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Game of the Year 2024

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Innehåll tillhandahållet av Al McKinlay. Allt poddinnehåll inklusive avsnitt, grafik och podcastbeskrivningar laddas upp och tillhandahålls direkt av Al McKinlay eller deras podcastplattformspartner. Om du tror att någon använder ditt upphovsrättsskyddade verk utan din tillåtelse kan du följa processen som beskrivs här https://sv.player.fm/legal.
Al, Codey, and Micah talk about their favourite farming and cottagecore games of 2024.

Timings

00:00:00: Theme Tune
00:00:30: Intro
00:01:37: What Have We Been Up To
00:22:18: Rules Explanation
00:26:13: Update Of The Year
00:42:17: Early Access Of The Year
00:52:11: Game Of The Year Nominations
01:46:31: Debate
02:01:59: Winner Discussion
02:10:47: Outro

Contact

Al on Mastodon: https://mastodon.scot/@TheScotBot
Email Us: https://harvestseason.club/contact/

Transcript

(0:00:30) Al: Hello farmers and welcome to the sixth annual harvest season
(0:00:35) Al: game of the year episode.
(0:00:37) Al: My name is Al.
(0:00:38) Codey: And my name is Cody.
(0:00:40) Micah: And I’m Micah.
(0:00:41) Al: And we’re here today to talk about Cottagecore games.
(0:00:44) Codey: Ooh.
(0:00:45) Micah: Yay.
(0:00:48) Codey: Make it, it’s a woo, not yay.
(0:00:49) Micah: Yeah, wooh.
(0:00:53) Al: All right. This is. Spicy, we, as mentioned, this is going to be our game of the year episode
(0:00:54) Micah: I’m trying to add a little spice to it, you know, spice it up a little bit.
(0:01:04) Al: for this year. Why all that? This is the sixth one. I don’t know how to deal with that.
(0:01:10) Micah: Yeah, I can’t believe it’s it’s been that long you said I didn’t even register
(0:01:15) Micah: I saw the list of the the previous ones you said six just now and it hit me like a truck
(0:01:20) Al: We’ve changed things up this year a little bit compared to previous years.
(0:01:21) Codey: Yeah you said it and I was like no way. This is wild.
(0:01:30) Al: I’m not going to go into that just now, but just bear in mind listeners, there are some
(0:01:34) Al: slight changes.
(0:01:37) Al: Before that, Micah, what have you been up to?
(0:01:38) Micah: Aww, I’ve been playing a lot of Jeragon Quest 3, HD2D, which I might talk a little bit about the Greenhouse episode.
(0:01:50) Al: I love how you say might like we’ve not just recorded it.
(0:01:50) Micah: Might, maybe, you’ll have to tune into the Greenhouse episode to find out.
(0:01:56) Codey: You could cut it.
(0:01:57) Codey: You could cut it out.
(0:01:58) Micah: Great.
(0:01:58) Al: No, it’s fine. It’s fine. I love when we like we break through the barrier and like stop
(0:02:04) Codey: Oh, yeah.
(0:02:04) Al: pretending like we record the greenhouse later.
(0:02:06) Micah: that is primarily what I’ve been playing when I have the time to play games. Cody and I were
(0:02:09) Codey: You’re right, you’re right.
(0:02:17) Micah: just talking before we started recording about just being busy and not being able to play a
(0:02:22) Micah: whole lot of games this year. So it’s always nice doing a game of the year recording because it
(0:02:27) Micah: gives me an excuse to kind of revisit and catch up on things and have a an allotted time to play
(0:02:34) Micah: games, but other than that, it’s been Drangle.
(0:02:36) Micah: Quest 3. And I have also been shiny hunting a lot more in
(0:02:41) Micah: Pokemon, but in older Pokemon games, I’ve been kind of
(0:02:44) Micah: revisiting and kind of I don’t know what the term is, like
(0:02:53) Micah: realigning myself with what I loved about Pokemon, and not so
(0:02:56) Micah: much the how what modern Pokemon has become, I guess. And there’s
(0:03:03) Micah: been a lot of like interesting I found in the
(0:03:07) Micah: the kind of like deeper level in community, there’s a lot
(0:03:12) Micah: of like really interesting new things that people have found
(0:03:15) Micah: or like, you know, different hunts that people have set up
(0:03:20) Micah: like one of the things that I’m working on right now is shiny
(0:03:22) Micah: hunting, Kanto starters in the original gen one virtual console
(0:03:27) Micah: games, which is something that you can do, but you have to do
(0:03:27) Al: Oh, why? Why?
(0:03:29) Micah: it by like, trading them over to a gen two virtual console game
(0:03:33) Micah: to see or if you
(0:03:37) Micah: have a totally legal copy of the virtual console games,
(0:03:42) Micah: there’s a patch that you can apply that will just show you
(0:03:44) Micah: if it’s shiny or not, which is very cool.
(0:03:47) Micah: But there’s been a lot of like really neat little things like
(0:03:49) Micah: that that I’ve been kind of experiencing and re-linking
(0:03:56) Codey: You’re you’re getting back to your roots now. What’s your current hunt?
(0:03:57) Micah: myself with and yeah, yep.
(0:04:02) Micah: I think there’s been a lot of, well, yeah, that Gen 1 hunt is
(0:04:05) Micah: my current hunt.
(0:04:06) Micah: Uh, I’m doing all four of this stuff.
(0:04:10) Micah: So like the three Kanto original Kanto starters and the Pikachu in the
(0:04:15) Micah: games that they originate in, um, which is, has been a little bit complicated
(0:04:22) Micah: to set up, uh, but it has been pretty enjoyable, like learning how things,
(0:04:28) Micah: uh, work and how, how to, you know, like set things up properly.
(0:04:33) Micah: Uh, it’s just been, I don’t know.
(0:04:36) Micah: Interesting.
(0:04:37) Micah: And I think there’s been a lot over the years that has like kind of had me
(0:04:44) Micah: disconnect from Pokemon and in specific ways that like, kind of, like you said,
(0:04:51) Micah: you know, coming back to my roots has kind of retaught me what it is that I
(0:04:56) Micah: love so much about creature collecting and, you know, these core games and
(0:05:02) Micah: stuff like that, this of course has nothing to do with the fact that, uh,
(0:05:07) Micah: you know, earlier this year, they shut down the three S, uh, internet
(0:05:12) Micah: capabilities and that may be possibly in the future.
(0:05:15) Micah: Pokemon bank is going to shut down and that I am anxious about the
(0:05:19) Micah: possibility of losing, you know, and I’m not rushing to, you know, it has
(0:05:24) Micah: nothing to do with the fact that I’m like prepping for the quote unquote
(0:05:24) Codey: Yeah.
(0:05:28) Micah: end of the world when it comes to, but yeah.
(0:05:32) Al: Prepping for something they haven’t even announced is going to happen yet.
(0:05:35) Micah: Yes.
(0:05:36) Codey: But it’s going to happen, though.
(0:05:36) Micah: You know, that’s the glory of anxiety.
(0:05:41) Al: Well, yeah, fair.
(0:05:44) Codey: You can’t choose what you get worried about.
(0:05:45) Micah: Yep.
(0:05:46) Micah: Yep.
(0:05:46) Codey: You just– yep.
(0:05:47) Micah: And then you just over prepare for it.
(0:05:48) Micah: And everyone’s like, why did you do that?
(0:05:49) Micah: And I’m like, I don’t know.
(0:05:50) Micah: I just felt like it was a good idea.
(0:05:52) Al: There is no why there only is.
(0:05:54) Micah: Yep.
(0:05:55) Micah: That’s right.
(0:05:56) Codey: Yep, I did that. I’ve been doing a PhD. I don’t know if you all know about that. So, I mean, I’ve just had like, this is like conference season. And then I’ve also had a lot of review requests lately. So journals have been like, hey, there’s a paper that you’re really like is within your like niche. Can you review this? Since you’re a subject matter expert?
(0:05:56) Micah: So that’s primarily what I’ve been doing.
(0:05:59) Al: Cody, what have you been up to?
(0:06:26) Codey: And I’ve learned that I’m bad at saying no. So I am about to finish that. Like, literally after this, I have to write something for a nomination. And then I have to finish a review. And then I will finally be free of my obligations. And then I can actually focus on just my, my PhD. Yeah, lots of insect identification. Lots of that. And then
(0:06:52) Codey: recently started playing, uh, Pokemon Pocket.
(0:06:56) Codey: And, uh, I, during that Venusaur event that happened, um, I got three
(0:07:03) Codey: of the promo Venusaur, but I did not get any of the Jigglypuff or the
(0:07:06) Codey: Hunter and I am really salty about that.
(0:07:08) Micah: Oh no.
(0:07:10) Codey: Like I literally opened my game.
(0:07:13) Codey: I was like, Oh, I need to do those.
(0:07:14) Codey: Cause I thought today was the last day, like through like 11 59 tonight,
(0:07:19) Codey: but it was yesterday, so rip.
(0:07:21) Al: Yeah, this is the problem Cody, you need to be doing this this event all through the event,
(0:07:26) Al: otherwise it’s going to because I did, I kid you not, 38 packs of that event. 38 packs I opened
(0:07:32) Codey: That means, that means you won 38 of the, okay, with no Venusaur.
(0:07:36) Al: with no Venusaur. Yes, correct. With no Venusaur in 38 packs. The last three packs that I could
(0:07:44) Micah: That is unbelievable.
(0:07:49) Al: could have opened in the game because of the timer.
(0:07:51) Al: Without paying gold, the last three packs, all Venus are.
(0:07:56) Codey: They turned up the Venus or the Venus or knob. I mean, maybe
(0:08:00) Codey: that’s where they opened the cannon. Um, maybe that’s where
(0:08:07) Codey: that’s my issue because I did start doing it near the end. And
(0:08:11) Al: I don’t, yeah, I don’t think, I don’t think, I think it’s just cause like there were loads
(0:08:12) Codey: so they, there was like all Venus or it’s just like
(0:08:18) Al: of people I know who couldn’t get any Grinninja and kept getting Venus or instead. So I don’t
(0:08:22) Al: think it’s, I don’t think it’s quite that simple, but yeah, if you want it like 41 is what I got,
(0:08:27) Al: 41 packs is why I opened and that, and I needed to get, you know, 39 to get one of each.
(0:08:30) Codey: Wow.
(0:08:30) Codey: Mm-hmm.
(0:08:34) Al: So like, yeah, you can’t, you can’t half-heartedly do these events. If you want everything,
(0:08:38) Al: You got to go all in. And the good thing is that like one.
(0:08:41) Al: Once you’ve done the first couple of days, if you do all of the, like, use all of the
(0:08:46) Al: hourglasses in the first couple of days, like just kind of like do everything as quickly
(0:08:50) Al: as you can, then the most you can do a day is two because of the 12 hour timer. So it
(0:08:56) Al: makes it really quick and easy after the first couple of days. I guess the problem. Well,
(0:08:59) Codey: I mean my I’m not a try-hard though
(0:09:03) Al: I think you’re always going to be disappointed in pocket if that’s the case, then.
(0:09:06) Codey: I’m just I’m just always gonna be disappointed in myself. Let’s be honest. That’s never gonna not
(0:09:10) Micah: I got the inverse of that initial I eventually did get to Venus or which was I was happy
(0:09:22) Micah: with that because that’s you know, the max that you can put in a deck is two of a card.
(0:09:26) Micah: But it took a very, very long time and I got an endless amount of Haunter like just a ridiculous
(0:09:33) Micah: amount of Haunter to the point that I thought it was like something either was wrong or
(0:09:34) Al: Yeah.
(0:09:38) Micah: Or I was like, it’s been.
(0:09:40) Al: Opening the wrong packs or something.
(0:09:40) Micah: Having a trick played on me or something.
(0:09:42) Micah: Yeah.
(0:09:42) Micah: Like something was going wrong because it was just, it was just
(0:09:46) Micah: Haunter all the time and I w I went to my, my work team and I was like,
(0:09:51) Micah: Hey, is anybody else just pulling Haunter and everyone was like, no,
(0:09:56) Micah: I got all of them already.
(0:09:57) Micah: I figured, you know, whatever.
(0:09:58) Micah: And I’m like, what is wrong with my game?
(0:10:00) Al: Yeah, I got 13 Hunter and 11 Jigglypuff.
(0:10:00) Micah: I’m like hard resetting and
(0:10:04) Codey: Well, why don’t you save them for me, please, because I need it.
(0:10:05) Micah: incredible.
(0:10:09) Micah: - Yeah.
(0:10:10) Micah: - There’s no shortage of, no shortage of Haunters for you when the trading happens.
(0:10:11) Al: We’ll see what trading ends up being like, but yeah, got your name on it.
(0:10:19) Micah: - Al, what have you been playing?
(0:10:26) Al: Because I’m recording so many, I’m literally recording the live.
(0:10:30) Al: So I am specifically going to talk about one game that I haven’t talked about on the other episodes so that I don’t get confused about things.
(0:10:46) Al: So this is not all I’ve been up to. This is just what you’re getting this episode. I have played Sonic Shadow Generations, Sonic X, or to be specific, I’ve played Shadow Generations.
(0:11:00) Al: I wasn’t playing Sonic Generations because I did enjoy it when I played it the first time, but I don’t have time to be replaying games. Come on, that’s not my life anymore.
(0:11:08) Al: So I bought the game to play Shadow Generations. And let me tell you, I still do not like 3D Sonic games, even when it’s Shadow you’re playing as instead.
(0:11:21) Micah: Okay, so is it is it sonic generations just with like added? Oh
(0:11:28) Al: So, think of it like Bowser’s Fury with Mario.
(0:11:31) Al: Did you play that?
(0:11:32) Micah: Sure, yeah
(0:11:33) Al: It’s exactly the same as that.
(0:11:35) Al: You open up the game and it shows you the two things side by side, and you either choose
(0:11:38) Al: Sonic Generations or you choose Shadow Generations, and they are different games.
(0:11:40) Micah: » I see.
(0:11:41) Micah: » Okay.
(0:11:45) Al: It’s not like you’re playing Sonic Generations, but with Shadow, no.
(0:11:48) Al: It’s a different story.
(0:11:49) Al: It’s your different character, and it’s different levels, and he has different powers.
(0:11:55) Al: It’s completely different.
(0:11:56) Micah: And a motorcycle and swears I mean he has a gun and
(0:11:58) Al: » Yeah, exactly, exactly.
(0:12:01) Al: So, I keep trying to like 3D Sonic games,
(0:12:04) Al: and I think part of the problem is I did enjoy Sonic Generations,
(0:12:08) Al: which did have some 3D levels,
(0:12:10) Al: and I don’t know whether maybe I should play Sonic Generations to check,
(0:12:14) Al: but I’m not going to.
(0:12:16) Al: But I wonder whether I liked that despite the 3D levels,
(0:12:20) Al: and I just mostly enjoyed the 2D levels,
(0:12:22) Al: or whether I actually enjoyed the 3D levels in that game.
(0:12:25) Al: I can’t remember.
(0:12:26) Codey: Well, the more important question is are you gonna see the movie or when are you gonna see the movie?
(0:12:28) Al: Oh, yeah, I’ve already got tickets.
(0:12:33) Codey: Okay
(0:12:34) Al: Let me check when I’ve got them booked for.
(0:12:36) Al: So I have them booked for the Saturday because I’m, yeah, I couldn’t do the Friday because
(0:12:41) Al: Rona’s out to a concert, but yeah, I’ve got tickets booked for the Saturday.
(0:12:42) Codey: Mm hmm. So there’s some showings on Thursday for me where I’m at, but I that’s also my partner’s
(0:12:52) Codey: Christmas holiday party. So and we always go to like a fancy place and they pay for everything.
(0:12:56) Codey: So I’m going to get a bunch. I’m going to slam free food in my face, but I’ll probably like really.
(0:12:59) Micah: The dream.
(0:13:02) Al: You’re gonna eat as much food as you can as quickly as possible and then go to see Sonic?
(0:13:06) Codey: Uh, I don’t know if that’s going to work, but I will probably see Sonic on Friday. If not the
(0:13:13) Codey: after when it’s like cheap, cheap, cheap. Um, because.
(0:13:14) Al: hmm I see I don’t care about the price because I have the like season pass
(0:13:20) Codey: Oh, what? Wait, what?
(0:13:21) Micah: there’s a there’s a season pass to the theater
(0:13:23) Al: you guys don’t have that yeah I i I paid 135 pounds and I can go to the
(0:13:26) Micah: at least not that i’m aware of
(0:13:31) Al: cinema as many times as I want it for a year for the whole year yeah
(0:13:34) Micah: - What?
(0:13:35) Codey: - What?
(0:13:36) Micah: I’ve never heard of this.
(0:13:38) Micah: What is your like, big name, like theater, like cinema?
(0:13:42) Al: So we have, we have two bigs, we have two.
(0:13:44) Al: big cinema chains. One is called ODEON and one is called Cine World. And both of them,
(0:13:49) Micah: Okay, neither of those
(0:13:51) Al: but yeah. Well, so I think, is ODEON I think is owned by MGM maybe? I don’t know. They’re
(0:14:00) Al: both owned by big US brands, but they kept a specific name. No, maybe it’s not. Oh, sorry.
(0:14:07) Al: It’s AMC, the audience owned by MGM and do not own actual cinemas.
(0:14:10) Micah: - Okay, AMC, I do know.
(0:14:15) Al: There is a filmmaker. Let’s see what.
(0:14:17) Micah: They make the movie.
(0:14:20) Codey: Literally all that they offer to us is $15 a year gets you like points and you don’t have to pay fees for if you buy tickets online and that’s pretty much it.
(0:14:36) Micah: Okay. So I do see, I’m looking now, cause this is mind blowing, so I didn’t know this
(0:14:39) Codey: It is yeah.
(0:14:40) Micah: concept existed. Uh, we have Marcus theaters has a, it’s $10 a month and you get one movie
(0:14:47) Codey: - Oh.
(0:14:49) Micah: credit per month, which means you just get a, a single movie ticket. Yeah. I mean, you’re
(0:14:51) Al: What’s the point, then?
(0:14:56) Micah: kind of, I mean, if you’re seeing one movie a month, you’re probably not really, I guess
(0:15:03) Micah: Maybe you’re saving a little bit
(0:15:06) Micah: I mean
(0:15:06) Al: Yeah. Yeah, whereas I, I see like easily for like, I’m easily seeing one.
(0:15:14) Micah: Okay, so there’s there is also unused credits rollover so like if you miss a month you say there’s nothing right
(0:15:20) Al: Yeah but that’s still, unless that’s cheaper than a cinema ticket, there’s no point.
(0:15:22) Micah: You’re still paying for the month
(0:15:26) Micah: Which I think it is I think it’s $10 a month
(0:15:29) Micah: I don’t know what what like a movie ticket is there but here in the
(0:15:34) Micah: Great
(0:15:36) Micah: I think we’re in the ballpark of at minimum like 16 to 20 dollars for a movie ticket
(0:15:41) Al: Oh my word. For 20, I’d be expecting at least IMAX. That’s wild.
(0:15:42) Codey: - Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
(0:15:43) Micah: So you are saving some but you’re also
(0:15:50) Micah: No, you’re talking standard you’re talking getting your chairs kicked
(0:15:54) Al: Oh no. So yeah, so that’s just because you said that. That’s the same company that is
(0:15:56) Codey: Yeah, so regal which is a cinema place in some parts of the United States has
(0:16:08) Al: world technically it’s cine world owns regal not the other
(0:16:11) Al: for this one but yeah they’re the so they’re the same same company
(0:16:12) Codey: Ok.
(0:16:14) Codey: But you said you pay what? $100?
(0:16:16) Al: I paid 135 pounds for the year so what does that work out at 135
(0:16:19) Codey: Mm-hmm.
(0:16:21) Codey: That is $170 US dollars.
(0:16:24) Al: uh it’s
(0:16:24) Codey: We can get…
(0:16:26) Micah: Just I just looked at what you’re
(0:16:28) Al: yeah so that’s that’s 14 dollars uh 14 dollars a month or 11
(0:16:32) Codey: Mm-hmm Regal unlimited pricing for the base tier that only has access to 148 theaters
(0:16:39) Codey: So 100% not you’re not gonna get it where you are like where most people are going to be
(0:16:46) Codey: is
(0:16:49) Codey: $260 a year
(0:16:50) Al: for the cheapest.
(0:16:52) Codey: For the cheapest and that’s about $22 a month you get unlimited tickets
(0:16:52) Micah: Mm-hmm
(0:16:53) Al: Oh, my word.
(0:16:58) Codey: It says tickets, but I’m assuming it’s just like you get a ticket. It’s not that’s probably it’s probably purpose
(0:17:01) Micah: Right, I would imagine, yeah.
(0:17:03) Al: Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, it is.
(0:17:03) Codey: and
(0:17:05) Codey: Then you get 10% off concessions, which is nothing
(0:17:08) Al: Yeah. Yeah, we get that as well. We get that as well, which is is is totally just a way to get you to buy more of the cinema, which I obviously do because I’m a sucker and I know that I’m a sucker.
(0:17:09) Micah: Yeah, that’s pretty much nothing.
(0:17:15) Micah: Now,
(0:17:20) Micah: the next question is because our ticket prices
(0:17:23) Micah: are so much higher than yours,
(0:17:24) Micah: are your concession prices as high as ours are?
(0:17:27) Al: I mean, so okay.
(0:17:27) Micah: ‘cause we can, I mean, a small popcorn is $5, maybe.
(0:17:31) Micah: And a small soda or small beverage is probably also like $5.
(0:17:31) Codey: Mm hmm. Mm hmm.
(0:17:36) Al: So I feel like they’re not too bad.
(0:17:38) Al: So if I go, I can go into my app just now, because the good thing about
(0:17:41) Al: the cinema that I have, that I go to now, which is like fantastically like 10
(0:17:45) Al: minutes drive from my house, which is, is amazing, um, which is, you know, for
(0:17:50) Al: city people might seem weird, but like, yeah, I don’t have things 10
(0:17:54) Al: minutes away from my house.
(0:17:56) Al: Uh, if I look, I can get, so you said a small popcorn, $5.
(0:18:02) Al: Let’s see for us.
(0:18:03) Al: uh yeah a regular popcorn would be five
(0:18:07) Al: um but they do like deals that make them cheaper
(0:18:10) Codey: they used to do that. They don’t do that anymore. I remember you could get like a meal deal. I don’t
(0:18:16) Codey: think they do that anymore.
(0:18:17) Al: - Yeah, so like me and Rona went to see Wicked
(0:18:19) Al: and I never get run into the cinema.
(0:18:21) Al: Like that’s the first time she’s been to the cinema since.
(0:18:24) Al: Oh, what was that other musical?
(0:18:26) Al: The one about the kid who kills himself.
(0:18:28) Codey: You have to be more specific.
(0:18:28) Micah: Holy moly. Yeah, there’s oh
(0:18:29) Codey: You have to be more specific.
(0:18:32) Al: Dear Evan Hansen.
(0:18:33) Al: There we go, dear Evan Hansen.
(0:18:33) Codey: Oh yeah.
(0:18:34) Al: So that was the last film she saw in the cinema
(0:18:38) Al: before Wicked.
(0:18:39) Al: So that’s kind of, was that like two and a half years ago
(0:18:41) Al: or something like that?
(0:18:42) Al: So she doesn’t come out to the cinema very often
(0:18:45) Al: just because she just doesn’t like going out in the evening.
(0:18:47) Al: Which is fair, we went to see Wicked and we bought, we got two hot dogs, a large portion
(0:18:57) Al: of tater tots and one large slushie and that was 17 pounds, so it’s not cheap, but for
(0:19:08) Al: me that felt not terrible.
(0:19:09) Codey: Mm-hmm.
(0:19:11) Micah: Yeah, we we really don’t get that much it’s I mean it’s it’s kind of the like the the the
(0:19:12) Codey: Yeah, that’s a lot for that amount of money.
(0:19:14) Codey: Yeah, I-M-O.
(0:19:22) Micah: common concept of going to the theaters and eating anything is that you’ve kind of like
(0:19:27) Micah: just bring your like sneak your own stuff in yeah.
(0:19:29) Codey: You sneak. You sneak your own. Yeah, 100%.
(0:19:31) Al: Oh, yeah, yeah. And I, to be fair, I do that a lot. I don’t often buy stuff from the cinema,
(0:19:36) Al: right? We were doing that because it was a special occasion type thing, like let’s go.
(0:19:37) Micah: Which like
(0:19:40) Al: We went to IMAX because I have to pay more to go to IMAX. I don’t, it doesn’t include
(0:19:44) Al: IMAX in the, in the bundle. I think I have to pay five, five pounds to upgrade a ticket
(0:19:48) Al: to IMAX, which I feel is not too bad. But it’s not something I do every week, obviously.
(0:19:53) Al: So we went to IMAX and we paid like stupid amounts for her ticket. And then we, we got
(0:20:00) Al: their spindle of feed didn’t.
(0:20:02) Al: And we just like made an evening of it.
(0:20:03) Al: So it was fun.
(0:20:06) Codey: All of this to say, I’m really excited for Sonic 3.
(0:20:09) Codey: And I didn’t realize that Shadow is voiced by Keanu Reeves.
(0:20:15) Al: Yeah. Wild. Wild that they have Keanu Reeves’ shadow and Idris Elba’s knuckles. It’s like,
(0:20:18) Codey: Wild.
(0:20:20) Codey: And Idris Elba.
(0:20:23) Al: what a combination. Amazing. What other famous massive actors can they get playing furries.
(0:20:26) Micah: That’s incredible
(0:20:28) Micah: You
(0:20:30) Micah: You
(0:20:35) Codey: - I guess whose tails?
(0:20:37) Al: Oh, I don’t know
(0:20:39) Codey: I’m gonna Google it.
(0:20:40) Codey: We could probably move on and fuck this.
(0:20:42) Micah: Uh, I am also seeing the Sonic movie, but it’s, I’m not like a huge Sonic fan.
(0:20:48) Micah: I like Sonic, but I’m not like, you know, mega fan or anything, but my like best friend
(0:20:54) Micah: is absolutely obsessed.
(0:20:56) Micah: So as part of our like Christmas get together, we’re going to see the, the Sonic three, um,
(0:21:05) Micah: that like opening weekend, which is like, not don’t typically go to the theater that
(0:21:09) Micah: often anymore.
(0:21:12) Micah: So I’m kind of excited because it’s very rare.
(0:21:14) Codey: Yeah
(0:21:16) Micah: This is the first time I’ll be at the theater, I think, all year.
(0:21:19) Codey: Tails is uh, Colleen O’Shaughnessy
(0:21:20) Micah: Yeah, I don’t know what that is either.
(0:21:22) Al: Don’t know who that is.
(0:21:24) Codey: I don’t she sees she’s a voice actor. Uh, looks like that’s what it is
(0:21:27) Al: Right, okay. So the only actual voice actor.
(0:21:28) Micah: Okay.
(0:21:30) Micah: I have seen the two previous Sonic movies, though, and they’re really good.
(0:21:30) Codey: Yeah
(0:21:31) Al: Because of course Ben Schwartz is Sonic as well.
(0:21:34) Codey: Yeah, I’m just
(0:21:39) Codey: I love those movies so much so good
(0:21:39) Micah: They did a really good job of them.
(0:21:42) Micah: Great.
(0:21:42) Micah: Mm-hmm.
(0:21:42) Micah: Mm-hmm.
(0:21:42) Al: Yeah, I think they’re exactly what we need from Sonic films.
(0:21:47) Al: And I think if you did this, what they’ve done with Sonic films, if you did it with anything else,
(0:21:51) Al: it wouldn’t work the same. It works because of what it is, and nobody takes it too seriously.
(0:21:58) Al: So yeah, I don’t like 3D Sonic games. That’s a shame. Maybe I should stop trying. I do still
(0:22:06) Al: like 2D Sonic games, so hopefully they make another one of those. But yeah, that’s what I’ve been up to.
(0:22:12) Codey: - Woo.
(0:22:13) Al: Whoo!
(0:22:19) Al: All right, so we are gonna go into our… No, let me just… Right, I’ll explain what’s happening
(0:22:27) Al: first before I try and do a funny segue. So I’ve changed things up a little bit this year
(0:22:35) Al: because there have been so many questions about early access games and updates and what counts
(0:22:41) Al: for game of the year. So I decided.
(0:22:43) Al: To make it simpler going forward, we’re going to have three awards now.
(0:22:47) Al: Okay, we’re going to have update of the year, which is for any game that has
(0:22:52) Al: previously released out of early outside of early access and now has a content update.
(0:22:58) Al: We’re going to have early access, which is for games that are in early access.
(0:23:02) Al: And then we’re going to have game of the year, which is for any game that has
(0:23:05) Al: released their first non early access version. Does that make does that is that clear?
(0:23:08) Codey: » Sounds good.
(0:23:10) Codey: » Yep.
(0:23:11) Al: See you next time.
(0:23:12) Micah: Yes, I guess a great system
(0:23:12) Al: Excellent, we’ll see, we’ve never tried it like this before, we’ll see whether it’s good or not.
(0:23:14) Codey: Yep.
(0:23:20) Al: So that this game, this episode isn’t three times as long as the previous ones, we’re going
(0:23:27) Al: to do the nominations a little bit differently for update and early access. So for game of the
(0:23:32) Al: year we’re going to do the same as we always have, except one slight change, which I’ll get to that
(0:23:36) Al: in a minute, in round robining our nominations and then we’ll decide from.
(0:23:42) Al: What we’ve done, which should be the winner for update and early access, we’ve just got a list
(0:23:48) Al: of all the ones that came out that we could think of because there’s less than 10 of each.
(0:23:54) Al: So it’s a nice list to just list them all and then we can debate. The one other thing is,
(0:24:00) Al: because of the debacle last year of Carl Island not winning, I have been forced into,
(0:24:06) Codey: - Got scammed.
(0:24:11) Al: I would suggest to do.
(0:24:12) Codey: - No one is forcing you.
(0:24:12) Al: I was suggested by Johnny and I thought it was a good idea that when we, I sent
(0:24:18) Codey: - It’s a good suggestion.
(0:24:19) Al: out a Google farm to the other people who have been on the podcast this year, I think this year,
(0:24:24) Al: I don’t know, some people who have been on the podcast, I sent them a form so they can input
(0:24:29) Al: as well. So we’re going to also read their feedback on what they think should win the awards.
(0:24:35) Al: And maybe that will, maybe that will stop the co-hosts complaining after
(0:24:40) Codey: Nope nope
(0:24:40) Al: - Sure.
(0:24:42) Micah: I am convinced that the reason that Cody and I are both on this episode with you is because
(0:24:42) Al: - I don’t know. (laughing)
(0:24:46) Codey: You can uh you can dream out
(0:24:56) Micah: this is the equivalent of the Coral Island committee jumping me in a back alley for my
(0:25:03) Al: Oh yeah, because it was Kevin last year, wasn’t it, is that right, because Cody had played
(0:25:05) Micah: game of the year 2023. Yes. Yeah.
(0:25:12) Micah: It was, and it mostly was, yeah, it mostly was down to that. Kevin and I hadn’t played it.
(0:25:13) Al: Carl Island
(0:25:14) Al: Exactly, exactly.
(0:25:18) Codey: Yeah, and you were like, oh, I really think it should be and we were all screaming at our podcast players.
(0:25:19) Al: Because I think all three of you, you and Johnny and Bev all, all said that you would
(0:25:27) Codey: Yeah. Yeah. 100%.
(0:25:33) Al: be playing for Carl Island.
(0:25:34) Micah: This is this is my formal apology to
(0:25:38) Micah: everyone. [laughs]
(0:25:39) Codey: You’re no you’re allowed to have like you provided your input with the knowledge that you had and I’m here to make sure that you do it the right way this time.
(0:25:47) Al: This is why we have the farm.
(0:25:50) Al: It’s so that we can see people, we can see the other co-hosts opinions
(0:25:50) Micah: - Under,
(0:25:53) Al: before we make a bad decision and then still make a bad decision.
(0:25:56) Codey: And we can still make, yeah, we can still make that decision.
(0:26:00) Al: No, I’m excited for this one.
(0:26:01) Al: We’ll see, we’ll see how it goes.
(0:26:02) Al: I’ve seen, I’ve seen the feedback from the other hosts.
(0:26:05) Al: So I’m, I’m, I’m interested to see what your guys’s are.
(0:26:07) Al: We’ll get to that in a minute.
(0:26:10) Al: And I’m in it.
(0:26:10) Al: Goodness me, probably like two hours, we’ll see.
(0:26:14) Al: We’re going to start off with update of the year.
(0:26:18) Al: And so I’ll just, I’ll read through the nominations for that this year.
(0:26:21) Al: Uh, and hopefully I’ve not missed anymore.
(0:26:23) Al: Cause apparently I list missed three off the list.
(0:26:25) Al: When I sent the form to the other costs, we have Stardew Valley, 1.6, Carl Island, 1.1
(0:26:34) Al: Moonstone Island, cooking update, Disney, Dreamlight Valley, a rift in time, which yes,
(0:26:39) Al: was this year, the whole thing we released it this year, which is crazy.
(0:26:43) Al: I thought some of it had released last year, but.
(0:26:45) Al: but uh
(0:26:47) Al: farm skies of Azoria, Dave the Diver DLCs, those would be Godzilla and I can’t remember
(0:26:54) Al: the other one. Yeah what was oh um oh Dredge Dredge uh Terranil Vita Nova and Wildflowers
(0:26:55) Micah: whatever the non Godzilla one is,
(0:26:57) Micah: ‘cause the Godzilla one is the only one I made it.
(0:26:59) Codey: Yeah, I was gonna say it was a dredge.
(0:26:59) Micah: Oh, sure, sure, sure, yeah, yeah.
(0:27:05) Al: Magical Creatures. Yeah yeah because Kevin decided not to put anything in the farm until
(0:27:15) Al: literally, what, five hours before we start?
(0:27:18) Al: I’m not sure, and was the only person to mention wildflowers, I had completely forgotten the
(0:27:24) Al: wildflowers had an update this year. Anyway.
(0:27:28) Micah: You know, I looked at the show notes last night, too, and did not see that on there.
(0:27:32) Micah: So that makes complete sense.
(0:27:34) Al: Yeah. So, um, I’ll just go through our other hosts opinions and what should win, and then
(0:27:39) Al: we can discuss what we think as well. Uh, so we have one person says, Dave, the diver,
(0:27:47) Al: we have, uh, two people saying stardew outright, uh, one person adding stardew as one of their
(0:27:55) Al: three that they decided, uh, but not like the ultimate, what they think should win.
(0:28:01) Al: one for wildflowers.
(0:28:04) Al: one for terra nell, vita nova, and then one for disney dreamlight valley.
(0:28:09) Al: I feel like I need to read johnny’s out, because it’s just, this is a weird year for best update.
(0:28:16) Al: carl island 1.1, a great update no doubt, it added everything carl island and yours were asking for,
(0:28:20) Al: but to reward this with update of the year feels wrong, it should have been 1.0 but it wasn’t.
(0:28:25) Al: stargie 1.6 added more to a great game and the updates are good, but also just stop,
(0:28:30) Al: it’s okay for stargie to be done, i’m ready for it.
(0:28:33) Micah: Which is funny maybe I’m wrong and in assuming this but I feel like that’s a wild take from Johnny is that.
(0:28:40) Codey: No, I think he’s he would be a proponent of like, let like, like, stop the nostalgia machine from cranking. Yeah, I think that’s also Yeah.
(0:28:46) Al: I think he’s worried for concerned apes mental health.
(0:28:48) Micah: Okay, okay
(0:28:49) Micah: for concern days
(0:28:51) Micah: Yeah, I mean after that interview where he was kind of like, uh, I could just keep going forever. I don’t know
(0:29:00) Al: I think that leaves Disney Dreamlight Valley is the one that stands at his best update that
(0:29:03) Al: continues to add to a great game bringing in memorable characters in a way that continues
(0:29:07) Al: to surprise and delight. So that looks what I can see that looks like two stardew votes,
(0:29:13) Al: One Wildflowers, one Drusney Dreamlet Valley, and one Davey.
(0:29:16) Al: The Diver. What do you guys think?
(0:29:19) Codey: Um, so I, so I mean, some of these, I didn’t play. So like, I didn’t play moonstone island. Uh, I
(0:29:23) Al: Fair. That list is just going to get longer as we go through the episode.
(0:29:28) Codey: right. I feel like it’s true. I feel like Fay Farm Skye’s Zozoria when we were talking about it on
(0:29:33) Codey: the pod, it did not fix the issues that people wanted in the first one. So I think in my opinion,
(0:29:35) Al: No
(0:29:38) Codey: we can just strike that off. Um, I think the same about Taranell. I don’t think that that added
(0:29:39) Al: I agree. Yeah
(0:29:43) Codey: anything really. Um, and I honestly like, honestly, like,
(0:29:46) Al: R.I.P. Kevin’s option.
(0:29:49) Codey: I will just like double retweet Johnny’s thing because I agree. Like my go-to was
(0:29:59) Codey: Coral Island 1.1. Um, I really loved it, but it did basically add like, one of the reasons I loved
(0:30:05) Codey: it is because it added the rest of the story, but that should have been in the initial game.
(0:30:06) Al: Mm hmm. Yeah.
(0:30:10) Codey: Like why, like you can’t have an update, just be like, oh, adding the things that we didn’t
(0:30:17) Codey: I had originally, but finished again.
(0:30:20) Codey: So I don’t want to go with that.
(0:30:22) Al: I would, I would agree with that.
(0:30:23) Al: Any objections, Micah, to those three being struck off.
(0:30:26) Micah: I think Coral Island is an incredible game, and I think it should win.
(0:30:32) Al: Have you played it yet?
(0:30:34) Micah: So okay, I have not, but this is where I’m at with Coral Island, because if you recall on the
(0:30:40) Micah: previous Game of the Year episode, the reason that I said that I didn’t get it yet was because I was
(0:30:44) Micah: waiting for the Switch version, which we all kind of know how that went. So I did eventually just
(0:30:48) Al: Awkward. You.
(0:30:53) Micah: kind of buckle and get it on the steam deck so I do have
(0:30:56) Al: Yeah, nice.
(0:30:56) Micah: it now to play on the steam deck haven’t had a chance to
(0:30:59) Micah: play it yet but I am excited to play it especially after
(0:31:02) Micah: hearing uh how much 1.1 kind of made it a 1.0 I guess um but
(0:31:06) Codey: Yeah.
(0:31:10) Micah: there’s just you know II’ve been I’ve yeah I don’t know I’ll
(0:31:15) Micah: get I’ll get into that more later but I have not played it
(0:31:17) Micah: yet.
(0:31:18) Codey: Okay. And then yeah, Stardew is the same, like, I agree with Johnny, like, let it, let it lie.
(0:31:24) Codey: And so for what I’ve played.
(0:31:25) Al: I’m not, just for the record, I’m not, I’m not striking stardew off the list.
(0:31:28) Codey: Correct. Did not strike Stardew off the list. This is just my opinion.
(0:31:30) Al: I’m not, yeah, I don’t care what you’re saying. I’m not doing it.
(0:31:32) Al: I’m not letting that happen right now. Right. We’ll get to that.
(0:31:37) Codey: My top one would be Disney, Journey Valley. They really did add a lot of really good characters.
(0:31:42) Codey: I didn’t play specifically the Rift in Time, like the paid deals, because that’s the paid one.
(0:31:46) Codey: Um.
(0:31:48) Codey: But I saw all the stuff from it and I know that it added like a considerable amount to the game and added to the story and I would like to play it when it becomes free. Fingers crossed that that ever happens.
(0:32:00) Al: Is it not included in Game Pass?
(0:32:02) Codey: Um, yeah.
(0:32:06) Codey: No, you have to pay, you have to buy the DLC in Game Pass.
(0:32:08) Al: Oh, weird.
(0:32:10) Al: I think for, right, that’s interesting, because the whole point of Apple Arcade is everything
(0:32:10) Micah: - I think it’s the same way with Apple Arcade,
(0:32:17) Al: is free and you never have to pay for anything, but anyway, well, okay, yes, but you don’t
(0:32:20) Codey: You have to pay for Apple Arcade.
(0:32:22) Micah: Yeah, yeah
(0:32:23) Al: have to pay for anything else.
(0:32:24) Al: Like it removes in-app purchases from every game and stuff like that.
(0:32:26) Al: I think, for the purposes of argument, we will crown it for a game.
(0:32:30) Al: I feel like nobody is arguing for Moonstone Island, is that correct?
(0:32:34) Codey: Well then it’s gotta, if it’s just gonna be for a game,
(0:32:36) Codey: then it’s gotta be Coral Island, right?
(0:32:38) Codey: No, I’m kidding, I’m kidding.
(0:32:40) Micah: - I agree, definitely, Coral Island.
(0:32:43) Codey: Yeah, so that’s my two cents.
(0:32:50) Micah: I have not played enough of Moonstone Island to be able to confidently to even touch the cooking update, so I don’t think that I could justify it.
(0:32:58) Al: Yeah, I don’t think I think cooking is a fun thing to add and it did add a few more
(0:33:04) Al: spirits, but I don’t feel like it added enough to be like
(0:33:08) Al: Major like I don’t think it stands aside stardew 1.6 and all of the stuff that Disney dream life alley added
(0:33:17) Micah: Uh I still have yet to play Dave the Diver. I’ve heard great things about it. Uh it just
(0:33:21) Al: At all. Come on, maker.
(0:33:25) Micah: it just there’s something about it that just you know just hasn’t like clicked with me yet.
(0:33:31) Micah: It hasn’t hooked me. That’s not I didn’t mean that as a pun but uh but I will say the Godzilla update
