T.O.T. - Atari 50 Namco - Hellfire Club - Elden Ring Nightreign - MGS Delta - Katamari - More! - ThisWeekInGeek

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Did you grow up with them?

Speaker 2 (00:01):
Next?

Speaker 3 (00:01):
PlayStation star Boss?

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Can't you said any CV?

Speaker 2 (00:06):
Do you like to think you would win in a
fight between Batman and the mass Star Chick? Comic Skays, Movies,
Music Can TV. They're gonna tell you wheverything you need.
Superheroes are nothing, Cat sharp back, They're gonna save the world, Tomcakes,

(00:36):
Comic Skays, Movies, Music Can TV. They're gonna tell you
wheverything you need. Superheroes are nothing, Cat sharp back. They're
gonna say the world dom da swear, can't cake.

Speaker 1 (00:55):
Swear, can't cake? Well.

Speaker 4 (01:00):
Hell, Hello, Hello, Hello, and welcome back to another episode.
As you probably saw on social media, we were off
this week from the main show as Birdman and I
are working on a lot of stuff that has come
in for our holiday gift guides, Black Friday, Last Minute gifts,
all that fun stuff that comes over the next few
weeks as we you know, roll right into the holiday season.

(01:23):
It just didn't line up with how much were we
were working on at his schedule didn't work line up,
and I was like, we're not going to do another
solo show. We're going to do another review show. And
he says, I have a few things for you. We've
got something from Ken here, and then I said, okay,
well i'll see what I compare with it myself, as
there's a bunch of stuff that we want to get
to before it gets you know, untimely. As far as

(01:47):
what I have, I have to go through basically a
list of the things that I've got that are you know,
some of the things are embargoed, some things are not,
and I will see what I put in. But from Birdman,
we've got a decent variety of things here. I know
that there's some books, there are some games included from

(02:08):
both Birdman and Ken, and that's it's.

Speaker 1 (02:12):
Pretty much it.

Speaker 4 (02:12):
As far as what else has been going on with us,
I have been mostly just nose down into a lot
of the programming and behind the scenes stuff as getting
basically shit together for the shows. And Birdman has been
the same thing. He's recovering from being ill and then

(02:34):
also just dealing with a lot of you know, his
extracurriculars and like something he does with volunteering and whatnot.
So it's been a very pretty hectic last week or so,
but we should have everything smoothed out as we get
to our Black Friday coverage this coming week as well
as you know, getting stuff prep for the Gift Guide.

(02:54):
So not much more I can say here right now.
We'll sort of just get into it. I'll come up
back at the end and I'll give you an update
on some of our programming because we've got a lot
of cool stuff coming up. So without further ado, I
guess one of us is going to take it away
with our first review. Our friends at Atari have sent
over the Namco Legendary Pack for Atari fifty. For those

(03:15):
of you who don't know, I've talked about the well,
the Atari fifty pack as well as just the those
gold box sets that have been put out by Digital
Clips a fair bit. Oh, I guess over the last
year or two they've been putting them out, you know,

(03:35):
the most recent ones being the Tetris one and then
I guess after that was the it's not part of
the same gold series, but the the Mortal Kombat package,
which you know, as you've heard us and other people
talk about, has had some issues, but overall it's been
pretty well received. This is a major expansion for the
Atari fifty pack. For those that don't know, it was

(03:59):
a game aim that their whole shtick of how they
do things is it provides you with a timeline and
you get to like watch it documentaries, look at all
the interactive pieces of you know, media created for you know,
the entire timeline of a company or either a company,
a game studio or a series, and you'll see interviews,
You'll see things like posters and original artwork, and then

(04:23):
you can jump in and play the games as you
go along the timeline. And then of course you can
also just jump into the games as you want. But
the timeline thing is is the really interesting archival piece
that they put it together. And what they've done here
is they've added the other publisher, you know, Namco to
this where previously you were looking at things that were
first party published by Atari. They've done other expansions as

(04:44):
they go, and this time, you know, one of the
major companies that work with them over the course of
their fifty years was Namco, and you learn a whole
bunch of history about how Namco even started in the industry.
And I won't spoil much for you, but because it's
a really interesting watch. But what you have is games
from Namco that are spread over you know, the different

(05:06):
systems that a Torry put out, the twenty six hundred
and fifty two hundred and seventy eight hundred. There's you know,
games that you would have heard of like Galaga, dig Doug, Zvius, Glaxian,
as well as all new interviews with all the people involved.
We've had a chance to check it out on Xbox
as well as Switch, which is pretty sweet. I can

(05:28):
confirm that visually it performs and feels just as good
on both platforms, which is awesome. And you know, it's
one of those things where, yes, it's a cool expansion,
you do have to have the base game, but it's
one hundred percent worth it. There's a lot of value
involved here. I've been singing their praises for quite some time.
I've enjoyed it great visual I guess it's not just

(05:51):
the visual art style. It's just the art design of
visually representing, you know, a timeline of an entire company
is really well represented in the art language that they've
chosen for this. Audio wise, it feels like you're in
an arcade or you're just sort of like you're living
in the retro documentary yourself as you play it. It

(06:13):
can be played you know, portable as you said with
the switch, or you know, if you want to sit
down at a console you can do that. Your experience
is going to be pretty much the same regardless of
platform you play it on, which is always nice to see.
And it's good that we had a chance to check
out on both to make sure. And I'd say it's
definitely worth your time. If you're looking for something cool
as a gift for, like, you know, retro dad's, moms, kids, anybody,

(06:36):
this is a pretty good thing to get, you know,
pick up the Bass game, get the expansion pack for it,
and I don't think you'll be disappointed. I think you're
really gonna enjoy it.

