The Besties - The Besties 61 - Welcome back for the first time

Episode Date: June 21, 2013

Allow me one moment to welcome any new listeners who were introduced to The Besties by our recent E3 video spectacular. The podcast is a little different than what you saw last week. For one, it's not filmed. For two, the rules and structure tend to change — regularly. For three, there are, how do I put this, special guests. Yes, this week, Milton Bradley, the grandfather of board games himself, graced The Besties recording studio to inform us of the games he failed to sneak onto store shelves. These games sure are something, and by something I mean morally repugnant! We also talked about the big news of the week: Griffin bought an Android phone! Oh, and Microsoft changed its controversial policy. And Griffin bought an Android phone. You'll hear all that and more on this week's Besties! 4:35 - Best "switcherooniski" (Xbox One game licensing policy) 21:45 - Best gaming device I've bought this year (HTC One) 29:00 - Halftime! 35:40 - Best screenwriting gig for a popular game designer (Ken Levine is writing the Logan's Run remake (and I predict it will take longer than three months to write, despite what Frushtick says, because Hollywood is Hollyweird)) 40:10- Best flashback to shop class (Bridgy Jones) 49:15- The winner is... Theme song by Ian Dorsch Get the show: Download MP3" Subscribe to the podcast (RSS) Subscribe on iTunes 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!

so you guys know how there are badges in animal crossing yeah new leaf fake achievements there's yeah they're yeah they're achievement-esque um there's one you get for how long you've been playing oh no oh gross and i got the 50 hour one like three weeks ago and i'm like so fucking scared to get the next i'm so like there's no way of keeping track of how long you've played except for these things, so like, You're dreading the arrival of that, like, teddy bear. That fucking beaver dude is gonna roll in and be like, hey dog,

five days! Five days of your life are mine now. How do you like your furniture sets? Oh, you've completed Modern Wood and it only took you five of your real-life goddamn days. Your life tastes like wood to him, because he's a beekeeper.

It tastes like Modern Wood, and also shells, because I'm a shell. I'm a shell. I'm a husk now. Yeah. Shells don't sell very well, though. my name is justin mcroy and i know the best thing of the week i forgot what we were doing huh no i was hitting the consonants My name is Justin McElroy, and I know the best thing of the week.

Forgot what we were doing, huh? No, I was hitting the consonants. My name is Griffin McElroy, and I know the best game of the week. My name is Christopher Thomas Plant, and I know the best thing of the week. My name is Russ Frostick, and I know the best thing of the week. My name is Russ Frostick and I know the best thing of the week. Guys, we need to stop for a minute. I left my DS in another room. No, no. Guys, you can't be playing Animal Crossing while the show

is going on. Yeah. Yeah, definitely. Admit it. Who is right now? Say it. Say it out loud. I literally closed it. I was doing it all through the intro. Admit it to Jesus. Who's still playing?

This is the Besties, where we talk about the latest, greatest, and most spectacular in tech, movies, art, opera, gaming, you name it. This week, we're focused on gaming. We're four best friends, and talk about the games and stuff hey hey community let us know in the comments if you want us to actually do an all animal crossing episode we're ready to turn up prices did i tell you guys that i saw john c mcginley at the airport i was leaving lax i was in security And who's behind me looking dapper, carrying what appeared to be a ukulele case, but John C. McGinley.

Okay, so correct me if I'm wrong. This is not John C. Reilly, who I can picture in my brain. No, sorry, it is John C. Reilly. Okay, because John C. McGinley, if I recall, is the guy that shows up on a lot of series that then get canceled. No, John C. Reilly. John C. Reilly? John C. Riley John C. Riley have you really gotten those two

confused for the better part of a week because they physically couldn't look any more different from each other also I don't think John C. McGinley I think it's just John McGinley who's the doctor on Scrooge never mind I was thinking of the neighbor in

Married with children whoa this that's ted mcginley this just in guys i almost uh tried to introduce myself to john c riley and i 100 would have addressed him as mr mcginley so i am really glad that i got that fucking sorted out in my head so i was not there by sorted out, you mean that you're a huge pussy. Yeah, right. But I mean, it saved me this time. My fear of social interaction was well-founded, which is so rare. Why did someone put an IMDB page of John C. McGill?

Yeah, right. He's handsome. Yeah, like we know what he looks like. I know it now. Who's bringing what? And it is a big week, and we need to get into it because I'm a busy man. Let's start with Justin's thing because Justin's thing is a big news item. Oh, man.