(0:33:32) Al: you need to start it, that’s why. You need to just play it.
(0:33:39) Micah: got me enticed me a little bit because I I do love my Kaiju but uh I I want to play it and I’ve
(0:33:47) Micah: heard nothing but good things about it. My boss is like in love with it and sings its praise all
(0:33:50) Al: David Diver is a fantastic game. The Godzilla DLC in particular is so silly. I love it so
(0:33:51) Micah: the time but um
(0:34:00) Al: much, right? Like any game where you like find Godzilla in a cave underwater and then
(0:34:07) Al: you end the story by literally controlling Godzilla has my vote.
(0:34:12) Codey: Oh, so you’re, is that your vote then?
(0:34:12) Micah: That sounds awesome. That sounds incredible, honestly.
(0:34:17) Al: What was that Cody? Well, I mean, it’s, it would definitely be on the shortlist.
(0:34:18) Codey: I said, is that your vote then?
(0:34:24) Codey: Okay.
(0:34:25) Al: I’m not saying it’s definitely my favorite, but I feel like it’s, I could be convinced of that.
(0:34:30) Codey: Okay.
(0:34:32) Micah: uh as far as the rest of them I think you know looking at the the two current feels like top
(0:34:40) Micah: contenders being disney dreamlight valley and stardew I like cody have played disney dreamlight
(0:34:48) Micah: valley base not the the paid dlc portion of it yet um and I did really really enjoy it
(0:34:56) Micah: uh I just the the cost to get to
(0:35:02) Micah: you know we kind of talked about this when I was on previously right around what disney
(0:35:06) Micah: dreamlight valley came out um that I was under the impression that it was cheaper than it was
(0:35:13) Micah: or that there was a they were doing a uh like a like a um uh like a free to play version of it
(0:35:21) Micah: when it had originally started to come out but you know I feel like the price of disney dreamlight
(0:35:26) Micah: valley has just felt bigger and bigger over the the years
(0:35:32) Micah: and that’s that’s great if the amount of content is there and it’s a very like pretty game it seems
(0:35:38) Micah: like there is plenty of content there um but it’s a really like pitting that against stardew which
(0:35:47) Micah: you know I know stardew has been around for so long it is it’s it just keeps going I do agree
(0:35:54) Micah: it is okay for stardew to be done again I i love the game but it is okay concerned you can focus
(0:36:02) Micah: here now it’s okay you can work on other things it’s all right but the the 1.6 update for stardew
(0:36:09) Micah: is so massive for free content that like it’s hard for me to pit it against you know something that
(0:36:20) Micah: the total cost of it is like what are we you know pushing a hundred dollars at this point
(0:36:27) Micah: with in-app currency and all this stuff. I don’t know. Again,
(0:36:32) Micah: I really, really like Disney Dreamlight Valley and I’m looking forward to playing more of it.
(0:36:38) Micah: I love that they have kept it up. The community for it seems great, but yeah, it’s just such a
(0:36:46) Micah: hard comparison because it’s like massive franchise, massive brand, costs a lot of money.
(0:36:54) Micah: They’re still keeping it up and doing a great job with it versus one guy making stuff for free
(0:36:58) Codey: - Yeah, I get that.
(0:37:02) Micah: and I’m like, you know, I don’t know. It’s hard. If I personally had to put it on something,
(0:37:08) Micah: I would put it on Stardew, but I would not be opposed to Disney Dreamlight Valley yet,
(0:37:12) Codey: I mean, you do have to put it we have to we’re here to put it on
(0:37:17) Micah: which is very hard for me to try. But yeah, that would be my nomination. I think would be Stardew 1.6.
(0:37:23) Al: I feel like we’re probably we’re striking wildflowers off right? I think I don’t think
(0:37:30) Codey: Sorry, Kevin.
(0:37:30) Micah: Sorry Kevin
(0:37:32) Al: even he was seriously suggesting it because I think yeah I yeah so so he says wildflowers
(0:37:34) Codey: Yeah, the first thing in his thing is stardew.
(0:37:36) Micah: Just more the representation, you know
(0:37:41) Al: because it hasn’t won anything yet and it’s amazing and wildflowers but in reality but
(0:37:45) Micah: It’s got to get the wildflowers representation in this understandable
(0:37:48) Al: in reality Terranell is the only update I’ve played is great so he hasn’t even played wildflowers
(0:37:54) Al: I think I understand why he would want wildflowers to win something because he thinks it probably
(0:37:59) Al: should have won game of the year last year but yeah I think as an update it I don’t think
(0:38:06) Al: it compares to stardew 1.6 or to all of the updates that Disney Dreamland valued so we’re
(0:38:12) Al: down to 3 stardew 1.6 Disney Dreamland Valley and the day of the diving
(0:38:19) Codey: I think from what Micah said, I’ve moved over to Stardew.
(0:38:24) Codey: I didn’t play it, but I know literally dozens of people who have.
(0:38:31) Codey: And yeah, I think the amount of effort that this solo human keeps pumping into this game
(0:38:37) Codey: that is so beloved by the communities, it deserves it.
(0:38:42) Codey: - Bye.
(0:38:43) Al: - Say that with more passion.
(0:38:45) Micah: But, you know, that’s in the context of like how much effort and how much content there
(0:38:47) Al: Yeah.
(0:38:53) Micah: is in something like the Disney Dreamlight Valley DLC, like I think it’s just the greater
(0:39:00) Micah: context of the amount of effort and money that is put into one versus the other, I suppose.
(0:39:05) Al: I think I would also say that as much stuff as there is in the Disney Dreamland Valley
(0:39:12) Al: updates over the last year, the fact of the matter is the day that Stardew 1.6 came on,
(0:39:18) Codey: Yeah.
(0:39:18) Al: it became like the fifth highest consecutive players on Steam for like a week. That is
(0:39:23) Micah: Mm hmm. Which is
(0:39:25) Al: a wild amount of control that that game still has over.
(0:39:31) Micah: Yeah, that’s, I mean, remarkable for a game as old as it is to be able to update and hit
(0:39:38) Micah: that milestone is incredible.
(0:39:41) Micah: It’s just, you don’t see that with really anything aside from like me, you know, multiplayer
(0:39:45) Al: Yeah, and legitimately, like, I can’t find the chart, but it’s all time peak was miles
(0:39:47) Micah: online games or something like it’s, it’s impressive.
(0:40:00) Al: lower than that. And then the update came out and then suddenly it was high up. So it’s
(0:40:08) Al: all time peak takes a 56 place, place at 56. But I think on the week that it was out, it
(0:40:15) Al: was top five. I think I can’t remember because we don’t have obviously the historical, historical
(0:40:17) Micah: Mm-hmm, sure.
(0:40:21) Al: data for that. But like, yeah, abs and that was, you know, I think it’s previous peak
(0:40:26) Al: was something like 50,000 or something. So it like quadrupled its highest consecutive
(0:40:32) Al: players for an eight year old game. That’s that’s mad. And I also got me to the point
(0:40:38) Micah: Yeah, it’s pretty remarkable.
(0:40:43) Al: of perfecting the game.
(0:40:45) Al: Like I had never gotten close to that, and with 1.6, I put so much time into it because
(0:40:51) Al: of all of the different things that it had and all the different additions it had.
(0:40:56) Micah: Mm-Hmm
(0:40:57) Al: I got to the point where I was like, Oh, I can, I can complete this game.
(0:41:01) Al: You know, it’s like I created a new save, a brand new save, because I hadn’t really
(0:41:01) Micah: Mm-Hmm
(0:41:06) Al: played it on my steam deck.
(0:41:07) Al: I had done it originally on, on switch and so I brought a brand new save and I sunk
(0:41:14) Al: a hundred hours into it.
(0:41:15) Al: So we’re giving it to Stardew, Stardew 1.6 update of the year with honorable mentions
(0:41:20) Micah: Yeah. I think so.
(0:41:30) Al: for Disney Dreamlight Valley and Dave the Diver, specifically the Godzilla one.
(0:41:33) Codey: Godzilla.
(0:41:34) Micah: I am floored.
(0:41:36) Al: The dredge one is fun and has more content on it, but the Godzilla one was the one that
(0:41:41) Codey: You’re floored.
(0:41:43) Micah: I’m floored that Coral Island did not.
(0:41:45) Micah: Going into this, I prepared, reading the list, I prepared that I was just going to fold to
(0:41:50) Micah: Coral Island the second that you both defended it, but.
(0:41:52) Al: No, I think everybody’s opinion is the same about Coral Island, is that 1.1 should have
(0:41:58) Al: been 1.0. This is obviously what matters to them, but if they had waited until the 1.1 update to
(0:41:59) Micah: Mm-hmm
(0:42:06) Al: release 1.0, I reckon it would have been Game of the Year this year. For us, obviously not,
(0:42:10) Micah: Mm-hmm. Yep
(0:42:10) Codey: Yeah, yep, for everything.
(0:42:14) Al: for the Game Awards. All right, next we have Early Access Game of the Year.
(0:42:20) Al: So our nominations for this.
(0:42:22) Al: A new leaf memories chill town for lands fields of mystery garden life cozy simulator go go down like your frontier of life and land and over magic.
(0:42:36) Al: And the opinions from other hosts are one that I think we can probably discount over magic because it sounds magical. I think this person. I think this person has not played any early access games this year.
(0:42:46) Codey: With the shrug emoji?
(0:42:50) Al: Uh, we have to vote.
(0:42:52) Al: I think the early access game of the year should be demos.
(0:42:58) Al: Honestly, everything that’s come out in early access has been a disappointment.
(0:43:02) Al: It’s become the vehicle for a game with a single cool concept to release, get bits of hype, and then proceed to deliver something exceptionally mid.
(0:43:10) Al: Meanwhile, there has been a resurgence of demos, games trying to win your business by offering a slice.
(0:43:14) Al: These games are the ones that have brought me joy this year.
(0:43:18) Al: this year, death to early access, long-lived demos.
(0:43:22) Al: So that’s two votes for Fields of Mystery and one for demos.
(0:43:27) Al: There’s not any specific demo, just demos in general.
(0:43:34) Al: For me, it’s Fields of Mystery.
(0:43:36) Al: I think Fields of Mystery is a fantastic start for the game.
(0:43:40) Al: I think it does.
(0:43:42) Al: What I really hate about Early Access is when it’s like, here’s the game, but it’s buggy.
(0:43:49) Al: I much prefer how Fields of Mystery have done it and how
(0:43:52) Al: like Ooblets did it and Carl Island did it, which is here is a very solid base for the game. It feels
(0:43:59) Al: like it’s a complete game and you just hit roadblocks along the way. I think that’s a really good way
(0:44:03) Al: of doing it. I do kind of agree with Johnny and that this can be a problem in many cases. It’s
(0:44:08) Al: sometimes hard to go back to games when you’ve started with early access, but I do think that
(0:44:13) Al: means most people probably just shouldn’t play early access games, but you know, what can you do?
(0:44:20) Al: I also enjoyed Gogotown.
(0:44:22) Al: I am not sure if this is a good one, but I feel like they have a lot more work to do to make a fully formed game.
(0:44:28) Al: It also released in AWP, it didn’t feel buggy sort of aspect and you had the core bones of the game there, but there’s no real narrative there and it kind of felt a little bit like it fell off quite quickly.
(0:44:42) Al: So that’s why I would vote for Fields of Mistreer.
(0:44:44) Al: Hmph.
(0:44:44) Codey: Uh, I didn’t play any of these and, um, I kind of agree with Johnny, but also
(0:44:51) Codey: like, basically early access is just a way to almost like crowdfund something.
(0:44:56) Codey: So you’re like pitching your, your base ideas to an audience and then they
(0:45:02) Codey: give you money to like, make it what you want it to be like to develop it.
(0:45:07) Codey: Cause they’re, they believe in what you’re doing.
(0:45:09) Codey: Uh, so like I see the value of early access, but I also.
(0:45:14) Codey: I, I think that it’s often like abused in that it’s just, like you said, like
(0:45:21) Codey: release the buggy version or release like a small version to like, generate
(0:45:26) Codey: hype or something.
(0:45:28) Codey: Um, so yeah, I’m, I mean, I, I am willing to just like pass or defer my
(0:45:35) Codey: judgment to y’all, like whatever y’all decide, cause I just personally, unless
(0:45:39) Codey: there’s this super big argument for any one particular thing, and we want to
(0:45:43) Codey: thing and we want to discuss.
(0:45:46) Micah: Well, that might make things easy because I also not voting for fields of mystery.
(0:45:52) Codey: Yay, fields of mystery.
(0:45:53) Micah: Yeah, I, I do, I agree with what a lot of what Al said that, you know, the, the core
(0:46:05) Micah: of the game is so solid.
(0:46:08) Micah: It’s also just, you know, it does feel so, so heavily based in like stardew core.
(0:46:16) Micah: Or that like, you know, I think that can be seen as a negative sometimes now where like,
(0:46:22) Micah: you know, it’s just, it started with a coat of paint or like, it started with like a different
(0:46:28) Micah: slightly different feature or whatever.
(0:46:30) Micah: But I think there’s enough things that stand out in fields of mystery to separate it.
(0:46:36) Micah: Like, I don’t know, just quest progression and I just feel like the, I mean, personally,
(0:46:47) Micah: I like the pixel, the pixel art is beautiful.
(0:46:49) Micah: The, the character portraits are fantastic.
(0:46:53) Micah: They’re done in that kind of like 90s Bishoujo, like anime style, like, like magical girl,
(0:47:01) Micah: kind of like Sailor Moon era anime.
(0:47:03) Micah: And I, it, it just also, you know, everybody in the game is, is beautiful, which I think,
(0:47:12) Micah: you know, Cody had the issue with Coral Island, but you know, like
(0:47:16) Codey: Yeah.
(0:47:16) Micah: just like one, somewhat like normal person, you know, would be cool to see but, but, but yeah, I mean, everyone is very, very nice to look at that, I think, definitely adds to that kind of like, because it’s, it’s high fantasy, right? So it has this kind of like, magical, magical girl kind of, you know, vibe to it that I really like.
(0:47:21) Al: We need ugly representation.
(0:47:43) Micah: like, and I think, haven’t really seen–
(0:47:46) Micah: represented in this genre at least this well.
(0:47:52) Micah: But as far as the game itself and the mechanics and stuff
(0:47:56) Micah: like that, I think, especially with the recent patch and stuff,
(0:48:02) Micah: I think it’s a really, really solid game
(0:48:05) Micah: and a really good case for–
(0:48:08) Micah: or a really good standard for early access,
(0:48:10) Micah: I guess, especially in, again, a world where
(0:48:14) Micah: I agree with that like.
(0:48:16) Micah: Maybe more demos, less early access would be a better thing, but.
(0:48:21) Al: I do think that it set itself up with a lot of potential, which I think is what you want
(0:48:27) Micah: Mm-hmm
(0:48:28) Al: with an early access game. We will see whether it follows through on that potential or not.
(0:48:38) Al: I’m not saying that because it’s done well here means it will win game of the year one year.
(0:48:42) Al: Who knows? We’ll see. I also think the whole like, oh, it’s just a stardew clone with a different
(0:48:47) Al: pain to like yeah that’s actually really hard
(0:48:51) Al: to do right like how many games have we played that are stardew clones that are just not fun
(0:48:52) Micah: Mm-hmm.
(0:48:56) Micah: Yep. Oh, yeah, totally.
(0:48:56) Al: so many like and this is actually this is fun right and if it just recreates stardew and adds
(0:49:02) Al: some extra stuff so what that’s fun right like I like when people do new things as well
(0:49:04) Micah: » Mm-hmm. Yeah.
(0:49:09) Al: but I also like when a game is fun and a lot of a lot of what I want from these games
(0:49:15) Al: is easily plowing in tens of hours into it you know I don’t i’m not
(0:49:21) Al: looking for something I have to plow in 500 hours to do everything but i’m also not looking
(0:49:25) Al: for something that after 10 hours I feel like i’ve done everything even in an early access
(0:49:30) Al: and I got to the point where i’ve basically done everything in this game but i’m at slightly over
(0:49:34) Al: 40 hours so like that feels like pretty decent and I feel like maybe the game is like a quarter done
(0:49:41) Al: so that feels like a good amount of content if they continue that sort of level of things
(0:49:47) Al: I’m probably not going to touch it again until it’s 1.0 because I’m scared of burning.
(0:49:51) Al: Before it releases, but yeah, I think it, I think it does a good balance for an early access.
(0:49:59) Al: And if we’re going to give an early access game, an award, I feel like.
(0:50:04) Micah: Yeah, I agree.
(0:50:04) Codey: I think my favorite thing that you said there is that some year it might win
(0:50:11) Codey: a game of the year and so you’re really not saying next year.
(0:50:14) Al: Oh, I don’t think it’s, I don’t think, no, no, it’s not, like, so when did this, when did this
(0:50:15) Micah: I thought it was later than that, oh, maybe it was, yeah, you were pretty close, yeah.
(0:50:19) Al: first cut? Was it July? Let’s have a look. August, oh, 5th of August. I was pretty close when I said
(0:50:22) Codey: Yeah, I thought it was later.
(0:50:28) Al: July. That’s pretty close. And it’s, so it’s been four months and they’ve had one update, and that
(0:50:30) Codey: - But you were wrong, so.
(0:50:31) Codey: Thank you.
(0:50:36) Al: one update has mostly been quality of life stuff. There’s not really been a huge amount of extra on
(0:50:43) Al: on top of that.
(0:50:45) Al: after four months with one update that it’s coming out in the next year.
(0:50:49) Al: I’ve got some, I’ve, you know, come on, that’s not happening.
(0:50:54) Al: And when have I ever been wrong about this, Cody, right?
(0:50:56) Al: Always err on the side of it’s not coming out next year.
(0:51:00) Codey: Oh yeah, oh yeah, we gotta in some episode this year, we gotta talk about all the games that the fallen the ones that were supposed to come out this year that are not.
(0:51:12) Al: Yeah. How many times have I said that Snacko is my most anticipated game of the year?
(0:51:16) Codey: Oh, no.
(0:51:18) Codey: Yeah.
(0:51:19) Al: The answer is four times. That’s how many times.
(0:51:20) Codey: Oh.
(0:51:21) Micah: I’m in, I’m in that boat.
(0:51:24) Al: I suspect next year will be the year.
(0:51:26) Codey: Okay, we’ll say that I get someone clipping
(0:51:28) Al: But we’ll see.
(0:51:30) Codey: It. Yep.
(0:51:33) Al: OK, well, it sounds like this is an easy one, then, right?
(0:51:35) Al: We had two other people saying Fields of Mistria and
(0:51:39) Al: both me and Mike are saying Fields of Mistria.
(0:51:42) Al: That feels like an overwhelming Fields of Mistria win.
(0:51:42) Codey: and me agreeing with whatever you say.
(0:51:46) Micah: We did it.
(0:51:46) Al: Congratulations, Fields of Mistria, Early Access Game of the Year.
(0:51:47) Micah: He he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he
(0:51:50) Al: There was not a lot of competition.
(0:51:53) Codey: Congrats, it’s like when my mom told me
(0:51:56) Codey: I was her favorite child.
(0:51:58) Al: To be fair, with some parents, that’s a hard thing to do, be their favorite child, even
(0:51:58) Codey: Like, I’m your only child.
(0:52:06) Al: if you are the only one.
(0:52:08) Codey: womp womp. It’s true. You’re not wrong.
(0:52:09) Al: All right, time for the big one, game of the year.
(0:52:16) Al: So we have five previous winners of game of the year.
(0:52:21) Al: In 2019 it was DeRaymon’s Story of Seasons, in 2020 it was Summer in Mara.
(0:52:24) Codey: Woohoo!
(0:52:28) Codey: Woo!
(0:52:28) Al: In 2021, it was Spiritfarer, which definitely didn’t come out in 2021, in 2022 it was Ooblets.
(0:52:30) Codey: Woo!
(0:52:34) Codey: We don’t care.
(0:52:38) Al: And last year, 2023, it was Mineko’s Night Market, slash Carl Island.
(0:52:42) Micah: Well, with the runner up, Corel, (laughs)
(0:52:47) Codey: Depending on who you start to.
(0:52:50) Al: This year, we have too many games to count released, so I’m going to go through the list
(0:52:56) Al: to release games.
(0:52:58) Al: And then, like previous years, we’re going to round robin our nominations, and then
(0:53:02) Al: I will read out the nominations from the other hosts as well, and then we’ll get into
(0:53:06) Al: our discussion trying to decide the winner.
(0:53:08) Al: So here’s our long, completely unnecessary list.
(0:53:11) Al: Amber Isle, Animal Crossing Pocket Camp complete.
(0:53:15) Al: Botany Manor, Creatures of Ava, Critter Crops, Distant Bloom, Dreamland Farm, Echoes of the
(0:53:22) Al: Plum Grove, Ever After Falls, Ever Home, Fabledom.
(0:53:28) Al: Farmagia, Farming Simulator 25, Garden Trails, Garden Witch Life, Gourdlets, Harvest Days,
(0:53:37) Al: Harvest Moon, Home Sweet Home, too many H’s in that name.
(0:53:41) Al: Honey Grove, Horticular, Immortal Life, Kamairu, A Frog Refuge, Little Known Galaxy, Luma Island,
(0:53:49) Al: Mellowbot, A Last Song, Mika and the Witches Mountain, which just for the argument’s sake
(0:53:55) Al: we have decided that this is not an early access game.
(0:53:58) Al: I don’t care, tweet at me, I really don’t care, go away.
(0:53:59) Codey: Especially because we’re not checking Twitter anymore.
(0:54:03) Al: It is not, it is not an early access game.
(0:54:06) Al: Shut up and go away.
(0:54:09) Al: Natsuma on 20th century summer kids, orange season, petite island, pixel
(0:54:14) Al: cross, story of seasons, plant, which, yeah, I know it’s not a card to go game.
(0:54:18) Al: I don’t care.
(0:54:19) Al: It’s story of seasons.
(0:54:21) Al: Plant to be, Rusty’s retirement, song of the prairie, star struck
(0:54:25) Al: Fagobond, the Guardian Path.
(0:54:28) Al: The Last Farmer, The Palace on the Hill, Window Garden and Web Fishing.
(0:54:34) Codey: Whoo!
(0:54:34) Al: Goodness me.
(0:54:35) Al: Oh, that’s such a list.
(0:54:35) Micah: - What a list.
(0:54:36) Codey: Yeah.
(0:54:37) Al: That list took me two and a half minutes to read out.
(0:54:40) Codey: Next year, it’ll take three minutes to read it.
(0:54:43) Al: Well, interestingly, it’s not significantly bigger than last year.
(0:54:49) Al: It is bigger, but by like three, I think.
(0:54:52) Al: So we might have plateaued on the number of games released each year,
(0:54:56) Al: which I really hope we have.
(0:54:58) Al: In which case, can it start going down as well? That’d be great. Please and thank you.
(0:55:03) Codey: - Now I’m gonna be, Vernon,
(0:55:05) Codey: or I’m gonna be Dudley here being 36,
(0:55:07) Codey: but last year, last year I had 37.
(0:55:10) Al: All right, we’re going to round robin these nominations. We haven’t seen each other’s
(0:55:17) Al: of this ones. People might have sneaked their peaks at the hosts, the other hosts ones, but
(0:55:22) Al: Micah, what’s your first nomination?
(0:55:26) Micah: Uh, I, my personal biggest game of the year for cottage core games, which
(0:55:33) Micah: I feel like is going to be an uphill battle.
(0:55:35) Micah: So I’m going to get it out of the way right away is a Natsuman 20th century kid.
(0:55:41) Micah: I think that it is a fantastic game.
(0:55:44) Micah: It is a sort of re-imagining of this series, uh, called Boku no Natsuyasumi,
(0:55:52) Micah: which is, you know, like the, the Shinshan games that have been recently released.
(0:55:57) Micah: Uh, this is more closer to the non-collaborative, uh, you know, core of the series,
(0:56:04) Micah: not Shinshan, Kran Shinshan branded. Um, but it is a newer take on it. So like the Kran Shinshan
(0:56:13) Micah: versions of the game, the two now we’re at, um, do feel much more like the, the core games. They,
(0:56:21) Micah: they’re, uh, you know, designed in a way where the backdrops are.
(0:56:26) Micah: Are beautiful, hand-painted. It’s, you know, kind of static and you’re moving around
(0:56:31) Micah: in these, these, you know, static backgrounds that change, but the, the position, the camera
(0:56:37) Micah: direction is always the same, you know? Um, and this is more of a 3D, uh, it’s 3D, first of all,
(0:56:46) Micah: which is like, like entirely 3D, which is, which is kind of big, but it’s also a third person POV,
(0:56:53) Micah: Uh, which is new for this, this series.
(0:56:57) Micah: But I think it is a much needed introduction for people to this, this series.
(0:57:03) Micah: I think it’s, they’re really doing a push to get people in the West to appreciate it.
(0:57:09) Micah: And I think that’s definitely been seen with, you know, the, the tuition
(0:57:14) Micah: Chan games and now this, uh, localizing this as well, which I absolutely did not
(0:57:19) Micah: think we were going to get a localization of it, I thought for sure.
(0:57:23) Micah: This was a niche enough thing that we were not.
(0:57:26) Micah: going to get it localized, but I’m happy that we did, and they did a really great job with it.
(0:57:30) Micah: I bought it originally and on the Japanese eShop when I didn’t think it was going to be localized
(0:57:35) Micah: because I was looking for something that was a little bit slower paced to help with learning
(0:57:42) Micah: Japanese, which I’ve been doing for a long time. And I was disappointed to learn that it was very
(0:57:51) Micah: quickly the dialogue and it was was very fast.
(0:57:57) Micah: There was no pausing there was no like I can take some time and dissect the sentence structure and you know the characters and stuff so that was kind of my initial disappointment with it but when they localized it obviously that isn’t a problem anymore the the the my interest in it has shifted to more just enjoying the game itself.
(0:58:19) Micah: And it is such a like unique and beautiful way to play a game like this like a.
(0:58:26) Micah: Like a this kind of you know just living in this cute little town and you every day you have you know like your morning breakfast and then your morning stretches and then you have the day to do whatever you want because it’s your kid and it’s summer vacation and you can go climb trees and catch bugs and go fishing and explore you can meet people in the town and like have conversations with them.
(0:58:54) Micah: A lot of times those wind up turning in.
(0:58:57) Micah: Deeper quests that you would otherwise miss if you just decided to do something else that day.
(0:59:04) Micah: And the glory of it, I think, is that it is a digestible game because you’re kind of on this
(0:59:12) Micah: time limit where you just have the summer vacation. So you just have this certain amount
(0:59:19) Micah: of days that you can play through. And then once it’s over, it’s over. The summer vacation is over,
(0:59:26) Micah: but there is so much replayability. So you can complete the game and say, you know, 20 hours,
(0:59:33) Micah: maybe, but there’s so much replayability for it that you can continue to experience the things
(0:59:39) Micah: that you missed previously. Like, you know, there’s a whole subsection that’s dedicated
(0:59:47) Micah: specifically to the shrine or to this specific type of bug or, you know, filling the museum with
(0:59:56) Micah: rare fish or something like that where, you know, you can kind of pick and choose and then go back
(1:00:02) Micah: and do things that you missed. And it’s just a very feel good carefree game that really kind of
(1:00:12) Micah: taps into that childlike wonder that I feel like we don’t really get as much as adults.
(1:00:20) Al: I suspect, I suspect, Michael, this is going to be the Coral Island of this year, in the.
(1:00:20) Micah: That’s my case for it. I love it.
(1:00:30) Micah: - For me, person, just me.
(1:00:33) Al: I haven’t, I haven’t played it. And the funny thing is behind the scenes, we actually planned
(1:00:39) Al: an episode on this game. But the problem is that we planned it for what, two weeks after
(1:00:47) Al: Harvest Moon Home Sweet Home came out and then.
(1:00:50) Al: They announced that it was coming out that day and I was like, Oh my God.
(1:00:52) Al: I think we just need to, I think we need to cover Harvest Moon Home Sweet Home.
(1:00:55) Micah: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
(1:00:56) Al: And so we just, we just, uh, pivoted and did that instead.
(1:01:00) Al: And of course, if I don’t have a podcast to record on the game,
(1:01:03) Al: I’m probably not going to play it.
(1:01:04) Al: Um, I do, however, suspect that if I had played it, it wouldn’t have
(1:01:10) Al: been one of my games of the year.
(1:01:12) Al: And that is purely because I don’t like games that are slow.
(1:01:17) Al: Um, and, and that is a definitely.
(1:01:17) Micah: Mm-hmm
(1:01:20) Al: And, but I, yeah, you’re, when you were like, Oh, I love how every morning you eat
(1:01:26) Al: your breakfast and you do your morning stretches.
(1:01:29) Al: And I’m in my brain.
(1:01:30) Al: I’m going, Oh no, I have to look at this man.
(1:01:32) Micah: I should clarify that those segments are extremely short scripted segments, so they’re not like
(1:01:33) Al: Oh, it’s just so like, Oh no, just let me do the things I want to do.
(1:01:37) Al: You know, just like even that, even that tiny thing just stressed me out so much.
(1:01:49) Micah: things that you have to do. It’s basically like the the loading. Yeah, you can skip any
(1:01:50) Codey: Can you pass them, though?
(1:01:54) Micah: cutscene that you want in the game, so you can skip it. There’s just I choose not to because
(1:01:59) Micah: Sometimes there’s dialogue for certain things that like.
(1:02:02) Micah: You know you can you can use to determine what you want to do for the day or maybe like there’s something that you wouldn’t know about you know.
(1:02:08) Al: Well, this is the problem. This is the problem with those cut scenes, right? Like, it’s like,
(1:02:11) Al: would I want to skip it? Or would I feel like I want to skip it, but I can’t really skip it?
(1:02:16) Micah: - You can’t bring yourself to it ‘cause…
(1:02:17) Al: You know, it’s just one of those things that it’s like this. Yeah, well, exactly, exactly. It’s like,
(1:02:20) Micah: - Yeah.
(1:02:21) Al: it’s probably, it was like, you know, Isabelle talking in Animal Crossing. It’s like, this is
(1:02:25) Al: pointless and silly, and I don’t want to do this, but she might say something that matters to me.
(1:02:28) Al: So I have to watch it, right? Like, and it’s just so slow. It’s the same reason why, like, I just,
(1:02:36) Al: As much as I played Animal
(1:02:38) Al: Crossing or I still don’t know whether I enjoyed that game or not because it is just so slow. And
(1:02:45) Al: that’s not where my that’s not what I like. Like I, I speed run farming games. Well, not,
(1:02:51) Al: not all of them, but I speed run spring of year one in every farming game. It’s like, do the bare
(1:02:56) Al: minimum, get my plants. I want to get to the, I want to get to the fun bit. I want to get to the
(1:03:00) Al: bit where I have money rolling in, you know, that’s, that’s what I’m there for. And it sounds
(1:03:06) Al: like this is this game
(1:03:08) Al: is just entirely spring one.
(1:03:10) Micah: There is a lot of, you know, there’s a lot of content to it and you can realistically
(1:03:18) Micah: kind of, so there is one of the things that they’ve, they’ve added somewhat recently.
(1:03:24) Micah: I can’t remember if this is, they’ve added this in the Shinchan games or if this is new
(1:03:28) Micah: to this one, but there’s a time, uh, speed, there’s like a clock speed setting.
(1:03:35) Micah: so you can set it to so that the day moves super quick.
(1:03:40) Micah: And that the time and the sun rises and sunsets very quickly.
(1:03:46) Micah: Or you can set it even longer, right?
(1:03:49) Micah: There’s like three settings to it.
(1:03:51) Micah: There’s a fast day, there’s like normal time,
(1:03:53) Micah: and then there’s a long day.
(1:03:54) Micah: So I personally chose the long day
(1:03:57) Micah: because that gives me more time throughout each day
(1:04:00) Micah: to do all of the things that I want to do.
(1:04:04) Micah: But yeah, if you’re not,
(1:04:07) Micah: know, if kind of like moving slow.
(1:04:10) Micah: And living your daily life is not something that you enjoy
(1:04:15) Micah: that probably not for you, but there is, I would encourage.
(1:04:18) Codey: That provides no dopamine for Al.
(1:04:21) Al: It really doesn’t and it’s sad because I feel like I could enjoy that sort of thing, but
(1:04:27) Al: it’s just my brain doesn’t like me.
(1:04:28) Micah: Yeah, I mean, I would encourage you to try it at some point
(1:04:31) Micah: if you get the opportunity to, if it’s, you know, cheaper.
(1:04:35) Micah: I can’t remember what it is, maybe $38 USD on the eShop.
(1:04:36) Al: Well, yeah, Micah, Micah, I own the game.
(1:04:41) Micah: But oh, well, yeah, well, then, uh, you know, in that case.
(1:04:41) Codey: He’s locked and loaded.
(1:04:42) Al: This is this is this is my problem.
(1:04:46) Al: This is my curse.
(1:04:46) Al: I own all the games.
(1:04:48) Al: I just never play them.
(1:04:53) Micah: Uh, yeah, I mean.
(1:04:54) Codey: - I think it sounds really cute.
(1:04:56) Codey: I think like for me, nostalgia games,
(1:04:58) Codey: especially nostalgia for like the summers of your childhood,
(1:05:01) Codey: they would, it would hit a little too close to home for me.
(1:05:04) Codey: Like, oh man, I miss this.
(1:05:06) Codey: Like I miss just going to my grandma’s
(1:05:08) Codey: and playing in the backyard and playing with the aunts
(1:05:10) Codey: and like, you know, things like that.
(1:05:12) Micah: Yeah. Yeah. And that’s primarily what it’s designed to do, you know, like that, the designer
(1:05:22) Micah: Kazayabe of the like Malayim Kitchen is the company that makes all these Boku no Natsuyasumi games.
(1:05:30) Micah: He had designed the game with the intention of like, you know, living, he lives this, you know,
(1:05:38) Micah: high, like fast moving, high stress life.
(1:05:42) Micah: In, uh, you know, downtown Tokyo and as a like salary man and, you know, he yearned
(1:05:49) Micah: for that.
(1:05:50) Micah: It’s the slower days than the country, the Japanese countryside as a kid.
(1:05:55) Micah: And so that is essentially, he made this to kind of recapture that and the, you know,
(1:06:00) Micah: the, the serious to recapture that, not this one specifically, but, uh, yeah.
(1:06:04) Micah: And it’s just the characters have such like unique, um, they’re just designed so uniquely
(1:06:12) Micah: physically and, uh, you know, um, uh, personality wise are just very unique.
(1:06:19) Micah: So I, I would encourage people to try it if it’s something that they would, you know,
(1:06:24) Micah: it sounds like something that they would like, but especially if you are an animal crossing
(1:06:28) Micah: van, I think you probably, you might, you might like it, which Al clearly is not.
(1:06:33) Micah: And so, uh, probably will never play it.
(1:06:36) Al: Look, right, I opened the game three times to try and play. And I know no Animal Crossing,
(1:06:42) Micah: not to one okay all right yeah yeah yeah yeah
(1:06:43) Al: I put stupid amounts of time into despite still not knowing whether I’ll enjoy it or not.
(1:06:48) Al: Look, it was 2020. It was like, we don’t talk about 2020, right?
(1:06:55) Al: No, I yeah, I tried. I opened this game three times before they announced Tarver’s
(1:07:01) Al: been homeschooled home really state and I went oh, thank goodness. I don’t know why.
(1:07:06) Al: I just couldn’t get through even just the loading screen. And I know this sounds so stupid.
(1:07:13) Al: And I don’t know why. And eventually I do need to go back and I do need to properly play it
(1:07:18) Al: because I can’t just like, wave it away. There are some games that you just really want to like,
(1:07:25) Al: even if you never will get there. And I need to try again. I really want to like it in theory.
(1:07:32) Codey: Well, it sounds like a game that tries to make you be present and like that can be really
(1:07:37) Codey: hard for people. I mean, like I, I have this little phone game for self-care and I have
(1:07:43) Codey: to take care of those little birds of a game called Finch. And the game, I told the game,
(1:07:47) Codey: I wanted to be more present and it gave me a task to do every day, every once a day to
(1:07:53) Codey: eat a meal without distractions. And I hate that. I hate it, but I do, but I have to do
(1:08:01) Codey: And it’s one of those things like-
(1:08:02) Codey: because I hate it, I want to do it.
(1:08:06) Codey: But it makes me be present and makes me think about what I’m eating
(1:08:10) Codey: and maybe kind of go over my day instead of constantly distracting myself.
(1:08:14) Micah: Mm hmm. I have used that app as well, and I do like it.
(1:08:14) Codey: And sometimes you gotta do that.
(1:08:16) Al: I feel super uncomfortable with that concept.
(1:08:20) Codey: Yeah, I love Finch. So cute.
(1:08:21) Micah: I think it’s great. Yeah, I can understand from everything that you’ve said about the
(1:08:27) Micah: games that you like, Al, that you are uncomfortable with that concept.
(1:08:31) Micah: But that’s definitely what I think Natsuman and the Boku no Natsuyasumi games are all kind of that
(1:08:38) Micah: definitely with the intention of making you kind of feel a little bit more present.
(1:08:42) Micah: But it’s also, you know, it’s…
(1:08:45) Micah: It’s just so open-ended, you know, you can really do whatever you want day to day.
(1:08:50) Micah: You can do nothing.
(1:08:51) Micah: You can spend your entire, you know, summer vacation just waking up, going fishing every day and going home.
(1:08:58) Micah: And that’s it. If that’s really what you wanted to do, like you can do the entire game that way.
(1:09:03) Micah: You can, you know, do min-max everything that you want to min-max.
(1:09:08) Micah: You know, it’s really, it’s really open-ended in that way.
(1:09:10) Micah: but it definitely is designed with the intention.
(1:09:14) Micah: I would love to talk about it at some point, further than just, you know,
(1:09:26) Al: Well, we just need to schedule a time again for this episode and we know I will put in at least five hours into it, right?
(1:09:36) Al: Yeah, we just need to schedule it for a time they’re not going to release a Harvestment or a story of seasons, simple, right?
(1:09:38) Micah: the way that it’s designed.
(1:09:42) Codey: There needs to not be an excuse for Al to not play.
(1:09:45) Al: Yeah, exactly. That’s exactly it, we need to, because the thing is, right, if there’s a clear, the reason why I got out of that was because it was a very clear, this is the alternative.
(1:09:55) Al: if I’ve organized an
(1:09:56) Al: episode, I will do that episode unless something gets in the way because you know what is the
(1:10:01) Al: hardest thing to do is deciding on episodes. That is the hardest bit of it. Cody knows this
(1:10:08) Al: because they’re in a chat with me in Slack and I feel like every week we have a discussion of what
(1:10:15) Al: are we doing, right? Because deciding on 52 episode topics a year is really difficult and so if we have
(1:10:24) Al: decided on one and it’s going to happen.
(1:10:26) Al: But the problem is it was just the absolute perfect timing because we knew it was coming
(1:10:33) Al: at some point but we didn’t know when it was coming and I was kind of expecting it
(1:10:37) Al: to come later because they’d shown us literally nothing about the game but then they announced