Speaker 5 (06:44):
Hey guys, this is Mike the byrd Man here once again.
I'm here to talk to you about something kind of fun.
So I found something interesting while I was browsing YouTube
one day.

Speaker 1 (06:54):
And I was watching a video by.

Speaker 5 (06:56):
T t RPG YouTuber Jenny d and in one of
her sponsored segments, she mentioned a website called Brass Dragon Bistro,
and I was very curious, like what is this and
she started talking about it, and it's sort of these
D and D or tt RPG inspired food little snacks

(07:17):
you can have at your table, like these little gummies
and these little caramel things. And while that's awesome and
great and tasty, what they do is they offer in
game benefits.

Speaker 1 (07:27):
So if you're the dungeon.

Speaker 5 (07:28):
Master, or even if you're a player and you're willing
to share these around the table, this is kind of interesting.
So I reached out to Matt and Danny over at Brass,
Drag and Beetro. I'm like, hey, I saw your ad
on Jenny D's video. We're doing a holiday gift guide.
I'd love to talk about this. This sounds really weird
and kind of fun, and I have.

Speaker 1 (07:51):
Talked about gaming food before. If you guys remember gamer
grub rip, I.

Speaker 5 (07:56):
Guess this is kind of in the same vibe as
gamer food for gamers. So not quite gfuel worry it'll
stop your heart, but this is something that could maybe
turn the fight against Vekna or Orcus, for example. So
I was sent one of every flavor. I was sent
Cosmic Cosmic caramels with champions Chai, Elvin Espresso, Magnificent Mocha,

(08:20):
Halfling Hot Cocoa, and I also have ones that are
based on gelatinous cubes we've got good berry. I'm a druid,
so that's one of my first level spells. We also
have gelatinous cubes of blue, raspberry, fire fruit, and ginger.
But what I really dig it's the writing on the cars.

(08:41):
For example, I'm gonna read you the one for good berry. Sorry,
I'm a druid. You're just gonna have to deal with that.
So this is the gelatinous cube, and it reads as follows.
These free range gelatinous cubes were raised on a delicious
diet of forest good berries and used over the ages
as a preemptive cure for all manners of mala or

(09:01):
miladies either way, sorry, anyway. You can consume one of
these gummy cubes as a bonus action. When you do so,
you have resistance to poison damage. You lose this benefit
after you take poison damage ones, after you finish a
short rest, or after you consume another curious confection another one.
I'm gonna read you this is going to be the

(09:21):
magnificent mocha. This is the cosmic caramels one. This caramel
combines the luxurious flavor of dark chocolate with the powerful
essence of coffee. Who point is it ever creating a
delectable dessert worthy of any monarch's cord. You can consume
this caramel as a bonus action. When you do so,
you have advantage on the next charisma check or saving

(09:44):
throw you make. You lose this benefit after you use it,
after you finish a short rest, or after you consume
another curious confection, and then finally another one. I'm gonna
read you is the uh. This is another cosmic caramel.
This is the Elvin Espresso. This carmal is infused with
the very same coffee enjoyed but the high elves of
the Tower of Watchman's Spire. When consumed, it grants a

(10:07):
creature a taste of the mental acuity the experience when
studying in those vast libraries. When you consume this caramel
as a bonus action. When you do so, you have
advantage on the next intelligence check you make.

Speaker 1 (10:18):
You lose this benefit after you use it. You get
the idea. I could see some of these being kind
of fun for like an artificer or a wizard.

Speaker 5 (10:27):
Obviously, you know poison damage tends to come up a lot,
especially in the early levels of D and D, but
you could also use this in like Pathfinder or any
games that have poison or any of these checks that
would apply. I mean, maybe it might be a little
harder to use these in like Shadow Run, but I'm
pretty sure if.

Speaker 1 (10:44):
You were kind of fun you could do these.

Speaker 5 (10:46):
But yeah, I think these are actually really kind of
fun and I really dig these artisanal things where like
you can do something kind of fun, and like, the
prices are pretty reasonable. The Cosmic carmels run about ten bucks,
the Gelatinous Cubes about thirteen. You get free shipping on
orders over fifty dollars or above, and their customer service,
from what I can tell, is really second to none.

Speaker 1 (11:09):
The fact that I heard back from.

Speaker 5 (11:11):
These guys within like twenty minutes of running the email
is really awesome. I'm gonna presume it wasn't a very
hum I'm gonna presume my name just really stood out
and that you know, these guys, like I said, really
on the ball when it comes to helping out customers,
and they are more than accommodating. I have passed these
out to my wife Blair and my friend Liam. They

(11:34):
really dig the Gelatinous cubes. It's a really nice texture.
It's different than like say a sweetest fish or a
gummy bear. It's more gelatinous, And I know that makes
no sense, but it's more liquidity than a gummy bear.

Speaker 1 (11:50):
I would say, if I had to place this, if you've.

Speaker 5 (11:53):
Ever had a really fresh Twizzler's gummy or a really
really fresh but slightly more moist Skittles gummy, that kind
of reminds me of that.

Speaker 1 (12:09):
But even that doesn't do it justice. The caramels literally
are luxurious.

Speaker 5 (12:14):
That mocha one I had for the Elves, that was
the magnificent mocha that had the dark chocolate.

Speaker 1 (12:22):
I am not kidding.