Hachi Machi. It's the biggest. Okay. My official nomination was Best Switcherooniski. nomination was best switcheroo nice key now I say that just to leave myself room in case I want to give the award of the best switcheroo the best switcheroo knee the best switcheroo nice key and that is the the the Xbox 180 and people are calling it no okay listen it's not just funny it's tremendously appropriate right it's not just the i mean it's fantastic it's not can we make it can we just acknowledge the fact

that like somebody made that joke as soon before that fucking page even went up like as soon as those early reports hit hit giant bomb and what hi-fi like somebody was like xbox 180 and then like this morning people were like hey guys xbox 180 and it's like dog i don't think it's i wasn't trying to be funny i'm just saying that that's what people are calling it it's like watergate or whatever it's just a name people put in there so who came up with the 180 thing probably me yeah thing. Can somebody explain it to me? I'm not sure I understand. Okay. So, do you know what DERM is? Mm-hmm. Xbox One had bad DERM on it.

Wait, I don't know what DERM is. Raleigh DERM? It stands for Digital Rights. Right. ERM. Mine. Mine. Microsoft's.

It belongs to Microsoft. It's basically said that all of your digital rights belong to microsoft right um that was yes drm stands for digital rights management uh it's pretty sure it's digital rights microsoft's okay uh the microsoft had imposed some rules uh for the xbox one including your inability to share physical games unless you, or sell physical games unless you sold them to an approved retailer. The 24-hour online check where the system would stop playing games

if it did not go online once every 24 hours. These policies were, of course, very unpopular with people. There was also something about sharing. Like, you couldn't give a disc to someone, or you could only do it once. It was very complicated. You could only do it once, and only if you were friends with them.

We did a whole episode about this. Yeah, we don't need to. I like that the plan is playing in the audience here. Anyway, they said fuck all that. Yeah. After basically wasting the most important news week, the most important week-long news cycle in the entire fucking year, after completely blowing it by announcing their crazy nutso policies

right before the biggest news cycle of the year, and then fucking blew the week, and now afterwards they're like, oh, okay, we realize we fucked up so now we're gonna get back in see i see this is where i have a problem uh i i don't think it's draconian like i mean it was very forward looking i mean it it it this is the way things are going i mean well let's talk talk about what the reversal is and then we'll get into this okay so the reversal is basically none of it no i mean they're not I mean, they're not doing anything.

It's going to be exactly like... It's basically just like Xbox 360. I mean, the problem I have with it is, obviously, I understand completely... For me, the idea of divorcing games from discs is like... games from discs is like Corey Banks, who's a PC gamer now, he called it the pawn shopification of video games and I think that

and he talked about how this continues that like, explain turning games into a commodity that are bought and sold used like this and not making an experience where you own a game and, and,

and that's yours. This idea of like, you know, games being secondhand commodities that you can buy and sell. Aren't there like 10% of the people that think that, because with that policy that they announced, I felt like I didn't own the fucking game. If I couldn't decide what I wanted to do with it after,

or if their servers went down, you wouldn't be able to play the game you could have owned. I don't want to misconstrue my point here. The way they explained it was horrific. I mean, a PR debacle of unimaginable proportions. And it just kept going with support tweets. And it just kept going. And it was bad. Nightmarish i mean the idea is not inherently bad it's just the execution was bad not quite as bad as the

messaging but like the idea of doing this this physical game thing again is just so weird i mean it's so backwards because you're locking us into that for five years and like at the very at the very least at the very least and i think that a lot of like what you see in like flexible pricing that is able to be done on pc things like that is because that's an all digital space oh but there's no way they would have video games triple a video games using the model that microsoft proposed we're not to get less than $59.99 a pop. There's no fucking way. First off, A, there's no way of knowing that.

B, what keeps those things, I mean, part of what keeps those prices like they are is the insane markup that GameStop puts on them. I mean, the idea of having to push these things into physical channels, I think it hampers a lot of the pricing. There is no way that EA would pass the savings on to you.

That's the thing. We have shitloads of digital options for purchasing games and physical games. Can you think of five examples where, three examples, how about one example where the, where the digital game at launch, you're like,

all right, so we don't have to fucking ship this to retailers. We're going to knock 10 ski off for you, the gamer. Cause we love it. What, what, what possible,

I mean, where, where is that situation ever occurred? Where there's a digital version and not a retail version. Oh, no, I'm saying, I'm saying when they launch,

when they launch alongside one another, they cost the same amount of money. Sim city was a digital version and a physical version. Because they have to stay in bed with GameStop and they can't undercut the price that GameStop is selling. Exactly, because that relationship is important. And what Microsoft has done is just continue that relationship for another five years.

