatever the hell has
been that I did purchase the remaster because I refuse
to let this game beat me. I refuse to let

(01:00:06):
this game beat me, so I'm gonna replay it.

Speaker 2 (01:00:09):
I could.

Speaker 1 (01:00:09):
I should have went back to my three DS safe
and played it from there.

Speaker 2 (01:00:12):
But nope, nope. I wonder how many years it's been.

Speaker 1 (01:00:16):
At least ten years because there was Bravely Default, there
was Bravely Default something with a subtitle, and then there
was Bravely Default too. That all came before the remaster,
so it's been at least ten years.

Speaker 2 (01:00:33):
So we shall see. But I'm gonna play that with
my kid. I'm gonna play that with my kid and
I'll be fine, all right? And what are we drinking?

Speaker 3 (01:00:45):
Jordan?

Speaker 2 (01:00:45):
What you drinking?

Speaker 3 (01:00:48):
I am now drinking water?

Speaker 2 (01:00:50):
What were you drinking? I'm not drinking water because we've
been talking for two hours.

Speaker 3 (01:00:55):
Well not that, because I don't know how to thoroughly
read and I still cannot comprehend time zones. So I
came down at three thirty. I was like, I'm ready.
I opened my drink and I sat down. I was like,
I did not read this fully. It's at five. So

(01:01:20):
I was like, well, this is already open and I
don't want to go bad, so I'll just slowly sit
on it for the next three hours. But it was
Boulevard Brewing Company would barren barrel fresh ale. And even
though this is ale, it's more of a stout oop,

(01:01:41):
And I really really like the stouts from Boulevard Brewing Company.
My favorite is the one made in whiskey barrels. My
second favorite is the one made in Burbal bourbon barrels. Yeah,
this one, it's not bad. It's just not my favorite.
But Star was out of the other ones, so I

(01:02:03):
was like, Okay, this is a good replacement.

Speaker 2 (01:02:07):
I guess.

Speaker 1 (01:02:09):
So the barrel fresh is it just straight barrel, not
a not a like a whiskey soap barrel or a
barrel that had whiskey in it before.

Speaker 2 (01:02:18):
Sorry, yeah, no, you're correct.

Speaker 3 (01:02:20):
And then it it's slightly I mean it is still
a higher alcohol, darker type beer, because I mean it
is more like a stout, but it also has ever
so slightly more of a I don't want to say

(01:02:41):
fruity because that's not the right word, like a red
ale almost mixed in. And I like just the regular
stouts in the age barrels better nuts.

Speaker 2 (01:03:00):
All right, what about you, Victoria? Whatch you drinking?

Speaker 4 (01:03:04):
I'm drinking an accidental raspberry lemonade slushy.

Speaker 1 (01:03:13):
When I read that, I was like, is it accidentally raspberry?

Speaker 2 (01:03:17):
Is that the brand?

Speaker 7 (01:03:18):
Name.

Speaker 4 (01:03:19):
What the hell I guess, raspberry lemonade, accidental slushie. Mm hmm, okay, yeah, okay,
my refrigerator is broken and without the whole long story,
neither side does what it's supposed to be right now.
But at least the freezer keeps things mostly cold but
not frozen. And so I put the lemonade in the
freezer because I wanted it cold, and it turned it

(01:03:41):
into a slushie, and so now I have an accidental slushie.

Speaker 2 (01:03:44):
Accidental slushies can be good.

Speaker 4 (01:03:46):
It is pretty good. I wish, but it's pretty good.

Speaker 2 (01:03:51):
Yes.

Speaker 1 (01:03:52):
I had a pomegranate pineapple lemonade the other day, which
was good because pomegranate is not super sweet, and you know,
pineapple is also, I mean, pineapple is sweet, but it
is also, you know, very acidic, and then so you mix,

(01:04:13):
but the pomegranate is it, and then you mix, so
you have the acidic pineapple with the acidic lemonade and
then the pomegranate to kind of smooth it out.

Speaker 2 (01:04:22):
It was really good. It was too sweet, though, it
was too They had sweetened it too much. They sweetened
it too much. I was like, you could have just
mixed all those juices together and gave them to me,
and I would have been fine.

Speaker 1 (01:04:33):
So now I have it in my head that I
want to go to the supermarket and get a bottle
of pomegranate juice, a bottle of pineapple juice.

Speaker 2 (01:04:40):
And then like make some lemonade that's not super sweet
and mix them all together.

