Daydreamcast

Happy Halloween from your friends at the Daydreamcast! Timely as ever, despite our one week break, we indulge in seasonal musings as we explore the philosophy of modern horror games, the horrors of being a completionist, as well as the most horrific creature known to man: the Pac-Man reimagining from Pac-Man & his Ghostly Adventures. We refuse to move on, however, before tackling the real reason for the season: more F2P gacha games! Please pray for Brogan's recuperation, but not until listening to our deep dive on the daddy of modern stealth games, Thief: The Dark Project. Thief focuses on providing the player with a toolset within a rule set and going: "Your move", pioneering emergent gameplay and many more staples of the stealth genre we take for granted now. Complete with a dense atmosphere, an amalgamation of medieval and steampunk, and that Y2K edge™, the game warrants (and rewards) thorough re-examination. Halloween Vile wishes you and your family blessed holidays.

Timestamps:

Whatcha Playing

00:00 Pac's Scary Halloween (2016)

06:30 Five Nights at Freddy's (2014) and the modern horror game

19:40 Downwell (2015), a completionist's lament

26:24 Looney Tunes: World of Mayhem (2018), Rockman X DiVE (2020)

35:15 Hot Take Central (also known as The Hot Take Minute)

Featured Game

45:11 Thief: The Dark Project

The Daydreamcast is buggin'! The anime has taken over the show, leaving Brogan beyond salvation, as we talk about the gacha craze that has swept the nation (and its name is Genshin Impact) and Kingdom Hearts, of all things. Meanwhile, Pavlos finally delivers his thoughts on the Meiji era Ace Attorney spin-off which never made it out of Japan. Thankfully, we have the palate cleansers at the ready with two hot-as-heck-for-realsies-this-time hot takes straight from hell, definitively rewriting the general consensus on two beloved platformer series. A little less revisionist is our take on the game of the week, Donkey Kong 3, the ugly duckling of the original arcade trilogy. While we're down with Stanley the Bugman (formerly known as The Fumigator) and shooting things with pesticide, we acknowledge the epigonal nature of the game and its lack of variety. A podcast episode full of lessons, just like the following: whatever you do in life, always go for the Full Melon Run.

Timestamps:

Whatcha Playing

00:00 Genshin Impact (2020) and other gacha games

10:39 The Great Ace Attorney: The Adventure of Ryūnosuke Naruhodō (2015)

27:00 Kingdom Hearts series

37:23 Hot Take Central (also known as The Hot Take Minute)

Featured Game

47:37 Donkey Kong 3

There may be an imposter on board but this podcast ain't it! The Daydreamcast returns to talk about the newest hotness of two years ago, Among Us, a game of love and betrayal, of murder and hats. We proceed to usher in the spookiest time of the year as we wrestle with the horrors of bad ports and delisted games on GOG, 3DS, and elsewhere, before we turn our attention to horror video games. Silent Hill gets the hot take treatment, and the 1995 cult classic Clock Tower the game of the week treatment. A marriage of survival horror and point-and-click adventure, this Argento homage by Human Entertainment features a dense atmosphere and actual narrative variability within a fully realised mansion setting, capitalising on the two scariest things in the world: the sensation of being chased, and giant scissors. Aggrieved mums are also in there somewhere, so buckle up, Jennifer Connelly!

Timestamps:

Whatcha Playing

00:00 Among Us (2018)

25:45 Konami's GOG dump and the (mis-)treatment of legacy titles

28:40 Pavlos' 3DS shenanigans, part deux

22:27 Hot Take Central (also known as The Hot Take Minute)

Featured Game

51:23 Clock Tower

In our most jam-packed episode, yet, we are joined by RPG and anime savant David from the Twin Geekscast to talk all of the talk, every last drop of the talk, about The World Ends With You, the inventive and expressive Nintendo DS rpg gem single-handedly developed by Tetsuya Nomura and no one else. But not before Pavlos is back on his puzzle game/Pokémon spin-off bullshit again and Brogan hands in his report on turkey mounts in Spelunky 2 fresh off the presses. The Hot Takes are the hottest they've ever been, featuring outrageous claims about Zelda, Metroid, and a third thing! Lastly, we are happy to announce we have been acquired by Microsoft for 7.5 billion dollars. This podcast is now available for free via Xbox Game Pass and we'll be introducing support for the Zune family of devices soon. 7.5 BILLION dollars.

Timestamps:

Whatcha Playing

00:00 7.5 billion dollars

01:24 Pokémon Picross (1999) & other spin-offs

11:25 Spelunky 2 (2020)

16:17 Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne (2003)

22:27 Hot Take Central (also known as The Hot Take Minute)

Featured Game

42:17 The World Ends With You

Late, but not too late, the Daydreamcast is here to light up your night. We get into the controversial announcements for the 35th anniversary of everyone's favourite Italian entrepreneur in a segment we like to call 'Nintendo: Who Knows?' before we break down the catalogue of New Blood Interactive's throwback FPS games in a segment affectionately dubbed "Doom and Quake-Likes: Brogan Knows!". Once again, we leave the verdict on the hotness of our takes in the hands of our listeners as we try to bring the heat to Smash Bros. and water levels in platformers. Our game of the week is the GBA remake of the 1993 NES platformer, Kirby's Adventure, which we discuss with unprecedented depth. That's right, we talk about frame lag, sprite size, and even critique the menus! We also talk about normal things for all the listeners not called Sakurai.

