iPhone Fold Hype And Roast

SPEAKER_01 0:14

Not doing it. A new challenger approaches.

SPEAKER_05 0:18

Woo woo.

SPEAKER_03 0:22

Do you guys see the new iPhone fold?

SPEAKER_01 0:26

Stupid. So dumb. And it costs.

SPEAKER_04 0:30

Now alienated a third of our population. Congratulations.

SPEAKER_01 0:33

I know. But that's how you get clicks is we need to be infamous, not just famous.

SPEAKER_04 0:40

But we're so famous. We're so famous, we're in famous. In famous.

SPEAKER_01 0:45

I'm not sure. You know what, though? I saw a meme about that phone a couple hours ago, and it said, great, so now you have to sell two kidneys to get an iPhone.

SPEAKER_04 0:56

Yeah. Here's in somebody else's. That's fine. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:00

I just want to know what's the phone case gonna look like. Is the back of the phone still a solid back or is it screen all around?

SPEAKER_03 1:11

I would imagine the back back is a scre is a back of a phone, but when it's open, like the front is two screens. And when you open it, it's screens. But the back, I would imagine on the yeah, I don't know. And it looks really like an awkward size.

SPEAKER_01 1:28

Yeah, so the picture of the hand holding the phone had to have had Photoshopped added length to the fingers because all four fingers were the same length if you look at how they curve around the phone. And the phone is two of these. I'm like on my webcam. You can they can see my hand and fingers. You have to extend all my fingers by two and a half inches to hold that phone. So you know what they're gonna say about people who have that phone and hold it with one hand. They have big gloves? Yes, they have gigantic gloves. Exactly. Marcus, you have a face right now that says what has happened the first two minutes of our show is not what you were expecting. It's exactly what I was expecting.

SPEAKER_03 2:22

I'm glad we could meet expectations. You guys always meet my expectations. I I just saw it and I shook my head and I was like, okay. I want to see what a phone case looks like because I drop my phone on the regular. That phone just says to me, smash. Yeah. A friend of mine has the the Android the Galaxy. It's called the Galaxy Fold, right? Yeah, and that one is perfect. It's a phone, regular phone size, and then you open it and it's double phone size, but then it closes, and they came out with the perfect case for it.

SPEAKER_05 3:02

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_03 3:04

But that's like normal phone size, where when that phone is folded shut, it looks like it's odd-shaped iPhone.

SPEAKER_01 3:13

The other thing for me, I never have gone with the iPhone super big, largest size. I have an iPhone 17 Pro right now. And when I'm texting and I want to hit that bottom left corner to access the emoji keyboard, sometimes I can hit it, and sometimes the phone is slid just a little bit over on my pinky, and I can't reach it. And so I'm thinking about that extra wide phone screen just when it's still folded, and I'm thinking that is gonna be so awkward. It basically forces you to two-hand text on that phone. I do all of my texting by sliding, just one thumb.

SPEAKER_03 4:02

Oh, the swipe's called the swipe.

SPEAKER_01 4:06

Yeah, that's how I type all of my text. I don't. Yeah, I guess I'm just old. You definitely are, but

Spider-Man And Fandom Whiplash

SPEAKER_01 4:15

something far worse can happen besides just getting old. That's what the Force Awakens taught me. What's that? Oh, you can become Kylo Wren. Nobody wants to do that. Exactly. That's the point. Although Adam Driver is gonna be playing Mr. Sinister, which is pretty awesome. That's really awesome. So good for him. He has started a life of successfully villainizing every major fandom.

SPEAKER_03 4:45

And can we say that the Spider-Man, like the Tom Holland Spider-Man movies, brought back good Marvel movies? Since End War. Endgame. Endgame.

SPEAKER_01 5:01

There are a couple movies since Endgame that I've had a lot of fun with. I liked Doctor Strange and the Metaverse of Madness. It was good. Yeah, I'm a sucker for multiverses. I've been having a good time. But yeah, Spider-Man is probably the best superhero content-wise in my lifetime. It's always for me back and forth between Batman and Spider-Man, but Spider-Man is doing stuff that Batman franchise wishes it was doing right now.

SPEAKER_02 5:31

The new one was really good. Which one? What's the newest movie? Brand New Day? Yeah. Yeah, loved it. It was really good.

SPEAKER_01 5:43

Did you see Spider-Man Doritos? Nope. No? Really good.

SPEAKER_03 5:51

But okay.

