The Besties - Better Know a Dungeon! (Plus, Persona 3-5!) [The Resties]

Episode Date: January 24, 2023

Today we're trying a new format called Better Know a Dungeon (a.k.a. Isn't It Levely). We pick an iconic stage or dungeon and perform an autopsy, revealing what makes it magical. For our experiment, we've selected Elden Ring's Stormveil Castle. For the back half, we help you pick which Persona to play, now that Persona 3, Persona 4, and Persona 5 are widely available.  Get the full list of games (and other stuff) discussed at www.besties.fan. Want more episodes? Join us at patreon.com/thebesties for three bonus episodes each month!

hello everybody welcome to the show my name is christopher thomas plant my name is ross this is the resties where the rest of the best discuss the best of the rest this week we're talking about a new segment that you're bringing. You should just say what it is because it's your thing. It's an examination of dope-ass levels that we really like and level design

and levels that really stand out. Now, we're going to start with the big one from Eldenbrick. You have a name for it. You didn't even give the name. You started with the word examination. You need to start with the big one from Elden Ring. You have a name for it. You didn't even give the name. You started with the word examination. You need to start with the big catchy. Well, you can. Boom, headline.

Okay. Boom. Knock him down. Well, you called it Better Know a Dungeon. Did I call it that? I don't think I called it that. Better Know a Dungeon. That sounds great.

Here's mine. Ready? Isn't it level-y? No. We can leave it to the listeners. I'm going to guess that i'm gonna win on this one isn't it levely oh boy is i hope the segment's as good as this anyway uh before we get into that um as people recall from our i believe last episode uh we had a bet regarding uh who got the most predictions right for 2022 you narrowly won

by i believe a point or a half point depending and uh your reward was me funding a action a sorry a video game statuette of uh my choosing i guess. And so I found something. The problem was I found something that was very expensive. So I- And it was on sale. It was on sale, but it was still- It's cheaper than its current listed price on Amazon by quite a bit, but- Oh my God, how much is it up to now on Amazon? It's a lot.

Okay, well, regardless, I found a 13 Sentinels statue that I linked to you. And I was like, hey, this seems perfect, but there's no way I'm spending. At the time, it was like $200. And I was not going to spend $200 on this thing. So I helped fund it. We went halfsies, basically. We went halfsies. But you super-duper wanted it.

And correct me if I'm wrong it actually arrived it's a real monkey thought kind of wish it arrived talk about the scenario that it came in okay well okay so i was out of town i'm gonna be honest with you fresh my wife has not seen it yet i cannot i have i have not shown it to steffi yet i'm like back and forth on what to do if i i need to return it but the problem with returning it is i need to go to the amazon drop off and then they would see me i mean it's gonna be in a box oh i don't know i don't know i know i threw the box so i threw like the delivery box oh big mistake yeah so okay so here's what i didn't appreciate when we ordered it it is one four

scale and and talk about like what like who is the character people need sure it's natsuno minami who is i don't know kind of like plays the elliot to et and 13 sentinels. She carries around a little robot, like a durable robot. And her storyline, yeah, it's very E.T. the Extraterrestrial. Yeah. And the toy is her and like the robot inside of her like gym bag.

But it's like, it's not a toy. Let's not diminish it. It is like a high quality statue. A PVC figure, I believe is how it's described. It really doesn't make it seem any better. It is 15.3 inches tall. Which like I was trying to pick. I mean, it's three inches longer than a foot, obviously.

Uh-huh. That is how much it works. Yeah. No, it's slightly longer than a foot. And it's pretty sizable for a statue what i didn't appreciate than an oscar if i recall it doesn't fit like on a shelf that and that's the problem i think on any shelf it doesn't fit it doesn't fit like on my bookshelf like it fits you know where it fits on my bookshelf, like as in quite literally on top of the bookshelf.

Yeah. Like between the bookshelf and the ceiling. That seems like a very vaunted place for it to go. Like that's the only respectful place to put it. I think so there are smaller figurines. There's like an eighth scale. Yeah. I think I might be like, maybe I'll trade it in and we'll go down a notch. Maybe quarter the scale of a human person.

Maybe that's not quite right. Yeah. You know? Well, I did. It seems like a bit much. What do you think of my idea, which was to put it out in front of your yard as like a lawn ornament? Get arrested? Yeah, I think that'll go great.

People will love that. Billy, stay away from that house. Do not let him anywhere near you. Do we know what we're going to do for our prize for the next session? No. Didn't we come up with something good? Oh, yeah, we were going to do art. We were going to do custom art.

Okay, okay, that's a good idea. Something that is a little more classy and we wouldn't be ashamed of. Yeah, okay, that sounds good. Well, thank you for following through on this. Of course. And it turns out I do actually have shame. And I've found... Are you going to share an image of it on the Twitter?

