Press B 10: The good, the bad, and the fugly?

Remember that one game that despite how terrible it looked was one of your all time favs? How bout those games as beautiful as can be, yet somehow flaming trash heaps in gameplay. This episode we give our personal picks for best of the worst, and the worst of the best.

Episode Transcription:
The below is a machine based transcription of this episode. Sorta like Skynet if it was 2 years old, and wanted a cookie. Take it with a grain of salt.

Jake 0:01
Episode 10 the good, the bad, and the ugly Today on

Wulff 0:07
peski

GP 0:28
Hello and welcome everyone to press B to cancel. My name is Guy friend. And with me today we have our usual days of rapscallions to my left is where we'll say hello werewolf. Hello werewolf

GP 0:44
apt

GP 0:47
also with me today sick Jake

Jake 0:49
here buddy glad to be here

GP 0:52
and of course, Polish 109

Palsh 0:56
Whatever happened to polish runaway nevermind

Wulff 1:00
Yeah, we had to let him go.

Palsh 1:03
Yeah, a

GP 1:05
lot of turnover in the police departments, there can be only one. There can be only at pulse post is the equivalent title to Highlander if you're Canadian.

Jake 1:16
Alright, so that's a worldwide sensation. I'm sorry, everybody in every country loves Highlander.

GP 1:22
That's true. That's true. Okay. Alright, so today, we're going to be discussing kind of a variety. It's a little bit of a different show tonight. Typically, we just take one game or one series, and we discuss our experiences, our likes or dislikes. Tonight, we're going a little bit different. The title of the episode tentatively was called the good, the bad and the ugly. If you don't know what fugly means, have one of your ugly friends explain it to you. So essentially, the idea of this episode is that we can all acknowledge the great Games, they look good, they play good, the sound is great. And we can all acknowledge the crap games, they look horrible. They sound horrible. There are no redeeming qualities. So tonight we're discussing the ones the games in between games that either look gorgeous, but are otherwise devoid of anything meaningful. We will call those Travolta's or the ugly games that have a lot of heart. We're going to call those quasi motos. Okay, so those are the two categories today. I'm going to start us off and then we'll discuss and you know, go around the table as we always do, but we're going to start off with the ugly but great or quasi modo category. And I tell you what, guys, let's just go through different video game systems. We'll start with the eight minute video games. For me it's any s, which is going to be Bionic Commando. Okay, so I love this game. I played it on stream recently, and I'm always reminded about how much I love it but truly Fully the color palette is obnoxious. There's not the greatest animations between your character or the bad guys that you're trying to kill. And it's repetitive as hell. So that's kind of the idea here. Let's talk about Bionic Commando. And if you guys agree, let me know if you disagree. Let's have that conversation. werewolf. What do you think?

Wulff 3:20
You know, I've actually not played a lot of Bionic Commando. I think the last time I played it was, gosh, I was seven years old. So almost 30 years ago. Good grief. So I can't say much to it. But I can say that from what I've seen people play on Twitter recently. It's not a pretty game. But I do see a lot of people playing it on Twitter recently. So that must be some somewhat test some testament to its quality.

GP 3:51
Sure, yeah. Okay, so it's a popular enough game. It's not always the best to look. So if you're going to watch Bionic Commando

Unknown Speaker 4:00
A beer to first

GP 4:02
beer or do you first got

Jake 4:04
Yep. enhancer

GP 4:07
Okay, sick Jake. Paul What do you guys think about Bionic Commando?

Palsh 4:12
We go I'm sick regoing sick Paul shirt Jake 109 Who's going first?

Unknown Speaker 4:18
we merge together we are one

GP 4:21
yeah give us that sexy fusion voice yeah

Wulff 4:23
that trunks fusion voice

GP 4:31
Alright, so I guess we'll go with Jake first.

Jake 4:34
What do you think about Bionic Commando supplying commando? I played this quite a bit as a kid. I'm just trying to struggle how much variety was there in the enemy's

GP 4:45
will as far as the enemy sprite goes? All of your entry level guys are pretty much the same. They were maybe one or two like older throwers or you know rocket launcher guys, but otherwise Yeah, all the same.

Jake 4:56
Yeah, like none of them stand out to me. In hindsight when I kind of Going back to that game, I don't remember anything notable graphic wise, I remember that. I remember the back color palette like you mentioned, for sure. It's poor choice. They're all they really remember but graphics is the main character. As a kid, I thought he's got a doc rip off with that weird mechanical arm. That's all I got from the game graphic wise. Nothing memorable at all. I didn't care for Gameplay wise, it was actually quite fun. I mean, mechanics were solid.

GP 5:27
Right? Yeah. And I think that's exactly right. I think the biggest mechanic or the biggest saving grace of this game would be the mechanics, no jumping, just extendo arm. And also I to me, I love the sound. This is for me one of the rare games where the not just the soundtrack. But the the, the noises of the game. Were so perfect. And for me they invoke such a strong nostalgia, but I mean yeah, that's I think that's exactly kind of the heart of what the category is. So post, what do you think about commando

Palsh 6:01
I, it's pretty much the same as Jake is like, I don't remember a lot. But the things I do remember that kind of stuck in my brain like I remember not being able to jump and always wanting to swing like Spider Man basically, ever since now I was like, Yeah, I want to do this I remember playing the game and I think this is so cool. But I never thought it was amazingly good luck and I just thought that was the coolest idea. So I think sure yet looks was no, but you know, gameplay was I thought it was fun. So I agree with you.

