GWJ Conference Call Episode 635

Ashen, GRIS, Hidden Agenda, Pokemon Let's Go, Lots of Your Emails and More!

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This week Shawn, Julian and Cory take a shot at catching up on some emails as we roll into the end of the year. We also draw the two winners of the donation drive custom icon draw!

To contact us, email [email protected]! Send us your thoughts on the show, pressing issues you want to talk about or whatever else is on your mind.

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Comments

Congrats to our two winners in the custom tag draw! I'll spoiler tag them in case you wanted to hear it on the show first.

Spoiler:

Reluctant Cynic and MulderTPC!

00:04:19 Epic Games Store
00:11:40 Ashen
00:20:12 The Outer Worlds
00:22:47 PAX Unplugged
00:28:58 Hidden Agenda
00:32:06 GRIS
00:38:05 Pokemon Let's Go
00:44:21 Assassin's Creed: Odyssey
00:50:30 Your Emails

Games which have emotionally moved me... There are a whole bunch, but here's a curated list. Some of these also fit the "outside factors" email.

  • Mass Effect trilogy. Um, duh, have you met me. Was in tears during several key story points of ME3 (namely the scripted death of two characters, and the goodbyes in London).
  • The Walking Dead, the end of episode 4. I did not see that coming (though I should've known better), and it broke my heart in a million pieces.
  • Guild Wars 2. This might seem kinda funny, but I got through and finished the main quest, about the same time I was writing my MD thesis and also experiencing domestic abuse. The theme song, Fear Not This Night, started playing and I just started bawling. To this day, can't hear it without getting misty-eyed.
  • Journey. For much of the same reasons as GW2, though I first played it in December 2014, a little further down the timeline. And the music, and the poetry of it, it was amazing.
  • Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion. The first Elder Scrolls game I picked up (in a bargain bin, no less). I remember exiting that sewer and seeing the gorgeous word that surrounded my character, with the beautiful soundtrack. It was beautiful in every way and brought tears to my eyes.

GRIS looks and sounds really good, I'm looking forward to it.

Just a quick note. Triumvurate is not up on the Patreon Page yet.

According to Patreon, GWJ hasn't posted anything recently. (https://www.patreon.com/GWJ/posts)

mudbunny wrote:

Just a quick note. Triumvurate is not up on the Patreon Page yet.

According to Patreon, GWJ hasn't posted anything recently. (https://www.patreon.com/GWJ/posts)

It was emailed out directly to all Patrons and Paypal donors since we're kinda split there with the databases. Check your filters and let me know if you didn't get it!

I am getting emails from other creators I support on Patreon, but nothing from GWJ. The settings on Patreon say I should be getting them, and I am not finding anything anywhere in my emails.

I have PMed you my Patreon Account.

Did Cory humblebrag about the size of his TV?

Small thing. Hidden Agenda was made by Supermassive Games. Supergiant Games made Bastion, Transistor, Pyre and Now Hades.

Certis wrote:
mudbunny wrote:

Just a quick note. Triumvurate is not up on the Patreon Page yet.

According to Patreon, GWJ hasn't posted anything recently. (https://www.patreon.com/GWJ/posts)

It was emailed out directly to all Patrons and Paypal donors since we're kinda split there with the databases. Check your filters and let me know if you didn't get it!

Confirmed. I hadn’t gotten it before but I did get the email this evening!! Yay!

No tears for Floyd the Robot?

Man did I butcher the second part of that question. What I was trying to ask was: What the biggest piece of media that you love that, in total time spent, would be blown away by a game you only consider "good-ish"?

I literally set a calendar reminder this morning that said "defend Hidden Agenda" after hearing Julian's take on it last night at 2am while rocking a baby.

Hidden Agenda is great! A cross between Until Dawn, a Telltale game, and a cheesy police procedural tv show. It's a fun, interesting crime story, relatively compact (~2 hours), great for non-gamers (my wife and I had a lot of fun playing through it together), and there are lots of interesting ways the story can be steered based on your choices. If you're a fan of adventure games, especially the more cinematic choice-based adventure games, don't listen to Julian! It's really worth playing, and I believe it's now down to $5.

#1 on my emotional games list is Spec Ops: The Line. In 20+ years of gaming, it is the ONLY one that made me have a physical (nauseous) reaction to events, where I had to turn it off and walk away. I have had "aww" moments in other games, but nothing to that level.

As for games vs movies (time spent), I think you're forgetting how important repetition is for our monkey brains. Watching Star Wars 10 times is going to leave more of an imprint that playing Stellaris for 200 hours, because the events do not play out the same way every time, and therefore the imprint is not the same.

