Controlled Interests Gamecast

This week the guys discuss their time with Kingdom Hearts 3 with another week of playing underneath their belt. Though it's success is discussed later in the show, Jerrad provides the crew with his initial impressions on Respawn Entertainment's battle royale shadow-drop, Apex Legends. After a jampacked quickie news segment the guys take a look at all of the good and bad news that came out during the publisher investor meetings. Lastly, Mat Piscatella from the NPD group made some 2019 NPD predictions and the crew takes a look at what trends Piscatella sees taking over in the coming year.

This week the guys are joined by Raccoon City Radio co-host and Resident Evil diehard, Andrew Taylor. They begin the show by giving their overall review of the Resident Evil 2 Remake and discuss why its improvements translate well into the modern age. Kingdom Hearts 3 then takes center stage as the group gives their initial impressions on a game they've waited 14 years for. Did it live up to the hype and expectations so far? Closing out the show is Nintendo's announcement that Metroid Prime 4 will restart development in partnership with Retro Studios? What does this mean for Retro Studios' current project? Should we expect a marquee release for Nintendo in 2019? If so, what?

It was a slow news week as the guys' anticipation for Kingdom Hearts 3 continues to grow amidst numerous glowing reviews. Everything is not great though, as the industry saw the Creative Director of Cyberpunk 2077 leave CD Projekt Red to join Blizzard Entertainment in the same role. The guys discuss what it means for Cyberpunk 2077 in the immediate future and how it affects it's development schedule. The guys close out the show going over all of the NPD numbers for 2018 provided by Mat Piscatella. It covers the best-selling console, video games, and explains how much money the industry made as a whole in 2018.

It was a week full of numerous big stories in the gaming industry revolving around some major developers. The guys begin by discussing their recent gaming experiences including the Resident Evil 2 Remake demo as well as Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. The news begins with a quickie section involving NBA 2K as well as Ariana Grande. With the big stories the guys tackle the Randy Pitchford allegations as well as the announcement that EA canceled EA Vancouver's open-world Star Wars games. The show closes out with the big topic covering Bungie announcement that they would be splitting apart from publisher Activision.

Now that 2018 is behind us it's now time for the guys to talk about their favorite games of the past year. They start by running down their personal Top 5 lists for 2018, discussing why each game is on their list and why they ranked where they did. At the end of the show Jerrad goes down the Controlled Interests cumulative Top 10 games of 2018. Tune in to see what reigns supreme. 

The beginning of the year is usually a barren wasteland in terms of news, but luckily for Jerrad and Dom there were some interesting developments. They talk about Infinity Ward's upcoming Call of Duty game and whether or not we should expect Modern Warfare 4. They also cover the news that the UK games market is heavily moving towards digital and Xbox Game Pass January additions. Lastly, they cover the announcement that Second Dinner, the studio lead by former Hearthstone director Ben Brode and comprised of former Blizzard devs, secured $30 mil. in funding and their first game is a partnership with Marvel.

With 2018 about to close out the guys look towards the future. They each come with a set of predictions for 2019 and run through them with one another. Is The Last of Us Part II coming out next year? What's the deal with PlayStation? Can Kingdom Hearts 3 really live up to the hype generated by an elongated development cycle? Tune in to check out our personal crystal balls for the coming year.

As 2019 approaches the guys are itching to get their hands on some long awaited titles. Releases like Kingdom Hearts 3 and Anthem are right around the corner and they can't come soon enough. Tune in to find out what makes each of the guy's Top 5 lists for their most anticipated games coming out in 2019. There's a good handful of likely suspects, but that doesn't mean there's a lack of surprises.

In a special Christmas episode, Jerrad and Jordan go over a ton of interesting and not-so-interesting topics in a spectacular for the ages. The topics range all over the place in the gaming industry. Some of the discussions revolve around the future of Xbox, where Marvel Games will be seen next, and a bevy of other points of interest.

Not only did we see big announcements like Mortal Kombat 11, we saw surprises left and right. Joker was introduced as the first DLC character for Smash Bros. Ultimate and Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3 was announced exclusively for the Nintendo Switch. Geoff Keighley followed through and delivered this year.