Telltale’s The Walking Dead with Scott Seiss

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Oh my god, you guys.

I just got the door locked.

I can't fucking believe this is happening.

It's just like a movie.

There are zombies everywhere.

No, they're breaking into the studio.

Oh, fuck.

Oh, fuck.

Oh, no.

Oh, my God.

My leg is trapped under a mic stand.

Oh, no, no, no, no, no, wait, no, ranch is trapped behind the producer's desk.

No, ranch!

We only have time to save one of them.

What are we gonna do?

Ranch!

Ranch!

Ranch!

Let's save ranch!

Let's save ranch!

We're gonna save ranch!

We're gonna save ranch!

Oh, come on!

Oh, come on!

No, no,

we're saving ranch.

Yeah, no, no, come on.

No, we simply don't have time.

Oh, let's get this table moved out of the way.

All right, the table's moved.

Oh, thank God.

We saved ranch.

I'm just a scared guy.

Come on.

Oh, no.

We didn't have time.

We don't have time for it.

Yeah, there's no time.

There's time for me now, too.

No, I think we're out of time.

I'm going to decide so quickly.

All right, I'm going to pack up my stuff.

I'm going to put my stuff in my...

Wait, has anybody seen my keys, actually?

They're not even here yet.

Wait, actually, Nick, can you move your leg one second?

My keys are right behind your leg.

Okay.

Okay, thanks.

Yeah, thanks.

I'll just put this back real quick.

I got stuff with it pinned under this microphone stand.

I don't even need your wallet, are you?

Like, can I have your wallet?

Because you're, like, not gonna need it.

What, are you gonna need currency if the catalyst comes?

Maybe they, you know, the government will come back.

I'm just saying, like, for safekeeping, maybe I should take your wallet.

I gotta, right?

We gotta hurry.

We gotta hurry.

They're gonna be in here at any minute.

It just wasn't even a moment of hesitancy.

Like, I would have picked Ranch 2, alright?

Like, I would have sacrificed myself, but just to have a moment where it's like a dilemma.

Nick, you're not gonna eat this gun with one bullet, right?

I mean, I brought that just in case, but I kind of have it with me at all times.

I'm just going to take it.

I don't think you're just going to have any use for it.

Come on.

All right, so we got his wallet.

We got his gun.

Ranch is okay.

You know what?

Before...

I feel like we're going to have a lot of difficulty finding adequate shelter for the next few days, so I might take a little nap here.

Yeah, yeah.

You know what?

Ah, oh, it took all my strength, but I actually freed myself so I can come with you now.

Ah, you know what?

I'm going to put this board back over to let Nick's leg.

Ow!

Fuck!

Put that back.

And you know what?

I'm just going to shoot him in the leg real quick for good measure.

Come on.

Nick will remember this.

We witness unspeakable human misery and make decisions NBCs remember as we discuss Telltale's episodic adventure game series The Walking Dead this week on Get Played.

Welcome to Get Played, your one-stop show for good games, bad games, and every game in between.

It's time to get played.

I'm your host, Heatheran Campbell, along with my fellow host, Nick Weigern.

It's me, Nick Wigern.

I'm here with our third host, Matt Abadaka.

Hello, everyone.

Hello, everyone, and welcome back to the premiere video game Podcast where we used to talk about bad games, then we talked about good games, then we talked about some games, and then we just talked games.

And that's what we do now.

We talk about games.

Talk about games.

It's been a process of simplification, I would say.

Just stripping away layers until we got it.

What is the core of the show?

And the core is we're an enthusiast podcast.

That's right.

Enthusiast gamers

who also

are,

some of us have some difficulty in social settings

i'd do

for yourself

no

no no no no

don't don't don't don't you act like that

you know how you are

hey adding to the mix today we have a fantastic guest with us a comedian and actor you can pre-order his new book the customer's always wrong which is everywhere september 10th scott sees us here hi scott hi there thank you for having me hi scott thanks for making time for us.

What a hoot.

Oh, of course.

Congrats on the book.

I want to give you a little bit of runway to tell us about it.

Oh, yeah, please.

So it's a humor book.

It's called The Customer's Always Wrong.

It's filled with like a bunch of rants and bits about the most annoying parts of having a job.

It's meant to be kind of reflect the experience of like going into the break room, hiding from your boss and complaining about work, you know, with your coworkers, like a very cathartic thing.

And it kind of expands on these TikTok

videos that I do making fun of like the worst customers imaginable.

Yeah, it's a go on.

I was going to say, it feels weird to sit next to you on the couch because I know you from my phone.

This is a huge experience.

You came out of the phone.

Yeah, people don't realize that.

I am very polite in person, though.

I don't yell.

I'm not mean.

I'm not menacing.

Yes, okay, there you go.

And I yelled at you to say I'm nice on the podcast beforehand.

She's nice.

But that sometimes happens where I'll meet people and they'll be disappointed and they'll be like, yell at me.

They want something else.

Yeah.

They want something else.

Give me a little bit of the juice.

Give me the juice.

I'm sure Nick will get you there over the course of the next hour.

Yeah, I'm already, I'm pissed off.

I'm pissed.

Okay, we were talking before we began because you and I have a similar experience.

We've all worked retail in various capacities, including ranch.

But, but, but, you know, you and I have a similar experience.

We both worked in call centers.

I worked, it was my first video game job.

I worked at Activision and customer support.

You worked at IKEA.

Yes, exactly I worked the IKEA call center and like these videos that I do where I kind of just take like something a customer says and then do like the reply you would want it kind of like it almost feels like the thing that you would do at a call center where you would put someone on mute and you'd go this is such a fucking asshole yeah right you know what I mean where it's like someone's like I've been a customer here for 40 years it's like oh good I hope that you're dead soon.

You know what I mean?

Like that, like that kind of thing is what I do in the videos.

That's what I do in the book.

And so, yeah, man.

Yeah.

It was a lot of fun writing it.

The IKEA call center is probably tough because somebody's calling to complain about something they probably can't pronounce.

And then you have to figure out

how to spell.

Yeah, hedge of a gig.

It's like, okay, just give me 45 years to look that up real quick.

Yeah, it was very difficult.

You had to kind of like, you know, we were talking about it earlier, like, people would send photos of where they were in the process of assembling it.

And it's like, bro, you just got to start all the way over.

Buy a new one.

This one is ruined.

I think you're experienced working retail.

And

I think

your expertise kind of ties in with the news peg we got, which is that GameSpot, GameStop, rather, is launching GameStop Retro.

We were looking at this before we began recording.

Yeah,

there was an announcement.

Maybe it's come out a couple of weeks ago, but it was just pushed to me via the algorithm that GameSpot.

GameSpot?

GameStop.

You made me do it.

You know, I did it.

I know.

GameSpot is the site with

the reviews that's now kind of defunct.

GameStop is the game tailor that it was kind of like sushi stop.

Yeah, like sushi stop, which derives from GameStop.

So, so I don't think sushi stop is nationwide, by the way.

I think that's a that's a low.

Oh, really?

Yeah, I don't think it is.

Oh, wow, surprising.

It should be.

It's pretty good.

It feels like a chain.

It's not bad.

It is a chain.

Have you ever got a sushi stop?

I've never been, actually.

I've never been.

Treat yourself.

It's pretty good.

Pretty good.

Ranchie gets sushi stop.

I have been.

Yeah.

It's not bad, right?

It's okay.

It's fine.

It's okay.

It's fine.

It's okay.

It's cheap.

It's better than gas station sushi.

I prefer sushi spot.

That's my favorite place.

It's reviews.

Okay.

So anyway, there, GameStop has now GameStop Retro, which is going to be

a branch of GameStops that only service up to the PS3.

So you can get games from Dreamcast.

You can get games from NES.

You can get games from Game Boy.

Now, when I heard about this, I assumed Cash Grab.

I assumed here's a company that is going to be predatory and

extort us for these old games at extremely high modern prices.

Shocked when I went on the website and the prices were okay.

Like 44 bucks for Pokemon Gold, which isn't...

Oh, that made Matt shoke.

But given that, like...

Wait, was that a shoot cough?

Did you actually cough?

No, I swallowed wrong.

Okay.

So that was real.

It was not.

I was still going to deal

Wow.

Please move on.

But I was surprised because, like, we've become very desensitized to the fact that, like, right now in the gaming retro market, it'll be like $400 for a copy of Pokemon Red.

Right.

So, when I saw that these were, yes, loose carts, you know, not all the packaging, not all the manuals, the maps, et cetera, but still $44,

not too bad.

That being said, I did do a little bit more research and found found that they have no way in store of differentiating between reproduction carts and original carts okay so there is a possibility that the inventory is flush with repros oh so how how are you gonna be willing to you're gonna be willing to

roll those dice right well i'll i'll go to this store as often as i go to a regular games stop It's hard.

Zero times.

How dare you?

I still like going to an IRL GameStop.

That's fun.

I think if if you get like disc-based games, it's not going to be repros.

Yeah, no.

Like, you get PlayStation 2 games, Dreamcast games, etc.

Like, I immediately learned that.

It would not matter if it's a Dreamcast game.

What does that mean?

Oh, because they can be burnt.

What are you talking about?

They can be burnt.

Because they can be, they were.

Okay.

They were burnt.

You can burn them pretty easy.

No.

Hey, no, no, no.

Whoa, whoa, whoa.

I have no smoke for the Dreamcast.

I love the Dreamcast.

All right, so, Scott, let me bring it to you.

So, so you have a.

So I'm curious, are you someone, like, do you ever

shop at a GameStop in person?

I, you know, I haven't in years.

Yeah.

But, you know, like from working retail, because I always felt like so much empathy for those people behind the counter, of course.

Because it's like, they have to try to sell you the Prima strategy guide.

They have to try to sell you the warranty.

They have to try to get you to pre-order next year's Madden.

And like, I just, it's just, I just feel like, ah, fuck, I know you got to go through all this shit and you're doing a good job doing it, but I'm just, it's a no, it's a hard no for me from all of this, you know?

Oh, absolutely.

It's like, bro, I'm not going to help with any of your KPIs.

I'm not going to help with any of the shit you're trying to prove prove to your boss right now.

And I'm sorry.

So it's a separate location.

This isn't just a section of Games.

No, separate locations.

Like a branded GameStop retro.

Okay.

And also,

I think that's a good idea.

Yeah, I do too.

