Game Scoop! 839: This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Games

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I'm your host, Damon Hadfield. Joining me here in studio is Nick Lamont. I'm back, baby. We're also joined by Sam Claiborne. Happy Scoop Year, everybody. And Mark Medina. Happy 2026. I'm here, Damon. And we've got a great show for you this week. Great show to kick off the year. We'll be talking about, I think, Sam beat Metroid. And someone from inside Nintendo is throwing a little bit of shade Samus' way over the Switch 2's holiday season. We've also got a new trailer for Resident Evil Requiem. Avow was just announced for PS5 moments ago. Just moments ago. And we also have some speedrunner news that I'm looking forward to sharing with Mark. But first, what were the most popular games on PlayStation 5 in 2025? Well, second verse, same as the first. They were the exact same games in the exact same order as 2024. Wow, really? This info comes from Matt Piscitella from Serkana, the artist formerly known as MPD. And he shared on Blue Sky the top five most played games on U.S. PlayStation 5's. Fortnite, Call of Duty, GTA 5, Roblox, and Minecraft. If you compare that to 2024, it was Fortnite, Call of Duty, GTA 5, Roblox, and Minecraft. I'm going to assume that 2025 number six is Ball Pit. Ball Pit? And I don't want to know the answer. On a PS5? I'm just going to assume. Choose to believe that. Yeah, so a lot of people playing. So these are live service games. Right, right. All of them. But all of them, none of them require a PS5. Oh, also. Yeah, some of you can play on a phone, too. Don't you have a phone more handy than your PS5? Yeah, that's what I was thinking. It's also the exact same games on Xbox, just in a slightly different order. Right. So people are buying a PS5 or an Xbox to play old live service games. These games are old. It doesn't even say what Call of Duty they're playing. But everything else. Fortnite was the most recent game. Well, the thing with Call of Duty is weird because it's Call of Duty HQ. Yeah, because it's just one you'll never know. Generic Call of Duty that whenever a new Call of Duty comes out, they just update Call of Duty. You should have seen me trying to download Black Ops 7 when it came. I was like, where is it? I know I got the game. It's like you go to install it and it's like a mile long checklist. It's like, do you want the Modern Warfare 3 campaign? I'm like, no. I don't think there is an uncheck, right? Because I went through it. I went through it. I went through it. I went through that and unchecked everything. You can uncheck it, but I don't know. It's very strange. Well, I did it on Steam. I think I did it on PS5, too. Yeah, I mean, I went down with my controller and unchecked everything. But yeah, all I wanted to do was play the campaign. And to its credit, it does allow you to just download the Call of Duty campaign. You don't have to get everything. It's just a really weird platforming setup for it, right? Yeah. It's so silly how they do it because their Steam numbers are always just going to be messed up. Because no matter how many people play, there was like a moment in time. Where like Warzone was super popular. And so their peak will always be then. Even if it's the new game, they're competing with something from three years ago. Anyways, Call of Duty. And I'm sorry. Are these numbers peak concurrent players? Or is it just the most played game? Playtime. Percent of active panel that played is what it does. Yeah, I mean, you know, it does seem like initially like, where's Ghost of Yotei? But like for the most part. Well, I knew it wasn't going to be Ghost of Yotei. But yeah, no. But like first party PlayStation titles, right? I know your instinct. A lot of people's instinct is like, oh, well, where? Or video games are dying or whatever. But it's like, well, I mean, those games are kind of one and done, right? At a certain point, you play those games, you finish it. And for the most part, that's a good one. People play Call of Duty and they're just going to continue playing. Like Fortnite. I still play Fortnite. And that's going to be in my regular rotation. Mario 64. That's all of them are. That's the only game I've ever played. There's other games. So yeah, it does. It does seem a little bit like Doom and Gloom. But maybe it's not as bad as we initially think. At least I want to be optimistic. I mean, that's a good point. Because the other games. The other games end at some point. And these games never end. That's the whole point. They want to keep you there. Also, Roblox is like 50,000 billion games. Dude, I was. That also doesn't mean anything. They're all playing Grogu. So many family gatherings with like children much younger than me who are playing Roblox on their phone. I'm just watching them in their Sonic skin playing parkour maps. I was like, dude, what is. That's why. Why are so many kids playing Roblox on a PS5? Just because. Their parents have one. Maybe like to be fair, watching it. Their parents have this PS5 loaded up with all these amazing AAA games. And they're just there at their fingertips. And they're like, I can't believe all my parents have is the stupid PS5. I guess I'll play Roblox on it. Watching a kid play a parkour map on a phone, though, is painful because he's like, you know, having to make precision jumps, trying to like zoom in. He's pretty good. Granted, using like the mobile interface. But it's probably a little bit easier on a controller. I would assume. I could barely. Type on a phone. I definitely can't game on one. I can't do on my phone. I can't like text with both thumbs. I can't. I can't even do that. I can't do this. Oh, wow. Is this like in a decade from now or people will be like people were complaining you couldn't use two figures to use a phone like like how we were doing. Like you can't look and move at the same time in a first person shooter. Anyway, looking at these these games, Fortnite, Call of Duty, GTA 5, Roblox and Minecraft. Maybe this is why PlayStation stopped releasing games. And I kid, but their output has slowed. They put out games with much less frequency than they used to, but they have the data here. They're not playing our games on our console. Picture this. Can someone else do it? Yeah. Picture this. They made a Last of Us factions multiplayer mode. That was a game as a service. Well, it also tells you why they were so hot to get their own game as a service, because that's what people use their console for. Right. Yeah. That's why they all use like monthly active users as their metrics now. Yeah. Weird. Piscatella was also recently on Kind of Funny, and he explained on their show. He said, this is a quote, the way the market used to work is that players would buy one big new game, spend all their time on that, then move on to the next one. Yep. That's what I want. That's what I do. That's what I've always done. That's still how it works in this house. Yeah, exactly. Except for Marvel Rivals. I don't know what it is. I can't break it. A publisher has a game I want. I will pay them one time for the full game. I'll play it until I'm done with it. Put it away. Move on to the next one. That's how it works. So, Sir Connor puts out the monthly sales data, and then they'll put out yearly sales data for 2025, which I'm very interested in seeing. But he said, Piscatella's guesses, he expects their data is going to show that 30% of people that play video games did not buy a video game in 2025. Wow. Yeah, I believe it. 30% of people that play video games did not buy a video game in 2025. But I mean. I mean, really. Yeah. Sorry. - I don't know how many people have been playing the, one mobile game that's even yeah not even a shooter like a cookie crusher or