I will. And I'll share maybe whatever version. Like if I trade it in, I'll share that version too. Okay, good. Okay. Okay, cool. Should we get to the show? Let's do it after this break.

Okay, so we are jumping in. Sure, we'll call it Better Know a Dungeon, even though Isn't It Level-y is really catchy. And for this installment, we're going to be exploring Stormvale Castle. Now, Stormvale Castle, for those who have played Elden Ring, is the very first major dungeon in the game. I believe it's called a legacy dungeon. And you basically like come out of your cave after being revived and smack dab in front of you you could see in the distance this amazing huge medieval castle um tackling it probably another

10 10 hours down the road but uh it is sort of this this kind of looming thing right at the beginning of elden ring and it is one of my favorite dungeons in the game by far it's probably my second favorite dungeon in Elden Ring and I thought it'd be fun if we just did like a slow verbal walk through it just to talk about like parts we liked parts we got confused in

stuff like that so I thought we'd just jump from there how's that sound? I think that's a great idea yeah I think it's a cool chance for us to talk about what makes, on a really granular level, a video game good and what we like about a video game. So I'm very into it. So we have slain a few beasts. We have. We have found some clothes.

Yeah, we've been chilling in limb grave which is the starting area of elden ring i you know most people i think are going to spend five or ten hours in limb grave before kind of marching up to stormville obviously you could run right at it but i think most people probably be a little bit leveled up and generally speaking the first kind of interaction you have with oh shit this might be a tough area is the approach which isn't even in the castle it's sort of like the outskirts of the castle there's this giant gate and behind the gate this giant like a 20 foot tall giant drops down from the ceiling surrounded by guards who all have like crossbows and just like fuck your shit up very

quickly and that was like basically telling me immediately this place is not to be fucked with think it through before you keep going so then you you turn around and go grind a little bit more and increase your yeah i mean some people did that i kind of ground down on the on the giant himself because he was right by a save point and i got some so souls runes whatever they're called an elden ring and kind of spent my time there for a little while but eventually i was able to push past that and do you remember what the area that comes after that i mean this is so i i went back i've i've played this i went back and watched a bunch of playthroughs ahead of this. And where I picture Stormville Castle starting is that approaching gate. There's a there's a there's an actual gate to the castle.

Yeah. You're talking about the one behind all the ballistas. Yeah. Well, there's a gate. And then behind that gate, there are ballistas aiming at you. Yeah, but the gate has the giant there that he drops down from the ceiling, right? Oh, no. Well, maybe you should have fucking played the game.

Well, I did. You did, and you watched videos of it. Okay, you keep telling me what happens next. Okay. I'll tell you if that's where i'm at so uh you go past this giant you climb up and you're kind of in this like foggy you know uh area it's raining it's the weather's disgusting and you start pushing in and you see all these ballistas that are pointing directly at you and guys start like launching um you know giant like trebuchet type weapons at you and you're just

kind of getting attacked from all angles it's around this time that you kind of have to make a choice and i made an interesting choice here that uh you know you can kind of follow the road into what essentially is a large wall um or you can keep kind of walking straight the road curves off to the left and if you keep walking straight this is what i did on my first playthrough ever i just totally bypassed stormville castle entirely like i walked around the edge of it by accident uh and ended up in um linernia which is like the second area of the game without doing any of stormville castle which is like an interesting choice because it's not even hidden. It almost like encourages you to go that way.

Yeah. I remember that from the very first time we did it and feeling very clever. Yeah. When in reality, it's like there's nothing clever about it at all. Yeah. Well, it just puts you in a situation where you're way under leveled for anything that's ahead of you. you in a situation where you're way under leveled for anything that's ahead of you but i i kept pushing on and ended up like in line earlier for like another 10 hours before i went back and took on stormville castle realizing i was definitely outclassed where i was yes once i did

though uh i i got past all those ballista guys and finally finally got into what I would call like, you know, Stormvale proper, which starts with Margit the Fel Omen. Okay, so here, okay, so now I see why the confusion. Okay. To me, this is all prelude to Stormvale Castle. Do you think Margit is prelude to Stormvale Castle? Yeah, it is the final test to see if you're ready for storm vale castle yeah i don't think so i think they are all you make it seem

like i don't know how this game works i know exactly what we're talking about you're talking about you're like over here reading through the text of the star wars opening scrawl and i'm like you're like you remember this some people stole some I'm like, I don't think that's how New Hope begins. And you're like, no, no, no. Trust me. And it's like, no, you're talking about the overture. No, I mean, I think the overture matters a lot. And then, oh boy.

You don't think it matters? Sure. I mean, Stormville Castle is what we're here to talk about, right? Like that's the big thing. But no, you're setting the scene. You're like the dungeon. And I think that's a lot of the dungeon design is like a surprising amount of choices. Whereas in most levels that are like this, like you think of a Zelda dungeon, for example, incredibly linear experience. And that is not what's going on here.

