Game/Life Balance U.S.

Jon reviews Crypt of the NecroDancer before he talks about his obsession with this year’s Final Fantasy V Four Job Fiesta. Hear whether he got a decent starting character, or if he’s just going to FAIL MISERABLY. Plus: Cody actually played video games this week, specifically Geometry Wars 3! And, of course, there’s some requisite Hearthstone talk in there, including Cody’s opinion on expansions Naxxramas and Blackrock Spire.

Show Notes:

* Jon talks about what it’s like to drive long distances with a baby

* Speaking of driving: Cody talks about driving from Chicago to North Carolina!

* Jon explains Crypt of the NecroDancer, and Cody talks about why he should probably play it

* He grills Cody for details on his new Hearthstone obsession, which included purchasing the Naxxramas and Blackrock Spire expansions

* Cody explains the difference between the two expansions and discusses whether they’re worth the cost

* Cody reviews Geometry Wars 3 and talks about how the game is different than its predecessors

* For the second year in a row, Jon is participating in the Final Fantasy V Four Job Fiesta, and explains how you, too, can get involved to help support a good cause

* Cody claims that he has discovered the best type of single-player video game to play with friends (trading off lives), and he talks about how he tested it with Rogue Legacy, a game that both he and Jon had chosen as a “Game of the Year” recently

* Shameless plug for the Unqualified Gamers video game podcast LIVE at Gen-Con 2015

* Cody plugs Gonna Geek Network podcasts Voices of Defiance and the GonnaGeek.com Podcast’s 100th episode

Jon recaps E3 2015, including press conferences from Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo, and he and Cody discuss their reactions to various announcements. Plus, hear what games Cody has purchased so far in the 2015 Steam Summer Sale!

Show Notes:

* Jon and Cody brace for a podcast with some vicious technical difficulties, and this time it’s actually Jon’s fault

* As they postulate which Elder God they angered to bring about their horrible luck with computers recently, Cody and Jon debate about how to pronounce the name of H.P. Lovecraft’s fictional character Cthulu

* Cody is sitting in a chair that is over 35 years old, and he is fine with that

* Which of the “big three” (Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo) WON E3 and is objectively better than literally every other one? Cody asks Jon for his input

* In Jon’s estimation, Sony and Microsoft held very similar press conferences based on their major focus on games and rapid-fire game trailers; however, most of Microsoft’s games are coming this year, whereas Sony talked about a lot of things coming in 2016

* Microsoft’s press conference:

* Microsoft announced Gears of War 4, which looks like it will have more of a horror/thriller element than the previous installations in the series

* Microsoft also talked Halo 5, but neither Jon nor Cody are the target audience for that game… or for Forza Motorsport, because they don’t “do” racing games

* Rare came out and announced a huge Rare collection, featuring a bunch of their games from the Nintendo 64 era onward, including Blast Corps, Banjo Kazooie, and more

* Rare also announced an open world adventure game that looks like a pirate-based multiplayer game, which got Jon very excited

* The new Tomb Raider looks ridiculously gorgeous, and looks like it will be less focused on combat, which Jon supports

* Dark Souls 3, which will be the last game in the series, should also be pretty good, even though they only showed a teaser trailer

* Jon goes into detail describing Microsoft’s Hololens, and the Minecraft demo they performed on-stage, which was ridiculous

* Cody saw some negative reactions after Microsoft announced that they are going to make the Xbox One compatible with Xbox 360 games, but Jon doesn’t think that’s a valid thing to be upset about

* Jon and Cody discuss the pros and cons of backwards compatibility: it’s not good for everyone, but there are definitely situations where it can be an issue

* Sony’s press conference:

* Jon explains the back story behind The Last Guardian, made by Fumito Ueda, the same guy who made Shadow of the Colossus and Ico, which was the game that kicked off Sony’s press conference with a gameplay demo on the PlayStation 4

* Both Cody and Jon are hot for Horizon, the second game Sony showed off during its press conference, because it is basically the most beautiful game ever and features tribes hunting robot dinosaurs… and as a PS4 exclusive, it could be a system seller

* Sony somehow nabbed Street Fighter V exclusivity, which will help sell some PS4 consoles

* An on-stage demo of No Man’s Sky got Cody even more hype for the game, and Jon describes why he’s so amazed by it

* Jon tells Cody why he should know Media Molecule, and why people were excited for the extremely bizarre game “Dreams,” which they then try to describe

* FINAL FANTASY VII REMAKE OH MY GOD HOLY SHIT GET HYPE #HYPE #FFVIIREMAKE #GETOUT

* Jon explains why it’s such a big deal, but let’s face it, we all know already

* Jon is actually pretty excited about PlayStation View,

In this solo episode, Cody explains why he and Jon missed two weeks of podcasts. Hear about Martin Con, Cody’s new apartment, the new Mad Max movie, and everything else that’s been going (and is to come) this summer!