Speaker 5 (12:24):
That is the best caramel I've ever had. Like, it
is such a rich coffee flavor, but it's undercut with
the chocolate. It's just it's this really nice infused combination
that I really am not doing justice too. It is
such a fun confection that have and the fact and

(12:45):
the fact that this can have an effect on your
T t RPG experience, I think it's great. Like, honestly,
if you gave these out as stocking stuffers for your
dungeon master or your gay mastering, for your like kind
of table that you're kind of playing at, I think
you're really gonna impress people like I really wish I
could share these with my friends, mostly because we play online,

(13:08):
not because I'm fat, but not seriously, Brass Dragon Bistro
really went out of their way to make sure I
had every sample available to them. I really think these
guys are great to deal with, So if you happen
to do something with breath with Brass Dragon Bistro, please
let them know that we sent you.

Speaker 1 (13:28):
I really think this is fun.

Speaker 5 (13:30):
I love adding new wrinkles to the live play experience
at my table, and honestly, if there's anything left when
I go down to my friendly local game store and
if any of my players wish to partake in a
free range gelatinous.

Speaker 1 (13:46):
Cube, I might just have to do that.

Speaker 5 (13:49):
So once again, if you want to find out more
information about these guys, go to Brass Dragonbistro dot com.
Tell them Mike from this week in Geek Sencha and yeah,
I think that's awful. So once again, big thanks of
those guys for sending us samples of this, and look
forward to me recommending these again when we have our
tt RPG Holiday Gift Guide, which would be premiering in

(14:11):
early December.

Speaker 6 (14:13):
The Hooded cultists chant hale Lord vecna hal Lord. They
turned to you and move thereods. They recognize most of
them from mockmart. There is one you do not recognize.

(14:38):
His skin shrivel, desiccated, something else. He is not only
missing his left arm, but his left off.

Speaker 5 (14:53):
Hey guys, this is Mike the Birdman here. I'm here
to talk you about something that our friends over at
Wizards of the Coast sent over for us to take
a look at. This is the Dungeons and Dragons Welcome
to the hell Fire Club box set, inspired by the
Netflix show Stranger Things, based upon the character Eddie who
really ramps up the D and D lore in the

(15:14):
fourth season where he passes the reins of the hell
Fire Club over to Dustin or Will.

Speaker 1 (15:19):
I can't remember which one is.

Speaker 5 (15:20):
I don't think it's Mike, but either way, what this
is this is a box set that includes multiple adventures,
multiple character seats for the characters as they advance through
level so, level one, level two, level three, et cetera,
et cetera, and some dice, some monster tokens, item cards, monsters,
et cetera, et cetera. I do like how they do

(15:44):
the Dungeon Master screen that comes with this set. It
is a really nice set, and I'm actually probably gonna
use that as my DM screen whenever I do convention
games here at the University.

Speaker 1 (15:57):
Of Guelph, or I'll be using this at my.

Speaker 5 (15:59):
Friendly local game store where I am one of the
game masters there. Currently what this is though, this is
an introductory box set where you're running very simple adventures,
but I would argue they are really creative, Like there's
one where you have to find this vanishing gnome. He
dares you to find him in this dungeon where you

(16:21):
fight a spawn of the demo Gorgan, which is the
monster that they've really decided to highlight in stranger things
like the weird creature with like the weird flower head
with all the teeth and everything. And if you find
this vanishing gnome, you get a cap of a vanishing
or another one. This is the adventure I think I
like the most out of the set is you'll get

(16:42):
hired by a farmer to go find his missing daughter
and it turns out there's a blight that's happening to
the land because the steak that was used to kill
a vampire has kind of gotten a life of its
own and has sprouted these evil vibe, and his loyal
hounds that were with him are now resurrected and are

(17:05):
causing trouble. And it's just it's really really creative, Like
there's actually our adventures.

Speaker 1 (17:11):
Here with plot and consequences.

Speaker 5 (17:13):
There's another one where there's like this murderer who has
like this pipe that can like summon rats and everything.

Speaker 1 (17:20):
There's like even like a demonic element in here.

Speaker 5 (17:23):
Honestly, the adventures, they feel like they were written with
a lot of love and someone who is definitely playing
the game around the nineteen eighties and into the nineties,
Like I'm old enough to remember what the old D
and D and A D and D sets used to
look like with the different colored booklets. Here they've actually
recreated that to a limited extent. Here, Like when I

(17:47):
read through the books, I feel the love, I feel
the vibe. And as much as I was expecting a
character like Eddie to have these really edgy encounters with
like more like types of like undead, like I was
expecting the Welcome to the hell Fire Club to be
a not a starter set. I was expecting this to

(18:07):
be of higher levels personally, kind of like the more
adventure pathy stuff where it's like, hey, this is meant
for characters one to twelve or something. That's kind of
what I was expecting. But this is a pretty cool
box set that's themed.

Speaker 1 (18:23):
The Last Stranger Things box set was also quite good.

Speaker 5 (18:26):
I thought I liked the mini that came with it,
But I think in terms of what you're getting in
terms of plot and in terms of adventures, I think
this is a lot better written. And this is obviously
based in the twenty and twenty four kind of rule sets,
so take from that what you will. I like some
of the rules, some of the rules I don't. But
considering we just got the Heroes of the Borderland set

(18:47):
a little while ago, I think I prefer this one
as the better box set.

Speaker 1 (18:53):
I think there are better tokens in the other.

Speaker 5 (18:55):
Set if I had to, if I had to yoink
something out of there. I like the character sheets here
because again they feel like the old school AD and
D sheets. Here's like all your stats, here's all your modifiers, this,
that and the other thing.

Speaker 1 (19:11):
Here's like your spells and everything. Again, I dig that.

Speaker 5 (19:14):
I love that, and I like how they even have
the players' names, like, hey, here's Erica, et cetera, et cetera.
It feels very steeped in the world and the facts
that they call it the world of Gray Hawkins, Castle Buyers,
stuff like that, Like it's very steeped in the lore
of the show.