(1:10:45) Al: it and it was like yeah two weeks after or two weeks before we were planning on recording and
(1:10:49) Al: I’m like that’s just enough time for us to play this game enough for the episode and it’s like
(1:10:52) Micah: Sure, right.
(1:10:55) Al: It’s, you know, it’s.
(1:10:56) Al: So hard for us to organize specific episodes and it’s like, anyway,
(1:11:00) Al: it doesn’t matter that’s way too inside baseball.
(1:11:00) Codey: Yeah.
(1:11:02) Al: Great.
(1:11:03) Al: Thank you for your first nomination.
(1:11:04) Codey: Oh, that’s a great question. Um.
(1:11:04) Al: Cody, what’s yours?
(1:11:05) Al: Hmm.
(1:11:10) Codey: My first one is window garden. So this is the game the game on the iOS where you have these little plants.
(1:11:18) Codey: And you’re basically like at a window and you grow the plants across days, you have to make sure you water each plant every day give them the amount of suns that they want.
(1:11:30) Codey: And then everything died and then everything died.
(1:11:39) Al: what’s that I don’t know her
(1:11:44) Codey: You know that that classic, uh, you, you’re like, Oh yeah, I need to check on my plants. And then five days later, like, you’re like, Oh yeah, I remember this morning reminding myself I need to check on my plants and it was really five days ago.
(1:12:00) Codey: Yeah.
(1:12:00) Al: This is why for my real life plants, I have an app that notifies me every day.
(1:12:01) Micah: I was going to say, at least this is like the digital, they’re, they’re perishing instead
(1:12:05) Al: If I need to do something for them.
(1:12:10) Al: Yeah, exactly.
(1:12:12) Micah: of actual plants.
(1:12:14) Codey: Yeah, I so I mean, my actual plants like they’re pretty front
(1:12:20) Codey: and center in my living room. And so if they start dying, I can
(1:12:23) Codey: like very clearly see, especially because I have I also
(1:12:26) Codey: have like idiot proof plants, like pathos, where the second
(1:12:31) Codey: they start looking droopy, you just throw water at them. And
(1:12:35) Codey: then they’re happy the next day again. Anything that’s like
(1:12:39) Codey: fidgety, not going to survive in my house. Um, yeah.
(1:12:44) Codey: That was my only real frustration with window garden. And then also like you build, you, you
(1:12:50) Codey: have all these plants and you keep wanting to get the new types of plants. And then sometimes
(1:12:55) Codey: the game will give you like a bonus plant. So you’ll have like two strawberry plants or whatever.
(1:13:00) Codey: And then it’s just upkeep simulator. Like every day you have to log on and you suddenly have to
(1:13:04) Codey: take care of like a hundred things. Um, I do think you were able to like put some things,
(1:13:10) Codey: Oh, you could put them in like storage, but then they’re not I wanted
(1:13:14) Codey: to look at like a cacophony of plants and I just would have liked if
(1:13:18) Codey: there was a certain point where I didn’t have to take care of them anymore.
(1:13:21) Codey: They kind of just took care of themselves.
(1:13:23) Codey: Um, like once you hit a certain level, but I don’t know, but I really, that
(1:13:29) Codey: was a game that I played this year that I did really enjoy, um, and
(1:13:33) Codey: that I would recommend, so that’s mine.
(1:13:37) Al: My first one is I was struggling to get a third game because apparently most of the games I played this year were not 1.0 releases, they were early access or updates.
(1:13:51) Al: So my first suggestion is not a real suggestion, that is Harvest Moon Homes Field. This is not the game of the year, right? I just want to make it clear, this is not the game of the year, at all.
(1:14:06) Codey: It’s an honorable mention from you.
(1:14:07) Al: What I do think is that it is the closest we have got to a good Harvest Moon game since the split, and that is something to be commended, even if that is a very low bar. I think it is so close to being good, really good.
(1:14:26) Al: I think they have got a lot of the bones there now, and honestly if I think this game was on Switch, it maybe would have been one of my games of the year, but the not being on Switch.
(1:14:37) Al: Switch and Steam and not having controller support and all those little things that we talked about in the episode that really annoy me about it, just mean it is just not quite there, but it is like I really want it to be, can you just be good already, you are so close to it.
(1:14:44) Micah: Mm-hmm
(1:14:51) Micah: Yeah
(1:14:52) Al: We have been doing this for six years now on this podcast, no what, seven, nearly seven years? Nearly seven years now we have been doing that, no six years, I am confused, what is time? Nearly six years we have been doing this for.
(1:15:07) Al: And you are so close, you have gone from one earth that you are doing to almost good, but just frustratingly close. So I am more nominating it as can you just hurry up, because actually you could be there, you could be the farming game of the year, if you just did those last few things, come on.
(1:15:30) Micah: Yeah, I agree. I want to see them succeed. I want to see them make a good Harvest Moon.
(1:15:41) Micah: Obviously I had some very strong opinions about this one, you know, primarily the user
(1:15:47) Micah: experience more than like the progression of the game or anything like that. I mean,
(1:15:52) Micah: it’s just simple things like controller support or cloud saves or, you know, things that you
(1:15:58) Micah: would come to expect for a special.
(1:16:02) Micah: Game and you know, coupled with the $18 price tag for a mobile game with like no other option for, you know, I don’t know, it’s it was just it was it was a hard one to to watch turn out the way that it did. And I’m hoping that something changes. Has there been any like update to it or anything? Are they just kind of done with it?
(1:16:24) Al: I don’t think so. I don’t think so. Well, so, I mean, we talked about this in the episode,
(1:16:28) Al: I think this is coming to consoles. I think that’s what the next thing is happening.
(1:16:32) Al: I think they’re working on porting it to consoles and steam. And so,
(1:16:32) Micah: Yeah. It’s just interesting that it’s been so long and we haven’t seen anything in it.
(1:16:38) Al: well, it’s been four months, right? That’s not actually that long a time. Like, if you look at,
(1:16:42) Micah: Has it? Oh.
(1:16:43) Al: yeah, it was August. It was late August, so maybe three months, three and a half months.
(1:16:48) Micah: Yeah, yeah. No, it’s really not.
(1:16:49) Al: But like that’s not a long time. And if you think about say like.
(1:16:52) Micah: But. Mm-hmm.
(1:16:54) Al: Hello Kitty, Island Adventure, there will have been three years between it coming out on
(1:17:00) Al: Apple Arcade and coming out on Switch. No, two years, sorry, two years, no, two years,
(1:17:03) Micah: » It’s been three, I can’t, that’s, holy cow, okay.
(1:17:08) Al: it will have when it comes out, it will have been two years, sorry, not two years, two years.
(1:17:13) Al: So, you know, I wouldn’t be surprised if we heard something about it next year. But yeah,
(1:17:19) Al: what I suspect is they’re porting it to Steam and Switch and as part of
(1:17:24) Al: that I think or I hope that they will add quality of life features to that and they will
(1:17:30) Al: back port them to the iOS now Android version that is my current theory as to why we’ve not
(1:17:36) Al: because yeah you would think if they were just working on that you would expect an update at this
(1:17:41) Al: point because like most of the complaints about these quality of license prunes right
(1:17:46) Al: but if they’re working on a port at the same time they’ll be incorporating that into it and
(1:17:49) Al: and then backboarding them I think. So probably so they release it this
(1:17:51) Micah: - Yeah.
(1:17:52) Micah: Yes.
(1:17:54) Al: time. My theory, but we’ll see what happens. Anyway, I really wanted to be good. Come on,
(1:18:01) Al: you’re so close. Micah, you’re number two.
(1:18:02) Micah: And just to follow up quick, I did play Window Garden Cody.
(1:18:09) Codey: Okay, yeah
(1:18:11) Micah: I I do like it.
(1:18:13) Micah: I like the premise of it.
(1:18:15) Micah: I like the concept.
(1:18:17) Micah: I was a little disappointed in not being able to unless there is a way
(1:18:22) Micah: and I don’t know how, but not being able to like pay to get rid of ads
(1:18:27) Micah: or something like that.
(1:18:30) Micah: Thank you.
(1:18:32) Micah: The ads kind of and probably no fault to the developer, because I don’t know what goes into picking what ads you get and what ads you don’t get like that run on your your app.
(1:18:46) Micah: But the my first experiences with it were really like I was enjoying it.
(1:18:51) Micah: It was really kind of cute.
(1:18:52) Micah: I pressed something to claim something and I got hit with the most unbelievable ad I think I’ve ever experienced, which was someone like, you know,
(1:19:02) Micah: like fake streamer kind of like playing a game ad.
(1:19:03) Codey: » Yeah.
(1:19:05) Micah: But the first line was, oh, my mom is dead.
(1:19:09) Micah: Oh, my dad’s also dead.
(1:19:11) Micah: And it was like I think it was some like superhero simulator thing where it’s like that they’re kind of doing a like, oh, it’s Batman without really saying it’s Batman.
(1:19:21) Micah: You know, but like the way that it took me out completely of the like, I’m cozy.
(1:19:22) Codey: - Mm-hmm.
(1:19:28) Micah: I’m having a nice time.
(1:19:29) Micah: I’m watering my plants.
(1:19:32) Micah: in my sunshine. And then this guy screaming in my ear, my mom’s dad, my dad’s dad. It
(1:19:39) Micah: just kind of just kind of took me out of it a little bit. But I would love the ability
(1:19:44) Micah: to for games like that to be able to just pay like a flat, you know, like I would rather
(1:19:49) Micah: pay the $20 that Harvest Moon home sweet home made me pay to even try the game to even touch
(1:19:54) Al: You mean twice?
(1:19:55) Micah: the game. I’d rather pay that to yet to what well, you know, but that’s either
(1:19:58) Al: If you want to hear that story, tune in to our Harvest Moon, Hope Sweet Home episode.
(1:20:02) Micah: here, right there to. But I would rather that be the fee to like disable ads on something
(1:20:07) Al: Why was it a story?
(1:20:14) Micah: like that, you know, or like, but yeah, I don’t know. That’s my little gripe about it.
(1:20:19) Micah: My second nomination for game of the year is something that has been talked about in
(1:20:26) Micah: this podcast, Rusty’s retirement, which is just.
(1:20:30) Codey: Yay!
(1:20:32) Micah: Such a unique idea and cute. And it’s it’s, you know, little retired robot plant a little
(1:20:43) Micah: running a farm and generating biofuel and stuff that sits on the bottom of your monitor
(1:20:48) Micah: while you work. And I always I not always, but I tend to have it up underneath my discord
(1:20:56) Micah: window on the monitor that I use discord on. And it just kind of runs. It’s really nice
(1:21:00) Micah: is to, you know,
(1:21:02) Micah: if something stressful is going on to look over and see all my
(1:21:05) Micah: little old rusty retired robots kind of bopping around on my
(1:21:10) Micah: little farm and planting stuff. There’s so many aspects to it
(1:21:16) Micah: too, that feel like as an idle game made it feel really not
(1:21:23) Micah: just like, you know, set it and forget it kind of like, you
(1:21:27) Micah: know, I there’s the progression made me really want to.
(1:21:32) Micah: Stick with it, and I do like to that you have the option to set it to like focus mode.
(1:21:36) Codey: Mm-hmm
(1:21:37) Micah: I don’t know if that’s recent, a recent edition or not, or if that was in the base game, but.
(1:21:42) Codey: I think it was in the base game because I think I wouldn’t have played it if they didn’t have
(1:21:46) Codey: Let’s be honest.
(1:21:50) Micah: But the game has a focus mode that basically just like extends the time that everything
(1:21:55) Micah: takes to to develop on your farm so that you’re not just constantly checking everything, which
(1:22:02) Micah: I have found myself doing, you know, and I’ve had to kind of shift to that mode, because
(1:22:06) Micah: I will get really like distracted by, okay, I got to plant the stuff and I these if this
(1:22:11) Micah: is what I need to plant in order to unlock this next crop and this is, you know, where
(1:22:16) Micah: I want to place my next, you know, house or whatever, and it’s just, they also recently
(1:22:23) Micah: had a little Christmas update that lets you put, you know, like a holiday update that
(1:22:27) Micah: let’s you put candy canes and trees and stuff on your on your
(1:22:32) Micah: your your plot and your little under under your discord land
(1:22:36) Codey: - Yeah.
(1:22:38) Micah: that you have. Yeah, he’s got a little Santa hat and he kinda
(1:22:40) Codey: - And he has a little Santa hat on, doesn’t he?
(1:22:43) Codey: That’s so cute.
(1:22:46) Micah: bops back and forth with him as he moves around. It’s very
(1:22:49) Micah: cute. II really really love the game. It was such a like neat
(1:22:53) Micah: surprise to me because II it was what is it like $5 or
(1:22:57) Micah: or something, it’s such a low price and
(1:22:59) Codey: Yeah, yeah.
(1:23:02) Micah: it’s not something that I was fully aware of, you know, it didn’t like have the same
(1:23:07) Micah: level of coverage, I think that, you know, like wider coverage that something like Fields
(1:23:14) Micah: of Mystery had or something like that. But it’s just such a it’s just such a good game.
(1:23:16) Codey: Mm hmm. It kind of came out of nowhere, yeah, for sure.
(1:23:21) Micah: And I think it’s a good contender too, because it has already started to inspire more, you
(1:23:29) Micah: You know, it’s got that, like.
(1:23:32) Micah: A Stardew sauce of being, being the baseline for people to start making new idle sims that can sit on the, you know, the bottom of your monitor or the side of your monitor or whatever and run while you do other things.
(1:23:46) Al: There are so many of them now. It’s wild how that is just like, because I think,
(1:23:54) Al: yeah, I don’t have this on my list because one, I’ve not played it, which is mainly because I do,
(1:24:01) Al: I work on a client machine. I’m a consultant, I work for clients, so I use their machine,
(1:24:05) Al: and I’m not exactly installing Rusty’s retirement on a client machine, but also because I just don’t
(1:24:13) Al: think it works again for my brain.
(1:24:16) Al: I think I would end up in the situation where you find found yourself unable to turn on that
(1:24:22) Al: setting. Like I would just be like focusing on the game and I just don’t think that would work
(1:24:23) Micah: Mm-hmm.
(1:24:27) Al: for me. Because I would turn on the focus mode and I’d just be like now it’s just boring, right?
(1:24:32) Al: Like we’re back to that problem of me wanting games to be faster. Like I’m gaming or I’m not.
(1:24:36) Codey: Yeah, you want to get your, you’re a game guzzler.
(1:24:40) Al: But what I am and I’m totally fine with that. Like that’s how I like to play games. That’s
(1:24:44) Al: That’s just how life is.
(1:24:46) Codey: That’s totally fine, yeah.
(1:24:46) Micah: Yeah, yep.
(1:24:46) Al: gotta accept that. But I think that I love what it has done, even if I don’t want it myself,
(1:24:54) Al: right? I think it’s impressive how it’s gone from like, this is not a thing I’d thought of.
(1:25:01) Al: And then they announced it and I was like, fascinating. And now we have, I think, three
(1:25:05) Al: other games announced this year that are doing a similar thing, but different game categories.
(1:25:11) Al: And that’s really interesting. Like it’s not, it’s not often you get a genre defining.
(1:25:16) Micah: Mm-hmm. Yeah, it’s really not
(1:25:18) Codey: Yep. Well, what a great time for me to skip over my second one and announce that Rusty’s retirement is my number one game of the year.
(1:25:28) Codey: Because I mean, it’s for all the reasons y’all just said, I mean, I think that the fact that it is kind of the stardew of its genre, like it started its like category and it has inspired other games.
(1:25:44) Codey: But it’s just so like like people have
(1:25:48) Codey: And then they also have the like set it and forget it games that they might have up on a screen or something. And they were like, hear me out. What if both? And it’s just on the bottom of your screen and you don’t have to have it in like a separate window. They’re just doing their thing and you and the fact that you can have it on the side and wherever you want it and yeah, so that was my that’s my number one, personally. So.
(1:26:16) Al: While we’re talking about it, I think I’m going to input Johnny’s comments into this because it makes, I think, I was going to leave all these till the end, but I feel like this one makes sense to talk about just now.
(1:26:25) Codey: Yeah. Yep.
(1:26:28) Al: So Johnny has said while my favourite game of the year has been Mika and the Witches Mountain, which we may talk about later, I firmly believe Rusty’s retirement should be game of the year.
(1:26:36) Codey: Mmm.
(1:26:36) Al: Cottagecore as a genre has largely stagnated the last few years as we’ve seen the tail end of the Stardew but X games being released and are now firmly stuck in the era of genre but with-
(1:26:46) Al: where games are low on innovation and what appeals to any individual is simply based on how much they like the merged genre. This is why Mika and Luma Island are my personal favourites.
(1:26:54) Al: I enjoy the puzzle exploration nature but at their heart they are just fine Cottagecore games.
(1:27:00) Al: In this world, Rusty’s retirement has done something truly novel that has opened an amazing new design space for the genre we love. Cottagecore and farming at its heart utilises time as a key mechanic.
(1:27:10) Al: A partial screen overlay is an elegantly simple idea that provides the core cottage court
(1:27:16) Al: while enabling a game that progresses at a slower pace. While Rusty’s retirement hasn’t
(1:27:19) Al: had the widespread success of something like Stardew, we are already seeing new games being
(1:27:24) Al: developed that are taking and evolving this concept in a year full of games that have been
(1:27:28) Al: fine but with nothing that has really stood out. I would love for us to be on the bright side of
(1:27:32) Al: history and recognize a game that I believe will have a huge impact on the genre and consequently
(1:27:37) Al: the harvest season for years to come.
(1:27:40) Codey: Here, here.
(1:27:40) Micah: Incredibly well said.
(1:27:42) Codey: Yeah.
(1:27:43) Micah: And I think very much empowers my feeling that, you know,
(1:27:49) Micah: I think Natsuman was kind of my wild card.
(1:27:52) Micah: It is my personal favorite game of the year,
(1:27:56) Micah: but I think as far as the genre goes,
(1:27:59) Micah: for sure that I think Rusty’s retirement kind of
(1:28:02) Micah: takes the cake on it for me.
(1:28:02) Codey: Yep. Okay, well, that’s mine. What’s your second?
(1:28:06) Al: My number two is Echoes of the Plum Grove. I haven’t put a humongous amount of time into this,
(1:28:13) Al: but what I love about this game is how it… And I know this is a little tropey,
(1:28:19) Al: but cutesy face to it, but also you can dive dysentery. I love the balance there.
(1:28:31) Al: I do have issues with how the game actually plays, which maybe I’ll talk about in a future
(1:28:35) Al: your episode.
(1:28:36) Al: We’ll see if I can get anyone to go on a podcast about with that about me.
(1:28:41) Al: No with me about it.
(1:28:42) Codey: I mean, I, I mean, you said you die of dysentery and I am intrigued, so count me in.
(1:28:49) Al: I just I love and I also like because you know people talk about how much they enjoy
(1:28:54) Al: in what was the Harvest Moon game where you can play as your kid.
(1:28:57) Micah: Wonderful life.
(1:28:58) Al: Wonderful life yes that’s what that’s what it’s called. That concept of like you you die and life
(1:29:05) Al: moves on.
(1:29:07) Al: And just because you aren’t there anymore doesn’t mean your farm isn’t, and you can
(1:29:10) Al: continue that and you can play as continually going down the generations.
(1:29:15) Al: I really love that idea and I think it’s been done pretty well in Echoes of the Plum Grove.
(1:29:23) Al: And I also just I really love the art style it’s kind of paper Mario-esque thing I really
(1:29:28) Al: like and you know as Johnny talks about like oh yeah this is just a genre of a game but
(1:29:35) Al: with farming, it actually.
(1:29:36) Al: Feels like echoes of the plum grove is trying to do farming game, but different.
(1:29:42) Al: Um, and I, I, yeah, I really like that.
(1:29:42) Codey: Yeah.
(1:29:45) Codey: Cool. I’ve not, not played, but we’ll be on an episode with you then.
(1:29:52) Al: Careful, I’m going to write it down, Cody.
(1:29:52) Micah: I also have not played
(1:29:56) Micah: But I have added it to my wish list because I do really like the art style I like how it looks and I like the
(1:30:03) Micah: You know everything that you said has enticed me to
(1:30:06) Micah: Want to try it, but I haven’t I haven’t touched it personally
(1:30:08) Codey: But what’s the console?
(1:30:10) Al: I played it on Steam but I don’t know if it’s on any consoles. I think it might just be
(1:30:14) Micah: Yeah, we’re supposed to sit on Steam but
(1:30:15) Al: Steam. It’s on Windows and Mac though. So there you go. Yeah, true. Yeah, so I know
(1:30:19) Codey: Ooh.
(1:30:21) Codey: Well, if I get a Steam Deck for Christmas,
(1:30:23) Codey: then it won’t matter.
(1:30:27) Codey: Cool.
(1:30:28) Micah: That’s exciting. It’s a great console.
(1:30:28) Al: it’s not going to win because I’m literally I think the only person who’s mentioned it but
(1:30:34) Al: I think it’s up there. Yeah, I think we did have, did we maybe have one person mentioning it?
(1:30:34) Codey: Yeah, it’s a little out of left field.
(1:30:41) Al: One person mentioned it as one of their top three but didn’t make an argument for it being game of
(1:30:45) Al: the year. So, all right Micah, your final game, your number one game of the year. Well,
(1:30:54) Al: if that’s how you’ve been doing it, I’m not sure.
(1:30:56) Micah: Maybe this is you know, I think that this is maybe a little bit of wild card, but it’s all of these all of my nominations have been
(1:31:06) Micah: Kind of things that take the the genre and kind of flip it on its head a little bit or do something new with it
(1:31:13) Micah: um
(1:31:14) Micah: That’s kind of what I looked at as like
(1:31:17) Micah: Criteria personal criteria for what?
(1:31:20) Micah: Makes something kind of game of the year for me as far as these games go this this genre goes
(1:31:26) Micah: So contrary to maybe popular belief, it is not harvest or story of seasons pixel crossing
(1:31:34) Micah: uh
(1:31:35) Micah: I
(1:31:37) Micah: Played played that game to completion but was not necessarily a huge fan of it. Uh, but that’s neither here nor there
(1:31:44) Micah: Uh, my final nomination is web fishing
(1:31:49) Micah: uh
(1:31:50) Micah: because it is
(1:31:52) Micah: such an
(1:31:54) Micah: Interesting game, it’s just-
(1:31:57) Micah: I don’t even know. I mean, it’s- you’re fishing, right? Like, that’s the whole thing.
(1:32:00) Micah: It’s kind of like, if you took, uh, you know, the art style of Animal Crossing and made it, like,
(1:32:07) Micah: low poly, uh, and it’s just the fishing part of it, but you also added some, like, chat room to it.
(1:32:17) Micah: Like, like a- like a- it’s just- you just fish with people. And you can just fish with your friends,
(1:32:24) Micah: or you can just fish by yourself or you can just…
(1:32:27) Micah: fish with random people, but the whole concept is that like you just hang out and it’s…
(1:32:34) Micah: I saw a, you know, a video about how this is re-bringing the like chat room game back to life,
(1:32:43) Micah: right? Like games like maybe Club Penguin or, you know, the games in that style where it’s like,
(1:32:50) Micah: you can play games together and it’s just, you kind of like goof off and there’s not really like
(1:32:54) Micah: a whole lot to do but…
(1:32:56) Micah: You know, there is if you want to, but it’s also just fun, like it’s just there to be fun.
(1:33:02) Micah: It’s not there to have like high stakes or, you know, hyper-specific things that you need to do.
(1:33:08) Micah: You can just catch weird fish and there’s a lot of like really good humor in the game.
(1:33:15) Micah: And it’s just, it’s very cute too. So like, you know, there have been a lot of instances where,
(1:33:21) Micah: you know, people will join with, because you can, you can use a microphone or not.
(1:33:26) Micah: You can just, you know, use text chat. You can disable mics entirely if you choose to.
(1:33:32) Micah: You can just, you know, kind of exist on your own if you want.
(1:33:38) Micah: And it’s, there have been so many instances where it’s like, you know,
(1:33:43) Micah: somebody kind of just waddles up to you and is like, do you need help doing this thing that
(1:33:47) Micah: you’re trying to do? Or do you need help figuring out how to do this thing? Are you new here?
(1:33:52) Micah: whatever, and then they just kind of bop around the little little forest together.
(1:33:56) Micah: And they show you how to do things, or they’ll give you stuff, or you know, you like make friends
(1:34:01) Micah: just kind of sitting on the dock fishing. And it’s just such a weird, unique game. And it,
(1:34:08) Micah: I think, gained a lot of popularity quickly because of that, because it’s such a like,
(1:34:14) Micah: different style of this kind of, you know, cozy, but like connected kind of game.
(1:34:22) Micah: And I think it’s, I think it’s doing some really cool and interesting.
(1:34:26) Micah: Things and I am excited to see what comes of it because I know that because of the popularity that it garnered that there it’s going to inspire some, you know, new games similar to this and I’m excited to see what happens with it but yeah webfishing is great.
(1:34:44) Micah: It’s very fun and very weird.
(1:34:46) Al: So you might, you might be a bit surprised by this. It’s not on my list. I’m not going to say that,
(1:34:51) Micah: Shocking.
(1:34:51) Al: but, but two other co-hosts have nominated web fishing. So both Kelly, who has been on
(1:34:56) Micah: » Okay, all right, now we’re talking.
(1:35:03) Al: several episodes this year, and Dalen, who I don’t think has been in an episode this year,
(1:35:07) Al: but was on an episode last year. Both of them nominated web fishing for their, their farming,
(1:35:12) Al: they are Cottagecore Game of the Year. So you’re not the only one. It’s not on my list.
(1:35:17) Al: And I’m guessing it’s not on Cody’s because I haven’t heard Cody talk about it.
(1:35:20) Codey: Well, yeah, yeah, no, it’s not
(1:35:23) Al: But, I mean, you know, based on our current voting, it is in second place just now,
(1:35:29) Al: which is probably not what you were expecting coming into this, Mike.
(1:35:32) Micah: It is not what I was expecting, but it’s good, it’s a good game.
(1:35:35) Codey: That’s so that’s what’s so that’s what’s so fun about this like I you know with Rusty’s retirement as my number one
(1:35:41) Codey: I was like, okay, I’m gonna be coming out here being like I like the little the little bottom of the screen game like
(1:35:49) Codey: and like
(1:35:51) Codey: Before I had the chance to say all the cool all the wonderful things like y’all said it and I was like, oh wow
(1:35:55) Codey: Like I’m not I’m not a lone wolf in my appreciation for this game
(1:36:00) Codey: So yeah, that’s cool that other people have heard of and played with fishing
(1:36:04) Micah: Yeah, it’s it’s it’s fun
(1:36:05) Codey: uh
(1:36:06) Codey: Yeah, my number two because I already said my number one is honey growth, which is another
(1:36:16) Codey: mobile game and it’s this game where you’re a little a little bee a couple of bees actually or you you use resources to
(1:36:25) Codey: How you collect resources by using these bees that have different tasks
(1:36:29) Codey: And you have a little garden that you bet that you plant that has food products, but also
(1:36:35) Codey: just flowers and you collect resources from the flowers and you harvest the food and you can cook and you can
(1:36:42) Codey: Craft and it’s just such a cute little game and you can really put as much or as little time as you want into it
(1:36:50) Codey: Um, there is there are no ads, which is amazing. Um
(1:36:56) Codey: honestly
(1:36:57) Codey: and
(1:36:59) Codey: Yeah, I just I really love this game. Um, i’ve been playing it quite a bit
(1:37:05) Codey: and I think it’s one of the only games that i’ve played for the podcast that i’m not just gonna
(1:37:11) Codey: Uninstall the moment like the podcast is over like the podcast the recording is over. So
(1:37:18) Codey: um, yeah, that’s my my number two and I think that’s kind of my wild card because um
(1:37:25) Codey: We haven’t talked about it a lot. So
(1:37:26) Al: » We all got to have a wildcard.
(1:37:29) Micah: it looks really cute. I’ve not heard of this, but I do like the, uh,
(1:37:34) Micah: what I see of it and what you described of it.
(1:37:37) Micah: Sounds like something that I would like, but
(1:37:40) Al: It’s not on my list. I have been playing it because I don’t need to keep the secret because
(1:37:40) Micah: and no ads as a, you know,
(1:37:48) Al: it’s already out by the time this episode comes out because I normally like to be really secretive
(1:37:49) Codey: I know.
(1:37:51) Codey: We’re covering it.
(1:37:54) Al: about the episodes that are coming out because I don’t want to promise anything but it’s already
(1:37:58) Al: happened. We have done an episode, the last episode was on Honeygrove and well I don’t want
(1:38:00) Codey: by the time this is released.
(1:38:07) Al: want to spoil anything for Cody, because we’re recording that in two days.
(1:38:08) Codey: Yeah.
(1:38:10) Al: It’s not on my list, and we’ll talk about that maybe why on Sunday.
(1:38:14) Codey: That’s fine.
(1:38:18) Al: No, I think it’s fun and I love how it looks, and I think it is
(1:38:22) Al: a good game. I suspect a lot of it is just, it’s not for me, which is just what happens.
(1:38:30) Al: But yeah, I mean, in terms of mobile games, it is better than most mobile games we have covered
(1:38:38) Al: on the podcast.
(1:38:40) Al: Agreed. My final one is one I’m a little bit disappointed hasn’t been mentioned
(1:38:40) Codey: - Correct, though the bar is on the ground, so.
(1:38:50) Codey: Here’s every five seconds. Here’s some ads. Yikes. But yeah, this game does not have any,
(1:39:01) Codey: which is lovely. Al, what’s yours? Your game of the year.
(1:39:10) Al: anyone before, but it’s okay because other hosts have also nominated it. And that is
(1:39:14) Al: Mika and the Witches Mountain. This is absolutely like, this is, I think my favorite game of
(1:39:19) Al: the year full stop. We talk about my non farming game game of the year in the greenhouse episode,
(1:39:26) Al: but I think this beats it as well. It is such there’s something about chibi games and the
(1:39:32) Al: games that they do, right? Like Summer in Mara was the first game that I played of theirs.
(1:39:37) Al: It was just so fun.
(1:39:40) Al: It’s like there are bad things that happen, but they’re all just like things for you
(1:39:48) Al: to overcome.
(1:39:49) Al: They’re never like actual bad things, right?
(1:39:52) Al: Like in Summer in Mara, you get kidnapped by pirates, but that’s just fine, right?
(1:39:57) Al: Like, cause you then convince the pirates to help you, right?
(1:40:01) Al: And then in this, it’s like our plane crashes and bursts into flames.
(1:40:06) Al: That’s fine because, you know, the person who was flying it got it.
(1:40:10) Al: In their parachute.
(1:40:13) Al: And you can just go and find all the things that it dropped and go deliver them, right?
(1:40:17) Al: Like the bad things happen, but that’s okay.
(1:40:20) Al: We can get over it.
(1:40:20) Al: And I love that because I’m never that.
(1:40:24) Al: That’s not me.
(1:40:24) Al: I’m not that kind of positive, but I love the idea of being that.
(1:40:29) Al: And the, particularly with Miikka, the movement is just so fun.
(1:40:36) Al: They do movement so well in their games, right?
(1:40:40) Al: Summer in Mara, the boat riding was just perfect.
(1:40:44) Al: Like it was so good.
(1:40:46) Al: And with Miikka, the flying is just so fun.
(1:40:50) Al: Like I was a little bit unsure of how it worked to start with,
(1:40:55) Al: because it didn’t work exactly how I expected it to the flying.
(1:41:00) Al: But after like an hour or so of playing, I was totally in.
(1:41:04) Al: And this idea of being able to fly around in a broom and deliver packages to people.
(1:41:10) Al: It was just a little fun story to go along with it.
(1:41:12) Al: It’s everything I wanted from that.
(1:41:14) Al: And I didn’t know I wanted it until they announced it.
(1:41:16) Al: And then I was like, that’s exactly what I want.
(1:41:18) Al: And they released it.
(1:41:19) Al: And I was like, yep, this was exactly what I wanted.
(1:41:21) Al: And very rarely do you have that with a game where they announce it and you go,
(1:41:26) Al: I need that.
(1:41:27) Al: And then they release it and you go,
(1:41:28) Al: that was exactly what I expected and exactly what I wanted from it.
(1:41:31) Al: That is such a rare thing to happen.
(1:41:33) Micah: Mm-hmm now have you yet played Wind Waker? Okay
(1:41:33) Al: I love it so much.
(1:41:40) Al: I am waiting.
(1:41:40) Al: I’m waiting for the switchboard.
(1:41:46) Micah: Hey, you might be waiting a little longer
(1:41:49) Al: Look, it’s coming.
(1:41:50) Al: It’s going to come eventually next year.
(1:41:50) Codey: That’s a long time waitin’, waitin’, it’s a long time waitin’ for a ship don’t come.
(1:41:52) Al: Next year is coming.
(1:41:55) Micah: Yeah, we’ll see
(1:41:57) Al: I’m so surprised.
(1:41:58) Al: I’m so surprised it didn’t come when they decided to delay the new console again.
(1:42:02) Al: It’s like, how are you still not releasing this game?
(1:42:02) Micah: Yeah
(1:42:03) Micah: Really weird circumstance too because that was one of the times that we got like a leaked
(1:42:05) Al: Would you release it already?
(1:42:10) Micah: Like store listing for it, you know, like a like a reputable like target
(1:42:14) Micah: I think released the store listing for it like leaked the store listing, but it still never came out
(1:42:18) Micah: So clearly it has existed to some degree
(1:42:21) Al: Well, and the, well, and the rumours are that it has been finished completely for three years now.
(1:42:27) Micah: That’s
(1:42:29) Al: And they’re just waiting for the right time to release it.
(1:42:30) Micah: Interesting
(1:42:33) Al: And I’m like, what is the right time? What are you waiting for?
(1:42:33) Micah: Uh
(1:42:36) Micah: Yeah
(1:42:38) Codey: Corporations are not don’t have any incentives anymore.
(1:42:43) Micah: But I ask because obviously for anybody who has played it or listened to the episode that
(1:42:48) Micah: The harvest season episode about it. Uh
(1:42:51) Micah: It it very much plays like wind waker. Um
(1:42:55) Micah: and I did I did
(1:42:57) Micah: Play it not enough of it. Not as much as I would have liked to play but I played
(1:43:01) Micah: Uh, good amount of…
(1:43:03) Micah: Mika and the Witches Mountain, because, again, also a big Chibig fan, and I like the stuff that
(1:43:09) Micah: they make. Uh, the kind of, like, premise of this, that, that sort of, um, Studio Ghibliification of
(1:43:19) Micah: this, this, you know, style of game is really cute. The, uh, you know, the characters that,
(1:43:26) Micah: the people that inhabit the island are very cool, very, like, unique, very cute.
(1:43:34) Micah: And the interactions are fun. The movement is great. I was very pleasantly surprised by, uh,
(1:43:41) Micah: how well the movement was in this game. Um, how, how, how much they made it work from, you know,
(1:43:48) Micah: kind of, like, the, the start of it being that you’re, you have, like, the lowest possible function
(1:43:55) Micah: on your, your flying broom, uh, and then kind of goes up from there. But even at the lowest
(1:44:01) Micah: possible function it’s still
(1:44:03) Micah: like it performs really well.
(1:44:06) Micah: So I also really, really liked it.
(1:44:09) Micah: I just didn’t include it in my nominations
(1:44:14) Micah: because it didn’t feel like, you know,
(1:44:17) Micah: I guess, unique enough to me.
(1:44:19) Micah: As someone who has played Wind Waker,
(1:44:21) Micah: it does feel like it borrows a lot from it.
(1:44:23) Micah: Obviously, makes so much of it its own.
(1:44:27) Micah: And it’s more kind of just in how it plays
(1:44:30) Micah: general aesthetic is, but
(1:44:34) Micah: Yeah, it’s it’s it’s still really good. I like it a lot
(1:44:37) Al: I think the other thing that it does really well is the thing that all GB games do well,
(1:44:42) Al: which is their characters. The stories aren’t huge and overarching, but I always feel like I
(1:44:48) Al: care about the characters. And obviously it has a storyline about taking down a capitalist,
(1:44:54) Al: which I’m always fun with. Collective action. Sorry, Micah, spoilers.
(1:44:55) Codey: - Mm-hmm.
(1:44:58) Micah: Now you’re speaking my language.
(1:45:05) Al: Yeah. And yeah.
(1:45:07) Al: Right. It definitely does borrow a lot from what I’ve seen from Wind Waker. If I understand
(1:45:14) Al: correctly, so did Summer and Mara. But the… Yeah, exactly, exactly. But yeah, what I love
(1:45:17) Micah: Yeah, yeah, primarily the boat, I think the sailing aspect of it, so.
(1:45:25) Al: about this is, yeah, how they make it their own. And the characters are a huge part of that. And
(1:45:30) Al: yeah, there’s some crossover from previous ones, but it’s not a huge… It’s maybe like three
(1:45:35) Al: characters crossover between the game.
(1:45:37) Al: And so they still have loads of characters that are new, and I still really care about them.
(1:45:44) Al: And yeah, you’re right, the upgrading of Brooms was done really well.
(1:45:49) Al: And it could have ended up really badly.
(1:45:51) Al: It could have just not been fun.
(1:45:53) Al: But the way that you upgrade felt really rewarding for playing the game.
(1:46:00) Al: And was a great way of expanding more of the island without having like unnecessary.
(1:46:07) Al: There’s no gates in your way, like you can get around the whole island, there’s just like high up places you can’t get to until you get a better broom, which works really well.
(1:46:18) Al: And yeah, I enjoyed the story.
(1:46:21) Codey: Another game that does that really well is, you know, a little kitty big city.
(1:46:21) Al: So I’ve already added to my wish list.
(1:46:22) Micah: Very cool.
(1:46:27) Al: Come on.
(1:46:28) Al: You don’t have to convince me.
(1:46:30) Codey: Yep, cool.
(1:46:31) Al: I guess at this point, I should probably point out that multiple people had Mika from the other co-hosts as well.
(1:46:37) Al: So Johnny had it as one of his top three.
(1:46:39) Al: Obviously, he wasn’t arguing for it to win overall.
(1:46:42) Al: But I’m counting anybody that’s put the games in their top three.
(1:46:48) Al: So that’s Johnny and Kevin.
(1:46:51) Al: And where was the other one?
(1:46:54) Al: Was it just two?
(1:46:55) Al: Just Johnny and Kevin put Mika.
(1:46:59) Al: So I think I’m looking through the other hosts options.