Dungeon Crawler Carl Audiobook Love

SPEAKER_03 5:54

I'm dating back two episodes. We were talking about books, Doc. Remember? And you were people were suggesting books to you, and they mentioned that dungeon crawler Carl. Yep. Okay. So I'm on book three because I've been audiobooking it in my ear. You need like this. If there was ever a book series that was written for you, it's this. The entire aliens come take over. If you want to survive, you have to go into a dungeon. And everything is about leveling up and like everything. And now that they've gotten to this floor, they can get their own stronghold. It's okay. Yeah. You definitely need to listen, or listening is the way because they say the audiobook is way better than the actual like reading the book. Okay. Because the guy doing it's like having not Mark Hamill. Oh my god, Mark Thompson do the narration.

SPEAKER_01 6:57

I love that we're doing a viral fan campaign to get Mark Hamill involved in Dungeon Crawler Carl. Well, Mark Hamill's already the best Joker ever. Yeah, I think so. And also the thing about animated series, and this is true in Star Wars as well, is whoever voices characters in animated series end up being close to or definitely the quintessential representation of that character. Because if you take the Joker, it's like, okay, so you're a Jack Nicholson person. You have two hours of content of Jack Nicholson's Joker. But when you say what Mark Hamill has done as the Joker, you have the entire animated series, all the Joker episodes, you have the Arkham saga in the video game world, right? There's so much more Mark Hamill Joker to consume than Heath Ledger, Jack Nicholson, Jared Leto. It's not even close. It's hours and hours of more content. Like with Anakin Skywalker, you can love Hayden Christensen for the couple hours in Revenge of the Sith, Attack of the Clones, and some of the TV shows. But Matt Lanter has hundreds of hours of being Anakin Skywalker for us. That's just a fun thing to think about. I loved it. I loved it so much.

Star Wars Catch-Up And Quality Fatigue

SPEAKER_01 8:29

It made me care about Cassian Andor in a way that I didn't. And my wife, even as soon as we finished last episode, was like, we gotta watch Rogue One because I don't remember it. And I'm like, I am always down to watch Rogue One. So we watched that within 24 hours of her saying that in the middle of a work day. I just grabbed my laptop and was like, we're gonna watch this now. So cool. That was a lot of fun. And I also finally went back and watched Mandalorian and Grogu. And that's a decent, decent movie. It could have been a Disney Plus thing. It did go to theaters. I'm glad it exists. It's a nice little Star Wars season.

SPEAKER_04 9:12

It was, it's it was season four of The Mandalorian.

unknown 9:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 9:17

And they released it in the theater because they couldn't make it into enough episodes.

SPEAKER_03 9:21

So it was that Doritos, and I heard it would be it was going to be cheaper to just make a two-hour movie than it would have been to pay them for all the episodes of the show. And there wasn't enough content.

SPEAKER_01 9:38

It works as a movie though. It's not in the mythology of an episode one, two, three, four, five, six kind of thing, but I've seen so many worse movies on streaming services this month compared to that. So I'm glad I'm slowly getting caught up to where I can say I've seen all of the Star Wars.

SPEAKER_03 10:02

Yeah, I really need a Star Wars movie to get me hooked again. I feel like there's been so much bad Star Wars for so long that I'm just like it was almost like, and I'll say even Marvel. After Endgame, like you had such a high, like you were at such a high, you were at the top of Mount Everest of quality.

SWTOR Difficulty Scaling And Nostalgia

SPEAKER_03 10:32

After that, Destiny 2. Like you you finished a saga of something that they've cut been culminating to for 10 years, and then they expect, hey, we're gonna put mediocre content out, and it's gonna just capture you again. You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 10:51

It's hard for me to be sucked into it. Is that what happened with Dark Wars the Old Republic and Knights of the Eternal Throne? That was so good. It really was that I remember when I was doing my master mode run of those chapter stories, and beating Valkorion at the end was just such a cool feeling to know that there is no other difficulty left for this story.

SPEAKER_03 11:25

I was reading something that the new content, you're gonna be able to scale difficulty.

SPEAKER_04 11:32

Yeah, they're coming out with a classic mode, which is I have not tested. I think part of it's on the PTS is scaled to like original launch difficulty, is kind of the intent. And then there's going to be a more difficult hard mode, and it's more scaling damage output of enemies and scaling down, scaling up their damage output and scaling down your healing received. And with the way the toggles are supposed to work, just say you're doing we're doing the same content, you could be on classic mode, and I could be on hard mode doing the same stuff. Interesting.

SPEAKER_01 12:19

So it's Knights of the Elden Ring public.