Yeah. Or to put it another way, this game at its best is teaching you a thing and then giving you a larger version of it and a larger version of that still and a larger version of that still, right? It's a Mario model of like, I teach you that and we test you with it. And here you started with like, here's a giant and this is hard, right? And then you're going to like work your way up to Margit. And that is now the big test. And then you're ready for the actual castle. And now it's like, here's the big version of that, right?

Like here's what happens if we expand that out into a, what do they call it? Legacy dungeon. Yeah. Well, and it also allows you to make a choice. Whereas I think once people get into a dungeon like stormville castle they feel like they're stuck there they feel like i'm gonna do this until i leave right or beat it or whatever it is right but by having all these choices in the lead up to stormville castle i think it's encouraging people either like go try something else if they feel like they're under

powered or just like you know kind of nip at the edges and see if this is the thing you want to do right now, which is cool and a really nice touch. Yeah. So now we're at Stormville Castle. We're actually there, according to you. This is where Stormville Castle begins. It's the castle. It's in front of you.

The actual castle, right? Yeah, fair enough. And you have two choices. You have the big giant gate yeah and you can you can go through it and there are what ballistas giant arrows aiming at you they'll destroy you they'll wreck you unless you are somehow the world's best elder ring player or there's a dude who's like hey you know you can go around back maybe you want to do that uh and and that begins like the theme of this castle which is going in and out like i i i don't know i wrote down as like prepositions this is

prepositions as video game design where and like a lot of traditional dungeons you're going through it right or and especially first person games you're going through the game you're going purposely propelling forward towards an end, where here you are going, like, in the castle, out of the castle, under the castle, over the castle, around the castle. You are experiencing every preposition you

could take in terms of what this castle is. The first half is just trying to kind of, like, really break into the heart of it. So you start outside and then you, every time you kind of think you're getting into the castle, it throws you back out. You realize you're only on like a part of the wall that has been beaten down and discarded. And then to progress, you have to go down or up a cliff side and then you try breaking into the castle again.

And then that is kind of a dead end. And this. The way that you feel. How impenetrable and big the castle is. By sending you in and out of it. Up and down it. Just trying to kind of you know. Like find that hole in its armor.

It's so brilliant. Because it really captures the scale of this thing. Which honestly for the first. I don't know 30 minutes, you're not even really getting inside of. in you're kind of in these rampart walls that are very dark and creepy and and feel very close to the tone and and style of like dark souls one for example but there's an element at which it it starts kind of escalating into something a lot more involved and interesting um just from like structurally speaking like i think the first part of that map, cause realistically like no one for the most part is going right through the gates, uh, facing, um, those ballistas. Like it's, as you said, the death sentence. So almost everyone's going to go towards this like side alleyway and the side alleyway for for the most part, is pretty linear. Like, it's kind of guiding you up and up and up until you can eventually get to, there's, like, the Rampart Tower of Grace, which is, like, the first time that this map really earnestly starts branching.

And when it branches, it branches in, like, crazy fucking ways. Very overwhelming ways but like in ways that make you not even fully grasp how big this level is and how many options there are in terms of tackling it well and and that first so again going from this cliff side that is going in and out of the castle to the rampart i think is so interesting because it feels to me like the transition from dark souls to something bigger um that that going into the castle it's very dark it's very moody um it's it kind of winds in and on onto itself over and over again and it reminds me of just the early stages of any dark souls game or even demon souls to some level um and then when you finally get through that you're right you go into the that

tower and it has um right in the middle of it is an elevator that is not operating um and yeah depending on which floor you go to one just the verticality of it is a huge shift um but two that yes it takes you to um kind of the different types of experiences that you're going to have in Elden Ring. Yeah. You know, like there's like one of them is like very, very platforming heavy. And like really, so, I mean, you can describe this like going onto the rooftop specifically. Yeah. So from that Rampart Tower site of grace uh you have the option you can either go just like keep

walking outside to the ramparts or you start climbing up and these rooftops that you reach by going up are uh there's tons of them and because you can now jump in a in a soulsborne which is new um you have so much more like versatility in terms of where you can go on these rooftops to the point where so i played this game obviously when it came out in february of 2022 um but hadn't really played through this map in particular since then and i found myself finding items that I like completely missed and, and areas that I completely missed just by thinking of the game in a different way,

by really like looking at every ledge and every sign and, and even like player notes and being like, hi, I wonder why that's there. Oh, I, I had never gone through this. And suddenly I'm opening doors that I'd never opened before

and seeing areas that I'd never opened before, which is just like so cool. And that whole like upper area, the rooftops area, is like pretty off the beaten path. Like it is kind of going away from your end goal, which is like the final boss fight of this map. But you find like dope shit up there, dope items. And it just like gives you a lot of fun activities to do that.