Especially since it'll be like driving down resale prices, which is the whole problem with the retro games

world right now.

That being said, I was

the retail that I worked first was an electronics boutique, which was eventually swallowed up by GameStop.

Yeah, right.

So I can speak to that like

pressing people for the insurance policies, pressing people for like, please buy the strategy guide.

And as I was like 18 when I started, you know, like, and so they had to explain to me how profit worked.

Because I was like, wait, but the games are expensive.

And they're like, yeah, but we don't make any money on the games.

And on some of the systems, we lose money.

Wow.

And I'd be like,

what is economics?

Yeah, right.

Yeah.

This is what he's saying.

And they'd be like, so push the push the strategy guides, push the, the, the, um,

the, the insurance policies on, like, oh, if your game breaks down or like, you know, you smash it or whatever, you can come bring it in and we'll replace it.

Yeah.

And who wouldn't trust like an 18-year-old girl saying, like, like, me being like, no, I'm serious.

The insurance policy is a great option for you.

And they'd be like, well, I'm getting this from my grandson.

So

give me five years of the policy and that would be here's my social security number just in case that was direct cash for us as retailers too like as the individual seller right it was it's a crazy system what you would make like a hundred percent commission not a hundred I don't know what that means.

It wouldn't be like that their insurance policy would be all for us.

Oh, I thought that's what you were saying.

But I'm saying that it would be a direct, it would directly influence our paychecks.

Like the more you sold, the more bonuses you got each month.

Right.

And on working on minimum wage at a video game store, that was like the only way to be able to buy the game.

Yeah.

Right, right.

Here's my problem with the separate locations, though.

Like you're saying, like a grandparent comes in to buy a game.

I don't think they're going to understand the difference in the branding of the stores.

Like it's going to be like Dishwash.

Black Myth Wukong or whatever.

And they're going to be like, this is actually GameStop Retro.

And it's going to be like, are you fucking kidding me?

Why are there two stores?

So you have it for the Game Boy that I was like,

no, no, it didn't come out for Game Boy.

I mentioned, I I think I've said this on the podcast before, but when I was working Activision support, we'd get those calls from frustrated parents who like they bought the wrong version of the game and they didn't understand why I couldn't fix it for them.

This one lady was so mad because she bought her son had a GameCube and she bought Tony Hawk for the Xbox or vice versa.

It might have been worse than that.

I think it might have been that her son had an N64 and she bought Tony Hawk for the Xbox.

And she's like, I don't, like, why isn't it working?

It's like, it's like the game my son wanted.

And I was like,

I don't don't want to tell you.

You bought the wrong thing.

She's like, well, I opened it.

Well,

then you're fine.

That sucks.

I'm sorry.

Like, there's nothing I can do to help you.

Is it at all possible that she was also mad because she was talking to you?

I definitely did.

There was a day when there were a bunch of issues with Call of Duty dedicated servers and everyone was mad.

And so there was like a campaign on the message boards to like get everyone to call in and talk to the Activision call center.

And people were like posting about like who they were talking to.

And I saw somebody like, I talked to Nick.

He you didn't know the fuck he was talking to

there are there are Yelp reviews written about me

from when I worked as a like a reservationist at a restaurant and people couldn't come to their reservation like on time and some of these this restaurant like had like a fee like if you canceled within a certain amount of time you'd have to pay still and they're like they didn't waive the fee even though I read I signed the document saying that I would pay and shit like that.

Just horrible, horrible stuff.

Yeah.

Getting yelled at as an adult by by another adult too is it's rough sucks yeah it's rough yeah sorry we do that to you rochelle yeah sorry we scream at ranch constantly what we do am i in that i should you got i'm i'm not in the room for that yeah yeah yeah okay it's just voice memos of us being like ranch we shouldn't be

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Okay, all right.

We're going to talk about the Telltales of Walking Dead today, but there are a couple other things you talked about that were game-related you pitched to us.

One of which I'm just, we're all just don't understand what it is you did stand up in fortnight oh yes yes i did stand-up comedy in fortnite the game what happened like what is stand-up island on stand-up island

you have to go to stand-up island in order to view it okay um don't i've never even played fortnite i really don't know how to access this what i would say it was a comedy club that they that they kind of premiered with their like creator mode okay and so you could like it was to show off like that you could film yourself doing something and then like make your own kind of like like little movie or performance within Fortnite.

And it was a comedy club produced by Trevor Noah.

There were lots of comics in it.

There was like Preacher Lawson, Matthew Broussard, and I was one of them.

And we went to the, we went, I went to like epic studios.

I put on a motion capture suit.

Oh, wow.

I did my like five minute set.

And then, you know, I like made a joke about death.

And they were like, you can't say death in Fortnite.

They were like, no one ever dies in Fortnite.

They just respawn.

And I was like, okay, I'm sorry.

And then I tried doing a joke about Amber Alerts.

And they were like, you definitely can't do that joke either.

I was like, oh, my God, I'm so sorry.

So I had to kind of like, you know, adjust or whatever.

But it was a super fun experience.

And like everyone who worked on the project was like, super nice.

They like.

After I did the set, like they showed me a video of it.

And I was watching a Fortnite character do like my movements, my nervous movements.

It wasn't you.

It was like.

No, so it didn't look like me.

It was a Fortnite skin of a, it looked like a soldier slash fast food drive-through cashier.

That was like what they picked for me.

And, and he was, but he was doing my movements and it was my voice.

And it was just super cool, man.

It was wild.

I would have asked for like Peter Griffin or something.

Yeah.

They had three skins.

They were like, you could choose, it was like a cow suit with like, I don't know, utter grenades or something like that.

And then there was the fast food guy in a caveman.

Yeah.

One of the, one of the funniest parts about it, though, I was doing it, and they were like, the director was like, this is going to look like a club.

This is going to look like a stand-up comedy club in Fortnite.

And there's going to be a bar in the back.

And he was like, but you can't say anything about the bar because this is Fortnite.

No one drinks alcohol, whatever.

And he goes, but Bender is going to be back there serving drinks.

He was like, Bender from Futurama is going to be serving slurm back there.

And he was like, so if during your set, you want to say, please enjoy some Slurm in the back at some point, you can slip that in wherever you feel comfortable with and I was like I don't think it's gonna come up naturally

So like right at the end I just like shouted like and get some slurm like drink slurm I didn't know what to do

But I hope everyone enjoys slurm in Fortnite look I'm interested.

I'll give it a sip.

Why not?

Yeah.

Is that wait?

Was this a was this a limited time thing?

Can people still see this?

I'm pretty sure you can still view it.

Okay.

Yeah, you just I mean you there's like a certain island code you have to put in, but it's for stand-up island.

And you can go there.

And like, the reason I never watched it, because they gamified it where like the players could then vote on who was their favorite comedian that they saw.

And I was like, I can't take this.

Jesus Christ.

Yeah.

But it was, it was really fun.

It was definitely.

the wildest place I've ever done stand-up.

That is crazy.

And like, so you had to, yeah, you wore the ping pong suit.

Yeah.

Had you never worn one of those before?

No.

That was a completely new experience.

No, it was a completely new experience.

And they had, like, I had a helmet on that had a camera like about like a foot in front of my face and they had like a fake microphone so i could like feel like i was doing stand-up

and when the first take you know i was trying to be professional trying to be like i deserve to be here or whatever you know and i and they were like okay go and as a comic like i always just take the mic off the stand you know it's a very it's a it's a motion that i that i know very well and i took the the microphone out and immediately slammed it into the camera that was in front of my face not that like, broke the helm.

And I went, Oh, fuck me.

Like, it's loud.

And I say, Can I restart this?

And they were like, Yeah, sure, that's fine.

So it was embarrassing.

I humiliated myself.

Oh, my gosh.

This reminds me.

I don't know.

Have I told you guys the gig that I did in VR?

No, I think you may have done it.

Maybe.

Maybe.

There was

Sarah Silverman had an online company, which their name was like

Jash.

Jash.

Jash.

Yeah, those hurt a few people.

Yeah.

So they, so they had like a VR room where they were booking people to do comedy gigs the difference between what you did and what I did is that I was in a VR helmet and I was doing an improv show with my partner my improv partner was in a different room because they had body cams pointed at us so that they could like track all of our emotions right and also i was blind so like

so like i'm in a room but the only thing i can see is the comedy club we were in in virtual space, not the space that I was in in my real world.

Oh, you don't have a pass-through through camera.

Yeah, no, there was no pass through camera.

So once I put on the helmet, I was in the VR space trying to do an improv show in a room where I didn't even know where the barriers were of the thing.

And they also, it was, it was designed so that there would be live audiences so that you could interact with the people on stage.

So all the people in the audience did was keep coming up on the stage and then the proximity vocals would make it so that like i'd be like hey is that

be careful over there grandma you you don't want to fall out the window like to my scene partner and then suddenly somebody would come up into my face who i i couldn't see and they would just be like

if i was in that situation i would just be speed running throwing up like that sounds like a nightmare

i love when you're on the new frontier or something, and they're just like, Yeah, we're just gonna

test out something that doesn't work.

Right.

And other people do it who are insane.

That's wild.

So, that boy, the Fortnite experience sounds more fun than

it does, yeah.

It was the only bad part was that no one could laugh like while the audio was getting recorded.

So, it was like, I, is this funny at all?

Like, this feels like my worst nightmare.

But at the end, everyone in the room would go, we thought it was funny.

That's usually how it goes when we record record this.

Ranch will just be like, good show.

Wait, Heather or Ranch, you both play a fair amount of Fortnite.

Have you hopped into any of these experiential things there?

Have you seen like a DJ set or anything in the game?

I went to a Paul Boy concert.

Yeah, that's pretty cool.

How was that?

Awesome.

It was just...

like it was like an arena and then there was a just a video of them on a screen.

Oh, so there weren't like Fortnite characters playing their music.

Oh, that's a little bit of a disappointment.

Yeah, it was literally just like a big jumbo-drawn screen with them at a live concert.

It would be funny if they had those at like arenas, like actual like sized like arenas, kind of, but your character in Fortnite, you still get like a bad seat.

You're just like,

like super far away.

It kind of sucks, actually.

Actually, they'll figure out how to do that.

They'll figure out a way for there to be pricing tiers for virtual experiences when you pay more.

No, Matt, it's done.

It's out of it.

I did the concert that was, or I went to the concert that was

the guy who sings that song with Justin Bieber that was like super viral a few years ago.