Timestamps:

Whatcha Playing

00:00 Super Mario 35th anniversary announcements

14:18 New Blood Interactive games (Gloomwood, Dusk, Amid Evil, Ultrakill)

18:30 Hot Take Central (also known as The Hot Take Minute)

Featured Game

29:48 Kirby: Nightmare in Dream Land

The Daydreamcast bounces back this week as we take on the new gaming sensation, Fall Guys, and personally say "hello" to the fellow kids. We certainly don't stop there, though, as Pavlos recounts doing inappropriate things to his 3DS inbetween watching what is widely known as the 'beautiful game'. Meanwhile, Brogan sticks with what he does best: talking about Hylics. We launch a new segment about takes so hot your ears might get burned from listening! Equally heated is our discussion on this week's main feature, the 1995 rail shooter Panzer Dragoon, mainly because the game is hot tras--, a flawed if not original experience. We meditate on its successes, its many limitations, and the differences between the original version and its 2020 remake. If you have come for answers on what the heck happens in that opening cutscene, move right along!

Timestamps:

Whatcha Playing

00:00 Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout (2020)

08:11 Pavlos' 3DS shenanigans

13:49 Hylics 2 (2020)

19:15 Reigns: Kings & Queens (2018)

26:40 Hot Take Central (also known as The Hot Take Minute)

Featured Game

40:06 Panzer Dragoon

The Daydreamcast returns with all the fighting game talk you never would have expected! We fight pesky connections as we learn about the netcode saviour called 'rollback' and fight the power as we condemn their modern DLC practices. We mash on the buttons and smash on the Dolphin, and despite how it sounds, we consider neither dirty. Right at the heart of it, an epic full of twist and turns, a ballad about the cruel irony of Kickstarter. Finally, we lift off with our game of the week, the often overlooked Game Boy gem Balloon Kid. A natural and creative iteration on and evolution of the Balloon Fight formula, it represents the best in early bite-sized handheld gaming with its charm and thrills. And remember: it might blow up but it won't go "pop!".

Timestamps:

Whatcha Playing

00:00 Street Fighter V (2016) and the problem with modern fighting games

14:00 Battle Princess Madelyn (2018) or A tale of Kickstarter

33:25 Super Smash Bros. Melee (2001) on Dolphin

38:07 itch.io Minute: Secret Little Haven (2018); Lyne (2014)

Featured Game

46:14 Balloon Kid

A wild Daydreamcast draws near! It's a full-on role-playing extravaganza this week as Brogan returns and with him the hard-hitting game talk. We delve into Mario's most recent stationery adventure, the trippy world of Hylics, the regular deluge of HyLeaks out of Nintendo's Google Drive, the masochistic pleasure of Japanese captchas, and a damning account of the PS4's retro emulation. For our game of the week we focus on Phantasy Star, Sega's flagship RPG on the Master System, as we pit it against its contemporaries, discuss its many ambitions, and the various ways to engage with it today. Before you listen, please look up the sprite of Werebat. We have contacted his agent to get him to guest on a future episode.

Timestamps:

Whatcha Playing

0:00 Paper Mario: The Origami King (2020)

16:41 Hylics (2015)

23:28 Nintendo Leaks

34:04 Brogan's Sobering PS2-on-PS4 Experience

37:39 itch.io Minute: Nuclear Throne (2015); Anodyne (2013)

Featured Game

44:45 Phantasy Star

In this week's Daydreamcast, we revisit and get visited by old favourites of the show. Calvin('s wallet) steps up to deliver the hot-from-the-oven take on the sequel to Deadly Premonition, Alligator Skating 2020. We vent our frustrations on the vices of gaming media before shifting gears and sharing much warmer thoughts on the overwhelming nature of Forza Horizon 4 , the sadomasochistic qualities of Ludo and other tabletop classics in Clubhouse Games, as well as further recommendations from the itch.io bundle. Finally, we tip our proverbial hats to the pulsating arcade classic Windjammers, a household favourite competitive disc-throwing delight that, over 35 years later, is getting a sequel for a reason. We hope this episode isn't a "MISS!" and we humbly give it "FIVE POINTS!".

P.S.: We played a 12-game match directly after the show and you already know who won.

Timestamps:

Whatcha Playing

0:00 Deadly Premonition 2: A Blessing In Disguise (2020)

14:03 The Paper Mario Fallacy

20:11 Forza Horizon 4 (2018)

29:20 Clubhouse Games: 51 Worldwide Classics (2020)

37:39 itch.io Minute: Heavy Bullets (2014); Starseed Pilgrim (2013)

Featured Game

42:07 Windjammers (1994)

In this week's only seemingly light Daydreamcast, we talk nightmares. The nightmare of Pyramid Head selling out, for one. The nightmare that is working retail in a consumerist society. And, lastly, the nightmare that is the concerning lack of Covid safety measures in Pokémon cafés around the country. As the main course, we serve a goofy-yet-earnest nightmare in Dead Rising, a creative and ambitious early Xbox 360 game which stands at the crossroads that is mid-00s game design. We focus on the various systems of the game, its design philosophy and unique approach to an open (yet defined) world, and trace back the steps the series would go on to take. Also, we forget to mention how Carlito looks like a scrapped Tekken character, so there!

Timestamps:

Whatcha Playing

0:00 The Great Pokémon Café Mix (2020) Soliloquy

07:44 Dead By Daylight (2016)

14:19 itch.io Minute: Beglitched (2016); Night of the Consumers (2012)

Featured Game

25:22 Dead Rising