SPEAKER_03 12:25

I think it's a good idea. If they can knock it out of the park, even just the classic mode, because in the beginning there was no level scaling.

SPEAKER_04 12:35

So when you actually scaling didn't come till way after because when people were going back and clearing older content on more easy difficulties or at higher levels, right? The whole was it 4.0 expansion stuff where you could go in and four man most all ops.

SPEAKER_01 12:54

Yeah, those were the good days when you could go back with your level 60 character to Korraban and kill everything with one hit of that just basic lightning because you're the Sith Master on the Apprentice Planet. I miss that stuff. But the goal at that era of the game was how do we make all the heroics and all the dailies replayable for people at endgames so that there's the feeling of more content and more things to grind. And then that became the solid experience of the game for the last six years of me when I was still in the game every day. I think it's cool to add the difficulty levels because I love the level one to fifty experience. And I believe you create a character from the beginning fresh and put it into this mode.

SPEAKER_04 13:50

Yes, it has to be a fresh character, yes.

SPEAKER_00 13:53

Yeah.

Elden Ring Restart And Rune Grinding

SPEAKER_01 13:55

So I want to tell specifically you, Marcus, what I've been up to in video games because I know Doritos knows already. All right. I have played two different games since the last time we spoke. Okay. Would you like to guess what they are?

SPEAKER_03 14:14

Star Wars, The Old Republic, and I can't pick two because I'm torn between two, but they're the same. So it's either Final Fantasy XIV or Final Fantasy VII, rebirth, retake, remake, whatever.

SPEAKER_01 14:29

Wow, you got zero out of two, correct? Ooh. Yeah. I created a new character in Elden Ring on my PS5. But you have your computer. I know, but I wanted to play in the living room. Oh I play on a couch. Come on. Yeah. I was thinking about that whole theory that the DLC expansion is harder for me because I'm on my sixth playthrough. Yep. I didn't buy the DLC yet for PS5, but I am playing with the Tarnished Edition DLC. So I was able to create an IDIS Knight. And I've stuck with that sword. I have a different shield, but still that sword and shield combo all the way to where I'm at. I'm officially farther than I was on the PS5 before I switched to PC all those years ago. And I've beaten through Carrion Manor and I'm at the end of Ray Lucaria Academy. Which one's Carrion Manor? It's the one on the northwest side of Larry of the Lakes.

SPEAKER_03 15:46

Yeah, it's not when you're fighting Moon Lady uh Ranala. Renala's Ray Lucary. Yes. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:53

Yes. I got them mixed up. I'm at Renala also. I haven't killed her yet. I've gotten her down to 15%. I totally could if I went and I focused on it just a little bit longer, but I also am grinding to try to get where I can use a colossal sword because I just want to be able to jump and heavy strike her little children and destroy them in one smash. I think that will make the fight a lot easier. I thought it was really easy for me. We're all good at different things, Marcus. Oh, but I'm not with a very heavy magic build yet. Once I get a little bit more points to spend and I can make intelligence where I need it to be, the game's gonna be over. But right now I'm actually grinding and I'm enjoying it. If we say level 150 is where you're gonna go after the end of the game, I'm not even halfway there yet.

SPEAKER_03 16:55

I'm excited to hear this. What is your experience like doing it again from the start?

SPEAKER_01 17:03

I'm forcing myself to play mostly with a sword. I am still summoning my wolf friends during boss fights because I love them. They I probably should name the wolves at this point because they're such an integral part of my social game. Larry Curly and Mo. We're not naming them. We're gonna go epic or something, like anime heroes or something, if we go that route. I'm having a lot of fun. Something I can do while I'm watching Raw or SmackDown and just have my portal have that boulder run down the hill after me and get 2,000 runes every 30 seconds and just meditate and level up my runes and I did all the murder and stuff to open up Mowin Palace. Yeah, so you gotta get to the cliff. You just gotta run for it. Yeah, I've made it to the cliff. That's how I've been doing most of my grinding. But I need oh, the cliff in Mowin Palace. Yeah, I haven't gotten there yet. I am so weak that those zombies take a lot of hits for me to take them out, and it is not worth it time wise. It's fair to just go to Kalid and let the boulder roll down the hill.

SPEAKER_03 18:23

Yeah, but I'm pretty sure if you just jump on your horse, you can run all the way to that cliff. And oh, in the palace?

SPEAKER_01 18:32

Yeah, in that zone. Oh. I'll have to look up. I've never used that grinding location.