I don't know the name of it.

Esposito?

No, no, no, no, no.

I can't think of his name.

The only song Nick knows.

It's like,

no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, that song.

Whatever.

Killer Roy.

Yeah, there it is.

Killer Roy.

So I went to his concert event, and the way they made it sort of an interactive experience is that you went through his entire life.

So you start on like the street where he grew up, like a Fortnite facsimile of that, where he's playing like a gig on his front lawn.

And then you like follow his career path by like following him through these virtual spaces until you're in his like fancy house.

And in order to like progress to the next part, you have to smash everything in his fancy house because it's a crazy party.

And so you're like smashing the TV and smashing like crates or couches or whatever.

And then you follow him into a big arena where they are doing a video version of him singing the concert and then also like motion captured versions of him on stage.

Right.

And you're flying through the air and through rings and shit and getting experience points.

I didn't enjoy it, but I, but I also, it was my first week in Fortnite.

so i was like is that what this is yeah right yeah

like what how often does this happen but now all of these major gas like lady gaga is in the game and you know ariana grande and all like they they it's just like

pop-up events and it's not usually as elaborate as that one as far as i can tell interesting Yeah, I feel like I saw Steve Aoki doing a DJ set in like the Green Hill Zone from Sonic the Hedgehog.

And I was like, all right, sure, yeah.

It's all tracks.

No, I think, I feel like I just saw a video of that, and I was like, I don't know how this came together, but all right, why not?

All right, let's,

I, I do want to ask about a couple other things.

Um, you are a fan of the Hitman series.

This is something that Aquadaka has played a lot of.

I love what the how they've repacked.

I don't know how they repack what the title of it is now.

The um

they repackage it as like one game.

There's like a sort of legacy.

There's one through three, and they're all, yeah, I'll look up exactly.

But I was super hyped on,

I hadn't played any of them really, but then when Hitman 3 was coming out, I was like, I could see myself really liking this.

Let's get one and two on board.

And I just blazed through those.

And then just like the idea that you can just kind of do anything in those games is so, it's like.

They're very funny games on accident.

They're hilarious.

That's what I love about them.

It's like they can be as serious as you want or as silly as you want.

Like, it's like you could play it and be like, okay, I'm going to sneak in.

No one's going to know where, like, like that I was even here when I take out a target.

Or you could be like, I'm gonna lead everyone to the same bathroom and kill like 300 people with a banana peel.

And that's what I'm gonna do in this map.

Like, they're just hilarious.

The first one I ever played was Hitman Absolution,

which was like, I think on the PS3.

And I loved it.

I'd never played a Hitman game before.

And then, like, it was like one of those things where I went online and I was like, oh, everyone thinks this is the worst one.

No one likes this at all.

I was like, I thought it was fun.

But then the newer ones, Hitman, like one, two, and three.

I just think that the map design is so good.

Yeah.

They're super fun.

And just like also, like, I think it's called the World of Assassins.

Hitman World of Assassination is the bundle where.

And like, but now they have this thing where there's like weekly challenges or things like that.

So it's sort of more of a live service type thing where there's they'll update the targets now.

And it's like the same maps and you know, just re-skinned characters and stuff.

But like you can,

it's now just like a forever game.

You could just play it forever now.

It's kind of amazing.

I have a question.

So, TikTok is becoming sort of a precog with its algorithm and showed me a bunch of Hitman content this week, even though I don't follow any Hitman games and have never really talked about it before in my life.

Oh my gosh.

So,

it's very, it's great, brilliant.

Whatever they're doing over there, fantastic.

I also haven't watched any playthroughs, and here's what I saw: okay, was the bald guy walking through 47,

a kitchen and murdering like workers

by like shooting them either in the head with a silencer or like throwing fire extinguishers at their heads or like

shooting them once in the leg so that they scream for a moment and then throwing like a frying pan at them.

Is that what the game is?

You don't have to do that.

You can do it.

That's the best part about it.

I always assumed it.

I love you framed it as killing workers specifically.

Everyone is trying to do their job.

It would be like a guy like cooking.

It'll be like a guy cooking at like a

at a stove.

And you're like clearly at the back of like some hotel room or some, like a big, you know, like a casino.

It's a huge, a huge environment.

And this dude was just like walking up and murking these people.

But I assumed there was like a target.

Like it's like you have to kill one guy.

Yes, that is a part of it.

There's, there's a target that you have to reach.

And then part of it is like, you get like points for how you do it.

So you'll get points deducted if you kill anyone else other than that target.

Oh, okay.

Yeah, yeah.

And then there are people that play through it.

Like there's a bunch of YouTube videos where it's like, I kill everyone in this map.

And it's like, okay, that's super fun.

But most of the time, it's like you are going through a kitchen, you knock out the chef, you put on the chef's clothes.

Now you can be in the kitchen.

Then you walk up and you, you know, hit the waiter on the back of the head with a frying pan.

Now you put on the waiter.

It's a lot of putting on people's clothes

and then getting getting closer to the target and then poisoning them or something like that i feel like within these maps too like if it was at like a hotel or something the chef is somehow in on it yeah so you don't feel like that bad about like like knocking the chef out and taking his outfit because it's like oh the chef works for this evil guy who he knows is evil right right because it looked from what i was seeing it looked like two people like discussing the menu on a clipboard and then he just walks up and like shoots both of them in the back of the head and i was like

What is the game?

Like Reservation Day, we can send these two people home.

They don't have to come in

and an underground agency, one of those two people murdered

the specials.

But that's kind of like you have like that freedom in the game where it's like you can be as violent as you want, as stealthy as you want.

It's just like, as long as you kill the target by the end and get out, then you win.

And it is like a like, I don't know, and it's interesting that the game can like even account for certain things too.

Like, I don't know, it's I would be interested to see you try it because I, Heather, I think you might find a satisfaction in playing the game because

this game sort of suggests what if stealth is combat?

Like, you have to sort of think about stealth that way in these games, because you have to, you have to, like, get to your main target, and you can't just walk up and do it.

You could go guns blazing, but there's like a very like low percent chance that you're gonna to succeed that way.

You have to sort of be clever and think of the game

as

a puzzle, kind of almost, which I know you also don't like.

I just said it's describing two things.

Yeah.

Stealth and puzzles.

Yeah.

But you get to kill.

You do.

Yeah.

And

there's a bunch of different weapons.

You can just go in with the, you know, one of those, like, you know,

piano wire.

Yeah.

That's pretty fun.

How did you figure out what he was doing doing from that motion?

What do you mean?

He just, Matt just kind of waved his hands around randomly.

Yeah, like he was working a speed bag, and you just went your mind just went straight to piano wire.

All of our minds go like that.

You could go in just with a piano wire.

I barely moved.

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Okay, you did play Baldur's Gate 3.

Is that correct?

Oh, yeah, that was my, I think that's like my favorite game of all time.

It's my favorite.

It's my favorite game game, too.

I love it so much.

I finished it twice.

Matt's finished it twice.

I finished it once.

I'm on my second playthrough, though.

You're near the end, though, right?

I'm in Act 3.

I thought you finished that.

I apologize.

No.

But it's.

I blazed through the first two acts

in the second playthrough because I just knew how to do everything.

So there's just no learning curve.

And now I feel sort of like overpowered in some ways, too.

I can talk about Boulder's Gate 3 all day, but

can you give us an overview of

what your approach was, what your play style was?

Did you murder any NPCs like Heather did?

That's not, I did not kill you.

Did you murder people?

No, I didn't.

Who did you kill?

I didn't kill.

They came after me.

Oh, my God.

I cannot handle this every fucking thing.

You can kill everybody.

You're criticizing us for killing people.

You can't handle this every fucking thing.

And then you're killing actual people.

She killed certain characters involved with people.

I looked in a box.

You killed Carla.

No.

What?

She came after me.

She did not come after her.

She did.

You came after her

Oh, you killed the other T Flings.

Oh my god, the peaceful Twinkle.

I was probably

tired of hearing about it.

I opened a box in a town.

They tried to arrest me.

I tried to leave.

Okay.

And they wouldn't let me leave.

So I shot somebody with an arrow.

And then it just aggroed like in waves.

It just escalated from that.

The entire town,

which then created a tone for my entire playthrough where I met Carlak in the forest.

Put one reputation.

But she knew what you brought.

On site, she just attacked me.

And it wasn't until weeks later that I even knew that she was a character.

I will give you credit for just rolling with that playthrough.

Because I think that is the thing a lot of people, I think, would have just been like, oh, I'm just letting the other save.

But you just were like, ah, let's just live with the consequences.

And to give you just a little bit more grace, I think just...

In summary, the list of people who she didn't kill is way shorter, probably easier to explain.

Oh, my God.

There were a few people who didn't attack me, and they're in my party now.

And they're my friends.

That makes sense.

That makes sense.

Okay, so what kind of character did you play, and

who are some of your party members?

Who are your romance?

You can just give us an overview of.

Yeah, I mean,

I played as a rogue, a half-elf rogue, and then I met Asterion, and I was like, oh, I'm playing as you.

I can't have you in my party.

I'm sorry.

And then, you know, I romanced Shadowheart, like, you know, a basic bitch.

I did,

and then I had,

who else?

I had, oh, I had Lazelle and I had Gale.

That was like my main party for my first playthrough.

But I wanted to play it like a game of D ⁇ D where I didn't like save scum or anything.

I wanted, if I failed to roll, I was just going to keep rolling with that.

Nice.

And I did that through acts like one and two and everything.

And then once I got to act three, I was so fucking invested in my character and like the relationships that I started really like uh really considering redoing roles because I was like, well, now I just want the story to end exactly how I want it.

And this is like, I have too much invested for this not to go like a well-written story.

So I played through like the ending maybe three different times and then sat there and chose what canonically I wanted to have in my character.

But I just love the game.

And I mean, it hit at the right time because I had just gotten into D and D.

Yeah.

Like I only played like in person a couple of times.

But all of a sudden, I had known nothing about Baldur's Gate 3.

And then at the time, I was like, oh, there's a whole like D DD game that I can just play right now.

And so I sunk like fucking 200 hours into it, man.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So good.

It's so good.

It's excellent even if everybody says, you, and then like

starts combat with you.

You have no idea what the story is.

Right.

The writing is just phenomenal, like the performances, like everything about it, man.

Yeah, it's an excellent game.