Speaker 1 (01:04:45):
But I would have to drink the whole thing because
my kid is one of those people who's sensitive to pineapple.
Oh the enzyme in pineapple. Yeah, so the enzymes eat
her first. So yeah, so she can't really do pineapple.
So maybe something that's like pineapple but not pineapple.

Speaker 2 (01:05:07):
I have to think about it, and.

Speaker 1 (01:05:09):
Then that way I won't because I'm not gonna drink
a bunch of lem I'm gonna drink like a picture
of lemonade or a picture of you know.

Speaker 2 (01:05:16):
But if it's something else, she would drink something else
that she can drink, she would.

Speaker 1 (01:05:22):
So I have to think about what would be similar
to pineapple but not pineapple. They, I mean, all the
technology we have, can they date enzime pineapple dreuic yet?
But okay, so I'll tell you what I'm drinking. I
am drinking cherry cider.

Speaker 2 (01:05:44):
It is. I forgot I had it. I opened this like.

Speaker 1 (01:05:48):
Before we went on hiatus intentional or unintentional in the podcast,
and so it was in the fridge and there was
like a third of a bottle left, and it was
one of the seven hundred and fifty milligram bottles, like
a bottle of wine.

Speaker 2 (01:06:09):
And so.

Speaker 1 (01:06:11):
I was like, oh, I'll drink this, and I took it.
I was like, oh, it's like a lot left. It's
more than a you know, more than like a wine glass.
So I got a tumbler and I'm like, I'm just
gonna pour it all in there. I'm gonna pour it
all in there and I'll drink whatever I drink, and
then the rest of it I'll pour out because I'm
not putting this back in the fridge. And then I
realized also I hadn't eaten anything I had, and then

(01:06:35):
I was like, oh, let me grab something. So I
grabbed some food right before the some leftovers, right before
the podcast started. I was like, I got to put
something in my stomach in case I mess around and
drink this whole tumbler full of hard cider.

Speaker 2 (01:06:54):
So I pretty much finished it at this point.

Speaker 1 (01:06:57):
That's why I was like, I can't remember anything because
clear I've been drinking.

Speaker 2 (01:07:02):
And I haven't. I haven't had I haven't had a
drink all summer.

Speaker 1 (01:07:06):
So my body's like, what is the strange substances you're
putting into me? So, yeah, that's what I'm drinking. It's
a hard cherry cider. It's good, it's tart cherry e
and it feels very kind of fitting for the for
the season, the change of seasons. Now I need to
go back to the liquor store and get some seasonal siders,

(01:07:31):
some seasonal siders.

Speaker 2 (01:07:35):
Yeah, and that's what I'm drinking. That's what I'm drinking.

Speaker 1 (01:07:42):
So we were using this podcast as a as a
chance to catch up because not only have we not
podcasted because I was sick.

Speaker 2 (01:07:52):
So for the just the a brief.

Speaker 1 (01:07:57):
T L d R is that I got sick at
the beginning of the summer, and then I was sick
and waiting to get in to see a specialist, got
to see the specialist, got my surgery planned because they
were like, well, clearly you need to have your gawbladder out.
And then I had to wait for the surgery and

(01:08:20):
then I had the surgery, and it was a little
more complicated than we're going to punch three holes and
take your gawbladder out, because they had to do some
other stuff. So it took a little longer to heal
than just the regular laparoscopic just a regular laparoscopic gallbladder
removal surgery, even though it wasn't a full you know, surgery,

(01:08:43):
but the full old fashion gallbladder surgery, let's put it
that way.

Speaker 2 (01:08:49):
So we hadn't.

Speaker 1 (01:08:50):
Podcasted because I was just out of it. It was
completely That's why Jordan was like, it's not your fault.
It was one hundred percent my fault. It was one
hundred percent. Well it was my gallbladder's fault.

Speaker 2 (01:09:03):
How's that that might be better? It was my gallbladder's fault.

Speaker 1 (01:09:07):
So my mom was here all summer helping and making
me watch a lot of.

Speaker 2 (01:09:12):
TV because my mother likes TV a lot.

Speaker 1 (01:09:17):
But also it was great to have her here with
my kid, with you know, with my kid who's you know,
pretty much grown now, but she's seventeen, and you know,
she's not used to me being sick because I'm not
usually sick, especially with something like that.

Speaker 2 (01:09:32):
So having her here to.