Aren't just like, I'm going to fight a bunch of Eagles that throw exploding barrels at me. Yeah. One, there's that thing of up horizontal sideways, I guess, or down. So what you're talking about that,

that area to me, you're right it's teaching you effectively jump platforming yeah i'm saying like this is a new way you know this is another way of thinking about these games there's an intentionality to every corner and every little thing that you can jump onto the sideways route takes you actually back to that original cliff side yeah and it rewards you from like hey okay this is backtracking you're familiar with this if you do this you know there's going to be the bonus rewards and then the down gap which is this area there's a bunch of uh birds with blades stuck to their their feet um or some of them are like throwing exploding barrels you can jump downwards from that area and it's a

series of jumps down down down down until one of my favorite moments the first time i played the game the ground gives way underneath you and you drop even further till you're basically at the bottom of this cliffside way underneath the storm bill castle and that's similar to again the old kind of dark souls for me of well you can't jump but you can kind of fall you can throw yourself off ledges and there are these hidden things and what's so wild about that is the reward is that elevator yeah so this thing is like very very easy to overlook going off this very specific edge and dropping and dropping and dropping and dropping the reward is tremendous it's so big um which again is just teaching you hey you know you could go in one direction and do all of this really challenging stuff and then you get a you

know like crappy stone or you could just jump off ledges for you know 10 minutes and then the reward is you now have a means of navigating this entire level. Okay, so let me say something at this point. That elevator remains non-functioning to me because I had never, and I spent a long time trying to figure it out, had never figured out how to activate it, how to get down to where that bottom is where I could turn the elevator on. And obviously I could have looked it up, but I intentionally was like not doing that for Elden Ring and continue to not do that for Elden Ring. Of course, Chris Plant just spoiled it for me.

It's fine. Don't worry about it, Chris Plant. Hey, I did this without spoilers the very first time I played it how did you even know to go down there because it was dark souls and every ledge and the first thing i was like i gotta look under that and i was like it's also so it's kind of to me it was kind of obvious because it's a big open space it like when you're going out to these birds with that are throwing the the bomb barrels at you there's like a big almost like a patio ledge um and it looks out really at nothing when i started

i was like that has like they don't put anything in this game unless there's you know a reason yeah and i think that rings true throughout the entire game there's there's always a reason for a platform or an item if there's an an item that's floating out there in space, you can obviously get to it somehow, and it kind of gets your brain cooking in terms of how you might go about that. Yeah, and again, what I loved about that spot, that fall that I mentioned where you jump and you jump

and you jump and the ground actually gives way, that to me really set the tone for the entire game. The two things in this stage really set the tone for the entire game the two things in this in this stage that set the tone were one just birds with blades on their feet that's when i saw them yeah and throw in it throw exploding barrels like i was like okay i i get the sense of humor that's going on here but two when i was doing that jumping and the ground gives way and then i didn't die i actually like it just scared me for a minute and it's like okay well now you're in this new area that is so much kinder than the

early dark souls model um where it trolls you just to troll you yeah um this is like yeah we we got you but also like hey good job i'm we're glad you actually looked over here here's a reward um i don't know that that felt like a consistent energy where they didn't want to punish me when i was really actually having fun when i was really making an effort to like see everything that they put in the game yeah and it's funny because when i was playing it the first time back in february of last year i remember being really conservative about my choices like oh i'm not gonna summon a spirit summon because like i'm gonna save that or whatever it was and while i was playing replaying it just now uh i remember being kind of amazed at like wow i could play almost this entire dungeon with like

a ai companion with me and that's fucking great like that's so nice and i was just like not even like attuned to that but at that point of the game when i first played it so they really do give you a lot of options and tools to make the game much easier for you um which which would would have probably taken a lot of the sting out of my uh deaths the first time through but i was playing it like a dark souls game like playing it really conservatively and carefully and just learning the ropes at that point. Yeah. So for me, this, like all this kind of comes together, like you're right.