So now... I think the bigger problem here is communication and trust, right? Like, one, this whole thing, I think the message was just delivered in the worst possible way. There were things that seemed interesting that Microsoft was offering, like the sharing with your family plan or being able to lend a game, a digital copy of a game, or just your copy of a game to someone.

There was a lot of good, and they said it in all the wrong ways. And I think when you present this new plan, you don't want to come out and present it how you would to a corporate board meeting, right? You don't want to put all the evil stuff first and be like, well, here's how we're going to do well. When you're talking to human beings, you want to say, well, here's how you're going to benefit from this. And I don't think they said, they delivered it like it was a board meeting,

not like it was a human to human interaction. And here's the thing. I'm totally for this, this digital future that everybody is clamoring for, but you're right, Justin, it is about trust. And they like,

I have absolutely, they have no line of credit in that department with me yet. If they had done anything to, to move in that direction during this past generation then i would be totally fine with it but but i don't feel like anybody has sony microsoft or nintendo like nobody right i mean there's no there's no question about my my only point is i just it's a shame that I believe in digital distribution as the sole platform of a console. I think that that is a healthy way for the industry to progress. And I just hate to see that because Microsoft fucked it up so bad and didn't think about execution or response or anything, we get this bungled at it where the the answer is just to completely

backpedal and not push things forward at all well and i just think that's important i don't here's the silver lining to all this uh i agree with you justin i i too am looking forward to things going all digital like i don't need 50 000 copies in my house like i'm looking forward to going all digital but the bright side to all of this for sony and for microsoft and nintendo to a certain extent they've certainly been trying is that from what i understand every single game that comes out will be day and date a digital release as well yeah so so if you don't want to go to gamestop and frankly i've been there enough to know that i certainly don't want to go because it's such a miserable shopping experience.

Just say Amazon. Like, just say Amazon. Nobody goes to GameStop anymore. Everybody uses Amazon. No, but plenty of people do have to go to GameStop and, like, wait on Midnight Lions and stuff like that. I'm just saying. I guess if you don't have a Prime membership, if you're one of the fucking trolls. There are people like that.

Wow. So, I'm just saying. 70 bucks a year, people. Get it. It's the best service on offer anywhere in the world i'm sorry i called you a pro if you don't have amazon prime but really what the fuck are you doing day but i just want to say every game will now be digital so if you want your call of duty digital if you want your whatever game you like digital you can get it day and date you won't have to

worry about discs whatever like it's yours you and and now bright side if you get a downloadable game that's doesn't require an internet connection you won't need to connect to the internet every day and that was honestly the biggest issue that i had with their policies was that even living in new york city my internet goes down every once in a while for several days and right that was going to be real bad so it's not that bad all things considered i'm happier where microsoft is now than i was three days ago i so it's not that bad all things considered i'm happier where microsoft is now than i was three days ago i think it's a big improvement certainly i just want to make one more comment on the trust thing and why i think the microsoft thing is such a bummer is because they

didn't do it the right way that trust is so low that it's going to be a while before i think anyone has the chance to come out and even try. And on the flip side of seeing a company that did it right, that, you know, did have issues with DRM when it first announced was Valve and Steam. I mean, people had serious reservations with Steam. And what they have done is they've built this trust. They've earned the trust by having the deals and having low prices and trying to work with the consumers and give them what they want i i think that's that's the obvious model that these larger companies should be trying to rip off and it's disappointing that they seem to have not even looked at it but as like the way i consume games and i honestly like

have no metric for whether or not i'm in the the minority or not is I approach it from a very archival point of view um like the games I I don't buy every game I buy the games that are like special to me that I think are going to remain special to me that I you know I like having in a physical collection I like looking at my collection of 100 good games i love and just like knowing that i have them and thinking about them as pieces of media that i own that i can like show my kids no no issue or like ship to my dad for him to borrow it because like he doesn't he loves games but he doesn't buy a lot of them because he's kind of clueless about games or like let my friends borrow and like i do use gamefly i i rent shit from gamefly if i'm unsure about whether or not i want to add it to my

you know bug collection like that is that's the way that i play and buy and consume games and the model that microsoft proposed literally shut that down in in every conceivable fashion i i guess i understand what you're saying. And I'm also like, I want that, that digital future, but like, not if it comes at the expense of my, my way of life when it comes to gaming. No, I have, I mean, I completely agree with you. And, and, and the craziest thing about this is that they put this completely in the context of here is what – it's like how to win friends and influence people, like 101 shit. Like you don't put stuff in the context of here's what I need you to do for me because no one cares. Like nobody cares what you think nobody cares do you think if they had announced their plans and they hadn't

had the 24-hour checks if it had been more about an accessibility all you're gonna have a cloud library you can take anywhere with you and had it be less about we're fucking we didn't we don't want anybody pirating shit so we're just gonna assume you are like do you think if they had pitched it as more of an accessibility thing and less of a you know drm assurance that definitely would have been a big improvement yeah it's it was at most it was the biggest issue was a marketing issue it was it was poor messaging from beginning to end released on a friday night wasn't it like well that that's because they knew how bad they buried it yeah let's take out the trash day buried it. Yeah. Let's take out the trash day.