Speaker 1 (01:09:34):
Kind of keep her grounded was really helpful and I
really appreciate my mother for that. So we were using
this episode as a chance to kind of catch up
and talk about what we've been playing and what we've
been doing and all kinds of fun stuff. We talked
a lot about what we've been playing. We can also
talk about anything else we've been playing. I haven't been

(01:09:55):
playing a lot of anything, but I did get oddly enough,
I got right projects done this summer. Victoria really kind
of saved my ass with finishing help finishing up this
the Call of Duty piece she and I were writing.
She and I finished that up and got everything edited,

(01:10:17):
and she did all the Oh my god, And let
me tell you the fact that you did all of
the formatting makes me feel like I owe you dinner
next time, uh, next time I see you, because that's
the part I hate the most.

Speaker 2 (01:10:34):
And that's also always the part that takes me the
longest too.

Speaker 4 (01:10:39):
I know, I like to format things.

Speaker 1 (01:10:40):
Well, you you are your documents are always beautiful, so.

Speaker 2 (01:10:48):
And and so you know ya.

Speaker 1 (01:10:50):
If you're a document design nerd, you'll you'll understand what
I mean by a beautifully designed document. Victoria makes beautiful documents.

Speaker 2 (01:10:59):
And then I finished my lower craft piece, which was
it was.

Speaker 1 (01:11:04):
Fun doing, but doing all the little stuff afterwards was
a pain in the ass. And when you're doing it,
and it's because it's a critical less play, So when
you're doing a critical less play, you're doing a video
and then it's all all done and then it goes
out and they're like can you change these things or
what about this? And you're like no, because you don't understand.
I have to just not like going in and editing

(01:11:26):
a document and saving it, I have to redo the
whole damn thing. So I kind of said to myself
at that point, I was never going to publish another
critical lets play and a peer reviewed thing. And then
immediately someone sent me a CFP for another critical let's
play and a peer review thing, and I was.

Speaker 2 (01:11:46):
Like, oh, I should do this.

Speaker 1 (01:11:48):
I was like, what is this like giving birth? You
know how people say they give birth and they're like, oh,
that's worst pain I've ever been in my entire life,
and then like two months later, they're like, what if
I did it again? Because they've forgotten. I feel like
it might be like that. I feel like it might
be like that. But I finished that, and then I
finished another piece that was going in a edit, a

(01:12:08):
collection on keywords on live streaming. So I actually got
a lot of like writing stuff done this summer.

Speaker 2 (01:12:16):
I don't know how.

Speaker 1 (01:12:17):
It must have been the drugs. It must have been
the drugs. Whatever drugs they gave me in post surgery.
I need to take more of No, I don't, I'm
just playing. I'm playing, y'all.

Speaker 2 (01:12:30):
I actually didn't take I just I actually didn't take
the narcotics. They were kind of mad at me.

Speaker 1 (01:12:34):
I actually wouldn't take the narcotics that they gave me
because I don't I don't like narcotics.

Speaker 2 (01:12:40):
I was like, I'm not taking that.

Speaker 4 (01:12:41):
You can.

Speaker 2 (01:12:41):
They were like, we're gonna call it in anyway. I'm not.

Speaker 1 (01:12:44):
Even when I was in the er, they came in
and they were I was like, what's that and they
were like, well, this is an in set and this
is and I was like, I'll take that. I will
not take that. They were like, but your pain, I
don't care. They were like, well, we're just gonna leave
it right here on the counter. It's not a it's

(01:13:04):
not all or nothing. You can take it later if
you decide. I'm not gonna decide you could take it
with you. Don't leave it there, what if it spoils?
And they thought they thought I was weird when I
said that, I'm like, no, I want that.

Speaker 2 (01:13:18):
I'm too much of a control free to take narcotics.

Speaker 1 (01:13:22):
I'm too much of I'm too much of a control
free to take take narcotics. I was like, no, I
need to know what's happening at all times and be
fully in possession of my faculties.

Speaker 2 (01:13:36):
So that's what I did this summer.

Speaker 1 (01:13:39):
Be sick, get surgery, heal, and finish up writing projects
and not really play video games until just recently.

Speaker 2 (01:13:48):
Yeah, anybody else do anything fun? This summer.

Speaker 3 (01:13:55):
Play expedition?

Speaker 2 (01:13:58):
Cry about it.

Speaker 1 (01:14:01):
I started it, but it was right before I got sick,
so I didn't get a chance to finish it. I
started that and Date everything like literally like the weekend
before I got sick, Like literally the weekend before I
got sick. In fact, I was playing I was playing
Day Everything right before I went to bed the night

(01:14:22):
I got sick. Oh, but I I haven't gone back
to them because I haven't really been playing a lot.