(1:47:04) Al: Other than that, so we’ve got Rusty’s retirement has.
(1:47:07) Al: I’m ignoring Spencer’s vote for Rusty’s retirement because he says Rusty’s retirement
(1:47:13) Al: because you told me so, which is not quite true.
(1:47:17) Al: That’s not what I said to him.
(1:47:20) Al: Spencer actually voted for Animal Crossing Pocket Camp complete, which sure, fine.
(1:47:26) Micah: I’ve got feelings about that, but you know, we’ve already been at this for quite a while,
(1:47:29) Al: We also have, we’ve also, yeah.
(1:47:30) Codey: Mmm, mmm, mmm, mmm, mmm, mmm.
(1:47:33) Micah: so I won’t go on that tangent.
(1:47:37) Al: Also got Luma Island, one vote for Luma Island, one vote for Pixel Cross Story of Seasons,
(1:47:43) Al: one vote for Amber Isle, one vote for Gerdlets, two votes for Luma Island, sorry, Daelin voted
(1:47:49) Codey: Yeah, two votes for Lim Island.
(1:47:51) Al: for Luma Island as well, one vote for Echoes of the Plum Grove, one for Botany Manor, and
(1:47:57) Al: interestingly one for Infinity Nikki.
(1:48:00) Micah: - Okay.
(1:48:01) Micah: Okay.
(1:48:04) Al: So I’m gonna read out what Dylan says about Infinity Nikki because yeah I saw
(1:48:07) Al: that and went okay interesting. So the whole thing that Dylan said was I’m a
(1:48:14) Al: big fan of completed tasks so I think it’s gonna be Luma Island for me. That
(1:48:18) Al: being said I would give thought to Infinity Nikki because I think it’s
(1:48:21) Al: Cottage Core E and it’s gonna be a big deal but it’s also a gacha game so
(1:48:26) Al: that’s a big demerit. I think it’s pretty accessible though and because it’s a
(1:48:29) Al: 3D game I think it can maybe pull people into that style of playing who are not
(1:48:33) Al: is familiar. Infinity Nikki came out.
(1:48:37) Al: This week, didn’t it?
(1:48:39) Micah: It came out very recently and it I haven’t seen a lot about it besides some like trailers and some ads for it.
(1:48:42) Al: 5th of December, last week.
(1:48:47) Al: Oh, my word, every second ad on TikTok for me is Infinity Nikki.
(1:48:51) Al: Every second ad…
(1:48:51) Micah: Yeah, and.
(1:48:53) Micah: It’s interesting because the the way that it’s being advertised or the way that it initially was advertised, I don’t know, gave me the feeling of like a kind of.
(1:49:09) Micah: » What’s a like PG way to say this?
(1:49:11) Al: Cosplay.
(1:49:12) Micah: Sure, yeah, like a cosplay heavy gotcha game with like anime girls in it, right?
(1:49:20) Micah: But the more that I, so that was my initial reaction to it was like, okay,
(1:49:24) Micah: all right, I don’t really, this isn’t really for me.
(1:49:26) Micah: But the more that I’ve seen about it and heard about it, people are just describing it as
(1:49:31) Micah: that like, as basically that, that it’s like a kind of like a cozy open world game.
(1:49:39) Micah: Which is interesting because that’s not the impression that I got from a lot of
(1:49:43) Micah: the trailers or ads, so I would be interested to try it.
(1:49:47) Micah: I just didn’t get that impression, which is very strange to me, but.
(1:49:48) Al: Yeah. So I’m going to read the gameplay description on Wikipedia. Infinity Nicki features stylist
(1:49:59) Al: duels where players select outfits based on attributes such as sweet, fresh, elegant,
(1:50:08) Al: sexy and cool to compete against opponents. Specific attire enables gliding or shrinking
(1:50:16) Al: to x-axis otherwise unreachable.
(1:50:18) Al: What is this game?
(1:50:34) Micah: Yeah, it’s so like baffling to me, and I think I’m that alone. I’m like interested to try it and you know, like obviously I’m not opposed to like sex positivity or anything like that. I think it’s just a lot of these games that are like, gotcha.
(1:50:52) Micah: Anime girl heavy tend to feel a lot more like exploitative than they do. Like, you know, sex positive so I guess.
(1:50:58) Al: Yeah, they quite often, they quite often skew younger, which can feel a little not
(1:51:04) Micah: Right.
(1:51:07) Al: great, shall we say.
(1:51:08) Micah: Yep, yep. So if this really tones down the, you know, the like, horniness of it, then I think maybe that is, like, I’m more inclined to try it but, yeah, I don’t know.
(1:51:26) Micah: It’s just very strange that it’s, it gives the impression of one thing but apparently is
(1:51:34) Micah: very much different. So.
(1:51:36) Al: Yeah, is it? Yeah, I mean, it’s an open world adventure game where you you can explore
(1:51:45) Al: based on powers that you get from competing in dress up competitions. Weird.
(1:51:50) Micah: which like that sounds cool you know like I absolutely loved like fashion dreamer and uh
(1:51:59) Micah: you know what was the the ds one style savvy so if there’s like some aspect of that that’s
(1:52:06) Micah: like a you know like a fashion kind of like and a lot of the outfits that i’ve seen for it look
(1:52:12) Micah: cool you know like that they’re very like kind of cute stylish outfits and stuff um so
(1:52:20) Micah: maybe fun if that’s an element to it I just you know i’m i’m just maybe jaded by the like
(1:52:28) Micah: exploitative nature of what games like that this feels like have been like in the past so
(1:52:35) Micah: we’ll see I guess I don’t know clearly it wasn’t on anyone else’s list so
(1:52:39) Micah: So… (laughs)
(1:52:41) Al: Yeah, it’s obviously not winning. But it has, well, this is one of the things I like about
(1:52:45) Al: this episode is it always gives us something new to think about. Like, it’s normally Mika bringing
(1:52:53) Al: that. But I feel like we’d already, we’d already talked about it in previous episodes, not fully
(1:53:00) Al: covering it, but at least talking about it. We knew about it. He didn’t bring us something we hadn’t
(1:53:04) Al: heard of this year, Mika. But
(1:53:08) Micah: - I’m happy that that’s the case
(1:53:11) Micah: ‘cause otherwise I’d probably extend the runtime
(1:53:15) Micah: even longer, I’m sure, so.
(1:53:16) Al: So yeah, I guess thank you Daelynn for bringing up Infinity Nicky and maybe we’ll look into
(1:53:24) Al: it. But yeah, it’s a bizarre game.
(1:53:28) Micah: Mm-hmm. That’s odd, I think pretty much everything, like it’s on mobile and stuff too, right?
(1:53:34) Al: Yeah. It was the Gacha game. Of course it’s going to be on mobile. That’s where people spend the
(1:53:34) Micah: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Of course, yeah.
(1:53:37) Al: money on Gacha games, right? I know that Dalen loves Gacha games. They are all over the Gacha games.
(1:53:44) Micah: And you know, what is Pokemon Pocket if not a gacha game in the form of cards, so…
(1:53:49) Al: Well, sure. Sure. Fine. If you’re going to, if you’re going to go there, then yes.
(1:53:57) Al: I was going to say, but I’m not suggesting it’s game of the year, but I literally do that in the
(1:54:00) Al: Karina’s episode.
(1:54:04) Al: Moving on! So I think we’re down to three finalists, if I’m counting correctly,
(1:54:11) Al: and that is Mika and the Witches Mountain having three votes,
(1:54:14) Al: WebFishing also having three votes, and Rusty’s Retirement having four votes.
(1:54:19) Codey: Woooo!
(1:54:20) Micah: Like, you know what that means.
(1:54:22) Al: So, I mean, so I don’t, I’m just going to say this, I don’t think we have a clear 100%
(1:54:30) Al: Rusty’s retirement definitely wins this because as one more.
(1:54:34) Al: I think we need to at least discuss this.
(1:54:37) Al: Although I did before this episode, I did predict that Rusty’s retirement would win.
(1:54:42) Codey: - Wow, well, ‘cause you had to see everyone’s things.
(1:54:42) Al: Uh, but I didn’t look at your twos.
(1:54:48) Al: I only looked at the other host opinions.
(1:54:48) Codey: But you saw everyone else’s, yeah.
(1:54:50) Al: Yeah, I did.
(1:54:51) Al: Um, but you two, like that was only two before you two started giving your suggestions.
(1:54:58) Al: Um, I think, I mean, I would still argue that I think Mika should win personally.
(1:55:04) Al: Um, I’m not really sure what else I’m going to say other than what I said before.
(1:55:08) Al: Right.
(1:55:08) Al: I think it is a fantastically fun game.
(1:55:11) Al: I think it gives everything that it expected to.
(1:55:13) Al: And, um, I mean, I’m always going to, well, I was going to say I’m always going to
(1:55:16) Al: love chibi games, but that’s not true.
(1:55:18) Al: Cause I didn’t like the puzzle one they did.
(1:55:21) Al: Was it last two years ago?
(1:55:22) Al: Can I remember what it was called?
(1:55:22) Micah: It ain’t Cora was I get I’ve lost track of
(1:55:24) Al: Yeah.
(1:55:25) Al: And Kora lost days.
(1:55:26) Al: Yeah.
(1:55:27) Al: Yeah.
(1:55:27) Al: That one, um, didn’t like that one.
(1:55:30) Al: Uh, but I’ve liked every other one.
(1:55:32) Al: in the games.
(1:55:34) Micah: Yeah, and I’ve been a big fan of it. Sorry, go ahead.
(1:55:34) Codey: Oh, I was just gonna say, I mean, I didn’t play either of these other two games.
(1:55:41) Codey: I think that web fishing is a game that wouldn’t appeal to like all cottagecore fans.
(1:55:48) Codey: I think it’s kind of a niche thing.
(1:55:51) Codey: So for me, it would be between either Rusty’s retirement or Mika, but I think that because
(1:55:55) Codey: Rusty’s retirement has that innovative quality, I think it is still my top pick.
(1:56:04) Codey: But I can understand that Mika is like a phenomenal game, but it’s not a tiny little robot retiring
(1:56:08) Micah: I. It’s just the cutest way possible.
(1:56:12) Codey: and making a garden at the bottom of my screen.
(1:56:17) Codey: He’s living his dreams.
(1:56:20) Micah: I’m so proud of him.
(1:56:23) Micah: I do think that I’m surprised that we’re fishing at three votes.
(1:56:27) Micah: I’ll say that I came into this fully expecting that it was going to be kind of
(1:56:31) Micah: like a maybe not because I had seen that it had gotten some some level of like
(1:56:36) Micah: recognition, uh, but
(1:56:38) Micah: I, I guess I wasn’t expecting it to be in the top three, I guess. Um, so I am okay
(1:56:45) Micah: with striking that from the list. I think that you’re right, Cody, in that it is maybe
(1:56:52) Micah: a little bit more niche. I, as someone who is not typically a fan of multiplayer games
(1:56:57) Micah: myself, uh, you know, I was a little bit apprehensive playing it, but once I got over that, the
(1:57:04) Micah: experiences that have had in it have been so like fun and goofy.
(1:57:08) Micah: And impossible to replicate in A, other sessions and B, any other game.
(1:57:19) Micah: But it does require kind of like getting over that hump of stepping into online socialization
(1:57:27) Micah: where maybe some people are just averse to that. And I totally understand that as someone who
(1:57:32) Micah: a lot of times feels that way too. So I think that that is maybe a good enough case
(1:57:39) Micah: to maybe remove it from contention, in addition to the fact that neither of you had it on your list.
(1:57:46) Al: Yeah, I’ve already scored it off
(1:57:46) Micah: But I appreciate that it got where it did. So yeah.
(1:57:49) Al: Top three is impressive, you know, a lot of games were mentioned a lot of games released
(1:57:55) Al: I haven’t I yeah, I haven’t played it. I keep
(1:58:00) Al: thinking about it because I’m intrigued by it and like you say I like
(1:58:05) Al: the way it’s kind of like
(1:58:07) Al: Bringing chat rooms back right like that’s such a weird thing to do
(1:58:12) Al: Which I feel like is a theme this year is that’s
(1:58:16) Al: a weird thing to do with games, but I like it. So that’s 2024 in a nutshell. Why are
(1:58:19) Micah: Yeah, yep.
(1:58:26) Al: you doing that? Please do it more. I’m happy with it being in the top three. It would feel
(1:58:38) Al: weird to make webfishing the cartridge core game of the year.
(1:58:42) Micah: Yeah, I agree. I do agree. That being said.
(1:58:46) Al: Purely from the fact that I don’t think we should have a game where you could have slurs
(1:58:52) Al: shouted at you as cartridge core game of the year.
(1:58:53) Micah: Sure, or like yes someone just ruin it for you
(1:58:56) Codey: Yeah, I think that’s, that’s another part of it. Like, it just makes me think of being on those types of chat rooms and how you can be having a totally cozy conversation and then people could come in and just like spoil a book or spoil a TV show or say.
(1:59:10) Al: I love how that’s your thinking, spoil the book, and I’m thinking shout the N word!
(1:59:10) Micah: Yeah
(1:59:15) Micah: Which you know, I’m sure
(1:59:18) Micah: Thankfully in my experiences with it. I have not
(1:59:22) Al: Oh, yeah, I’m not saying it definitely happens.
(1:59:22) Micah: encountered that I
(1:59:24) Micah: Haven’t encountered any but I’m sure there is you know
(1:59:25) Al: I’m just saying that the stress of that would make it not cottage core for me.
(1:59:28) Micah: Yes, and that’s why
(1:59:29) Al: You know, it’s not calm and yeah.
(1:59:32) Micah: That’s why I say, you know, I know that some people are reversed do that like, you know
(1:59:36) Micah: Social interaction online social interaction in that way because
(1:59:40) Al: Or you didn’t have to put online just any social interaction
(1:59:40) Micah: there is that possibility. Yeah, or just, you know, at this
(1:59:44) Micah: point, just any social interaction, unfortunately. But
(1:59:47) Micah: I think that if that is a concern for you, and it is a
(1:59:51) Micah: game that you’re interested in, I would say, you know, try to,
(1:59:56) Micah: try to experience it with because you can have private
(1:59:58) Micah: games too, right? Like you can just play with just your friends.
(2:00:01) Micah: So, you know, try experiencing with just your friends, maybe
(2:00:04) Micah: instead of like getting in a discord group chat or something,
(2:00:07) Micah: you get in a web fishing group chat and you all just fish and
(2:00:09) Micah: Talk about your day or something.
(2:00:10) Micah: You know, but yeah, there is, you know, I don’t know what the filtering is like.
(2:00:16) Micah: I should have looked into that more, but I’m not sure what the filtering is like
(2:00:19) Micah: and things like that, as far as the moderation goes for the game.
(2:00:22) Micah: I’ve heard that there is some like fairly decent levels of moderation with it,
(2:00:26) Micah: but I don’t know for sure.
(2:00:29) Micah: And I don’t know from experience if that’s the case or not.
(2:00:31) Micah: So. But yeah, that’s web fishing.
(2:00:36) Codey: So what are your thoughts, Micah, on Mika versus Rusty?
(2:00:40) Micah: I got I have to go with Rusty’s retirement, I think, for my number one.
(2:00:45) Codey: YEAH!
(2:00:47) Micah: It’s just and I think because, you know, I came into this saying that like my
(2:00:53) Micah: my criteria, personal criteria for this was
(2:00:57) Micah: games that have made a difference or like change the genre in some way
(2:01:01) Micah: or done something new and Rusty’s retirement clearly has done
(2:01:05) Micah: that has already started to define its own sub genre.
(2:01:09) Micah: and…
(2:01:10) Micah: As much as I love Mika and as much as I love chibi games, which I do, it’s just…
(2:01:19) Micah: It’s not that it’s, you know, more of the same. It just doesn’t feel like it is as, like, unique or groundbreaking as Rusty’s retirement is.
(2:01:28) Micah: You know, I can’t imagine that there’s gonna be a lot of episodes of this where, you know, you’ll be talking about Mika and the Witches Mountain…
(2:01:41) Micah: Clones. But I can see it in a situation where you’re talking a lot about Rusty’s retirement clones.
(2:01:48) Micah: And I think that in its own right is a pretty big plus for it. That’s my personal thought. Sorry, Al. I know that that’s not what you want to say.
(2:01:53) Codey: Yeah, all right.
(2:01:56) Al: No, I don’t apologize. Look, I mean, I’m not going to be unhappy about Rusty’s retirement
(2:02:03) Al: winning, right? Like it’s not my game of the year, but I totally understand why it is Cody’s
(2:02:11) Al: game of the year and not Johnny’s game of the year, but Johnny’s opinion on what should
(2:02:15) Al: be game of the year and Micah’s second game of the year. Like I totally understand why
(2:02:21) Al: people love this game. It is not for me, but if I were only to
(2:02:26) Al: let things win that were for me, it wouldn’t be the harvest season game of the year. It
(2:02:30) Al: would be my game of the year, which nobody wants that let’s be honest, right? So I’m
(2:02:39) Al: okay with it. You know, Micah will always be my game of 2024, but I get Rusty’s retirement
(2:02:47) Al: and I do agree completely with what Johnny is saying about Rusty being that genre.
(2:02:56) Al: It hasn’t even taken that long because of how simple a concept is and how a small game
(2:03:06) Al: like that can be built reasonably quickly leading to so many other games. I’m not going
(2:03:13) Al: to say copycats because I hate the term because it’s such a, it’s a, it’s a, it’s a, that’s
(2:03:15) Micah: » Right.
(2:03:16) Codey: clones.
(2:03:18) Al: even worse. It’s a term that’s just filled with such a ignorance of how art happens.
(2:03:26) Micah: Mm-hmm. It really removes the element of inspiration from it, I think, which is really important.
(2:03:26) Al: That just makes me hate it so much. Exactly. Exactly. And like the idea that if you were
(2:03:37) Al: to create something completely unique, like, come on, everything’s based on something.
(2:03:41) Al: It’s such a stupid idea. And yeah, it’s so ignorant to call it a clone or whatever. So,
(2:03:49) Al: we’ll call them rusty lakes, right? You know, the.
(2:03:52) Micah: which is very funny because there is an entire genre of games called Rust-Likes
(2:03:54) Codey: - I love that.
(2:03:56) Al: Amazing. And I love the idea that, you know, a single developer can release this crazy
(2:03:59) Micah: which are games that are very similar to the game Rust so
(2:04:02) Codey: - There you go.
(2:04:10) Al: idea they have, and then suddenly it’s a whole new genre and people are doing it. And like,
(2:04:14) Al: to an extent that happened with Stardew, but that was still very much based on Harvest
(2:04:20) Al: Moon. And yes, this was clearly based on Stardew and other things, but it’s, it’s different
(2:04:26) Al: that it feels completely new, if that makes sense. And I love that idea.
(2:04:28) Micah: Yeah. And it’s not, it’s not even the first time that there has been something like this
(2:04:36) Micah: kind of like background PC existing on your desktop kind of thing, that it is just the
(2:04:42) Micah: most fleshed out version of it and the most like, you know, modern version of it. You
(2:04:48) Micah: know, I, I very distinctly remember, you know, back in like Windows 98 days or whatever,
(2:04:56) Micah: I’m just, you know, aging myself.
(2:04:58) Micah: But like old PC, you know, when there wasn’t a whole lot that you had to work with, there
(2:05:05) Micah: were little like widgets and stuff that you can install, even like on older Macs, too.
(2:05:10) Micah: They had, you know, widgets that would be like a little thing.
(2:05:13) Micah: Maybe it’s like a little Tamagotchi or something that exists.
(2:05:16) Micah: So this is just a so like a like a much more involved version of it and a much more developed
(2:05:23) Micah: and polished version of it that has opened up people’s eyes to like.
(2:05:29) Micah: Oh yeah, this is something that people really like or just like there’s something, I don’t
(2:05:34) Micah: know innate about like having something running, especially in this day and age where, you
(2:05:40) Micah: know, you need that constant input of stimulation.
(2:05:44) Micah: So you’ve got, you know, your work on the top screen and underneath it, you’ve got Rusty’s
(2:05:48) Al: Yeah. And I think it’s, it’s also been successful, right? Like if you look on Steam, it has 10,000
(2:05:50) Micah: retirement going.
(2:06:01) Al: reviews, which I have no idea how many people leave a review, but it’s, it’s a fraction
(2:06:07) Al: of the people that play a game, right? Have either of you ever left a review on Steam?
(2:06:09) Micah: Oh yeah for sure, I think maybe like once or twice, very very rare.
(2:06:14) Codey: Yeah, it’s yeah, maybe.
(2:06:17) Al: exactly, right? It’s just not a thing that people do. And to give you a concept, Disney Dreamlight
(2:06:22) Al: Valley, right, an incredibly popular game, has 17,000. Not even double Rusty’s retirement in terms
(2:06:27) Micah: Yeah. Yeah. Right.
(2:06:31) Al: of review. Now that doesn’t give us an idea on how many sales either of them have. But that is
(2:06:38) Al: overwhelmingly positive 10,000 reviews. Like it’s got a SteamDB rating of 94%. Like Disney Dreamlight
(2:06:46) Al: And my valley has 89%
(2:06:47) Al: So, like people love this game
(2:06:48) Micah: Yeah. It’s also time too, you know, like how long has Rusty’s retirement been out versus
(2:06:50) Al: Yeah, well, in fact, in fact, looking at the steam dv stats, it looks like Rusty’s
(2:06:54) Micah: how long, you know, something like Disney’s. So the fact that it acquired or accrued that
(2:07:00) Micah: many positive reviews in that timeframe is wild.
(2:07:07) Al: retirement currently has more people playing it than Disney Dreamland Valley does.
(2:07:10) Micah: Well, yeah, you know, you can kind of just like let it run in the background.
(2:07:16) Micah: But yes, I completely understand.
(2:07:19) Codey: - Mm-hmm, cool.
(2:07:21) Micah: It’s great.
(2:07:22) Micah: I love it.
(2:07:23) Micah: I just I’m a big fan of Rusty and everything that he’s done for us in his previous life
(2:07:28) Micah: as a robot.
(2:07:29) Micah: He earned his retirement.
(2:07:31) Codey: Yep. I look forward to my rusty days.
(2:07:36) Micah: I have moved to that to kind of speak to what you said, Al.
(2:07:39) Micah: I’ve moved to that.
(2:07:40) Micah: You know, instead of going into focus mode, there are now just times where I’ll just boot it up and just play it and then close it when I’m done playing it rather than like, let it run in the background, not all the time, but sometimes I’m just like, I just want to focus on playing rusty right now.
(2:07:55) Al: I would love to see how it works on a Steam deck.
(2:08:00) Micah: That’s a great question. I would love to too, actually.
(2:08:05) Al: Yeah, I’ve got no more other thoughts other than that.
(2:08:08) Al: Just like, how is it?
(2:08:11) Al: That’s all.
(2:08:13) Al: Let me see if it’s got a rating.
(2:08:13) Micah: - Yep.
(2:08:15) Al: It has playable on the compatibility.
(2:08:19) Micah: - Oh, no way.
(2:08:19) Al: So entering some text requires manually invoking the on-stream keyboard.
(2:08:24) Al: that’s a pretty standard one.
(2:08:26) Al: All functionality is accessible when using the default controller configuration
(2:08:32) Al: and the default graphic configuration performs well on Steam Deck.
(2:08:36) Al: So, looks very playable.
(2:08:36) Micah: Interesting. Okay. Cool. Yeah.
(2:08:39) Al: Obviously removes kind of half of the point of it.
(2:08:44) Codey: I want them to port it in a way where if I’m playing with my steam deck, I can dock my steam deck and watch a movie and have Rusty in the bottom.
(2:08:53) Micah: Oh, that’s a great idea.
(2:08:56) Al: I mean, you could do that, right? There’s nothing stopping you doing that because
(2:08:58) Codey: I don’t know.
(2:09:00) Al: if you dock your Steam Deck, you can then just open the Windows mode or the desktop mode and then
(2:09:07) Al: open up whatever you want to stream and just have it playing there. Pretty sure that would be easily
(2:09:13) Micah: - Yeah, I just don’t know if it’s like,
(2:09:15) Micah: you would have to do it as like a screen extension
(2:09:18) Micah: rather than like mirroring when you dock it, you know?
(2:09:21) Al: No, I don’t think you… Oh, do you mean have Rusty on the deck and with the streaming on the screen?
(2:09:26) Micah: Yes, I think that’s what you were saying, Nightcody.
(2:09:31) Micah: Like having Rusty on the deck while it’s docked
(2:09:31) Codey: Why me? Oh, no, I meant like you’re watching, like I’m watching Lord of the
(2:09:33) Micah: and then doing something else on your actual like…
(2:09:38) Codey: Rings and while, uh, the writers of Rohan are, are riding into Minas Tirith, like
(2:09:45) Codey: Rusty’s on the bottom, like farming of my TV screen.
(2:09:50) Al: Right, okay. Yeah, no, I think yeah. Yeah, that’s why I thought you meant. I’m pretty sure that would be that would be possible from
(2:09:50) Micah: Oh, I see, I see. Yeah, that’d be great.
(2:09:55) Micah: Yeah, that may actually be possible through the, like, Windows mode, yeah?
(2:09:55) Codey: That’s what I want in life.
(2:09:59) Micah: That’s funny. Or it’s Linux mode, I guess, you know, but…
(2:10:02) Al: Yeah, it’s it’s it’s called desktop mode, but yeah, I accidentally said Windows initially I don’t know why don’t know why.
(2:10:05) Micah: Mm-hmm
(2:10:08) Codey: Well, like, window, because it’s a window.
(2:10:11) Al: That’s probably why I thought about it. Yeah, but then I realized that that was a silly thing to say. So change what will change what I was saying.
(2:10:13) Codey: Yeah.
(2:10:17) Codey: Cool.
(2:10:18) Codey: Yay, Rusty’s retirement.
(2:10:19) Micah: Yay!
(2:10:22) Al: Congratulations to Rusty’s retirement for winning.
(2:10:25) Al: You are in a unique group of six games that have won this award.
(2:10:32) Al: I think the reason why Rusty’s retirement winning is that I suspect that Rusty’s winner with Rusty’s developer will respond to this because the big ones never do.
(2:10:42) Codey: Hmm. That’d be fun.
(2:10:45) Al: So, yeah, we shall see.
(2:10:47) Micah: - That’ll be cool.
(2:10:48) Al: All right, well I think that’s everything for this episode.
(2:10:52) Al: Where can people find you on the Internet?
(2:10:54) Micah: Uh, mostly, I think blue sky at this point it’s been, you know, as everybody has kind
(2:11:02) Micah: of like had the mass exodus from Twitter, I think it’s, that’s kind of where I’ve landed,
(2:11:07) Micah: uh, which is at Mike, the brave.be sky social, always a mouthful. Um, but I’m pretty much
(2:11:13) Al: I love how they’ve done this, we’re federated but we’re not really federated because it
(2:11:15) Micah: just, yeah, I’m just, yeah.
(2:11:21) Al: doesn’t really work, but we still have the negative of federation that you have to have
(2:11:24) Micah: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, but I am at Mike and the brave pretty much anywhere you can find
(2:11:25) Al: your domain, even though everyone’s domain is the same just now.
(2:11:36) Micah: me. I’ve been doing a little bit of twitches. I’ve been, you know, shiny hunting, but you
(2:11:41) Micah: know, a lot cat more casually, I guess. So just wherever you want to find me, I guess
(2:11:46) Al: I feel like you’re missing something, Maker, your new podcast.
(2:11:47) Micah: I’m there. Where am I missing? Oh yeah. I mean, you know, I don’t
(2:11:54) Micah: want to, I don’t want to advertise on my, uh, yeah, I do have a podcast with, uh, one
(2:11:58) Codey: No, please, do it!
(2:11:58) Al: Why not?
(2:11:58) Al: I asked you to, I asked you where people can find you.
(2:12:01) Al: No, tell them.
(2:12:06) Micah: of my friends and coworkers Kiefer. Uh, we, it’s called the soft reset and it’s a shiny
(2:12:13) Micah: hunting podcast. Well, we shiny hunt. So we talk about Pokemon or shiny hunting stuff
(2:12:19) Micah: and we shiny hunt while we’re talking about it. So it’s primarily a video podcast, but
(2:12:24) Micah: it’s a podcast where you do, uh, it’s very, very casual. It’s not, you know, like it’s
(2:12:28) Micah: kind of just a fun thing that we do when we have the time to do it. Um, not super, supers
(2:12:36) Micah: here. There’s only two episodes so far. We have the third episode filmed. We just have
(2:12:39) Micah: not had the time to finish the editing process for it because it is, uh, including a guest,
(2:12:45) Micah: which is, has changed the video format from two people to three people. So, uh, it’s made
(2:12:51) Micah: it a little bit harder to figure out but
(2:12:54) Micah: yeah it’s a lot of fun you can find it on Spotify primarily right now and yeah
(2:13:02) Micah: we’re also on Twitter unfortunately for the time being and blue sky if you just
(2:13:09) Micah: search the soft reset pod at BSky social or at the soft reset pod on Twitter
(2:13:14) Al: I do love that you say two episodes. You also in the second episode said it was the third episode
(2:13:23) Al: because that was that secret first episode that you never released.
(2:13:24) Micah: there was technically a first yeah we did a first episode we we did and felt that maybe we should
(2:13:26) Codey: A secret third thing?
(2:13:34) Micah: try again so uh yeah so maybe someday eventually you know but uh
(2:13:36) Codey: It’d be that way.
(2:13:41) Al: But you can’t get it out your head, which is why in the second episode, you said it’s
(2:13:44) Al: the third episode. And I was like, wait, did I miss an episode? Oh, wait, no, you were
(2:13:47) Al: just meaning the episode that you talked about that you never released. Nice and confusing.
(2:13:50) Micah: technically a third episode yeah hey no problem that’s what i’m here for
(2:13:51) Al: Thank you very much. But I’m enjoying listening to it. It’s good. Um, and I don’t think every
(2:13:55) Micah: happy to help
(2:14:00) Al: podcast needs to be weekly or, or whatever. Like I think just, you know, do what, do what
(2:14:06) Micah: Yeah, yeah, we kind of planned for like biweekly
(2:14:10) Micah: is what we were going for.
(2:14:12) Micah: And it’s still kind of what we’re shooting for.
(2:14:14) Micah: It’s just over the holidays and I work for both of us
(2:14:17) Micah: ‘cause we work together has picked up quite a bit.
(2:14:19) Micah: So we, you know, haven’t had as much time to get through
(2:14:24) Micah: this little bit more of a behemoth of a third episode.
(2:14:27) Micah: So after that, probably more back to the biweekly
(2:14:32) Micah: but I don’t want to promise anything.
(2:14:34) Al: That’s all good.
(2:14:34) Micah: It’s casual. We’re having fun, you know?
(2:14:36) Micah: That’s all that really matters.
(2:14:39) Al: The fun about a podcast that isn’t weekly is like, you just get a new episode.
(2:14:45) Al: That’s fun.
(2:14:46) Al: I wasn’t expecting that.
(2:14:47) Al: There’s only a few podcasts I listened to like that and I wouldn’t want every podcast
(2:14:52) Al: like that.
(2:14:53) Al: I like most of my podcasts to be regular.
(2:14:54) Al: So I know that they’re going to come every day or they’re every, every week or whatever,
(2:14:58) Micah: I will preface this with or you know the leave the disclaimer that it is a little bit more
(2:14:59) Al: but having a few that just pop up every so often is a fun little surprise.
(2:15:11) Micah: crude humor on the soft reset than maybe I’m usually like contributing so just mostly because
(2:15:21) Micah: of my co-hosts got pretty crude sense of humor so you know just a lot of butt jokes you know so
(2:15:28) Codey: I love, first of all I love the name, that’s an amazing name, and second of all, is that
(2:15:28) Micah: that I guess if you’re not
(2:15:34) Codey: a Pokemon TCG in your pocket?
(2:15:39) Codey: I love that.
(2:15:40) Codey: That’s all I’m gonna say.
(2:15:42) Codey: Yeah, there you go.
(2:15:43) Codey: Ooh, sleepy.
(2:15:44) Micah: - Great, then we did it, that’s already success.
(2:15:46) Al: Cody, where can people find you on the internet?
(2:15:55) Micah: They’re sleeping!
(2:15:57) Al: Just get out.
(2:15:58) Codey: - I think I’m on, I’m on Blue Sky.
(2:15:58) Al: I want to go to bed.
(2:15:59) Al: It’s nearly 11.
(2:16:04) Codey: So just my name, Cody Mathis.
(2:16:06) Codey: I doxx myself all the time.
(2:16:08) Codey: My name has an E in it.
(2:16:11) Codey: And hiking, oh, I spelled it wrong.
(2:16:12) Codey: Hiking beagle, B-E-E goal, like the bees on Instagram.
(2:16:18) Al: Could you miss the pun out of your name? That’s shocking.
(2:16:20) Codey: - I don’t.
(2:16:20) Codey: - Well, ‘cause it didn’t start out as a pun.
(2:16:22) Codey: And then I think it was Kevin that was like,
(2:16:25) Codey: oh my gosh, like a bee?
(2:16:26) Codey: And I was like, I should, yeah.
(2:16:28) Codey: I should do that.
(2:16:28) Al: You can find me at the Scottbot on primarily Mastodon at Scott, but I’m also on Blue Sky
(2:16:29) Codey: Um, so yeah, that’s, that’s where I’m at.
(2:16:39) Al: and some other stuff somewhere. I think I’m cross-posting to Mastodon and Blue Sky now,
(2:16:49) Al: so you’ll get it on there. I don’t do anything on threads or Twitter anymore. But they exist.
(2:16:56) Al: there if you want to follow me, but I don’t do anything.
(2:16:58) Al: there. You can find the podcast at THSPod on Tumblr, and also Blue Sky, and maybe some
(2:17:09) Al: others soon. We’ll see. You can send us feedback, tell us what your game of the year was,
(2:17:16) Codey: And why it was rusty’s retirement
(2:17:18) Al: and why you disagree with us. You can find that feedback form on our website, harvestseason.club,
(2:17:26) Al: or you can, you know.
(2:17:29) Al: Was the blue sky posting?
(2:17:32) Al: It’s some stupid name, isn’t it?
(2:17:32) Codey: Uh, we’re just, we’re just saying posting. I don’t, it used to be skeeting. I don’t
(2:17:36) Al: Oh, my word. Is that…
(2:17:36) Micah: I mean they kind of adopted that on Twitter too and just started calling it zeeding but
(2:17:37) Codey: like that.
(2:17:38) Al: Oh, that’s terrible.
(2:17:48) Micah: with an X you know?
(2:17:49) Al: Nobody said that literally nobody has ever said that though, that’s the thing like people will have said skeeting but not a single person has ever non ironically referred to posting on X as cheating. Nobody has ever done that.
(2:17:50) Codey: - Yep.
(2:18:02) Micah: You’re absolutely right. I would argue that most people don’t even call it X, so, yep.
(2:18:02) Codey: Yeah. Yeah, true.
(2:18:08) Al: Well, yeah, I wouldn’t use it wouldn’t say X it just only made sense in the context of talking about that stupid word.
(2:18:17) Al: You can post that to us.
(2:18:19) Al: On Blue Sky with that if you want.
(2:18:22) Al: Or you can be like the single person that goes through and likes every single one of our Tumblr
(2:18:26) Al: posts. Thank you. I appreciate you. Or you can comment on Spotify. That’s a thing. Thank you to Jack.
(2:18:42) Al: Thank you to Jack for your comments as well. We responded to Jack’s comment about Fields
(2:18:48) Al: of Mystery and then did an episode on it. You’ve asked us to cover We Harvest Shadows.
(2:18:54) Al: Probably not. We’ll see. I don’t know, it looks scary. It’s a horror survival farming game.
(2:18:56) Micah: I
(2:18:59) Micah: Don’t know about that
(2:19:04) Codey: Whoa!
(2:19:04) Micah: Interesting that sounds kind of interesting
(2:19:07) Al: Okay. Maybe somebody will cover it. I don’t think I’m, I don’t, I don’t think I’m going to be, I don’t think yet.
(2:19:10) Codey: Michael, let’s do it!
(2:19:10) Micah: Yeah, maybe Cody and I’ll cover
(2:19:12) Micah: You
(2:19:12) Al: Feel free. I’ll write it down. I don’t think I want to because I did Pumpkin Panic and that one scared me
(2:19:14) Micah: You
(2:19:18) Al: enough and that wasn’t even realistic. So I don’t think so. But if you two want to do it, feel free.
(2:19:23) Al: Maybe we will, Jack. Tune in. Find out. If you also want to comment on Spotify like Jack, you can do that
(2:19:29) Al: and I will read them eventually when Spotify notifies me about them. But it takes ages to do that.
(2:19:38) Al: You can also find links to everything related to the podcast on our website.
(2:19:42) Al: HarvestSeason.club, where you can find a link to our Patreon, patreon.com/thspod,
(2:19:48) Al: where you can get access to our Slack community where we talk about these things.
(2:19:53) Al: I have been posting to the Slack while we’ve been recording this podcast. Shocking.
(2:19:57) Al: You can go there and find some fun stuff, like how I found out that the new next Stardew concert
(2:20:05) Al: that I’m going to in Glasgow in February of 2026 will be just two weeks before the 10th
(2:20:11) Al: anniversary of Stardew Valley.
(2:20:12) Al: Wow, that’s wild.
(2:20:14) Micah: That’s, yeah, that’s pretty wild, 10 years.
(2:20:18) Al: I know 10 years.
(2:20:20) Al: I also posted a theory about something related to that,
(2:20:23) Al: which I’m not going to talk about here because that’s special for the patrons.
(2:20:28) Al: You can also get access to our greenhouse episodes, our bonus podcasts.
(2:20:33) Al: We have one coming out on Saturday, which is our non-Cottagecore Game of the Year,
(2:20:38) Al: and we have a lot of games that we mention, and no game is mentioned twice.
(2:20:43) Al: Come listen to that.
(2:20:44) Codey: Mm-hmm
(2:20:45) Al: Find out what are games of the non-Cottagecore year.
(2:20:50) Micah: What was the term that Kevin came up with, neighborvania?
(2:20:51) Al: Why am I so bad with the name of these podcasts?
(2:20:53) Codey: Non not a cottagecore game, but that game of the year
(2:20:58) Codey: You
(2:21:00) Codey: You
(2:21:02) Al: Oh, I don’t even.
(2:21:06) Al: He didn’t come up with it, but he brought the video to our attention and I hate him for it.
(2:21:07) Micah: Okay, got it.
(2:21:11) Micah: Yeah, I can’t imagine I’m ever gonna say the term neighborvania ever again.
(2:21:18) Al: It’s so stupid. I just I hate it.
(2:21:19) Micah: But…
(2:21:20) Codey: However, we will be saying, we will be saying rusty-like for everything going forward.
(2:21:21) Micah: But it’s funny.
(2:21:24) Al: Yeah, fine. That’s a good Rusty like I think that’s everything.
(2:21:25) Micah: Absolutely.
(2:21:31) Codey: » Mm-hm.
(2:21:32) Al: Great, perfect. I can’t keep this going for another three minutes to make it the longest episode ever.
(2:21:37) Al: Sad for that, but there we are. Thank you for listening.
(2:21:41) Al: Listeners, thank you, Michael, for joining me. Thank you, Cody, for joining me.
(2:21:41) Micah: Yay.
(2:21:42) Codey: Yay
(2:21:44) Micah: Yeah, thanks for having me.
(2:21:45) Codey: Whoo
(2:21:46) Micah: Always a pleasure.
(2:21:48) Al: And until next time, have a good harvest.
(2:21:49) Codey: Have a good harvest
(2:21:50) Micah: Have a good at a harvest.
(2:21:52) Theme Tune: The harvest season is created by Al McKinley, with support from our patrons, including our
(2:22:01) Theme Tune: pro farmers Kevin, Stuart and Alisa.
(2:22:05) Theme Tune: Our art is done by Micah the Brave, and our music is done by Nick Burgess.
(2:22:09) Theme Tune: Feel free to visit our website harvestseason.club for show notes and links to things we discussed
(2:22:15) Theme Tune: in this episode.
(2:22:24) Micah: close to, you know, after three hours or whatever, close enough.
(2:22:28) Al: And I think you’ll find it’s actually four hours since we started.
(2:22:30) Codey: We did it, Reddit.
(2:22:35) Micah: Oh, my God, you’re right.
(2:22:35) Codey: It is, it is, yikes.
(2:22:38) Codey: I can’t feel my feet.
(2:22:41) Codey: The room I’m in has no heat and it is 28 degrees up.
(2:22:46) Micah: I am. Yeah, I’m freezing right now, too.
(2:22:48) Micah: It’s was it was like two today.
(2:22:50) Codey: I should have grabbed a heater.
(2:22:52) Micah: I don’t know where we’re at now, but it was
(2:22:53) Codey: Oh, you win, I’m at, you win, I’m at 28, so.
(2:22:54) Al: oh we oh you’re talking about farn height as well what is that you have to see that is minus 16
(2:22:55) Micah: almost below zero.
(2:23:00) Micah: Yes, yeah.
(2:23:03) Al: Woo-hoo-hoo!
(2:23:05) Micah: Yeah, it’s getting cold.