Oh, for sure. But it's not take out the trash day when everybody, every fucking journalist on the planet flies to Los Angeles for E3

literally 12 hours later. Yeah, they should have done it on Friday after E3 when everyone's in a coma. Well, no, I'm sure that they didn't. Here's what's great

is I'm sure they didn't want everybody asking them about this shit all through E3 so they announced it and then didn't want everybody asking them about this shit all three, three. So they announced it. And then it's all, anybody asked them about it. E three,

like how many, how much like coverage of, of Microsoft's position in the next gen race and like coverage of their games catalog and the promise of next gen, correct. Like how to connect, how much shit like that? Did you see hit the,

hit the press compared to like sony's kicking your guys asses through your faces they completely lost the conversation it's a it is a complete debacle i mean no it's a it's a fucking fiasco i'm gonna upgrade it from debacle to fiasco yikes i will say gamescom is gonna like, now that the fucking gloves are... Well, it's a software battle now. It's just about software now. I gotta say, also, and I'm mainly playing devil's advocate here, but I do want to say that I was also kind of looking forward to a console where, like, a console generation

where the two were significantly different yeah me too it was like a legit console war where like it's not like you were voting for two political candidates that were exactly damn same like there was a drastic shift in the way people were doing things and now it's a bit of a

bummer because it really just is the same like the last generation who has games I'm more interested in now it's pc pc or pc right but well right but those those three i mean you can say it's three pcs before pc sorry wii u well three pcs and a wii u uh it's my favorite it's my favorite movie that's my favorite steve gutenberg flick uh but like things like their their marketplace ecosystems like we've gotten a little bit of information about what playstation is doing we know it's going to be but by far the more indie friendly system which i think is still very very promising

there's still hardware differences like i think every xbox one game is probably going to incorporate connect and at least first party and and smart glass in some fashion like that probably going to incorporate Kinect and at least first party and smart glass in some fashion. Like that's going to be a huge focus. While fucking Sony showed off a single tech demo with the PlayStation 3. It's like they're hardly pushing that message at all. Like there are still going to be major differences between these consoles. And obviously the TV stuff with Xbox, the fact that it plugs into your cable box is a big deal. Which I am.

What? Did you say wet fart i mean it is it's it's probably at this point the only major differentiating factor except for the camera is the fact that it's that's the other crazy thing about e3 and i don't know if we talked about this but like they did a they did a their whole e3 presentation. The main reason that they have such a massive price gulf between the PS4 and the Xbox One is the camera. And they didn't say the word connect. They didn't make a case for having it in the package. Like, really, it's baffling. Yeah, I have no idea why it's there. Apart from voice controls.

Well, that felt like that was consulted. You know, like, a consultancy firm came and they're like, hey, every time you said Kinect last year, people groaned. And they're like, okay, let's not do that. Don't say sports, either. That's because that's all they showed off, but here's the thing. Behind closed doors at E3, they were showing off a tech demo for how the Kinect could be utilized in new ways using first-person shooters, and it was

pretty fucking cool. That's the kind of, like, your new technology can actually be used in, not that the Kinect was not used in cool ways for games on Xbox 360, but on Xbox One, it can more seamlessly be folded into the more traditional style of playing games instead of being a fucking gimmick. That shit was cool, and they didn't show it at all during the press conference.

Yeah, Sony's got a consultancy firm they listen to, too. You know what it's called? What? We the Gamers. Vox Populi. Okay, that's a good segue. Hey, Griffin. Hey, a good hey uh hey griffin hey listen what's your thing what's your thing of the week oh you guys want to talk about fucking hardware do you guys oh sorry i should have asked you guys want to talk about fucking hard oh yeah uh yeah best piece of gaming hardware i've bought this year oh no and perhaps you're a madman it's

not gonna be wii. Everyone calm down. No, I know what it is and you're still a madman. When did you buy your 3DS? My 3DS XL, I bought that last year. Oh, okay. I made the jump, you guys. Jump ship. Are you enjoying iOS games from three years ago?