There's all these different ways that you can branch out or you can just kind of go effectively directly to the boss. But again, the kind of problem is you don't know where that is. You don't really know where you're going. But once I did kind of figure out where I was going, once I got into the heart of the castle, right? And you can tell when you're on the right path because it starts to actually feel lived in. Like you go into rooms and there's like paintings. Yeah. Right? feel lived in like you go into rooms and there's like paintings yeah right like there's chandeliers

that you are in a place where like creatures live not just on these like abandoned exterior rooms it felt to me like um do you remember in when you're a kid like on the playground kids would have like yarn like a circle of yarn right and they would put their fingers into it and they would make like these like shapes and then you could put your hand in the middle yeah you're talking about tiddlywinks for a second it sounded like a 1910 street kid game but no it's tiddlywinks basically tiddlywinks is that what i think that's what it's called no tiddlywinks is where you have like little circles of plastic and you like throw them in a mat uh cat's cradle maybe yeah cat's cradle okay but yes it reminded me of that where you get you get the yarn like a whole thing and then you

like pull it right and then it just all goes back to being normal yeah and it's like that to me is is the brilliance of this design where it feels so complicated it feels like it's just this giant knot and you're like how could this possibly make sense how could they possibly direct me and have control and have any sense of you know direction and then you end up exactly where you need to be and it just all in instant clicks yeah everything sort of funnels to the same eventual spot but there are so many ways to get there um and it's using a lot of these like very i mean not, not super subtle, but, you know, when you see a bunch of enemies that are pointing ballistas in one direction, you kind of know that their backs are facing where you need to go. They're obviously guarding a specific spot.

If there's a giant sitting on some stairs, you want to get behind that giant, right? some stairs you want to get behind that giant right so there are a lot of tools that are telling you secretly very subtly hey this is the direction you should be going in but it still makes you feel like you have a lot of control over how you know you approach that before we get to like the end sort of area uh i just want to talk about the court main courtyard for example yeah i think this is an area that like everyone thinks of immediately when they think of stormvale castle because it is the area with the like 20 soldiers with ballistas and you know it's very crowded and from this spot there's kind of like six or seven branching paths you can take and one of them i miss for a really long time until i not this time not the

time that i most recently that i played through this map but maybe a month or two after the launch of the game i came back here and realized that there was just like an edge that i didn't fall off of and a totally optional giant boss fight that was just like waiting for me at the bottom of this pit with like a creepy face down it was just like this weird twisted unexpected moment um for an area that i thought i had fully explored and just like stumbling upon that was was so incredible yeah and again buried under the thing that seems like it is the thing right there's a thing within the thing is is so wild as if like you hadn't designed enough i mean that that is also one of the funniest moments in the game to me where you've made your

way you feel like you're really into the castle you there's like a bit of a boss fight once you're into the kind of these main rooms it's like this creature with multiple arms it's in like a ball or a hall yeah that's right like a royal hall whatever and then you yeah you see it the the the door with light shining and you're like oh great an exterior i'm at the courtyard and you go out and you just see all of those weapons aiming at you yeah and the instant just like okay you're dead um just such a good goof such a great goof um between that and and the fact that you do all of this work and you realize like wow if you could have gone through the front gate it would have taken you exactly here yeah but you would have been dead because yeah yeah yeah yeah but it is a good good geography right yeah it's i i i would love for from software to make a die hard video game they're the only people who could do it

you know i mean no no why you want nakatomi plaza from them yeah like that to me is that's what's so appealing about die hard is it's this rare action movie where you know exactly where you are at all times that's very complex geography of of the um the skyscraper the office building and you always know where you are and where he needs to go. And I just feel like, oh, a match made in heaven would be From Software doing a digital version of that.

Total waste of their talent. They shouldn't actually do it. But just for me, if they want to put together a Christmas present next year, now would be a good time to get started. At the very least, maybe a modern From Software Now would be a good time to get started. At the very least, maybe a modern FromSoftware game would be interesting. Yeah.

I don't even know what that would look like. Yeah, I don't think we'll ever see that. Yeah, probably not. Yeah. Okay, so we've battled the big ball guy. We got ourselves through the courtyard. We found the ulcerated tree spirit that was kind of off that hidden ledge

in the back. And we're kind of approaching you know essentially the end of of this dungeon and it was here that you know you can basically power your way through this big giant sitting on the stairs at a safe point behind him and i remember uh going through this and oh, this is the final boss right here. There was like a little side room with some pot guys. And the side room was an area that I kind of like dipped a toe into and then kind of forgot about. And on this playthrough, again, I went through there and realized that like, oh, here's a whole other area and series of jumps and locked door that i just never found the first time through after spending like easily 10 hours if not 15 hours in this dungeon alone it continues to just be

shocking to me that they were able to like nestle all of these secret little paths and entryways throughout the entire experience to make it just way more satisfying it's you know with games this big obviously you know team members split up and they go off and they have like the dedicated team that's working on this dungeon or the dedicated team working on this system and it just didn't doesn't feel like there's like a b league team at from software like that got stuck with a dungeon that ends up coming out crappy. I mean, this I think is one of the better dungeons, but I think they're all pretty fucking great. And kind of just an amazing feat that they were able to accomplish this.