GP 6:36
It's got that heart that addictive quality that after you leave the game, like if you haven't beaten it, you know you're wanting to go back and continue or you know, just pick up where you left off. Yeah. Now I'll say this. I don't have this for every category, but the eight bit ugly but great category. I have an alternate or an honorable mention. And I'll say this real quick, Final Fantasy the riginal a bit Final Fantasy not a pretty game, but damn it was amazing. I no no no you guys know I love Final Fantasy. And it was great for what it was and what it sparked. But going back it is it is dated.

Wulff 7:16
Yeah those those tiny backgrounds and battle with just four characters in a box and a little background and then the rest of its black

GP 7:27
it's it's a sexy older sister, I guess technically the sexy younger sister of Oregon Trail,

Jake 7:34
which,

Wulff 7:35
I mean, the game was based on d&d, so it was leaps and bounds from pen and paper numbers, but they still hadn't found their visual groove yet by any means.

Jake 7:51
Of course, but the enemy sprites and the boss sprites that game were extremely detailed and there's a lot of variety and the monsters you face because I thought about This game is well for my list. I didn't do it because of the variety of monsters on the graphics, the sprites.

GP 8:05
Yeah. Okay. See, I could definitely concede to that. But you know, to the point of it was inspired by or trying to invoke d&d as a great point because d&d requires a lot of good imagination to fill in the gaps visually and I think that is the point to Final Fantasy that I'm trying to make is there's some cool ideas there. But with the limited motion and animation you really have to use your you know, theater of the mind as it were to to fill in those those gaps.

Palsh 8:37
That's pixel or a nutshell for me, so I agree. But you can get some effing cool pixel art that said, Okay,

GP 8:45
I don't know No, no, that's good. Actually polish. Let's go to your what's your quasi modo game, the ugly

Palsh 8:52
but great game, this one stuck out to me and just because it I was felt like it looked like an entire game to me. Kind of That meant that made it with an any s game and it still had kind of elements of mostly Atari boys blob, because the graphics were really great. But the whole premise this game was hard, I still won't touch it because I'm just I don't have the fear of failure. But the fact that you could, you know, give them like 40 different jellybeans and have all these different things like you could turn your blog into a trampoline or a ladder or a friggin rocket you know, it's it's really cool but the graphics didn't keep up but I thought considering how ugly it was it still was pretty fun. And so that's that's just what stuck out for me.

GP 9:44
Yeah, I I own a boy and his blog and I have started a boy this blob but I think the graphics and I hate to say it this way because it makes me sound so shallow. But I think the graphics is prevented me from really getting into it. So I think that It's a bit of a home run for choice there. But I can't speak to the greatness of the game just to the just to the ugliness as far as the sprite quality. And you know the image quality in general. Yeah, everything is

Wulff 10:15
the design choices as far as the characters, they're very ugly. Yeah, there's not a lot of detail. However, they're really smoothly animated for how ugly they are, which I always found kind of odd.

Palsh 10:28
Yeah, and I think that's part of it, too, because they ended up it was so simplistic. I think they ended up getting a little bit more leeway when it came to animating them.

Wulff 10:37
Yeah, but yeah, that that game is definitely a favorite of mine. I had that growing up. I don't know what happened to my copy. I don't remember getting rid of it. But I don't know if it got lost in a movie or I did eventually trade it in or something. That is a game I put far too many hours into as a child. Oh my goodness. Like, I can probably still remember What most of the jelly beans do. That's how much I played it. Catch up a catch a pole.

Palsh 11:07
Yes.

Wulff 11:09
That is licorice ladder root beer rocket.

GP 11:13
I had a root beer rocket one

Jake 11:17
I think I agree with GP on the terms of the graphics is what probably turned me off in the game as well. I didn't really finish it. I spent I made it to the offworld section and that was interesting. But you spend majority of your time on the ground and there's such a limited palette of colors down there. It's all brown and black. I found it extremely dull.

Wulff 11:36
Yeah, they're their color choices definitely reflected what they went back to in the early 2000s just with less bloom. Right? Yeah.

GP 11:44
Well, Jake, what What game do you have for us? Ugly but lovable for the eight bit?

Jake 11:52
I mean, I mean, some guys know me. If I'm not complaining about a game on I don't like it. And they'll go on game I complain about all the time is our type for the master system this game is brutally hard for me. It took me forever to beat it and I had to use a continue code to do it. It's great The gameplay is classic to me the bosses are awesome. There's also mechanic where if you don't be the boss is fast enough to take away from you. There's you know, upgrades. It's a great game, poured it on literally everything. But the matches is the one is the one I played the most. But the thing that makes it ugly is there slow down constantly, there's flickering every other level. There's one level I want to say it's the third one where the background is this organic, pulsing like red color. But that's fine, but the enemy shots are also red. So because of the poor choice and colors of the background, the enemy bullets, you can't see where the bullets are half the time in addition to all the flickering. So like the graphics are just terrible, terrible. I've seen this game in arcades and it looks 10 times better. It's a shame because it's a fantastic game gameplay. It's plays well for me in any system. I know of the Master System and I love it there but the graphics on that system just can't keep up.

GP 13:06
Gotcha. Okay, so I hear you saying that you've only beaten it with the continue code. So what you mean is you've never beaten it. Little bit of shady games each other

GP 13:30
sick burger.

GP 13:33
Wolf, what do you got for us for ugly URL now? I'm sorry. Let's not do that yet. A portion where what do you guys think about our day?

Wulff 13:40
Um, I've never been a fan of shoot 'em ups and bullet hills. So our type was one I didn't really get into. They

Palsh 13:49
kind of blend together for me. Not that I'm saying it was a bad game or anything, but I can't tell the difference between archetype and Gradius. And anybody who's a shoot 'em up fan right? I was probably wanting to strangle me so I apologize but either way, honestly, you're not wrong. There are very few shooters that pull me in.