No, it's, it's staggering.

All right.

I have one more question.

This is for everybody.

I'm curious about some video games we've been playing now.

What are you playing?

What are you playing?

Hey, it's me, the Resident Evil Merchant, asking you the question of the week.

What are you playing, Matt Abadaka?

What are you playing?

Thank you, Resident Evil Merchant.

You're welcome.

I actually, I am playing a new game.

I haven't mentioned this in the thread, even.

Oh, okay.

I was going to text you guys over the weekend if I wanted to save it for the show.

Oh, I love it.

So I just didn't want to.

You have my number?

I think I do have it.

Yeah.

I do have the number.

Can you share your contact?

I don't have your number.

No, I think it's just better if I have yours.

And then.

No, but if you send me your contact info, then I can get that card.

No, oh, yeah, yeah.

No, I'm good.

Can I be honest?

Because I also have your number and I tried to call you once and the pickup sound was a dial-up modem.

Like,

what is your setup?

Yeah.

All right, so I don't have a data plan.

Okay.

Because I'm not like an elitist.

Right.

So I have a i have a a a what do you call a modem right uh hooked up into a uh ethernet cable which then i have into a wi-fi blaster that i that i then wi-fi blast my iphone so so you probably sometimes there's some errors and you might get the dial-up part of it uh when i'm still managing data Well, we'll have to send up over an IT guy or something, take a look at what you got, what you're working with.

Do not send anybody.

Okay.

Not yet

i need to clean up some things where are you staying these days well i uh i there's a decommissioned best western about 45 miles outside of los angeles and that's where i'm staying for the moment i mean it sounds apocalyptic to be honest Why?

What are we talking like?

West Covina?

You're in a condemned hotel?

Altadena.

Altadena.

Yeah, North Altadena, right at the mountain ridge.

Oh, wow.

Yeah.

There's a decommissioned hotel.

And, you know, if you go in the lobby, they still got all the keys in those places.

Isn't that wild?

Yeah, I mean, so you just, you just broke into a shut-down hotel.

Well, if you leave money, you're checking in, and I checked in.

I checked in.

I checked into the, I checked in.

It sounds like you did your due diligence.

If it was otherwise unoccupied, it seems like no harm, no foul.

Thank you very much.

Just, you know, be safe.

Please share your contact info with me.

Okay, we'll share it.

We'll share it.

I started to, because after, after I I finished Chrono Trigger, after we had recorded the episode,

I had finished it.

Oh, yes.

And I was every time this has been happening to me more recently, I think it's because.

Yeah, sorry, to clarify, we did a Chrono Trigger episode.

You had not finished the game yet.

A couple days afterwards, you did finish the game.

You did see it through the game.

And recorded an epilogue for the episode.

Yeah, we put that in at the very end there.

I was very pleased with my ending.

I loved it.

I loved it.

I love that game,

I think, more than life itself.

It's a beautiful,

wonderful game.

I loved it.

But afterward,

this happened after Elden Ring, DLC.

This happens now this year, I think, because there's just fewer games coming out this year that I'm interested in.

So there's not like something hot and fresh ready for me to jump into right away.

So I went, I did a rare, rare move.

Went to the back catalog.

What's in the back catalog?

Okay.

Oh, my God.

Oh, my God.

Is he about to say it?

Oh, what?

No.

No.

I know what you're excited about.

about.

And

I did not start Mother 3Hender.

So just let's rip that mandate off real quick.

I didn't start it.

But

I kind of wanted something that I knew wasn't going to be

very challenging for me or ask that much of me.

And I know that I would like these games.

I just have never really played one with much seriousness and not finished one before.

So

I loaded up the Nathan Drake collection and I started Uncharted Drake's Fortune, the first one.

Oh, wow.

Okay, great.

And I'm, I'm absolutely certain this is not a new observation.

Nathan Drake is a mass murderer.

Yeah.

I got an achievement in like the first area for getting 50 headshots.

Yeah.

I'm just headshotting everybody.

Yeah.

Just do it.

If you see Indiana Jones acting that way, you'd be like, this man is horrified.

Yeah.

And so it's so knowing that the next games after these games are The Last of Us and The Last of Us 2, I can see how Neil Druckman gets to the idea that maybe violence is bad.

Because

Nathan Drake is just like shooting other treasure hunters.

And you hope that they are just, that they're treasure hunters.

Yeah.

And Bruce Straley, who co-directed, you know, was the other director on Last of Us Part 1 and one of the people who created the series, it's like, it's, yeah, I think that was a largely a response to the Uncharted franchise and criticism of the Uncharted franchise, for sure.

Because the platforming, very fun.

And, you know, I feel like finding treasure is cool.

Like, that's like, that's...

If I found some treasure, I'd be pretty fucking stoked.

I'd love to do that.

But Uncharted 1 is also like very video game-y.

And you think about it as a PlayStation 3 game.

It wasn't like, you know, there's all sorts of stuff like what, like, you know, the parts where you're like dodging barrels of TNT

in a speedboat or whatever or like you know there's a lot of like relic collection that feels just like you know it feels almost like banjo-kazooye it feels very video gamey yeah but it's just that you were dealing with like this is starting to look like reality like the the the graphical fidelity is reaching a point where it looks like i'm killing actual people yeah that's what made it a little weird and upsetting it makes it weird and then and then uncharted 2 and 3 start to get more like you know um

They start to remove some of those video game-year elements and lean into like it being like an adventure a little bit more, which makes it feel even more asynchronous.

So yeah,

it's an interesting experience.

Because I bought this game when I bought my PS3, actually.

Wow.

And I just never, like, never finished it.

I just moved on to God knows what.

Are you playing it on the PS3?

No, I'm playing it on my PS5.

Yeah.

But I do have, I have all the discs for, I bought all of them.

Yeah.

I don't know what was going on.

I knew that I would like them.

And I was like, they're probably just never going to make another system.

This will not be available.

Of course, it's available on PS5.

So I'm playing that.

I guess it doesn't take that long to finish all three of them.

So I might be sticking with these first three at least and then maybe jumping into four, which everyone says is fantastic.

And then the

other one.

The Vita one.

I did start the Vita one not long ago, actually.

Yeah.

The one that has the two women is the protection.

Is it Lost Legacy?

Is that what I started?

Yeah.

Yeah.

That was also very good.

But

I'm enjoying that.

Chloe.

Yes.

That's one of them.

Chloe.

And then the other girl.

That's right.

Chloe and the other girl.

Yeah, but so I'm enjoying that.

It is funny because I guess in this updated

bundle, it tells you what you've done better than your friends.

So like

when you've cleared an area, it'll be like, you've,

it's showing this to me.

It's like, you've killed more people than Chef Kevin.

And I'm like, okay.

Good.

Good to know.

That's great.

I wish that feature was in more games.

Yeah, it should be in every game.

That's That's a great way of making a game sort of like

a strand game.

Yeah.

Like if you just had a little light information about how your friends play it.

There is, yeah.

I mean, that is like, you know, a thing in Telltales The Walking Dead, but it's not as personalized.

It doesn't say what the choices of like the people in friends listen to.

Everybody

pulls the overall pool.

Yeah.

Scott, any games you're playing right now?

Yes.

I'm on like a rogue-like kick or whatever.

I'm doing Hades right now for the first time.

I'd never tried it before.

It's fucking great.

It is.

It's amazing.

And then I also, I made the mistake of downloading Slay the Spire to my phone.

Oh, yeah, God.

Oh, my.

It's a trap.

God.

Yeah, it is a time suck.

Like, it's like, there's a timer on the game.

So it's like, I can see that a run takes me like an hour and eight minutes or whatever.

But for some reason, when I have a free 10 minutes, I'm like, I can do a full run right now.

I could fit this in in the next 10 minutes and then I just spend an hour looking at my phone building building a deck that sucks, but Slay the Spire, so fucking good.

It's so fun.

I mean, this, you know, a run-based deck builder game.

And yeah, I put so many hours into that on PC.

And then, yeah, when the phone version, I was like, oh, I'll mess around with this.

And I was just like surprised by how well executed it is.

Because it's very play like a lot of, you know, sometimes you'll get, you'll have the mobile version of something that's like, this doesn't really play very well.

It's very playable on a phone.

Yeah.

Oh, it very much is.

The only issue is if, like, if your fucking hand gets so massive, it's pretty easy to play like a card you weren't meaning to, but that just could be my clumsy fingers or something like that.

But, but the uh, but everything else like works so, so well.

Yeah, I'm obsessed with it.

Yeah, it's an awesome design.

I do wish runs were shorter because, yes, it is.

I just like, I, I've, I have had that installed on my phone and then I've had to delete it because I just like, I can't do this anymore.

Oh, really?

And that, that's always my cycle, I feel like, with the, with games.

Like, I had the same thing with Marvel Snap.

I was just like, and Hearthstone, too.

I did that exact same thing with Marvel Snap.

I had to delete it.

I was like, this has got to go.

I can't do this anymore.

I love it, but I just, this is all I do.

You know, it's too absorbing and it's too available.

That's the whole issue.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I've just started.

So,

I mean,

enjoy just deleting it in like the next three days.

Nick, what are you playing?

Well, thank you so much for asking, Resident Evil Merchant.

I'll try not to blow V8 too much this week.

Wait, what?

So try not to.

He He didn't say Blow V8.

All right.

I didn't, I've never heard that word or expression.

Blow V8, like just talk at length, like be a blow hard.

I think they have the same or all right.

Okay.

The way Blow V8 sounds is like what you look like, resonant

like a water corpse.

Exactly, exactly that.

Exactly that.

Somehow, wet and dry.

I'm a lost girl.

You have to stop saying the most horrific things and making direct eye contact with me.

I just don't know who else to sell it to.

Looking at Nick's like looking at a blank mirror.

Like a vampire's mirror?

Yeah, like when you...

Yeah, exactly.

You're just seeing a reflection of the room?

Yes.

All right, I'll take it.

All right.

I think that's fair.

Okay, so I'll try not to talk too long, too lengthy about this.

Elden Ring, I finished the base game.

Yes.

I went with the Ronnie ending.

I'm so glad I finished this game this time.

I did beat Millennia.

Love to hear it.

I did end up using the Mimic tier.

And it was one of those things where I was just like, I played it a couple more times.

I took like two days off the game.

I played a couple more times.

And then I just like, I was like, ah, well, what happens if I throw in the mimic tier in there?

