Welcome to Episode 19 of Load Save Game, a podcast where I talk to people about their personal journey with video games. I am your host Jose Eusebio. 

My guest today is my wonderful friend Ralph Miranda. Ralph is an illustrator, a production artist, and storyboarder. Ralph has worked on marketing campaigns for big brands, movies, tv shows, and several video games including Multiversus and Call of Duty. Ralph also has a very entertaining series of animated shorts that he works on with his fiance Jen and his sister Daisy called Oh, Bubba Lu! You can find Oh, Bubba Lu! on Youtube and Amazon Prime, we’ll have a link to his website in the show notes. 

We talk about a ton of great games in today’s episode like opening doors with Gyromite with Nintendo’s infamous R.O.B. robot, jump kicking punks with SEGA sneakers in Streets of Rage, and whipping vampires while wearing a leather loincloth in Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest.

Ralph Miranda’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ralph-miranda-683620b/ 

Oh, Bubba Lu!: https://www.amazon.com/Oh-Bubba-Lu/dp/B0B6S5SV89 

Make sure to subscribe and review Load Save Game on your podcast listener of choice. Follow us on socials we’re @loadsavegame on most platforms. If you have any thoughts or questions about the show feel free to email us at [email protected]! I hope you enjoy the episode!

Thank you to Shaun Panado for the use of our theme song "One Shot One Kill Kestrel" off of the album Kind of a Big Deal Vol. 2. You can find his music and projects at his Linktree:  https://linktr.ee/shonix

Show Art by: Jordan Maeve https://www.instagram.com/thejollity/ 

Welcome to Episode 18 of Load Save Game, a podcast where I talk to people about their personal journey with video games. I am your host Jose Eusebio. 

My guest today is my wonderful friend Chris Wu. Chris is an actor and has recurring roles as Noah Yang in The UpShaws on Netflix, Officer Williams in 9-1-1, and very relevant to this podcast, played the role of Aidan Chen in the 2023 remake of Dead Space. Chris gives great insight into his experience working on Dead Space and talks about how much fun he had getting to not only voice his character, but doing the motion capture and getting to literally and figuratively be in the game which was a lifelong dream of his. 

We talk about so many great games in today’s episode from the bullet hell shoot em up Gradius, to picking our best girl in Final Fantasy VII (spoiler’s it’s Tifa), to some of our modern favorite indies like Hades, Stardew Valley, and Rimworld. Chris also talks about his sibling’s influence on his gaming growing up, from having a brother who worked at Nintendo and getting early access to Super Mario Bros. 3, to getting his lives stolen by his younger brother while they were playing the side-scrolling NES classic Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. We talk about those stories and so many more great games in the episode.

Chris Wu’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wutini/

Chris Wu’s IMDB: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm5082721/

Make sure to subscribe and review Load Save Game on your podcast listener of choice. Follow us on socials we’re @loadsavegame on most platforms. If you have any thoughts or questions about the show feel free to email us at [email protected]! I hope you enjoy the episode!

Thank you to Shaun Panado for the use of our theme song "One Shot One Kill Kestrel" off of the album Kind of a Big Deal Vol. 2. You can find his music and projects at his Linktree:  https://linktr.ee/shonix

Show Art by: Jordan Maeve https://www.instagram.com/thejollity/ 

Welcome to Episode 17 of Load Save Game, a podcast where I talk to people about their personal journey with video games. I am your host Jose Eusebio. 

My guest today is my great friend Shaun Panado. If that name seems familiar to you it is because I mention his name every episode because Shaun is the composer of the theme song for Load Save Game, “One Shot One Kill Kestrel.” I am very grateful for Shaun allowing us to use his music for the podcast these past two years. Be sure to check out his music both on Spotify and Youtube, you can find a link to his linktree in the show notes. 

Shaun is a music producer, a music teacher, and a lover of video games. I was so happy to finally have Shaun on so he can share the many games he has loved over the years. We talk about a ton of great stuff during the episode like how obsessed his group of friends were with Phantasy Star Online to the point that that they would ditch school to marathon the game and race to reach the max level. He also talks about how he met former guest Steph Han in the arcades battling it out in BlazBlue at Arcade Infinity. Shaun also talks about cutting his RPG teeth on the original Final Fantasy for the NES which fostered a lifelong love of RPGs and the Final Fantasy series. During the pandemic Shaun also decided to try out developing his own game project called “The Starsong Odyssey” a pixel art 2D action side scrolling game in the vein of Megaman with some added fighting mechanics like a Devil May Cry or Viewtiful Joe. Follow The Starsong Odyssey’s Facebook Page so you can see progress on the game.

