Daydreamcast

Well dear listeners, we've decided to settle things down and go a little more relaxed and quiet this episode. Murph and Bro discuss some indie games they've played, Murph particularly discusses The Stanley Parable Ultra Deluxe, and then he explores the first entry in his new retrospective: Yakuza. While less crazy and refined than its successors, it still delivers a solid foundation for a franchise. Then, we discuss farming in video games. All two of them (just kidding). After all is said and done, we play the SNES title Harvest Moon and discuss the ins and outs of turnip farming.

Time stamps:

Whatcha Playin'

0:15 Dagon (2021)

2:35 Blue Flamingo (2014)

6:00 Pawnbarian (2021)

9:30 Hrot (2021)

14:45 Vampire Survivors (2022)

17:50 Stanley Parable: Ultra Deluxe (2022)

24:45 Yakuza (2006)

Variety Minute

33:40 Farming in games

Game of the Week

50:05 Harvest Moon (1997)

Gotta Catch 'em All! Only, we aren't catching them all. Instead, we're rescuing some after like fifty flights of stairs. Join Bro, Murph, and David from the Twin Geeks show as we dissect the rogue-like Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Red Rescue Team and Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: DX. Before that, we talk about the new Kirby game, and whether it sucks or blows. Then, we put a cap on Resident Evil as a franchise and Murph announces his next game franchise exploration. For the Variety Minute, we go for the ambitious topic of Pokemon spin-offs. Wish us luck!

Timestamps:

0:00 Welcoming David back to the show

Whatcha Playin'

3:10 Kirby and the Forgotten Land (2022)

14:40 Resident Evil Village (2021), and the Resident Evil retrospective

37:00 Lunacid (2022) and Tunic (2022)

Variety Minute

42:00 Pokemon Spin-offs

Topic of the week

1:10:00 Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Red Rescue Team (2005) /Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: DX (2020)

Talk about a sticky situation! This episode of the Daydreamcast Bro and Murph explore the icky sticky ooey gooey wiiware title World of Goo! We also talk about Resident Evil 3's remake, Elden Ring (again), and we analyze how goo functions in video games. Gooigi will reveal the truthigi. Murph then gushes about World of Goo's 10/10 aesthetic and mechanics. This goo structure builder and physics simulator made a huge splash in indie games, but how does it play today?

Whatcha Playin'

Resident Evil 3 Remake (0:00)

Elden Ring (11:30)

Variety Minute

Goo Games (31:45)

Game of the Week

World of Goo (41:30)

We seem to have a crisis of dinosaurs! Journey with us as we basically talk about three things: Elden Ring, dinosaur games, and Dino Crisis. Elden Ring takes about half the podcast and if you still stuck around for the rest of the cast, thank you. You're very loyal and we love you. Dino Crisis is an action oriented dinosaur version of Resident Evil, also directed by Shinji Mikami. In this cast we explore its strengths and weaknesses and compare and contrast to that beloved franchise. What's better: survival horror, or panic horror? Let's find out.

Whatcha Playin'

Elden Ring (0:00)

Variety Minute (Retbrospective)

Dinosaur Titles (36:30)

Game of the Week

Dino Crisis (51:00)

The Daydreamcast is seeing double with a two-feature show! In this episode Bro and Murph anticipate Elden Ring's impending release, talk about AER, Grand-Theft Auto San Andreas, and Hero's Hour! Murph has played some obscure indies and Bro played an old game. What a shock! After, we try to escape the top-secret Black Mesa facility as Gordon Freeman. Has the game aged well enough? Can we forgive the mistakes it's made in the name of innovation or is it just impossible to have fun? After, we also examine its sequel: Half-Life 2. Where we talk about how it goes above and beyond the original title's goals and what makes the game special. We also wonder if it's just a tad overrated. Now time for the ultimate moral choice in games: Pick up that podcast!