something like that that seems a little strange though with the call of duty of it all though i guess they are probably playing just war zone to be fair but i don't know people seem to do the multiplayer stuff in each specific bespoke call of duty so i i call a tiny bit of shenanigans on that well do you think that's this good i was just gonna say like there's a million of those gotcha games now and those are all free genshin and withering waves and infinity nikki and there are just so many games out there that you never have to pay for if you don't want to don't you think that stat was exactly the same in 1999 though because most people were playing minecraft and solitaire and they hadn't purchased those those games with windows 98 why not because it wouldn't be out yet that's that's not a 90s game mine sweeper i meant oh oh there we go yeah and then the free one level of that pinball game that i love the space one yeah yeah there's other levels i think so so 30 i could buy new i could buy new maps 30 didn't buy a game at all our article says a further 18 would purchase a new game every six months or less frequently does that mean 48 if 30 a further 18 does that make 48 i don't david i work in video production i'm not a mathematician let me uh let me send this down to the boys in the lab i took a very specific walk in life and it did not lead me down the math route 48 two two-thirds of a cup to one-fourth of a what uh well this stat is easier to read only 12 by a game once a month and four percent of gamers buy new games more than once a month i'm in the four percent yeah we are the four percent so once again coming back to this list you look at this list fortnite call of duty gta 5 roblox and minecraft what i would hope is that publishers look at that list and they say okay i think we're covered off on uh uh games as a service let's make something different unless you're a rock star and then they'll be like wait a second yeah i i man i bet that number is not going to change when gta 6 comes out i think i think people just live in gta 5 and they're not going to leave it i mean i did wonder what it's going to do but do you think they'll both be on there yeah like at least i do think there will be we don't we don't we don't know when gta 6 online is coming out which will be next year right so when gta 6 online comes out next year i think gta 5 will still be bigger because for one it's on more platforms and pc for two like gta online rpg and stuff like that like people aren't going to leave that stuff they live in that they never had a reason they never said they're going to do a new online right that's just not even they they haven't said that they're doing one you would assume that they will or yeah i mean they could they could pull a world of warcraft and just have gta online be gta online forever or yeah like a graphical an engine overhaul or something i don't know what that would look like but that'd be that's definitely going to be one of the most interesting things that happen next year for sure because it's excited for like you said as excited for gta 6 as people are it would be really hard to get them out of gta online into something new especially all the amount of money people have poured into their own yeah experience in gta online yeah then our next story is somewhat related uh to the first story nintendo source blames switch to holiday sales slowdown on the economic landscape and the absence of a major western game so this comes from game business switch to sales in the switch to sales in the u.s and within key markets in europe fell behind the equivalent pace of switch one something that an unnamed senior nintendo source blamed on a complicated economic crisis climate and the absence of a major western game was there any major western game for switch to this holiday season i guess what they're saying is terror and we only had a minor western but to be fair the the main the main holiday season is like november the shopping season november black friday and metroid prime 4 the western game came out in december you know a little bit a little bit miyamoto once again dropping shade on metroid there's gotta be i'm sick of it there's got to be a nicer way of phrasing that though right like it is a weird thing do you think that means go ahead sam i i mean we're making metroid jokes because you know we can but you know call of duty didn't come out on switch right that's that's the major western game that they don't have you know or are many other western games that's what i want to say to be fair uh the holiday sales were terrible for all three consoles not just switch yeah yeah it was it was an industry-wide issue this holiday because everybody was scared of gta changed things many years ago to get out of the way of it there we are wake before i don't know if this factors into it actually but i a lot of only ps5 went on sale right like xbox and switch didn't go on sale at all i mean how could they they literally cost more to important on every in the united states when he says a major western game you think he means a game by a western developer because when has that ever been a big draw to nintendo i know it's funny to think about that i don't get it it's a weird comment very strange anyway the game business supports us switch to sales over the holiday period we're down 35 versus the switch one's sales performance in 2017 so it's first holiday but i do think like we've always i know it's silly and it feels outdated to say this now but like if there is a big fall game like gta 6 but more like the next assassins creed like they really should get that out on switch 2 at the same time as the other systems yeah but i was gonna say comparing the the holiday uh periods for these two consoles in their launch years is not comparing apples to apples because with the switch one it was unproven it's a weird new system we didn't know what to expect they were coming out of the wii u so it wasn't nearly as much excitement for the switch but we got it on launch and then we started playing it again and spreading the word about how great it was and breath of the wild and then mario kart 8 deluxe came out and then mario odyssey was there so there was october yeah like hype for the console crescendoed into the holiday season whereas here there was a lot of hype right at launch midnight launches for the first time in a long time sold really well so i think coming into the holiday season a lot of people who wanted to switch you already had one yeah they're all covered yeah i mean if they if they had released a a 3d mario which we were kind of hoping they would yeah i think it would have been a different story but launching with mario kart and then their game being metroid prime 4 which you know i think their big game was kind of their own oh they did have the pokemon so but a mainline pokemon is going to do a very different thing for nintendo although it's going to be on switch one also and this is the comparison right that that he this is the comment is about not switch to sales necessarily being quote-unquote bad but being fewer switch twos were sold in switch ones is that the stat oh i don't know just during the period or just the switch two is still okay it's still the fastest selling console yeah yeah i i don't so you know we get to see people's playing patterns and the game that came with switch two got a massive boost in the coverage that we do so behind the scenes we can see that a lot of people got mario kart and they're looking up the things that you look up in mario kart from the start of mario kart that that there's a lot of people that are looking up the things that you look up in there's no other bigger theme than that for the holidays and that does not saying that's the biggest game the