SPEAKER_03 18:40

So you know where you do the sword and you kill all those people?

SPEAKER_01 18:44

Yeah, I don't have that sword yet.

SPEAKER_03 18:46

And you shoot your bow and arrow at this bird and you hit the bird and it runs right off the cliff, and you get 8,612 runes every time he jumps off. If you use one of the bones, the gold beat, you get 13,000.

SPEAKER_01 19:01

But the other game that I've been playing is Mistfall Hunter.

Mistfall Hunter And Proximity Chat

unknown 19:04

That's Mistfall Hunter.

SPEAKER_02 19:06

Do you know that one? Nope. I'm looking it up right now.

SPEAKER_01 19:10

It's the newer one.

SPEAKER_04 19:12

When it comes out month ago, July 29th. A month ago.

SPEAKER_03 19:16

It is a extraction shooter dark fantasy online co-op game.

unknown 19:22

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 19:23

It's what Night Rain should have been. It's what Night Rain should have been. That's exactly right. I create a sorcerer. No. And yep. Yep. And you go into these realms, it's timed. There's other people playing in them. They can try to kill you. You can play solo or you can do a three-person team. So the reason I chose this game is because Ven and Kat, our good friends from the Old Republic, said that they can't play together because there's no option to group up as a duo. You're either one person or three. So I said, when I get a chance, I will buy the game and I'll I would love to be that third person. So we haven't gotten to do a game session as a team yet, but uh you get XP even if you fail to escape, which is cool. Uh I did escape one out of my first three missions. First two I failed, third one I got out. And it's it seems fun. There's different classes, and the way the skill trees work, I really can see that they will all end up playing very differently.

SPEAKER_00 20:38

So is it souls-like?

SPEAKER_01 20:43

I would say that's what it's going for. Yeah. It's a central room, it's a female guide that you give your XP points to and she levels you up. Then you go talk to this bird owl creature that talks to you, and he sends you into your missions. And the maps have different spawn points, so you don't end up entering the map at the same place. They have bosses in them and they have monsters, but there's also other players. So if you run into them, they probably are gonna try to kill you, so you need to take them out. You could work together, that's always an option.

SPEAKER_03 21:21

Is there a proximity chat?

SPEAKER_01 21:24

Yeah, but I have it turned off. I don't want to talk to anybody. Leave me alone.

SPEAKER_03 21:28

The whole point of an extraction shooter is to be able to have that proximity chat on. So then when somebody you're coming around the corner, be like, hey man, I'm not trying to kill you, just try to kill this boss. Want to team up? And they either kill you and loot you, or you just go. You not having your mic on, they're like, This guy, we gotta kill this guy.

SPEAKER_01 21:49

Oh, so I've made it the problem. Yes, you are the problem. It's a way to play the game, yeah. It's like in Fortnite, the Dululu mode. I didn't even understand what that was until I saw someone streaming it. And I was like, oh, this is a lot more fun, lighthearted than I thought. And so the one time I did a match that way, I was just being a colossal jerk to everyone. So I was like, oh, enemy, I will kill you. Right. So funny.

SPEAKER_00 22:26

Oh. I'm the one with oppositional defiant disorder.

GTA 6 Hype And PTO Chaos

SPEAKER_01 22:36

Alright, there are two gaming culture topics that I want to talk about this week. The question is, which fandom do we want to start with? So do we want to go with the fandom that gets mentioned on page one of the gamers journey, but not very much the rest of the book? Or do we want to go with the fandom that gets mentioned the thirdmost amount of times out of anything in the book? Yes. Begin at the beginning. Alright. So, believe it or not, I mentioned Grand Theft Auto on the very first page of my book. Because I thought it would create a really interesting contrast for this idea that we're not just talking about fantasy games. We're not just talking about the Mushroom Kingdom. We're also talking about games with an edge to them and games that have a story, even if you don't think of them like their mythology. So Grand Theft Auto 6 comes out in two months from now. Conspiracy theory, it's going to get delayed again.

SPEAKER_03 23:46

Keep going.

SPEAKER_01 23:47

It might get delayed again, and it might want to when we get to story number two. But let's assume that it doesn't get delayed and it comes out in November when half of the country, by the way, has already taken PTO for that week, and they're estimating it's going to cost the economy billions of dollars to cover the work that's not being done on release day. Isn't that fun?

SPEAKER_03 24:14

Hey, Doritos, clearly these people aren't real gamers because don't they know that launch day never goes well? They're hopeful. Yeah. Let them experience broken servers and not being able to play the game, and you wasted a PTO day.