Timestamps:

Whatcha Playin’

0:00 Countdown to Elden Ring

1:00 Hero's Hour (2022)

5:00 Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (2004)

10:45 Aer Memories of Old (2017)

19:45 Variety Minute (Retbrospective): Silent Protagonists

Games of the Week

36:15 Half-Life 1 (1998)

1:07:15 Half-Life 2 (2004)

The Daydreamcast makes a triumphant return after a hiatus! Pavlos has had to retire from co-hosting duties due to a busy schedule, but Murph has filled in as the permanent co-host. Bro and Murph start by talking about Sekiro, then Bro shares his experiences with Death's Door, while Murph complains about the Resident Evil 2 remake! Then we try out a new segment where we explore gaming oddities, starting with the wii controller and peripherals. Then, we talk about the 2010 video game Epic Mickey. Certainly a game with a complex history, we explore how much of the game is exciting and how much of the game is a mediocre platformer. The only thing more exciting than the house of mouse is the house of the Daydreamcast!

Timestamps:

Whatcha Playin'

0:00 Pavlos's absence and our lamentation

1:30 Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice (2019)

8:30 Death's Door (2021)

12:00 Resident Evil 2 Remake (2019)

The Variety Minute

25:00 The wiimote and accessories

Topic of the Week

41:00 Epic Mickey (2010)

David brings Pavlos and Bro back from the brink of extinction to talk about the things that matter most: Metroid and monkey balls. David tells us the virtues of playing the original Super Monkey Ball in a game bar. He packages this with his own pro gamer strats and insights into the world of speed-eating-while-taking-turns-playing-video-games. It's a niche sport, but it'll catch on. We talk about other stuff, too, eventually. Like Banana Mania, the Castlevania Advanced Collection, and the new Nintendo Switch Online plan. All are revived old things, but some we like more than others! David tries to create a theme for the cast with further Metroid discussions on Prime and Dread, but all this turns out to be a ruse to host Pavlos's intervention. Pavlos explains that he doesn't have an addiction to Final Fantasy XIV as the recorded days of playtime start to stack up! Eventually we move on to our game of the week: Metroid Fusion. The 2002 GBA title may differ from its franchise's legacy, but it turns out to be what makes the game great in the first place. As Samus faces off against the new X parasite, the new, more linear structure might actually help the game's narrative and put it above most genre peers in this department. We also examine the flaws, as is our wont, and, of course, meditate on the idea of elegance. Samus may be more like a tank than a dancer... or something. At the end (and the beginning), we address the certain and uncertain aspects of the podcast's future. Make no mistake! We will determine the game of the year for 1986. Our very lives depend on it. (Okay, they don't.) (They do, though.)

Time Stamps:

Whatcha Playing

00:00 David's report from the game bar

17:59 Super Monkey Ball: Banana Mania (2021)

26:26 Nintendo Switch Online Expansion Pack

50:09 Castlevania Advance Collection (2021)

59:20 Metroid & Friends: Dread (2021), Return of Samus (1991), Hollow Knight (2017)

01:23:53 Final Fantasy XIV (2010)

Featured Game

01:30:34 Metroid Fusion

Summer vacation is over and your favourite podcast returns with a nice sun tan to discuss all manners of video gaming! Joined by our friend Stephen from sister podcast Ranking the Monsters we tackle most, hell, every new release you could possibly care about, from Psychonauts 2 to WarioWare: Get It Together!, from (urgh) Twelve Minutes to that Skyward Sword re-release, from yet another Pokémon spin-off to yet another disappointing Mario sports title. Youtube extraordinaire Brogan continues his journey through From Software's catalogue from before they became known for only one thing, Pavlos brings up a tower defence game (probably the very first for the show, period), while our guest is up to all sorts of shenanigans with the King of the Universe. Or so we've heard, we don't like to pry. Our game of the week is the indie darling Fez, initially an XBLA exclusive, it has since made its way onto most platforms, including the eShop this year. A puzzle platformer with a uniquely realised perspective-shifting twist, Fez is a two-faced bag of wonders, one part the thing everyone thought it would be, one part Mastermind, hiding a whole game-behind-the-game that will put your code-breaking abilities to the test. While it kept all of the internet busy in 2012, we not only reminisce but discuss the merits of the game as they still persist today, with favourable results. If life seemed a little flat to you up to this point, this week's show will add a whole new dimension to your exi-- we're just happy to be back, okay?