most popular game or anything but i can tell people opened mario kart at christmas day no question about it so what they should have done was get claire and kingdom come deliverance to on switch to you by fall i mean that's probably would have sold more that i mean that type of stuff is like so essential to make sure that people play switch to you for because remember when switch one came out it did have a couple years where you could play admittedly lesser version of this game on that so that's why resident evil requiem is a big deal to have on it right they are doing assassin's creed you know but they did get they did outlaws and stuff like that it's just those were not big western games right i meant to ask you sam they got cyberpunk five years old yep they got a good a perfectly good portable version of cyberpunk uh thinking jumping back to those top five playstation five games for one second i'm going to ask you sam fortnite call of duty gta 5 roblox minecraft how closely does that correlate to ign guide traffic for the year is there is there overlap there incredibly close okay yeah i mean the thing is about those things is that we know that that's where a lot of people play stuff but also like there's not a lot of people that need strategy guides for some of these things although roblox is one that's like a huge strategy guide point for us there's actually a big rpg in roblox called the forge that came out in uh late maybe well it got really popular in november december it's one of the most popular games of the fall like it's a it's a an actual you know rpg mark you played a little bit of it right i did it's a it's you know it has it's typically like you know stripped down for what it is but it's you know 20 years from now a lot of people are gonna be like oh yeah the first rpg i played is that game it's like probably you know i don't know tens of millions of people probably played it yeah games huge they just man roblox needs to they need to figure out the whole like walking like you can't when you look like you know it's so funny but but you know the other thing about strategy guides and how we cover them is that usually a giant audience doesn't necessarily mean everybody's using strategy guides a hard game means everybody's using strategy guides so there's plenty of hard games out this year that did really well and one of those is expedition 33 hard hard game right now all of mint mobile's plans are 15 per month even unlimited so free yourself from big wireless and their gimmicks and gotchas and switch to mint for high speed data and coverage on the t-mobile 5g network isn't that right seth definitely going to be trying out mint mobile switching over uh get that three months for 15 a month that is nothing 15 you can't buy anything in this day and age for 15 it is a pretty excellent deal especially for mobile service um you know i mostly use it to just uh scroll on social media and click things that i like anyway so why am i paying like several 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green crystals like every time you all of those are like somehow you get a radar that like allows you to like kind of get them all and there might be some kind of like algo thing happening but it takes a long time so i'd like put on a podcast and like drive around the desert and like just do that mindlessly because there's no music yeah and and it does unlock you know some cool in-game stuff but then it doesn't like the 100 it just there's the gallery so i go to the gallery at the end of 100 all this stuff do the items i see you know the ending the special ending or whatever and then i go to the gallery and there's three things not unlocked in the gallery and like i don't care that much i'm not going to play the game for them but it says it's because i didn't beat the hard mode so i now i would have to play hard mode all the way through to 100 100 100 which i'm not going to do but i loved it i love this game i think it's really really cool did you see the the interview with the japanese devs where they were saying because breath of the wild was such a big hit that's why they felt like they should add the open world stuff into prime 4. everybody should check this out we summarized it in a news article and i don't know if you guys are familiar with it but yeah it is so crazy it's like there was like a you know this pull to make it an open world game and then like no we're gonna reverse that and then we have to leave a little bit of it in because we built the game yeah we can like we can't start it over again so just leave it totally nuts it's exactly what you think it would be though i mean who that if you would tell make up a story for how this game ended up how it is that's what i would say right yeah it's like an unfinished like a half-hearted open world yeah a whole but you know the stuff that is not that is even i don't really care about that i thought it was all fine like it's all fine but then that i really like the the um the power of the switch to in this game like i just thought it looked really good almost all the time and i was so impressed by that it's a very pretty game and i think it's a great technical showcase of the switch too yeah i mean we wait till you get to the ice stuff if you haven't played there yet like ice looks really good in this game and it looks really good looking damn all right and you also started you also started terminator 2d sam yeah um how far did you get in that like three or four levels yeah i i got to the point where i'd lost all my lives and you you have to start over like it's not like a you know it's like a hardcore game right so it's like i didn't i'm not going to do that i got to probably like i don't know eight or nine something levels like i got past the cyberdyne um infiltration stuff and then i got to the decision making points where i was like oh my god i'm not gonna do that i'm not gonna do that i'm not gonna do that i'm not gonna do that i'm not gonna do that i'm not gonna do that do you you know when sarah connor breaks into the people's house to like kill the guy that made the chip and then she finds out that like you know she doesn't kill him like there's a decision to kill him or not and stuff like that i saw that stuff and i think it's interesting this game is really amazing looking like it's really fun and cool like even like these parts where they're recounting the story and they're showing this really janky looking but totally accomplishable on a super nintendo this yeah like that it would be like if that was on sega cd i would have been you know yeah i thought about that graphics can't get better yeah it's a very cool game uh that i'm glad exists very much same i'm not really playing anything new notable just completely random stuff and then uh something else for uh is it still fun uh nick anything you're playing you want to share uh is it still fun secret project and then uh i am very close i am within a stone throws distance of the ending of baldur's day three nice i am oh that i'm at like i've never beat it 130 hours or something right now i'm i'm genuinely sad like i'm trying to like procrastinate finishing it because i'm like this this is one of the greatest rpgs i've ever played i'm i'm in the house of hope right now if you know what that is cool but there's just so much good writing happening in that game at every point where i'm just like the premise of the house of hope is so sick of just this devil has captured the personification of hope and uses the personification of hope to be like well you i can make you rich bro if you sign your soul away to me and it's just like how like literary that is and just how clever oh it's so good man uh and i just had a lot of major revelations that happened about who certain people