SPEAKER_01 24:36

That's not the story I thought we were going to cover, but I can absolutely see that being what happens in November. But actually, that's not what I wanted to talk about with GTA 6. There is a preview video they debuted on Netflix that showed off a little bit about what the game is going to be. Have either of you watched that?

SPEAKER_03 24:58

So I have I've seen that and I've seen all the Cyber Leak stuff. So I I'm following GTA 6 pretty much. I'm following it because it's going to be probably the biggest game ever made. Yeah. But it's I'm not buying just for the record, I'm not buying it. Really? Why? I played Grand Theft Auto 3, loved it, and it's not for me. Okay. You know what I mean? Like I I can appreciate the quality and the spec that scope of that game, but honestly, if I have a choice to play Grand Theft Auto 6 or Ocarina of Time, I'm gonna buy Ocarina of Time.

SPEAKER_01 25:43

Why not both, Marcus? Okay, this is fine. This is going exactly the direction I want it to go. Oh, wait a minute.

SPEAKER_03 25:51

Yeah, okay. I'm a 43-year-old man who gets maybe 20 minutes a day, if I'm lucky, to be able to play a game. I don't desire. I'm not gonna play a game anymore that I don't want to play. That's why I'm not gonna play. And because Grand Theft Auto is not coming out for the computer, and I refuse to play Grand Theft Auto on an Xbox or a PlayStation.

SPEAKER_01 26:20

So is the PC version coming out next year? Is that the deal? There's rumors that it's never coming out for the PC. Oh, that is really interesting.

SPEAKER_03 26:31

But it's complete and utter bullshit because they know that if they come out with it on the PC, they're just gonna turn on the print. They can release it two years later, and the money guns are just gonna start shooting hundreds all over again.

SPEAKER_01 26:45

Yeah, especially once they get what do they call the the cards in that game that are basically like the the in-game currency star cards or whatever. Like I don't know. GTA makes so much money every day.

SPEAKER_03 27:01

But that's the thing, too, is on launch, the GTA online community is bigger than the actual game. You know, I've watched people that I know stream and they do real RP. Like they'll be streaming and they do push to talk in the game. One guy's a cop, and like he'll push to talk in the game and he'll pull somebody, like he'll legit pull somebody over that's driving their car for speeding. Hi, I'm officer, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. SM Playboy, he's the attorney in the game. Like, he legit goes to courthouse every day at a certain time because he has cases and he can't break character.

SPEAKER_00 27:45

Right.

SPEAKER_03 27:47

It's yeah, and in there, so the big scandal with that is so GTA Online's not launching with the game, right? Right. Fine. The big question is are they gonna charge for GTA online or are they gonna require you to buy their sub-service, that $8 a month service that they're offering, in order to unlock GTA Online and keep it and make it like MMO subscription?

SPEAKER_01 28:17

Why wouldn't they do that? That's an obvious yes. Even if you lose some players, the amount of money you'll get from people who decide to stay involved in that is life-changing. Yeah, millions. Okay. Well, all of us have played Star Wars The Republic, and we all have had the chance to choose to romance a companion. Marcus, have you had a romance with a companion in a video game?

SPEAKER_03 28:52

All right, well, you're in multiple games. Are we talking Star Wars in or in other games?

SPEAKER_01 28:57

Any game like Baldur's Gate, Persona, Miranda in Mass Effective. Yeah. All right. Okay, so all of us apparently are micro-cheating according to the viral scandal debate that's going on in social media since the Grand Theft Auto 6 Netflix video came out.

Is Game Romance Microcheating

SPEAKER_01 29:19

There are people online that I'm assuming do not themselves play video games that are saying that if their significant others play Grand Theft Auto 6, they will be cheating on them because the two protagonists of that game have the option to either be platonic friends or romantic partners. And I just want to ask us today on the gaming persona, what do we think about this incredible perspective?

SPEAKER_04 29:50

It is a point of view. Yeah. And like Obi-Wan says, lots of things in life depend on your point of view.

SPEAKER_00 29:59

Ooh, paraphrase, of course.

SPEAKER_01 30:03

That is such a backpedal conversation in Return of the Jedi, but I love that you brought that in because that gives us a lot more ideas to play with here.