Bought that HTC One. Uh-huh. Guys. It's a game changer. I'm sure it's a very nice phone. Bought that HTC One. Uh-huh. It, guys. Mm-hmm. It's a game changer. I'm sure it's a very nice phone. I'm sure you guys are sheeple. That's, I'll just, I hate to drop the S word on you guys this soon into the cast, but you're sheeple. And you're fucking brainwashed, and you're all part of the fucking Steve Jobs Illuminati.

Uh-huh. Android is where it's at. steve jobs illuminati uh-huh android is where it's at um so the games on offer on android it's not as bad as everybody like it i feel like i can't even take this theory i feel like it's like a stand-up routine um we'll get there it's uh-huh it's antiquated thinking to say like people are only releasing games on iOS and not Android. No, that's true. I mean, trust me, I look at these release lists every week. And not only that, I still have my iPad.

And I never gamed on my iPhone because I had an iPhone 4, which very quickly got outdated. Very, very quickly. The HTC One is way more powerful. I could have upgraded to an iPhone 5, but I was waiting for them to drop that 6 at WWDC. They didn't, and they announced iOS 7, which I got to play around with because we had some dev demos at E3, and it's flatter, and that's cool.

There are buttons to turn off Bluetooth. That's great. It just didn't get me excited, so I made that jump. And I got to gotta say it's pretty cool like most games get released day and date ios and android that is a dirty lie it's 50 maybe a third i would say a third how's how's xcom or home look trust me griffin i'm if you're making an argument to say that the hgc1 is a better cell phone and like smart device than the iphone fine i will say there's a possibility i use an iphone i'm not i don't use an hgc1 so i

can't really say if you're saying it's a better or even like on par gaming device in terms of what games are on there you are a madman that should jump off a cliff okay let can i finish yes go ahead it's this is i feel like this has been a far i'm gonna start crying and nobody wants because you bought the wrong phone no i bought a great phone here's the thing i i really never played any games on my iphone the ones that i did i feel like there's a specific type of game that works really well on the iphone like if i had my druthers, I played all of my games. Like, Super Stickman Golf 2. Like, I played that on the iPad because I like the bigger screen.

The Lamp Beers games. You know, like, twitchy games. Even, like, strategy games. Like, I found it nicer to just, you know, have more real estate for virtual buttons and stuff to sort of of rest on here's the thing though here's what android has the ios doesn't is emulators oh my god wow you cannot make this argument i'm gonna make this fucking argument because we just had a whole segment about drm and why things uh got shut down,

and a lot of it is this, is because you can't sell a system off emulators. That's not cool. You can, and they are, but here's the thing. I only doubt, here's the thing. Here's my stance on emulators, and it's also the legal stance on emulators, is if you have the game, if you have the physical game,

then it's not illegal to have a ROM of it. That's fucking law. That's law books 101. That is true. That is the law. That's law books 101. That is true. That is the law. And they will teach you that shit. So I have, I don't know if you guys know this, an almost complete Game Boy Advance collection

that I usually tool around with my Game Boy Micro on. I just fucking got those ROMs. Now I have a Game Boy Advance that's inside my phone. I'm fucking at BB&T standing in line. I got to deposit a check. I got enough rounds, enough time for like three rounds of Final fantasy tactics advance and let me tell you nobody on ios has ever released a strategy game this is because final fantasy tactics advance that's just that's that's law 101 what about final fantasy tactics on ios oh advance is way better okay it's a way

better game i i'm just saying listen i get most of the shit that you guys get yeah pretty late i will concede that but let me get let me hit you with a few things emulators boom front facing speakers love that love those front facing speakers that fucking boom sound it's like louder louder than most jam boxes i owned as a kid uh-huh let me hit you with this the vine app is pretty shitty mine is almost completely non-functioning but you know what they'll get around to fixing that i'm so alone out here guys oh okay why did you why did you what is the i just i just don't get it i've been on that iphone tip i've been on that iPhone tip since, what, the 3? Since the original 3?

And that was, what, like, 6, 7? How long ago was the 3? Probably like 4 years ago. No fucking way was it 4 years ago. 3 years ago? I got it right before I moved to Cincinnati, which was in 2009. 3S, 4, 4S, 5. So 4, wow.

