Scanline Talks

March is behind us, and thus, the really busy season of game releases also relents. It's that end of fiscal quarter that's so killer, isn't it? Six is here to talk about the often-misunderstood Sifu, Kyrie is ready to talk about the new Kirby, and Jen has found things to love in Ghostwire: Tokyo where other critics haven't.

Our intro music is 8bit 23 from Demon Souls, a Japanese royalty free music site.

Do you like... my car? Forza Horizon 5 left Jen and Six feeling surprisingly lukewarm, and most of the time that would be the story of racing games for the time being. After all, Need For Speed has been a mess for years, and while Jen likes more serious racing games like DiRT, they're beyond Six's ken. But what is this? The elusive Polyphony Digital have put out their first fully featured Gran Turismo in almost a decade? Well we GOTTA talk about that.

If you want to find us on Twitter, Jen is @jbu3 and Six is @sixdettmar.

It's time for the new monthly Playlist Podcast! I mean, the podcast isn't new. It's just that we're doing it monthly now. Kyrie dove back into The Wolf Among Us, Six tried the newest expansion for Star Wars: The Old Republic, Jen is playing more of the new Sherlock Holmes, and there's plenty to say about Elden RIng of course!

Our intro music is 8bit 23 from Demon Souls, a Japanese royalty free music site.

Here we are: Best Game, aka Game of the Year. You know what this one's about. Let's get into it.

The Nominees Are:

That's it! Thank you everyone for joining us for a look at 2021, and all the marvels in it. And bad stuff too. And everything. Thank god that's all behind us.

Our intro music for the Gimmick Awards 2021 is Piano 29 from Demon’s Souls, a Japanese royalty-free music site. A big thank you to daanboii (@daanboii on Twitter) for our Game of the Year art!

Whether touching, hilarious, sick af or what have you, games have always been good at creating moments you just have to tell others about. Let's talk about those moments.

The Nominees Are:

And now our last category is to follow: Best Game. Let's settle this.

Our intro music for the Gimmick Awards 2021 is Piano 29 from Demon’s Souls, a Japanese royalty-free music site. A big thank you to daanboii (@daanboii on Twitter) for our Game of the Year art!

Is this where I make a "ya like jazz" joke? That's Our Jam is our music category, and we want a song that isn't just good to listen to, it's also good in game, and just generally a bop.

The Nominees Are:

Next up is the Best Moment category, with some great individual parts of games that were truly amazing!

Our intro music for the Gimmick Awards 2021 is Piano 29 from Demon’s Souls, a Japanese royalty-free music site. A big thank you to daanboii (@daanboii on Twitter) for our Game of the Year art!

Remasters. Remakes. Whatever you want to call them, they are here to stay. The PS3/360 generation poked its foot in the door with these, and now they live here. I have pretty mixed feelings about them, to be honest. But definitely some of them are worth celebrating, and we'd like to talk about those.

The Nominees Are:

We're posting four awards in short order here, for the last four categories! Next up is That's Our Jam, the most editing-heavy category and the reason all the others are late! Stay tuned!

Our intro music for the Gimmick Awards 2021 is Piano 29 from Demon’s Souls, a Japanese royalty-free music site. A big thank you to daanboii (@daanboii on Twitter) for our Game of the Year art!

You could also call this Best Old Game, if you hated being pithy and also wanted to insult these games. But in any year, MOST of the games we play aren't from that year. They're from years previous, sometimes many years previous. Of these, which ones defined our 2021?

The Nominees Are:

And that's a wrap for today's Gimmick Awards! Please come back tomorrow for two more, and then two more the day after that!

Our intro music for the Gimmick Awards 2021 is Piano 29 from Demon’s Souls, a Japanese royalty-free music site. A big thank you to daanboii (@daanboii on Twitter) for our Game of the Year art!

The difference between Chinese and Japanese, aka "Riichi" mahjong, is the concept of the Yaku. Basically, it's a bunch of special forms your hand can take that allow you to call a win, and give you extra points. As a bunch of newbies to the scene, we have strong feelings about which ones are best. So Nick is gonna join us to figure it out.

The Nominees Are:

One category down for the day, one to go! Next we've got Backlog Star, featuring all the old games we loved in 2021!

Our intro music for the Gimmick Awards 2021 is Piano 29 from Demon’s Souls, a Japanese royalty-free music site. A big thank you to daanboii (@daanboii on Twitter) for our Game of the Year art!

There are a lot of bad things about the way technology has allowed games to be changed. Gacha mechanics. Live service hellscapes. Free to play torture. Patching out things that are fun because they're not what the devs "intended." But also? There's DLC, or other add-ons. And sometimes those add-ons really freakin good. Let's celebrate the ones that are.

The Nominees Are:

That's it for today's Gimmick Awards! Tune back in tomorrow for more, and I hope you've enjoyed what you've heard so far!

Our intro music for the Gimmick Awards 2021 is Piano 29 from Demon’s Souls, a Japanese royalty-free music site. A big thank you to daanboii (@daanboii on Twitter) for our Game of the Year art!