SPEAKER_04 30:17

It's a video game, so uh is it displaying insecurity by somebody or fear by somebody else? I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 30:28

Around two or three years ago, I had an episode with Jenny where we played the song Me or the PS5, and we talked about that that whole thing was going around social media with that song and the lyrics, and basically a girlfriend that's saying, You can't give me enough attention if you're too busy having video games as a hobby. And I feel like this perspective comes from that same subset of the overall population. It is a point of view. I can't imagine any other girl game players that I know having this point of view.

SPEAKER_03 31:17

Let me ask you a question. Okay. You're playing Mass Effect 2, you're sitting on your couch playing your PlayStation, and your wife is sitting right next to you. And you have the option to start making out with your video game person. Okay. Are you gonna make out with that person in the game in front of your wife? And okay, and wait before you answer that. But if you say no, then it could be considered like a weird way of cheating. Like, how about this? I'll say myself, if I'm playing a game, Star Wars The Old Republican, do you want to marry Lana? Which I did in the game, and I'm sitting next to my wife, I'm probably not gonna marry Lana because I'm married to my wife. Yeah, it would be weird to me, or in heavy rain, like when there's like the option of like going under the girl's shirt and grabbing some titty and all this stuff, and then you end up banging on the on the bed. I wouldn't have done any of that sitting next to my wife.

SPEAKER_01 32:27

Okay, I do all of that sitting next to my wife, and if I were to pass on those opportunities, she'd probably make fun of me and be like, Why didn't you go for it? There's a fun story. This would have been, oh my gosh, like 15, 16 years ago. I'm playing heavy rain in my living room. I'm the one with the controller. My wife is there, and Gene, former co-host of the show, is in our living room. And it's that scene. It's the sex scene where what are their names? Ethan and and the girl, other girl protagonist, and they have the opportunity to have a sex scene, and I missed one of the reaction commands that would have allowed me to grab her butt in the middle, and I got ridiculed for years about how I was too scared to grab her butt. Like it became a an inside joke and a running gag of the fact that I didn't perfect that sex scene because of the pressure of having to hit those buttons in front of everybody. I've had some pause in my head when I've been playing Baldur's Gate 3 in the living room because the way sex scenes happen in that game, I feel like that could be embarrassing if my wife walked in and just saw those scenes out of context because it's bizarre fantasy sex and it's different. But I see what you're saying, Marcus, but I think it depends on the relationship. I know that my wife plays video games and goes after all the romance options, too.

SPEAKER_03 34:15

I think that for me is the big thing. My wife is not a gamer, has like I'll play Mario when the new Mario game comes out, she'll play it for a week. I'll spend the 60 bucks or 70 bucks, whatever it is. Now with Switch 2, it's probably $400 for the new Mario game. And she'll play it for a week, but like she's not a gamer.

SPEAKER_01 34:37

Do you think that it would be as controversial or as worthy a debate topic if people who play games like the three of us say that my wife can't watch Love Island because they're just drooling over guys with abs and that's microcheating?

SPEAKER_03 34:58

Well, I don't care about that because that's just trashy TV, I guess. Hey, but but where I'm coming from, though, like I do, we're not saying that because it's ridiculous. But I but if but I was playing a video game, if I was watching my wife play whatever game, and there was the option for her to hook up with this romance, and I'm sitting there watching, going, that guy don't look like me.

SPEAKER_00 35:26

And I'd be like, uh I don't know how I would feel.

SPEAKER_01 35:34

I'm I thought this was gonna go a very different direction.

SPEAKER_04 35:38

Does your does your wife go to work?

SPEAKER_01 35:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 35:42

Are there men at work? I'm sure. Then why don't you have the same feelings when she goes to work?

SPEAKER_01 35:48

Because I'm not there watching it? Because there's no option to rapidly spin a control stick at work. No quick time events.

SPEAKER_03 35:56

Yeah, and I'm not there, right? I'm not there to witness that shit, right? If I because you can see it then.

SPEAKER_01 36:02

That's correct. Oh, that's even weirder of a conversation because then it's like, how much oversight do you put into your romantic partner before you accept object permanence is a thing? Oh.

SPEAKER_04 36:19

Is the concept of are you not trusting the person with the virtual romance situation? Is that because is that what they're calling the microcheating? Or is it the fact that they are now being pulled away for their gaming time, whatever that is, however many hours that is, because we all know that when you get into a game like that, that you get lost, it's the whole concept of just oh, just one more objective, just one more mission. And the next thing you know, six hours are gone, you've missed your day, dinner's cold, and uh, she is now in a huff in the bed, and you're sleeping on the couch.