GP 14:09
Yeah, I'm with you. I think the only one that really stood out for me was like life force. And that's that's really the only one I paid attention to. I'm kinda like you guys with that so I will have to take sick Jake's word on this one. Yeah, but I believe especially I mean, yeah, I've never heard of anything like that where the bullets are the same color as the background. Obviously that is a horrible design

Wulff 14:35
that's that's a controllers are are right there.

GP 14:38
Yeah.

Palsh 14:39
It ends up being any s heard.

Jake 14:42
It belongs in any as hard but different system.

Palsh 14:44
Yeah. Gotcha. Master Cisco. doesn't have the same ring to it.

GP 14:49
doesn't roll off the tongue as much. Yeah.

Wulff 14:53
Alright, so what do you got for us on your quasi game, the game that everybody is familiar with. The Ninja for Master System but this game, the gameplay is an absolute blast. You're running around you're throwing jerkins at people you get upgrades to your stuff like movement upgrades, weapon upgrades, special attacks, all sorts of crap the enemies there's all sorts of enemy types they have different a eyes the levels get mixed up summer like a lot of them are just you know, go from the bottom scroll upward. Occasionally it's like scroll from right to left but they've got like the river level where you're trying to move from log to log and kill enemies before they get you stuff like that. They did a lot of creative things with the game, but boy did it not look good at all. There were a lot of sprites and they were a lot of ugly pixels. That the colors like they use really bright colors, their eye catching colors. But there's so much of one color that covers the screen at a time that it just it fries your eyeballs a little bit. That that bright neon green grass.

Palsh 16:11
Yeah, everything looks green afterwards. It's like you're wearing you must be wearing like some like tinted sunglasses afterwards

Wulff 16:19
Yeah, there's there's almost there's really very little detail on any of the locations in the game. You got to use your imagination a lot. But that game is so much fun. And it's it's a hard one. So it's one of those ones that's like punishing and you want to go back.

Palsh 16:38
I didn't even know that was for Master System. The first time I actually played was on like a bootleg 31 and one NAS card and I had no idea that this is bootleg up until like, a few years ago so I was like, This is amazing. Oh, nevermind.

Jake 16:53
Spiders in that you also picked a Master System game. Do you think it's something to do with that system and that just couldn't put out The solid graphic power to handle those games because there's a few other games that are also not that great graphic was

Wulff 17:05
no because there are some actually really pretty Master System games to the the Master System graphically had superior capabilities to the ns but you have to remember they were a lot more companies pumping games out on the IDS it's like it's it was the platform that was supported versus the platform that wasn't it doesn't matter how much power it has if people don't know how to make use of it.

Jake 17:30
Like I'm just thinking of the Sonic games, and some of them are really terrible. The slowdown is ridiculous lots of flickering like it is. It's disappointing because there aren't great games on the system is one of my favorite systems.

Wulff 17:41
Well the Master System. The Master System is just a Game Gear. It's it's a Game Gear Fit to TV resolution, or rather, at the Game Gear is a Master System fit to a smaller resolution. They're they're the exact same architecture. That's why all the emulators run both of them.

Jake 18:00
Interesting. Okay,

GP 18:01
okay, so that's our that's our time for a bit games. Let's move on to 16 bit if you guys are ready for that, is that good? Sure. Holy cow. Is that that claw?

Palsh 18:14
Yeah, we'll call the

Wulff 18:17
next bit

GP 18:22
is one of those rare occasions where I wish I had worn pants now? Well, I'll tell you what wolf blitzer with you 16 bit ugly but great. What do you think and start race effects?

Palsh 18:34
Yeah.

Wulff 18:36
Not absolutely good. It had a lot of character in the graphics, but it was not pretty at all. The, for whatever reason, I'm pretty sure those What is that? gas. That gas station with the chevron? Pretty sure those Ever on cars were inspired by this game.

GP 19:03
Or vice versa. But it's a good

Wulff 19:06
Yeah, I've I you know what, they dropped it on the switch this week. And I went back and played it. And I had so much fun with it. Oh my goodness. It was a lot of fun. And I used to play it a lot to player which I mean, you can play two player races against the AI as well. Which is pretty taxing on a Super Nintendo. Which I'm pretty sure that killed the frame rate big time, so it made it even uglier. It was still somehow playable. And it was a lot of fun. I really really enjoyed that one.

Jake 19:41
Yeah, I was gonna say the only time I saw framerate that bad post mariokart the switch was after watching stunt racer x like, it's like three FPS. It's

GP 19:52
you know, that brings up I mean, we'll have to see how the rest of the show plays out but I've had in the back of my mind like that. This big question mark of the two categories today, how many sports games or how many racing games ultimately are going to be referenced? So we're going to chuck that down as you know, the first one I suppose for, for racing, but that's, that's interesting to me. I think that's a good pic. Absolutely. But I'm glad you chose that because, well, that was on my short list of like five games. I was so hesitant to pull out as a racing game or a sport themed game. Because those really didn't hit their stride until you know much later. But I like that one pulse. What do you got for us

Palsh 20:34
on 16 bit mine is pretty much the 16 bit argument all over again from from a pit I've got a game that was hard that I loved, but the same kind of problem lemmings and I hate saying it because let me look terrible Lamine, but they're, you know, like they're like six pixels each. So you can't really complain too much, but the idea behind it again, was so cool like you could make one guy stop everybody else Another one would start digging and other woman started digging upwards and whatever. So game itself was just great. The music is probably one of the top five for like Super Nintendo for me for for soundtracks. But I just remember and it never bothered me about the graphics I'm just saying it's just that they don't look great.