Speaker 1 (19:31):
If you know, you know, and I dig that.

Speaker 5 (19:34):
That's very app or pro I think it's the word
they call it. I probably mess it up, but whatever. No, seriously,
I think this is great. With the new season and
final season of Stranger Things coming to a streaming service
very very soon, probably even as of this recording, I
think it should be out within like a week or so. No, seriously,

(19:57):
I think Welcome to the hell Fire Club is one
of the strongest box sets, at least in my opinion,
and I'm mostly basing in that upon the adventures. I
think with the right game master and with the hype
coming back, I think this could really get people excited.
If I did have to make one minor quibble, I
like I said, I wish the tokens were a little

(20:18):
bit better. There actually is a Netflix Stranger Things branded
dice set. It would have been really cool to get
those in here, just to add extra value.

Speaker 1 (20:29):
But what really impresses me.

Speaker 5 (20:31):
It's the theming of the items and the artwork on
the dungeon master screen and here is awesome. It looks
like Will's basement. It has just the overwhelming theme of Eddie. Now,
to talk very briefly about the digital version of this,
I like how you're getting all of the maps. Obviously,
you're getting all of the different tokens you can put

(20:51):
down the scarecrows and stuff like that.

Speaker 1 (20:53):
I use them for other things in my game.

Speaker 5 (20:56):
There's even like pictures of Eddie which we use as
Griff in our games, and we have them have the
magic mouse spell. So it's actually worked out really well
for my game master friend Paul. So yeah, we really
like this. I recommend it. I think this is a
great way to get into D and D and with
Stranger Things reigniting the hype, I think you should definitely

(21:19):
give this a check out this holiday season.

Speaker 6 (21:21):
Find out. Guys. I hate to say this, but we've
got to flee.

Speaker 5 (21:25):
I concur didn't we just agree to today?

Speaker 1 (21:28):
That wasn't literal.

Speaker 7 (21:29):
That just decimated us.

Speaker 3 (21:31):
We can't kill him with two players, you too, He
only has fifteen hit points left.

Speaker 1 (21:35):
Don't be pussies.

Speaker 6 (21:36):
Pussies, really because.

Speaker 1 (21:38):
We're not delusional delusional, how about not cowards?

Speaker 7 (21:41):
Hey, if I may interject, gentlemen, Lady apple Jack, whilst
I respect the passion, you'd be wise to take care
at the greats concern to heart. There is no shame
in running.

Speaker 3 (22:10):
Hey, guys, Ken Reels here and welcome to my review
for elden Ring Night Rain for the Xbox and thinks
of folks over at Bandai Namco and from Software for
sending me a code. This was the deluxe edition that

(22:31):
they sent over to me, and this is a third
person soulsborn Fortnite type run based game. Now that is
a mouthful of a sentence, but hear me out. You
and up to two other buddies can team up, or
you can just go solo battling the Creeping Night and

(22:52):
the denizens there in you drop in a Fortnite kind
of styled elden Ring asset using map and as the
encroaching Night or Rain seat lowsely crawls into a circle.

(23:15):
You end up having to battle all these different enemies
from Elden Ring as well as some of the bosses,
and that counts as a knight. Now, there are three
nights in the game, and each night is stronger and
stronger enemies. Each night you fight one from a pool

(23:37):
of major bosses, with the final night being a very
specific boss that you select before starting your run. You
select from a pool of six pre determined characters, with
additional characters coming in the upcoming DLC, which was recently
announced to be dropping in December. Each character has two

(23:59):
unique special moves, one that you can trigger as normal
on a cool down, but there is another one that
is basically your ultimate move that you use the ability
to use by dealing damage to enemies. And each character
is built very specifically, unique enough where that you're going

(24:23):
to eventually find one that suits your play style and
works for you. Overall. I'm incredibly happy with what I've
played so far of this game, and for the Soulsborn
player who really wants a quick, little dose of that
fun without having to jump into a new save of

(24:44):
one of the previous titles, it certainly scratches that itch.
And it is quick, it's fun, it's simple, you know
what you're doing and you just go. There are actually
two versions of the game digitally that you have. You
have the regular edition, which will cost you forty USD

(25:04):
and the Deluxe Edition, which will cost you fifty five USD.
The Deluxe Edition comes with the newly announced LC at
no extra charge, as well as a digital art book
and MEI soundtrack. And honestly, I'm super happy with this.
Expect to actually hear my recommendation on the Holligate Day

(25:28):
Gift Guide which is coming later this month for this title,
because this title is top notch. Cannot wait to play
more of this. Thank you to the folks over at
Bandai Namco and from Software for sending me a code.
And now back to the guys.

Speaker 4 (26:30):
Alex the producer here, and this is going to be
a QUICKI little I guess round up of indie titles
that I've had to review on Steam first Impressions, a
little bit of a full review for some smaller titles
that are very interesting. We wanted to make sure we
talked about them as we're getting closer and closer to

(26:51):
the holiday season and you might be looking to get
somebody like a gift card for Steam, or you know,
looking to pick up some like stocking stuff for that
sort of stuff, or even just for yourself treat yourself
sort of thing. So we've got a couple here and
then I've got one more that sort of came in
at the end of the last week or so that
I've had a chance to check out. But the first

(27:13):
two here are Million Depth and Motion rep from Playism,
so I've had a chance to you know, sort of
bounce around with these, both on the bedroom PC as
well as in the living room, and like the bigger setup,
both will play on pretty much anything. You don't have
to worry if you've got, you know, a computer from

(27:36):
the last ten years or so with you know, anything
but integrated graphics. And even then if you've got a
very very modern like Intel Ultra Series or something, you'd
have no trouble playing, you know, even with integrated graphics.
Million Depth is the basically your your You're underground and

(28:04):
you're going through different timelines. You're trying to save a friend.
Basically I don't want to spoil too much here, but
basically action strategy.