SPEAKER_01 36:56

I just want to say, as a counselor, when I'm talking to guys that play video games, they frequently are also the person who cleans the house, who cooks, who pays the bills, who picks up the kids from school. And some of these responsibilities, they're not even shared responsibilities. It's a hundred percent to zero percent. And I wonder if inside this debate is what you're hitting on, Doritos, that there's a fear that GTA 6 will have so much content and such a pull for investing your time that now that balance of responsibility has to be shared. But that's not the direction I thought I was gonna go with this. I really was just going at the is it okay to practice pickup lines on a virtual character.

SPEAKER_03 37:59

Yes, so it is okay. I what I'm saying is I would just feel awkward if I was playing in my living room next to my wife and it was a romance scene, and I'm like playing in XX, and I turn and look at her, and she's just mash the circle, Marcus. I think it has to do it has to do with people who don't play video games versus people that do.

SPEAKER_01 38:28

Yeah, and games that are as huge as Grand Theft Auto bring in a lot of commentary from people who aren't on the in-group of video game culture now feeling like their perspective needs to be part of the conversation. I think this debate is one of those things where it's like you are not getting what this activity actually is at all.

SPEAKER_03 38:53

But I believe that if your husband or boyfriend is a gamer, and when their game comes out every year, and they're like the new Call of Duty as an example comes out, and they basically are glued to that for the next 90 days because they want to grind out the prestige and all that stuff, and all the kits and all the weapons, and the girl feels like their second fiddle to the games. I can understand how a female or a male can feel that way. They asked.

SPEAKER_01 39:29

Where do we draw the line between our favorite things being

Time Balance And Healthy Gaming

SPEAKER_01 39:34

good for us and healthy and being unhealthy for us? And it's about your obligations, your responsibility to other people, and understanding your time. And just if I know I have to teach class at 8:30 or I'm recording the podcast at nine, that's gonna determine do I let myself have an adult beverage for dinner, or am I doing the zero calorie soda, or am I just making another pot of coffee? Some of those answers are fine for a professional environment, some of them are not. And there's a difference between a night that's completely free to me, a night where I'm podcasting where one or two drinks could be okay at dinner, and then just do the podcast in two hours, and then being in front of my students, that would not be the right choice, right? And so video games are the same thing. If you have four hours to play, then play. But if people are gonna be missing you during that four hours, maybe you don't actually have four hours. And if you're skipping your visit to the gym to play four hours, maybe you should go to the gym first, come back and play only for 90 minutes.

SPEAKER_05 40:49

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 40:49

Right? Like, if you are gonna hate yourself for not doing the gym after this video game sit-down binge, listen to what your mind and your body's telling you, right? It already knows what the right answer is to this. And when you ignore that voice, that's when your life is falling out of balance. That includes your romantic partner, that includes your family and your friends. And you already know just by asking the question out loud, you just have to listen to that answer. Unless you're addicted, and then that voice is probably telling you the wrong thing, and then you might need therapy. But that's how I've come to see it. That's what really, outside of all the YouTube videos and Twitch streams and podcast episodes, that's what Dr. Gamology actually is. Just so everyone knows. It's about a healthy approach to how we play video games. The topics like this one are just a way to have a conversation and hang out with friends. I'm glad you brought that up, Marcus.

SPEAKER_03 41:55

Everybody plays their games for a certain reason, but I find if I'm playing games, unless I'm playing a multiplayer game where me, you, and Doritos have a common goal to beat Hammer Station because it's really difficult, that is the only time I'm social when gaming, right? It's almost like my private time when I'm gaming. Just like podcasting, I'm talking to you two knuckleheads, but it's also this is like my private, I'm gonna call it guy time, right? This is like bro night.

SPEAKER_00 42:38

Interesting.

SPEAKER_01 42:40

This is like the third time in a row that I've talked to you that you mentioned doing hammer station too, just anecdotally. I think you really miss hammer station.

SPEAKER_04 42:50

He misses it. He so totally misses going through hammer station.

SPEAKER_03 42:52

I as like I've been playing this Final Fantasy game, but I have been reading a lot about Swotor, and I'll be honest, I figured out what's keeping me from playing it. The Steam Deck. Yeah. Like right now, coming to my office has been hard for me because of how busy I am.

SPEAKER_01 43:17

You knew about your time and your obligations and responsibilities to other people, and you showed up where you were supposed to, Marcus.