So yeah, 4 or 5 years. It seemed like so much longer. I wasn't playing any fucking games on the iPhone, so why not try something else? I find the Android user interface, for all my phone shit that I do phone shit on, is I actually like a little bit better than iOS. Everything I do in my workflow is all tied into Google,

like fucking Google Apps, Google Maps, Google Voice, Google Translate. That's all on there, and it's fucking streamlined. You're a pioneer, and I respect that. I'm a pioneer. I'm out here fucking giving you guys all the Android news. That's another reason. It's sort of the same reason I bought the Wii U. I was writing Wii U stories with no passion about it because i didn't own one

like just didn't give a shit and like by the way post-mortem i'm actually pretty glad i bought one before this e3 um but now like when i write a wii u story it's like android i get it you know what i mean you know what the funniest part of all this about griffin being the pioneer and all pretty sure android remains the um most widely used mobile OS out there. Yeah, that's a good sheeple argument for it. No, you're the sheeple. I'm a goat. Can I say that I am really depressed now,

and I'd like to talk about something else. I want a two-year contract. I won't be out from under this fucking thing until 2015. Guys, guys, guys, guys. When you went to the app store or whatever the fuck you guys call it, was it distracting with all the tumbleweeds? Was it hard to click on your eye? Whatever you wanted to buy? Guys, somebody's been in the office all day,

and I told him that he could come on the show if he wanted to do that. Okay. Yeah, I guess. Hello? I don't even know who this one is. I don't either, actually. I know who this one is. That sounds

like Steam. Steam's board game developer, Milton Bradley. Are these the besties I've been hearing so much about? Welcome, Mr. Bradley. Hi, Mr. Bradley. Thank you very much. Mr. Bradley, have you visited us before when I was on a bye week? I know.

I don't think I've had the pleasure to meet any of you. Besties debut. Besties exclusive. But it does seem you are aware of my work as a board game creator. Justin, I know you are aware of my work as a board game creator. Justin, I know you are quite a fan of board games. Yeah.

Milton, you should actually say hi to Russ. He's one of your biggest fans. Russ, what do you think of board games? Oh, Russ, are you there? Russ is no longer here. Why can't Russ seem to... I feel bad because we get all these fucking big names on the show. We get Milton Bradley.

We get New York Giraffe. And Russ is never here to rub a Texarkana tumbleweed. He's never here to rub elbows and make connections. Yeah, he always misses them. I am sorry. I will send him a note. Besties. Have you guys ever noticed how Russ looks like New York giraffe with glasses?

Anyway, sorry, Mr. Bradley, go ahead. I wanted to come by because as many of you know, I've been making board games for quite some time. As a matter of fact, I haven't released a new one since the year 1930. And I thought it was time to get back in the game, so to speak. I don't...

I hate to keep interrupting you, but I don't think they let dead people make board games anymore. I am not dead. I've been sleeping in my home pop-o-matic bubble and also it's worth knowing that uh his last game apparently according to his testimony came out uh 20 years after his death so um also to be fair to griffin his skin is falling off of his face right now, so he does look dead. It's terrible. It's like a deleted scene from Death Becomes Her.

Do not focus on anything related to my corporeal being. I wanted to come by and introduce some new titles. It's like all that we can... It's like, it's very prominent. It's very noticeable. Please ignore anything about me. I am not to be noticed, It's very noticeable. Please ignore anything about me. I am not to be noticed, even if I may seem zombie-esque.

Why wouldn't you call in, though, if you wanted to talk about games and not your physical presence? Like, why wouldn't you just call in? His eyelashes just fell on my glass of water. I am not familiar with the telephone, as you so call it. That was definitely around before you kicked it, chief. I am slow to pick up new devices. I'm a Luddite. I get it. So tell us about your new games.

Gentlemen, I have been working on games. As I mentioned, I have not released a game since 1930. So these are some games that I thought, you know, get back in the game, enjoy myself, and spread the word. So number one on my list of games, we have, I don't know if you're familiar

with my game called Candyland. Yeah, it's really a very bad game. Have you all played it? Yeah. Haven't you noticed that there are wizards made of candy and witches and evil beings? But it doesn't really encourage the young children to adventure through this land of candy? Yeah, I noticed that just yesterday. What if instead of wizards and witches made of sweets,

they were Irish people? Okay. This is... What would you think of that? You'd sure be running yourself through that land much faster, wouldn't you? Because... First of all, I guess thanks for doing Irish people and not literally any other race.

I've got more if you'd like. I don't think I like. How about one more? How about one more? Maybe like a more like, I know you've been fucking out of the game for a few centuries, but, like, we're totally cool with Irish people now. Justin and I are among them, kind of. What? Ish.

Ish. We're in the mix. We got Irish in the mix. How about this? Are you familiar with my game, Mousetrap? Yeah. Are you familiar with my game, Mousetrap? Yeah.