GP 21:26
I tell you what I appreciate here is Forgive me for saying it this way. This shame in your voice when you said lemmings? It's almost like you know, it's 3am I've had a few drinks I'm lonely. I'm going to call lemmings and not tell anybody about it the next day, so I love that See, that's why I love this. This idea for the for the episode. You sneak that Kelly? Yeah, you got me good. No, I love that. I think that's a great choice. And I think we've all done that with either lemmings or a game like lemmings were like ah I just want to want to save my appetite but I'm not proud of it let's let's play lemmings

Wulff 22:05
yeah that's good. What do what do you guys think about lemmings? That's actually another game where despite the ugliness of the palette, and you know, the little tiny characters that you can barely make out, they were really smoothly animated and they can eat a lot of information with what 15 pixels.

Palsh 22:22
Yeah, that here but what they were doing

Unknown Speaker 22:26
that's pretty impressive.

Palsh 22:28
Yeah. So they, they definitely went for function over form. And they I think they succeeded. So I mean, that's that's saying, Oh,

GP 22:38
yeah, it's, it's a great game. It's that argument again, it's got a great personality.

Jake 22:45
Okay, all right. The backgrounds, okay, granted, not all the backgrounds are your hot redhead, okay? But a lot of them look fine to me. There's one I played on the Genesis so 16 bit and the one level or there's couple levels with the forest theme. I thought that looked amazing. And the fact that you could dig through the leaves of the tree and everything looks great to me.

Palsh 23:08
Yeah, I can see your point there.

Jake 23:10
Plus the intro was funny. I thought the intro was well animated.

Palsh 23:13
Yes, true.

Jake 23:14
I like six pixels. What are you going to do, right? There's only so much you can do with six weeks one character.

Palsh 23:19
And now you see why I feel guilty even saying it because it's like, there's so much charm to this game. And considering what they've done with it. So

GP 23:27
I think it's a great game that conveys exactly what it needed to but you're right. There's not much frill to it outside of like visually, it's not arresting in a positive way.

Wulff 23:39
Yeah, it's not something that ever made me stop and look when I saw it on a screen anywhere. But playing it I could not put it down.

GP 23:48
Yeah, it's a game you play in your own home. Like if you had gone to Walmart and got on the display, you'd be like not here lemmings. We can know each other but nobody can know I'm going to sound like a jerk

Palsh 24:04
Just you wait I'll get you back

GP 24:07
okay all right so polished one or nine with lemmings subject. What do you got for us? 16 bit

Jake 24:14
16 bit So you mentioned earlier about racing games and this is technically a racing game. It's unit racers for the snice Oh man, I

Palsh 24:21
forgot about that.

Jake 24:22
So I don't know if you guys have played this game before. cycles

Palsh 24:26
Yeah, I was like yeah, just cycles without right.

GP 24:29
Yeah, I remember

Jake 24:29
Yeah. It's the weirdest concept for a video game I've seen in a while. But I love the hell this game I got it at a US store for like 10 bucks. Graphic wise. Literally you do you guys said it. You're just a unicycle no writer. And the tracks are basically this candy stripe. You know line that loops around and goes left to right. There's not much going on graphic wise but Gameplay wise the tricks system in it. There's like a dozen different tricks you can do with your your bike. You know flips and cartwheels, all kinds of crazy stuff. And you need to do those tricks in order to build speed and momentum. And you kind of get tied up in the different modes. Like some of the modes are focused on doing the stunts, and the ones are about speed. Some are just like, you know, marathon and length. There's a lot of variety, and tracks in the game. The game plays outstanding. The only problem is, it's a lot of them with the same precursor to Tony Hawk's

Palsh 25:23
Pro Skater. And a lot of ways

Wulff 25:26
Yeah. Now that you mentioned it, yeah, that game did a ton of stuff for being a 2d side on racing game.

GP 25:34
Yeah, but I think when you can make the argument that if Marble Madness makes you look like a chump, then Okay, you know, yeah. Well, they might be but you can't tell because there's there's just no way no, no, I think that's a good and you're right, like, that's that's their kind of racing thing as well. So that's, that's interesting. I remember the game I don't remember much of playing it though, but I can see it in my mind. And yeah, I agree. I think that's a good good entry. What

Wulff 26:06
do you guys think? I would agree that that game was not a whole lot to look at, like it was cleanly animated. But there was a is literally, you know, the track is just a candy striped bar on the ground that moves around. And then you're a unicycle no character on the unicycle. You're just a unicycle doing stunts and tricks and jumps and bouncing around and zooming along. So it was it was a limited presentation type of game. I wouldn't say

GP 26:38
yeah, but werewolf the way that you just described it, like the you're a unicycle going around doing tricks and bumps and jumps. I if you said that to me, I would actually I would want to pick that up the way you just presented that actually had me interested. I'm like, Oh shit, maybe I should play this again. It was an absolute blast. It really was. I played the crap out of it. Good. I mean, that's, that's the heart and soul of this, this category, so that's good. I'll jump in now with my 16. But I was torn between two. So I'm going to pick the little, the one that's a little bit more controversial, just because it'll be a better discussion, but I was thinking about doing Starfox but I think we can all agree it did not age well it was not great, but it's a fun game. I know. Jake loves it. But what I'm gonna I'm gonna, what I'm what I'm gonna officially state is the original Mortal Kombat. Now I love most Mortal Kombat. It's, you know, in the series, but if you look at the first Mortal Kombat, and when I first played that I played it around the same time as Street Fighter two. So comparatively Street Fighter two, crisper cleaner, brighter, smoother. And to me Mortal Kombat, though I enjoy it. The first one was very clunky you hear how stressing

Palsh 27:56
though I enjoyed, you know, he's he Doing this right

GP 28:00
because I Well, there's there's points coming in later polish. Their Mortal Kombat will make other entries in the future. I you know, starting with Mortal Kombat two, great franchise. And if you look at this disparity between how poorly the first foot looks and plays, compared to MK two, that's kind of the crux of my argument for Mortal Kombat. If they ended the Mortal Kombat series with the first one, it wouldn't have made the list but out of all of it, yes, MK one. Not that great, in my opinion, fun to play, but just pretty ugly.