Speaker 2 (01:14:33):
What about you, Victoria, did you do anything else fun
or interestingly, you did too, did I? Yes, what did
I do?

Speaker 4 (01:14:45):
I mean we wrote the article you're seeing it. Yeah,
I didn't get any chair.

Speaker 2 (01:14:55):
No, I don't want to out you. I mean bought
a house. I said, you're sitting in it. She goes,
I didn't get a new chair.

Speaker 4 (01:15:10):
I was legitimately looking down like my chair. I was like,
I didn't get a new chra. Well, I did last year,
but I've put it in my office at the university
because it's one of them nice Herman Miller chairs, which
I sit at home more than it works, so I
should probably switch that up. But no, Yeah, I bought
a house.

Speaker 2 (01:15:31):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 4 (01:15:32):
Yeah, been doing house things, which is why it's frustrating.
The refrigerator is, you know, broken, because it was a
brand new, remodeled kitchen. The refrigerator is manufactured in December
of twenty twenty four. Its tag is in the refrigerator.
You can see it, and it's like, I'm broke. They're
not old enough to be broken.

Speaker 1 (01:15:54):
It's like, no, this new house, new refrigerator, you could
not break.

Speaker 2 (01:16:01):
Yeah, I did.

Speaker 4 (01:16:02):
I did buy a new house. I bought a new
old house, not as old as my Indiana house, which
was built in nineteen twenty, But I have a I
have a house, but.

Speaker 2 (01:16:14):
New old houses. Old houses are actually better than the
new ones most times.

Speaker 4 (01:16:19):
I agree. This one's from nineteen ninety, so it's it's
it's kind of on the cusp, but it's pretty solid.
And it survived a tornado.

Speaker 2 (01:16:28):
So there's that.

Speaker 1 (01:16:30):
Yeah, right before, right before you moved into it.

Speaker 4 (01:16:34):
Yeah, well right before, two days beforehand, the inspector had
come through the house and was like, everything's fine. Then
the tornado was two days after that, and Nick and
I drew. It took us an hour and a half
to drive across this town, which should only have taken
us like eight minutes according to Google, and power lines

(01:16:56):
down power lines. The shed in the backyard of this
house was in there, and.

Speaker 1 (01:17:01):
I didn't believe you when you said that until you
sent me the picture and I was like, oh my god,
the shd is in the tree.

Speaker 2 (01:17:09):
That is in the tree.

Speaker 4 (01:17:09):
We got a new roof out of it, So I
suppose there's.

Speaker 2 (01:17:11):
Not Hey, that's always a good thing. Mm hmm, yeah, yep.

Speaker 4 (01:17:17):
So I have I have a house, So I guess
I'm saying in Rala for a bit.

Speaker 2 (01:17:21):
Mm hmmm mm hmm. I mean, or you can sell
it either way. But it's exciting to have a new house.
It's always exciting to to move, at least until you
have to unpack. That's the worst part.

Speaker 4 (01:17:35):
I think we still have two rooms that have boxes
in them because we haven't finished unpacking.

Speaker 2 (01:17:40):
M M. It's a it's a process. Well, just like
Jordan just showed us, you have three and a half years.

Speaker 4 (01:17:46):
Yes, thank you, thank you.

Speaker 2 (01:17:49):
Jordan.

Speaker 4 (01:17:50):
I was feeling like we had friends over for game
night last night and there was a room with boxes
in it that's like next to the bathroom, the guest bathroom,
and I was like, should we close that door? My
partner was like, no, it's fine. They can see that
there's still boxes everywhere. It's like, oh, no.

Speaker 3 (01:18:08):
Other rooms in there. And then I'll add more time.

Speaker 2 (01:18:13):
It compounded.

Speaker 1 (01:18:14):
It resets time when you put more boxes in there.
So you know, right now, you you got three years
instead of three and a half years. You put more
boxes in there, it resets to three and a half years.

Speaker 3 (01:18:24):
I'm just saying, because if you moved it, you dealt
with it where it was, so it opened up that space.

Speaker 4 (01:18:31):
There you go, So if if we move it to
another room or like hide it in a closet. Does
that also reset time.

Speaker 2 (01:18:40):
If it's in another room?

Speaker 5 (01:18:43):
Oh?

Speaker 2 (01:18:43):
Sorry, would you say, Jordan?

Speaker 3 (01:18:45):
I would say the room that already has a bunch
of boxes or closet. If it goes to another room
that was open for me, I'd take it and just
throw it even if it didn't fit. I'm like, you're
going in here, coming.