Shaun Panado’s Music Linktree: https://linktr.ee/shonix

The Starsong Odssey Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61562767498947

Make sure to subscribe and review Load Save Game on your podcast listener of choice. Follow us on socials we’re @loadsavegame on most platforms. If you have any thoughts or questions about the show feel free to email us at [email protected]! I hope you enjoy the episode!

Thank you to Shaun Panado for the use of our theme song "One Shot One Kill Kestrel" off of the album Kind of a Big Deal Vol. 2. You can find his music and projects at his Linktree:  https://linktr.ee/shonix

Show Art by: Jordan Maeve https://www.instagram.com/thejollity/

Welcome to Episode 16 of Load Save Game, a podcast where I talk to people about their personal journey with video games. I am your host Jose Eusebio.

My guest today is my awesome friend Stephanie Gerk.

Steph is a writer, a podcaster, and content creator. Steph has also moderated and been on panels at conventions such as San Diego Comic Con. Steph has been playing video games for most of her life and is very passionate about Assassin’s Creed, Dragon Age, and the Myst series among many others. Outside of video games Steph is a huge fan of so many nerdy Sci-Fi and fantasy series like Star Trek, Star Wars, and Doctor Who. Steph is a co-host of The Debrief Weekly Report, a fun pop-culture infused science news show. Steph has also assisted on several comic book projects and has several graphic novel projects in development. Check the podcast notes for links to Steph’s socials and The Debrief Weekly Report podcast. 

Steph’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stephgerk/
Steph’s Website: https://stephaniegerk.com/
The Debrief Weekly Report: https://thedebrief.org/podcasts/

We talk about so many great video games in this episode like playing Big Head mode in Goldeneye, learning to play the piano in the puzzle game Myst, and assassinating guards with the hidden blade in Assassin’s Creed. Steph also laments the USA-focused trivia of some of the Carmen San Diego games. Also I say this in the episode, but I think we can all agree that Carmen San Diego is a very hot lady and did nothing wrong. Steph also tells me about how many games were banned in her household because of her strict upbringing, but somehow Medal of Honor was fine, because despite all the violence, it was “historical.” Steph also vehemently refuses to romance anyone in almost any video game unless the outcome is useful minions and sidekicks, and the lack of function of the children in games like Stardew Valley and Harvest Moon annoys her to no end.

Make sure to subscribe and review Load Save Game on your podcast listener of choice. Follow us on socials we’re @loadsavegame on most platforms. If you have any thoughts or questions about the show feel free to email us at [email protected]! I hope you enjoy the episode!

Thank you to Shaun Panado for the use of our theme song "One Shot One Kill Kestrel" off of the album Kind of a Big Deal Vol. 2. You can find his music and projects at his Linktree:  https://linktr.ee/shonix

Show Art by: Jordan Maeve https://www.instagram.com/thejollity/

Welcome to Episode 15 of Load Save Game, a podcast where I talk to people about their personal journey with video games. I am your host Jose Eusebio. 

My guest today is Dr. Jason Lo. I’ve known Jason going back to our college days. Jason is one of the most talented and hardworking people I know. Jason is an amazing pianist and has played piano at Carnegie Hall, at the 2012 London Olympics, and as I record this he is traveling through Europe with scheduled performances in Germany and the Czech Republic. Jason has a Doctorate of Musical Arts in Piano Performance from the University of Southern California Thornton School of Music. While most of Jason’s concerts are comprised of classical music he is also a lover of video games and video game music. I’ve seen him perform amazing arrangements of Final Fantasy music, Sonic the Hedgehog, among many others. 

Jason’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/the.bearded.panda/

Jason's Piano Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/panda.plays.piano

You can visit Jason’s website at jasonwlo.com where you’ll find links to his piano performances and contact information if you’d like to book him to play for an event. Jason also teaches piano, so if you have need for a piano teacher in the Southern California area he’s as good as they come.