Palsh 28:38
You know, I can get beyond that. I thought it was really cool to see Street Fighter two, and had all the way smoother animations and stuff but I mean, they weren't taking, you know, real life models and trying to digitize them. So the the motions and the animations were so much more fluid because you're working with the cartoon versus real life. So it was fun. Don't get me wrong, but, you know, I thought it looked pretty bad.

GP 29:05
Yeah, it's the video game equivalent to spawn the live action movie. Yeah. Yeah, it didn't necessarily look that great. Also, some of the acting was hit or miss. But in the end, there's something about it that I still love. But yeah, well what do you think about that Mortal Kombat? Ugly but great or just a game? What do you think? I think

Wulff 29:25
it's just a game. I was never drawn into Mortal Kombat. Like all my friends were a I mean, I was in the initial rush of it. Yeah, it was like, Oh my gosh, they're just brutally bashing each other's skulls in and there's blood and Oh, man. But at the end of the day, I was still kind of like well, street fighters more fun and prettier. Pen over this. I granted my experience with it was a neighborhood full of kids who had the Genesis so it was even more limited than the Super Nintendo one. So I'm kind of colored by that memory. Everybody I knew had it for Genesis, because of course more blood.

GP 30:04
Right? Yeah. Okay. Okay. Jake, how about you?

Jake 30:09
I've been I hate disagreeing with you guys on every game. It's not that but Okay, look, you're right Street Fighter is definitely not

Palsh 30:16
garbage say it's a game.

Jake 30:18
It's not it's not lukewarm garbage at best. Okay? You microwave me on

Wulff 30:25
the garbage?

GP 30:27
If your argument against me here's it's not that bad. Okay

Unknown Speaker 30:33
then it's kind of that bad.

Jake 30:34
All right. The color palette is a bit limited, I give you that. But the digitized actors was revolutionary and they look pretty good. In fact, I wonder if you compare the frames of animation in Mortal Kombat vs. Street Fighter? I bet you they have the same frames. The only difference is not as colorful. And like you're right when you mentioned later entries, the series that kind of expand on that. Moral Kombat three is one of my favorite fighting games and the color Pelletier is amazing, but just watching Keno. That rapscallion thrusting his fist in somebody's chest and pulling out their beating heart. That looked great. I thought that was hilarious as it was good looking to me at the time. I like to look at the game I also love subzero team some zero I will be for life. I thought the sprites and the characters were well done. all agree Street Fighter looks better, but I think brutal combat is not as bad as you think it is. It's no clay fighter but that way. Okay,

Palsh 31:30
basically, Jake feels like Cora when he got punched in the nuts in the first movie.

Unknown Speaker 31:36
That's true.

GP 31:38
And the rest of us feel like Johnny K. Yeah.

Palsh 31:41
hundred dollar glasses, glasses. So

Jake 31:45
last all this before or after the discectomy I'm leaving that one.

GP 31:50
Yeah, glass, all for the wind. Okay, I like that. Okay, so um, next is going to be the 32 bit category. Let's start with Paul. Tell me Whoa, and let's, let's, let's clarify this. This tier is 3264 bit because we're

Wulff 32:05
Yeah, it's the same generation

Palsh 32:08
so we can switch it up. Okay. So I'm going to name a game. And I'm going to tell you guys what the game and I want you to tell me if you think that I think it's ugly but amazing, or if I think it's terrible, but beautiful.

Palsh 32:22
Okay. Okay.

Palsh 32:25
Castlevania Symphony of the Night.

Jake 32:31
Okay, if you don't think that's a pretty game, there's something wrong with you.

Palsh 32:33
Yeah, that was just trolling. I was hoping. For more.

Wulff 32:38
See, I was in on that one. Otherwise, I probably would have laid into pause What the fuck is wrong with you?

Palsh 32:46
Know, that one I can't say anything bad about so. That's the joke. So anyways, continue forward.

GP 32:54
No, now you have to give us a real game. Yeah, I believe a beautiful 32 or 64 Doom 64 Okay, okay, tell us about that. Why why why do you hate that game so much?

Palsh 33:06
It would look great. I remember seeing magazine ads, I remember playing it or not playing it wanting to play it. And then finally I went out on vacation, came back and had a copy of it my hand I was like it was this or Duke Nukem. 64 I was already playing Duke Nukem 64 I was like, okay, so I need something new for me, my friends. So we can just lay into this game. And I tried it. I was like, This looks so cool. And then I realized this, like, this game is crap. I was so disappointed with it. It moved well, like the graphics look great. But it other than that, it just felt like a little bit better version of doom to me like, and I can't play the original Doom anymore or give it headaches just from the motion. So it looked better. But I was disappointed because I thought it was, you know, the 64 and it just meant it was for 64 and I thought it was going to be the actual Doom with better ground. Fix. Now it was completely different. Like they made their own game and I was just I wasn't ready for that disappointment. You've you've given me a bit of a revelation here and agree or disagree but let me know. Would you say no?

GP 34:16
Okay, moving on. No. Would you say that video game commercials and box art and descriptions? Were the back in the day preteen equivalent to Tinder profiles.

Palsh 34:32
Never thought about it now.

