April Exclusive Podcast Questions

Hi guys - I'm super late for this (I'll probably ask again next time). Any chance you guys can break the RPG only rule, and play/discuss Hollow Knight? The lore is incredible.

Michael R

I see them boulder shoulders Mike, you looking jacked! How do you find the balance between podcasting, playing video games, taking notes for in-depth analysis and still looking that jacked.

Hi guys, this is the first time I participate! I'm curious, have you ever played the Baten Kaitos games? I've heard some members of the team behind them came from Xenogears! Not many people talk about these games, but I love the story, characters and the card game system they have (even though at first glance I didn't like it).

I have read and heard alot of people refering to RPGs that got them through There tough teens and so forth. FFVII tend to be mentioned often. For me this was the case. Though I wonder if it was the story, a distraction from pain, escapism, the characters or all of the above. Though one question for me is if it is a healthy help or if it is a type of procrastination? Was this the case for you guys, if so, which game and why, was there a game or games that helped you whilst growing up?

Tomas

Interesting idea. King K does some good retrospectives and I'd listen Pat Holleman talk about pretty much anything. Also I hear that Malgadar guy is pretty interesting.

Japanese game developers ran headfirst into this problem all throughout the 2000s. Devil May Cry 4 tried replacing Dante with the much more surly Nero in the hopes that it would appeal more to Western gamers, then they just rebooted DMC a few years later with Dante being turned into an initially-apathetic and foul-mouthed delinquent; Resident Evil 5 and 6 tried turning the series into Call of Duty, and FFXIII's battle pacing and linear hallway designs were apparently inspired by first-person shooters. (That last part boggles my mind because, in thinking back over all the FPSs I've played in my life, I don't recall ever once thinking to myself: "Boy, I sure do love running in a straight line for 50 hours! They should make an entire game out of this!") Suffice to say, all of the above games were met with mixed responses. Yosuke Matsuda is actually very well-informed when he says the above, if the Japanese gaming renaissance since the mid-2010s is anything to go by.

Recently, the president of Square-Enix came out and said that copying Western games will mean Japan won’t be able to make good ones. What are your thoughts?

I would be curious to hear you talk about the struggles one faces when they decide to turn an artistic passion into a job. I know you work another job to really pay the bills (a “survival job” as my actor buddies and I always referred to them) but RA is effectively a job as well. You’re not just doing it for fun, it has become a career in and of itself. There are many good things and bad things that occur once you turn an artistic passion into a career, and it’s something I don’t see often discussed. Healthy ways of dealing with the (often self generated) pressure, how it affects your passion, the line between creative fulfillment and business practicality etc. I know it’s something I’ve struggled with in my acting career, and I would be very interested to hear your thoughts on it from your side of the creative aisle.

Do you see yourselves approaching more games that you may have no or little love for with this project? FF XIII is one of my favourites within the series and i know many find it abbrasive but following 8 and 10 i feel it might make a good candidate going forwards. Additionally, I know this is a writing themed podcast but you very rarely go into the gameplay and im curious as to why that is? I appreciate how focussed it makes the pods feel but touching on things like difficulty spikes, weird mechanics and odd side things can make for some interesting discussion as well and i was wondering if you would consider including a segment on gameplay perhaps just in the conclusion episodes. Thanks guys!

Blake Walden

I would love to see more guests on the game analysis podcast like you did on the Xenogears series. Maybe you could ask other YouTubers to join for an episode of their favorite games? Or just let the "guest" have a prerecorded clip where they express their feelings/analysis of a specific design choice. Some YouTubers that come into mind could be SuperDerek, HappyConsoleGamer, KingK and Pelvic Gaming. Any thoughts?

Toni Gröndahl

Casen, what is your top 5 favorite video games?

Toni Gröndahl

While I listen to your podcast I always try keep the things you say in mind while I write my script for my video game. Through the years I've seen that quite many gamers still associate some amount of shame with their favorite hobby. As "escapism" for example. I would love to write a story which uses that guilt associated with gaming against the player which even attacks the player on that in meta level. Any ideas how one could achieve this? Something that came into my mind is like Chrono Trigger's Trial event. My game is inspired by the classic 16 JRPGs like Chrono Trigger and Terranigma so it's in that vein. Any ideas from anyone? Would love to hear all of your ideas

Toni Gröndahl

My question is an old one which is often debated among critics, and I was wondering what your thoughts are. My question is: are numerical scores good for reviews or not? I ask because I've personally found that numerical scores tend to impede readers' understanding of what the critic thinks for a variety of reasons: One is the fact that few seem to agree on what counts as a "high" or a "low" score. Most audiences seem to believe that a 6 is a bad score (since that's how the education system works), whereas a lot of critics believe that a 5 out of 10 is merely "average." (The fact that Zelda fans DDoSed Jim Sterling's website over their "negative" 7/10 review for Breath of the Wild is proof of this communication failure.) The other, more important problem with numerical scores is that, as they are sometimes used, they only tell us how well "put together" the work is--like a puzzle: the pieces (e.g., the plot, characters, cinematography, dialogue) all need to fit together in order to create a coherent image. However, I've often found that a viewer's enjoyment of a work is not solely determined by how well the pieces "fit together," but more by whether it succeeds at "drawing them in." For example, Final Fantasy XV has more imperfections than XIII, but I still enjoy the former because I CARED about its characters and their journey, whereas I felt absolutely no emotional attachment to XIII's plot, world or characters). But this perspective, I believe, cannot be expressed numerically while still being fair. It would imply that works which are technically well-made but emotionally unengaging would get an automatic 0/10. I realize this is an unpopular opinion, but I personally did not enjoy Akira for example, because it didn't get me to feel anything other than apathy. I didn't CARE what happened to its characters or their world because I couldn't find anything worth investing in. Yet giving it a 0/10 still seems unfair given its technical accomplishments (e.g., the animation and voice acting). All told, I don't think numerical scores can clearly and explicitly communicate whether a given work will appeal to certain viewers. Viewers engage with media for a variety of different reasons, and what some find engaging, others might find boring. Thus, judging a work based on how well put together it is, rather than explaining WHY it appeals to person X but not person Y, seems a bit counterproductive to me. Any thoughts on this? Why do we keep using numerical scores if they arguably seem to obstruct the conversation, rather than facilitate it?

Have you guys ever had any interest in Gundam? Also, did you guys see the Made in Abyss game trailer?

Chase