We talk about a ton of video game moments during the episode from wrestling the “Russian Bear” Zangief in Street Fighter II, playing Sonic 3 at the K-mart kiosk, and helping the Jester save Nightopia in Nights into Dreams. We also touch on Marvel vs. Capcom a bit during this episode and a very exciting thing just happened, Capcom announced that they are releasing a Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Game Collection for the Switch/PS5/PC. It will be the first time that Marvel vs. Capcom 2 will be purchasable since it was removed from the PSN and Xbox Live stores in 2013. So a lot of the people who loved the MvC games and that series are super stoked, I’m definitely going to check that out.   

Thank you to Shaun Panado for the use of our theme song "One Shot One Kill Kestrel" off of the album Kind of a Big Deal Vol. 2. You can find his music and projects at his Linktree:  https://linktr.ee/shonix

Show Art by: Jordan Maeve https://www.instagram.com/thejollity/ 

Make sure to subscribe and review Load Save Game on your podcast listener of choice. Follow us on socials we’re @loadsavegame on most platforms. If you have any thoughts or questions about the show feel free to email us at [email protected]! We’ll see you next time!

Welcome to Episode 14 of Load Save Game, a podcast where I talk to people about their personal journey with video games. I am your host Jose Eusebio. 

My guest today is Nik Corzine. I’ve known Nik since High School. Nik is a lovely person. He’s a great storyteller. Around the time when we first met we were both in Comedy Sportz in High School which is a comedy improv program. I did not keep up with stage performance, but Nik did and went on to do a lot of local theater shows in the Southern California area. 

I also have a distinct memory of us playing D&D together. I think the campaign we played together spanned for like two years. And during that time the whole party noticed how fast he would add up all of his bonuses while attacking or doing skill checks. Like he would always know how much damage he was taking before everyone else. And low and behold Nik became a high school math teacher so I’m glad he put those impressive math skills to good use. 

We talk about a ton of great video games this episode. Nik talks about barbecuing sheep as the purple dragon Spyro on the Playstation, the 4th wall breaking horror of Eternal Darkness, and being a sort-of one time video game writer while QA Testing Square Enix.

Make sure to subscribe and review Load Save Game on your podcast listener of choice. Follow us on socials we’re @loadsavegame on most platforms. If you have any thoughts or questions about the show feel free to email us at [email protected]! I hope you enjoy the episode!

Thank you to Shaun Panado for the use of our theme song "One Shot One Kill Kestrel" off of the album Kind of a Big Deal Vol. 2. You can find his music and projects at his Linktree:  https://linktr.ee/shonix

Show Art by: Jordan Maeve https://www.instagram.com/thejollity/ 

Make sure to subscribe and review Load Save Game on your podcast listener of choice. Follow us on socials we’re @loadsavegame on most platforms. If you have any thoughts or questions about the show feel free to email us at [email protected]! We’ll see you next time!

Welcome to Episode 13 of Load Save Game, a podcast where I talk to people about their personal journey with video games. I am your host Jose Eusebio. It’s been one year since we first launched the podcast! Thank you for listening for the past year. I’ve gotten so much lovely feedback from people telling me how much they love the show, how it brings up a lot of nostalgic memories of growing up with video games and also learning about games that they would love to try out and that makes me so happy to hear. I love hearing and sharing people’s journeys with video games and how this amazing medium and artform has shaped our lives and I’m glad to be able to share that same joy with both my guests and listeners too.

Speaking of guests, my spectacular guest this episode is Frank Lima. You know that scene in the first Iron Man movie where Jeff Bridge’s character is like, ‘TONY STARK BUILT THIS IN A CAVE, WITH A BOX OF SCRAPS!” I’m confident that Frank could build an Iron Man suit with a box of scraps. Frank is an animator, a filmmaker, a writer, a game designer, a software developer, a 3D modeler, an illustrator, a roboticist, a special effects artist, an archived video restorer, among many other things. He’s worked for Legacy Studios, Dreamworks, JPL which is pretty much NASA. Frank is one of the smartest people I know and on top of that he’s a huge lover of video games so I was super excited to have him on the show.