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Innehåll tillhandahållet av Al McKinlay. Allt poddinnehåll inklusive avsnitt, grafik och podcastbeskrivningar laddas upp och tillhandahålls direkt av Al McKinlay eller deras podcastplattformspartner. Om du tror att någon använder ditt upphovsrättsskyddade verk utan din tillåtelse kan du följa processen som beskrivs här https://sv.player.fm/legal.
Al, Codey, and Micah talk about their favourite farming and cottagecore games of 2024.

Timings

00:00:00: Theme Tune
00:00:30: Intro
00:01:37: What Have We Been Up To
00:22:18: Rules Explanation
00:26:13: Update Of The Year
00:42:17: Early Access Of The Year
00:52:11: Game Of The Year Nominations
01:46:31: Debate
02:01:59: Winner Discussion
02:10:47: Outro

Contact

Al on Mastodon: https://mastodon.scot/@TheScotBot
Email Us: https://harvestseason.club/contact/

Transcript

(0:00:30) Al: Hello farmers and welcome to the sixth annual harvest season
(0:00:35) Al: game of the year episode.
(0:00:37) Al: My name is Al.
(0:00:38) Codey: And my name is Cody.
(0:00:40) Micah: And I’m Micah.
(0:00:41) Al: And we’re here today to talk about Cottagecore games.
(0:00:44) Codey: Ooh.
(0:00:45) Micah: Yay.
(0:00:48) Codey: Make it, it’s a woo, not yay.
(0:00:49) Micah: Yeah, wooh.
(0:00:53) Al: All right. This is. Spicy, we, as mentioned, this is going to be our game of the year episode
(0:00:54) Micah: I’m trying to add a little spice to it, you know, spice it up a little bit.
(0:01:04) Al: for this year. Why all that? This is the sixth one. I don’t know how to deal with that.
(0:01:10) Micah: Yeah, I can’t believe it’s it’s been that long you said I didn’t even register
(0:01:15) Micah: I saw the list of the the previous ones you said six just now and it hit me like a truck
(0:01:20) Al: We’ve changed things up this year a little bit compared to previous years.
(0:01:21) Codey: Yeah you said it and I was like no way. This is wild.
(0:01:30) Al: I’m not going to go into that just now, but just bear in mind listeners, there are some
(0:01:34) Al: slight changes.
(0:01:37) Al: Before that, Micah, what have you been up to?
(0:01:38) Micah: Aww, I’ve been playing a lot of Jeragon Quest 3, HD2D, which I might talk a little bit about the Greenhouse episode.
(0:01:50) Al: I love how you say might like we’ve not just recorded it.
(0:01:50) Micah: Might, maybe, you’ll have to tune into the Greenhouse episode to find out.
(0:01:56) Codey: You could cut it.
(0:01:57) Codey: You could cut it out.
(0:01:58) Micah: Great.
(0:01:58) Al: No, it’s fine. It’s fine. I love when we like we break through the barrier and like stop
(0:02:04) Codey: Oh, yeah.
(0:02:04) Al: pretending like we record the greenhouse later.
(0:02:06) Micah: that is primarily what I’ve been playing when I have the time to play games. Cody and I were
(0:02:09) Codey: You’re right, you’re right.
(0:02:17) Micah: just talking before we started recording about just being busy and not being able to play a
(0:02:22) Micah: whole lot of games this year. So it’s always nice doing a game of the year recording because it
(0:02:27) Micah: gives me an excuse to kind of revisit and catch up on things and have a an allotted time to play
(0:02:34) Micah: games, but other than that, it’s been Drangle.
(0:02:36) Micah: Quest 3. And I have also been shiny hunting a lot more in
(0:02:41) Micah: Pokemon, but in older Pokemon games, I’ve been kind of
(0:02:44) Micah: revisiting and kind of I don’t know what the term is, like
(0:02:53) Micah: realigning myself with what I loved about Pokemon, and not so
(0:02:56) Micah: much the how what modern Pokemon has become, I guess. And there’s
(0:03:03) Micah: been a lot of like interesting I found in the
(0:03:07) Micah: the kind of like deeper level in community, there’s a lot
(0:03:12) Micah: of like really interesting new things that people have found
(0:03:15) Micah: or like, you know, different hunts that people have set up
(0:03:20) Micah: like one of the things that I’m working on right now is shiny
(0:03:22) Micah: hunting, Kanto starters in the original gen one virtual console
(0:03:27) Micah: games, which is something that you can do, but you have to do
(0:03:27) Al: Oh, why? Why?
(0:03:29) Micah: it by like, trading them over to a gen two virtual console game
(0:03:33) Micah: to see or if you
(0:03:37) Micah: have a totally legal copy of the virtual console games,
(0:03:42) Micah: there’s a patch that you can apply that will just show you
(0:03:44) Micah: if it’s shiny or not, which is very cool.
(0:03:47) Micah: But there’s been a lot of like really neat little things like
(0:03:49) Micah: that that I’ve been kind of experiencing and re-linking
(0:03:56) Codey: You’re you’re getting back to your roots now. What’s your current hunt?
(0:03:57) Micah: myself with and yeah, yep.
(0:04:02) Micah: I think there’s been a lot of, well, yeah, that Gen 1 hunt is
(0:04:05) Micah: my current hunt.
(0:04:06) Micah: Uh, I’m doing all four of this stuff.
(0:04:10) Micah: So like the three Kanto original Kanto starters and the Pikachu in the
(0:04:15) Micah: games that they originate in, um, which is, has been a little bit complicated
(0:04:22) Micah: to set up, uh, but it has been pretty enjoyable, like learning how things,
(0:04:28) Micah: uh, work and how, how to, you know, like set things up properly.
(0:04:33) Micah: Uh, it’s just been, I don’t know.
(0:04:36) Micah: Interesting.
(0:04:37) Micah: And I think there’s been a lot over the years that has like kind of had me
(0:04:44) Micah: disconnect from Pokemon and in specific ways that like, kind of, like you said,
(0:04:51) Micah: you know, coming back to my roots has kind of retaught me what it is that I
(0:04:56) Micah: love so much about creature collecting and, you know, these core games and
(0:05:02) Micah: stuff like that, this of course has nothing to do with the fact that, uh,
(0:05:07) Micah: you know, earlier this year, they shut down the three S, uh, internet
(0:05:12) Micah: capabilities and that may be possibly in the future.
(0:05:15) Micah: Pokemon bank is going to shut down and that I am anxious about the
(0:05:19) Micah: possibility of losing, you know, and I’m not rushing to, you know, it has
(0:05:24) Micah: nothing to do with the fact that I’m like prepping for the quote unquote
(0:05:24) Codey: Yeah.
(0:05:28) Micah: end of the world when it comes to, but yeah.
(0:05:32) Al: Prepping for something they haven’t even announced is going to happen yet.
(0:05:35) Micah: Yes.
(0:05:36) Codey: But it’s going to happen, though.
(0:05:36) Micah: You know, that’s the glory of anxiety.
(0:05:41) Al: Well, yeah, fair.
(0:05:44) Codey: You can’t choose what you get worried about.
(0:05:45) Micah: Yep.
(0:05:46) Micah: Yep.
(0:05:46) Codey: You just– yep.
(0:05:47) Micah: And then you just over prepare for it.
(0:05:48) Micah: And everyone’s like, why did you do that?
(0:05:49) Micah: And I’m like, I don’t know.
(0:05:50) Micah: I just felt like it was a good idea.
(0:05:52) Al: There is no why there only is.
(0:05:54) Micah: Yep.
(0:05:55) Micah: That’s right.
(0:05:56) Codey: Yep, I did that. I’ve been doing a PhD. I don’t know if you all know about that. So, I mean, I’ve just had like, this is like conference season. And then I’ve also had a lot of review requests lately. So journals have been like, hey, there’s a paper that you’re really like is within your like niche. Can you review this? Since you’re a subject matter expert?
(0:05:56) Micah: So that’s primarily what I’ve been doing.
(0:05:59) Al: Cody, what have you been up to?
(0:06:26) Codey: And I’ve learned that I’m bad at saying no. So I am about to finish that. Like, literally after this, I have to write something for a nomination. And then I have to finish a review. And then I will finally be free of my obligations. And then I can actually focus on just my, my PhD. Yeah, lots of insect identification. Lots of that. And then
(0:06:52) Codey: recently started playing, uh, Pokemon Pocket.
(0:06:56) Codey: And, uh, I, during that Venusaur event that happened, um, I got three
(0:07:03) Codey: of the promo Venusaur, but I did not get any of the Jigglypuff or the
(0:07:06) Codey: Hunter and I am really salty about that.
(0:07:08) Micah: Oh no.
(0:07:10) Codey: Like I literally opened my game.
(0:07:13) Codey: I was like, Oh, I need to do those.
(0:07:14) Codey: Cause I thought today was the last day, like through like 11 59 tonight,
(0:07:19) Codey: but it was yesterday, so rip.
(0:07:21) Al: Yeah, this is the problem Cody, you need to be doing this this event all through the event,
(0:07:26) Al: otherwise it’s going to because I did, I kid you not, 38 packs of that event. 38 packs I opened
(0:07:32) Codey: That means, that means you won 38 of the, okay, with no Venusaur.
(0:07:36) Al: with no Venusaur. Yes, correct. With no Venusaur in 38 packs. The last three packs that I could
(0:07:44) Micah: That is unbelievable.
(0:07:49) Al: could have opened in the game because of the timer.
(0:07:51) Al: Without paying gold, the last three packs, all Venus are.
(0:07:56) Codey: They turned up the Venus or the Venus or knob. I mean, maybe
(0:08:00) Codey: that’s where they opened the cannon. Um, maybe that’s where
(0:08:07) Codey: that’s my issue because I did start doing it near the end. And
(0:08:11) Al: I don’t, yeah, I don’t think, I don’t think, I think it’s just cause like there were loads
(0:08:12) Codey: so they, there was like all Venus or it’s just like
(0:08:18) Al: of people I know who couldn’t get any Grinninja and kept getting Venus or instead. So I don’t
(0:08:22) Al: think it’s, I don’t think it’s quite that simple, but yeah, if you want it like 41 is what I got,
(0:08:27) Al: 41 packs is why I opened and that, and I needed to get, you know, 39 to get one of each.
(0:08:30) Codey: Wow.
(0:08:30) Codey: Mm-hmm.
(0:08:34) Al: So like, yeah, you can’t, you can’t half-heartedly do these events. If you want everything,
(0:08:38) Al: You got to go all in. And the good thing is that like one.
(0:08:41) Al: Once you’ve done the first couple of days, if you do all of the, like, use all of the
(0:08:46) Al: hourglasses in the first couple of days, like just kind of like do everything as quickly
(0:08:50) Al: as you can, then the most you can do a day is two because of the 12 hour timer. So it
(0:08:56) Al: makes it really quick and easy after the first couple of days. I guess the problem. Well,
(0:08:59) Codey: I mean my I’m not a try-hard though
(0:09:03) Al: I think you’re always going to be disappointed in pocket if that’s the case, then.
(0:09:06) Codey: I’m just I’m just always gonna be disappointed in myself. Let’s be honest. That’s never gonna not
(0:09:10) Micah: I got the inverse of that initial I eventually did get to Venus or which was I was happy
(0:09:22) Micah: with that because that’s you know, the max that you can put in a deck is two of a card.
(0:09:26) Micah: But it took a very, very long time and I got an endless amount of Haunter like just a ridiculous
(0:09:33) Micah: amount of Haunter to the point that I thought it was like something either was wrong or
(0:09:34) Al: Yeah.
(0:09:38) Micah: Or I was like, it’s been.
(0:09:40) Al: Opening the wrong packs or something.
(0:09:40) Micah: Having a trick played on me or something.
(0:09:42) Micah: Yeah.
(0:09:42) Micah: Like something was going wrong because it was just, it was just
(0:09:46) Micah: Haunter all the time and I w I went to my, my work team and I was like,
(0:09:51) Micah: Hey, is anybody else just pulling Haunter and everyone was like, no,
(0:09:56) Micah: I got all of them already.
(0:09:57) Micah: I figured, you know, whatever.
(0:09:58) Micah: And I’m like, what is wrong with my game?
(0:10:00) Al: Yeah, I got 13 Hunter and 11 Jigglypuff.
(0:10:00) Micah: I’m like hard resetting and
(0:10:04) Codey: Well, why don’t you save them for me, please, because I need it.
(0:10:05) Micah: incredible.
(0:10:09) Micah: - Yeah.
(0:10:10) Micah: - There’s no shortage of, no shortage of Haunters for you when the trading happens.
(0:10:11) Al: We’ll see what trading ends up being like, but yeah, got your name on it.
(0:10:19) Micah: - Al, what have you been playing?
(0:10:26) Al: Because I’m recording so many, I’m literally recording the live.
(0:10:30) Al: So I am specifically going to talk about one game that I haven’t talked about on the other episodes so that I don’t get confused about things.
(0:10:46) Al: So this is not all I’ve been up to. This is just what you’re getting this episode. I have played Sonic Shadow Generations, Sonic X, or to be specific, I’ve played Shadow Generations.
(0:11:00) Al: I wasn’t playing Sonic Generations because I did enjoy it when I played it the first time, but I don’t have time to be replaying games. Come on, that’s not my life anymore.
(0:11:08) Al: So I bought the game to play Shadow Generations. And let me tell you, I still do not like 3D Sonic games, even when it’s Shadow you’re playing as instead.
(0:11:21) Micah: Okay, so is it is it sonic generations just with like added? Oh
(0:11:28) Al: So, think of it like Bowser’s Fury with Mario.
(0:11:31) Al: Did you play that?
(0:11:32) Micah: Sure, yeah
(0:11:33) Al: It’s exactly the same as that.
(0:11:35) Al: You open up the game and it shows you the two things side by side, and you either choose
(0:11:38) Al: Sonic Generations or you choose Shadow Generations, and they are different games.
(0:11:40) Micah: » I see.
(0:11:41) Micah: » Okay.
(0:11:45) Al: It’s not like you’re playing Sonic Generations, but with Shadow, no.
(0:11:48) Al: It’s a different story.
(0:11:49) Al: It’s your different character, and it’s different levels, and he has different powers.
(0:11:55) Al: It’s completely different.
(0:11:56) Micah: And a motorcycle and swears I mean he has a gun and
(0:11:58) Al: » Yeah, exactly, exactly.
(0:12:01) Al: So, I keep trying to like 3D Sonic games,
(0:12:04) Al: and I think part of the problem is I did enjoy Sonic Generations,
(0:12:08) Al: which did have some 3D levels,
(0:12:10) Al: and I don’t know whether maybe I should play Sonic Generations to check,
(0:12:14) Al: but I’m not going to.
(0:12:16) Al: But I wonder whether I liked that despite the 3D levels,
(0:12:20) Al: and I just mostly enjoyed the 2D levels,
(0:12:22) Al: or whether I actually enjoyed the 3D levels in that game.
(0:12:25) Al: I can’t remember.
(0:12:26) Codey: Well, the more important question is are you gonna see the movie or when are you gonna see the movie?
(0:12:28) Al: Oh, yeah, I’ve already got tickets.
(0:12:33) Codey: Okay
(0:12:34) Al: Let me check when I’ve got them booked for.
(0:12:36) Al: So I have them booked for the Saturday because I’m, yeah, I couldn’t do the Friday because
(0:12:41) Al: Rona’s out to a concert, but yeah, I’ve got tickets booked for the Saturday.
(0:12:42) Codey: Mm hmm. So there’s some showings on Thursday for me where I’m at, but I that’s also my partner’s
(0:12:52) Codey: Christmas holiday party. So and we always go to like a fancy place and they pay for everything.
(0:12:56) Codey: So I’m going to get a bunch. I’m going to slam free food in my face, but I’ll probably like really.
(0:12:59) Micah: The dream.
(0:13:02) Al: You’re gonna eat as much food as you can as quickly as possible and then go to see Sonic?
(0:13:06) Codey: Uh, I don’t know if that’s going to work, but I will probably see Sonic on Friday. If not the
(0:13:13) Codey: after when it’s like cheap, cheap, cheap. Um, because.
(0:13:14) Al: hmm I see I don’t care about the price because I have the like season pass
(0:13:20) Codey: Oh, what? Wait, what?
(0:13:21) Micah: there’s a there’s a season pass to the theater
(0:13:23) Al: you guys don’t have that yeah I i I paid 135 pounds and I can go to the
(0:13:26) Micah: at least not that i’m aware of
(0:13:31) Al: cinema as many times as I want it for a year for the whole year yeah
(0:13:34) Micah: - What?
(0:13:35) Codey: - What?
(0:13:36) Micah: I’ve never heard of this.
(0:13:38) Micah: What is your like, big name, like theater, like cinema?
(0:13:42) Al: So we have, we have two bigs, we have two.
(0:13:44) Al: big cinema chains. One is called ODEON and one is called Cine World. And both of them,
(0:13:49) Micah: Okay, neither of those
(0:13:51) Al: but yeah. Well, so I think, is ODEON I think is owned by MGM maybe? I don’t know. They’re
(0:14:00) Al: both owned by big US brands, but they kept a specific name. No, maybe it’s not. Oh, sorry.
(0:14:07) Al: It’s AMC, the audience owned by MGM and do not own actual cinemas.
(0:14:10) Micah: - Okay, AMC, I do know.
(0:14:15) Al: There is a filmmaker. Let’s see what.
(0:14:17) Micah: They make the movie.
(0:14:20) Codey: Literally all that they offer to us is $15 a year gets you like points and you don’t have to pay fees for if you buy tickets online and that’s pretty much it.
(0:14:36) Micah: Okay. So I do see, I’m looking now, cause this is mind blowing, so I didn’t know this
(0:14:39) Codey: It is yeah.
(0:14:40) Micah: concept existed. Uh, we have Marcus theaters has a, it’s $10 a month and you get one movie
(0:14:47) Codey: - Oh.
(0:14:49) Micah: credit per month, which means you just get a, a single movie ticket. Yeah. I mean, you’re
(0:14:51) Al: What’s the point, then?
(0:14:56) Micah: kind of, I mean, if you’re seeing one movie a month, you’re probably not really, I guess
(0:15:03) Micah: Maybe you’re saving a little bit
(0:15:06) Micah: I mean
(0:15:06) Al: Yeah. Yeah, whereas I, I see like easily for like, I’m easily seeing one.
(0:15:14) Micah: Okay, so there’s there is also unused credits rollover so like if you miss a month you say there’s nothing right
(0:15:20) Al: Yeah but that’s still, unless that’s cheaper than a cinema ticket, there’s no point.
(0:15:22) Micah: You’re still paying for the month
(0:15:26) Micah: Which I think it is I think it’s $10 a month
(0:15:29) Micah: I don’t know what what like a movie ticket is there but here in the
(0:15:34) Micah: Great
(0:15:36) Micah: I think we’re in the ballpark of at minimum like 16 to 20 dollars for a movie ticket
(0:15:41) Al: Oh my word. For 20, I’d be expecting at least IMAX. That’s wild.
(0:15:42) Codey: - Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
(0:15:43) Micah: So you are saving some but you’re also
(0:15:50) Micah: No, you’re talking standard you’re talking getting your chairs kicked
(0:15:54) Al: Oh no. So yeah, so that’s just because you said that. That’s the same company that is
(0:15:56) Codey: Yeah, so regal which is a cinema place in some parts of the United States has
(0:16:08) Al: world technically it’s cine world owns regal not the other
(0:16:11) Al: for this one but yeah they’re the so they’re the same same company
(0:16:12) Codey: Ok.
(0:16:14) Codey: But you said you pay what? $100?
(0:16:16) Al: I paid 135 pounds for the year so what does that work out at 135
(0:16:19) Codey: Mm-hmm.
(0:16:21) Codey: That is $170 US dollars.
(0:16:24) Al: uh it’s
(0:16:24) Codey: We can get…
(0:16:26) Micah: Just I just looked at what you’re
(0:16:28) Al: yeah so that’s that’s 14 dollars uh 14 dollars a month or 11
(0:16:32) Codey: Mm-hmm Regal unlimited pricing for the base tier that only has access to 148 theaters
(0:16:39) Codey: So 100% not you’re not gonna get it where you are like where most people are going to be
(0:16:46) Codey: is
(0:16:49) Codey: $260 a year
(0:16:50) Al: for the cheapest.
(0:16:52) Codey: For the cheapest and that’s about $22 a month you get unlimited tickets
(0:16:52) Micah: Mm-hmm
(0:16:53) Al: Oh, my word.
(0:16:58) Codey: It says tickets, but I’m assuming it’s just like you get a ticket. It’s not that’s probably it’s probably purpose
(0:17:01) Micah: Right, I would imagine, yeah.
(0:17:03) Al: Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, it is.
(0:17:03) Codey: and
(0:17:05) Codey: Then you get 10% off concessions, which is nothing
(0:17:08) Al: Yeah. Yeah, we get that as well. We get that as well, which is is is totally just a way to get you to buy more of the cinema, which I obviously do because I’m a sucker and I know that I’m a sucker.
(0:17:09) Micah: Yeah, that’s pretty much nothing.
(0:17:15) Micah: Now,
(0:17:20) Micah: the next question is because our ticket prices
(0:17:23) Micah: are so much higher than yours,
(0:17:24) Micah: are your concession prices as high as ours are?
(0:17:27) Al: I mean, so okay.
(0:17:27) Micah: ‘cause we can, I mean, a small popcorn is $5, maybe.
(0:17:31) Micah: And a small soda or small beverage is probably also like $5.
(0:17:31) Codey: Mm hmm. Mm hmm.
(0:17:36) Al: So I feel like they’re not too bad.
(0:17:38) Al: So if I go, I can go into my app just now, because the good thing about
(0:17:41) Al: the cinema that I have, that I go to now, which is like fantastically like 10
(0:17:45) Al: minutes drive from my house, which is, is amazing, um, which is, you know, for
(0:17:50) Al: city people might seem weird, but like, yeah, I don’t have things 10
(0:17:54) Al: minutes away from my house.
(0:17:56) Al: Uh, if I look, I can get, so you said a small popcorn, $5.
(0:18:02) Al: Let’s see for us.
(0:18:03) Al: uh yeah a regular popcorn would be five
(0:18:07) Al: um but they do like deals that make them cheaper
(0:18:10) Codey: they used to do that. They don’t do that anymore. I remember you could get like a meal deal. I don’t
(0:18:16) Codey: think they do that anymore.
(0:18:17) Al: - Yeah, so like me and Rona went to see Wicked
(0:18:19) Al: and I never get run into the cinema.
(0:18:21) Al: Like that’s the first time she’s been to the cinema since.
(0:18:24) Al: Oh, what was that other musical?
(0:18:26) Al: The one about the kid who kills himself.
(0:18:28) Codey: You have to be more specific.
(0:18:28) Micah: Holy moly. Yeah, there’s oh
(0:18:29) Codey: You have to be more specific.
(0:18:32) Al: Dear Evan Hansen.
(0:18:33) Al: There we go, dear Evan Hansen.
(0:18:33) Codey: Oh yeah.
(0:18:34) Al: So that was the last film she saw in the cinema
(0:18:38) Al: before Wicked.
(0:18:39) Al: So that’s kind of, was that like two and a half years ago
(0:18:41) Al: or something like that?
(0:18:42) Al: So she doesn’t come out to the cinema very often
(0:18:45) Al: just because she just doesn’t like going out in the evening.
(0:18:47) Al: Which is fair, we went to see Wicked and we bought, we got two hot dogs, a large portion
(0:18:57) Al: of tater tots and one large slushie and that was 17 pounds, so it’s not cheap, but for
(0:19:08) Al: me that felt not terrible.
(0:19:09) Codey: Mm-hmm.
(0:19:11) Micah: Yeah, we we really don’t get that much it’s I mean it’s it’s kind of the like the the the
(0:19:12) Codey: Yeah, that’s a lot for that amount of money.
(0:19:14) Codey: Yeah, I-M-O.
(0:19:22) Micah: common concept of going to the theaters and eating anything is that you’ve kind of like
(0:19:27) Micah: just bring your like sneak your own stuff in yeah.
(0:19:29) Codey: You sneak. You sneak your own. Yeah, 100%.
(0:19:31) Al: Oh, yeah, yeah. And I, to be fair, I do that a lot. I don’t often buy stuff from the cinema,
(0:19:36) Al: right? We were doing that because it was a special occasion type thing, like let’s go.
(0:19:37) Micah: Which like
(0:19:40) Al: We went to IMAX because I have to pay more to go to IMAX. I don’t, it doesn’t include
(0:19:44) Al: IMAX in the, in the bundle. I think I have to pay five, five pounds to upgrade a ticket
(0:19:48) Al: to IMAX, which I feel is not too bad. But it’s not something I do every week, obviously.
(0:19:53) Al: So we went to IMAX and we paid like stupid amounts for her ticket. And then we, we got
(0:20:00) Al: their spindle of feed didn’t.
(0:20:02) Al: And we just like made an evening of it.
(0:20:03) Al: So it was fun.
(0:20:06) Codey: All of this to say, I’m really excited for Sonic 3.
(0:20:09) Codey: And I didn’t realize that Shadow is voiced by Keanu Reeves.
(0:20:15) Al: Yeah. Wild. Wild that they have Keanu Reeves’ shadow and Idris Elba’s knuckles. It’s like,
(0:20:18) Codey: Wild.
(0:20:20) Codey: And Idris Elba.
(0:20:23) Al: what a combination. Amazing. What other famous massive actors can they get playing furries.
(0:20:26) Micah: That’s incredible
(0:20:28) Micah: You
(0:20:30) Micah: You
(0:20:35) Codey: - I guess whose tails?
(0:20:37) Al: Oh, I don’t know
(0:20:39) Codey: I’m gonna Google it.
(0:20:40) Codey: We could probably move on and fuck this.
(0:20:42) Micah: Uh, I am also seeing the Sonic movie, but it’s, I’m not like a huge Sonic fan.
(0:20:48) Micah: I like Sonic, but I’m not like, you know, mega fan or anything, but my like best friend
(0:20:54) Micah: is absolutely obsessed.
(0:20:56) Micah: So as part of our like Christmas get together, we’re going to see the, the Sonic three, um,
(0:21:05) Micah: that like opening weekend, which is like, not don’t typically go to the theater that
(0:21:09) Micah: often anymore.
(0:21:12) Micah: So I’m kind of excited because it’s very rare.
(0:21:14) Codey: Yeah
(0:21:16) Micah: This is the first time I’ll be at the theater, I think, all year.
(0:21:19) Codey: Tails is uh, Colleen O’Shaughnessy
(0:21:20) Micah: Yeah, I don’t know what that is either.
(0:21:22) Al: Don’t know who that is.
(0:21:24) Codey: I don’t she sees she’s a voice actor. Uh, looks like that’s what it is
(0:21:27) Al: Right, okay. So the only actual voice actor.
(0:21:28) Micah: Okay.
(0:21:30) Micah: I have seen the two previous Sonic movies, though, and they’re really good.
(0:21:30) Codey: Yeah
(0:21:31) Al: Because of course Ben Schwartz is Sonic as well.
(0:21:34) Codey: Yeah, I’m just
(0:21:39) Codey: I love those movies so much so good
(0:21:39) Micah: They did a really good job of them.
(0:21:42) Micah: Great.
(0:21:42) Micah: Mm-hmm.
(0:21:42) Micah: Mm-hmm.
(0:21:42) Al: Yeah, I think they’re exactly what we need from Sonic films.
(0:21:47) Al: And I think if you did this, what they’ve done with Sonic films, if you did it with anything else,
(0:21:51) Al: it wouldn’t work the same. It works because of what it is, and nobody takes it too seriously.
(0:21:58) Al: So yeah, I don’t like 3D Sonic games. That’s a shame. Maybe I should stop trying. I do still
(0:22:06) Al: like 2D Sonic games, so hopefully they make another one of those. But yeah, that’s what I’ve been up to.
(0:22:12) Codey: - Woo.
(0:22:13) Al: Whoo!
(0:22:19) Al: All right, so we are gonna go into our… No, let me just… Right, I’ll explain what’s happening
(0:22:27) Al: first before I try and do a funny segue. So I’ve changed things up a little bit this year
(0:22:35) Al: because there have been so many questions about early access games and updates and what counts
(0:22:41) Al: for game of the year. So I decided.
(0:22:43) Al: To make it simpler going forward, we’re going to have three awards now.
(0:22:47) Al: Okay, we’re going to have update of the year, which is for any game that has
(0:22:52) Al: previously released out of early outside of early access and now has a content update.
(0:22:58) Al: We’re going to have early access, which is for games that are in early access.
(0:23:02) Al: And then we’re going to have game of the year, which is for any game that has
(0:23:05) Al: released their first non early access version. Does that make does that is that clear?
(0:23:08) Codey: » Sounds good.
(0:23:10) Codey: » Yep.
(0:23:11) Al: See you next time.
(0:23:12) Micah: Yes, I guess a great system
(0:23:12) Al: Excellent, we’ll see, we’ve never tried it like this before, we’ll see whether it’s good or not.
(0:23:14) Codey: Yep.
(0:23:20) Al: So that this game, this episode isn’t three times as long as the previous ones, we’re going
(0:23:27) Al: to do the nominations a little bit differently for update and early access. So for game of the
(0:23:32) Al: year we’re going to do the same as we always have, except one slight change, which I’ll get to that
(0:23:36) Al: in a minute, in round robining our nominations and then we’ll decide from.
(0:23:42) Al: What we’ve done, which should be the winner for update and early access, we’ve just got a list
(0:23:48) Al: of all the ones that came out that we could think of because there’s less than 10 of each.
(0:23:54) Al: So it’s a nice list to just list them all and then we can debate. The one other thing is,
(0:24:00) Al: because of the debacle last year of Carl Island not winning, I have been forced into,
(0:24:06) Codey: - Got scammed.
(0:24:11) Al: I would suggest to do.
(0:24:12) Codey: - No one is forcing you.
(0:24:12) Al: I was suggested by Johnny and I thought it was a good idea that when we, I sent
(0:24:18) Codey: - It’s a good suggestion.
(0:24:19) Al: out a Google farm to the other people who have been on the podcast this year, I think this year,
(0:24:24) Al: I don’t know, some people who have been on the podcast, I sent them a form so they can input
(0:24:29) Al: as well. So we’re going to also read their feedback on what they think should win the awards.
(0:24:35) Al: And maybe that will, maybe that will stop the co-hosts complaining after
(0:24:40) Codey: Nope nope
(0:24:40) Al: - Sure.
(0:24:42) Micah: I am convinced that the reason that Cody and I are both on this episode with you is because
(0:24:42) Al: - I don’t know. (laughing)
(0:24:46) Codey: You can uh you can dream out
(0:24:56) Micah: this is the equivalent of the Coral Island committee jumping me in a back alley for my
(0:25:03) Al: Oh yeah, because it was Kevin last year, wasn’t it, is that right, because Cody had played
(0:25:05) Micah: game of the year 2023. Yes. Yeah.
(0:25:12) Micah: It was, and it mostly was, yeah, it mostly was down to that. Kevin and I hadn’t played it.
(0:25:13) Al: Carl Island
(0:25:14) Al: Exactly, exactly.
(0:25:18) Codey: Yeah, and you were like, oh, I really think it should be and we were all screaming at our podcast players.
(0:25:19) Al: Because I think all three of you, you and Johnny and Bev all, all said that you would
(0:25:27) Codey: Yeah. Yeah. 100%.
(0:25:33) Al: be playing for Carl Island.
(0:25:34) Micah: This is this is my formal apology to
(0:25:38) Micah: everyone. [laughs]
(0:25:39) Codey: You’re no you’re allowed to have like you provided your input with the knowledge that you had and I’m here to make sure that you do it the right way this time.
(0:25:47) Al: This is why we have the farm.
(0:25:50) Al: It’s so that we can see people, we can see the other co-hosts opinions
(0:25:50) Micah: - Under,
(0:25:53) Al: before we make a bad decision and then still make a bad decision.
(0:25:56) Codey: And we can still make, yeah, we can still make that decision.
(0:26:00) Al: No, I’m excited for this one.
(0:26:01) Al: We’ll see, we’ll see how it goes.
(0:26:02) Al: I’ve seen, I’ve seen the feedback from the other hosts.
(0:26:05) Al: So I’m, I’m, I’m interested to see what your guys’s are.
(0:26:07) Al: We’ll get to that in a minute.
(0:26:10) Al: And I’m in it.
(0:26:10) Al: Goodness me, probably like two hours, we’ll see.
(0:26:14) Al: We’re going to start off with update of the year.
(0:26:18) Al: And so I’ll just, I’ll read through the nominations for that this year.
(0:26:21) Al: Uh, and hopefully I’ve not missed anymore.
(0:26:23) Al: Cause apparently I list missed three off the list.
(0:26:25) Al: When I sent the form to the other costs, we have Stardew Valley, 1.6, Carl Island, 1.1
(0:26:34) Al: Moonstone Island, cooking update, Disney, Dreamlight Valley, a rift in time, which yes,
(0:26:39) Al: was this year, the whole thing we released it this year, which is crazy.
(0:26:43) Al: I thought some of it had released last year, but.
(0:26:45) Al: but uh
(0:26:47) Al: farm skies of Azoria, Dave the Diver DLCs, those would be Godzilla and I can’t remember
(0:26:54) Al: the other one. Yeah what was oh um oh Dredge Dredge uh Terranil Vita Nova and Wildflowers
(0:26:55) Micah: whatever the non Godzilla one is,
(0:26:57) Micah: ‘cause the Godzilla one is the only one I made it.
(0:26:59) Codey: Yeah, I was gonna say it was a dredge.
(0:26:59) Micah: Oh, sure, sure, sure, yeah, yeah.
(0:27:05) Al: Magical Creatures. Yeah yeah because Kevin decided not to put anything in the farm until
(0:27:15) Al: literally, what, five hours before we start?
(0:27:18) Al: I’m not sure, and was the only person to mention wildflowers, I had completely forgotten the
(0:27:24) Al: wildflowers had an update this year. Anyway.
(0:27:28) Micah: You know, I looked at the show notes last night, too, and did not see that on there.
(0:27:32) Micah: So that makes complete sense.
(0:27:34) Al: Yeah. So, um, I’ll just go through our other hosts opinions and what should win, and then
(0:27:39) Al: we can discuss what we think as well. Uh, so we have one person says, Dave, the diver,
(0:27:47) Al: we have, uh, two people saying stardew outright, uh, one person adding stardew as one of their
(0:27:55) Al: three that they decided, uh, but not like the ultimate, what they think should win.
(0:28:01) Al: one for wildflowers.
(0:28:04) Al: one for terra nell, vita nova, and then one for disney dreamlight valley.
(0:28:09) Al: I feel like I need to read johnny’s out, because it’s just, this is a weird year for best update.
(0:28:16) Al: carl island 1.1, a great update no doubt, it added everything carl island and yours were asking for,
(0:28:20) Al: but to reward this with update of the year feels wrong, it should have been 1.0 but it wasn’t.
(0:28:25) Al: stargie 1.6 added more to a great game and the updates are good, but also just stop,
(0:28:30) Al: it’s okay for stargie to be done, i’m ready for it.
(0:28:33) Micah: Which is funny maybe I’m wrong and in assuming this but I feel like that’s a wild take from Johnny is that.
(0:28:40) Codey: No, I think he’s he would be a proponent of like, let like, like, stop the nostalgia machine from cranking. Yeah, I think that’s also Yeah.
(0:28:46) Al: I think he’s worried for concerned apes mental health.
(0:28:48) Micah: Okay, okay
(0:28:49) Micah: for concern days
(0:28:51) Micah: Yeah, I mean after that interview where he was kind of like, uh, I could just keep going forever. I don’t know
(0:29:00) Al: I think that leaves Disney Dreamlight Valley is the one that stands at his best update that
(0:29:03) Al: continues to add to a great game bringing in memorable characters in a way that continues
(0:29:07) Al: to surprise and delight. So that looks what I can see that looks like two stardew votes,
(0:29:13) Al: One Wildflowers, one Drusney Dreamlet Valley, and one Davey.
(0:29:16) Al: The Diver. What do you guys think?
(0:29:19) Codey: Um, so I, so I mean, some of these, I didn’t play. So like, I didn’t play moonstone island. Uh, I
(0:29:23) Al: Fair. That list is just going to get longer as we go through the episode.
(0:29:28) Codey: right. I feel like it’s true. I feel like Fay Farm Skye’s Zozoria when we were talking about it on
(0:29:33) Codey: the pod, it did not fix the issues that people wanted in the first one. So I think in my opinion,
(0:29:35) Al: No
(0:29:38) Codey: we can just strike that off. Um, I think the same about Taranell. I don’t think that that added
(0:29:39) Al: I agree. Yeah
(0:29:43) Codey: anything really. Um, and I honestly like, honestly, like,
(0:29:46) Al: R.I.P. Kevin’s option.
(0:29:49) Codey: I will just like double retweet Johnny’s thing because I agree. Like my go-to was
(0:29:59) Codey: Coral Island 1.1. Um, I really loved it, but it did basically add like, one of the reasons I loved
(0:30:05) Codey: it is because it added the rest of the story, but that should have been in the initial game.
(0:30:06) Al: Mm hmm. Yeah.
(0:30:10) Codey: Like why, like you can’t have an update, just be like, oh, adding the things that we didn’t
(0:30:17) Codey: I had originally, but finished again.
(0:30:20) Codey: So I don’t want to go with that.
(0:30:22) Al: I would, I would agree with that.
(0:30:23) Al: Any objections, Micah, to those three being struck off.
(0:30:26) Micah: I think Coral Island is an incredible game, and I think it should win.
(0:30:32) Al: Have you played it yet?
(0:30:34) Micah: So okay, I have not, but this is where I’m at with Coral Island, because if you recall on the
(0:30:40) Micah: previous Game of the Year episode, the reason that I said that I didn’t get it yet was because I was
(0:30:44) Micah: waiting for the Switch version, which we all kind of know how that went. So I did eventually just
(0:30:48) Al: Awkward. You.
(0:30:53) Micah: kind of buckle and get it on the steam deck so I do have
(0:30:56) Al: Yeah, nice.
(0:30:56) Micah: it now to play on the steam deck haven’t had a chance to
(0:30:59) Micah: play it yet but I am excited to play it especially after
(0:31:02) Micah: hearing uh how much 1.1 kind of made it a 1.0 I guess um but
(0:31:06) Codey: Yeah.
(0:31:10) Micah: there’s just you know II’ve been I’ve yeah I don’t know I’ll
(0:31:15) Micah: get I’ll get into that more later but I have not played it
(0:31:17) Micah: yet.
(0:31:18) Codey: Okay. And then yeah, Stardew is the same, like, I agree with Johnny, like, let it, let it lie.
(0:31:24) Codey: And so for what I’ve played.
(0:31:25) Al: I’m not, just for the record, I’m not, I’m not striking stardew off the list.
(0:31:28) Codey: Correct. Did not strike Stardew off the list. This is just my opinion.
(0:31:30) Al: I’m not, yeah, I don’t care what you’re saying. I’m not doing it.
(0:31:32) Al: I’m not letting that happen right now. Right. We’ll get to that.
(0:31:37) Codey: My top one would be Disney, Journey Valley. They really did add a lot of really good characters.
(0:31:42) Codey: I didn’t play specifically the Rift in Time, like the paid deals, because that’s the paid one.
(0:31:46) Codey: Um.
(0:31:48) Codey: But I saw all the stuff from it and I know that it added like a considerable amount to the game and added to the story and I would like to play it when it becomes free. Fingers crossed that that ever happens.
(0:32:00) Al: Is it not included in Game Pass?
(0:32:02) Codey: Um, yeah.
(0:32:06) Codey: No, you have to pay, you have to buy the DLC in Game Pass.
(0:32:08) Al: Oh, weird.
(0:32:10) Al: I think for, right, that’s interesting, because the whole point of Apple Arcade is everything
(0:32:10) Micah: - I think it’s the same way with Apple Arcade,
(0:32:17) Al: is free and you never have to pay for anything, but anyway, well, okay, yes, but you don’t
(0:32:20) Codey: You have to pay for Apple Arcade.
(0:32:22) Micah: Yeah, yeah
(0:32:23) Al: have to pay for anything else.
(0:32:24) Al: Like it removes in-app purchases from every game and stuff like that.
(0:32:26) Al: I think, for the purposes of argument, we will crown it for a game.
(0:32:30) Al: I feel like nobody is arguing for Moonstone Island, is that correct?
(0:32:34) Codey: Well then it’s gotta, if it’s just gonna be for a game,
(0:32:36) Codey: then it’s gotta be Coral Island, right?
(0:32:38) Codey: No, I’m kidding, I’m kidding.
(0:32:40) Micah: - I agree, definitely, Coral Island.
(0:32:43) Codey: Yeah, so that’s my two cents.
(0:32:50) Micah: I have not played enough of Moonstone Island to be able to confidently to even touch the cooking update, so I don’t think that I could justify it.
(0:32:58) Al: Yeah, I don’t think I think cooking is a fun thing to add and it did add a few more
(0:33:04) Al: spirits, but I don’t feel like it added enough to be like
(0:33:08) Al: Major like I don’t think it stands aside stardew 1.6 and all of the stuff that Disney dream life alley added
(0:33:17) Micah: Uh I still have yet to play Dave the Diver. I’ve heard great things about it. Uh it just
(0:33:21) Al: At all. Come on, maker.
(0:33:25) Micah: it just there’s something about it that just you know just hasn’t like clicked with me yet.
(0:33:31) Micah: It hasn’t hooked me. That’s not I didn’t mean that as a pun but uh but I will say the Godzilla update
(0:33:32) Al: you need to start it, that’s why. You need to just play it.