Speaker 1 (28:15):
You are.

Speaker 4 (28:17):
Using something called the biotope jammer, which freezes all the
enemies around you, and you're able to like then use
that extra time to defeat the enemies. You can craft
things to advance. There's there's a puzzle elements to it,
and it's it's pretty fun. It's it's it's not so

(28:40):
i'd say in depth that you're going to be like
worried that you're not gonna be able to figure it
out or do it, like unless you're like a hardcore
game or anything. It's got a decent learning curve the
difficulties there, but it's not too much as far as
visuals are concerned. It's it's a pretty good looking game overall.
I would say you have the ability to sort of

(29:02):
craft things and how you go around about. It's got
a very you know, anime ish style to it, but
it's pretty good. I don't think it's going to be
for everybody out there, but it's a pretty fun game overall.
And you know, it's sitting at about depending on the
country you're in, at least in Candadate, it's about twenty
bucks right now. It might be on sale where you are,

(29:25):
so keep an eye out for it. The other game,
motion Wreck, is one that I had seen I think
about six months ago maybe more, when they had like
the Japanese indie showcases, you know, usually hours and hours
and hours, and I watched that and what this was
one of the ones I highlighted going this is really neat.
So for motion Wreck, it's the post apocalyptic world. You're

(29:48):
playing a robot named Wreck and as you travel and
try to traverse it's a platformer. You can record a
set amount of movement and when you repeat that movement,
so like they're recording and replaying it, your character will
then repeat the exact same movement in the exact same
positions and you use that to get around and platform

(30:11):
around the areas you normally wouldn't be able to access.
Pretty sweet, really cool idea. Hearkens back to the era
of when like you would go and play like arcadie
style games at home. It's that sort of It's a
mixture of like eighties arcade style puzzle mixed with like
Nintendo into the Super Nintendo era of like visuals. But

(30:35):
at the same time it makes me think of something
like the eight bit computers, like a ZX Spectrum or
something like that. Pretty neat. And again this one is
about twelve bucks Canadian. There is a bundle you can
get if you're gonna get on Steam to get the
game plus the original soundtrack for twenty bucks, depending on

(30:59):
the sale where you are. I say it's worth it.
It's got a really cool visual style and as far as,
like I said, running it on your computer, like minimum
requirements for this a Pentium D, a pendim D is
from like fifteen years ago, or an Avalon sixty four
with one gigs a RAM. It's recommending a video card

(31:20):
of a G four seventy six hundred gs basically two
hundred and fifty six, meaning that this can run on
anything modern even with integrated graphics. You won't have any issues.
So if you're concerned, it'll run on your laptop, it'll
run on your desktop, it'll run on your like Steam Deck,
all that sort of stuff, no issues whatsoever. I recommend
it highly. I really enjoyed my time with this one.

(31:42):
And as far as the other title that I wanted
to mention that you know it sort of fits in
with these with these indies, is Dragon Blazers. Now, this
is not from the same publisher. This is a separate one,
but again it was sort of in the realm of
the the retro inspired sort of arcadie platform, he beat

(32:05):
them up sort of game. This is I think like
Monster was it like like Monster World or are the
other like almost like adventure Island style games. If that
makes sense, and you're going around it's it's platform you

(32:28):
can you can you have up to two players, you
can play as, you can go side scrolling, dungeon exploration,
beat them up, highly colorful animesh style again, works on
pretty much anything. It requires a penny of four or
later with two hundred and fifty six eggs a RAM

(32:48):
and basically works on anything. Really colorful characters, decent controls.
I've had a good time with it as far as
as far as any thing beyond that, I could just
say it's a fun game. So if you're interested, it's
available you know, on Steam.

Speaker 1 (33:14):
Depending on the price.

Speaker 4 (33:15):
I'm gonna say you kind of have to determine whether
or not it's good for you for your your region.
It does have a recommended OS of you know, Windows
seven or guitar later with one gigs one gig graphics
and penny and four later, but that's only if you're
I guess playing it at a higher resolution. It's one
of those games that scales to anything. So I had
a good time with it. You might too. That's all

(33:36):
I can say. That's sort of going to do it
for this, you know, smaller Indie roundup of titles I've
been playing over the last few weeks. They're all worth
your time. I think they all fit different niches, but
at the same time, I do think if you're a
fan of like retro style nineties games with you know,
interesting new takes on visuals and controls, then I think
they're worth your time for sure.

Speaker 5 (34:00):
Solid Snake and you're listening to this Weekend Geek with
Mike the Birdman and the rest of the twig crew
on this Weekend geek dot Net. Hey guys, this is
Mike the Birdman here, and I'm here with one of
my early picks for our annual holiday gift guid. You'll
probably hear me talk about this more a little bit
later on when we go live with it, but I
wanted to give you a little bit of a preview,

(34:22):
so Kanami was generous enough to send over some codes
for metal Gear Solid Delta on the Xbox Series X
and I also play this on the PlayStation five. Metal
Gear is one of my all time favorite game series
of all time. I have interviewed multiple voice actors from
the series. I've beaten almost every single one. In fact,

(34:45):
I've owned multiple versions of Snake Eater over the years,
and I even had the Metal Gear Solid PlayStation console
once upon a time, So being able to play a
Snake Eater on modern generation hardware was a utter treat.