are and i'm just loving every second of it i'm uh i'm like also listening to a like kind of uh accompaniment podcast from the people who do uh watch out for fire fireballs podcast they do like a book club podcast and stuff like that so i'm just like oh my god this is so cool and i'm like oh my god this is so cool and i'm like oh my god this is so cool and i'm like oh my god this is so cool and i'm like oh that's what i missed that's cool and then move on so uh big big shout out there those those those folks are awesome but uh yeah this i am excited to finish this game so i can move on and play other things but i am going to be a little bit sad that nothing will quite you know i'm not going to be able to finish this game so i can move on and play other things but reach this high presumably until divinity comes out yeah yeah i never finished this game i would like to go back to it now probably would have been a good time i don't know i might be i might have missed that window but but we'll see i have to do it too i have to play the game and it's part of like a you know a career goal for me this year too um i have a pitch for you damon i do think you should try dispatch now that you have some downtime between things um i think that the the voices and like the characters are so good and you know it's aaron paul and he's he's the lead in it and he's great like it's really good like he he actually contributes a lot to the game being good the way he plays his character and then jeffrey wright uh plays a character that's really different from what jeffrey wright normally plays and he's really funny and i really like that and then um it's great i have no complaints and it has this cool overlay of being like a cop dispatch two superheroes that are going around the city and and bumbling because they're actually super villains like it's good it's a good premise and it's got a lot going for it and You know, I was like, I was trying to play, I started playing it chapter by chapter and that feels good too. Cause you just stop playing. And then the next day you pick up, it's like watching an episode of TV. It's like only going to be a half an hour, 45 minutes. Right. So you can like kind of binge it if you want or not. But I started playing and I was like playing it too close to going to bed. And it was like hyping me up too much. I was like, I can't play this board game. Easily one of my favorite TV shows of last year. It is, it is. That's what it is. I devoured it. It's so much fun. And it happens to have, you know, the dispatch mini game that, that Sam was talking about. It's such a fun, like clever use of, it's a great way of shaking up that telltale formula. Right. Cause usually the, the gameplay of telltale apart from making choices is you have to awkwardly navigate your character over to something and then do click on a little marker to shoot something in the head. But this is a more clever adaptation of making something feel meaningful without it feeling too gimmicky. Is there ever a part where you control a character? Who's Alana? You don't typically control a character. It is very streamlined. I think. It takes all of the stuff that wasn't fun from telltale out and then just streamlines it and makes it more fun. Alana is this character that you see, uh, malevolent, a little, uh, devil, the red, the red lady. Yeah. The devil girl. Yeah. Hmm. Cool. All right. Well, I will check it out and then report back. Good stuff. Very tangentially related. Uh, my kids were watching Zootopia. I was not watching it. It was just one or two, one, one, which is like 2016. I want to say they're watching. I'm not watching it, but it's on. And I hear. They're one of the animals that's like, I think they're in like a, a mafia, like type of everything. And they say someone has just arrived. They say, he says like, Walt and Jesse just arrived. And I just hearing that, I was like, that has to be a reference. That has to be. Oh, definitely. Definitely. That was pretty good. Um, Mark, Mark, anything you want to shout out that you're playing? Um, let's see. So I, I finally, now that Hades is out, Hades two, I went, I started a fresh new file and I played like, man, I played like 50. 50 hours over the break because like, it's, it's, I got the Legion go ass, which is just like a beefed up steam deck. Nice. And I just, I can just take Hades anywhere. What a game. I finally got the true ending. What a fantastic game. That is. Is it better than ball pit? Oh, so different. I don't know. Hot take ball pits. Real good. I think it's much. The, the thing with Hades is always, the thing with Hades has always been that some people find it a little bloated. Cause there's so much in it, but, uh, I, I did get to the point where I was just kind of skipping the dialogue. Cause I was like, I, I. What the heck? These dudes, these dudes never stop talking. That's half the game. Yeah, exactly. Uh, and then, uh, let's see. So right now I'm bouncing between, I, I, I finally had the Arc Raiders click moment where I played with my friends one night and I was like, I got it. Nice. I got it. I'm in. I get it. Uh, and then I weirdly started playing PoE too. It's very fun. But I have like eight level seven characters cause I can't decide who I want to play. I thought we've already established that we're not mathematicians here. Path of exile two is like spreadsheet. The game of like, how do I min max my character to get 0.01% faster? It's like, it's like the passive skill tree when you zoom out is the worst thing you'll ever see. I looked at that. I was like, I think I'm good. I think I'm good. Can you bring up a screenshot? It is. Yeah. It is. It's like the passive skill tree in path of exile two. It looks like the solar system. It's awful. What was that space game that it would, uh, that have starfield. No, no, no. That people have really cool stories of like people losing millions of dollars and it's all that. It's like, to me, it's very much Eve online of like looking at something. I'm like, I'm happy for anyone who's excited about this, but could not be me. It's fun to play, but I'm telling you the passive skill tree. Is, is the worst thing you'll ever see. It makes you want to vomit. There it is. That's the passive skill tree that's zoomed out. And it is just zoomed out all the way. It's hard to get a sense of how big it would look on like your screen. But why it's awful. It does definitely. It's like a mark. It is the worst. Is this, this is the reason why people use max roll, right? A hundred percent. No way. What I ever try to figure any of this crap out. Tell me how to be good. By the way, max roll. I'm not. our mark and i's colleagues and we work with them and they make an amazing tool for path of exile too which i'm sure anybody here has played path of exile is already using because it is essential i'm not because i'm level i'm not even in the double digits of letters levels yet because i can't decide who i want to play you already messed up your build dude yeah my builds my builds messed up right now i'm uh yeah the druid's really fun but yeah i i'm such a filthy casual i didn't even know what poe 2 was okay pillars of eternity well yeah yeah nick said it uh avowed was just announced for ps5 i put it on the run of show but i don't know if there's anything much to say about that i don't even know what the release date is happy for the people who haven't played february 17th oh it's right it's right there that's like it's finally coming to a real console okay okay thank god all right all right everybody let's settle down that game is i think that game is is awesome a lot of fun uh so i think if you like uh if you like data worlds 2 on ps5 i think you should check out about world needs good more good faces too i forgot about the goofy