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Hearthstone mobile is now available on phones! There’s a legit Final Fantasy game on mobile! Transistor is awesome! Cody and Jon discuss the latest awesome things in video games–tune in to hear all the great news.

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In this rare solo podcast episode, Jon gives a brief update on his recent gaming stuffs, including his hardcore Diablo III adventure in the new season of Diablo III and his progress playing through “every Final Fantasy game,” specifically Final Fantasy VI on iPad and Final Fantasy IV on Steam.

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Show Notes:

* Jon explains that since he’s doing a solo episode, he plans on only talking about video games… so he starts the episode by talking about his weekend

* Jon describes his first experience with “hotel living” while traveling for work, and why he is a terrible solo traveler

* Update on Jon’s progress playing Final Fantasy VI on his iPad, but can’t give an update on his progress in Final Fantasy IV on Steam because he can’t save his file to the cloud, which is stupid

* Blizzard ruined Jon’s plans to play Final Fantasy games because oops, here comes a new season of Diablo III

* Learn about how “seasons” work in Diablo III, including leaderboard stats

* Jon explains what a “hardcore” character entails in Diablo III, and how his first foray into it went

* Adventures in getting epic level gear from running rifts with his hardcore character

* ULTIMATE BONUSES and how high he had to turn up the difficulty before the game began to feel truly perilous

* Hear the gritty details about an elite pack ambushing Jon, and learn whether his hardcore character survived

* Jon explains why he probably won’t play a hardcore character again, and why you may or may not want to as well

* Update on Jon’s progress in Final Fantasy IV on Steam, and how he’s faring in the final dungeon

* Hear which version of Final Fantasy VI Jon recommends playing if you’ve never played a Final Fantasy game

* Jon plugs Unqualified Experts and wraps up the show

Jon reviews Square-Enix’s latest ports of Final Fantasy IV and Final Fantasy VI, and Cody brings it all back together by reviewing mobile game Final Fantasy Record Keeper. Plus: Cody’s first impressions of Supergiant Games’ 2014 release, Transistor.

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Show Notes:

* Jon discusses the insanely graphic fatalities featured in the upcoming game Mortal Kombat X

* Jon gives a quick recap of the inner circles of hell from Dante’s “The Inferno”

* Cody explains the significance of the number 107 from his childhood

* Jon’s kid is still sick all the time always, because apparently kids can run ridiculous fevers and then be perfectly fine at random

* Jon had the most beautiful weekend he could basically ever remember in Minnesota, because Weather

* Cody recaps his birthday weekend, which was full of less fanfare than he’d anticipated, and also full of far more church than he’d anticipated

* Cody explains how he and his girlfriend kept themselves entertained during the longest Catholic Mass he has ever attended

* Cody started playing Transistor, but didn’t get very far because he’s busy selling things

* Transistor is the kind of game that makes you think about video games as art, according to Cody

* Cody explains the ability system in Transistor, which allows for a ridiculous amount of customization

* Jon insists that he’s going to play Transistor this weekend, after months of anticipation

* Cody explains the very deep storyline to Captain Toad’s Treasure Tracker

* Cody got a third-party Gamecube controller adapter so he can play Super Smash Bros for WiiU with a Gamecube controller, and he says it works great!

* Minor complaint about how it would have been nice to have a story mode in the newest Smash Bros game, but it’s still fun

* Jon gives an update on his progress in Final Fantasy IV, which he’s playing on Steam, and Final Fantasy VI, which he’s playing on his iPad

* Jon explains how he broke Final Fantasy IV using augments, primarily Counter and Kick

* Even with broken augments, the final dungeon of Final Fantasy IV is still stupidly hard… but the Bahamut Cave is not

* Jon explains the difference between “old school” classic NES and SNES JRPGs, especially the difference in the purpose of battles in the games

* It’s hard to “enjoy” playing Final Fantasy IV from the standpoint of modern gaming, but it’s still an amazing trip down memory lane and totally worth it for the feels

* Cody and Jon discuss Edge, the ninja who is no longer as horribly awful when he joins your party in the new version of the game

* Jon has a freakish memory when it comes to the exact number of hit points he had when he joined your party in the original game

* Jon discusses the new “art” “style” of Final Fantasy VI on the iPad, and why he is basically disgusted by the changes they made

* “It plays like an SNES-style RPG, but on an iPad.”

* Jon doesn’t understand why developers make stupid decisions when it comes to making joysticks appear in games on tablets and other touch-screen devices

* The controls in combat are super-intuitive, but on the main map…

Ryan from Darrel TV joins Cody and Jon to announce that he is becoming the official Twitch streamer / partner / something vaguely affiliated with/of the Unqualified Gamers! Meet Ryan for the second time and marvel at the insanity that ensues. Plus, hear Cody’s first impressions of Final Fantasy Record Keeper and Jon’s devious plan to beat every Final Fantasy game… again.