(35:06):
Like you can put these two games side by side,
Like if you want to know if that ration's gonna
be there, it's gonna be there. Is the sniper rifle
gonna be there, the scorpion pistol, all those things, all
year old bullsh hit tricks work and even more, this
is a fantastic I don't even know what to call
this because it's it's a remake and it's a remaster.

(35:28):
It is pretty much everything that you'd want a modern
game to be that is an update of an older game,
And my experience with this title was really fantastic. Like
there's two there's multiple different control schemes. I played with
the updated version of this, and it felt like my
CQC was a lot more effective. I wasn't accidentally knocking

(35:52):
people out. In fact, it felt like it was a
lot easier to do stealth runs this time around, just
because the controls felt a lot tighter on my PlayStation
Pro controller and also on my Xbox Elite Series X controller.

Speaker 1 (36:08):
As well.

Speaker 5 (36:10):
Plus, like there isn't a lot to really say about
the storyline, like it is the Metal Gear game you remember,
Like there's even all the Easter eggs are here, although
the Nightmare sequence has been updated, and if you know
exactly what I'm talking about, go check that out. You
can do like the secret theater and stuff like that.

(36:32):
There's like different costumes and camouflages and all that stuff.
And because I've now had the advantage of having played
this game over the course of what feels like twenty
something years, new tactics work on like some of the bosses,
Like if you want a sniper the end before he
has a chance to become that really annoying sniper battle, you.

Speaker 1 (36:53):
Can still do that.

Speaker 5 (36:55):
So yeah, like this is ultimately one of the best
games I've played this year and probably of all time,
because it is one of those games to me that
has such fun memories on the PlayStation two and even
the three DS and the other platforms.

Speaker 1 (37:10):
That it has been ported to over the years.

Speaker 5 (37:13):
Like Metal Gear, Solid Delta is one of those games
that I think is going to be a landmark in
terms of what a modern remake can be. I'm really
hoping at some point, Kanami, I know you're listening right now.
I would love to get a remake of Metal Gear
Solid the Twin Snakes from the GameCube or Metal Gear

(37:36):
Solid if you have to remake it like you did this, yes, please,
and look, if I have to offer you my firstborn
for Metal Gear Solid for Guns of the Patriots, you
know what, maybe we can.

Speaker 1 (37:50):
Have that conversation.

Speaker 5 (37:52):
But absolutely expect this game to show up on my
holiday gift guide. I had such a blast with this.
There's multiple ways to play. Replayability is definitely there. Whether
you want to go for a complete Foxhound run, if
you truly want to earn the rank of big Boss,
you can do it.

Speaker 1 (38:11):
Or whether you want to be a trigger happy psycho,
you can do that too.

Speaker 5 (38:15):
But seriously, Metal Gear Solid Delta by Konami is an
absolute winner and definitely something you want to have on
your consoles later on this holiday season.

Speaker 8 (38:27):
Snake, you created a time paradox.

Speaker 1 (38:31):
The future must not be changed. You must know the future.

Speaker 5 (38:35):
Hey guys, this is Mike the Birdman here and this
is one of our selections we're going to be making
for our two thousand and twenty five holiday gift guide.
We had a review code provided to us by Bandai Namco,
and we are looking at the switch to version of
Once Upon a Katamari. So this is a game that
my wife actually reviewed for us here on the show,

(38:56):
and I'm going to kind of give you my thoughts too,
as I had a chance to play through some of
it as well. I'm typically not into these games, although
to share a personal note, when I played this game,
it got real personal for about an hour where I
wanted to beat one of the puzzles in this just
to say, oh, you.

Speaker 1 (39:15):
Are not getting away with this BS.

Speaker 5 (39:17):
And thankfully I beat it, much to my wife's surprise,
because I'm just not used to this type of game.
More or less, my type of game is can I
punch it in the face or can I shoot it
with a rocket launcher? And well, this time it involves
rolling up cows and milk and other bizarre pieces of cheese. Anyway,
getting aside, so my wife writes, welcome back to the

(39:39):
Prince and the King, who is hilarious and can basically
kind of give you crap when you don't accomplish certain objectives.

Speaker 1 (39:45):
When you're rolling up your catamari has to be.

Speaker 5 (39:47):
A certain size and all that, and you know if
you don't do what he wants, he's gonna give you crap,
much like any parent would. I guess, however, that gentle
ribbing is enough for you to basically go go back
in and say, all right, let's try this again, which
definitely happened to me during my playthrough with this. As

(40:07):
with all the other Katamari games, there is an underlying story,
and it seems to be with this one. Basically, the
king of all the cosmos was messing around and of
course shenanigans, and now you kind of wiped out the
planets and the stars, and now it's time to rebuild
everything to make the night sky sparkle and once again
and restore the splendor to the universe, such as it

(40:29):
might be. And from what I understand, this is the
first new Katamari game in like fourteen years or something. Again,
a lot of these have been off my radar. Forcing
we've had the re releases recently, Katamari, Katamari, Demarci Reroll
and stuff like that, which my wife looked at I
think a couple of years ago. But yeah, so again,

(40:49):
the point of any Katamari game is to roll around.
You start really small, and eventually you get bigger and
bigger and more and more ridiculous, where you're sticking things
to this little ball of fluff and eventually you could
be rolling up people, cows, buildings. I've seen some utter
ridiculousness happen in some of these Katemori games when I
would come into the room and go, what the hell

(41:11):
is going on? And more often than not with these
catemory games, that's more often than not what I'm actually
kind of thinking. However, though, there are new rifts to
this where you maybe have to gather different items in
a level. I know one of them is like you
have to get tumble weeds.

Speaker 1 (41:27):
You might have to.