GP 34:33
Yeah, they show up and you're so excited because their profile and then they show up and you realize this is not what I thought it was going to be

Palsh 34:40
at all. Man, sir.

Jake 34:43
Well, you are thirsty and hell.

GP 34:46
Oh, God, thirsty for that video game. Yeah.

Palsh 34:51
I didn't care about girls back then. I just cared about more video games. Just thinking about that power of

GP 34:57
the power of what was your favorite position back then? 64 cut that out.

Jake 35:05
Nope. Three hands on the stick.

Palsh 35:08
That's my joke on you need three hands to play an M 64 controller.

GP 35:13
Yeah, we saw that name then way nowhere. Okay, so Doom 64. werewolf. What do you what do you think? agree disagree?

Wulff 35:22
That's one I don't know much about unfortunately. I thought it was just gonna be Doom for in 64 so I didn't bother with it.

Palsh 35:34
PC Okay, shut up.

Wulff 35:36
No literally like I thought it was Doom like because I played it on. I think I played it at a friend's house on PC and then I had played it on Super Nintendo. So I was like, well, I played it on a couple of platforms. I don't want to play it again. So I didn't play it for in 64

Palsh 35:53
Yeah, well that's that's exactly why I bought it because they'll say Oh, man, like it's a better version. No.

GP 35:58
Wrong That's brilliant wrong. Was that Charlie Murphy? Wrong?

Wulff 36:05
Or the tigers in Wow, wrong? Yeah.

GP 36:10
Okay, but see like how great of a pic was that pulse bought the game because of two words. Doom 64 did not buy that game because of two words. Doom 64 I swipe left so

Wulff 36:26
hard.

Palsh 36:30
Man. I practically hit super like all right.

GP 36:35
I don't get that reference. I don't know super late.

Palsh 36:38
I'm very single. We'll put it that way.

GP 36:44
Okay, so, Jake, what do you do? I'm 64

Jake 36:49
I'm actually not a fan of doom. I actually don't like the series at all. Although the recent PC ones that came with the reboots, those are okay but the classic do my never really cared for and there's a series of games on the 60 That kind of tried to bring over to the PC stuff. There's Duke Nukem and hexen. And I think XM XM hex n. That's a word was the better of those type of games that 2d sprites in a 3d world? I didn't care for Doom 64 at all. I did rent it. I played a little bit. I couldn't care for it at all. It is ugly. I'll give you that. I just also think it's a bad game.

GP 37:23
Yeah, and I think Doom 64 was one of those games, where I watched my cousins play it. And I loved watching them like I could keep up with it. If I was watching somebody else, but the first time I tried playing it, it was like I completely forgotten what it was like to look at the game and could no longer keep up with it. So I played maybe 30 minutes of it and realize this is not for me to play. But it was entertaining to watch other people run and gun and blow up stuff. So I like it and the visuals are okay so long as I am not guiding the visuals. But that's that's just me say Take what do you ever is for this category? Ugly but great 32 or 64 bit? Okay.

Jake 38:07
Hear me you Final Fantasy seven. I love this game.

GP 38:11
I think that's a great choice Yeah,

Jake 38:13
everybody loves family seven or at least people who were in that generation love probably seven. Today it doesn't hold up for sure I mean the pre rendered backgrounds and in the CGI very pixelated very under rez for today's time but even back in high school I played this game originally, the sprites and the overworld and the exploration areas like cloud looks like some kind of peanuts character mutated into 3d polygon. And there's no textures anywhere to be found any of the enemies practically It is one of the ugliest first gen 3d games I've ever seen. Like I'm talking marrow 64 Meg's father's sevens cloud look like fucking the Mona Lisa. This game is the only reason people like this game. is because of the FMV The video is very cool. And I love that story. I love the music, and the gameplay is fun. But it's ugly as hell.

GP 39:09
No, I think I think that's, that may be one of the best because that's exactly right. And I think part of the reason Personally, I was so let down by the graphics is because the commercials that came out back in 97 for the games pretty much only showed the FMV it's the one so your hype for this and you're like, Oh my god, considering the last Final Fantasy with six leaps and bounds and you play it and you're like you said you're just playing to get to the next video. But somewhere somewhere in there you fall in love with it. That's probably like the earliest version of you know, people getting mad because of, you know, not showing gameplay, you know, because that wasn't the practice back then. You know, everybody just played the game because there weren't cutscenes like that. And now it's like the cutscenes look awesome, but let's see what the gameplay looks like you know, so you have gameplay trailers besides you Know the actual trailer? Well yeah, it's the video you ever been catfished by a video game? That's the idea right? The whole dating thing around again? Yeah, I think that's brilliant. I think that's a great observation and that is the cultural and historical significance of the Final Fantasy seven commercials. But if you go back and still because I did this recently if you YouTube the original Final Fantasy seven TV commercials I still get the same feels

Jake 40:28
Oh yeah, the atmosphere is amazing and and said jump from snez to PlayStation you just so hyped that the game is going to look amazing and that we all love family six I think of this podcast and just yeah the sprite work and there's great the bosses look I'm awesome. It's graph as graphics are amazing because 2d, so you just really hoping that for the jump to 3d would be something amazing. And what they show you the commercials. Looks great. But that's maybe about 10 minutes of FMV the entire game.

Palsh 40:56
Yeah

Wulff 40:58
that's true. Wolfie what do you what do you think? Final Fantasy seven okay I'm probably in the minority here to where I'm not a huge fan of Final Fantasy seven that's not to say I wasn't when it came out I played 200 hours probably in that first go through where I did just about everything I think except killing Ruby weapon I even made a second Knights of the Round so

GP 41:25
so I'm hearing you say you never beat Final Fantasy I'm playing I'm playing I'm playing

Wulff 41:33
now I I even made like I I enjoyed that game so much that time that I even made a friggin anime music video and I am V out of it back in the day with VHS like that was time consuming first I was dedication.