In the episode we talk about a ton of great stuff. Frank tells us about Tahi which was his independent video game project he was working on in college where his team developed an entirely new video game engine for the Sega Dreamcast as part of their senior thesis project. We talk about one of his favorite and most influential games, Star Control 2 which is a Sci-Fi action game from 1992 that helped to inspire the Mass Effect series, and BeachCon, his college dorm LAN party that grew from being a few dozen people to a full-size video game convention attended by tens of thousands of people.

Follow Frank on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wizards.foundry/

Darknet Diaries Xecutor episode: https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/136/

Make sure to subscribe and review Load Save Game on your podcast listener of choice. Follow us on socials we’re @loadsavegame on most platforms. If you have any thoughts or questions about the show feel free to email us at [email protected]! I hope you enjoy the episode!

Thank you to Shaun Panado for the use of our theme song "One Shot One Kill Kestrel" off of the album Kind of a Big Deal Vol. 2. You can find his music and projects at his Linktree:  https://linktr.ee/shonix

Show Art by: Jordan Maeve https://www.instagram.com/thejollity/

Make sure to subscribe and review Load Save Game on your podcast listener of choice. Follow us on socials we’re @loadsavegame on most platforms. If you have any thoughts or questions about the show feel free to email us at [email protected]! We’ll see you next time!

Welcome to Episode 12 of Load Save Game, a podcast where I talk to people about their personal journey with video games. I am your host Jose Eusebio. First some house-keeping I know it’s been a good long while since our last episode. I’m sorry about that. I went on vacation for a while. I was fortunate to visit a friend in Taiwan. I also spent a week in Osaka, Japan right after. I think I’ll share some stuff on socials regarding some of the cool video game stuff we saw like visiting a Taito Station arcade in Osaka and just the general Nipponbashi Den Den Town area which is like the nerdy Akihabara-like area of Osaka. We went into tons of arcades or Ge-mu centa as they call them there so I think I’ll share some photos and videos of that at some point. 

After all that my computer broke, and got I busy with work, and also got pretty addicted to Baldur’s Gate III which is just an incredible game that I recommend to anyone who is a fan of RPGs or Dungeons and Dragons. So yes, very sorry this was delayed, but I think it was worth the wait!

My amazing guest this episode is Diane Nguyen. We talk about tons of great stuff in the episode like the philosophy of what it takes to be a Pokemon Master, the urge to play games on Hard Mode for the “purest experience” of a game and letting go of judging others for playing on Easy mode or maybe even learning to forgive ourselves for doing it? Diane also shares great memories bonding with her family while playing Time Crisis in the arcades. 

Make sure to subscribe and review Load Save Game on your podcast listener of choice. Follow us on socials we’re @loadsavegame on most platforms. If you have any thoughts or questions about the show feel free to email us at [email protected]! I hope you enjoy the episode!

Thank you to Shaun Panado for the use of our theme song "One Shot One Kill Kestrel" off of the album Kind of a Big Deal Vol. 2. You can find his music and projects at his Linktree:  https://linktr.ee/shonix

Show Art by: Jordan Maeve https://www.instagram.com/thejollity/ 

Welcome to Episode 11 of Load Save Game, a podcast where I talk to people about their personal journey with video games. I am your host Jose Eusebio. My wonderful guest today is my great friend Melissa Pountain. Melissa and I talk about a ton of great games. She’s a huge fan of Fallout 3 and New Vegas and talks about a pilgrimage she took to the New Vegas locations, and if it isn’t obvious yes, she’s married to previous guest Sandy Pountain. She talks about her love of Final Fantasy VII and Kingdom Hearts and she also agrees that Tifa is best girl. Melissa is a huge fan of The Legend of Zelda and one of her first games that she played all the way through was A Link to the Past and at the time of recording was deep into Tears of the Kingdom so we talk about Zelda through the years. Melissa also reveals what game she recommends for first time Zelda players and that answer might surprise you, so listen to find out. 

Melissa is an illustrator and has done commissions and fanart for lots of games and other media. She features her latest work on Instagram so follow her @msmissypaints 

Follow Melissa’s art socials: 
https://www.instagram.com/msmissypaints/ 
https://twitter.com/msmissypaints

Make sure to subscribe and review Load Save Game on your podcast listener of choice. Follow us on socials we’re @loadsavegame on most platforms. If you have any thoughts or questions about the show feel free to email us at [email protected]! I hope you enjoy the episode!