And I was just like, oh, I'm just going to win the next time.

And so I used a rune arc and I went and I won.

It was kind of easy mode, but it was still gratifying and uh my mimic tier did die on the second form and i i still was able to bring it home on enough gas in the tank but but it was the sort of thing it was just like i do kind of wish i i i will we'll save i'll save it for another playthrough uh all that said i i i have i really loved how it ended i thought it was very satisfying it's really hard like with baldur's gate 3 to land the plane on one of those big meaty sprawling hundred plus hour games and you know i i think the ending has elements of anti-climax but it still is just overall does a good thing of of you know just i i I think, I already said this, but just like landing the plane.

That's all you want.

You don't want it to be like a mess.

So now I'm about 10 hours into the DLC.

Shout out of the Air Tree, and I really, really love it.

A couple of complaints I'll say real quick.

I wish there was a little more enemy variety.

I'm not sure if you guys felt that.

Like, I know it's super time-consuming to...

You know, to model and bone and animate

a new enemy and balance it and everything.

But I just feel like I've fought so many palette swap trolls and finger creepers at this point.

You know, I just like, I kind of, I do really admire like the Diablo expansion approach of just like every enemy is a new enemy is something you didn't see in the base game.

I also wish there were achievements.

I'm kind of surprised there are no achievements in the DLC.

Oh, interesting.

Yeah, there's none.

I guess they didn't clock that.

No, there's none.

Yeah, no, at least on Steam.

Maybe you just didn't get any.

No, there's none.

I looked it up.

Maybe you're just bad at the game and you didn't get it.

Matt, I am bad at the game, but I looked up, there are no achievements on Steam.

You're not bad at the game.

You beat Millennia without any assistance other than a mimic tier.

Yeah, but that's good.

That is true.

Anyway, I I was going to say, the

all positives overall about the DLC because it's just, I love it so much.

The environments are awesome.

The level design is just so expansive, so impressive.

I'm trying to use exclusively new DLC weapons and armor and ashes of war of spirit and spirit ashes, which all just like make it feel like you know something of a new game.

And that's really fun.

I love the sword, Milady, the allies blade.

It's so great.

What's your most frequent Instagram comment here?

It matches my pork by now.

Anyway,

It's so fun.

And I also will say that there's some great boss fights.

The Black Jail Knight, I've been using his Great Sword.

He's just like a guy you just find in a little alcove.

The Lion Guardian, who I think is very memorable.

Is it Rolana, Rayana, the Twin Moon Knight?

Rolana, yeah.

Really, really fun fight.

Awesome.

Rinala, I have it backwards.

Also,

the Black Jail Knight

is my nemesis.

It's a cool ass fight.

It's cool.

He He comes out of nowhere.

He's tough.

He was really, really hard.

He's got a big health pool, yeah.

Almost snapped my fucking controller in half trying to take him down.

Yeah.

No, I really had to be like, you have those moments, I feel like, with Souls games where you're just like, I have to just play the game.

I just like to lock in.

I have to not try to, you know, whatever, just muscle my way through this.

I'll also just say, just from a design standpoint, the use of the shadow tree fragments like as a way to balance and accommodate for players of whatever level coming into this game of just like, oh, that's just such a smart way to do it.

like, there's just like a separate level pool that you use.

You just, you, as you explore this game, you become more powerful in this section of the game only.

So I, I, I, I'm, I'm, you know, that's, it's not anything novel to say like this incredible game is incredible, but I, I, I am really, really enjoying my time with it, and I'm glad I'm playing the DLC.

Um, Heather, what are you planning?

Uh, well, I'm continuing on the Chrono Trigger journey.

Wow, I love it.

I am not much farther.

I didn't have a ton of gaming time this week, but I am going to head towards the horizon and try and beat this game finally.

I'm also really grateful for all of the Discord comments and Instagram comments of people who, like me, have been playing the game over and over and over again, but have never actually completed it.

I challenge you, like me, to finish the game finally, hopefully on this run.

Did you ever see that?

Sorry, Roger just interjected.

You ever see that Hard Times headline that was an Earthbound fan excited to play it for the first time?

That's funny.

I so I was playing that um the game that I'm excited about um I kind of want to talk about the game even though I haven't played it yet because it is being played and that game is Star Wars Outlaws

and there is a lot of hubbub this week about

the state that the game was in when it was being reviewed by games journalists and then what happened today to those games journalists.

So

everybody got their early review code.

Reviews have been all over the place.

Friend of the pod, Gene Park, really enjoyed it.

And the reason he gave for enjoying it was that it's a really fun game to vibe in.

In that, like, there are these recognizable Star Wars environments with incredible detail, and it's kind of just nice to exist in them.

And for me, that made the game sound so attractive because, like, my favorite part of any Ubisoft game is the environment.

The gameplay loop is fine, but getting to go to Northumbria in Vikings or in Valhalla and get to experience sort of the archaeologically accurate area of that game, it's like, that's why I'm there to play.

And if they're doing that in Star Wars, like there was a review I saw that was somebody who had found the most Isley Cantina using exclusively landmarks that they remembered from the movies.

Wow.

So they were able to walk through the neighborhood and find it

because everything kind of tracks.

And I was like, oh, this is great.

And specifically, it's great in a way that the game that I never played, Hogwarts Legacy, was for Hogwarts.

Like, if you're a super fan of Hogwarts, you could be like, oh, I know where the bathroom is because I watched those kids go up those flights of stairs.

That's the place where the kids shit and piss on the floor and they use spells to make the feces and urine disappear.

This is canonically the case according to J.K.

Rowling.

Yeah, it didn't hit the floor though.

Oh, okay, right, right.

Yeah, it would be under their robe while standing.

Got it, got it, got it.

So if they were raised in regular earth rules, they would have to unlearn those rules to just shit and piss while walking around.

Wow.

Is that real?

That's actually Carrie?

Yeah, I've never even heard of that.

Yeah, they did.

There's like 20.

Whatever many insane thoughts.

This is just another thing you did not need to add.

Kept that in your brain.

Kept your mouth shut.

So reviews have been really, really mixed.

And I've been watching a lot of like gameplay videos and getting myself hyped up for this, for this game because I want to go in eyes unclouded, like knowing that I'm in for a very mixed experience and it is not going to be the Star Wars game of my dreams.

But today,

Ubisoft launched a patch, like a pre-day one patch.

And if you were a games journalist who'd put in like 50 to 75 hours on this fucking game to review it, your save was destroyed by the patch.

Wow.

So like people like who had invested invested huge amounts of time already can't play the game that they were playing.

And a huge number of people on like Twitter or like TikTok were devastated by this experience because it's like, well, how does that buy us any like goodwill?

Yeah.

To do something like that to people who are like trying to give your game a fair shake.

Yeah, that does happen sometimes.

You know, you got like an open bait or something like that.

You're just, your save just isn't going to work in the full game.

But that, that's, that is, that, that, that is frustrating for it to happen so close to release.

Yeah, like the game comes out tomorrow as of recording.

So, anyway, yeah, I'm really excited to play that game.

Uh, it probably will put a bookmark in Chrono Trigger for me for a bit, um, but only based on how good the game is.

Like, I could come in next week and be like, guys,

Star Wars is dog shit.

I hate it.

Um, I hope they have an Exegal DLC.

I saw a little, I saw the thing that I was like, okay, I'm buying the game right now

was if you point your gun, you've got a little guy with you, a little squeaky guy, right?

You don't have to sell this to me.

I'm going to get it.

He's like a little cat lizard, you know, like a little squeaky guy.

And if you point your gun at the little squeaky guy, your character will go, pew, pew, pew, and it'll go, ah, and like fall over and play dead.

And I was like, that's it.

That's the whole, I'm sold.

Yeah, that's

for sure.

Just, I'm going to buy it too.

Yeah.

But that's what I've been playing: is Chrono Trigger and the hype cycle for Star Wars Outlaws.

We'll all find out for ourselves next week.

Let's talk about Telltales: The Walking Dead.

These were the episodic adventure games based on the Walking Dead comics.

The first episode of the first season was released April 24th, 2012.

Ultimately, five seasons were produced up through the end of Telltale as an entity.

Yes, there is a Telltale now, but it is a new company that acquired the old Telltales assets.

So, we had The Walking Dead Season 1, The Walking Dead Season 2, The Walking Dead Michonne, The Walking Dead, a New Frontier, and then The Walking Dead, the final season.

Scott, so what is your history with this series?

Like, what got you into these games?

So, I mean, this hit at the right time for me where I had been reading The Walking Dead comic, I was watching the show, and then when the game came out in 2012, I played the first season and just fucking loved it.

So, you were immediately in on it?

I was immediately in on it, but then so I think I played the second season and then I played like some of the other telltale games and never actually finished The Walking Dead until literally like only like a month or two ago, I downloaded like the complete collection of all these and just played through again, like first season, second season, all the way through the final.

So this is like super fresh for me.

Yeah.

But I just, I love it.

I love any game.

I love any game where you make a decision and like or a dialogue option or you say like, Kenny, let's go on a supply run.

And then text pops up and says, Kenny hates you for that.

I just love that.

That is a gut punch every single time, like, no matter how little it is.

Like, and the games can be silly, but I just get so emotionally invested where I'm like, does he really hate me for that?

Or, like, you know, Clementine knows that you lied to her or whatever.

And it's like, can we resolve this now?

No, she's walking away.

Yeah.

It's their, you know, they're transitioning to the next sequence.

But I, I love, love, like, I feel like it's the best adaptation of The Walking Dead, truly.

Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, this is so I really like the series.

I never actually finished all of it.

I actually was thinking about going back and doing it because, you know, there is that remaster that came out in 2019, 2020, or whatever it is, that complete collection.

I'm waiting for that to go on sale.

But like, I played season one as one package because I'd heard about it.

I got it.

And I played all of it when it was already out.

And then season two, I was like playing episodically, like as it was coming out.

And I was just like super in on it.

Those first two seasons and then the 400 Days, which was the prequel to, I think, the first one, which,

you know,

it just kind of added to the world.

I think it was a prequel or between the two.

And then I never played Michon and I played some of A New Frontier, but then I kind of fell off.

And I feel like that was partly like also, I forget when

A Wolf Among Us came out, but like.

I love that game.

Yeah.

And I feel like, but I was also like kind of getting just kind of worn out of the Telltale formula more so than the Walking Dead games.