Well, you know how generally people try to trap mice in their Depression-era homes. What if, instead of mice, they were Catholics? Okay. Catholic mice or human beings? Human Catholics, although I dare say I wouldn't call them human. Ha ha ha. Or perhaps Clue. Have you heard of Clue before? You know how it's difficult to figure out Who did the murder

Yeah Well guess what It's always the Japanese guy No That one can't do it Oh Milton What a joy Is it a joy

What about Monopoly Do you know who has a monopoly on everything? Yes, we do, we do, we do! We know, we know! We know, we know! We know. Well... Guys, it's really warm in here.

One second, I'm gonna turn on a fan. Oh no, he's turning into dust! Oh, his bones out the window old racist shitty bones beware of the catholics okay yes thank you for your final message i'm so glad you could join us on the series finale of the besties uh i miss it we need to talk about literally anything else Chris Plant What's your favorite thing of the week My favorite thing is

Ken Levine writing His favorite movies remake Logan's Run That's pretty fantastic It's pretty simple If you know much about his life He left college to become a screenwriter in L.A. What kind of name is Levine?

Get out! Get out! Yep, yep, go. Be gone. Okay, he's gone, guys. He's gone. Don't worry. And he wrote this horrible movie called Devil's Advocate, in which the devil tries to seduce Amy Grant. Wait, hold on. This is a real movie. Not to be confused. No, it's not that Devil's Advocate. No, this is a different Devil's Advocate. Hold on, this is a real movie. Not to be confused.

No, it's not that Devil's Advocate. No, this is a different Devil's Advocate. It was a romantic comedy when the devil tries to seduce Amy Grant. Ken Levine wrote this? She's an angel, and then they fall in love. This is a movie that Ken Levine wrote? Yeah. Why have I never heard of this?

Because it didn't get made. Oh, okay. Yeah. But how do you know it's terrible? Because he said it was shit. Oh, okay. So these aren't your words. No, these are the words he told me when I said, that sounds pretty bad.

And he said, yes, that was shit. Well, it sounds like you brought up the badness and he just didn't want to be rude and be like, no, it's actually great. Fuck off. Well, he was ran out of the town. And by ran out of the town, I mean. Into video games. He didn't get more work. And then he came and did video games the story of video games it's sad because it is sad um but now he's uh a

big and famous and now of course hollywood comes crawling back um and he's getting to make the movie that i guess defined his sexuality and in one interview when i was doing research for a piece on him he just like goes on about how like how he got to see the woman in it naked and how he loved to buy the comics because i guess the woman was naked and this is logan's run you're talking about yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah but i guess it was it was very uh important for his uh coming of age yeah i'm glad that you told me that. Yuck fest. What about the porno Logan's fun? Now tell me what else gives Ken Levine a boner, Chris Buff.

I think D&D, rolling a 20, you know? Sure. Well, who wouldn't? Yeah, amen. That's exciting. It's just sort of a hard, like, I don't know. That'd be like getting assigned to do the total recall remake this i feel like which they treated with such yeah such tlc difference is that total recall is a pretty good

movie and logan's runs a bad movie i would also he's good it looks like sorry go ahead and play sorry i'm just curious what this contract looks like because he is like treated how do i want to say that um he can do whatever he want where he's at right now and people are like okay spend all of the money uh and take time to do this well uh hollywood studios they'll tell you that i but i don't think they really i don't think they fall through on that particular promise um i'm i i'm very um selfish i'm a very selfish person So when I saw this news I was Excited I like Kim Levine And I'm excited for him to have this

Dream gig but at the same time Every second that he Spends writing this movie Is a second that he's not going to be working On a video game I don't think you have to worry I think it was going to take, you know, a while for the next one to come out anyway.

Right, and now it's going to take approximately one Logan's Run script longer. But what if... And this is just me being, you know, I have no reason to believe this, but what if maybe him being focused on something else may be allowed for the next game to happen a little faster? Because maybe he wouldn't be so, you know, controlling.

No, he's not going to let his studio go and make a game that he doesn't have full control over. Well, he does have more writers, at least. Yeah, but they all have to go through his approval process. I'm not saying he's wrong in having an approval process, but there's no way he's going to take three months to write this script, come back, and then be like, hey, dude, we made this indie game. It's coming out tomorrow. I just don't know how it's possible for his approval process to exist

at the same time that he's writing something. Yeah, but how long does it... The script's not going to take longer than three months. So what's your favorite thing in the week, Frush? Okay, we could go into mine. Mine is the best memory recalled from shop class, thanks to an iOS game that I played this week called Bridgy Jones. I don't have that one.