I was a bit jealous when *edit* Julian mentioned he dreams about Horizon Zero Dawn. I don't completely understand why, but that game hit me on a deep emotional level in a way no other game ever has. After thinking about it though, I have to ask what kind of dreams he meant?

I've had plenty of games that have caused me to continue half-thinking/half-dreaming through a restless night about different (game) tasks I want to do, new plans of attack for something that's been kicking my butt, etc., but I've never had a dream that I was living in that game world or that a part of it was living in the real world along side me. The latter is the type of dream that I took his comment to mean and is the type I would truly be jealous of because of the connection I felt with that game.

So which is it and who/what/why? SHARE YOUR DREAMS WITH ME!!!

I was a bit jealous when (I think it was) Corey mentioned he dreams about Horizon Zero Dawn.

That was Julian. I'm starting to think he's the Every Voice. Untouchable.

Rat Boy wrote:

Did Cory humblebrag about the size of his TV?

Don't take this away from me, Rat Boy.

The part about external things that make you emotionally connected with games made me think. There are more than I thought at first hand.

The first time I was living alone after a divorce and played Batman Arkham Knight on a new years eve with fireworks outside was a thing I'll never forget.

Playing FIFA with my son is always special.

If I go way back in my mind and think about loading Zaxxon from cassette on the Commodore 64. Loading this game took about 20 minutes. Time we used to go outside to play one-on-one soccer in the street. Yes, in those days gaming was a healthy thing

Regarding the fracturing of PC gaming stores, my issue isn't multiple stores, competition is good! great even, my issue is games being exclusive to certain stores. Meaning if I don't want multiple clients on my PC, or I absolutely refuse to install a certain client, I can't buy the game from the store of my choice even though my machine is perfectly capable of running it. Same goes for if I don't want my digital library fragmented across several stores.

That's my issue. Have as many stores as you flippin want, just let me buy the thing from the store of my choosing.

Want FORZA? Better install the MS Store. Ashen? Epic Store...and on and on.

I would literally pay a $10 premium to buy FORZA on steam to avoid dealing with the MS Store, but as a consumer, I'm denied that option to what end? That's the part that irks me. Still, companies can do what they want with their products, and I can choose not to spend my dollars on them. Viva capitalism!

I second Sentient_d's points - I won't install Origin, uPlay or any of the others for that reason. They all seem to want to stay running, or run services in the background so they can give you notifications. Aside from that, I get that they don't want to pay the 30% or whatever Steam charges - that can be a significant chunk.

If Microsoft was smart, they would build into Windows a secure software delivery mechanism, so you buy any game from any website, and you get a key that you put into Windows along with your password for that website. It connects to the server to authenticate, download, etc. But you can't just take the files and give it to your buddy - it has to be installed via the key mechanism. They won't build that, of course, because they want their 30% to have it on the MS store...

dewalist wrote:

If Microsoft was smart, they would build into Windows a secure software delivery mechanism, so you buy any game from any website, and you get a key that you put into Windows along with your password for that website. It connects to the server to authenticate, download, etc. But you can't just take the files and give it to your buddy - it has to be installed via the key mechanism. They won't build that, of course, because they want their 30% to have it on the MS store...

Probably not, but an intelligent, enterprising software developer could probably do a stand-alone product with those features and end up making a fortune in the process. Unfortunately, I'm not that guy or I totally would.

Sentient_d wrote:

Regarding the fracturing of PC gaming stores, my issue isn't multiple stores, competition is good! great even, my issue is games being exclusive to certain stores. Meaning if I don't want multiple clients on my PC, or I absolutely refuse to install a certain client, I can't buy the game from the store of my choice even though my machine is perfectly capable of running it. Same goes for if I don't want my digital library fragmented across several stores.

That's my issue. Have as many stores as you flippin want, just let me buy the thing from the store of my choosing.

Want FORZA? Better install the MS Store. Ashen? Epic Store...and on and on.

I would literally pay a $10 premium to buy FORZA on steam to avoid dealing with the MS Store, but as a consumer, I'm denied that option to what end? That's the part that irks me. Still, companies can do what they want with their products, and I can choose not to spend my dollars on them. Viva capitalism!

For years any number of games were exclusive to the Steam store. If I bought a digital title from Amazon for the PC I was rarely offered a choice to install with another store front. So why is it an issue now?

Assassin's Creed: Odyssey is my first AC game, ever, period. As someone just dipping a toe in, it's lovely. I definitely think once I've played it out (I'm playing it on Easy, Open World and just completing each map, so this may take a while), I'm going to go back and play AC: Origins.

This episode made me buy Gris. I was hemming and hawing because I wasn't sure I was ready to deal with Heavy Emotions, but I was sold. Thank you guys!

MulderTPC got his sweet new golden icon! Ace of Spades!