And so like, I never actually finished it, but I did replay the first episode, which for anyone who hasn't played this series, like each episode is like a few hours of gameplay.

Like all put together, a season is like maybe about 10 hours.

And so then it's divided usually into five episodes or so.

I think for listeners who aren't familiar with the games, we should describe the games a little bit.

Yeah, for sure.

Which is that they are ostensibly adventure games, like in the tradition of LucasArts games or whatever, but they are telling a story

where you are piloting a character, not in a way that is like running him through the world and shooting zombies, but in a way where you are having interactions with other characters.

You make decisions with those characters, and those decisions are remembered by the game engine

actually, like by the characters.

Meanwhile, those events are punctuated by sort of quick time style events where you are fighting individual zombies or bosses or interacting with the environment as like fucking shit is collapsing on you or whatever.

There are environmental choices that you have to make as well as character choices that you have to make.

Like you have to choose between

individual things on a mantelpiece that you cannot ever go back and then re-choose.

It is a

and sometimes life or death decisions.

Like one of these two people is going to live and one is going to die is up to you and then you have to live with that.

Right.

And so as a represent, as a game experience that represents the walking dead, it is grim.

It is hard to swallow.

It is sad.

It is dark.

But it is also extremely effective.

Yeah.

And that's why this game was, it sold more than a million copies for its

initial season, season, uh, making it the most successful adventure game of all time.

And it was on a ton of top 10 lists, and some people even called it the game of the year

that that first year that it came out.

It felt very different.

And because it is not photorealistic, but is sort of

a pseudo-cell-shaded comic book, graphic novel inspired art style, it also has aged really well.

Yeah, it looks, it looks, still looks good.

Yeah, I will say the

aspects that haven't aged as well, as someone who, who just played it, and Scott, you can weigh in on this as well, is like, I feel like

things like the QuickTime events feel very dated, you know, like the mash the button and then

to get an action or like move a cursor to the right place in the screen.

But like the art style, like, looks, it's, it still works.

And then the, um, you know, the, like, the voice acting, and particularly like in the first season, like, so much of it is anchored by Lee Everett,

the player character who's voiced by Dave Finoy, and Clementine, who's voiced by Melissa Hutchinson.

And

they're such great performances with such a great dynamic.

But like, yeah, I think that stuff has aged really well.

Oh, yeah.

The look of the game is

beautiful, in my opinion.

Like, I think it looks great.

But I think, like you, I was a little burnt out on the Telltale formula because there was a period of time where one was coming out.

Like, it seemed like every couple of weeks.

And they had a bunch of different IP.

They had a Game of Thrones game.

They had a Borderlands game.

They had the Galaxy Man game.

And they had a Minecraft story mode, which we covered in the the podcast.

They just kept going back to the well.

They had a ton.

It got exhausting.

And then for a period, and then we had like no Telltale games for a while.

And that's why going back within the past couple of months, I'd given myself time to miss it a little bit.

So I didn't really feel as it was outdated.

I was like, it was almost, it was nostalgic.

I was like, oh, this is fun.

I remember playing these games all the time.

But as you go through the seasons, the walking dead, the final season,

they actually kind of

change the gameplay a little bit where they do make it a little more interactive, where you are walking as Clementine throughout the world and fighting.

It feels like more like a traditional action game.

Oh, it's the final season.

Yeah.

It's less of like the first season,

but you're still making like dialogue choices and choices with the environment.

It's just really good.

The choices feel impactful.

The thing with the Telltale games is I think they got a lot of criticism for like, it was like the illusion of choice.

Yes, right.

Right.

Where you're like, okay, I'm going to save this character instead.

But in the next episode, that character is just shot in the head anyway because the writers are like, there's too many branching paths.

We can't do this.

But if you're just playing it one time through,

it feels like your story is impactful.

And I feel like that's important.

Yeah.

And also, and we, and you need to look, not to bring everything back to Baldur's Gate 3, but like a game that does manage to work.

with all of those, you know, possibilities to it does manage all those uh different branching paths but i mean that was a game with like what like a 700 person development team it was like insane um yeah it it and and going back to what you were saying heather so like like yes it the the lucas arts formula itself had gotten very tired lucasarts had shuttered the point-and-click adventure games were dominated by like there were a lot of like like puzzles with moon logic and and that felt very stagnant and so telltale was at first like they were using LucasArts properties in part like they were they were doing you know monkey island games um salmon and Max games.

But yeah, when they, when they actually like, were like, okay, we're going to kind of rethink what an adventure game is, and maybe we don't need all these puzzles.

Maybe we can massively simplify things.

Maybe it can be more about just like interpersonal relationships and consequential dialogue.

Like it did feel like a revelation at the time.

It felt like something very, very new back in 2012.

Matt, what's your history with the Telltale games?

So I was playing.

I played these episodically.

I think I got, well, maybe after

you you're a Walking Dead fan, I love The Walking Dead.

I do agree that this is the best presentation of this world and story.

I think it's very, very good.

I fell off the show at some point.

I fell off the comics and then I heard that it ended and I went back and wrapped it up because I was like, oh, I wasn't that far away from just finishing it

in real time.

But then with these games, I think I jumped in on season one before the DLC came out, which is the 400 Days.

and then um,

from then on, was just super into it.

But I was, I've been looking at,

I've been looking up like things on my phone for the last couple minutes because I was like, I think I've done all of them, I have not done the final season, yeah, and the final season because it kind of came out partly after Telltale had closed, yeah, so I think it was like kind of a weird, like, is this, are they actually going to finish this thing or whatever?

And yeah, I, I never, I never got around to it either.

I had to, I think I got the whole collection on Steam at one point when it was like on sale or something.

So I would like to play them on my Steam Deck again because

I do love these games.

I know that like you said,

Scott, that like the characters just feel so good.

And like you do get so like emotionally invested in the choices that you make and stuff.

And it is,

I think it is because it is just like such a sad environment that like the smallest flight feels like the most horrific thing you could do to somebody for some reason.

But then also you have to make horrible choices.

Yeah.

Do you have beans?

I do have beans.

I do not have beans.

What are beans?

I don't have beans.

She knows you lie.

I do love, look, that there's very oftentimes just three dots is an option for dialogue.

Yeah.

Let me not say anything.

Okay, Ranch, you are also a Walking Dead fan.

You had not played these games, but you did watch a playthrough of the first season.

Yeah, first season and a little bit of the second season.

What was was your reaction?

I cried a lot this morning.

And the streamer that I was watching, she also was just having a mental breakdown at the end of the first season.

Yeah, yeah.

I joined her in that.

The thing, because like the relationship between

Lee and Clementine in the first season is

spectacular.

It's just so, so well done.

And does predate the Joel and Ellie thing by just like a little bit.

This is the thing.

It's remarkably, it's remarkably similar to Last of Us in terms of it's like a

surrogate father, you know,

orphaned girl, like

the two of them are like going through this apocalyptic zombie world.

Like it's like the same fucking thing.

It's just minus the gameplay, you know?

I think a lot of that has got to be influent because also,

first off, if you're at Naughty Dog and this game comes out like barely, like you, you've already made your game you already know what the story beats are you've already recorded your dialogue you're all your you're through everything this game comes out you must be like son of a bitch

but both of them i think are influenced by uh cormick mccarthy's the road yeah like i feel like everybody is coming from that fountain head and and exploring these similar stories over and over again like mandalorian is also effectively the last of us in that it's like guy with a ward um but yeah i lone Wolf and Cub, another like common influence, if you like, for the

but also I feel I feel so much for how nervous it must have made them to play Walking Dead and be like, yikes, we are so close to this.

Yeah, also, yeah, it came out within a very close window too.

And then not only that, every two months it came out

for $5

or whatever it cost per episode.

Yeah, I mean,

it is just kind of like one of those remarkable coincidences.

It's like that year that every game had jellyfish in it for whatever reason, you know.

Two years ago?

What the fuck is going on with those jellyfish?

I don't know.

Or, you know, it just happens all the time.

Like, there's like, you know, there'll be like two Snow White movies at the box office, or Armageddon and Deep Impact will come out.

But those are very oftentimes imitative.

The one of his reaction to the other.

They're making, you know, Tombstone because of Wyatt Earp, and then Tombstone actually ends up coming out before Wyatt Earp.

There's no, I don't think, any evidence that there was any sort of cross-pollination.

There was any sort of inspiration being drawn from one or the other.

They just happened to come out at the same time.

Yeah?

That's my understanding.

That's possible.

Yeah.

By the way, I will say, I did know

some people who worked at Telltale and

some people who lost their jobs and

the layoffs and the collapse of that company.

And I did get the sense without betraying any sources or anything that like it was a pretty punishing crunch towards the end.

And they, they did, part of the, the issue with the company is that they were just taking on so many projects to try and stay solvent.

And they just, it was just an

unsustainable situation.

But yeah, I know like people who worked on, you know, one

developer in particular who worked on The Walking Dead and was like a really, seems to have been a really cool experience to work on that game, but also like

it was just like a tough corporate environment.

Yeah.

I would imagine having to repeat the crunch every couple of months to like finish an episode is I mean, I don't know exactly what the timeline was on this, but like I would imagine probably making one full game to release is probably a little easier on your stress level to instead of having to do it every couple of months.

I don't know.

Yeah.

I don't know.

I've never worked on an episodic game, so I don't know.

I do.

I'd be interested to be curious.

Yeah.

Yeah.

There's got to be some sort of pressure where it's like, once the first episode is out, everyone's immediately asking for that second one.

Like, you know, and then if you delay that, then it's like, I don't know.

I feel like it feels bad somehow.

That's probably why I didn't jump into the last one, too, because I was probably just like,

I'll have to wait for the next one.

Am I going to remember to know what it comes?

I also feel like there must be some pressure of success because the game game was so widely acclaimed and you aren't, perhaps you have the story, of course you have the story mapped out, but to maintain that level of quality, the difference between being like, okay, we're making a game versus we are making a game that I hope isn't a disappointment to people already invested in this has to be a very unique pressure.

Yeah.

So I will say I love The Last of Us and I the particularly the first game, you know, you know, the PS4 remaster in particular, just played the shit out of it.

I loved it so much.

But at the time, I think I was trying to be a little bit more of like, you know, actually, I think The Walking Dead is a more effective and a little bit better version of this.

And replaying The Walking Dead, at least the first part of it.