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Show Notes:

-Cody introduces Ryan, host of Darrel TV, which is the new official Twitch stream affiliate partner whatever of Unqualified Gamers!

-Ryan answers some listener questions via Google Hangouts’ Q&A feature

-Jon and Cody explain what Unqualified Gamers is “all about,” explaining the format of their video game podcast

-Cody talks about Halo 5 in response to another listener question

-Jon prescribes Cody something to get rid of the ridiculous amount of mucus all up in his body (shout-out to Mucinex, apparently)

-Cody tells a story of meeting his friend’s baby and crashing at Ryan’s place

-Cody and Ryan talk about Mount Your Friends, a Steam game they streamed while incredibly drunk over the weekend

-Ryan describes Crawl, a roguelike, brawler indie video game by Australian developer Powerhoof, which he also played with Cody over the weekend

-Cody and Ryan tell the epic story of their second live stream of their drunken evening, which may or may not have actually been a stream

-Jon tells his weekend wedding story

-Jon talks about the horror movie “It Follows,” which he absolutely loved over the weekend

-Ryan reviews the first episode of Unqualified Experts and how it fit into his weekend

-Jon previews the Nintendo Direct scheduled for April 1, and he and Cody discuss how excited they are about it

-Ryan talks Nintendo vs. PC gaming

-Cody calls out Ryan for never using items in Super Smash Bros. for WiiU, and they get in a heated debate about the game’s balance and use of items and fun

-More Nintendo Direct talk, and why (and whether) to get excited about it

-Cody gives his very early impressions of Final Fantasy Record Keeper, the new mobile game from Square-Enix, now available for Android and iOS devices

-Ryan also played a mobile game: Scramble with Friends, which he is stupidly good at, so Cody stopped playing it altogether

-Cody resumes his Final Fantasy Record Keeper review, talking about the music and the actual size of the game

-Jon announces his plan to play through every Final Fantasy game and gives an update on his progress, though he is skeptical about the possibility of actually following through with that plan

-Ryan describes his history with the Final Fantasy series, particularly Final Fantasy VI, which takes some bizarre twists and turns

-What’s the best entry point into the Final Fantasy series? Jon analyzes which and why

-Jon explains why he wants a PS4, even though he definitely doesn’t have time to play it

-Ryan tells the story of why he calls his Twitch.TV channel “Darrel TV,” which involves Fire Emblem and a hilarious story involving his girlfriend

-More about Darrel TV,

After introducing special guest host Gold “Danger” Frieza, Cody tells an awesome story about meeting a rock and roll legend, which Jon quickly tries to ruin. Then, Cody and his guest discuss the pros and cons of Hyrule Warriors multiplayer before Jon delves further into his experience playing the Heroes of the Storm open beta.

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Show Notes:

* Cody introduces his surprise special guest for St. Patrick’s Day and explains that he will be drinking a Guinness on the podcast, since it is being recorded on St. Patrick’s Day

* Jon bought new shoes for his baby over the weekend, and apparently that took up literally all of his energy and made it impossible to do anything else

* Special guest “Gold Frieza” says that he worked all weekend… relatively un-interesting, to be honest

* Jon and Cody reveal their brand-new web series, Unqualified Experts, a non-video-game related series whose pilot episode is on their YouTube Channel

* Cody tells a story of how he met legendary drummer Dino Danelli in an alley next to a dumpster in Lakeview in Chicago, which Jon refused to believe and instead makes up an idiotic story that is completely improbable, probably because he’s jealous

* Please note that after the podcast, Cody confirmed via YouTube that he did, in fact, definitively meet Dino Danelli, one of the founding members of The Rascals, and it was awesome

* Cody’s special guest, now suddenly named Blake and somehow magically in his bedroom, joins him to discuss the good and the bad of Hyrule Warriors’ local multiplayer

* The conversation also contains a miniature debate regarding what makes a “good” game

* Jon compares the open beta of Heroes of the Storm to his experience playing League of Legends, focusing especially on the difference in healing abilities and playing solo versus playing with other people

* Cody explains his guest Blake’s rating system that is completely based around Link from The Legend of Zelda

* Blake jumps in to mention that he’s been playing Shadowrun Returns, which he believes will probably be a 25-30 hour game, and is cyberpunk, which is apparently better than steampunk according to him and Jon

* Blake also recently replayed through Mega Man Network Transmission on Nintendo Gamecube, which has old-school side scrolling Mega Man platformer game action

* Blake gives a mini-review of the game, which he thinks is awesome

* Cody got Captain Toad’s Treasure Tracker but probably won’t play it, because he’s too busy playing Hyrule Warriors

Jon has been playing the Heroes of the Storm closed beta, and he has a lot to say about it. Plus: tune in for a MOBA 101 recap, and hear how Jon thinks it’ll fare against other popular MOBAs like League of Legends and Dota 2!