(0:33:39) Micah: got me enticed me a little bit because I I do love my Kaiju but uh I I want to play it and I’ve
(0:33:47) Micah: heard nothing but good things about it. My boss is like in love with it and sings its praise all
(0:33:50) Al: David Diver is a fantastic game. The Godzilla DLC in particular is so silly. I love it so
(0:33:51) Micah: the time but um
(0:34:00) Al: much, right? Like any game where you like find Godzilla in a cave underwater and then
(0:34:07) Al: you end the story by literally controlling Godzilla has my vote.
(0:34:12) Codey: Oh, so you’re, is that your vote then?
(0:34:12) Micah: That sounds awesome. That sounds incredible, honestly.
(0:34:17) Al: What was that Cody? Well, I mean, it’s, it would definitely be on the shortlist.
(0:34:18) Codey: I said, is that your vote then?
(0:34:24) Codey: Okay.
(0:34:25) Al: I’m not saying it’s definitely my favorite, but I feel like it’s, I could be convinced of that.
(0:34:30) Codey: Okay.
(0:34:32) Micah: uh as far as the rest of them I think you know looking at the the two current feels like top
(0:34:40) Micah: contenders being disney dreamlight valley and stardew I like cody have played disney dreamlight
(0:34:48) Micah: valley base not the the paid dlc portion of it yet um and I did really really enjoy it
(0:34:56) Micah: uh I just the the cost to get to
(0:35:02) Micah: you know we kind of talked about this when I was on previously right around what disney
(0:35:06) Micah: dreamlight valley came out um that I was under the impression that it was cheaper than it was
(0:35:13) Micah: or that there was a they were doing a uh like a like a um uh like a free to play version of it
(0:35:21) Micah: when it had originally started to come out but you know I feel like the price of disney dreamlight
(0:35:26) Micah: valley has just felt bigger and bigger over the the years
(0:35:32) Micah: and that’s that’s great if the amount of content is there and it’s a very like pretty game it seems
(0:35:38) Micah: like there is plenty of content there um but it’s a really like pitting that against stardew which
(0:35:47) Micah: you know I know stardew has been around for so long it is it’s it just keeps going I do agree
(0:35:54) Micah: it is okay for stardew to be done again I i love the game but it is okay concerned you can focus
(0:36:02) Micah: here now it’s okay you can work on other things it’s all right but the the 1.6 update for stardew
(0:36:09) Micah: is so massive for free content that like it’s hard for me to pit it against you know something that
(0:36:20) Micah: the total cost of it is like what are we you know pushing a hundred dollars at this point
(0:36:27) Micah: with in-app currency and all this stuff. I don’t know. Again,
(0:36:32) Micah: I really, really like Disney Dreamlight Valley and I’m looking forward to playing more of it.
(0:36:38) Micah: I love that they have kept it up. The community for it seems great, but yeah, it’s just such a
(0:36:46) Micah: hard comparison because it’s like massive franchise, massive brand, costs a lot of money.
(0:36:54) Micah: They’re still keeping it up and doing a great job with it versus one guy making stuff for free
(0:36:58) Codey: - Yeah, I get that.
(0:37:02) Micah: and I’m like, you know, I don’t know. It’s hard. If I personally had to put it on something,
(0:37:08) Micah: I would put it on Stardew, but I would not be opposed to Disney Dreamlight Valley yet,
(0:37:12) Codey: I mean, you do have to put it we have to we’re here to put it on
(0:37:17) Micah: which is very hard for me to try. But yeah, that would be my nomination. I think would be Stardew 1.6.
(0:37:23) Al: I feel like we’re probably we’re striking wildflowers off right? I think I don’t think
(0:37:30) Codey: Sorry, Kevin.
(0:37:30) Micah: Sorry Kevin
(0:37:32) Al: even he was seriously suggesting it because I think yeah I yeah so so he says wildflowers
(0:37:34) Codey: Yeah, the first thing in his thing is stardew.
(0:37:36) Micah: Just more the representation, you know
(0:37:41) Al: because it hasn’t won anything yet and it’s amazing and wildflowers but in reality but
(0:37:45) Micah: It’s got to get the wildflowers representation in this understandable
(0:37:48) Al: in reality Terranell is the only update I’ve played is great so he hasn’t even played wildflowers
(0:37:54) Al: I think I understand why he would want wildflowers to win something because he thinks it probably
(0:37:59) Al: should have won game of the year last year but yeah I think as an update it I don’t think
(0:38:06) Al: it compares to stardew 1.6 or to all of the updates that Disney Dreamland valued so we’re
(0:38:12) Al: down to 3 stardew 1.6 Disney Dreamland Valley and the day of the diving
(0:38:19) Codey: I think from what Micah said, I’ve moved over to Stardew.
(0:38:24) Codey: I didn’t play it, but I know literally dozens of people who have.
(0:38:31) Codey: And yeah, I think the amount of effort that this solo human keeps pumping into this game
(0:38:37) Codey: that is so beloved by the communities, it deserves it.
(0:38:42) Codey: - Bye.
(0:38:43) Al: - Say that with more passion.
(0:38:45) Micah: But, you know, that’s in the context of like how much effort and how much content there
(0:38:47) Al: Yeah.
(0:38:53) Micah: is in something like the Disney Dreamlight Valley DLC, like I think it’s just the greater
(0:39:00) Micah: context of the amount of effort and money that is put into one versus the other, I suppose.
(0:39:05) Al: I think I would also say that as much stuff as there is in the Disney Dreamland Valley
(0:39:12) Al: updates over the last year, the fact of the matter is the day that Stardew 1.6 came on,
(0:39:18) Codey: Yeah.
(0:39:18) Al: it became like the fifth highest consecutive players on Steam for like a week. That is
(0:39:23) Micah: Mm hmm. Which is
(0:39:25) Al: a wild amount of control that that game still has over.
(0:39:31) Micah: Yeah, that’s, I mean, remarkable for a game as old as it is to be able to update and hit
(0:39:38) Micah: that milestone is incredible.
(0:39:41) Micah: It’s just, you don’t see that with really anything aside from like me, you know, multiplayer
(0:39:45) Al: Yeah, and legitimately, like, I can’t find the chart, but it’s all time peak was miles
(0:39:47) Micah: online games or something like it’s, it’s impressive.
(0:40:00) Al: lower than that. And then the update came out and then suddenly it was high up. So it’s
(0:40:08) Al: all time peak takes a 56 place, place at 56. But I think on the week that it was out, it
(0:40:15) Al: was top five. I think I can’t remember because we don’t have obviously the historical, historical
(0:40:17) Micah: Mm-hmm, sure.
(0:40:21) Al: data for that. But like, yeah, abs and that was, you know, I think it’s previous peak
(0:40:26) Al: was something like 50,000 or something. So it like quadrupled its highest consecutive
(0:40:32) Al: players for an eight year old game. That’s that’s mad. And I also got me to the point
(0:40:38) Micah: Yeah, it’s pretty remarkable.
(0:40:43) Al: of perfecting the game.
(0:40:45) Al: Like I had never gotten close to that, and with 1.6, I put so much time into it because
(0:40:51) Al: of all of the different things that it had and all the different additions it had.
(0:40:56) Micah: Mm-Hmm
(0:40:57) Al: I got to the point where I was like, Oh, I can, I can complete this game.
(0:41:01) Al: You know, it’s like I created a new save, a brand new save, because I hadn’t really
(0:41:01) Micah: Mm-Hmm
(0:41:06) Al: played it on my steam deck.
(0:41:07) Al: I had done it originally on, on switch and so I brought a brand new save and I sunk
(0:41:14) Al: a hundred hours into it.
(0:41:15) Al: So we’re giving it to Stardew, Stardew 1.6 update of the year with honorable mentions
(0:41:20) Micah: Yeah. I think so.
(0:41:30) Al: for Disney Dreamlight Valley and Dave the Diver, specifically the Godzilla one.
(0:41:33) Codey: Godzilla.
(0:41:34) Micah: I am floored.
(0:41:36) Al: The dredge one is fun and has more content on it, but the Godzilla one was the one that
(0:41:41) Codey: You’re floored.
(0:41:43) Micah: I’m floored that Coral Island did not.
(0:41:45) Micah: Going into this, I prepared, reading the list, I prepared that I was just going to fold to
(0:41:50) Micah: Coral Island the second that you both defended it, but.
(0:41:52) Al: No, I think everybody’s opinion is the same about Coral Island, is that 1.1 should have
(0:41:58) Al: been 1.0. This is obviously what matters to them, but if they had waited until the 1.1 update to
(0:41:59) Micah: Mm-hmm
(0:42:06) Al: release 1.0, I reckon it would have been Game of the Year this year. For us, obviously not,
(0:42:10) Micah: Mm-hmm. Yep
(0:42:10) Codey: Yeah, yep, for everything.
(0:42:14) Al: for the Game Awards. All right, next we have Early Access Game of the Year.
(0:42:20) Al: So our nominations for this.
(0:42:22) Al: A new leaf memories chill town for lands fields of mystery garden life cozy simulator go go down like your frontier of life and land and over magic.
(0:42:36) Al: And the opinions from other hosts are one that I think we can probably discount over magic because it sounds magical. I think this person. I think this person has not played any early access games this year.
(0:42:46) Codey: With the shrug emoji?
(0:42:50) Al: Uh, we have to vote.
(0:42:52) Al: I think the early access game of the year should be demos.
(0:42:58) Al: Honestly, everything that’s come out in early access has been a disappointment.
(0:43:02) Al: It’s become the vehicle for a game with a single cool concept to release, get bits of hype, and then proceed to deliver something exceptionally mid.
(0:43:10) Al: Meanwhile, there has been a resurgence of demos, games trying to win your business by offering a slice.
(0:43:14) Al: These games are the ones that have brought me joy this year.
(0:43:18) Al: this year, death to early access, long-lived demos.
(0:43:22) Al: So that’s two votes for Fields of Mystery and one for demos.
(0:43:27) Al: There’s not any specific demo, just demos in general.
(0:43:34) Al: For me, it’s Fields of Mystery.
(0:43:36) Al: I think Fields of Mystery is a fantastic start for the game.
(0:43:40) Al: I think it does.
(0:43:42) Al: What I really hate about Early Access is when it’s like, here’s the game, but it’s buggy.
(0:43:49) Al: I much prefer how Fields of Mystery have done it and how
(0:43:52) Al: like Ooblets did it and Carl Island did it, which is here is a very solid base for the game. It feels
(0:43:59) Al: like it’s a complete game and you just hit roadblocks along the way. I think that’s a really good way
(0:44:03) Al: of doing it. I do kind of agree with Johnny and that this can be a problem in many cases. It’s
(0:44:08) Al: sometimes hard to go back to games when you’ve started with early access, but I do think that
(0:44:13) Al: means most people probably just shouldn’t play early access games, but you know, what can you do?
(0:44:20) Al: I also enjoyed Gogotown.
(0:44:22) Al: I am not sure if this is a good one, but I feel like they have a lot more work to do to make a fully formed game.
(0:44:28) Al: It also released in AWP, it didn’t feel buggy sort of aspect and you had the core bones of the game there, but there’s no real narrative there and it kind of felt a little bit like it fell off quite quickly.
(0:44:42) Al: So that’s why I would vote for Fields of Mistreer.
(0:44:44) Al: Hmph.
(0:44:44) Codey: Uh, I didn’t play any of these and, um, I kind of agree with Johnny, but also
(0:44:51) Codey: like, basically early access is just a way to almost like crowdfund something.
(0:44:56) Codey: So you’re like pitching your, your base ideas to an audience and then they
(0:45:02) Codey: give you money to like, make it what you want it to be like to develop it.
(0:45:07) Codey: Cause they’re, they believe in what you’re doing.
(0:45:09) Codey: Uh, so like I see the value of early access, but I also.
(0:45:14) Codey: I, I think that it’s often like abused in that it’s just, like you said, like
(0:45:21) Codey: release the buggy version or release like a small version to like, generate
(0:45:26) Codey: hype or something.
(0:45:28) Codey: Um, so yeah, I’m, I mean, I, I am willing to just like pass or defer my
(0:45:35) Codey: judgment to y’all, like whatever y’all decide, cause I just personally, unless
(0:45:39) Codey: there’s this super big argument for any one particular thing, and we want to
(0:45:43) Codey: thing and we want to discuss.
(0:45:46) Micah: Well, that might make things easy because I also not voting for fields of mystery.
(0:45:52) Codey: Yay, fields of mystery.
(0:45:53) Micah: Yeah, I, I do, I agree with what a lot of what Al said that, you know, the, the core
(0:46:05) Micah: of the game is so solid.
(0:46:08) Micah: It’s also just, you know, it does feel so, so heavily based in like stardew core.
(0:46:16) Micah: Or that like, you know, I think that can be seen as a negative sometimes now where like,
(0:46:22) Micah: you know, it’s just, it started with a coat of paint or like, it started with like a different
(0:46:28) Micah: slightly different feature or whatever.
(0:46:30) Micah: But I think there’s enough things that stand out in fields of mystery to separate it.
(0:46:36) Micah: Like, I don’t know, just quest progression and I just feel like the, I mean, personally,
(0:46:47) Micah: I like the pixel, the pixel art is beautiful.
(0:46:49) Micah: The, the character portraits are fantastic.
(0:46:53) Micah: They’re done in that kind of like 90s Bishoujo, like anime style, like, like magical girl,
(0:47:01) Micah: kind of like Sailor Moon era anime.
(0:47:03) Micah: And I, it, it just also, you know, everybody in the game is, is beautiful, which I think,
(0:47:12) Micah: you know, Cody had the issue with Coral Island, but you know, like
(0:47:16) Codey: Yeah.
(0:47:16) Micah: just like one, somewhat like normal person, you know, would be cool to see but, but, but yeah, I mean, everyone is very, very nice to look at that, I think, definitely adds to that kind of like, because it’s, it’s high fantasy, right? So it has this kind of like, magical, magical girl kind of, you know, vibe to it that I really like.
(0:47:21) Al: We need ugly representation.
(0:47:43) Micah: like, and I think, haven’t really seen–
(0:47:46) Micah: represented in this genre at least this well.
(0:47:52) Micah: But as far as the game itself and the mechanics and stuff
(0:47:56) Micah: like that, I think, especially with the recent patch and stuff,
(0:48:02) Micah: I think it’s a really, really solid game
(0:48:05) Micah: and a really good case for–
(0:48:08) Micah: or a really good standard for early access,
(0:48:10) Micah: I guess, especially in, again, a world where
(0:48:14) Micah: I agree with that like.
(0:48:16) Micah: Maybe more demos, less early access would be a better thing, but.
(0:48:21) Al: I do think that it set itself up with a lot of potential, which I think is what you want
(0:48:27) Micah: Mm-hmm
(0:48:28) Al: with an early access game. We will see whether it follows through on that potential or not.
(0:48:38) Al: I’m not saying that because it’s done well here means it will win game of the year one year.
(0:48:42) Al: Who knows? We’ll see. I also think the whole like, oh, it’s just a stardew clone with a different
(0:48:47) Al: pain to like yeah that’s actually really hard
(0:48:51) Al: to do right like how many games have we played that are stardew clones that are just not fun
(0:48:52) Micah: Mm-hmm.
(0:48:56) Micah: Yep. Oh, yeah, totally.
(0:48:56) Al: so many like and this is actually this is fun right and if it just recreates stardew and adds
(0:49:02) Al: some extra stuff so what that’s fun right like I like when people do new things as well
(0:49:04) Micah: » Mm-hmm. Yeah.
(0:49:09) Al: but I also like when a game is fun and a lot of a lot of what I want from these games
(0:49:15) Al: is easily plowing in tens of hours into it you know I don’t i’m not
(0:49:21) Al: looking for something I have to plow in 500 hours to do everything but i’m also not looking
(0:49:25) Al: for something that after 10 hours I feel like i’ve done everything even in an early access
(0:49:30) Al: and I got to the point where i’ve basically done everything in this game but i’m at slightly over
(0:49:34) Al: 40 hours so like that feels like pretty decent and I feel like maybe the game is like a quarter done
(0:49:41) Al: so that feels like a good amount of content if they continue that sort of level of things
(0:49:47) Al: I’m probably not going to touch it again until it’s 1.0 because I’m scared of burning.
(0:49:51) Al: Before it releases, but yeah, I think it, I think it does a good balance for an early access.
(0:49:59) Al: And if we’re going to give an early access game, an award, I feel like.
(0:50:04) Micah: Yeah, I agree.
(0:50:04) Codey: I think my favorite thing that you said there is that some year it might win
(0:50:11) Codey: a game of the year and so you’re really not saying next year.
(0:50:14) Al: Oh, I don’t think it’s, I don’t think, no, no, it’s not, like, so when did this, when did this
(0:50:15) Micah: I thought it was later than that, oh, maybe it was, yeah, you were pretty close, yeah.
(0:50:19) Al: first cut? Was it July? Let’s have a look. August, oh, 5th of August. I was pretty close when I said
(0:50:22) Codey: Yeah, I thought it was later.
(0:50:28) Al: July. That’s pretty close. And it’s, so it’s been four months and they’ve had one update, and that
(0:50:30) Codey: - But you were wrong, so.
(0:50:31) Codey: Thank you.
(0:50:36) Al: one update has mostly been quality of life stuff. There’s not really been a huge amount of extra on
(0:50:43) Al: on top of that.
(0:50:45) Al: after four months with one update that it’s coming out in the next year.
(0:50:49) Al: I’ve got some, I’ve, you know, come on, that’s not happening.
(0:50:54) Al: And when have I ever been wrong about this, Cody, right?
(0:50:56) Al: Always err on the side of it’s not coming out next year.
(0:51:00) Codey: Oh yeah, oh yeah, we gotta in some episode this year, we gotta talk about all the games that the fallen the ones that were supposed to come out this year that are not.
(0:51:12) Al: Yeah. How many times have I said that Snacko is my most anticipated game of the year?
(0:51:16) Codey: Oh, no.
(0:51:18) Codey: Yeah.
(0:51:19) Al: The answer is four times. That’s how many times.
(0:51:20) Codey: Oh.
(0:51:21) Micah: I’m in, I’m in that boat.
(0:51:24) Al: I suspect next year will be the year.
(0:51:26) Codey: Okay, we’ll say that I get someone clipping
(0:51:28) Al: But we’ll see.
(0:51:30) Codey: It. Yep.
(0:51:33) Al: OK, well, it sounds like this is an easy one, then, right?
(0:51:35) Al: We had two other people saying Fields of Mistria and
(0:51:39) Al: both me and Mike are saying Fields of Mistria.
(0:51:42) Al: That feels like an overwhelming Fields of Mistria win.
(0:51:42) Codey: and me agreeing with whatever you say.
(0:51:46) Micah: We did it.
(0:51:46) Al: Congratulations, Fields of Mistria, Early Access Game of the Year.
(0:51:47) Micah: He he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he
(0:51:50) Al: There was not a lot of competition.
(0:51:53) Codey: Congrats, it’s like when my mom told me
(0:51:56) Codey: I was her favorite child.
(0:51:58) Al: To be fair, with some parents, that’s a hard thing to do, be their favorite child, even
(0:51:58) Codey: Like, I’m your only child.
(0:52:06) Al: if you are the only one.
(0:52:08) Codey: womp womp. It’s true. You’re not wrong.
(0:52:09) Al: All right, time for the big one, game of the year.
(0:52:16) Al: So we have five previous winners of game of the year.
(0:52:21) Al: In 2019 it was DeRaymon’s Story of Seasons, in 2020 it was Summer in Mara.
(0:52:24) Codey: Woohoo!
(0:52:28) Codey: Woo!
(0:52:28) Al: In 2021, it was Spiritfarer, which definitely didn’t come out in 2021, in 2022 it was Ooblets.
(0:52:30) Codey: Woo!
(0:52:34) Codey: We don’t care.
(0:52:38) Al: And last year, 2023, it was Mineko’s Night Market, slash Carl Island.
(0:52:42) Micah: Well, with the runner up, Corel, (laughs)
(0:52:47) Codey: Depending on who you start to.
(0:52:50) Al: This year, we have too many games to count released, so I’m going to go through the list
(0:52:56) Al: to release games.
(0:52:58) Al: And then, like previous years, we’re going to round robin our nominations, and then
(0:53:02) Al: I will read out the nominations from the other hosts as well, and then we’ll get into
(0:53:06) Al: our discussion trying to decide the winner.
(0:53:08) Al: So here’s our long, completely unnecessary list.
(0:53:11) Al: Amber Isle, Animal Crossing Pocket Camp complete.
(0:53:15) Al: Botany Manor, Creatures of Ava, Critter Crops, Distant Bloom, Dreamland Farm, Echoes of the
(0:53:22) Al: Plum Grove, Ever After Falls, Ever Home, Fabledom.
(0:53:28) Al: Farmagia, Farming Simulator 25, Garden Trails, Garden Witch Life, Gourdlets, Harvest Days,
(0:53:37) Al: Harvest Moon, Home Sweet Home, too many H’s in that name.
(0:53:41) Al: Honey Grove, Horticular, Immortal Life, Kamairu, A Frog Refuge, Little Known Galaxy, Luma Island,
(0:53:49) Al: Mellowbot, A Last Song, Mika and the Witches Mountain, which just for the argument’s sake
(0:53:55) Al: we have decided that this is not an early access game.
(0:53:58) Al: I don’t care, tweet at me, I really don’t care, go away.
(0:53:59) Codey: Especially because we’re not checking Twitter anymore.
(0:54:03) Al: It is not, it is not an early access game.
(0:54:06) Al: Shut up and go away.
(0:54:09) Al: Natsuma on 20th century summer kids, orange season, petite island, pixel
(0:54:14) Al: cross, story of seasons, plant, which, yeah, I know it’s not a card to go game.
(0:54:18) Al: I don’t care.
(0:54:19) Al: It’s story of seasons.
(0:54:21) Al: Plant to be, Rusty’s retirement, song of the prairie, star struck
(0:54:25) Al: Fagobond, the Guardian Path.
(0:54:28) Al: The Last Farmer, The Palace on the Hill, Window Garden and Web Fishing.
(0:54:34) Codey: Whoo!
(0:54:34) Al: Goodness me.
(0:54:35) Al: Oh, that’s such a list.
(0:54:35) Micah: - What a list.
(0:54:36) Codey: Yeah.
(0:54:37) Al: That list took me two and a half minutes to read out.
(0:54:40) Codey: Next year, it’ll take three minutes to read it.
(0:54:43) Al: Well, interestingly, it’s not significantly bigger than last year.
(0:54:49) Al: It is bigger, but by like three, I think.
(0:54:52) Al: So we might have plateaued on the number of games released each year,
(0:54:56) Al: which I really hope we have.
(0:54:58) Al: In which case, can it start going down as well? That’d be great. Please and thank you.
(0:55:03) Codey: - Now I’m gonna be, Vernon,
(0:55:05) Codey: or I’m gonna be Dudley here being 36,
(0:55:07) Codey: but last year, last year I had 37.
(0:55:10) Al: All right, we’re going to round robin these nominations. We haven’t seen each other’s
(0:55:17) Al: of this ones. People might have sneaked their peaks at the hosts, the other hosts ones, but
(0:55:22) Al: Micah, what’s your first nomination?
(0:55:26) Micah: Uh, I, my personal biggest game of the year for cottage core games, which
(0:55:33) Micah: I feel like is going to be an uphill battle.
(0:55:35) Micah: So I’m going to get it out of the way right away is a Natsuman 20th century kid.
(0:55:41) Micah: I think that it is a fantastic game.
(0:55:44) Micah: It is a sort of re-imagining of this series, uh, called Boku no Natsuyasumi,
(0:55:52) Micah: which is, you know, like the, the Shinshan games that have been recently released.
(0:55:57) Micah: Uh, this is more closer to the non-collaborative, uh, you know, core of the series,
(0:56:04) Micah: not Shinshan, Kran Shinshan branded. Um, but it is a newer take on it. So like the Kran Shinshan
(0:56:13) Micah: versions of the game, the two now we’re at, um, do feel much more like the, the core games. They,
(0:56:21) Micah: they’re, uh, you know, designed in a way where the backdrops are.
(0:56:26) Micah: Are beautiful, hand-painted. It’s, you know, kind of static and you’re moving around
(0:56:31) Micah: in these, these, you know, static backgrounds that change, but the, the position, the camera
(0:56:37) Micah: direction is always the same, you know? Um, and this is more of a 3D, uh, it’s 3D, first of all,
(0:56:46) Micah: which is like, like entirely 3D, which is, which is kind of big, but it’s also a third person POV,
(0:56:53) Micah: Uh, which is new for this, this series.
(0:56:57) Micah: But I think it is a much needed introduction for people to this, this series.
(0:57:03) Micah: I think it’s, they’re really doing a push to get people in the West to appreciate it.
(0:57:09) Micah: And I think that’s definitely been seen with, you know, the, the tuition
(0:57:14) Micah: Chan games and now this, uh, localizing this as well, which I absolutely did not
(0:57:19) Micah: think we were going to get a localization of it, I thought for sure.
(0:57:23) Micah: This was a niche enough thing that we were not.
(0:57:26) Micah: going to get it localized, but I’m happy that we did, and they did a really great job with it.
(0:57:30) Micah: I bought it originally and on the Japanese eShop when I didn’t think it was going to be localized
(0:57:35) Micah: because I was looking for something that was a little bit slower paced to help with learning
(0:57:42) Micah: Japanese, which I’ve been doing for a long time. And I was disappointed to learn that it was very
(0:57:51) Micah: quickly the dialogue and it was was very fast.
(0:57:57) Micah: There was no pausing there was no like I can take some time and dissect the sentence structure and you know the characters and stuff so that was kind of my initial disappointment with it but when they localized it obviously that isn’t a problem anymore the the the my interest in it has shifted to more just enjoying the game itself.
(0:58:19) Micah: And it is such a like unique and beautiful way to play a game like this like a.
(0:58:26) Micah: Like a this kind of you know just living in this cute little town and you every day you have you know like your morning breakfast and then your morning stretches and then you have the day to do whatever you want because it’s your kid and it’s summer vacation and you can go climb trees and catch bugs and go fishing and explore you can meet people in the town and like have conversations with them.
(0:58:54) Micah: A lot of times those wind up turning in.
(0:58:57) Micah: Deeper quests that you would otherwise miss if you just decided to do something else that day.
(0:59:04) Micah: And the glory of it, I think, is that it is a digestible game because you’re kind of on this
(0:59:12) Micah: time limit where you just have the summer vacation. So you just have this certain amount
(0:59:19) Micah: of days that you can play through. And then once it’s over, it’s over. The summer vacation is over,
(0:59:26) Micah: but there is so much replayability. So you can complete the game and say, you know, 20 hours,
(0:59:33) Micah: maybe, but there’s so much replayability for it that you can continue to experience the things
(0:59:39) Micah: that you missed previously. Like, you know, there’s a whole subsection that’s dedicated
(0:59:47) Micah: specifically to the shrine or to this specific type of bug or, you know, filling the museum with
(0:59:56) Micah: rare fish or something like that where, you know, you can kind of pick and choose and then go back
(1:00:02) Micah: and do things that you missed. And it’s just a very feel good carefree game that really kind of
(1:00:12) Micah: taps into that childlike wonder that I feel like we don’t really get as much as adults.
(1:00:20) Al: I suspect, I suspect, Michael, this is going to be the Coral Island of this year, in the.
(1:00:20) Micah: That’s my case for it. I love it.
(1:00:30) Micah: - For me, person, just me.
(1:00:33) Al: I haven’t, I haven’t played it. And the funny thing is behind the scenes, we actually planned
(1:00:39) Al: an episode on this game. But the problem is that we planned it for what, two weeks after
(1:00:47) Al: Harvest Moon Home Sweet Home came out and then.
(1:00:50) Al: They announced that it was coming out that day and I was like, Oh my God.
(1:00:52) Al: I think we just need to, I think we need to cover Harvest Moon Home Sweet Home.
(1:00:55) Micah: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
(1:00:56) Al: And so we just, we just, uh, pivoted and did that instead.
(1:01:00) Al: And of course, if I don’t have a podcast to record on the game,
(1:01:03) Al: I’m probably not going to play it.
(1:01:04) Al: Um, I do, however, suspect that if I had played it, it wouldn’t have
(1:01:10) Al: been one of my games of the year.
(1:01:12) Al: And that is purely because I don’t like games that are slow.
(1:01:17) Al: Um, and, and that is a definitely.
(1:01:17) Micah: Mm-hmm
(1:01:20) Al: And, but I, yeah, you’re, when you were like, Oh, I love how every morning you eat
(1:01:26) Al: your breakfast and you do your morning stretches.
(1:01:29) Al: And I’m in my brain.
(1:01:30) Al: I’m going, Oh no, I have to look at this man.
(1:01:32) Micah: I should clarify that those segments are extremely short scripted segments, so they’re not like
(1:01:33) Al: Oh, it’s just so like, Oh no, just let me do the things I want to do.
(1:01:37) Al: You know, just like even that, even that tiny thing just stressed me out so much.
(1:01:49) Micah: things that you have to do. It’s basically like the the loading. Yeah, you can skip any
(1:01:50) Codey: Can you pass them, though?
(1:01:54) Micah: cutscene that you want in the game, so you can skip it. There’s just I choose not to because
(1:01:59) Micah: Sometimes there’s dialogue for certain things that like.
(1:02:02) Micah: You know you can you can use to determine what you want to do for the day or maybe like there’s something that you wouldn’t know about you know.
(1:02:08) Al: Well, this is the problem. This is the problem with those cut scenes, right? Like, it’s like,
(1:02:11) Al: would I want to skip it? Or would I feel like I want to skip it, but I can’t really skip it?
(1:02:16) Micah: - You can’t bring yourself to it ‘cause…
(1:02:17) Al: You know, it’s just one of those things that it’s like this. Yeah, well, exactly, exactly. It’s like,
(1:02:20) Micah: - Yeah.
(1:02:21) Al: it’s probably, it was like, you know, Isabelle talking in Animal Crossing. It’s like, this is
(1:02:25) Al: pointless and silly, and I don’t want to do this, but she might say something that matters to me.
(1:02:28) Al: So I have to watch it, right? Like, and it’s just so slow. It’s the same reason why, like, I just,
(1:02:36) Al: As much as I played Animal
(1:02:38) Al: Crossing or I still don’t know whether I enjoyed that game or not because it is just so slow. And
(1:02:45) Al: that’s not where my that’s not what I like. Like I, I speed run farming games. Well, not,
(1:02:51) Al: not all of them, but I speed run spring of year one in every farming game. It’s like, do the bare
(1:02:56) Al: minimum, get my plants. I want to get to the, I want to get to the fun bit. I want to get to the
(1:03:00) Al: bit where I have money rolling in, you know, that’s, that’s what I’m there for. And it sounds
(1:03:06) Al: like this is this game
(1:03:08) Al: is just entirely spring one.
(1:03:10) Micah: There is a lot of, you know, there’s a lot of content to it and you can realistically
(1:03:18) Micah: kind of, so there is one of the things that they’ve, they’ve added somewhat recently.
(1:03:24) Micah: I can’t remember if this is, they’ve added this in the Shinchan games or if this is new
(1:03:28) Micah: to this one, but there’s a time, uh, speed, there’s like a clock speed setting.
(1:03:35) Micah: so you can set it to so that the day moves super quick.
(1:03:40) Micah: And that the time and the sun rises and sunsets very quickly.
(1:03:46) Micah: Or you can set it even longer, right?
(1:03:49) Micah: There’s like three settings to it.
(1:03:51) Micah: There’s a fast day, there’s like normal time,
(1:03:53) Micah: and then there’s a long day.
(1:03:54) Micah: So I personally chose the long day
(1:03:57) Micah: because that gives me more time throughout each day
(1:04:00) Micah: to do all of the things that I want to do.
(1:04:04) Micah: But yeah, if you’re not,
(1:04:07) Micah: know, if kind of like moving slow.
(1:04:10) Micah: And living your daily life is not something that you enjoy
(1:04:15) Micah: that probably not for you, but there is, I would encourage.
(1:04:18) Codey: That provides no dopamine for Al.
(1:04:21) Al: It really doesn’t and it’s sad because I feel like I could enjoy that sort of thing, but
(1:04:27) Al: it’s just my brain doesn’t like me.
(1:04:28) Micah: Yeah, I mean, I would encourage you to try it at some point
(1:04:31) Micah: if you get the opportunity to, if it’s, you know, cheaper.
(1:04:35) Micah: I can’t remember what it is, maybe $38 USD on the eShop.
(1:04:36) Al: Well, yeah, Micah, Micah, I own the game.
(1:04:41) Micah: But oh, well, yeah, well, then, uh, you know, in that case.
(1:04:41) Codey: He’s locked and loaded.
(1:04:42) Al: This is this is this is my problem.
(1:04:46) Al: This is my curse.
(1:04:46) Al: I own all the games.
(1:04:48) Al: I just never play them.
(1:04:53) Micah: Uh, yeah, I mean.
(1:04:54) Codey: - I think it sounds really cute.
(1:04:56) Codey: I think like for me, nostalgia games,
(1:04:58) Codey: especially nostalgia for like the summers of your childhood,
(1:05:01) Codey: they would, it would hit a little too close to home for me.
(1:05:04) Codey: Like, oh man, I miss this.
(1:05:06) Codey: Like I miss just going to my grandma’s
(1:05:08) Codey: and playing in the backyard and playing with the aunts
(1:05:10) Codey: and like, you know, things like that.
(1:05:12) Micah: Yeah. Yeah. And that’s primarily what it’s designed to do, you know, like that, the designer
(1:05:22) Micah: Kazayabe of the like Malayim Kitchen is the company that makes all these Boku no Natsuyasumi games.
(1:05:30) Micah: He had designed the game with the intention of like, you know, living, he lives this, you know,
(1:05:38) Micah: high, like fast moving, high stress life.
(1:05:42) Micah: In, uh, you know, downtown Tokyo and as a like salary man and, you know, he yearned
(1:05:49) Micah: for that.
(1:05:50) Micah: It’s the slower days than the country, the Japanese countryside as a kid.
(1:05:55) Micah: And so that is essentially, he made this to kind of recapture that and the, you know,
(1:06:00) Micah: the, the serious to recapture that, not this one specifically, but, uh, yeah.
(1:06:04) Micah: And it’s just the characters have such like unique, um, they’re just designed so uniquely
(1:06:12) Micah: physically and, uh, you know, um, uh, personality wise are just very unique.
(1:06:19) Micah: So I, I would encourage people to try it if it’s something that they would, you know,
(1:06:24) Micah: it sounds like something that they would like, but especially if you are an animal crossing
(1:06:28) Micah: van, I think you probably, you might, you might like it, which Al clearly is not.
(1:06:33) Micah: And so, uh, probably will never play it.
(1:06:36) Al: Look, right, I opened the game three times to try and play. And I know no Animal Crossing,
(1:06:42) Micah: not to one okay all right yeah yeah yeah yeah
(1:06:43) Al: I put stupid amounts of time into despite still not knowing whether I’ll enjoy it or not.
(1:06:48) Al: Look, it was 2020. It was like, we don’t talk about 2020, right?
(1:06:55) Al: No, I yeah, I tried. I opened this game three times before they announced Tarver’s
(1:07:01) Al: been homeschooled home really state and I went oh, thank goodness. I don’t know why.
(1:07:06) Al: I just couldn’t get through even just the loading screen. And I know this sounds so stupid.
(1:07:13) Al: And I don’t know why. And eventually I do need to go back and I do need to properly play it
(1:07:18) Al: because I can’t just like, wave it away. There are some games that you just really want to like,
(1:07:25) Al: even if you never will get there. And I need to try again. I really want to like it in theory.
(1:07:32) Codey: Well, it sounds like a game that tries to make you be present and like that can be really
(1:07:37) Codey: hard for people. I mean, like I, I have this little phone game for self-care and I have
(1:07:43) Codey: to take care of those little birds of a game called Finch. And the game, I told the game,
(1:07:47) Codey: I wanted to be more present and it gave me a task to do every day, every once a day to
(1:07:53) Codey: eat a meal without distractions. And I hate that. I hate it, but I do, but I have to do
(1:08:01) Codey: And it’s one of those things like-
(1:08:02) Codey: because I hate it, I want to do it.
(1:08:06) Codey: But it makes me be present and makes me think about what I’m eating
(1:08:10) Codey: and maybe kind of go over my day instead of constantly distracting myself.
(1:08:14) Micah: Mm hmm. I have used that app as well, and I do like it.
(1:08:14) Codey: And sometimes you gotta do that.
(1:08:16) Al: I feel super uncomfortable with that concept.
(1:08:20) Codey: Yeah, I love Finch. So cute.
(1:08:21) Micah: I think it’s great. Yeah, I can understand from everything that you’ve said about the
(1:08:27) Micah: games that you like, Al, that you are uncomfortable with that concept.
(1:08:31) Micah: But that’s definitely what I think Natsuman and the Boku no Natsuyasumi games are all kind of that
(1:08:38) Micah: definitely with the intention of making you kind of feel a little bit more present.
(1:08:42) Micah: But it’s also, you know, it’s…
(1:08:45) Micah: It’s just so open-ended, you know, you can really do whatever you want day to day.
(1:08:50) Micah: You can do nothing.
(1:08:51) Micah: You can spend your entire, you know, summer vacation just waking up, going fishing every day and going home.
(1:08:58) Micah: And that’s it. If that’s really what you wanted to do, like you can do the entire game that way.
(1:09:03) Micah: You can, you know, do min-max everything that you want to min-max.
(1:09:08) Micah: You know, it’s really, it’s really open-ended in that way.
(1:09:10) Micah: but it definitely is designed with the intention.
(1:09:14) Micah: I would love to talk about it at some point, further than just, you know,
(1:09:26) Al: Well, we just need to schedule a time again for this episode and we know I will put in at least five hours into it, right?
(1:09:36) Al: Yeah, we just need to schedule it for a time they’re not going to release a Harvestment or a story of seasons, simple, right?
(1:09:38) Micah: the way that it’s designed.
(1:09:42) Codey: There needs to not be an excuse for Al to not play.
(1:09:45) Al: Yeah, exactly. That’s exactly it, we need to, because the thing is, right, if there’s a clear, the reason why I got out of that was because it was a very clear, this is the alternative.
(1:09:55) Al: if I’ve organized an
(1:09:56) Al: episode, I will do that episode unless something gets in the way because you know what is the
(1:10:01) Al: hardest thing to do is deciding on episodes. That is the hardest bit of it. Cody knows this
(1:10:08) Al: because they’re in a chat with me in Slack and I feel like every week we have a discussion of what
(1:10:15) Al: are we doing, right? Because deciding on 52 episode topics a year is really difficult and so if we have
(1:10:24) Al: decided on one and it’s going to happen.
(1:10:26) Al: But the problem is it was just the absolute perfect timing because we knew it was coming
(1:10:33) Al: at some point but we didn’t know when it was coming and I was kind of expecting it
(1:10:37) Al: to come later because they’d shown us literally nothing about the game but then they announced
(1:10:45) Al: it and it was like yeah two weeks after or two weeks before we were planning on recording and