faces oh yeah yeah but they don't really bother me i'm not mad about it no i don't either the blue guy's kind of yeah they're doing a whole he's got a great anniversary update the actor i think he's from kotor he's been around for a long time oh path of i'm just path of exile uh avowed is also getting like a 2.0 update right is that true yeah it's doing new game plus it's doing a whole bunch of stuff so that that's also coming out on the 17th okay yeah i presume that they'd be one and one so yeah that's cool it seems like it's a great time to jump into the game it's never been a better time to jump in and vow whoa a year after really sorry that's my branded content i played games it is a fun game though it's fun it's a great game i had a lot of fun with it actually i mean and it does one of the the gaming ten commandments that we think should be in every game where you can just kill all the enemies in the area and kill everyone dead and they're all dead they're all dead travis's review well it will it'll always be my favorite thing where he's like basically when you're ready to leave an area it's like it's like you're on a movie set and if you haven't left yet you just see them tearing down the sets behind you they're like you're still here no you're supposed to you're supposed to move on there's nothing left here that's great baldur's gate three is like that yeah outer world is like that there's no reason for enemies to come back okay we've reached our speed running story uh mark it's time to get to the end of the game and we'll see you guys in the next one i didn't know if it was uh i didn't know if it was speed running or not i thought i was like i was like did they speed run or did they just like play it slow as heck and try to like make sure they didn't die well yeah he's just no death i think he's a speedrunner but i think in this case he was just trying to beat it without dying the the speed run category is a zero death completion yeah yeah that is goes by the name absolutely wow shredberg right here in sacramento here in california it took him more than 2 000 attempts in over a thousand hours wow that's impressive this is a really really difficult game uh i i reviewed it and i beat it but man i could i could never do it without dying never yeah i'm surprised you did and then listen to this at the end his video is like two and a half hours long of his playthrough at the end of his video on youtube he says this i'm going to be emailing everyone kataka tataku ign cnn chefs illustrated they're all going to hear about it i will unironically email ign well so i don't know if we've gotten any emails to our news tips line or something and if you want to unironically email gamescoop at ign.com i don't understand the ironically unironically i don't get it also i don't know ironically i don't know i don't know what chefs illustrated is either i mean well you did it they'd probably be more likely to cover super meat boy than sports illustrated oh maybe that yeah maybe that's what maybe that's the connection wait is it cooks illustrated that's a great magazine oh yeah that's associated with america's test kitchen right maybe he was just thinking that and it says chef skill anyway that's really funny though that's a funny comment quite the feat to defeat super yeah that's very impressive that's awesome and just in time to do the same thing in the next 15 years for super meatball 3d right yeah which i checked still doesn't have a release date just a release year sometime 20 this year this year right yeah this year yeah they had to wait till somebody beat this game without dying first yeah now they can release it okay right i gotta write down our time code because joebert's editing this episode thank you joebert so i can do top 100 xbox games oh smokes yeah on video that's a lot it is a lot well we can finally do it because they just finished their 100th game that's available yeah they got 100 games that's awesome congrats to xbox are reaching 100 games want to be the one who's always in the know about the game the scores the plays here's a tip the apple sports app just pick your favorite teams and get automatic live updates without even knowing their schedules and when your team scores it shows up right on your iphone lock screen making it easy to check in anytime so rule the group chat and download apple sports for free on the app store or find it on your new iphone the 11.9 million views from your iphone in the next 10 years will be the only time you'll be able to check in anytime so rule the group chat and download apple sports for free on the app store or find it on your new iphone the eliminate has spent decades keeping lemon on top and lime in the shadows their lemon agenda has infiltrated everything Even our music. That hit song named after the color of lemons? Not a coincidence. Big Lemon has been pulling strings in the industry for years. Think about it. But now, 7-Up is fighting back with their new lime lemon soda. Now lime comes first. 7-Up. Flip the sip. Since Sam just shared our email address, let's check in with the listeners. I'll do it. Hey, listeners. Oh, hey, listeners. Listeners, remember you can always reach us. I just sat back and waited. At the email address, gamescoop at IGN.com. Or you can mail us a letter. Whoa! Just like Ross Arbor in Ontario, New Market, Ontario did. He sent us a Christmas card. Wait, was it shipped to the office? Okay, to your home? I was like, uh-oh. Wow, to his house? It says, it's a Christmas tree. It says, Merry Christmas. Aw, nice. It says, Ross Arbor. It says, dear Scoop Crew, Omega Cops, Goose Camp, Damon, Justin, Sam, Nick, Mark, Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Thanks for another entertaining year. All the best for 2026 and hopefully GTA 6. Ross Arbor. Thank you, Ross. Merry Christmas, Ross. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. Ross, I love you, man, but I hate to tell you, GTA 6 ain't coming out this year. Sorry, buddy. Maybe next year. Ross. If anybody else wants to send us letters, Valentine's Day. It's just around the corner. That's just true. That's true. But those ones have to have candy in them or I don't want them. Ross also sent a card to Podcast Unlocked. What the heck? Wow. Unfortunately. That's so, like, I don't even care anymore. Let's read their mail. Can we just blast out? Yeah, open it. Unfortunately, no one from Podcast Unlocked lives in L.A. or works in this office, but I told Ryan McCaffrey that it's here, so next time. Ryan McCaffrey's like, why is this here? Why is the seal broken? Next time he comes down to the office, I'll have it waiting for him. It's not illegal if it's addressed to a business, okay? We can open their mail. What about, uh, Ross does not care about NBC or, uh, what's the other one? Oh, Beyond. Apparently. That's still coming. It just got delayed, okay? Okay. Our first email, uh, not snail mail, email comes from Joe from the North Bay. Do you know Joe, Sam? Do you think he's talking about the North Bay? Of San Francisco Bay Area? What other North Bay, like, would be? I don't, do you have one? Do you have one? No, I live in the South Bay. I've always heard about bays in Los Angeles. I live in the South Bay, but I don't, there's no North Bay here. There's no North Bay, yeah. Okay. It would be Malibu, I guess, maybe? Anyway, Joe from the North Bay says, I ran into an old friend. He was shocked. He was shocked. To hear I had not played Death Stranding. Oh, yeah. This is a good question for all three of you, but Nick in particular, I think. He said it is his favorite game, so with all the years of Perfect Dark, Resident Evil, and playing in hardcore. I should give it a try. I know the story is supposed to be on its own Kool-Aid. I've been working on my Spanish. Could I