Speaker 5 (41:28):
Get beverages or stuff like that, and just you know,
achieve certain objectives to get to the conclusion of the level.
But sometimes I'll introduce new environmental hazards. I know one
level that gave my wife a little bit of trouble
till we figured out the trick to it is one
level where you're gathering tumble weeds. There was an excessive

(41:48):
win so you couldn't go down certain paths in the
game unless you had one of the new power ups,
like if you had a rocket you could.

Speaker 1 (41:56):
Go against the wind and go down that way.

Speaker 5 (42:00):
There's also power ups, like a magnet left that allows
you to suck stuff up. There's a thing that allows
you to stop time, so when you start getting that
annoying last thirty second alarm bell, you can put a
stop to that and get like an extra fifteen or
thirty seconds, which also in this game kind of makes
a difference between success and failure. In also in terms

(42:21):
of level design and environment, you're jumping around from all
different eras of time, so like ancient, like dinosaur type time,
like in like the Jurassic era. There's like Japanese style stuff,
big surprise there, the wild West, and also ITTs of
weird places you'll go. As always with these games, there's
a fun selection of music. We did get the Uber

(42:42):
edition for this, so we can put different music in there. Again,
the Kanamari games has always been a very strangely, weirdly
hypnotic type of music.

Speaker 1 (42:51):
I kind of dig it.

Speaker 5 (42:52):
Don't know if it's going to end up on my
Spotify playlist, but it is kind of fun regardless.

Speaker 1 (42:57):
Though. This is one of those games where if you
dig the previous.

Speaker 5 (43:00):
Katemori's I think you're really gonna kind of dig this,
and especially as a Kadamari game on newer hardware, I think,
now maybe they can do a lot more stuff like that,
But these games never were like system breaking hardware or games.
Rather like there's just a lot of simplicity here, but

(43:21):
it's really goofy, sort of fun. I'm kind of trying
to convince my wife to get a tattoo of the
Prince because he's so odd and just kind of funny. Honestly,
these games are not my jam, but literally it's the
only thing she plays on my switch to outside of
maybe like Mario games. And if I can make my
wife into a gamer that isn't Pokemon Go, I think

(43:42):
that's a fairly strong indictment of how fun this game
is and the fact that this game drew me in
for an hour where I couldn't beat a section of
the game because I would just miss it by one
or two items. There's a line from Jay and Silent
Bob straight Back where Mark Hamill is fighting Jay and
Silent Bob and he literally says, Oh, you are not

(44:04):
upstaging me, Vanderbeek. That is literally how I felt with this,
Like you are not beating me the Prince. We are
going to settle this here and now, so once upon.
Acadamori by Bandai Namco's actually really recommended from my wife
and myself. You should check this out if you love
these games. If you want a weird puzzle game, well

(44:25):
you're not. You're not going to find anything weirder on
the market right now. I'm willing to put my reputation
on the line for that.

Speaker 4 (44:35):
Alex's the producer here and I have a couple of
movies that I wanted to talk about that we received
for a review. Naked Gun and Spinal Tap The End
Continues or Spinal Tap two. These are interesting. I know.
I saw they had Gutten in theaters and I was

(44:56):
pleasantly surprised with it. It's been a while since I've
seen a comedy that had, you know, wide market appeal
in theaters, and now I've had a chance to check
it out. Our home video, our friends over at Paramount
sent a review Blu Ray over. It includes a digital
copy where you can you know, watch anywhere depending on
where you're going to redeem it based in the country

(45:16):
you'll see on the box. Basically as far as special
features are concerned. It includes deleted, alternate and extended scenes,
most of which I would say I understand why they
were cut. It wouldn't have necessarily made the movie better.
It might have changed the pacing a little bit, so
I'm happy that they're included to see. But you know,

(45:36):
it's not like you lost anything if you saw it
in theaters. There is a special feature called The Legacy
of Laughter, which is a retrospective on the franchise, which
is interesting to take. There is another little documentary on
here called Son of an Aca Gun, which goes into,
you know, creation of the modern characters for the movie,

(45:58):
as well as a feature on pamel Anderson's character called
The Funny Femme Fatale, and some more little you know,
little features here and there and there, but nothing you know,
you know, too crazy to break home about. I can
say that it is a really good transfer. It's you know,

(46:18):
would be better if this was obviously a four K set,
But for the kind of comedy that it is, it
looks visually really good on Blu ray. It's going to
look better than what you get if you're watching it,
you know it's streaming audio wise, This is not an
overly bombastic soundtrack or or really crazy sound design. What's
most important is the dialogue is clean and clear, comes

(46:40):
in crisp, and the sound effects, while silly and ridiculous,
sometimes they add to it and it's it's a really,
you know, good mix. Overall, I'd say it's a solid release.
I've had, you know, fun time going back and rewatching it,
and now that I have it on home video, I'm
able to pause it and look for all the little
Easter eggs and things that are in there, and that is,
you know, a big part of why these films and

(47:02):
that franchise has been endearing is seeing all the little
things that they put in the background and whatnot. So
I do think it's worth it. It's worth checking out
and the other film, as I mentioned, Spinal Tap too.
The end continues. I have been a big fan of
Spinal Tap since it was one of the first DVDs
I bought back in oh two thousand maybe when we

(47:24):
got to the original DVD set of it, and obviously
I'd heard of it before that, but that was the
first time I really, you know, watched it. It was one
of the first, you know, big mockumentaries, and you know,
for years and years, there were thoughts and maybe they
were going to do sequels. They had done a sequel
album for the original album that was like the soundtrack,