SPEAKER_03 43:25

It's unlocked something that is not available for me on the computer. Where if you play on the Steam Deck or a PlayStation Portal or Switch 2, you can play that anywhere, even if it's for five minutes or 20 minutes or two hours. Where you have a computer or your PlayStation, you actually have to go and sit in a location in order to be able to do it. That's true. But I want to say one more thing about the Grand Theft Auto micro cheating. I think if you're playing the story of a game, it's not like you can it's not. I think you're just following the story of the game. Right? If you choose to romance somebody, you're following the story of a game. Because usually if you romance somebody, there's a reward behind it. Whether it's an achievement or a special piece of armor or a relic or something that you're gonna get because you romance somebody. Usually you get something from it.

SPEAKER_01 44:37

I'm thinking through a couple of the big games with this social option. And I think most of the time it's just different dialogue in the game, like the the games that I'm thinking about. That if you chose the platonic option, all the points would be the same on that relationship meter. It's just it would be more friendship and focusing on the mission instead of affection.

SPEAKER_03 45:08

Yeah. But usually if you uh if you romance somebody there's and you are successful, you get an achievement.

SPEAKER_00 45:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 45:20

Is that how Mass Effect does it?

SPEAKER_00 45:22

Yep. Okay. I'll have to pay closer attention to the case.

SPEAKER_04 45:30

Now what is that? That's where on select, if you have romanced them, you get a certain abilities to go on a quote unquote date night with a romanced companion. Oh, that's so fun.

SPEAKER_03 45:48

You gotta keep the spark burning.

Buying Games Late And Backlog Reality

SPEAKER_03 45:51

I'm gonna switch gears a little bit because I want to get your opinion on gaming. A game. So I'm gonna lay out a scenario. So you have two games that you really want to play. They come out one week apart from each other, right? And sure, you can buy both, but you don't have enough time to play both. Right? Do you still buy both because you want to support the studios that make the two games that you've been waiting for just unfortunate that it comes out within a week of each other? Or do you buy one and when you finally beat that one, hopefully the other one is on sale?

SPEAKER_00 46:36

I'll let Doritos go first. Both on my wish list, I'm waiting for them both to go on sale.

SPEAKER_01 46:44

I've started a new practice for myself where I don't buy games when they come out, I buy them when I'm ready to play them.

SPEAKER_02 46:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 46:54

The reason I just bought Mistfall Hunter this past week instead of a month ago was just I couldn't wrap my head around the idea of starting a new game until Sunday afternoon. And I was like, I can do this for my Monday stream. If it's a company, if it's a studio that I love supporting because they've given me so many things to think about and feel and talk about, like Square NX, I'm gonna buy Final Fantasy Resonance day one it comes out, even if I don't get around to playing it for three weeks. But if I'm busy with Ocarina of Time remake at the beginning of November when GTA 6 comes out, I'm not buying GTA 6 until I'm ready to play it. And by the time I finish with Ocarina of Time and feel good about where I'm at Elden Ring and level up my next DPS class in Final Fantasy XIV, and so on and so forth, GTA 6 might have been out for three years by the time it gets a chance for me to sit down and try it. And by that point, I might explain to myself, oh, everyone's moved on. Nobody cares if I play this game anymore. And I don't care if I play this game anymore, and so I don't play this game. So your question is when that happens, it could result in me never playing the second game. Yeah. What are the two games that you have in your mind that you're thinking about with this question?

SPEAKER_03 48:37

Castlevania Belmont's Curse comes out the week before Final Fantasy Resonance.

SPEAKER_01 48:43

You're a diehard Castlevania fan, Marcus. So that's a really important game.

SPEAKER_03 48:53

That's the one game I've been looking forward to. If there's a game that I'm gonna come down to my computer to play, it's gonna be that one. And then the other one is I might actually buy another Switch 2. So Ocarina of Time is coming out with their own Switch 2 console, and my buddy James, who is out of his mind when it comes to like special editions that he loves, so basically I told him I said, if you buy the new Switch 2, I'll buy your old one. Because my son has a Switch 2. But if you guys know kids and their mental, their mentality, if as soon as I put in Ocarina of Time, put in the fake cartridge and click go on the switch to, he's immediately gonna say, Dad, I want to play WWE on the Switch 2. What am I gonna say to him? You know what I mean? Get your own switch too, kid. It's Zelda time, but it's his, right? I might get my own switch too just for Ocarino of time.

SPEAKER_01 50:01

I did see when it comes to WWE, Danhausen got added to the game. Yeah. So I'm gonna have to download that again and check it out. He's like my favorite.

SPEAKER_03 50:14

I really like Danhausen, but I think instead of you are cursed, it should be continue the journey.