I mean, we haven't even talked about the like art design of this whole place, i mean every single moment looks straight out of like concept art like you could just screen screenshot anything and hang it on the wall it just looks so stunning and then you fight the big baddie and then you fight the big guy i mean it's funny that we you know it's arguably one of the most popular i guess recognizable boss fights instantly um but that's not what we're here to talk about we're here to talk about the castle yeah yeah i mean you know i do think both margaret and godric the grafted obviously play into the scene in some sense i wouldn't call them level design per se but but they, you know, kind of ramp up and speak to one another in the way that they both play and play out their fights.

I think they're both great boss fights and, again, visually stunning. But you're right. It's not necessarily a level design thing. Yeah. necessary level design thing yeah i mean i i do agree with the idea of book ending a stage with boss fights rather than just being a thing at the end is so clever and you're right the the kind of mirroring effect is so interesting it just rules i mean i you mentioned all the people on the team going up and making different things i continue to be impressed especially now going back and like i watched a few different runs of this just to see how different people

were playing it and one people approach it so differently which is cool to watch um but two it really does feel like a a tasting menu menu of what's to come in the game. Like there is a sewer area that you can kind of stumble upon. There is all this exterior verticality. There's the climbing on the roofs. It reminds me a lot of the sorcerers. Yeah, Raya Lucaria has a lot of that. Yeah, like it is giving you kind of a hint of what is to come. And I think almost each chunk of it, other castles or dungeons do better, but none of them have the sheer kind of variety.

And the way that it weaves all together is just phenomenal. Yeah, I think holistically, it feels like the most consistent of all of them. I think it, it feels like architecture to me in ways that not all of the other dungeons in the game, even though they might realize like logically work is like, Oh, this could exist in the real world.

Stormvale feels 100% like it could exist in the real world. And I think that's what makes it so satisfying, as you feel like you have the freedom to fully explore this place. That's it. We did it. We did. Isn't it lively? Lovely? Isn't it lovely?

Better know a dungeon. We'll call it that. We'll see you after the break. Hello, everybody. Welcome back. We did it. After talking about better knowing a dungeon, we're going into mini dungeons all at once. We didn't even prime you up top.

We realized we probably should have done that. We're going to talk about the release of Persona 3, 4, and 5 across basically every console. You can effectively play these games that were limited to obscure PlayStation Portable devices and the PlayStation 4 and 5

and now you can play them on everything. So which one should you play is the question. And your options are Persona 3 Portable? I think that's what the official name of it is. Yeah, I think you're right. Persona 4 Golden

and Persona 5 Royal. These are the best versions of each entry in the Persona. Sort of the game of the year versions, if you will. Yes. With even more significant changes um we will notice that persona one and persona two are not here that's because they are extremely difficult and we cannot condone that you play them uh are they not good well no

it's not that well i don't i think if if you're listening to this show right now and you have not played Persona 1 and Persona 2 on your own, I don't think they're for you. Let's start with 3, 4, and 5. They're at least approachable. Have you played 4 and 5? Yeah, both with 4 and 5, I probably played in two hours, I want to say. So let's get three off the table then, right off the top.

Persona 3, if you're listening to this show, and you played Persona 5, and especially if you played Persona 4, and you really enjoyed them, now is actually a great chance to play Persona 3. And here's the good thing about it. is actually a great chance to play persona 3 and here's the good thing about it you've learned all of the confusing and obscure things about the series by getting practice in these much more approachable games and you should go off and play it um some warning very violent very bleak um the way that characters uh initiate their personas is i don't know if it's really even pretending but like you know i'm not gonna say it you can you can see a video of it it's horrible and graphic and violent extreme trigger warning yeah extreme um so that's that we're gonna put that one aside for for the typical person uh especially people who have not played these games i think and you probably agree with me here, Persona 4 and Persona 5 are really now your starting points.

Yeah. We've narrowed it down even further. And based on what I played, I'll tell you, I found Persona 4 to be more grabby to me, just because I like the setting of a rural village more than downtown Tokyo. Yeah. I mean, let's talk about that.

Let's separate what these what the two different ones are set up set up persona 4 golden and i can take royal sure so oh god i mean just the general okay you're a persona 4 golden you're in uh this like small japanese village and something was this is like i didn't play it for it was like five years ago and i only played a couple hours but there's like a tv show that people are watching and people start dying at night and then you get sucked into the tv and there's a teddy is there and uh i remember juness is a store uh-huh that's about all yeah that's about all i remember you want me to save you i think i think you finished this game no you know that wasn't that wasn't the problem is i get sleepy that's

fair i think i think the writing i found the writing to be good i just i couldn't i couldn't get through it yeah that that that is generally the basic premise is that you are yes in a small town you are staying with i believe it's your uncle and his daughter um and mysterious deaths are taking place and you and your friends are kind of coming to terms with your own identities your personas if you will um in this alternate um violent scary rpg world and your time is split between uh your hobbies around town around this like small village uh in your school work and then you know going off and fighting monsters inspired by myths from across the world in time um persona five wait before you do that i do remember one more thing uh-huh everything's great at your juness yes there's there's a shopping center in town that has a very catchy jingle and that is what fresh is imitating that's all i remember um it is also it was released originally

i believe on the playstation 2 the first persona 4 and then golden the upgraded version was released on the playstation vita yeah and for a lot of people this was the reason to buy a playstation vita uh and it was really the only place to play it for quite a while um it feels like a playstation 2 game that that might be the biggest barrier for a lot of people is it doesn't have a lot of the creature comforts of modern role-playing games. You get into dungeons and there's quite frankly not a lot to see.