GP 41:49
Yeah,

Wulff 41:51
I still that's the only one I did. Oh no, that's not true. I did one with Resident Evil as well, but I really enjoyed that game the first time and then every time I've tried to play since I can't put more than like three hours into it before I'm just bored and walk away the game. Like even when I tried to play it a second time back then I was just like, man, I can't. So, to me the game, it hits some notes the first time other than that, I can't agree with that. It's an amazing game. I feel like it's just been overhyped so much. And I think it's also the fact that it wasn't my first Final Fantasy, a lot of people who love it, it was their first Final Fantasy, and that's often the case, but I will agree the game didn't look quite as good as I was hoping. But then I had spent all summer plans so he could n and Wild Arms and compared to Wild Arms. It was damn gorgeous.

Palsh 42:47
Wait, you mean it's not pronounced suikoden

Wulff 42:49
crap? No. But yeah,

GP 42:53
it's pronounced Wild Arms that

Wulff 42:57
that jump from sprites. It makes It with those backgrounds and everything it even though they weren't pretty polygons by any means for the characters, it was still an exciting change of presentation that let them tell the story in a different way.

GP 43:12
And I feel like with Final Fantasy seven they overcorrected the ship when they came out with Final Fantasy eight, with seven, the backgrounds looked more lush and detailed than the characters. And then they came out with eight. And the background was kind of put on the backburner, so they could focus on the sprites and the overworld for the main characters. So at least they paid attention and corrected a lot of people's biggest complaints. But yeah, I think that was a good good entry there. Were all four do you have for us in this category? 32 to 64 bit ugly but lovable Bushido blade? Yeah, we couldn't Bushido blade.

Wulff 43:53
I'm not gonna lie. I was kind of a square fanboy back in the PlayStation era. So I was getting all their stuff. Like it I had bought total number one nobody got total number one, but I got Bushido blade and it's it's not what I expected it to be and I had so much fun with it. And my friends and I we would just sit there and play Bushido blade for hours just because the combat it was so intricate for as limited as it was, I mean you injure your opponent, but if you got a killing stab that was it that that match was over with. There was no health bars, it was injury or death. And you can even mess up your opponent by like throwing sand in their fat face like a dirty rapscallion and then taking advantage of it. It it was it was so much fun and even just unlocking it. The the I think it had a couple of hidden characters. It was totally worth it. Just there was a lot of nuance to the game. Play that you don't see in a lot of fighting games.

GP 45:03
I'm sitting here I'm trying to remember exactly which one Bushido blade was. So it was it was a fighting game.

Wulff 45:09
Yeah, to a degree. It was a weapons fighting game. And I think you actually got to choose between a few weapons to if I remember correctly. Yeah, you're right. What the cover looks like I'm sorry, I'm trying to remember this one is black and white with I think a big big red splatter on it is like a black and white pencil drawing or ink drawing of somebody and then a big red blood splatter blade

GP 45:39
I'm also Yeah, I google image that endure. Yeah, I do remember now. I'm sorry. Thank you.

Wulff 45:44
But yeah, the the character models were not pretty that the locations are not very pretty. They weren't even very detailed. It was like one of them was a big courtyard of cherry blossom trees. And it looked like they just copy pasted the same square aware of the arena over and over and over and over the lawn from one end to the other until they got to the opposite wall.

Jake 46:05
There was a wonky camera and that came for sure used to zoom way out or like really get really close

Wulff 46:11
yeah cuz it let you run away from the your opponent pretty far right? Which of course just made the characters even more unreadable?

GP 46:21
Yeah, yeah more obscure. But yeah, I'll be honest that sounds like a piece of crap well done that's not a good entry sick Jake, what do you think about that one?

Jake 46:33
I love the game to me. We talked about this before the podcast procedure plays one of my favorite games of the PlayStation because it's not that many I played on that. The combat that one on one combat. I just love how most weapons strikes will like outright kill your opponent if they connect but there's all about the Perry system. And that's pretty unique for its time and there's not many games these days that have that same you know, do or die combat system. But I just love it when you thank you Nick's amazed leg that dropped to the ground. But they weren't dead. They still kept fighting while they're on the floor. I thought was hilarious. I love

Wulff 47:07
Yeah, they'll they'll like drag one leg while like trying to walk with the other leg with this horrible limp and it's great.

Jake 47:15
It's like Black Knight fight, right? Yeah,

Wulff 47:18
you break their arm and it just falls limp. They should have made the

GP 47:23
Black Knight like an unlockable character.

Jake 47:26
I'll know your polygons off. It's great. I love it.

Jake 47:31
The backgrounds I agree are bad. But there was a style to it though. Like the bamboo forest, the cherry blossoms it kind of felt like that martial arts, you know trope that's set up in a deserted field. A courtyard has been cleared away to warriors that battle. It had the style, but yeah, you're right. It did not have the graphic power and the textures to back it out.

GP 47:54
And then in the background, you see just the opening scene from Ninja Gaiden taking place.

Palsh 48:00
As long as that music from ninja guidance playing I'm down for it. I love that game.

GP 48:07
Okay, so Polish What was your? No You got us at the beginning. Sorry I got Castlevania joke. Yes. And the wolf goddess with Bushido blade. Jake What do you got?

Jake 48:21
We went seven man

GP 48:24
that's right that's how forgettable of a game that is.

Wulff 48:28
Bomb.