attempt to play it in Espanol, or is Kojima too wild, and should I play it in English? That is such a good idea to turn on, if you're trying to learn a language, to turn on your game in a different language and do the subtitles. I think that sounds great. Yeah, I think you could 100% play it in Spanish. It'd be all right. Oh, subtitles, of course. Yeah, yeah. It's just going to be, it's just going to be dubbed, right? Like, he's not going to be Norman. Think how good the rest of the world is at speaking American English because of video games, because they can get them only in English, or in English with subtitles, or, you know, that's their choice with movies, too. It's like, yeah, I think it'll help. Okay. Yeah, that's a fun idea. I mean, Damon plays games in Japanese all the time. I do. I played Doctor Who. I tried. I tried to play, I tried to play Yotei in Japanese, and I. What do you mean, tried? I couldn't, I couldn't retain. It's the best way to do it. It's kind of. I couldn't retain, like, anything. I couldn't retain any of the information, and I had to turn it off to English. It's kind of tough to read the subtitles and ride a horse at the same time. That was my issue, is, like, I'm, like, riding with somebody, and I'm having to, like, read these subtitles. I just, I couldn't retain the info. Well, that's the nice thing. It's a game that doesn't, that stuff doesn't really matter. If you're on a horse and people are talking to you, nothing really matters. They're just going to repeat it once you get there. Yeah. Yeah. Death Stranding would be fine because most, the only talking in the game is, like, cut scenes and stuff, like. Every prepper, they have a lot to say. Yeah, you're going to get a call. Right, but, like, you're not playing while that's happening. It's going to. Pizza was invented a long time ago, and pizza ovens have been around since then. I need you to. Sam, you're probably feeling water. That's called hydro. Oh, my gosh. Well, yeah, and then, like, no matter what, you're going to hear it twice because the puppet's going to repeat everything as soon as you leave the damn prepper. Sam, did you hear what I said? Did you hear what I said? That's the one. Shoot. Hey, that sold me. I might be in. Well, Joe from the North Bay, the puppet's not in the first game, I don't think. Right? Oh, sorry. No, no, no. Sam, I don't think I'd skip the first game at this point. I think it'll feel really good to go from one to the other. What if I told you Death Stranding 2 is just a remake of the first game, but with more stuff in it? It is. I know. Is that true? Yeah. Pretty much. Wow. It's not that different. It's just a different place. But I think it'd be worse to go. I think it'd be worse to go. If you're going to play them both. If you're going to play them both, I think it'd be worse to go in reverse order. Correct. A hundred percent. It will not be fun to go back to Death Stranding 1. Yeah, yeah. There's a lot of quality of life stuff. Hey, the good news is Death Stranding 2 starts in Mexico, so. Perfect. Yeah, you're right. A hundred percent. Okay. Did everyone see the new trailer for Resident Evil Requiem out of CES? I refuse. It's the one where they show the rainy street. Do you want us to. Yeah, that's all right. You can talk about it. I just didn't want to watch it. I was like, the game's out in like two months. I'm all right. Yeah. But please, don't. So it looks very nice. It looks very pretty, unsurprisingly. Also, I learned some things about it. Does anyone else know when this game is set? It's like 2028, 2026. It's 2028 because it's supposed to be 30 years after Raccoon City was destroyed. 1998. So Leon is in his 50s, would we guess? I think he's late 50s, early 60s. Well, he looks great. He looks fantastic. Yeah. And he's driving. And he's driving. And he's driving a Porsche. And he's sponsored by Porsche. But it's interesting. So 2028, because the Shadows of Rose DLC for Resident Evil Village is set in what? Like 2037? Yeah, it's far in the future. It's like way, yeah. Way out there. Wow. Okay. But that DLC was not very fun. So I'm happy to be away from that. I mean, this is starting to get into that Castlevania type of timeline. Then Dracula's Castle appeared in 2035. But that was actually the 2000s. That was the 2000s version of it, which you played in 1997. Yeah. That's like the Dawn of Sorrow timeline, future timeline, right? What's the one? Is that not the one? There's a lot of futuristic Castlevania. Yeah, there is one where it's like, takes place in Tokyo. There's also a really sick, sorry, quick aside, really sick ROM hack that released of Dawn of Sorrow, where you can play a full game as Soma if you chose the evil ending. So it's like, what happens when he becomes the bad guy? And it's. What? Looks really cool. Sorry. It's a quick aside. If only Konami could make games like that. Yeah. They've got something. They've been doing more stuff recently. Silent Hill. Did that Octopus game? Yeah, they've been doing Silent Hill. They were going to publish that Octopus game. Oh, that hasn't come out yet. I don't know that. That's right. That's right. I haven't heard anything about that in a long time. Or maybe it has. The Inside Limbo game. Yeah. It looks cool. It did look cool. Anyway, in the trailer for Resident Evil Requiem, there's a scene where. What's her name? Grace. Grace Ashcroft. Yeah. She's walking down a busy street, and some people are like, that's not Resident Evil. Whatever. Resident Evil is whatever's in a Resident Evil game. Yeah. I mean, it's called Raccoon City. There's other people. Yeah. She works for the FBI. Oh, that's why I investigated the setting, because I was like, I thought Raccoon City was destroyed. It's been rebuilt. It's been rebuilt. Yeah. 30 years later. It's just a little radioactive. No big deal. I wouldn't still want to live there. I mean, yeah, I don't know. Anyway, she was. Even at 195 FPS? I mean, now. I mean, the human eye can only see 24. What are you talking. I'm kidding. That's a joke. She's like an investigator for the FBI, right? Yes. And she's going. She goes to this hotel. Yeah. I think she's like a pencil pusher type. Not like an action hero. So in that scene, it just looks like she's walking down the street approaching the hotel. That's not like there's going to be this. Open. Huge open area that's busy with other people around. Yeah, the RE3 remake opens with you like chaos breaking out on the streets of Raccoon City. So it's like. Exactly. Exactly, Nick. We've seen tons of people in Resident Evil before. It's fine. Yeah. Yeah. Part of like a horror aesthetic can frequently be you are unsafe even if you're surrounded by the trappings of society and like how they take those away from you and how they make you like not believed by the people around you or make things happen that other people aren't seeing. Like, that's. That's all like horror trip stuff. It's common. A little bit of this. Yeah. Anyway, Resident Evil Raccoon continues to look good. It's out. Yes. Every RE engine game, man. It's just. How did they make the game look like this? It's so cool. It's so good looking. Well, they turned RTX on. RTX on. And that's what they did. I mean, I'm fingers crossed. Oh, yeah. What's up? Do you know what the RE engine stands for? It's not Resident Evil engine. It's rendering. Sure isn't. Rendering. Nope. Nope. Nah, what is it? It's the Reach for the Moon engine. Reach for the Moon? is a guy reaching for the moon oh wow is that true is it actually called it doesn't even make any sense though so what you're saying is engine is the e so we shouldn't be saying engine oh we should just be saying it's built on the re is it oh wait is this like an atm machine problem yeah dvd player or dvd disc yeah yeah disc yeah um okay getting