(47:45):
and then there was the appearance on The Simpsons in
the early nineties and then nothing for like thirty years. So,
for those that don't know, Spinal Tap is a fake
heavy metal group of aging rockers. Even I guess they
were sort of over the hill in the early eighties
when the movie came out. That was the idea, is

(48:06):
that they were like sixties you know, hippie pop stars
that ended up becoming heavy metal guys, and just the
excess and ridiculousness and overall buffoonery that involves them and
tragedy and you know struggles that a band has, breaking up,
coming back together, and the ridiculous stuff on tour. That

(48:27):
sort of idea and that's what they, you know, made
the movie and it became a very very big cult
hit and became a blueprint for future mockumentaries and TV
shows going forward ever since. So now we have finally
a sequel. It's you know, basic description is it's forty
one years after this is Spinal Tap. They're basically the

(48:49):
band isn't no longer together. They're all sort of a
strange from each other, and they're trying to reunite for
one final concert, which is going to be recorded again
by Marty de Bergie, the in you know, in Canon
director played by the real life uh director of the film,
Rob Reiner. Now what is happening is they they were

(49:13):
able to get a bunch of you know, famous celebrities
to be in this as well, Paul McCartney, Elton John
and it has that loose mockumentary feel to it.

Speaker 1 (49:25):
It's fun.

Speaker 4 (49:26):
This has been released by our friends of Castle Rock
and Bleeker Street, so it's it's a fairly bare bones release.
It's not a whole lot to it. But it had
a very limited release in theaters, so I feel this
is gonna be the first time a lot of people
are gonna know that it's out and be able to
watch it, and for that it's worth it. As far
as audio, it's the sound design is great, as you'd

(49:48):
expect from you know, a musical mockumentary film like this.
It's five point one master audio. The video presentation is
again better than you get during streaming. I would say
it's not the highest quality video out there. But it's
not designed to be. It's still supposed to have that
feeling like you're watching a rock documentary. So in that sense,

(50:10):
it's really good. The performances are all fantastic. If you
like the original, you like it. If you haven't seen
the original, you kind of have to. It's worth going back,
and you know, maybe picking up the original film and
watching this as a double feature. It'll be a great
dad gift is the best thing I can say for it.
So I think these are two interesting films that you
might want to check out and consider for stocking stuffers
or for you know, just that movie collector or in

(50:34):
this case, music documentary mockumentary collector buff in your life.

Speaker 7 (50:42):
Those magnificent facts color me kooky.

Speaker 3 (50:45):
But something very odd is going on around here.

Speaker 6 (50:47):
You're not allowed to talk.

Speaker 4 (50:48):
Anymore, and that's gonna do it for the show this week,
what do we have coming up? Well, we've been recording
a bunch of future imperfectly Canons and a few other
things in between. This upcoming week we've got obviously Earth
versus Soup that is for Mission Mars from nineteen sixty eight,

(51:12):
not Mission to Mars. That might be something we have
coming up later, but we've got that coming and then
this following next week we have Earth's Soup episode two
eighty four four d Man from nineteen fifty eight. As
far as other programming this coming week, we still haven't
determined one hundred percent if we're doing a full regular

(51:34):
show or if in its place is going to be
the Black Friday program. That it depends on how long
the Black Friday Program ends up being. If it's a
very short episode, then you can expect it to be
you know, two separate ones here. But as far as
actual programming that we've got ready to go, we have
a Loose Canon on the Goofy Movie double feature, so

(51:55):
both of those Goofy movies and a very like Goofy
movie and a very Goofy movie. We've all so been
recording a bunch of stuff for Future Imperfect regarding Star
Trek movies. We've got a few other space firing films
lined up, and a bunch of you know, sort of

(52:16):
off topic random stuff from Loose Cannon that we recorded
previously over the summer break as well as the fall.
We've got episodes of Future Perfectly on Judge Dread coming up.
We've got loose cannons on Treasure Planet, some Disney stuff,
as well as just off topic discussions on things like

(52:40):
from random access memories on like physical media. We've got
video games, just overall topic discussion talks. We've also got
a bunch of other stuff coming, so there's a fair
bit there. Over the next few weeks, expect most of
the programming to be focused on Black Friday and Holiday

(53:01):
Gift Guide stuff. So for the Holiday Gift Guide, expect
similar format to what we've done in the past. For
Burman and I have a bunch of of things that
we've spent a few minutes talking about that we've had
a chance to look at, and for the Black Friday,
I'm going to do a cursory look at some of
the specials that are available in Canada and then some
maybe in the States, as well as some brief you know,

(53:24):
touch poss some brief reviews, slash overview, slash first impressions
on some of the smaller items that we were sent
that probably also have a sale going on the following week.
Now that all of the sales information are sort of
popping up, we've sort of been collecting all that and
that'll be a very quick you know, easy breezy thing.
If you want to listen to and have a you know,
a quick cheat sheet, maybe you can look at for

(53:44):
some gift ideas and we'll go from there. But that's
going to do it for the show this week. We'll
be back with either the main show on Monday or
the I Guess the Black Friday Deals week you know,
small mini guide. Sure we're calling it just yet, but
we'll be back with that shortly in a few days.
Right here at this Week in Geek dot.

Speaker 6 (54:05):
At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you
even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought.

Speaker 8 (54:16):
Thanks for listening to this episode of This Week in Geek.
Hungry for more, check out our website at this Week
in geek dot Net. You can subscribe to the podcast,
browse our Twitter and Instagram, and leave your thoughts on
today's topics. If you'd like to give us some feedback,
send us an email at Feedback at this Week in
Geek dot Net. Tune in next time, and remember, lower
your shields and surrender your listenership.

Speaker 1 (54:38):
We would be on a if you would join us.
Thank you for your cooperation. Good night,

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