GP 48:30
I know I'm just I'm drinking drinking my haterade tonight No, I The reason I'm selling is because I've got so many honorable mentions for this category for 32 to 64 ultimately, I've settled on one but Metal Gear Solid has not aged well. This is not my These are my my honorable mentions. Such a great game, full of story and a lot of amazing twists and turns, but even playing that way came out. The graphics took me out of it. Mortal Kombat mythology sub zero. The fighting in that I don't know if you guys ever played that the graphics were bad. The fighting style was decent, but the platforming was abysmal, but it was still oddly charming because it's sub zero in an open world type setting. But ultimately, I think I have to settle for ugly but with a lot of heart, Nintendo 60 fours, GoldenEye. It was going to be that or Superman 64. And ultimately, I just don't care enough about Superman 64 so GoldenEye because I love that game. I don't know how much of the actual game or campaign I ever played through. I know I've watched it wire to wire with my older brother, but the four person you know, challenge mode was my entire experience pretty much with the 64 like that and Mario 64 and not much else. But he did great Yeah well but I mean even if you guys ever played like the giant head hack or you know code for golden it came on game was so yes DK mode so incredibly ugly but so much fun and it for me it was one of the first multiplayer you know games like that What do you guys think about golden I polished let's start with you know you summed it up

Palsh 50:23
I really can't add to it because it's just I want to say I loved it when it first came out but at the same like for graphics was but I think it was more just how you could shoot people in the crotch and they grab their crops and then fall over dead you know or it would tell you like give you the tally of headshots arm shots leg shots torso other you know other was always the crotch shot so right yeah, but I mean the graphics as much as I want to admit I thought they were amazing. I think it was more the gameplay itself so

GP 50:59
no slough Rizzoli. I'm still still playing that from an unfinished game that we started back then. That's impossible. Well, what do you think about GoldenEye? Ah,

Wulff 51:11
yeah, a, it didn't have a whole lot of texturing I think the majority of the the texture quality went to the characters faces, but not their models. So the game itself though, was an absolute blast. It wasn't a whole lot to look at, which is probably for the best because it I think it helped it run a little smoother. There were a lot and 64 first person games that made me gave me headaches or made me dizzy, something like that. Man, I spent so many hours in that game with friends after school. We just go to somebody's house and play for like two three hours that day and then do it all over again. The next day. It was crazy.

GP 51:54
Well, and it was just good enough of a game to make you want to hate your friends. Oh yeah, only for a short for short amount of time because like you said the next day, you're fine. Or if you were mad at somebody, you were only mad until you shot them in the crotch and then you were square

Wulff 52:10
that that Mario Kart 64 games that end your friendship for the day. Yep. And but it's fine tomorrow.

Palsh 52:18
Yeah. And then you started all over again with the next match.

GP 52:20
Yeah, we should we should set up a multi person. tournament or like cast of if we can figure out a way to do that either like Mario Kart or

GP 52:30
golden I think would be a blast. There's a PC version. I think actually, if GoldenEye

Wulff 52:34
And isn't it awful?

Jake 52:37
Okay, just like

GP 52:42
Okay, cool. So Jacob, what's your take on GoldenEye

Jake 52:45
wolf said I pretty much nail on the head with the low character Polly's or low Polly's link character models, the triangle shaped heads, it reminds me of that music video Dire Straits money for nothing. We're just Bismillahi low polygon models and it's just terrible plusses against 64. And hey, I love the system. I love Nintendo but they had the fog problem like the jungle level and the Russian level it just the design to get around the graphic failures. They brought in more fog, just more fog. And they do that all these games and it's just does not work for the game at all. But it's a fun game. I used to play multiplayer like everybody else. Proximity mines is my favorite weapon. I love that. Yeah, I love the game and I love playing it but you're right. It's it's ugly as dirt.

GP 53:31
Yeah. Do you know who I killed more with proximity mines than anybody else yourself? Yes, me. I find my short term memory man. I try.

Palsh 53:40
I tried to lure people into it without setting it off myself. And was very unsuccessful.

GP 53:46
Shit went to the to the point of the fog. And to kind of again, put this all in the same packaging as the Tinder and the dating things. They do the same thing in nightclubs. You know dim the lights a little bit and put into more fog, it'd be fine. So we've all fallen victim to that it's okay. Alright, so on to the other side of that coin. Let's now examine the beautiful games that are completely without any other merits. Next time, well maybe not next time but in the upcoming episodes on presby to cancel. Let's go around and restate our names a group of rapscallions and tell everybody where they can find us. Jake, you want to start us off?

Jake 54:33
Sure I'm sick Jake, you can find me on Twitch and Twitter. And I guess here

GP 54:39
Wonderful. Thank you

Palsh 54:41
push. You can find me here most of all, and I also stream very sparingly on Twitch as well under pulse 109 pls h 109.

Wulff 54:52
Okay, very good. And well. You can find me streaming on Twitch or here or occasionally posting on Twitter. werewolf w ar EWLFF

GP 55:04
awesome and I am guy prime. You can find me here on Twitch under the retro therapy or on YouTube, Instagram or Twitter as the retro therapy, everybody until next time, thank you so much for joining us.

Jake 55:21
Special thanks for music go to Arthur, the ancient found on Soundcloud or the last ancient on YouTube. For more episodes, please visit our website presby to cancel.com as well Feel free to like or subscribe at Apple iTunes, Google podcasts or anywhere else you'd like to listen to your favorite shows. As always, thank you. This has been

Wulff 55:42
a do again

Special thanks to Arthur The Last Ancient on soundcloud for our podcast theme.

For updates and more episodes please visit our website www.pressbtocancel.com, or find us on Twitter @pressbtocancel and Instagram @pressbtocancel.