GameEngineStart Podcast

We took some time away. We've come back. There are video games. It never changes

• Calum talks now real video game Deadlock. We all thought it was a secret, but it was just a MOBA
• Euan talks about the seemingly perfectly average Star Wars Outlaws

• 00:02:00 - Sony announced a £700 PlayStation Pro
• 00:11:48 - Concord has been taken offline after less than a month
• 00:20:39 - Former head of Sony Europe says industry layoffs aren't caused by greed, and people should "figure out how to get through it"
• 00:23:51 - Deadlock
• 00:45:17 - Star Wars Outlaws
• 00:59:51 - Space Marine 2
• 01:01:40 - Upcoming & Housekeeping

Intro Music - There It Is - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Outro Music - Honey Bee - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

News Sting - News Intro - Maximilien (soundbible.com)

All Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

We saw some video games happen, some people are denying video games are happening, and some people appear to be doing whatever they can to ensure they don't make another video game happen again.

• Euan investigates some sci-fi murders with mixed results in No One Wants To Die
• Calum conquers his demons, namely the new Final Fantasy XIV Savage Raids, and experiences some retro Morrowind vibes in Dread Delusion
• We both finally got to experience Thank Goodness You're Here, and it's every bit as good as we were hoping for

• 00:01:10 - Deathlock is being played by 20,000 people, but has never been officially announced or even acknowledged. Also we talk about that Verge article, and how people who don't understand what journalism is lost their minds.
• 00:15:05 - No One Wants To Die
• 00:26:25 - Thank Goodness You're Here
• 00:35:46 - FFXIV Savage Raid
• 00:44:38 - Dread Delusion
• 00:54:03 - News - PSVR2 looks like it's in trouble, with not a lot of new games and now $200 off in a fire sale
• 00:56:56 - News - Silent Hill: Ascension, the awful "interactive" TV show, won an Emmy!?
• 00:59:16 - News - Tango Gameworks, one of the many studios killed by Microsoft, appears to have been saved by South Korean publisher Krafton
• 01:06:35 - News - Bungie had another round of layoffs, bringing the future of Destiny into real question. Also the CEO bought a  lot of cars. Unrelated I'm sure.
• 01:18:29 - Upcoming & Housekeeping

Intro Music - There It Is - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Outro Music - Honey Bee - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

News Sting - News Intro - Maximilien (soundbible.com)

All Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

The games are sparse so we revert to type with RPGs and VR galore

• Calum plays hot new release Elden Ring. This is a lie but he hasn't heard anyone talk about this game, so it's worth a go. This was also a lie.
• Euan forgets reality for one of a virtual kind with Contractors Showdown and Ghosts of Tabor
• We both tried The First Decendant. It's alright. That's it, that's all we have to say

• 00:02:08 - Elden Ring
• 00:22:47 - Contractors Showdown
• 00:39:30 - Ghosts of Tabor
• 00:46:18 - The First Decendents
• 00:49:35 - FFXIV Raid
• 00:50:43 - Upcoming & Housekeeping

Intro Music - There It Is - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Outro Music - Honey Bee - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

News Sting - News Intro - Maximilien (soundbible.com)

All Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

We haven't heard from Calum in a while. He said he was exploring Tural? Don't know what that means but hopefully he's ok.

• Calum explores the latest Final Fantasy 14 expansion, Dawntrail
• Euan does what every Scottish person has to consider at one point in their life, and decides to work on an oil rig in Still Wakes the Deep

• 00:02:02 - FFIVX: Dawntrail
• 00:21:43 - Dragon Age: Inquisition
• 00:22:51 - Still Wakes the Deep
• 00:34:33 - Still Wakes the Deep - Spoiler Start
• 00:41:41 - Still Wakes the Deep - Spoiler End
• 00:41:50 - News - Cities Skylines 2 had to patch out landlords
• 00:46:31 - Upcoming & Housekeeping

Intro Music - There It Is - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Outro Music - Honey Bee - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

News Sting - News Intro - Maximilien (soundbible.com)

All Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

A long one for everyone this week. Between the Summer Keighley Fest and a new Destiny expansion, it's a new season for games.