It can be a little bit challenging. That said, I do agree with you in terms of just pure warmth and wanting to spend time with the characters. I think Persona 4, if that's what you're looking for and especially if you have some experience with role-playing games yeah you should definitely check this out kind of surprised you haven't checked it out already by now if that's you um then persona 5 takes place in tokyo splashier much splashier this game was originally developed i believe for the playstation 3 but it was probably most known for its release on the playstation 4

um and you are a collection of high school thieves pulling off heist in the it's like phantom zone you're the phantom thieves of hearts and you are um doing the exact same thing you know you're you have your hobbies now in the big city um you're going to school and now the kind of like the what these dungeons build towards are evil adults like adults in the world who are taking advantage of or exploiting children aka you and your friends and it is i think a bit darker than four it gets a little closer to three it is much more approachable in terms of for example like how you actually use personas these characters is not i would say immediately, immediately understandable in Persona 4. A joke with Persona 4 is that you learn how to play it about 95% of the way through.

Where I think Persona 5, especially Royal, does a much better job of explaining all of that. So if when you play a game, you really feel like you want to be in control and you're here for the combat and for all of that so if when you play a game you really feel like you want to be in control and you're here for the combat and for all of that stuff in that case i think five is probably the better pick the trick here is i think the characters are not quite as charming i think the visuals are i don't know a little harsher i don't know the the persona 4 has this kind of like 70s um burnt oranges and yellows and greens to it um persona 5 is like really stark red and very high contrast yeah and very moody um uh inspired a little bit by like casinos almost yeah um they're both great i mean that's the thing both of them i think you enjoy they're also both like 150 hours long so uh if you pick one you'll be good for a while

basically yeah yeah exactly um if you have the means maybe you try one and you can try the other um before you know really committing all of that time because especially Persona 5, when you think you are nearing the end, you have just reached the beginning. Very similar to Elden Ring. So long. Oh, but I mean, yeah, for me,

just even compared to Elden Ring, it just goes on and on. Elden Ring was also 150 hours for what it's worth. Yeah, I guess you're right. Jeez, video games, man. I think it's a series that is 100% worth trying at least once. Even if you're not a huge RPG person, I think it's one of those games that kind of transcends its genre a little bit.

Kind of especially 5, just because it is so much more approachable. Hey, there is one other option. You could also just watch the anime. There you go. It's right there. It's sitting there if you want it. I'm not saying it's the way that you should go. It's a good.

But it's right there if you want it. I mean, I didn't make it through it, but I also had played the game, so I don't really know. It's an anime of what, five? Well, there's one of four, and I believe there is one of five. I've seen one of four. That seems like a more appealing way to do it,

personally. Yeah? Is that what you're going to do? You're going to let up and count your own? I think I'm just going to watch the anime. That sounds great. So yeah, that's it. We just wanted to give you a little bit of a crash course and send you on your rightful way. Which one are you going to play? Yeah?

You're going to devote your time? No, probably not. But they seem nice. I'm glad they bring joy to people. But it's just like, I don't know where I'm going to have that time. If I have that amount of time,'m just gonna replay hollow night which i've been dying to do for years so well i wish you luck um uh anything else before you wrap yeah i wanted to really quick mention two mini games very small games but it's two excellent games the developer is johan pates i hope i'm pronouncing that right and johan makes um i want to say minimalist approaches to various

genres uh their style is like heavily pixelated, very low resolution pixelation, but they do a ton with that pixelation. So the two games that I'm recommending, which are both free and playable in a browser, if you want to do that, uh, they actually run on Pico eight, which is an independent, uh, kind of game system. them uh the first game is called ascent which is like a micro metroidvania it takes like 30 minutes to beat but kind of encapsulates everything about metroidvanias in a very very tight 30 minutes uh if you're a fan of like uh celeste and stuff like that um feels very similar so i really dig that and they also made a game called golf sunday which is a golfing game uh that is like a super minimalist golfing game where it like automatically picks what club you're using and uh there's no like element where you're you know trying to time your drives or anything like that the way the game works is the further your drive is, the further you're aiming away, the bigger the circle is,

which indicates that your accuracy is going to be worse. So it just like super simplifies everything. And to add a little fun to it, you actually have to walk to your ball or you can like drive a cart around. And all this is presented in like super lo-fi super pixelated tiny little 280 by 280 graphics and it uh it's great i love both of them so they're the uh one of them is called ascent and the other one is golf sunday highly recommended

it reminds me a little bit of that mario, the most recent Mario Golf. Pretty good game. Well, in terms of walking around, yeah. Yeah, yeah. I love a golf game that gets that walking around the golf course is a huge part of golf. Yeah. You know, it's like that part of it is the vibe. Yeah, that last Everybody's Golf game that came out on PlayStation did the same thing. And I agree with you.