(1:10:49) Al: I’m like that’s just enough time for us to play this game enough for the episode and it’s like
(1:10:52) Micah: Sure, right.
(1:10:55) Al: It’s, you know, it’s.
(1:10:56) Al: So hard for us to organize specific episodes and it’s like, anyway,
(1:11:00) Al: it doesn’t matter that’s way too inside baseball.
(1:11:00) Codey: Yeah.
(1:11:02) Al: Great.
(1:11:03) Al: Thank you for your first nomination.
(1:11:04) Codey: Oh, that’s a great question. Um.
(1:11:04) Al: Cody, what’s yours?
(1:11:05) Al: Hmm.
(1:11:10) Codey: My first one is window garden. So this is the game the game on the iOS where you have these little plants.
(1:11:18) Codey: And you’re basically like at a window and you grow the plants across days, you have to make sure you water each plant every day give them the amount of suns that they want.
(1:11:30) Codey: And then everything died and then everything died.
(1:11:39) Al: what’s that I don’t know her
(1:11:44) Codey: You know that that classic, uh, you, you’re like, Oh yeah, I need to check on my plants. And then five days later, like, you’re like, Oh yeah, I remember this morning reminding myself I need to check on my plants and it was really five days ago.
(1:12:00) Codey: Yeah.
(1:12:00) Al: This is why for my real life plants, I have an app that notifies me every day.
(1:12:01) Micah: I was going to say, at least this is like the digital, they’re, they’re perishing instead
(1:12:05) Al: If I need to do something for them.
(1:12:10) Al: Yeah, exactly.
(1:12:12) Micah: of actual plants.
(1:12:14) Codey: Yeah, I so I mean, my actual plants like they’re pretty front
(1:12:20) Codey: and center in my living room. And so if they start dying, I can
(1:12:23) Codey: like very clearly see, especially because I have I also
(1:12:26) Codey: have like idiot proof plants, like pathos, where the second
(1:12:31) Codey: they start looking droopy, you just throw water at them. And
(1:12:35) Codey: then they’re happy the next day again. Anything that’s like
(1:12:39) Codey: fidgety, not going to survive in my house. Um, yeah.
(1:12:44) Codey: That was my only real frustration with window garden. And then also like you build, you, you
(1:12:50) Codey: have all these plants and you keep wanting to get the new types of plants. And then sometimes
(1:12:55) Codey: the game will give you like a bonus plant. So you’ll have like two strawberry plants or whatever.
(1:13:00) Codey: And then it’s just upkeep simulator. Like every day you have to log on and you suddenly have to
(1:13:04) Codey: take care of like a hundred things. Um, I do think you were able to like put some things,
(1:13:10) Codey: Oh, you could put them in like storage, but then they’re not I wanted
(1:13:14) Codey: to look at like a cacophony of plants and I just would have liked if
(1:13:18) Codey: there was a certain point where I didn’t have to take care of them anymore.
(1:13:21) Codey: They kind of just took care of themselves.
(1:13:23) Codey: Um, like once you hit a certain level, but I don’t know, but I really, that
(1:13:29) Codey: was a game that I played this year that I did really enjoy, um, and
(1:13:33) Codey: that I would recommend, so that’s mine.
(1:13:37) Al: My first one is I was struggling to get a third game because apparently most of the games I played this year were not 1.0 releases, they were early access or updates.
(1:13:51) Al: So my first suggestion is not a real suggestion, that is Harvest Moon Homes Field. This is not the game of the year, right? I just want to make it clear, this is not the game of the year, at all.
(1:14:06) Codey: It’s an honorable mention from you.
(1:14:07) Al: What I do think is that it is the closest we have got to a good Harvest Moon game since the split, and that is something to be commended, even if that is a very low bar. I think it is so close to being good, really good.
(1:14:26) Al: I think they have got a lot of the bones there now, and honestly if I think this game was on Switch, it maybe would have been one of my games of the year, but the not being on Switch.
(1:14:37) Al: Switch and Steam and not having controller support and all those little things that we talked about in the episode that really annoy me about it, just mean it is just not quite there, but it is like I really want it to be, can you just be good already, you are so close to it.
(1:14:44) Micah: Mm-hmm
(1:14:51) Micah: Yeah
(1:14:52) Al: We have been doing this for six years now on this podcast, no what, seven, nearly seven years? Nearly seven years now we have been doing that, no six years, I am confused, what is time? Nearly six years we have been doing this for.
(1:15:07) Al: And you are so close, you have gone from one earth that you are doing to almost good, but just frustratingly close. So I am more nominating it as can you just hurry up, because actually you could be there, you could be the farming game of the year, if you just did those last few things, come on.
(1:15:30) Micah: Yeah, I agree. I want to see them succeed. I want to see them make a good Harvest Moon.
(1:15:41) Micah: Obviously I had some very strong opinions about this one, you know, primarily the user
(1:15:47) Micah: experience more than like the progression of the game or anything like that. I mean,
(1:15:52) Micah: it’s just simple things like controller support or cloud saves or, you know, things that you
(1:15:58) Micah: would come to expect for a special.
(1:16:02) Micah: Game and you know, coupled with the $18 price tag for a mobile game with like no other option for, you know, I don’t know, it’s it was just it was it was a hard one to to watch turn out the way that it did. And I’m hoping that something changes. Has there been any like update to it or anything? Are they just kind of done with it?
(1:16:24) Al: I don’t think so. I don’t think so. Well, so, I mean, we talked about this in the episode,
(1:16:28) Al: I think this is coming to consoles. I think that’s what the next thing is happening.
(1:16:32) Al: I think they’re working on porting it to consoles and steam. And so,
(1:16:32) Micah: Yeah. It’s just interesting that it’s been so long and we haven’t seen anything in it.
(1:16:38) Al: well, it’s been four months, right? That’s not actually that long a time. Like, if you look at,
(1:16:42) Micah: Has it? Oh.
(1:16:43) Al: yeah, it was August. It was late August, so maybe three months, three and a half months.
(1:16:48) Micah: Yeah, yeah. No, it’s really not.
(1:16:49) Al: But like that’s not a long time. And if you think about say like.
(1:16:52) Micah: But. Mm-hmm.
(1:16:54) Al: Hello Kitty, Island Adventure, there will have been three years between it coming out on
(1:17:00) Al: Apple Arcade and coming out on Switch. No, two years, sorry, two years, no, two years,
(1:17:03) Micah: » It’s been three, I can’t, that’s, holy cow, okay.
(1:17:08) Al: it will have when it comes out, it will have been two years, sorry, not two years, two years.
(1:17:13) Al: So, you know, I wouldn’t be surprised if we heard something about it next year. But yeah,
(1:17:19) Al: what I suspect is they’re porting it to Steam and Switch and as part of
(1:17:24) Al: that I think or I hope that they will add quality of life features to that and they will
(1:17:30) Al: back port them to the iOS now Android version that is my current theory as to why we’ve not
(1:17:36) Al: because yeah you would think if they were just working on that you would expect an update at this
(1:17:41) Al: point because like most of the complaints about these quality of license prunes right
(1:17:46) Al: but if they’re working on a port at the same time they’ll be incorporating that into it and
(1:17:49) Al: and then backboarding them I think. So probably so they release it this
(1:17:51) Micah: - Yeah.
(1:17:52) Micah: Yes.
(1:17:54) Al: time. My theory, but we’ll see what happens. Anyway, I really wanted to be good. Come on,
(1:18:01) Al: you’re so close. Micah, you’re number two.
(1:18:02) Micah: And just to follow up quick, I did play Window Garden Cody.
(1:18:09) Codey: Okay, yeah
(1:18:11) Micah: I I do like it.
(1:18:13) Micah: I like the premise of it.
(1:18:15) Micah: I like the concept.
(1:18:17) Micah: I was a little disappointed in not being able to unless there is a way
(1:18:22) Micah: and I don’t know how, but not being able to like pay to get rid of ads
(1:18:27) Micah: or something like that.
(1:18:30) Micah: Thank you.
(1:18:32) Micah: The ads kind of and probably no fault to the developer, because I don’t know what goes into picking what ads you get and what ads you don’t get like that run on your your app.
(1:18:46) Micah: But the my first experiences with it were really like I was enjoying it.
(1:18:51) Micah: It was really kind of cute.
(1:18:52) Micah: I pressed something to claim something and I got hit with the most unbelievable ad I think I’ve ever experienced, which was someone like, you know,
(1:19:02) Micah: like fake streamer kind of like playing a game ad.
(1:19:03) Codey: » Yeah.
(1:19:05) Micah: But the first line was, oh, my mom is dead.
(1:19:09) Micah: Oh, my dad’s also dead.
(1:19:11) Micah: And it was like I think it was some like superhero simulator thing where it’s like that they’re kind of doing a like, oh, it’s Batman without really saying it’s Batman.
(1:19:21) Micah: You know, but like the way that it took me out completely of the like, I’m cozy.
(1:19:22) Codey: - Mm-hmm.
(1:19:28) Micah: I’m having a nice time.
(1:19:29) Micah: I’m watering my plants.
(1:19:32) Micah: in my sunshine. And then this guy screaming in my ear, my mom’s dad, my dad’s dad. It
(1:19:39) Micah: just kind of just kind of took me out of it a little bit. But I would love the ability
(1:19:44) Micah: to for games like that to be able to just pay like a flat, you know, like I would rather
(1:19:49) Micah: pay the $20 that Harvest Moon home sweet home made me pay to even try the game to even touch
(1:19:54) Al: You mean twice?
(1:19:55) Micah: the game. I’d rather pay that to yet to what well, you know, but that’s either
(1:19:58) Al: If you want to hear that story, tune in to our Harvest Moon, Hope Sweet Home episode.
(1:20:02) Micah: here, right there to. But I would rather that be the fee to like disable ads on something
(1:20:07) Al: Why was it a story?
(1:20:14) Micah: like that, you know, or like, but yeah, I don’t know. That’s my little gripe about it.
(1:20:19) Micah: My second nomination for game of the year is something that has been talked about in
(1:20:26) Micah: this podcast, Rusty’s retirement, which is just.
(1:20:30) Codey: Yay!
(1:20:32) Micah: Such a unique idea and cute. And it’s it’s, you know, little retired robot plant a little
(1:20:43) Micah: running a farm and generating biofuel and stuff that sits on the bottom of your monitor
(1:20:48) Micah: while you work. And I always I not always, but I tend to have it up underneath my discord
(1:20:56) Micah: window on the monitor that I use discord on. And it just kind of runs. It’s really nice
(1:21:00) Micah: is to, you know,
(1:21:02) Micah: if something stressful is going on to look over and see all my
(1:21:05) Micah: little old rusty retired robots kind of bopping around on my
(1:21:10) Micah: little farm and planting stuff. There’s so many aspects to it
(1:21:16) Micah: too, that feel like as an idle game made it feel really not
(1:21:23) Micah: just like, you know, set it and forget it kind of like, you
(1:21:27) Micah: know, I there’s the progression made me really want to.
(1:21:32) Micah: Stick with it, and I do like to that you have the option to set it to like focus mode.
(1:21:36) Codey: Mm-hmm
(1:21:37) Micah: I don’t know if that’s recent, a recent edition or not, or if that was in the base game, but.
(1:21:42) Codey: I think it was in the base game because I think I wouldn’t have played it if they didn’t have
(1:21:46) Codey: Let’s be honest.
(1:21:50) Micah: But the game has a focus mode that basically just like extends the time that everything
(1:21:55) Micah: takes to to develop on your farm so that you’re not just constantly checking everything, which
(1:22:02) Micah: I have found myself doing, you know, and I’ve had to kind of shift to that mode, because
(1:22:06) Micah: I will get really like distracted by, okay, I got to plant the stuff and I these if this
(1:22:11) Micah: is what I need to plant in order to unlock this next crop and this is, you know, where
(1:22:16) Micah: I want to place my next, you know, house or whatever, and it’s just, they also recently
(1:22:23) Micah: had a little Christmas update that lets you put, you know, like a holiday update that
(1:22:27) Micah: let’s you put candy canes and trees and stuff on your on your
(1:22:32) Micah: your your plot and your little under under your discord land
(1:22:36) Codey: - Yeah.
(1:22:38) Micah: that you have. Yeah, he’s got a little Santa hat and he kinda
(1:22:40) Codey: - And he has a little Santa hat on, doesn’t he?
(1:22:43) Codey: That’s so cute.
(1:22:46) Micah: bops back and forth with him as he moves around. It’s very
(1:22:49) Micah: cute. II really really love the game. It was such a like neat
(1:22:53) Micah: surprise to me because II it was what is it like $5 or
(1:22:57) Micah: or something, it’s such a low price and
(1:22:59) Codey: Yeah, yeah.
(1:23:02) Micah: it’s not something that I was fully aware of, you know, it didn’t like have the same
(1:23:07) Micah: level of coverage, I think that, you know, like wider coverage that something like Fields
(1:23:14) Micah: of Mystery had or something like that. But it’s just such a it’s just such a good game.
(1:23:16) Codey: Mm hmm. It kind of came out of nowhere, yeah, for sure.
(1:23:21) Micah: And I think it’s a good contender too, because it has already started to inspire more, you
(1:23:29) Micah: You know, it’s got that, like.
(1:23:32) Micah: A Stardew sauce of being, being the baseline for people to start making new idle sims that can sit on the, you know, the bottom of your monitor or the side of your monitor or whatever and run while you do other things.
(1:23:46) Al: There are so many of them now. It’s wild how that is just like, because I think,
(1:23:54) Al: yeah, I don’t have this on my list because one, I’ve not played it, which is mainly because I do,
(1:24:01) Al: I work on a client machine. I’m a consultant, I work for clients, so I use their machine,
(1:24:05) Al: and I’m not exactly installing Rusty’s retirement on a client machine, but also because I just don’t
(1:24:13) Al: think it works again for my brain.
(1:24:16) Al: I think I would end up in the situation where you find found yourself unable to turn on that
(1:24:22) Al: setting. Like I would just be like focusing on the game and I just don’t think that would work
(1:24:23) Micah: Mm-hmm.
(1:24:27) Al: for me. Because I would turn on the focus mode and I’d just be like now it’s just boring, right?
(1:24:32) Al: Like we’re back to that problem of me wanting games to be faster. Like I’m gaming or I’m not.
(1:24:36) Codey: Yeah, you want to get your, you’re a game guzzler.
(1:24:40) Al: But what I am and I’m totally fine with that. Like that’s how I like to play games. That’s
(1:24:44) Al: That’s just how life is.
(1:24:46) Codey: That’s totally fine, yeah.
(1:24:46) Micah: Yeah, yep.
(1:24:46) Al: gotta accept that. But I think that I love what it has done, even if I don’t want it myself,
(1:24:54) Al: right? I think it’s impressive how it’s gone from like, this is not a thing I’d thought of.
(1:25:01) Al: And then they announced it and I was like, fascinating. And now we have, I think, three
(1:25:05) Al: other games announced this year that are doing a similar thing, but different game categories.
(1:25:11) Al: And that’s really interesting. Like it’s not, it’s not often you get a genre defining.
(1:25:16) Micah: Mm-hmm. Yeah, it’s really not
(1:25:18) Codey: Yep. Well, what a great time for me to skip over my second one and announce that Rusty’s retirement is my number one game of the year.
(1:25:28) Codey: Because I mean, it’s for all the reasons y’all just said, I mean, I think that the fact that it is kind of the stardew of its genre, like it started its like category and it has inspired other games.
(1:25:44) Codey: But it’s just so like like people have
(1:25:48) Codey: And then they also have the like set it and forget it games that they might have up on a screen or something. And they were like, hear me out. What if both? And it’s just on the bottom of your screen and you don’t have to have it in like a separate window. They’re just doing their thing and you and the fact that you can have it on the side and wherever you want it and yeah, so that was my that’s my number one, personally. So.
(1:26:16) Al: While we’re talking about it, I think I’m going to input Johnny’s comments into this because it makes, I think, I was going to leave all these till the end, but I feel like this one makes sense to talk about just now.
(1:26:25) Codey: Yeah. Yep.
(1:26:28) Al: So Johnny has said while my favourite game of the year has been Mika and the Witches Mountain, which we may talk about later, I firmly believe Rusty’s retirement should be game of the year.
(1:26:36) Codey: Mmm.
(1:26:36) Al: Cottagecore as a genre has largely stagnated the last few years as we’ve seen the tail end of the Stardew but X games being released and are now firmly stuck in the era of genre but with-
(1:26:46) Al: where games are low on innovation and what appeals to any individual is simply based on how much they like the merged genre. This is why Mika and Luma Island are my personal favourites.
(1:26:54) Al: I enjoy the puzzle exploration nature but at their heart they are just fine Cottagecore games.
(1:27:00) Al: In this world, Rusty’s retirement has done something truly novel that has opened an amazing new design space for the genre we love. Cottagecore and farming at its heart utilises time as a key mechanic.
(1:27:10) Al: A partial screen overlay is an elegantly simple idea that provides the core cottage court
(1:27:16) Al: while enabling a game that progresses at a slower pace. While Rusty’s retirement hasn’t
(1:27:19) Al: had the widespread success of something like Stardew, we are already seeing new games being
(1:27:24) Al: developed that are taking and evolving this concept in a year full of games that have been
(1:27:28) Al: fine but with nothing that has really stood out. I would love for us to be on the bright side of
(1:27:32) Al: history and recognize a game that I believe will have a huge impact on the genre and consequently
(1:27:37) Al: the harvest season for years to come.
(1:27:40) Codey: Here, here.
(1:27:40) Micah: Incredibly well said.
(1:27:42) Codey: Yeah.
(1:27:43) Micah: And I think very much empowers my feeling that, you know,
(1:27:49) Micah: I think Natsuman was kind of my wild card.
(1:27:52) Micah: It is my personal favorite game of the year,
(1:27:56) Micah: but I think as far as the genre goes,
(1:27:59) Micah: for sure that I think Rusty’s retirement kind of
(1:28:02) Micah: takes the cake on it for me.
(1:28:02) Codey: Yep. Okay, well, that’s mine. What’s your second?
(1:28:06) Al: My number two is Echoes of the Plum Grove. I haven’t put a humongous amount of time into this,
(1:28:13) Al: but what I love about this game is how it… And I know this is a little tropey,
(1:28:19) Al: but cutesy face to it, but also you can dive dysentery. I love the balance there.
(1:28:31) Al: I do have issues with how the game actually plays, which maybe I’ll talk about in a future
(1:28:35) Al: your episode.
(1:28:36) Al: We’ll see if I can get anyone to go on a podcast about with that about me.
(1:28:41) Al: No with me about it.
(1:28:42) Codey: I mean, I, I mean, you said you die of dysentery and I am intrigued, so count me in.
(1:28:49) Al: I just I love and I also like because you know people talk about how much they enjoy
(1:28:54) Al: in what was the Harvest Moon game where you can play as your kid.
(1:28:57) Micah: Wonderful life.
(1:28:58) Al: Wonderful life yes that’s what that’s what it’s called. That concept of like you you die and life
(1:29:05) Al: moves on.
(1:29:07) Al: And just because you aren’t there anymore doesn’t mean your farm isn’t, and you can
(1:29:10) Al: continue that and you can play as continually going down the generations.
(1:29:15) Al: I really love that idea and I think it’s been done pretty well in Echoes of the Plum Grove.
(1:29:23) Al: And I also just I really love the art style it’s kind of paper Mario-esque thing I really
(1:29:28) Al: like and you know as Johnny talks about like oh yeah this is just a genre of a game but
(1:29:35) Al: with farming, it actually.
(1:29:36) Al: Feels like echoes of the plum grove is trying to do farming game, but different.
(1:29:42) Al: Um, and I, I, yeah, I really like that.
(1:29:42) Codey: Yeah.
(1:29:45) Codey: Cool. I’ve not, not played, but we’ll be on an episode with you then.
(1:29:52) Al: Careful, I’m going to write it down, Cody.
(1:29:52) Micah: I also have not played
(1:29:56) Micah: But I have added it to my wish list because I do really like the art style I like how it looks and I like the
(1:30:03) Micah: You know everything that you said has enticed me to
(1:30:06) Micah: Want to try it, but I haven’t I haven’t touched it personally
(1:30:08) Codey: But what’s the console?
(1:30:10) Al: I played it on Steam but I don’t know if it’s on any consoles. I think it might just be
(1:30:14) Micah: Yeah, we’re supposed to sit on Steam but
(1:30:15) Al: Steam. It’s on Windows and Mac though. So there you go. Yeah, true. Yeah, so I know
(1:30:19) Codey: Ooh.
(1:30:21) Codey: Well, if I get a Steam Deck for Christmas,
(1:30:23) Codey: then it won’t matter.
(1:30:27) Codey: Cool.
(1:30:28) Micah: That’s exciting. It’s a great console.
(1:30:28) Al: it’s not going to win because I’m literally I think the only person who’s mentioned it but
(1:30:34) Al: I think it’s up there. Yeah, I think we did have, did we maybe have one person mentioning it?
(1:30:34) Codey: Yeah, it’s a little out of left field.
(1:30:41) Al: One person mentioned it as one of their top three but didn’t make an argument for it being game of
(1:30:45) Al: the year. So, all right Micah, your final game, your number one game of the year. Well,
(1:30:54) Al: if that’s how you’ve been doing it, I’m not sure.
(1:30:56) Micah: Maybe this is you know, I think that this is maybe a little bit of wild card, but it’s all of these all of my nominations have been
(1:31:06) Micah: Kind of things that take the the genre and kind of flip it on its head a little bit or do something new with it
(1:31:13) Micah: um
(1:31:14) Micah: That’s kind of what I looked at as like
(1:31:17) Micah: Criteria personal criteria for what?
(1:31:20) Micah: Makes something kind of game of the year for me as far as these games go this this genre goes
(1:31:26) Micah: So contrary to maybe popular belief, it is not harvest or story of seasons pixel crossing
(1:31:34) Micah: uh
(1:31:35) Micah: I
(1:31:37) Micah: Played played that game to completion but was not necessarily a huge fan of it. Uh, but that’s neither here nor there
(1:31:44) Micah: Uh, my final nomination is web fishing
(1:31:49) Micah: uh
(1:31:50) Micah: because it is
(1:31:52) Micah: such an
(1:31:54) Micah: Interesting game, it’s just-
(1:31:57) Micah: I don’t even know. I mean, it’s- you’re fishing, right? Like, that’s the whole thing.
(1:32:00) Micah: It’s kind of like, if you took, uh, you know, the art style of Animal Crossing and made it, like,
(1:32:07) Micah: low poly, uh, and it’s just the fishing part of it, but you also added some, like, chat room to it.
(1:32:17) Micah: Like, like a- like a- it’s just- you just fish with people. And you can just fish with your friends,
(1:32:24) Micah: or you can just fish by yourself or you can just…
(1:32:27) Micah: fish with random people, but the whole concept is that like you just hang out and it’s…
(1:32:34) Micah: I saw a, you know, a video about how this is re-bringing the like chat room game back to life,
(1:32:43) Micah: right? Like games like maybe Club Penguin or, you know, the games in that style where it’s like,
(1:32:50) Micah: you can play games together and it’s just, you kind of like goof off and there’s not really like
(1:32:54) Micah: a whole lot to do but…
(1:32:56) Micah: You know, there is if you want to, but it’s also just fun, like it’s just there to be fun.
(1:33:02) Micah: It’s not there to have like high stakes or, you know, hyper-specific things that you need to do.
(1:33:08) Micah: You can just catch weird fish and there’s a lot of like really good humor in the game.
(1:33:15) Micah: And it’s just, it’s very cute too. So like, you know, there have been a lot of instances where,
(1:33:21) Micah: you know, people will join with, because you can, you can use a microphone or not.
(1:33:26) Micah: You can just, you know, use text chat. You can disable mics entirely if you choose to.
(1:33:32) Micah: You can just, you know, kind of exist on your own if you want.
(1:33:38) Micah: And it’s, there have been so many instances where it’s like, you know,
(1:33:43) Micah: somebody kind of just waddles up to you and is like, do you need help doing this thing that
(1:33:47) Micah: you’re trying to do? Or do you need help figuring out how to do this thing? Are you new here?
(1:33:52) Micah: whatever, and then they just kind of bop around the little little forest together.
(1:33:56) Micah: And they show you how to do things, or they’ll give you stuff, or you know, you like make friends
(1:34:01) Micah: just kind of sitting on the dock fishing. And it’s just such a weird, unique game. And it,
(1:34:08) Micah: I think, gained a lot of popularity quickly because of that, because it’s such a like,
(1:34:14) Micah: different style of this kind of, you know, cozy, but like connected kind of game.
(1:34:22) Micah: And I think it’s, I think it’s doing some really cool and interesting.
(1:34:26) Micah: Things and I am excited to see what comes of it because I know that because of the popularity that it garnered that there it’s going to inspire some, you know, new games similar to this and I’m excited to see what happens with it but yeah webfishing is great.
(1:34:44) Micah: It’s very fun and very weird.
(1:34:46) Al: So you might, you might be a bit surprised by this. It’s not on my list. I’m not going to say that,
(1:34:51) Micah: Shocking.
(1:34:51) Al: but, but two other co-hosts have nominated web fishing. So both Kelly, who has been on
(1:34:56) Micah: » Okay, all right, now we’re talking.
(1:35:03) Al: several episodes this year, and Dalen, who I don’t think has been in an episode this year,
(1:35:07) Al: but was on an episode last year. Both of them nominated web fishing for their, their farming,
(1:35:12) Al: they are Cottagecore Game of the Year. So you’re not the only one. It’s not on my list.
(1:35:17) Al: And I’m guessing it’s not on Cody’s because I haven’t heard Cody talk about it.
(1:35:20) Codey: Well, yeah, yeah, no, it’s not
(1:35:23) Al: But, I mean, you know, based on our current voting, it is in second place just now,
(1:35:29) Al: which is probably not what you were expecting coming into this, Mike.
(1:35:32) Micah: It is not what I was expecting, but it’s good, it’s a good game.
(1:35:35) Codey: That’s so that’s what’s so that’s what’s so fun about this like I you know with Rusty’s retirement as my number one
(1:35:41) Codey: I was like, okay, I’m gonna be coming out here being like I like the little the little bottom of the screen game like
(1:35:49) Codey: and like
(1:35:51) Codey: Before I had the chance to say all the cool all the wonderful things like y’all said it and I was like, oh wow
(1:35:55) Codey: Like I’m not I’m not a lone wolf in my appreciation for this game
(1:36:00) Codey: So yeah, that’s cool that other people have heard of and played with fishing
(1:36:04) Micah: Yeah, it’s it’s it’s fun
(1:36:05) Codey: uh
(1:36:06) Codey: Yeah, my number two because I already said my number one is honey growth, which is another
(1:36:16) Codey: mobile game and it’s this game where you’re a little a little bee a couple of bees actually or you you use resources to
(1:36:25) Codey: How you collect resources by using these bees that have different tasks
(1:36:29) Codey: And you have a little garden that you bet that you plant that has food products, but also
(1:36:35) Codey: just flowers and you collect resources from the flowers and you harvest the food and you can cook and you can
(1:36:42) Codey: Craft and it’s just such a cute little game and you can really put as much or as little time as you want into it
(1:36:50) Codey: Um, there is there are no ads, which is amazing. Um
(1:36:56) Codey: honestly
(1:36:57) Codey: and
(1:36:59) Codey: Yeah, I just I really love this game. Um, i’ve been playing it quite a bit
(1:37:05) Codey: and I think it’s one of the only games that i’ve played for the podcast that i’m not just gonna
(1:37:11) Codey: Uninstall the moment like the podcast is over like the podcast the recording is over. So
(1:37:18) Codey: um, yeah, that’s my my number two and I think that’s kind of my wild card because um
(1:37:25) Codey: We haven’t talked about it a lot. So
(1:37:26) Al: » We all got to have a wildcard.
(1:37:29) Micah: it looks really cute. I’ve not heard of this, but I do like the, uh,
(1:37:34) Micah: what I see of it and what you described of it.
(1:37:37) Micah: Sounds like something that I would like, but
(1:37:40) Al: It’s not on my list. I have been playing it because I don’t need to keep the secret because
(1:37:40) Micah: and no ads as a, you know,
(1:37:48) Al: it’s already out by the time this episode comes out because I normally like to be really secretive
(1:37:49) Codey: I know.
(1:37:51) Codey: We’re covering it.
(1:37:54) Al: about the episodes that are coming out because I don’t want to promise anything but it’s already
(1:37:58) Al: happened. We have done an episode, the last episode was on Honeygrove and well I don’t want
(1:38:00) Codey: by the time this is released.
(1:38:07) Al: want to spoil anything for Cody, because we’re recording that in two days.
(1:38:08) Codey: Yeah.
(1:38:10) Al: It’s not on my list, and we’ll talk about that maybe why on Sunday.
(1:38:14) Codey: That’s fine.
(1:38:18) Al: No, I think it’s fun and I love how it looks, and I think it is
(1:38:22) Al: a good game. I suspect a lot of it is just, it’s not for me, which is just what happens.
(1:38:30) Al: But yeah, I mean, in terms of mobile games, it is better than most mobile games we have covered
(1:38:38) Al: on the podcast.
(1:38:40) Al: Agreed. My final one is one I’m a little bit disappointed hasn’t been mentioned
(1:38:40) Codey: - Correct, though the bar is on the ground, so.
(1:38:50) Codey: Here’s every five seconds. Here’s some ads. Yikes. But yeah, this game does not have any,
(1:39:01) Codey: which is lovely. Al, what’s yours? Your game of the year.
(1:39:10) Al: anyone before, but it’s okay because other hosts have also nominated it. And that is
(1:39:14) Al: Mika and the Witches Mountain. This is absolutely like, this is, I think my favorite game of
(1:39:19) Al: the year full stop. We talk about my non farming game game of the year in the greenhouse episode,
(1:39:26) Al: but I think this beats it as well. It is such there’s something about chibi games and the
(1:39:32) Al: games that they do, right? Like Summer in Mara was the first game that I played of theirs.
(1:39:37) Al: It was just so fun.
(1:39:40) Al: It’s like there are bad things that happen, but they’re all just like things for you
(1:39:48) Al: to overcome.
(1:39:49) Al: They’re never like actual bad things, right?
(1:39:52) Al: Like in Summer in Mara, you get kidnapped by pirates, but that’s just fine, right?
(1:39:57) Al: Like, cause you then convince the pirates to help you, right?
(1:40:01) Al: And then in this, it’s like our plane crashes and bursts into flames.
(1:40:06) Al: That’s fine because, you know, the person who was flying it got it.
(1:40:10) Al: In their parachute.
(1:40:13) Al: And you can just go and find all the things that it dropped and go deliver them, right?
(1:40:17) Al: Like the bad things happen, but that’s okay.
(1:40:20) Al: We can get over it.
(1:40:20) Al: And I love that because I’m never that.
(1:40:24) Al: That’s not me.
(1:40:24) Al: I’m not that kind of positive, but I love the idea of being that.
(1:40:29) Al: And the, particularly with Miikka, the movement is just so fun.
(1:40:36) Al: They do movement so well in their games, right?
(1:40:40) Al: Summer in Mara, the boat riding was just perfect.
(1:40:44) Al: Like it was so good.
(1:40:46) Al: And with Miikka, the flying is just so fun.
(1:40:50) Al: Like I was a little bit unsure of how it worked to start with,
(1:40:55) Al: because it didn’t work exactly how I expected it to the flying.
(1:41:00) Al: But after like an hour or so of playing, I was totally in.
(1:41:04) Al: And this idea of being able to fly around in a broom and deliver packages to people.
(1:41:10) Al: It was just a little fun story to go along with it.
(1:41:12) Al: It’s everything I wanted from that.
(1:41:14) Al: And I didn’t know I wanted it until they announced it.
(1:41:16) Al: And then I was like, that’s exactly what I want.
(1:41:18) Al: And they released it.
(1:41:19) Al: And I was like, yep, this was exactly what I wanted.
(1:41:21) Al: And very rarely do you have that with a game where they announce it and you go,
(1:41:26) Al: I need that.
(1:41:27) Al: And then they release it and you go,
(1:41:28) Al: that was exactly what I expected and exactly what I wanted from it.
(1:41:31) Al: That is such a rare thing to happen.
(1:41:33) Micah: Mm-hmm now have you yet played Wind Waker? Okay
(1:41:33) Al: I love it so much.
(1:41:40) Al: I am waiting.
(1:41:40) Al: I’m waiting for the switchboard.
(1:41:46) Micah: Hey, you might be waiting a little longer
(1:41:49) Al: Look, it’s coming.
(1:41:50) Al: It’s going to come eventually next year.
(1:41:50) Codey: That’s a long time waitin’, waitin’, it’s a long time waitin’ for a ship don’t come.
(1:41:52) Al: Next year is coming.
(1:41:55) Micah: Yeah, we’ll see
(1:41:57) Al: I’m so surprised.
(1:41:58) Al: I’m so surprised it didn’t come when they decided to delay the new console again.
(1:42:02) Al: It’s like, how are you still not releasing this game?
(1:42:02) Micah: Yeah
(1:42:03) Micah: Really weird circumstance too because that was one of the times that we got like a leaked
(1:42:05) Al: Would you release it already?
(1:42:10) Micah: Like store listing for it, you know, like a like a reputable like target
(1:42:14) Micah: I think released the store listing for it like leaked the store listing, but it still never came out
(1:42:18) Micah: So clearly it has existed to some degree
(1:42:21) Al: Well, and the, well, and the rumours are that it has been finished completely for three years now.
(1:42:27) Micah: That’s
(1:42:29) Al: And they’re just waiting for the right time to release it.
(1:42:30) Micah: Interesting
(1:42:33) Al: And I’m like, what is the right time? What are you waiting for?
(1:42:33) Micah: Uh
(1:42:36) Micah: Yeah
(1:42:38) Codey: Corporations are not don’t have any incentives anymore.
(1:42:43) Micah: But I ask because obviously for anybody who has played it or listened to the episode that
(1:42:48) Micah: The harvest season episode about it. Uh
(1:42:51) Micah: It it very much plays like wind waker. Um
(1:42:55) Micah: and I did I did
(1:42:57) Micah: Play it not enough of it. Not as much as I would have liked to play but I played
(1:43:01) Micah: Uh, good amount of…
(1:43:03) Micah: Mika and the Witches Mountain, because, again, also a big Chibig fan, and I like the stuff that
(1:43:09) Micah: they make. Uh, the kind of, like, premise of this, that, that sort of, um, Studio Ghibliification of
(1:43:19) Micah: this, this, you know, style of game is really cute. The, uh, you know, the characters that,
(1:43:26) Micah: the people that inhabit the island are very cool, very, like, unique, very cute.
(1:43:34) Micah: And the interactions are fun. The movement is great. I was very pleasantly surprised by, uh,
(1:43:41) Micah: how well the movement was in this game. Um, how, how, how much they made it work from, you know,
(1:43:48) Micah: kind of, like, the, the start of it being that you’re, you have, like, the lowest possible function
(1:43:55) Micah: on your, your flying broom, uh, and then kind of goes up from there. But even at the lowest
(1:44:01) Micah: possible function it’s still
(1:44:03) Micah: like it performs really well.
(1:44:06) Micah: So I also really, really liked it.
(1:44:09) Micah: I just didn’t include it in my nominations
(1:44:14) Micah: because it didn’t feel like, you know,
(1:44:17) Micah: I guess, unique enough to me.
(1:44:19) Micah: As someone who has played Wind Waker,
(1:44:21) Micah: it does feel like it borrows a lot from it.
(1:44:23) Micah: Obviously, makes so much of it its own.
(1:44:27) Micah: And it’s more kind of just in how it plays
(1:44:30) Micah: general aesthetic is, but
(1:44:34) Micah: Yeah, it’s it’s it’s still really good. I like it a lot
(1:44:37) Al: I think the other thing that it does really well is the thing that all GB games do well,
(1:44:42) Al: which is their characters. The stories aren’t huge and overarching, but I always feel like I
(1:44:48) Al: care about the characters. And obviously it has a storyline about taking down a capitalist,
(1:44:54) Al: which I’m always fun with. Collective action. Sorry, Micah, spoilers.
(1:44:55) Codey: - Mm-hmm.
(1:44:58) Micah: Now you’re speaking my language.
(1:45:05) Al: Yeah. And yeah.
(1:45:07) Al: Right. It definitely does borrow a lot from what I’ve seen from Wind Waker. If I understand
(1:45:14) Al: correctly, so did Summer and Mara. But the… Yeah, exactly, exactly. But yeah, what I love
(1:45:17) Micah: Yeah, yeah, primarily the boat, I think the sailing aspect of it, so.
(1:45:25) Al: about this is, yeah, how they make it their own. And the characters are a huge part of that. And
(1:45:30) Al: yeah, there’s some crossover from previous ones, but it’s not a huge… It’s maybe like three
(1:45:35) Al: characters crossover between the game.
(1:45:37) Al: And so they still have loads of characters that are new, and I still really care about them.
(1:45:44) Al: And yeah, you’re right, the upgrading of Brooms was done really well.
(1:45:49) Al: And it could have ended up really badly.
(1:45:51) Al: It could have just not been fun.
(1:45:53) Al: But the way that you upgrade felt really rewarding for playing the game.
(1:46:00) Al: And was a great way of expanding more of the island without having like unnecessary.
(1:46:07) Al: There’s no gates in your way, like you can get around the whole island, there’s just like high up places you can’t get to until you get a better broom, which works really well.
(1:46:18) Al: And yeah, I enjoyed the story.
(1:46:21) Codey: Another game that does that really well is, you know, a little kitty big city.
(1:46:21) Al: So I’ve already added to my wish list.
(1:46:22) Micah: Very cool.
(1:46:27) Al: Come on.
(1:46:28) Al: You don’t have to convince me.
(1:46:30) Codey: Yep, cool.
(1:46:31) Al: I guess at this point, I should probably point out that multiple people had Mika from the other co-hosts as well.
(1:46:37) Al: So Johnny had it as one of his top three.
(1:46:39) Al: Obviously, he wasn’t arguing for it to win overall.
(1:46:42) Al: But I’m counting anybody that’s put the games in their top three.
(1:46:48) Al: So that’s Johnny and Kevin.
(1:46:51) Al: And where was the other one?
(1:46:54) Al: Was it just two?
(1:46:55) Al: Just Johnny and Kevin put Mika.
(1:46:59) Al: So I think I’m looking through the other hosts options.
(1:47:04) Al: Other than that, so we’ve got Rusty’s retirement has.