• We talk about the things we care about from Summer Games Fest, including the new Dragon Age, slow female vocal covers in trailers, and many other smaller items.
• Calum takes up his mantle of Destiny editor and goes in depth to Destiny 2: The Final Shape.
• Euan talks about Senua's Saga: Hellblade II, a much anticipated sequel for him.

• 00:02:22 - SGF: The Dragon Age: The Veilguard: The Trailer
• 00:12:24 - SGF: Trailers and their Slow Music Covers
• 00:23:06 - SGF: South of Midnight and Souls-likes
• 00:27:23 - SGF: More From the Xbox Showcase
• 00:30:00 - SGF: Euan's Sad Teen Hour
• 00:35:42 - SGF: The Dragon Age Cinematic Universe
• 00:42:15 - SGF: The Actual SGF Show
• 00:58:51 - Euan bought a Quest 3
• 01:08:02 - Destiny 2: The Final Shape
• 01:42:08 - Hellblade 2
• 01:56:39 - Upcoming & Housekeeping

Break Music -The Complex - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Intro Music - There It Is - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Outro Music - Honey Bee - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

News Sting - News Intro - Maximilien (soundbible.com)

All Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

As summer approaches, one of us prepares for months of MMO gameplay and the other does what he always does. Plays weird indie games. 

NOTE - We talk about minor spoilers from Lorelei and the Laser Eyes, we are explicit when we are about to start, and there is a timestamp in the podcast description.

• We both played XDefiant, and had a surprisingly long conversation about the current state of the FPS genre.
• Euan plays a pile of puzzlers with The Excavation of Hobs Barrow and Lorelei and the Laser Eyes.
• Calum plays the latest Playstation PC port Ghosts of Tsushima.
   

• 00:02:44 - XDefiant
• 00:25:45 - Onward Mercenaries
• 00:28:01 - Hellblade
• 00:30:41 - The Excavation of Hobs Barrow
• 00:38:29 - Lorelei and the Laser Eyes
• 00:46:24 - Lorelei Spoilers Start
• 00:50:27 - Lorelei Spoilers End
• 00:51:33 - Ghosts of Tsushima PC
• 01:01:18 - News - Ubisoft have cancelled the F2P spin off of The Division. I hope the third instalment actually makes it out.
• 01:02:17 - News - Jake Solomon, the game designer behind the XCOM reboot has a new studio, and is trying his hand at a new genre. Ready for The Sims with half cover?
• 01:08:39 - Calum was at a Stardew Valley Concert
• 01:10:29 - News - Leaks have started around Valves next game, taking bits of Overwatch, DOTA and TF2
• 01:12:06 - News - Neil Druckman, perpetual man with opinions, thinks AI is actually great. He's wrong.
• 01:17:30 - Upcoming & Wrap Up

Intro Music - There It Is - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Outro Music - Honey Bee - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

News Sting - News Intro - Maximilien (soundbible.com)

All Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

We return with video games to talk about. Some of them are even current and relevant! 

• Euan plays the unexplainable Indika and the very explainable cat sim Little Kitty, Big City
• Calum substitutes his lack of raiding with raiding roguelike Rabbit and Steel and "anime Monster Hunter" Granblue Fantasy Relink

• 00:02:00 - Little Kitty, Big City
• 00:04:19 - Saints Row
• 00:06:52 - Indika
• 00:15:16 - Rabbit and Steel
• 00:19:38 - Granblue Fantasy: Relink
• 00:36:19 - News - In order to capitalize on the success of the Fallout series, Bethesda decided to catastrophically break Fallout 4.
• 00:40:47 - News - Nintendo just tweeted it out, and have confirmed that the follow up to the Switch is coming this fiscal year.
• 00:42:46 - News - Sony managed to destroy massive amount of goodwill behind Helldivers 2 by trying to enforce a PSN link on PC. They have now backed down from this idea.
• 00:50:20 - News - The industry takes another massive hit, as Microsoft shutters more studios, including Tango Gameworks and Prey developers Arkane Austin. You should play Prey.
• 01:11:50 - News - Someone has put together a bot that plays Tekken 8 by just pressing kick as Eddie Gordo, and it appears to be winning.
• 01:17:22 - News - Destiny 2 continues to make more changes in advance of Final Shape.
• 01:22:20 - News - Did you know that Hellblade 2 is out next week? Microsoft wants you to know that it hasn't forgot either.
• 01:25:45 - Upcoming & Wrap Up