I think it's a nice touch. I don't know if I'm going to even call this a recommendation, but I'm going to talk about it. playstation did the same thing and i agree with you i think it's a it's a nice touch um my uh i don't know if i'm gonna even call this a recommendation but i'm gonna talk about it have you heard about skinnamarink i've heard it's a horror movie okay so skinnamarink is the like maybe the closest this generation is going to get to a blair witch project and by that i i don't mean like in terms of quality or anything i think I'll let other people decide what they think of it. But it is a micro micro budget film, like thousands of dollars to make it. toddlers or very young children who wake up in their house and it's like in the mid 90s and suddenly like the doors and windows are or have already disappeared oh my and they're effectively trapped in the house and they're like no lights on except for like the light of

a tv that is just playing archive footage of like old cartoons, like open license cartoons. Creepy. And the movie never really like shows their faces. It never shows them like talking. You can kind of hear them talk at times, but it's hard to make out. So sometimes it puts text on the screen. Yeah.

And then there's also a voice coming from the darkness and you're not sure if you're ever really seeing anything because again it's shot on digital and effectively a room with no windows or doors um in the dark and that voice is gradually telling them horrible things um and yeah it's it's really upsetting uh and uh i whether or not anything even happens in it is a great question it has drawn a lot of attention because of it just being like i don't know very tiktok friendly but it's very um like uh past creepypasta like youtube video type of thing yeah but stretched out for 100 and some minutes. I had the chance to see it in a theater, even though most people will probably be able to check this out on Shudder,

I think in like two weeks. And I have not seen that many people walk out and boo a movie in a long time. But at the same time, a lot of people clapped. Got a reaction. Which I reaction is like partly a response yeah and like when the scares did happen again a very very very very slow movie when the scares happened oh my gosh like it felt like the entire place was having a collective convulsion um it was it was pretty wild uh it was cool just to see something i mean i i really admire it as like an artwork like it could like it could exist as like installation art or as again something cut down on youtube it was deeply weird to see something that is either of those things

being presented as a traditional movie in which people are going into it expecting that people who probably have and this is a critique of them just never had any experience with either of those things right they're just like i'm just here to watch a movie yeah i think the northman was probably another version of that yeah yeah though i again this is even more this is like going and watching like warhol's manhattan or something like sure i mean truly going and seeing something well i mean it's like i know gotham whatever it's called but it is yeah it's truly going and expecting a movie and it's simply not being a movie in any sense of that word um yeah it was it was a trip um it's gonna be on shutter i it's kind of a bummer i mean i'm

glad that it's gonna be on shutter because hey at least it's out there um but talk about a movie that uh is not gonna benefit from streaming uh in like bit rates and all that stuff like how how you actually stream video that dark of a bit of a movie is not going to look especially good well that's okay will look like shit too so whatever well yeah sure sure sure i the only thing i would recommend is if you do if for whatever reason you're humorous like i love this sort of weird upsetting thing definitely watch with headphones on because like this movie exists in its sound yeah um so if you're in it watch it on your laptop in a dark room and I think you might have a good time.

Let us know. Cool. That's it. We did it. This week, we talked about Elden Ring, for starters, Persona 3, 4, and 5, Johann Paitz,

Johann Paitz, Paitz? Sure. Sure. Ascent and Golf Sunday and Skinnam Rank, which will be on Shudder early in February. And that's it. We did it. We did another episode. Yay. It feels good, you know. It feels good just to

be back in the saddle of making podcasts. Do we know what we're doing next, Preston? No, we have no idea. That sounds good. I'm sure we'll have something really exciting to talk about. But I guess besties will have Fire Emblem, so that's... Oh, yeah, that's a big one.

Yeah. Maybe I'll convince you to do Grand Theft Auto 1, 2, and 3. Or 3. Grand Theft Auto 3 in the three versions of it, the trilogy. Maybe? Maybe. We'll see. We'll see. Okay, okay. three Grand Theft Auto 3 in the three versions of the trilogy maybe maybe we'll see we'll see okay okay um that is it for another episode of

the resties he is Ross Frashtick you want me to say your name yeah yeah he's Chris Plan I guess yeah we did it we're the rest we're the resties.

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