(1:47:07) Al: I’m ignoring Spencer’s vote for Rusty’s retirement because he says Rusty’s retirement
(1:47:13) Al: because you told me so, which is not quite true.
(1:47:17) Al: That’s not what I said to him.
(1:47:20) Al: Spencer actually voted for Animal Crossing Pocket Camp complete, which sure, fine.
(1:47:26) Micah: I’ve got feelings about that, but you know, we’ve already been at this for quite a while,
(1:47:29) Al: We also have, we’ve also, yeah.
(1:47:30) Codey: Mmm, mmm, mmm, mmm, mmm, mmm.
(1:47:33) Micah: so I won’t go on that tangent.
(1:47:37) Al: Also got Luma Island, one vote for Luma Island, one vote for Pixel Cross Story of Seasons,
(1:47:43) Al: one vote for Amber Isle, one vote for Gerdlets, two votes for Luma Island, sorry, Daelin voted
(1:47:49) Codey: Yeah, two votes for Lim Island.
(1:47:51) Al: for Luma Island as well, one vote for Echoes of the Plum Grove, one for Botany Manor, and
(1:47:57) Al: interestingly one for Infinity Nikki.
(1:48:00) Micah: - Okay.
(1:48:01) Micah: Okay.
(1:48:04) Al: So I’m gonna read out what Dylan says about Infinity Nikki because yeah I saw
(1:48:07) Al: that and went okay interesting. So the whole thing that Dylan said was I’m a
(1:48:14) Al: big fan of completed tasks so I think it’s gonna be Luma Island for me. That
(1:48:18) Al: being said I would give thought to Infinity Nikki because I think it’s
(1:48:21) Al: Cottage Core E and it’s gonna be a big deal but it’s also a gacha game so
(1:48:26) Al: that’s a big demerit. I think it’s pretty accessible though and because it’s a
(1:48:29) Al: 3D game I think it can maybe pull people into that style of playing who are not
(1:48:33) Al: is familiar. Infinity Nikki came out.
(1:48:37) Al: This week, didn’t it?
(1:48:39) Micah: It came out very recently and it I haven’t seen a lot about it besides some like trailers and some ads for it.
(1:48:42) Al: 5th of December, last week.
(1:48:47) Al: Oh, my word, every second ad on TikTok for me is Infinity Nikki.
(1:48:51) Al: Every second ad…
(1:48:51) Micah: Yeah, and.
(1:48:53) Micah: It’s interesting because the the way that it’s being advertised or the way that it initially was advertised, I don’t know, gave me the feeling of like a kind of.
(1:49:09) Micah: » What’s a like PG way to say this?
(1:49:11) Al: Cosplay.
(1:49:12) Micah: Sure, yeah, like a cosplay heavy gotcha game with like anime girls in it, right?
(1:49:20) Micah: But the more that I, so that was my initial reaction to it was like, okay,
(1:49:24) Micah: all right, I don’t really, this isn’t really for me.
(1:49:26) Micah: But the more that I’ve seen about it and heard about it, people are just describing it as
(1:49:31) Micah: that like, as basically that, that it’s like a kind of like a cozy open world game.
(1:49:39) Micah: Which is interesting because that’s not the impression that I got from a lot of
(1:49:43) Micah: the trailers or ads, so I would be interested to try it.
(1:49:47) Micah: I just didn’t get that impression, which is very strange to me, but.
(1:49:48) Al: Yeah. So I’m going to read the gameplay description on Wikipedia. Infinity Nicki features stylist
(1:49:59) Al: duels where players select outfits based on attributes such as sweet, fresh, elegant,
(1:50:08) Al: sexy and cool to compete against opponents. Specific attire enables gliding or shrinking
(1:50:16) Al: to x-axis otherwise unreachable.
(1:50:18) Al: What is this game?
(1:50:34) Micah: Yeah, it’s so like baffling to me, and I think I’m that alone. I’m like interested to try it and you know, like obviously I’m not opposed to like sex positivity or anything like that. I think it’s just a lot of these games that are like, gotcha.
(1:50:52) Micah: Anime girl heavy tend to feel a lot more like exploitative than they do. Like, you know, sex positive so I guess.
(1:50:58) Al: Yeah, they quite often, they quite often skew younger, which can feel a little not
(1:51:04) Micah: Right.
(1:51:07) Al: great, shall we say.
(1:51:08) Micah: Yep, yep. So if this really tones down the, you know, the like, horniness of it, then I think maybe that is, like, I’m more inclined to try it but, yeah, I don’t know.
(1:51:26) Micah: It’s just very strange that it’s, it gives the impression of one thing but apparently is
(1:51:34) Micah: very much different. So.
(1:51:36) Al: Yeah, is it? Yeah, I mean, it’s an open world adventure game where you you can explore
(1:51:45) Al: based on powers that you get from competing in dress up competitions. Weird.
(1:51:50) Micah: which like that sounds cool you know like I absolutely loved like fashion dreamer and uh
(1:51:59) Micah: you know what was the the ds one style savvy so if there’s like some aspect of that that’s
(1:52:06) Micah: like a you know like a fashion kind of like and a lot of the outfits that i’ve seen for it look
(1:52:12) Micah: cool you know like that they’re very like kind of cute stylish outfits and stuff um so
(1:52:20) Micah: maybe fun if that’s an element to it I just you know i’m i’m just maybe jaded by the like
(1:52:28) Micah: exploitative nature of what games like that this feels like have been like in the past so
(1:52:35) Micah: we’ll see I guess I don’t know clearly it wasn’t on anyone else’s list so
(1:52:39) Micah: So… (laughs)
(1:52:41) Al: Yeah, it’s obviously not winning. But it has, well, this is one of the things I like about
(1:52:45) Al: this episode is it always gives us something new to think about. Like, it’s normally Mika bringing
(1:52:53) Al: that. But I feel like we’d already, we’d already talked about it in previous episodes, not fully
(1:53:00) Al: covering it, but at least talking about it. We knew about it. He didn’t bring us something we hadn’t
(1:53:04) Al: heard of this year, Mika. But
(1:53:08) Micah: - I’m happy that that’s the case
(1:53:11) Micah: ‘cause otherwise I’d probably extend the runtime
(1:53:15) Micah: even longer, I’m sure, so.
(1:53:16) Al: So yeah, I guess thank you Daelynn for bringing up Infinity Nicky and maybe we’ll look into
(1:53:24) Al: it. But yeah, it’s a bizarre game.
(1:53:28) Micah: Mm-hmm. That’s odd, I think pretty much everything, like it’s on mobile and stuff too, right?
(1:53:34) Al: Yeah. It was the Gacha game. Of course it’s going to be on mobile. That’s where people spend the
(1:53:34) Micah: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Of course, yeah.
(1:53:37) Al: money on Gacha games, right? I know that Dalen loves Gacha games. They are all over the Gacha games.
(1:53:44) Micah: And you know, what is Pokemon Pocket if not a gacha game in the form of cards, so…
(1:53:49) Al: Well, sure. Sure. Fine. If you’re going to, if you’re going to go there, then yes.
(1:53:57) Al: I was going to say, but I’m not suggesting it’s game of the year, but I literally do that in the
(1:54:00) Al: Karina’s episode.
(1:54:04) Al: Moving on! So I think we’re down to three finalists, if I’m counting correctly,
(1:54:11) Al: and that is Mika and the Witches Mountain having three votes,
(1:54:14) Al: WebFishing also having three votes, and Rusty’s Retirement having four votes.
(1:54:19) Codey: Woooo!
(1:54:20) Micah: Like, you know what that means.
(1:54:22) Al: So, I mean, so I don’t, I’m just going to say this, I don’t think we have a clear 100%
(1:54:30) Al: Rusty’s retirement definitely wins this because as one more.
(1:54:34) Al: I think we need to at least discuss this.
(1:54:37) Al: Although I did before this episode, I did predict that Rusty’s retirement would win.
(1:54:42) Codey: - Wow, well, ‘cause you had to see everyone’s things.
(1:54:42) Al: Uh, but I didn’t look at your twos.
(1:54:48) Al: I only looked at the other host opinions.
(1:54:48) Codey: But you saw everyone else’s, yeah.
(1:54:50) Al: Yeah, I did.
(1:54:51) Al: Um, but you two, like that was only two before you two started giving your suggestions.
(1:54:58) Al: Um, I think, I mean, I would still argue that I think Mika should win personally.
(1:55:04) Al: Um, I’m not really sure what else I’m going to say other than what I said before.
(1:55:08) Al: Right.
(1:55:08) Al: I think it is a fantastically fun game.
(1:55:11) Al: I think it gives everything that it expected to.
(1:55:13) Al: And, um, I mean, I’m always going to, well, I was going to say I’m always going to
(1:55:16) Al: love chibi games, but that’s not true.
(1:55:18) Al: Cause I didn’t like the puzzle one they did.
(1:55:21) Al: Was it last two years ago?
(1:55:22) Al: Can I remember what it was called?
(1:55:22) Micah: It ain’t Cora was I get I’ve lost track of
(1:55:24) Al: Yeah.
(1:55:25) Al: And Kora lost days.
(1:55:26) Al: Yeah.
(1:55:27) Al: Yeah.
(1:55:27) Al: That one, um, didn’t like that one.
(1:55:30) Al: Uh, but I’ve liked every other one.
(1:55:32) Al: in the games.
(1:55:34) Micah: Yeah, and I’ve been a big fan of it. Sorry, go ahead.
(1:55:34) Codey: Oh, I was just gonna say, I mean, I didn’t play either of these other two games.
(1:55:41) Codey: I think that web fishing is a game that wouldn’t appeal to like all cottagecore fans.
(1:55:48) Codey: I think it’s kind of a niche thing.
(1:55:51) Codey: So for me, it would be between either Rusty’s retirement or Mika, but I think that because
(1:55:55) Codey: Rusty’s retirement has that innovative quality, I think it is still my top pick.
(1:56:04) Codey: But I can understand that Mika is like a phenomenal game, but it’s not a tiny little robot retiring
(1:56:08) Micah: I. It’s just the cutest way possible.
(1:56:12) Codey: and making a garden at the bottom of my screen.
(1:56:17) Codey: He’s living his dreams.
(1:56:20) Micah: I’m so proud of him.
(1:56:23) Micah: I do think that I’m surprised that we’re fishing at three votes.
(1:56:27) Micah: I’ll say that I came into this fully expecting that it was going to be kind of
(1:56:31) Micah: like a maybe not because I had seen that it had gotten some some level of like
(1:56:36) Micah: recognition, uh, but
(1:56:38) Micah: I, I guess I wasn’t expecting it to be in the top three, I guess. Um, so I am okay
(1:56:45) Micah: with striking that from the list. I think that you’re right, Cody, in that it is maybe
(1:56:52) Micah: a little bit more niche. I, as someone who is not typically a fan of multiplayer games
(1:56:57) Micah: myself, uh, you know, I was a little bit apprehensive playing it, but once I got over that, the
(1:57:04) Micah: experiences that have had in it have been so like fun and goofy.
(1:57:08) Micah: And impossible to replicate in A, other sessions and B, any other game.
(1:57:19) Micah: But it does require kind of like getting over that hump of stepping into online socialization
(1:57:27) Micah: where maybe some people are just averse to that. And I totally understand that as someone who
(1:57:32) Micah: a lot of times feels that way too. So I think that that is maybe a good enough case
(1:57:39) Micah: to maybe remove it from contention, in addition to the fact that neither of you had it on your list.
(1:57:46) Al: Yeah, I’ve already scored it off
(1:57:46) Micah: But I appreciate that it got where it did. So yeah.
(1:57:49) Al: Top three is impressive, you know, a lot of games were mentioned a lot of games released
(1:57:55) Al: I haven’t I yeah, I haven’t played it. I keep
(1:58:00) Al: thinking about it because I’m intrigued by it and like you say I like
(1:58:05) Al: the way it’s kind of like
(1:58:07) Al: Bringing chat rooms back right like that’s such a weird thing to do
(1:58:12) Al: Which I feel like is a theme this year is that’s
(1:58:16) Al: a weird thing to do with games, but I like it. So that’s 2024 in a nutshell. Why are
(1:58:19) Micah: Yeah, yep.
(1:58:26) Al: you doing that? Please do it more. I’m happy with it being in the top three. It would feel
(1:58:38) Al: weird to make webfishing the cartridge core game of the year.
(1:58:42) Micah: Yeah, I agree. I do agree. That being said.
(1:58:46) Al: Purely from the fact that I don’t think we should have a game where you could have slurs
(1:58:52) Al: shouted at you as cartridge core game of the year.
(1:58:53) Micah: Sure, or like yes someone just ruin it for you
(1:58:56) Codey: Yeah, I think that’s, that’s another part of it. Like, it just makes me think of being on those types of chat rooms and how you can be having a totally cozy conversation and then people could come in and just like spoil a book or spoil a TV show or say.
(1:59:10) Al: I love how that’s your thinking, spoil the book, and I’m thinking shout the N word!
(1:59:10) Micah: Yeah
(1:59:15) Micah: Which you know, I’m sure
(1:59:18) Micah: Thankfully in my experiences with it. I have not
(1:59:22) Al: Oh, yeah, I’m not saying it definitely happens.
(1:59:22) Micah: encountered that I
(1:59:24) Micah: Haven’t encountered any but I’m sure there is you know
(1:59:25) Al: I’m just saying that the stress of that would make it not cottage core for me.
(1:59:28) Micah: Yes, and that’s why
(1:59:29) Al: You know, it’s not calm and yeah.
(1:59:32) Micah: That’s why I say, you know, I know that some people are reversed do that like, you know
(1:59:36) Micah: Social interaction online social interaction in that way because
(1:59:40) Al: Or you didn’t have to put online just any social interaction
(1:59:40) Micah: there is that possibility. Yeah, or just, you know, at this
(1:59:44) Micah: point, just any social interaction, unfortunately. But
(1:59:47) Micah: I think that if that is a concern for you, and it is a
(1:59:51) Micah: game that you’re interested in, I would say, you know, try to,
(1:59:56) Micah: try to experience it with because you can have private
(1:59:58) Micah: games too, right? Like you can just play with just your friends.
(2:00:01) Micah: So, you know, try experiencing with just your friends, maybe
(2:00:04) Micah: instead of like getting in a discord group chat or something,
(2:00:07) Micah: you get in a web fishing group chat and you all just fish and
(2:00:09) Micah: Talk about your day or something.
(2:00:10) Micah: You know, but yeah, there is, you know, I don’t know what the filtering is like.
(2:00:16) Micah: I should have looked into that more, but I’m not sure what the filtering is like
(2:00:19) Micah: and things like that, as far as the moderation goes for the game.
(2:00:22) Micah: I’ve heard that there is some like fairly decent levels of moderation with it,
(2:00:26) Micah: but I don’t know for sure.
(2:00:29) Micah: And I don’t know from experience if that’s the case or not.
(2:00:31) Micah: So. But yeah, that’s web fishing.
(2:00:36) Codey: So what are your thoughts, Micah, on Mika versus Rusty?
(2:00:40) Micah: I got I have to go with Rusty’s retirement, I think, for my number one.
(2:00:45) Codey: YEAH!
(2:00:47) Micah: It’s just and I think because, you know, I came into this saying that like my
(2:00:53) Micah: my criteria, personal criteria for this was
(2:00:57) Micah: games that have made a difference or like change the genre in some way
(2:01:01) Micah: or done something new and Rusty’s retirement clearly has done
(2:01:05) Micah: that has already started to define its own sub genre.
(2:01:09) Micah: and…
(2:01:10) Micah: As much as I love Mika and as much as I love chibi games, which I do, it’s just…
(2:01:19) Micah: It’s not that it’s, you know, more of the same. It just doesn’t feel like it is as, like, unique or groundbreaking as Rusty’s retirement is.
(2:01:28) Micah: You know, I can’t imagine that there’s gonna be a lot of episodes of this where, you know, you’ll be talking about Mika and the Witches Mountain…
(2:01:41) Micah: Clones. But I can see it in a situation where you’re talking a lot about Rusty’s retirement clones.
(2:01:48) Micah: And I think that in its own right is a pretty big plus for it. That’s my personal thought. Sorry, Al. I know that that’s not what you want to say.
(2:01:53) Codey: Yeah, all right.
(2:01:56) Al: No, I don’t apologize. Look, I mean, I’m not going to be unhappy about Rusty’s retirement
(2:02:03) Al: winning, right? Like it’s not my game of the year, but I totally understand why it is Cody’s
(2:02:11) Al: game of the year and not Johnny’s game of the year, but Johnny’s opinion on what should
(2:02:15) Al: be game of the year and Micah’s second game of the year. Like I totally understand why
(2:02:21) Al: people love this game. It is not for me, but if I were only to
(2:02:26) Al: let things win that were for me, it wouldn’t be the harvest season game of the year. It
(2:02:30) Al: would be my game of the year, which nobody wants that let’s be honest, right? So I’m
(2:02:39) Al: okay with it. You know, Micah will always be my game of 2024, but I get Rusty’s retirement
(2:02:47) Al: and I do agree completely with what Johnny is saying about Rusty being that genre.
(2:02:56) Al: It hasn’t even taken that long because of how simple a concept is and how a small game
(2:03:06) Al: like that can be built reasonably quickly leading to so many other games. I’m not going
(2:03:13) Al: to say copycats because I hate the term because it’s such a, it’s a, it’s a, it’s a, that’s
(2:03:15) Micah: » Right.
(2:03:16) Codey: clones.
(2:03:18) Al: even worse. It’s a term that’s just filled with such a ignorance of how art happens.
(2:03:26) Micah: Mm-hmm. It really removes the element of inspiration from it, I think, which is really important.
(2:03:26) Al: That just makes me hate it so much. Exactly. Exactly. And like the idea that if you were
(2:03:37) Al: to create something completely unique, like, come on, everything’s based on something.
(2:03:41) Al: It’s such a stupid idea. And yeah, it’s so ignorant to call it a clone or whatever. So,
(2:03:49) Al: we’ll call them rusty lakes, right? You know, the.
(2:03:52) Micah: which is very funny because there is an entire genre of games called Rust-Likes
(2:03:54) Codey: - I love that.
(2:03:56) Al: Amazing. And I love the idea that, you know, a single developer can release this crazy
(2:03:59) Micah: which are games that are very similar to the game Rust so
(2:04:02) Codey: - There you go.
(2:04:10) Al: idea they have, and then suddenly it’s a whole new genre and people are doing it. And like,
(2:04:14) Al: to an extent that happened with Stardew, but that was still very much based on Harvest
(2:04:20) Al: Moon. And yes, this was clearly based on Stardew and other things, but it’s, it’s different
(2:04:26) Al: that it feels completely new, if that makes sense. And I love that idea.
(2:04:28) Micah: Yeah. And it’s not, it’s not even the first time that there has been something like this
(2:04:36) Micah: kind of like background PC existing on your desktop kind of thing, that it is just the
(2:04:42) Micah: most fleshed out version of it and the most like, you know, modern version of it. You
(2:04:48) Micah: know, I, I very distinctly remember, you know, back in like Windows 98 days or whatever,
(2:04:56) Micah: I’m just, you know, aging myself.
(2:04:58) Micah: But like old PC, you know, when there wasn’t a whole lot that you had to work with, there
(2:05:05) Micah: were little like widgets and stuff that you can install, even like on older Macs, too.
(2:05:10) Micah: They had, you know, widgets that would be like a little thing.
(2:05:13) Micah: Maybe it’s like a little Tamagotchi or something that exists.
(2:05:16) Micah: So this is just a so like a like a much more involved version of it and a much more developed
(2:05:23) Micah: and polished version of it that has opened up people’s eyes to like.
(2:05:29) Micah: Oh yeah, this is something that people really like or just like there’s something, I don’t
(2:05:34) Micah: know innate about like having something running, especially in this day and age where, you
(2:05:40) Micah: know, you need that constant input of stimulation.
(2:05:44) Micah: So you’ve got, you know, your work on the top screen and underneath it, you’ve got Rusty’s
(2:05:48) Al: Yeah. And I think it’s, it’s also been successful, right? Like if you look on Steam, it has 10,000
(2:05:50) Micah: retirement going.
(2:06:01) Al: reviews, which I have no idea how many people leave a review, but it’s, it’s a fraction
(2:06:07) Al: of the people that play a game, right? Have either of you ever left a review on Steam?
(2:06:09) Micah: Oh yeah for sure, I think maybe like once or twice, very very rare.
(2:06:14) Codey: Yeah, it’s yeah, maybe.
(2:06:17) Al: exactly, right? It’s just not a thing that people do. And to give you a concept, Disney Dreamlight
(2:06:22) Al: Valley, right, an incredibly popular game, has 17,000. Not even double Rusty’s retirement in terms
(2:06:27) Micah: Yeah. Yeah. Right.
(2:06:31) Al: of review. Now that doesn’t give us an idea on how many sales either of them have. But that is
(2:06:38) Al: overwhelmingly positive 10,000 reviews. Like it’s got a SteamDB rating of 94%. Like Disney Dreamlight
(2:06:46) Al: And my valley has 89%
(2:06:47) Al: So, like people love this game
(2:06:48) Micah: Yeah. It’s also time too, you know, like how long has Rusty’s retirement been out versus
(2:06:50) Al: Yeah, well, in fact, in fact, looking at the steam dv stats, it looks like Rusty’s
(2:06:54) Micah: how long, you know, something like Disney’s. So the fact that it acquired or accrued that
(2:07:00) Micah: many positive reviews in that timeframe is wild.
(2:07:07) Al: retirement currently has more people playing it than Disney Dreamland Valley does.
(2:07:10) Micah: Well, yeah, you know, you can kind of just like let it run in the background.
(2:07:16) Micah: But yes, I completely understand.
(2:07:19) Codey: - Mm-hmm, cool.
(2:07:21) Micah: It’s great.
(2:07:22) Micah: I love it.
(2:07:23) Micah: I just I’m a big fan of Rusty and everything that he’s done for us in his previous life
(2:07:28) Micah: as a robot.
(2:07:29) Micah: He earned his retirement.
(2:07:31) Codey: Yep. I look forward to my rusty days.
(2:07:36) Micah: I have moved to that to kind of speak to what you said, Al.
(2:07:39) Micah: I’ve moved to that.
(2:07:40) Micah: You know, instead of going into focus mode, there are now just times where I’ll just boot it up and just play it and then close it when I’m done playing it rather than like, let it run in the background, not all the time, but sometimes I’m just like, I just want to focus on playing rusty right now.
(2:07:55) Al: I would love to see how it works on a Steam deck.
(2:08:00) Micah: That’s a great question. I would love to too, actually.
(2:08:05) Al: Yeah, I’ve got no more other thoughts other than that.
(2:08:08) Al: Just like, how is it?
(2:08:11) Al: That’s all.
(2:08:13) Al: Let me see if it’s got a rating.
(2:08:13) Micah: - Yep.
(2:08:15) Al: It has playable on the compatibility.
(2:08:19) Micah: - Oh, no way.
(2:08:19) Al: So entering some text requires manually invoking the on-stream keyboard.
(2:08:24) Al: that’s a pretty standard one.
(2:08:26) Al: All functionality is accessible when using the default controller configuration
(2:08:32) Al: and the default graphic configuration performs well on Steam Deck.
(2:08:36) Al: So, looks very playable.
(2:08:36) Micah: Interesting. Okay. Cool. Yeah.
(2:08:39) Al: Obviously removes kind of half of the point of it.
(2:08:44) Codey: I want them to port it in a way where if I’m playing with my steam deck, I can dock my steam deck and watch a movie and have Rusty in the bottom.
(2:08:53) Micah: Oh, that’s a great idea.
(2:08:56) Al: I mean, you could do that, right? There’s nothing stopping you doing that because
(2:08:58) Codey: I don’t know.
(2:09:00) Al: if you dock your Steam Deck, you can then just open the Windows mode or the desktop mode and then
(2:09:07) Al: open up whatever you want to stream and just have it playing there. Pretty sure that would be easily
(2:09:13) Micah: - Yeah, I just don’t know if it’s like,
(2:09:15) Micah: you would have to do it as like a screen extension
(2:09:18) Micah: rather than like mirroring when you dock it, you know?
(2:09:21) Al: No, I don’t think you… Oh, do you mean have Rusty on the deck and with the streaming on the screen?
(2:09:26) Micah: Yes, I think that’s what you were saying, Nightcody.
(2:09:31) Micah: Like having Rusty on the deck while it’s docked
(2:09:31) Codey: Why me? Oh, no, I meant like you’re watching, like I’m watching Lord of the
(2:09:33) Micah: and then doing something else on your actual like…
(2:09:38) Codey: Rings and while, uh, the writers of Rohan are, are riding into Minas Tirith, like
(2:09:45) Codey: Rusty’s on the bottom, like farming of my TV screen.
(2:09:50) Al: Right, okay. Yeah, no, I think yeah. Yeah, that’s why I thought you meant. I’m pretty sure that would be that would be possible from
(2:09:50) Micah: Oh, I see, I see. Yeah, that’d be great.
(2:09:55) Micah: Yeah, that may actually be possible through the, like, Windows mode, yeah?
(2:09:55) Codey: That’s what I want in life.
(2:09:59) Micah: That’s funny. Or it’s Linux mode, I guess, you know, but…
(2:10:02) Al: Yeah, it’s it’s it’s called desktop mode, but yeah, I accidentally said Windows initially I don’t know why don’t know why.
(2:10:05) Micah: Mm-hmm
(2:10:08) Codey: Well, like, window, because it’s a window.
(2:10:11) Al: That’s probably why I thought about it. Yeah, but then I realized that that was a silly thing to say. So change what will change what I was saying.
(2:10:13) Codey: Yeah.
(2:10:17) Codey: Cool.
(2:10:18) Codey: Yay, Rusty’s retirement.
(2:10:19) Micah: Yay!
(2:10:22) Al: Congratulations to Rusty’s retirement for winning.
(2:10:25) Al: You are in a unique group of six games that have won this award.
(2:10:32) Al: I think the reason why Rusty’s retirement winning is that I suspect that Rusty’s winner with Rusty’s developer will respond to this because the big ones never do.
(2:10:42) Codey: Hmm. That’d be fun.
(2:10:45) Al: So, yeah, we shall see.
(2:10:47) Micah: - That’ll be cool.
(2:10:48) Al: All right, well I think that’s everything for this episode.
(2:10:52) Al: Where can people find you on the Internet?
(2:10:54) Micah: Uh, mostly, I think blue sky at this point it’s been, you know, as everybody has kind
(2:11:02) Micah: of like had the mass exodus from Twitter, I think it’s, that’s kind of where I’ve landed,
(2:11:07) Micah: uh, which is at Mike, the brave.be sky social, always a mouthful. Um, but I’m pretty much
(2:11:13) Al: I love how they’ve done this, we’re federated but we’re not really federated because it
(2:11:15) Micah: just, yeah, I’m just, yeah.
(2:11:21) Al: doesn’t really work, but we still have the negative of federation that you have to have
(2:11:24) Micah: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, but I am at Mike and the brave pretty much anywhere you can find
(2:11:25) Al: your domain, even though everyone’s domain is the same just now.
(2:11:36) Micah: me. I’ve been doing a little bit of twitches. I’ve been, you know, shiny hunting, but you
(2:11:41) Micah: know, a lot cat more casually, I guess. So just wherever you want to find me, I guess
(2:11:46) Al: I feel like you’re missing something, Maker, your new podcast.
(2:11:47) Micah: I’m there. Where am I missing? Oh yeah. I mean, you know, I don’t
(2:11:54) Micah: want to, I don’t want to advertise on my, uh, yeah, I do have a podcast with, uh, one
(2:11:58) Codey: No, please, do it!
(2:11:58) Al: Why not?
(2:11:58) Al: I asked you to, I asked you where people can find you.
(2:12:01) Al: No, tell them.
(2:12:06) Micah: of my friends and coworkers Kiefer. Uh, we, it’s called the soft reset and it’s a shiny
(2:12:13) Micah: hunting podcast. Well, we shiny hunt. So we talk about Pokemon or shiny hunting stuff
(2:12:19) Micah: and we shiny hunt while we’re talking about it. So it’s primarily a video podcast, but
(2:12:24) Micah: it’s a podcast where you do, uh, it’s very, very casual. It’s not, you know, like it’s
(2:12:28) Micah: kind of just a fun thing that we do when we have the time to do it. Um, not super, supers
(2:12:36) Micah: here. There’s only two episodes so far. We have the third episode filmed. We just have
(2:12:39) Micah: not had the time to finish the editing process for it because it is, uh, including a guest,
(2:12:45) Micah: which is, has changed the video format from two people to three people. So, uh, it’s made
(2:12:51) Micah: it a little bit harder to figure out but
(2:12:54) Micah: yeah it’s a lot of fun you can find it on Spotify primarily right now and yeah
(2:13:02) Micah: we’re also on Twitter unfortunately for the time being and blue sky if you just
(2:13:09) Micah: search the soft reset pod at BSky social or at the soft reset pod on Twitter
(2:13:14) Al: I do love that you say two episodes. You also in the second episode said it was the third episode
(2:13:23) Al: because that was that secret first episode that you never released.
(2:13:24) Micah: there was technically a first yeah we did a first episode we we did and felt that maybe we should
(2:13:26) Codey: A secret third thing?
(2:13:34) Micah: try again so uh yeah so maybe someday eventually you know but uh
(2:13:36) Codey: It’d be that way.
(2:13:41) Al: But you can’t get it out your head, which is why in the second episode, you said it’s
(2:13:44) Al: the third episode. And I was like, wait, did I miss an episode? Oh, wait, no, you were
(2:13:47) Al: just meaning the episode that you talked about that you never released. Nice and confusing.
(2:13:50) Micah: technically a third episode yeah hey no problem that’s what i’m here for
(2:13:51) Al: Thank you very much. But I’m enjoying listening to it. It’s good. Um, and I don’t think every
(2:13:55) Micah: happy to help
(2:14:00) Al: podcast needs to be weekly or, or whatever. Like I think just, you know, do what, do what
(2:14:06) Micah: Yeah, yeah, we kind of planned for like biweekly
(2:14:10) Micah: is what we were going for.
(2:14:12) Micah: And it’s still kind of what we’re shooting for.
(2:14:14) Micah: It’s just over the holidays and I work for both of us
(2:14:17) Micah: ‘cause we work together has picked up quite a bit.
(2:14:19) Micah: So we, you know, haven’t had as much time to get through
(2:14:24) Micah: this little bit more of a behemoth of a third episode.
(2:14:27) Micah: So after that, probably more back to the biweekly
(2:14:32) Micah: but I don’t want to promise anything.
(2:14:34) Al: That’s all good.
(2:14:34) Micah: It’s casual. We’re having fun, you know?
(2:14:36) Micah: That’s all that really matters.
(2:14:39) Al: The fun about a podcast that isn’t weekly is like, you just get a new episode.
(2:14:45) Al: That’s fun.
(2:14:46) Al: I wasn’t expecting that.
(2:14:47) Al: There’s only a few podcasts I listened to like that and I wouldn’t want every podcast
(2:14:52) Al: like that.
(2:14:53) Al: I like most of my podcasts to be regular.
(2:14:54) Al: So I know that they’re going to come every day or they’re every, every week or whatever,
(2:14:58) Micah: I will preface this with or you know the leave the disclaimer that it is a little bit more
(2:14:59) Al: but having a few that just pop up every so often is a fun little surprise.
(2:15:11) Micah: crude humor on the soft reset than maybe I’m usually like contributing so just mostly because
(2:15:21) Micah: of my co-hosts got pretty crude sense of humor so you know just a lot of butt jokes you know so
(2:15:28) Codey: I love, first of all I love the name, that’s an amazing name, and second of all, is that
(2:15:28) Micah: that I guess if you’re not
(2:15:34) Codey: a Pokemon TCG in your pocket?
(2:15:39) Codey: I love that.
(2:15:40) Codey: That’s all I’m gonna say.
(2:15:42) Codey: Yeah, there you go.
(2:15:43) Codey: Ooh, sleepy.
(2:15:44) Micah: - Great, then we did it, that’s already success.
(2:15:46) Al: Cody, where can people find you on the internet?
(2:15:55) Micah: They’re sleeping!
(2:15:57) Al: Just get out.
(2:15:58) Codey: - I think I’m on, I’m on Blue Sky.
(2:15:58) Al: I want to go to bed.
(2:15:59) Al: It’s nearly 11.
(2:16:04) Codey: So just my name, Cody Mathis.
(2:16:06) Codey: I doxx myself all the time.
(2:16:08) Codey: My name has an E in it.
(2:16:11) Codey: And hiking, oh, I spelled it wrong.
(2:16:12) Codey: Hiking beagle, B-E-E goal, like the bees on Instagram.
(2:16:18) Al: Could you miss the pun out of your name? That’s shocking.
(2:16:20) Codey: - I don’t.
(2:16:20) Codey: - Well, ‘cause it didn’t start out as a pun.
(2:16:22) Codey: And then I think it was Kevin that was like,
(2:16:25) Codey: oh my gosh, like a bee?
(2:16:26) Codey: And I was like, I should, yeah.
(2:16:28) Codey: I should do that.
(2:16:28) Al: You can find me at the Scottbot on primarily Mastodon at Scott, but I’m also on Blue Sky
(2:16:29) Codey: Um, so yeah, that’s, that’s where I’m at.
(2:16:39) Al: and some other stuff somewhere. I think I’m cross-posting to Mastodon and Blue Sky now,
(2:16:49) Al: so you’ll get it on there. I don’t do anything on threads or Twitter anymore. But they exist.
(2:16:56) Al: there if you want to follow me, but I don’t do anything.
(2:16:58) Al: there. You can find the podcast at THSPod on Tumblr, and also Blue Sky, and maybe some
(2:17:09) Al: others soon. We’ll see. You can send us feedback, tell us what your game of the year was,
(2:17:16) Codey: And why it was rusty’s retirement
(2:17:18) Al: and why you disagree with us. You can find that feedback form on our website, harvestseason.club,
(2:17:26) Al: or you can, you know.
(2:17:29) Al: Was the blue sky posting?
(2:17:32) Al: It’s some stupid name, isn’t it?
(2:17:32) Codey: Uh, we’re just, we’re just saying posting. I don’t, it used to be skeeting. I don’t
(2:17:36) Al: Oh, my word. Is that…
(2:17:36) Micah: I mean they kind of adopted that on Twitter too and just started calling it zeeding but
(2:17:37) Codey: like that.
(2:17:38) Al: Oh, that’s terrible.
(2:17:48) Micah: with an X you know?
(2:17:49) Al: Nobody said that literally nobody has ever said that though, that’s the thing like people will have said skeeting but not a single person has ever non ironically referred to posting on X as cheating. Nobody has ever done that.
(2:17:50) Codey: - Yep.
(2:18:02) Micah: You’re absolutely right. I would argue that most people don’t even call it X, so, yep.
(2:18:02) Codey: Yeah. Yeah, true.
(2:18:08) Al: Well, yeah, I wouldn’t use it wouldn’t say X it just only made sense in the context of talking about that stupid word.
(2:18:17) Al: You can post that to us.
(2:18:19) Al: On Blue Sky with that if you want.
(2:18:22) Al: Or you can be like the single person that goes through and likes every single one of our Tumblr
(2:18:26) Al: posts. Thank you. I appreciate you. Or you can comment on Spotify. That’s a thing. Thank you to Jack.
(2:18:42) Al: Thank you to Jack for your comments as well. We responded to Jack’s comment about Fields
(2:18:48) Al: of Mystery and then did an episode on it. You’ve asked us to cover We Harvest Shadows.
(2:18:54) Al: Probably not. We’ll see. I don’t know, it looks scary. It’s a horror survival farming game.
(2:18:56) Micah: I
(2:18:59) Micah: Don’t know about that
(2:19:04) Codey: Whoa!
(2:19:04) Micah: Interesting that sounds kind of interesting
(2:19:07) Al: Okay. Maybe somebody will cover it. I don’t think I’m, I don’t, I don’t think I’m going to be, I don’t think yet.
(2:19:10) Codey: Michael, let’s do it!
(2:19:10) Micah: Yeah, maybe Cody and I’ll cover
(2:19:12) Micah: You
(2:19:12) Al: Feel free. I’ll write it down. I don’t think I want to because I did Pumpkin Panic and that one scared me
(2:19:14) Micah: You
(2:19:18) Al: enough and that wasn’t even realistic. So I don’t think so. But if you two want to do it, feel free.
(2:19:23) Al: Maybe we will, Jack. Tune in. Find out. If you also want to comment on Spotify like Jack, you can do that
(2:19:29) Al: and I will read them eventually when Spotify notifies me about them. But it takes ages to do that.
(2:19:38) Al: You can also find links to everything related to the podcast on our website.
(2:19:42) Al: HarvestSeason.club, where you can find a link to our Patreon, patreon.com/thspod,
(2:19:48) Al: where you can get access to our Slack community where we talk about these things.
(2:19:53) Al: I have been posting to the Slack while we’ve been recording this podcast. Shocking.
(2:19:57) Al: You can go there and find some fun stuff, like how I found out that the new next Stardew concert
(2:20:05) Al: that I’m going to in Glasgow in February of 2026 will be just two weeks before the 10th
(2:20:11) Al: anniversary of Stardew Valley.
(2:20:12) Al: Wow, that’s wild.
(2:20:14) Micah: That’s, yeah, that’s pretty wild, 10 years.
(2:20:18) Al: I know 10 years.
(2:20:20) Al: I also posted a theory about something related to that,
(2:20:23) Al: which I’m not going to talk about here because that’s special for the patrons.
(2:20:28) Al: You can also get access to our greenhouse episodes, our bonus podcasts.
(2:20:33) Al: We have one coming out on Saturday, which is our non-Cottagecore Game of the Year,
(2:20:38) Al: and we have a lot of games that we mention, and no game is mentioned twice.
(2:20:43) Al: Come listen to that.
(2:20:44) Codey: Mm-hmm
(2:20:45) Al: Find out what are games of the non-Cottagecore year.
(2:20:50) Micah: What was the term that Kevin came up with, neighborvania?
(2:20:51) Al: Why am I so bad with the name of these podcasts?
(2:20:53) Codey: Non not a cottagecore game, but that game of the year
(2:20:58) Codey: You
(2:21:00) Codey: You
(2:21:02) Al: Oh, I don’t even.
(2:21:06) Al: He didn’t come up with it, but he brought the video to our attention and I hate him for it.
(2:21:07) Micah: Okay, got it.
(2:21:11) Micah: Yeah, I can’t imagine I’m ever gonna say the term neighborvania ever again.
(2:21:18) Al: It’s so stupid. I just I hate it.
(2:21:19) Micah: But…
(2:21:20) Codey: However, we will be saying, we will be saying rusty-like for everything going forward.
(2:21:21) Micah: But it’s funny.
(2:21:24) Al: Yeah, fine. That’s a good Rusty like I think that’s everything.
(2:21:25) Micah: Absolutely.
(2:21:31) Codey: » Mm-hm.
(2:21:32) Al: Great, perfect. I can’t keep this going for another three minutes to make it the longest episode ever.
(2:21:37) Al: Sad for that, but there we are. Thank you for listening.
(2:21:41) Al: Listeners, thank you, Michael, for joining me. Thank you, Cody, for joining me.
(2:21:41) Micah: Yay.
(2:21:42) Codey: Yay
(2:21:44) Micah: Yeah, thanks for having me.
(2:21:45) Codey: Whoo
(2:21:46) Micah: Always a pleasure.
(2:21:48) Al: And until next time, have a good harvest.
(2:21:49) Codey: Have a good harvest
(2:21:50) Micah: Have a good at a harvest.
(2:21:52) Theme Tune: The harvest season is created by Al McKinley, with support from our patrons, including our
(2:22:01) Theme Tune: pro farmers Kevin, Stuart and Alisa.
(2:22:05) Theme Tune: Our art is done by Micah the Brave, and our music is done by Nick Burgess.
(2:22:09) Theme Tune: Feel free to visit our website harvestseason.club for show notes and links to things we discussed
(2:22:15) Theme Tune: in this episode.
(2:22:24) Micah: close to, you know, after three hours or whatever, close enough.
(2:22:28) Al: And I think you’ll find it’s actually four hours since we started.
(2:22:30) Codey: We did it, Reddit.
(2:22:35) Micah: Oh, my God, you’re right.
(2:22:35) Codey: It is, it is, yikes.
(2:22:38) Codey: I can’t feel my feet.
(2:22:41) Codey: The room I’m in has no heat and it is 28 degrees up.
(2:22:46) Micah: I am. Yeah, I’m freezing right now, too.
(2:22:48) Micah: It’s was it was like two today.
(2:22:50) Codey: I should have grabbed a heater.
(2:22:52) Micah: I don’t know where we’re at now, but it was
(2:22:53) Codey: Oh, you win, I’m at, you win, I’m at 28, so.
(2:22:54) Al: oh we oh you’re talking about farn height as well what is that you have to see that is minus 16
(2:22:55) Micah: almost below zero.
(2:23:00) Micah: Yes, yeah.
(2:23:03) Al: Woo-hoo-hoo!
(2:23:05) Micah: Yeah, it’s getting cold.

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