Intro Music - There It Is - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Outro Music - Honey Bee - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

News Sting - News Intro - Maximilien (soundbible.com)

All Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

This is the last week of games coming out for a while, so we're going to spend it letting Calum talk about Dragon's Dogma 2.

• Euan plays tarot based story telling game The Cosmic Wheel Sisterhood and slasher inspired puzzle narrative game Killer Frequency
• Calum talks all things Dragons Dogma 2. That's all.

• 00:06:20 - The Cosmic Wheel Sisterhood
• 00:11:31 - Killer Frequency
• 00:16:32 - Dragon’s Dogma 2
• 00:41:58 - Minor Dragon’s Dogma 2 Quest Spoilers
• 00:53:29 - News - Apex Hack
• 00:59:46 - News - Kotaku Pivot
• 01:03:42 - News - GW3?
• 01:09:04 - Upcoming & Wrap Up
• 01:09:36 - Secret News - Destiny 2

Intro Music - There It Is - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Outro Music - Honey Bee - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

News Sting - News Intro - Maximilien (soundbible.com)

All Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

After a brief hospital visit, we're back again with some actual video games.

Editors Note: We realised later that the Helldivers 2 GM is actually named Joel. Too late to change the title now.

The Woods - Wilbert Roget, II - Pacific Drive: Official Game Soundtrack

Steam | Epic Games Store

• Euan rumbles around a messed up Pacific North-West in Pacific Drive, an early GOTY candidate.
• Calum is in the early stages of Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth, and has a bunch of things he can't talk about.
• We both have put a bunch of time into Helldivers, and we talk about how it might be the first game in a long time to do live service right.

• 00:02:05 - Hospital Chat
• 00:19:40 - Helldivers 2 & Live Service
• 00:40:00 - Final Fantasy VII: Rebirth
• 00:47:20 - Destiny 2 Hoverboards
• 00:52:26 - Music Break
• 00:54:20 - Pacific Drive and its save system.
• 01:20:45 - News - Akira Toyama passed away at 68, and leaves behind a legacy that touched a lot of people
• 01:22:25 - News - The remaster of the first three Tomb Raider games had some strange inconsistencies between the Steam and EGS versions
• 01:24:45 - News - Rooster Teeth shuts down after more than 20 years, because their new corporate overlords said "Nah"
• 01:26:36 - News - After a less than impressive showing by Suicide Squad, a live service game, Warner Bros are doubling down on live service games.
• 01:28:52 - News - EA CEO Andrew Wilson just went off to fantasy land about his perceived impressions of what AI can do.
• 01:32:46 - News - The wingnut gamers are at it again, constructing a conspiracy theory against narrative consulting shop Sweet Baby Inc.
• 01:33:51 - Upcoming Games & Wrap Up

Intro Music - There It Is - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Outro Music - Honey Bee - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

News Sting - News Intro - Maximilien (soundbible.com)

All Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

Intro Music - There It Is - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Outro Music - Honey Bee - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

News Sting - News Intro - Maximilien (soundbible.com)

All Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

No new games to talk about this week, so instead we talk about the Xbox Business Update and its ramifications on the gaming space

Intro Music - There It Is - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Outro Music - Honey Bee - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

News Sting - News Intro - Maximilien (soundbible.com)

All Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

Intro Music - There It Is - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Outro Music - Honey Bee - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

News Sting - News Intro - Maximilien (soundbible.com)

All Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0