There is the point you get towards the end of episode one where you have basically like a stealth combat sequence, but it's all covered through, you know, a point-and-click adventure action and QTEs.

And I did get to that point and I was like,

man, I kind of wish I was just playing this.

You know, I kind of wish I was just like, I kind of wish this was just a video game right now.

So from that ass, from that standpoint, it's just like, I don't know.

Games are a thing you play.

And I do really like when there's just like really tight gameplay in something.

That's a

super simple thing to say, but it's like,

the thing that always appealed to me about the Last of Us games is just, I feel like gameplay is

so incredible.

Those combat sequences are so intense.

I'm getting kind of emotional hearing you say this because it does feel like my thesis on games coming out of your mouth and that makes me really happy i also i also get frustrated when i am sort of barely interacting with and watching an event happen in a game versus like having some sort of um technical influence and capacity to control the thing happening.

Like

it, it feels it part of the reason I fell off of these games was I was frustrated by the experience of playing them.

It wasn't that it wasn't effective.

It was that, like, I'd be like, but I want to go look in that cabinet.

You know,

right, right.

Yeah.

And you look, obviously, it's a lot less resource-intensive to be like, hey, I'm going to press these buttons and this canned animation is going to

play as opposed to like, I have to have this whole combat system to figure out all these different approaches the player can take.

But yeah, I do kind of have that feeling.

All that said, I really do like these games.

And I do, I will say, I think the feeling of consequence is, to me, always affective.

Like,

I do really feel like, fuck, I just really like chose to save that little boy, but it meant this other guy's son died.

You know what I mean?

Like, it's just like, there are moments like this is just like, Jesus Christ, this is a grim thing for my character to have to come to terms with, you know, and for me as the player to have to come to terms with.

What are beans?

She knows you lied now.

Everybody knows what beans are.

You'd have to be a fool to not know what a bean is.

No, I've never heard of beans.

You're obviously lying.

And it feels just so dark what you're doing in the games.

Like,

like The Last of Us, obviously, super dark.

But The Walking Dead, I just feel like it's such a mainstream property now that to have like a game release and be like, you have to fight a dog to the death for food in this level.

You're like, what?

You know, like that is so intense.

And I feel like because the game looks like a comic book, you wouldn't expect it to go as far as it does

with those kind of decisions.

It also, it even follows, but just because we're the Last of Us comparison is already there, it even follows the Last of Us arc of the, by part two, you're playing as the daughter, you're playing as the child character, you know?

I was about to say, I feel like we're talking a lot about the first one because it's probably the most memorable to us because it's the one we've all started the most, probably.

Well,

it's fresh in my mind, too.

But yeah, it did have a specific impact on on me.

But even the, even the choice, like the narrative choice in that first game to have Lee be on his way to prison for a crime of passion and then having the player, you at home, me like 20 years old or whenever the fuck this game came out, like trying to think about like, I think it's better to lie about what I was doing when we bring it up instead of reveal to somebody that I was going to, like, that's such a, I don't know, that's like a very nuanced lie to like put in a game like that.

Cause then other people in the game do like uh what's the his fucking uh his the like his his buddy that's like his son dies or whatever his son's name is duck i know that um

kenny like will react to that in a specific way but then you tell him a story and he's like you know what that guy sounds like he deserved it or whatever you're like okay i don't know i need you agree being on my side with this kenny i just need to

atone for a crime i found in this in this game because usually i'm when i'm playing these games and we've talked about this on the pod before i there i'm i feel like I'm looking through a window and it's not really scary and nothing really exists.

And that's why I can kill the horse in Red Dead.

But with

the Walking Dead games, I felt it was a very effective way of making me feel empathy because the choices were...

It wasn't just like, well,

here's how we can distill it.

When you shoot the horse in Red Dead, nothing happens.

Yeah, you just get another horse.

When you have to make a decision between two characters, one lives, one dies,

it matters in this game.

And as such, felt like really effective and a little bit sickening storytelling to like really bring you into the world of The Walking Dead where you're watching, you know, Rick Grimes and his dudes, and you're kind of just like

blissfully entertained by like the horrifying things that they're doing on a weekly basis.

With this, it was like,

oh, man, I'm going to tell a lie to this person,

and that's going to bother me.

And, like, Rick Rimes lies to like literally everybody he comes across.

Right.

It's, I, I really, I thought it was really effective.

Yeah.

What?

What's that?

He'll never lie to his son, Carl.

Carl.

He's always talking about Carl.

He won't lie to him, though?

He won't lie to him.

I think that's not true, is it?

Maybe he'll lie to protect him.

Yeah.

You have to do things.

As a father, you have to do things that you wouldn't necessarily do.

Where are you going with this?

It feels like you just wanted to say the name Carl.

I kind of was saying,

I should not weigh in.

I kind of wanted to drop my friend.

Yeah.

It's hot.

We have to thank The Walking Dead because I'm not sure Death Stranding would exist without it.

That's true.

Yeah.

Hideo might not have ever known that the coolest guy ever on Earth was on TV if you could have put him in a video game.

had not been for The Walking Dead.

There also is something about The Walking Dead, the aesthetic, that, like,

I know it's similar.

The world of the Walking Dead seems grosser and nastier to me than The Last of Us does.

Yeah, it is.

Yeah, it's grimmer.

Yeah.

But, like, it seems, no, like, yucky.

Like, it is a little more distinct.

No, it's not so.

Yeah, I think it's, it's a little bit more just like immersed in human misery.

Not that that's not a part of like The Last of Us, but it it is really just like, oh, people

just people are so get become so depraved and so animalistic, you know.

Does there exist?

Because I've wanted this to exist and honestly, frankly, have pitched that this exists, but I don't know, given my limited media literacy,

is there a show that is a zombie show where everything is

hyper-realistic?

So, for example, you can't drive a car because there's no gas Or, like, the food is only good up to a point.

Like, is there any, is there any zombie media that really addresses that that anybody knows of?

God, I played this game in early access.

Now, I can't remember the name of it, but Project Zomboid?

Yeah, Project Zomboid.

That feels like it kind of delves into that a little bit.

Oh, wow.

Yeah.

I don't even know what that is.

Piano wire, piano wire.

Carl.

Yeah, I always thought this is the one thing in any sort of apocalypse section, I'm always just like, why aren't people riding bicycles?

Right.

Like, it's just always like, it feels like so much easier to find a working bicycle than a horse.

Yeah.

You know, but I guess horses are just more.

And also horses need to eat.

And horses need to eat.

Yeah.

Right.

But like, the fun thing about the world of the walking dead, it's kind of like Mad Max rules, kind of, where, like, you can just decide to be like a new type of guy.

And you're like, I'm like Negan.

And now I have a bat that I named Lucille.

And she's hungry.

Like, and like, and that type of shit.

Or you can be like that guy that I can't remember what his fucking name is, but he has a tiger.

And he's just like, yeah, I'm a guy with a tiger now.

And he wasn't like that before.

He worked at like an office.

And now he's like, now I'm a guy with a tiger.

Yeah, what was Scrotus doing before the fall?

Yeah, what was the people?

The people leader had, there was lore with him.

I can't remember what it is now.

He did what he did previously.

Managed a best buy.

Yeah, like, is there...

I don't know.

I mean, are there any moments that stick out to us where they're ever like looking back on this?

It's like, oh, oh, oh, yeah.

I mean, the dog thing was like part of it, like, that is a thing of just like you have to do something so brutal.

Again, Last of Us Part 2, you also have to fucking merc a dog.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But it's like fuck and merc.

No, I said fucking merc a dog.

You have to have a fuck Andy.

That's sick.

Yeah, they're crazy.

Part three had to fuck a dog.

Oh my god.

I mean, the stuff

the episode one, or you know, season one is probably the most memorable to me.

I do remember enjoying

because the the new frontier uh clementine doesn't factor into it until about like the last couple of chapters i believe it's a new family uh so it's like a new like type of like it's just just different just different uh like i don't know different vessel for storytelling just to get some new characters in the mix there um but then i mean i'm for some reason i'm remembering the the unhoused man that lives on the train i'd be like i love that guy yeah i know what you're talking about he's a clutch guy it's like do you want to share gin with him or he's like yeah i'll I'll do anything for the girl.

He knows you're lying about the gin.

What?

I feel mad.

I feel empathy now.

God damn it.

Going back to Hitman.

There's a way to turn off those notifications, isn't there?

Like, you can play it blind.

Yeah, you can do a minimalistic UX, I think.

Oh, interesting.

But I think that's part, to me, like, that's just part, like, seeing that stuff as part of the game.

Like, I lied, to me, I think that's kind of the experience.

Yeah.

I feel like a memorable season one decision was like telling, I mean, I don't know how spoiler we're getting, but like telling someone that whether or not you're bitten.

You're like being bitten and the group comes over and it's like, do you hide the bite?

Do you not hide the bite?

And like, that's a choice where I'm like, oh, that's a choice that's in all types of zombie media.

I don't think I've ever made that choice as a player of a game.

Like, I love that one.

Well, part of the tension of that choice is that you want to beat the game.

Yeah.

Right?

Because like

you can choose to tell people that you're bitten.

It's like one of the final final scenes you're with that dude, right?

Is that, I mean, is that what we're talking about?

I think the choice is, I think it might be like the last, like leading into the last episode.

Oh.

Well,

I'm thinking about the time when you're like sitting across from the guy in the chair.

Yes, yes, yes, yes.

But it feels like those, those moments only have tension because there's game.

Right, right, right.

Right.

Because like, otherwise you'd just be like, you'd tell everybody.

Like, if it was me, I would fucking immediately, I'd be like, guys, I've been bitten.

and it wouldn't make a difference in the real world because they'd be like, oh, okay, well we're gonna quarantine you until you turn and then shoot you in the head.

And I'd be like, great, thanks so much.

We're all on the same page.

Do you think that's what they're gonna do?

You think they'd shoot you in the head beforehand?

Yeah, that's what I'm saying.

I think they'd shoot you immediately.

Yeah, it's possible.

What?

Yeah.

Well, I mean, the people in the game, the game also.

You don't think so?

Right between the eyes.

I think you'd be, I think people, I think, like, I got bit by a zombie.

I think someone's like taking a shotgun, turned, putting a canoe on your head.

Immediately, like, but, but, but, wait, wait, wait, wait.

I'm assuming these people know each other maybe a little bit more than the Walking Dead people do.