It's called Bridgy Jones. It doesn't come out on, what is your device? The Palm Pilot Pre? It's actually a tiger handheld of Batman, the movie. No, they have a version of that, but there's only like two animations. One where the bridge is standing and one where it's fallen. I don't know if

any of you guys, I'm sure you all took shop class. You're burly gentlemen. It seems like you would. Absolutely not. None of you? Really? Yeah, we didn't have shop class. Home Ec? What did they replace it with? I took Home Ec, but that involved us putting, literally, I got a grade. It was like a week-long session on how to put shredded cheese on top of chips and put it in the microwave.

How do you do that? So, first of all, you're going to have to buy some chips, and you need to have shredded cheese. And really, that step is vitally important. Because if you try to do mozzarella or like a Gouda, then it's going to be delicious no matter what. I went to a Montessori nacho school. So they really let the kids, like, teach themselves and teach the teachers when it came to, you know, Gouda. Well, I went to a high school that had shop class. school that had shop class and um one of the segments that we had uh which is actually from what i understand pretty common is they give the kids um sticks of balsa wood and you're tasked

with making a weight-bearing bridge and the idea is you like you know you do like arches or you know stabilizing angles and it's supposed to teach you about physics or something. Apparently, I am awesome at this. Yeah. Because I rocked it. My elementary school, in my tag classes, in my talented and gifted classes, we did this with toothpicks. Called my bridge Golden Gate 2000 because it was 1996. Wait, you did this, how old were you?

It would have been nine. What are you trying to say? I'm just saying that nine years old is you've got your motor skills down, but you're terrified of girls, and just your general mechanical engineering skills are nonexistent. Well, apparently they're awesome because I totally rocked it, even though I was quite old when I did it. Tell me the game.

And the game is essentially that. You are a prospector with a furry dog driving a train. And there you go. Oh, sorry, the bridge stuff. I need to mention the bridge stuff. Yeah, it's a name. So you've got these planks, and you are essentially trying to get the prospector from, there's a series of different tracks that you're trying to complete.

trying to get the prospector from there's a series of different tracks that you're trying to complete uh and you're trying to build these like sustainable bridges using ropes and pulleys and and and planks and stuff like that and the fewer planks you use the more points you get and i find it oddly soothing i played it on the flight all the way out to e3 and it's just like one of the more relaxing ios games that i played in a while because it's just about making structures that stand the test of time. And I also appreciate it because it referenced one of my favorite rom-coms of the late nineties and early two thousands, Bridget Jones's diary. That's literally one of the reasons why you like it is because of the title.

Yeah. Well, that was part of it. It's a, it's, it is a very good title and it's a fun game. Like if you like it is because of the title yeah well that was part of it it's a it's it is a very good title and it's a fun game like if you like bridge building it reminds me of those levels in world of goo where you had to build bridges out of the goo balls isn't that like every level

no a lot of the levels are like you had to do like weird things where you'd have them rolling off cliffs and stuff uh this is straight bridge building 101 all bridges all the time well 102 really if your bridge fails are there fatalities because that's kind of ghoulish well the dog and the prospector both die but everyone else is fine that's ghoulish and it's a serious game and i can't believe that apple let that on the store i know i was shocked too anyway it's quite good and i enjoyed it okay well i'll check it out in like six or seven months. Yep, I look forward to you checking it out. That's the end of the show, I think. It peaked at Milton Bradley.

Yeah, yeah. You bet we did. That is a fucking stark picture of the landscape, huh? Thank you so much for joining us here on the Besties. Who won? I think Griffin. It felt like Griffin, though, to me. Here's the thing i know that it's becoming customary but i think because of like my the bravery that i showed off i think

i do probably it was a uh it was a 600 win uh okay griffin hard fought hard won it's very expensive very very permanent um uh justin sent me an address yesterday with like the i message Offensive. Very permanent. Justin sent me an address yesterday with, like, the iMessage, and I didn't get it. I couldn't get it. I couldn't open it. Yeah, what was that about? Because you asked me for my mailing address, and I sent you my street address and my zip code. And you said, no, your whole mailing address. And I don't know why you need to know

the city and state I live in since you were born and raised there well that's what droid runs on it's the fuel that droid uses to power its servos it's the information that it fucking consumes and then poops out so thank you congratulations

to Griffin thank you for joining us on the show we hope you've had some laughs, learned a little something. Hey, head over to Polygon.com. We got the last edition of Human Angle Up. It's the story of the voice actor behind John Marston. It's a great piece. It's fucking great, guys. It's really good.

We got the first edition of our embedded game development series where we follow the development of a single game over the course of a year. And that's going to be a really interesting experiment. It's called How Games Remain. It's about Defense Grid 2. That's on the front page right now. And we've got so much more for you. So stick around with Polygon.com and join us again on Friday for the besties. Because shouldn't the world's best friends play the world's best game?

Besties!