Time Stamps:

Whatcha Playing

00:00 Our guest Stephen's history with video games

09:40 Katamari Damacy Reroll (2018)

17:04 Psychonauts 2 (2021)

27:30 Mario Golf: Super Rush (2021)

49:10 Pokémon Unite (2021)

55:30 Kingdom Rush (2014)

56:25 Shadow Tower (1998)

01:02:12 The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD (2021)

01:12:50 Resident Evil 5 (2009)

01:20:58 WarioWare: Get It Together! (2021)

01:25:13 Twelve Minutes (2021)

Featured Game

01:37:22 Fez

After a long sabbatical, we are back to tee off with a new edition of the most leisurely gaming podcast around. We tackle everything exciting that happened at the Electronic Three (who are more the Electronic Six or Seven at this point) and hit you with all the talk you never knew you wanted on the off-beat rhythm game Dedede's Drum Dash Deluxe and a remaster of what could be considered the former incarnation of the B game (a concept alien to the present landscape), Destroy All Humans. Pavlos also kicks off a new series entirely dedicated to verbally demolishing Resident Evil 6 as he slowly crawls his way through it, regardless of how easy a target it might be. After this sand trap of a game, we move on to greener pastures with our game of the week, Neo Turf Masters, a delightfully dynamic and breezy golf game for the arcades and the Neo Geo. The special click system of the game as well as its idiosyncratic mix of cartoonish and realistic graphical elements, and, most importantly, its invigorating sounds make the game another essential entry in the SNK lineage of care-free and flat-out cool arcade sports delights.

Time Stamps:

Whatcha Playing

00:00 The most belated E3 coverage in the biz

40:55 Dedede's Drum Dash Deluxe (2014)

48:27 Destroy All Humans (2020)

53:33 Resident Evil 6ucks (2012) Part 1

Featured Game

01:06:00 Neo Turf Masters

We got a murder mystery on our hands at the Daydreamcast this week! But first, some familiar topics: We return to one of the earliest subjects of the show, tackling the recent Overwatch 2 announcements. Brogan continues to wade through the King's Field(s). Pavlos follows in the footsteps of a recent guest, however, with a differing conclusion on whether it is, in fact, time to d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-duel (answer: it is not). We have the hot scoop on the new entry in the Resident Evil series, so tune in to find out how tall that lady really is, and stay for our game of the week, a truly influential early adventure game and genre-defining visual novel for Japanese computers and, later on, the Nintendo Famicom, called Portopia Serial Murder Case. After making our top 10 of 1985 in last year's Game of the Year deliberations, we hereby supplement the deep dive. The maturity of themes and competence of the procedural narrative is striking in this early effort by Chunsoft and Dragon Quest creator Yuji Horii, with the pre-formulated courses of action at your disposal being in equal parts intriguing and amusing due to their idiosyncratic, pre-codified nature. Designed as a game of branching paths, with a clearly defined modern day setting, and omitting the possibility of a Game Over, Portopia Serial Murder Case captured the imagination of many future game developers and has been readily playable in English for a while thanks to fan efforts. If you want to know more, you'll have to beat it out of us!

Time Stamps:

Whatcha Playing

00:00 Overwatch 2 (2021)

12:05 Yu-Gi-Oh! Legacy of the Duelist: Link Evolution! (2019)

27:10 Resident Evil 8 (2021)

36:21 King's Field III (1996) and Bro's ongoing From adventures

Featured Game

41:55 Portopia Serial Murder Case