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Show Notes:

* Cody and Jon discuss what they’re hoping to accomplish on the show

* Minnesota is a tundra where nobody lives, and that is why the WiiU works better there than it does in Chicago; also, Cody is radioactive

* Daylight Saving is stupid, and is comparable only in practice to a dry handjob on your birthday

* Jon took his son on a walk because the weather is nice, which organically leads to Cody asking Jon how hard it is to produce breast milk

* Now that Cody’s girlfriend is listening to podcasts and she has identified the worst part of terrible podcasts, Cody finds this episode getting caught up in the same pitfalls

* Jon nearly died of a sinus infection, which he compared to that one time he was stabbed in the face

* Cody went to a pretentious but incredibly delicious and amazing bar in Wicker Park called Violet Hour, and then he talks about pharmacists and basically the best whiskey ever

* KFC’s secret recipe is kept in a vault and guarded by a sorcerer

* Cody and Jon debut “Qualifying Round,” a segment where they explain a gaming term before delving deeper into a related subject. This week: learn about the MOBA (Multiplayer Online Battle Arena) genre of video games (also a very popular type of e-sport)

* Jon explains League of Legends’ drafting system and how it contributes to making games take around an hour to play

* Jon explains how Heroes of the Storm features shorter games than League of Legends and Dota 2, has multiple maps, and has other traits that make it distinctly different than its peers in the MOBA genre

* Jon also talks about the Heroes of the Storm community is more inviting/forgiving than the community he experienced when playing League of Legends, and Cody compares it to other e-sports

* Cody goes on an inane tangent about unlocking stuff in video games, using Batman: Arkham City and Hyrule Warriors as examples

* Getting back to the main point, Jon gets to some listener Q&A, answering a question about micro-transactions within Heroes of the Storm

* Another question asks if we at Unqualified Gamers actually show game play, which Cody tackles before giving an overview of their YouTube content

* Cody incidentally mentions #GamerGate for the first time ever on the podcast, but only to tell the story of how he got really drunk one time and talked about it on a one-man episode

* Check out Cody’s video on “flipping,” especially as it applies to consoles, and find out why he doesn’t own a Limited Edition 20th Anniversary Sony Playstation 4

* Jon has been playing Adventure Mode in Hyrule Warriors, even though he continues to insist that it’s not a “good” game, and he can’t seem to stop himself from playing more of it

* Cody posits that Hyrule Warriors, at this point, may have surpassed Final Fantasy XIII-2 as the most...

Special guest host Meredith Targaryen joins Cody and Jon to talk all things Dragon Age: Inquisition, including an overall perspective on the series. Plus: more Hyrule Warriors, and Cody talks a bit about the indie games he played at Itty Bitty Bash in Chicago.

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Show Notes:

* Jon insists that he can “check in” and “get badges” on Twitter, which is asinine

* Cody introduces special guest host Meredith Targaryen, who loves dragons

* Meredith is literally the only girl in the universe who plays video games

* Meredith reviews Dragon Age: Inquisition and talks about the Dragon Age series with Jon, who has actually played games in the series before

* On Dragon Age 2: “It’s the worst video game I’ve ever played in my life”

* Also, “every Pokemon is awesome”

* Explanation of how Inquisition is bringing the series into the “modern day” gaming world by implementing Farmville-like systems and “bite-sized” quest content that makes it easier to pick up and play

* Cody presses Meredith on the burning question: what does she think of Frieza’s new look in the new Dragon Ball Z Movie: Revival of F Official Trailer

* Cody talks about how he has become completely obsessed with Hyrule Warriors, and Jon continues to insist that it is not a “good” game even though it’s really fun

* Jon was invited to the Heroes of the Storm closed beta, and it’s VERY different from League of Legends and DotA thus far

* Cody went to an event called Itty Bitty Bash, a small showcase of multiplayer indie games in Chicago, and touches on a few of the games:

* A Fistful of Gun (Farmergnome)

* Wormball (Chris Wade)

* Extreme Exorcism (Golden Ruby Games)

* Lethal League (Team Reptile)

* Slam City Oracles (Jane Friedhoff)

* SpeedRunners (DoubleDutch Games)

* Cody goes into actual detail about SpeedRunners, which was easily his favorite game at the event

* Cody tries to entice Meredith into playing Hyrule Warriors multiplayer

* In-depth conversation about Cody’s hair and the new Frieza

* Jon celebrated his son’s first birthday over the weekend! Happy birthday!

* What the hell is a truffle mocha?

* After breaking once again, Cody is completely done with his Microsoft LifeCam

* Exciting announcement: Jon and Cody are shooting the pilot episode of a non-video-game-related project this week, available only on YouTube!

* KAKAROT!!!