back to listener mail it's the moment we've all been waiting for uh matthew reed along with stats stats we got some mathematicians in the house greg kelly has the stats the 20 questions stats yes for 2025 and if it feels like justin should be here i get it justin does yes but there's some key stats missing from this so i will humbly ask at the end of this ask uh matt if we if there's we could get a couple more stats then we can share those next week when justin's back oh good idea anyway matt is in massachusetts he says thank you for reading my 20 question stats once again this year hearing my note read on the show each of the past three years has been such a thrill but not as awesome as it was flying across the country to meet you all at ign live from getting destroyed from getting destroyed at mario kart by pear to getting selfies with a bunch of you it was the coolest experience and i'm already looking forward to returning in 2026 now on to my stats i can't believe pear beat you all right now onto my stats for the past year starting off so we're just talking about 20 questions there are 516 unique games mentioned wow during 20 during 20 questions it's by far the most since i've been keeping track of these stats the game mentioned most frequently which thanks to sam will now forever be known as winning the prince of persia award was perfect dark it was named it was named during five different 20 questions episodes six if you count the mention of the xbox 360 remaster this is the most frequently that a game has been brought up during a given year since i started keeping track there was a tie for second place with dr mario elden ring punch out and stardew valley all being mentioned on four different segments wow okay okay last year's the year before 2024's most frequently mentioned game hades was not mentioned once during any 20 questions segment in 2025 wow wow okay the first game to be repeated was tom clancy's the division which was mentioned on episode 795 and then again on episode 803 games mentioned in 2025 included nine different halo games 12 different zeldas 13 different final fantasies and 15 different marios wow the episode with the most unique games mentioned was episode 833 when a whopping 34 different games were mentioned before mark finally figured out the correct answer it was titanfall oh yeah that was only a few weeks ago yeah wow we went through 34 games before we landed on titanfall there were back to back there were back-to-back episodes with the fewest games mentioned in episode 808 sam was playing solo and didn't mention a single specific game although he did mention the gta and pac-man franchises the correct game was psychonauts and then in episode 809 hollow knight was the only game mentioned as the panel quickly guessed it correctly in just eight questions so that's because i was interested in the game i was interested in the game i was interested in the game i was interested internally thinking of names of games i needed to say them out loud that's what he's saying about that yeah i guess so yeah i didn't win that no yeah not that one so that's a wrap on 2025 a big shout out to greg kelly the 20 question stats master for putting all my data on the game scoop wiki every year happy new year to the crew and everyone out in scoop nation long live the best and only video game podcast very cool to hear that was fun i would love to hear a win-loss ratio i miss getting that so kd yeah we need that uh so yeah matt if i could humbly ask for a if you have a win-loss ratio i would love to see that as well and how it compares to previous years yeah want to be the one who's always in the know about the game the scores the plays here's a tip the apple sports app just pick your favorite teams and get automatic live updates without even knowing their schedules and when your team scores it shows up right on your iphone lock screen making it easy to check in anytime so rule the group chat and download apple sports for free on the app store or find it on your new iphone the eliminati has spent decades keeping lemon on top and lime in the shadows their lemon agenda has infiltrated everything even our music that hit song named after the color of lemons not a coincidence big lemon has been pulling strings in the industry for years think about it but now seven up is fighting back with their new lime lemon soda now lime comes first seven up flip the sip and that brings us to video game 20 questions our suggestion this week comes from joseph in nevada city california which i didn't know was it i didn't know that existed i okay i'm going to nevada guys nevada city uh joseph says this game has some some of my favorite redacted in the past redacted oh man did you say nevada city california is that what you said yeah yeah that's like a grass valley area thing that's this is like i i've i've heard a lot about that it's like old um ghost townie gold country villages stuff i wonder where it is as you said it's a grass valley new sacramento oh okay okay well let the questioning begin is this game from the 70s 80s or 90s 70s 80s or 90s no does this game have recorded talky dialogue like the game hades i was gonna try to figure out a way to get hades in there uh not like the game hades for sure no no that's a talky game there's no god there's no god giving you boons got it okay no recorded dialogue it's got his favorite redacted okay that doesn't help us at all let's see here okay uh is this game exclusive to any platforms yes is this game developed by sony microsoft or nintendo in part oh okay it might be no man's sky okay let's see let's let's figure let's figure out what platform is so uh is it is it sony no that's five okay is this a nintendo exclusive yes maybe it's all right nintendo and maybe it's maybe it's hades it can't be because this doesn't have the dialogue levels that's true but not not co-developed that's monolith soft monolith soft and nintendo xenoblade yeah that one has a lot of fire fire fire emblem yeah it's like kind of that yeah yeah true uh let's think does this game take place in the mario or zelda universes no it's exclusive it's on it's a nintendo exclusive but we got to figure out which one yeah which which nintendo uh okay so is this uh is this on the switch because like it's the most popular one yes all right cool all right here we go let's see um does this game have does this franchise have a game that's on the nes yes does this game eliminate all your rpgs yeah i think it's not trade prime unless it's fire emblem oh i guess that would have been i mean that kind of counts it's not animal crossing or anything is this a hmm can you play as a lady in this game yes is this a platformer no is this a first-person game no what are we at you've asked 12 questions what other what other games are uh is this a strategy game oh no okay thank you oh okay hold on is it an action game yeah okay so it's either going to be bayonetta or what's that other one and yes astral astral chain oh that's right yes gosh dang it uh action game that would have also just remember remembering that action is a very very broad category there is action in this game huh yeah so it might it might be mario do i do i play no it's not set in the mario universe i know that was a joke do i play as a humanoid in this game yes okay so it's a humanoid in this game yes okay so it's a humanoid in this game yes okay so it's a humanoid in this game yes okay so it's a humanoid character yes okay so it's a humanoid character yes okay so it's a humanoid character you can play as a woman you play as a woman you can play as a woman you play as a woman you can play as a woman you play as a woman you can you can play as a woman you can you can play as a woman you can you can oh can you you can oh can you you can oh