Red Barrel Report

On the eve of Matt’s trip to Japan, Mike and Matt take on AI and what it might mean for the games industry (spoiler: much of it probably not great) as well as discussing good and not so good TV.

Mike and Matt talk some more about FF VII Remake (Matt's finished it now), for the first time about Over the Hill, and for the eleventeenth time about the Division 2. Then it's on to the sad news about BioWare (and the other 350 jobs lost at EA). We finish with rants and raves about the new Resident Evil movie (spoiler: it's great), Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (spoiler: it's not great), Pilates (great) and a tragic political attack in Australia (definitely not great).

We hope you enjoy it all!

Mike and Matt dig into Control Resonant, FFVII Remake (and the real Seventh Heaven) and Sony's move to extend the PS5 lifecycle with QSSR.  We finish with some heartfelt praise for all the complainers out there, along with rants and raves on James Bond, Man City and the Steam Deck. Enjoy! 

Mike and Matt discuss Star Wars Zero Company and Control; Netflix's gaming strategy; Xbox doing a (Metal Gear?) solid for Hideo Kojima; and among other things, The Bee Gees and Neil Diamond (!?)

Mike and Matt play The Division 2, Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds and Danganronpa. They also discuss their favourite games from Gamescom and the elephant in the room that is GTA VI. And they're impressed (and a little surprised) that Xbox is starting to get some things right. Enjoy!

Mike and Matt discuss quite a few games, including the new/old Halo (good buy or goodbye?), Splatoon Raiders, Denshattack and The Mound: Omen of Cthulu. They then move on to review some good and not so good financial results from Sony, Microsoft and Capcom. They end with rants and raves about Keigo Higashino, the SuperStation One, good and cheap audio gear, and why some videogame companies are not always good at listening to their customers. Enjoy!

Mike and Matt survey the steaming pile of wreckage that is the game industry in 2026.

Please note that we recorded this after the leaks of the Microsoft job cuts but before the official announcements. 

We also both thought that the new Star Fox game was really quite good.

Things are a bit different this week but we manage to talk about First Light and Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor, and why games are expensive. And, as per usual, we rant and rave. 

Mike and Matt talk about many things, including Mixtape and Pragmata; financial and pricing updates from the Big 3; and Kurosawa, Legends (TV series) and more!

In which Mike and Matt ponder how much more can be charged for a games console; discuss what the Epic layoffs might mean for the industry; and give their views on Paper Mario, Yotei, Project Hail Mary, PS5 controllers and more!