If Nick said I was bit by a zombie, I would not instantaneously kill him.

I would be like,

I'd be like, I'm sorry, Nick, that's so sad.

Sorry, buddy, and just chop his head off immediately.

Wow.

No, I think

we're talking about the characters within the game.

Yeah, what I would do for every single one of you in here.

The Kenny character is like, this guy is psycho, dude.

Like, he could do anything at any time.

Like, he's killing people on site no matter what.

And I feel like the game does such a good job of building pressure by, like, whatever you choose, you feel like a complete dick.

Like, everyone treats you like an asshole.

They're impossible decisions.

Right, exactly.

It's like you steal food for the group and everyone's like, you're a fucking thief.

I'd rather die than be with you.

Or you take, like, you don't take the food and everyone's like, you're going to get us killed, bro, if you don't steal that food.

But, like, that tension is like there with the bite where you're going, if I tell them about the bite, do they trust me more or do I not have help for the rest of the game?

Right.

Yeah.

Well, and so I feel like I've read criticisms of these types of choices in these games in particular.

And the criticism is that ultimately at the end of the game, like small choices don't actually matter because there's like a course correction for a there's only so many outcomes and like there's not like a

thing Scott was talking about earlier.

Yeah, it definitely, I mean, but I, but I mean, like, that's, I just don't know how you solve that.

Yeah.

Without having, you know,

counter-trigger endings to, you know, to the nth power, you know, in terms of, like, like, I don't know how you, I think all these things kind of are just going to end up funneling you towards a few, a handful of possibilities towards the end.

Because, like, you can't, like,

you know, like, leave Clementine behind and just, like, be like, that's it for Clementine.

You never hear from her again.

Yeah.

She's the protagonist of the series.

Right.

It's, it's like, you know, like, like, for instance, your Baldur's Gate 3 playthrough where you didn't have Laiselle the first time through.

Yeah.

Like, it's amazing that the game works all the way through without Laiselle.

Like, that's like, that feels miraculous to me.

But ultimately, you still have like a half dozen endings that you can choose from at the very end, regardless of your choices up to that point.

But it is still like the journey is part of it, that you can make these choices and you have to live with them.

I don't know.

I

dismiss that criticism a little bit.

I understand the feeling, but I do think like part of it is just like have like having those moments, having those, those, those, those feelings that you have to sit with for a second.

Somewhere some right now, some maniac is working on this game.

Like there's some indie developer who's trying to solve this problem.

And in like 10 years, a game's going to come out and it's like, no, man, there's almost 10,000 endings.

Yeah, right, right.

And every choice you make matters.

And it's going to be like...

a disco Elysium-esque game.

Yeah, it'll be like an animal world just out of nowhere.

Here's this design no one was thinking about that just like, you know, like I was like, holy shit.

Oh, well, there you go.

Yeah.

Yeah.

We'll look forward to that.

But for now, I do think the Walking Dead games are worth playing if you're a fan of graphic adventures.

And I'm sure a lot of our listeners have already

played through them.

Yeah, I mean, I don't know.

I mean, just, I, I, I, I'm really, it's really encouraging, Scott, to hear that you played through it at all recently and you did have such a positive reaction to it.

Yeah, and I think the final season particularly, it's, it, is, feels as strong as the first two, in my opinion, or even just the season one.

And it feels like it's almost like a send-off to the entire genre of Telltale games or something.

So I would recommend people play it.

I thought it was really satisfying, and I wept like a baby as we all have

been talking about.

So Clementine, Clementine, underrated video game protagonist

for sure.

So cool.

Yeah.

I'm going to keep playing it.

I have had fun returning to it.

Ranch, are you going to watch any more of it?

Yeah, I have to.

I'm so attached to Clementine.

I think we got time for a segment.

All right.

Hey, oh my goodness.

I got a segment.

What?

Can our producer, Rochelle Chen Ranch, identify dudes from video games?

It's the return of dude ranch.

So here's how this will work.

I'll name a dude.

I'll name a dude and Matt Heather and Scott, you guess if Ranch knows who this dude is.

So it will be a yes if Ranch can name the franchise.

Okay.

So like, you know, whatever.

If I, if it's like, oh, that's that character is from The Legend of Zelda.

They don't, she doesn't need to name the specific Zelda game.

Okay.

Um, and

I don't know Ranch.

Well, here's what I will say.

Ranch, you want to give a little bit of your background with video games?

I mean, like, I would say you, you are somewhat knowledgeable about gaming, but you are not like an avid gamer.

You play Fortnite, you played Resident Evil 2 recently.

Yeah, I would say that in the past year, I've been exposed to games because of this podcast.

Okay, gotcha.

But I played Fortnite before

and have very broad knowledge of games in general.

And you've absorbed a lot of Kingdom Hearts secondhand.

Yes, because my boyfriend is obsessed with Kingdom Hearts.

Understood, Ranch.

Understood.

May I call you Ranch?

Yes.

Okay, thank you.

Okay, and because we're talking Walking Dead, today the theme is horror games.

This is a horror game edition of Dude Ranch.

All right, first up, and when everyone can take a guess separately, does Ranch know this dude, Leon S.

Kennedy?

That's a yes.

That's a yes, Matt says yes.

Yeah, that's got to be a yes.

No, Ranch, what franchise is Leon Kennedy from?

President Evil.

Okay, so that's Ratt and Matt points.

Let's go.

Both on the board.

Next up.

Proud of you.

Next up, Freddie Fosbear.

Yes.

I'm going to say no.

I'm going to say no.

Ranch, who is Freddy Fazbear or Fazbear?

Five Nights at Freddy's.

Scott has two points.

Ranch and I are locked in.

We're locked in.

I said no because for a moment I didn't know.

I was like, wait, who is that?

It just wouldn't have shocked me if that somehow skipped Ranch's desk.

If she just didn't know.

Well, Heather, you and I are like just too old for it, is the thing.

Fuck?

What?

No, we're on the that's one we're on the other end of.

We're too old for five minutes.

I watched the movie.

I went to the, I saw the movie.

I saw the movie, too.

We all saw the movie.

I didn't know.

I didn't see the movie.

You didn't see the movie.

It's tough.

Joel Miller.

Yes.

Scott says yes.

I'm.

I am going to say yes.

And if, well, I'll explain why.

Okay.

Later.

I'm going to say say no.

The Last of Us?

Wow.

Matt and Scott both get three.

I said yes because, and I hope it's because of this.

Ranch loves my impression.

Is that why?

Yes.

Wow.

Thanks for sparing my human.

That's almost as good as your Carl.

Carl.

Ellie is one of them comic books you were looking for.

Wait a minute.

Those are kind of similar.

I have like one, I have like one guy, one vaguely southern guy.

Yeah, I say Clementine.

Clementine.

Freddy Fastbear.

Say, damn it, Bobby.

Damn it, Bobby.

All right.

Next up, Sam Porter Bridges.

No, absolutely not.

No.

Yeah, let's be on my first no.

No.

Ranch, who is Sam Porter Bridges?

No idea.

Wow.

Everyone gets a point.

Next up.

Wait, who is it from no you don't get you don't get to know no he's from death stranding yeah death stranding uh

uh

james sunderland

no no no knows all around

no wow from silent hill silent hill is huge specifically everyone else gets a point

ranch um could you play um silent hill 2 for us please like actually play it i think watch a playthrough you should watch it watch a watch a playthrough let us know what you think yeah i'll play it.

Okay, great.

Uh, there's the yeah, the remake's coming out.

I feel like if I had to suffer, so should Ranch.

Oh, it's not good.

No, it's no, it's good.

It's one of the best of all.

It's scary.

It's scary.

I'm not sure how it, I mean, it's it's a it feels a little clunky to play.

Wait for the remake.

Wait for the remake.

The remake's coming out.

Uh, okay, next up: Alan Wake.

Yes.

I'm also going to say yes.

I'm going to say no.

Heather says no.

Ranch, what franchise is Alan Wake from?

Alan Wake.

Wow.

She got it.

I guessed yes because there's a Fortnite skin.

All right, next up, Alu card.

No.

No.

This segment is so funny because it is just a list of names.

No.

Everyone says no.

Ranch, you know who what Alucard is from?

No.

Castlevania, the Castlevania franchise.

Dracula's son.

All right, we got a couple more here.

Next up.

Tiffany and Claire.

I don't even know.

I don't know what that is.

No.

Ranch, you remember Tiffany and Claire?

Mary Kate and Ashley, Sweet 16 licensed to Dracula.

That is correct.

They are the two playable characters who are not Mary Kate and Ashley.

Who is your main in that game?

Mary Kate.

Does she have better acceleration?

What was there?

Or her stat.

I just like her name.

Fuck.

All right, finally, Freddy Krueger.

Yes.

No.

No.

Matt says yes.

Everyone else says no.

Ranch, do you know Freddy Krueger?

The Friday the 13th game?

No, it is a nightmare on Elm Street.

Wow.

Wow.

Scott wins overall.

Hell yes.

Quite a showing.

That's this week's Get Played.

Our producer is Rochelle Chen.

Ranch, yard underscore underscore sard.

Our music is by Ben Prenti.

BenprentyMusic.com.

Our art is by DuckBrigade Design.

DuckBrigade.com.

And hey, check out our Patreon, patreon.com/slash get played, where you can find our interior pre-head gum back catalog plus ad-free main feed episodes including our patreon exclusive show get animated as well matt what are we watching this week we're watching violet evergarden and we're on episodes eight and nine i believe as of this week and let me tell you it's picking up picking up stuff's happening we keep saying it's picking up let me tell you it's picking up yeah patreon.com slash get played scott uh sis thanks so much for being here thanks so much for having me the customer is always wrong scott cease uh tell us again about the book and anything else you want to plug customer is always wrong uh it's a great gift book for anyone you know that has bad days at work.

Often, it's super funny.

If you like my videos, you'll like the book.

You can get it anywhere.

You get books, and you can go to scottsease.com for stand-up tour dates and more.

Awesome.

Thank you so much for being.

This was so fun.

Yeah,

y'all.

Thank you.

Great.

I love talking games with you.

Oh, yeah.

I do.

I don't have any, I don't take any pleasure in this.

As

I hate to do this to a guest, you did get played, though, and I'm very sorry.

Damn.

Matt, can you say that again in a southern voice?

You got played.

That was a head gum podcast.