Speaker 4 (01:19:00):
In the closet, wait until I start putting the boxes
under the guest bed.

Speaker 1 (01:19:10):
Funny suitcases under the guest.

Speaker 2 (01:19:13):
Bed that have so that's what I use, like, uh,
suitcases to store like seasonal clothes.

Speaker 1 (01:19:23):
So I have suitcases under the guest bed that have
seasonal clothes that really just need to be donated because
like the ones that are that are still packed in
the suitcases are ones that P have when she was younger,
that at different ages and outgrew, so they need to
be unpacked and donated, right because I would pack them
away like she'd be ten, and I would pack like

(01:19:46):
all of her, like her winter coat and thick sweaters
and stuff and put them under the guest bed when
I should have just packed them away because there was
no way she was gonna be able to wear them
the next year. So the ones that under the bed
and the guess from right now I need to be
pulled out, have all the clothes pulled out, washed, repackaged,

(01:20:06):
and dropped off at like Goodwill or so. So that's
what happens when you try to when you try to
store things away in a neat way that makes more room,
then you forget that they're there because you don't see them.

Speaker 2 (01:20:20):
So I got a side out of mind. At least
that's the way it is with me. Yep, mm hmm,
one hundred percent, one hundred percent. It's been so good
catching up with y'all. I miss talking to y'all. That's
the worst part. It's so nice it has been. That

(01:20:43):
was the worst part of the week of the summer.

Speaker 4 (01:20:46):
Don't have emergency surgery again.

Speaker 2 (01:20:48):
I won't. I don't plan on ever doing that again.
It was not fun. It was so it was so funny.

Speaker 1 (01:20:57):
I asked my daughter the other day about this, so
she bought me while while I was having surgery, she
bought me a I'm glad you didn't die stuffed sloth
because slots are one of my favorite like plushy animals. Right,
I don't know, I think slots are very cute otherwise too,

(01:21:18):
So she bought me a stuff sloth, and so I
asked her the other day.

Speaker 2 (01:21:22):
I said, okay, so here's a big question. And I
was like, I'm not being morbid. Oh I always I'm
a little morbid. I was like, did you buy the
sloth while I was in surgery or after I came
out of surgery? Well, I wanted to know.

Speaker 1 (01:21:44):
I wanted to know, and the answer was wild. So she,
you know, was not was not doing me. Well, I'm
gonna save my money in case she died.

Speaker 2 (01:21:53):
Thing.

Speaker 4 (01:21:58):
Oh it's manifesting.

Speaker 1 (01:22:00):
Yeah, yeah, it's like I bought this already. She has
to come out of surgery, she has to come out, okay,
because I gotta give it to her. So I did
get a I did get a new sloth, a very
cute one with a little heart on the chest out
of the surgery. That's the best part of surgery. Well
that in fact, that I can now eat food and
I'm not in pain twenty four hours a day, that.

Speaker 2 (01:22:23):
Too, is a good thing. Oh but it was. It's
been really good catching up with y'all, really really really.

Speaker 1 (01:22:34):
So now you know, absent any other weird stuff. We
should be back on track. Hopefully it's all.

Speaker 2 (01:22:44):
On me when it's not. Just so anybody listening, if
you're ever wondering why we're off track, it's my fault.
It's my fault. But I appreciate y'all for just chatting
and catching up tonight. It's been a lot of fun.

Speaker 1 (01:22:58):
Yeah, fun was and now we have to we have
to plan our we have to plan our set of
book club, our game club, and see what we want
to play, see who else we can drag into our ridiculousness. Yeah,
but thank y'all so much for hanging out, and thanks

(01:23:20):
to everybody for listening.

Speaker 2 (01:23:21):
We appreciate you.

Speaker 1 (01:23:23):
And so I guess with that, that brings us to
the end of episode two hundred and fifty nine and
until next time when we have episode two hundred and sixty,
where we're going to talk about something else fun. I'd
like to say, yeah, stay safe, stay I don't know, cool,

(01:23:48):
be cause it can be hot still even though the
weather's breaking here. And as always, my friends.

Speaker 2 (01:23:55):
Game one.

Speaker 7 (01:24:34):
SAT stations nations, estimations to name the station names the

(01:24:58):
bast as the name asks. Most men.

Speaker 2 (01:25:13):
Ask me.

Speaker 7 (01:25:50):
Indation that name the intimations lastly, nay name the name,

(01:26:14):
that's the name, Nate to anybody, anybody

Speaker 2 (01:27:02):
A