can you you do we want do you want to ask that you do we want do you want to ask that you do we want do you want to ask that no we know we already did and the answer no we know we already did and the answer no we know we already did and the answer was yes but it was that you can not that was yes but it was that you can not that was yes but it was that you can not that you do gotcha gotcha is anybody listening to the answers is anybody listening to the answers is anybody listening to the answers i'm just i'm in the zone right now i'm i'm just i'm in the zone right now i'm i'm just i'm in the zone right now i'm in my mind palace in my mind palace in my mind palace so you know so you know so you know if nintendo is this a franchise going if nintendo is this a franchise going if nintendo is this a franchise going back and it's not a first person game back and it's not a first person game back and it's not a first person game it sounds like it could be that other it sounds like it could be that other it sounds like it could be that other metroid game still right yeah metro metroid game still right yeah metro dreads you call that a platformer i would call that a platformer yeah it's a metroidvania calling a metroid a metroid game of metroidvania uh i don't know yeah it's a platformer is this a sci-fi game yes oh shoot maybe it is oh it might be metroid dread then it's on the switch or it's something that's available is this part of the metroid series yes all right yeah okay so we got a metroid but i'm a little unclear what when something's on switch we didn't actually ask about if it was on the switch like as in metroid zero originally yeah we just know it's not a first person shooter and it's but it's not a platformer did this game originally come out for the nintendo switch yes all right well there you go you didn't know the answer you want to you want to say it yeah you i'm not saying you do the honors sam well is there anything that could trip us up because like i don't think so uh what question are we on you have one question and a guess do you get chased by a robot frequently throughout this game yes is it metroid dread yes it is metroid dread a game i wouldn't call a platformer i know there is platforming i hear you no i i think there is platforming but yeah like if you were making a list of the top 10 yeah yeah astrobot is a platformer mario is a platformer yeah this is a metroidvania it has a jump button this is a wild take this is you guys blowing my mind they have a whole shot like is dead cells a platformer yes that's a metroidvania that's also the roguelike metroidvania which has platforming in it but like that's not the genre that you put it in i don't think i i'm would you nick would you say this is a shooter no or can you shoot no but but but hold on she has a gun what do you mean i don't know so i think what i feel like i'm getting at is that there could be it's like this is this genre in essence you know metroidvanias are they all a version of platformers yes right because like castlevania is a platformer symphony of the night came from castlevania just because you can go back and open doors does not necessarily mean it's not a platform i guess i'll say the only clips i've seen of silk song are people like pogoing and doing like these super complicated things so okay if you are bad at jumping you will not get far in these games if you are bad at jumping i see your question like why does it exist then if these are just platformers it's a flavor of platformer now i'm trying to think of a metroidvania that isn't a platformer but it is very funny to call a metroid game metroidvania you know it's like saying a kart racer is is not a racing game like it is a racing game it's a sub-genre of racing games called kart racers i didn't think about that nick that's like calling dark souls a souls like you're like it's not wrong but okay it's also kind of weird true i never finished this game it's good just another one that someday i like the last boss in it quite a bit that was his that was there oh my god hard that was the redacted joseph in nevada city said uh this game has some of my favorite boss fights in the past 10 years oh yeah samus has so much character in this game and i really like how like badass they make her unlike metroid prime 4 in which you get the silent protagonist in this game sam samus makes some like human decisions that are really interesting but does she talk does she speak she doesn't talk but there's just a lot of like okay body stuff that she does it's really cool first of all that's a huge spoiler and nick is wrong so which one which one you want to be mad about i mean it's been a minute since i played it but does she say okay there's there's a there's a moment where samus finally is like hearing out a point and then has a moment where she responds and it's awesome no fair enough i stand corrected what the hell it's in my it's in my review but i have to obscure it as like a moment that you won't expect that's never happened in a metroid game in this way because i certainly have another m very chatty in that game dread was developed by nintendo and mercury steam i like metroid samus returns for the 3ds there i said it it's a good one you got that better than dread no i like dread more but mercury steam did yeah that one that's why zero mission's my favorite metroid game that's yeah yeah probably probably same well nicely job you definitely got there thank you for the suggestion joseph in nevada city viewers and listeners if you have your own suggestions for video get video game 20 questions email them to me at the email address gamescoop at ign.com or feel free to send us a letter if you have if you want to uh send me uh suggestions in the more traditional way all right right now at humble you can get humble choice for just 14.99 and score a curatorial award for the best game of the year we hope you enjoyed today's episode and we'll see you next time on humblebundle this month's choice is available through February 3rd so head to humblebundle.com and start playing today and that's all the scoops that we have for you this week thank you for joining me here nick thank you to both sam and mark thank you to jobert and everyone working behind the scenes to make this episode possible happy new year everyone out there in scoop nation my name is damon this is ign gamescoop and we're out i love this streamer because all he does is stream these weird ass things like this egg thing uh he was streaming he was watching uh it was a cart pushing competition where they were pushing it into the corral and seeing how if they could get it to the corral and see if they could get it to the corral and see if they could get it to the corral and see if they could get it to the corral and see if they could make it because the corral was like super far away and then there was another one where it was like uh it was like a hotel bed making competition oh i've seen that one yeah we were watching that on game scoop once like what the like there are people there watching this but the bed making was really impressive it was like people throwing the sheets on so quick want to be the one who's always in the know about the game the scores the plays here's a tip the apple sports app just pick your favorite teams and get automatic live updates without even knowing their schedules and when your team scores it shows up right on your iphone lock screen making it easy to check in anytime so rule the group chat and download apple sports for free on the app store or find it on your new iphone now at kroger your points add up to more ways to save every trip use them your way to take dollars off groceries at checkout or save at the pump you can even 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