Thank you to Shaun Panado for the use of our theme song "One Shot One Kill Kestrel" off of the album Kind of a Big Deal Vol. 2. You can find his music and projects at his Linktree:  https://linktr.ee/shonix

Show Art by: Jordan Maeve https://www.instagram.com/thejollity/ 

Corrections:  Mr. Bones Wild Ride lasted 4 in-game years according to Know Your Meme. The Tug o’ War game on the original N64 Mario Party was the game notorious for destroying hands on the control stick. And when the game was brought back for Mario Party Superstars it actually featured a warning not to use the palm of your hand to play the mini-game. Disneyland’s first opening day was marked by many issues and calamities causing it to be named the “Black Sunday.”

Games Discussed: The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom/A Link to the Past/Ocarina of Time/Majora’s Mask/Wind Waker/Twilight Princess/Breath of the Wild, Pong, Sonic 2, Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars, Disney’s Aladdin, 1080, Re-Volt, Conker’s Bad Fur Day, Animal Crossing, Diddy Kong Racing, Star Wars Episode I: Racer, The Sims 1/2/4, Roller Coaster Tycoon, Final Fantasy VII/VIII, Baldur’s Gate, Fire Emblem, Borderlands, Fallout 3/New Vegas/4, Mario Party, Myst, Stardew Valley, Goldeneye, Fortnite

Welcome to Episode 10 of Load Save Game, a podcast where I talk to people about their personal journey with video games. I am your host Jose Eusebio. My wonderful guest today is my wonderful wife Jordan Maeve. Jordan is a huge fan of rhythm games like Dance Dance Revolution, puzzle games like Tetris, and cozy games like Animal Crossing. We talk a lot about Amplitude, a rhythm game on the PS2. We don't mention it in the episode, but the developer of Amplitude, Harmonix, would go on to develop the first Guitar Hero and Rock Band games. So all our comparisons to those later games make a lot of sense in hindsight. Jordan also talks about loving her Sega Pico which was this combination tablet/TV video game with edutainment games with Sonic and other Sega characters. Jordan talks about playing a not-so-legitimate copy of Pokemon: Yellow in the original Japanese and having to decipher the game by comparing it to her friend's Pokemon games to get through it.

Jordan is an illustrator and graphic designer. She frequently does portrait commissions for people's Dungeons & Dragons characters and has sold prints and merchandise at local conventions in Southern California. She features most of her work on her Instagram so follow her there to see all her great art! 

Follow Jordan's art socials: 
https://instagram.com/thejollity
https://twitter.com/thejollity

Make sure to subscribe and review Load Save Game on your podcast listener of choice. Follow us on socials we’re @loadsavegame on most platforms. If you have any thoughts or questions about the show feel free to email us at [email protected]! I hope you enjoy the episode!

Thank you to Shaun Panado for the use of our theme song "One Shot One Kill Kestrel" off of the album Kind of a Big Deal Vol. 2. You can find his music and projects at his Linktree:  https://linktr.ee/shonix

Show Art by: Jordan Maeve https://www.instagram.com/thejollity/ 

Corrections:  The Mario Kart 64 level Jordan was probably referencing was Choco Mountain that had the falling boulders. Ash Ketchum’s character in the original Japanese version of the Pokemon anime was named Satoshi Tajiri. Blasto the Spectre was a member of the hanar species in Mass Effect. 

Games Discussed: Elden Ring,Tetris/Attack, Dr. Mario, Duck Hunt, Super Mario Bros., Puzzle Bobble Bust-A-Move, Microsoft Encarta MindMaze, Sonic The Hedgehog, Sega Pico, Mario Kart 64/8, Super Mario 64, Star Fox 64, Super Smash Bros., PaRappa the Rapper, Dance Dance Revolution, Kingdom Hearts, Pokemon: Yellow, Amplitude, Guitar Hero, Rock Band, Overcooked, Left 4 Dead, Mass Effect, Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, Animal Crossing: New Horizons, Final Fantasy VII: Remake, Bang Dream, Wordle, Super Mario Odyssey