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WEBVTT
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Hello and welcome to another episode of Indie Devs Play, a podcast where two
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indie game developers dot dot dot play video games and we talk about them,
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discuss them, deconstruct them and everything else in between.
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My name is Jonathan Ridgway and I am joined by a man whose princess is never
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in another castle, Josh Watts. How are you, mate? Whoa, you've robbed my intro off me. I'm so sorry.
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I've been pushed out. I've had this prepared for weeks. I've just,
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oh, it's gonna, you're gonna demote me on the discord now calling me previous
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host? I basically started the podcast just so I could do that intro and chose
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the game specifically for it.
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But yeah. Today's episode, or this week's episode, is us playing Super Mario 64.
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Yeah. Have you played Super Mario 64 before, Josh? Yeah.
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Well, well, well back. When you were a wee nipper. As a wee spud.
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What a spud? Ah, last week then. Yeah, last week.
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Fair dues, fair dues. Before we get started on Super Mario 64,
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as we like to do on the podcast let's take a look
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into the time period when super mario 64 came out so in 1996 the game was
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released a long time ago it was a launch title for the super nintendo and it
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was the first super mario game to feature 3d graphics i've got the official
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date in japan was june 23rd
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1996 so
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some games that came out in uh 1996 which was a a long time ago well i suppose
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consoles we can talk about Nintendo 64 what a plot twist the Game Boy Pocket which was a,
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another version of the Game Boy it wasn't in the Game Boy Pocket was black and
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white and then the Game Boy Color came after maybe some people can can correct
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us on that one but uh I had that was called Game Boy,
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Now, so there was the Game Boy that was like a big gray slab. Yes.
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And then the Game Boy Pocket was like maybe half the size or something.
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I had a yellow version of it, I think. I have seeded memories somewhere of that Game Boy Pocket.
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It's not exactly a console, but a device that also came out during that period
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in 1996 was the Tamagotchi by Bandai. I don't know if you had one of those.
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The ones, do you remember them? I did not have a Tamagotchi.
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I do remember them, yeah.
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Yeah. And there was a lot of games and IPs started.
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I mean just to stick on consoles for a second the atari jaguar was discontinued
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the 3do sega cd and nintendo's infamous virtual boy which has had a comeback recently,
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like as part of the switch to classics library or something they're selling
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a virtual boy that connects to your switch,
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i think it's for the switch as well maybe but they also do kind of like a cardboard
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labo style version you know like a peripheral that you can get to play virtual
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boy games yeah that's all right That's all I'm saying on that one.
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But yeah, so some games that came out in 1996 as well. You had Street Fighter
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2 Alpha. You had Mario Kart 64 as well.
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Which also has Super Mario 64's castle in one of the levels as a cameo, I think.
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You do have to drive off the course. Yeah, you drive off that level, don't you?
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Yeah. Dookanookum 3D, which I think Dookanookum was like a side-scrolling shooter.
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And this was its first parade into 3D. Virtua Fighter 3 also came out.
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Are you saying Duke-a-Nukem on purpose, or is it Duke-a-Nukem?
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Duke-a-Nukem. Or is it called Duke-a-Nukem? I don't know, mate.
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I'm from a part of the West Midlands called the Black Country.
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Duke-a-Nukem? Terrifying.
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Duke-a-Nukem. Why do you keep saying Duke-a? How else do I say it? Like Duke!
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Like it is. Duke Nukem. Yeah. Duke Nukem. Like nuke, Duke, Duke nukes them. Duke Nukem. Duke Nukem.
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Do you know what? That might have been something. We're losing our mind now.
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I think we are losing our minds. And I think I've had a moment where I've only
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ever said it like that since I was six. And I've just never had to say it again.
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Because all I remember playing was Duke Nukem Land of the Babes. Stop saying that.
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Anyway, moving swiftly on. We're not quite on the Leisure Suit Larry episode
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yet. Oh, we're going to have to play Dookanookum now.
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I don't know if we can play it on anything. Damn, mate. Yeah, where were we?
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I had to Google it. I thought I was going, nah, that it had an A at the end.
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It's Dookanookum. Anyway.
Load full transcript
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I'm going to need to have someone else say it before we need to move swiftly on to Poconocom.
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No, Pokemon? Is it Pokemon or Pokemon? It's Pokemon. Okay. Say it with an American
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accent. Okay. So Duque, Nukem and Pokemon. Exactly. Yeah.
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Pokemon, red, green and blue came out in 1996. This intro is going great.
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And I assume, did you play those or did you play gold and silver first?
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I actually played gold first, yes, but I did own blue.
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Afterwards and play that. Yeah, Pokemon Red and Blue, I was the generation of
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that and it was just, everyone had it.
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It was insane. I remember weighing out. Not in my circles.
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We had Pokemon cards before we started playing the games. Oh, okay. Yeah.
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It's not in my circles, just my school. Like there wasn't any circles.
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Yeah, I mean, people didn't play Pokemon cards properly in my school. Oh, definitely not.
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We didn't play Pokemon cards. What did you do? Spread them. We just had them.
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Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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Just had them and traded them. This is good origami. Woo-hoo! And then we go.
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Well, that's why all my, you know, OG Pokemon cards are all damaged in a folder behind me.
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Oh, really? They're in a fat Pikachu that I've got. Whoa.
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Like a zipped up thing. Don't body shame, Pikachu. Well, it's the original design, but it's like a...
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Have you got first edition cards? Yes, yeah. With the little first edition tag on?
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Yeah, I believe so. Oh, some of those. Yeah, I've got like a shiny Charizard
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in there and everything.
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Well. He's a good lad. It's probably worth three pay with the boxing on the
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edges, I'm guessing, but that's the one. Yeah.
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Now, they're actually in those little sleeves as well, because it's a case that's
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designed specifically for them. Well, you know, you don't need to buy a new
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video game, just sell that. No, if I want to buy Dookanookum, I can just.
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If you want to buy Dookanookum for Eva. Yeah, for Eva.
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Another another ipo from 1996 before we go completely insane is a resident evil
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first resident evil came out in 1996 at least you said that one right did i
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yeah oh god the fine print says biohazard so maybe i didn't oh,
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dead or alive dead or alive that one also 1996 have you played the fighting
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games dead or alive very short uh,
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in passing like on holiday where there's like a console for rent and that comes
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with it that's when i've played oh wow okay yeah the people at the shop were
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like this one's a good one honestly no it's just more like,
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i don't want to get into the full details of it but like you could rent the
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the console and you could rent games but they came with
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like a selection of them when you rented it and then you could get extra games
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on top and that was just one of the ones that came with it yeah i remember when
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i went with my mom to chicago
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i want to say it was like 2000 maybe 2000 actually and i was like where i was
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staying i rented a nintendo 64 like a blockbuster or something like that and
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yeah and i played games on that nintendo 64 that i never played at home i'd like a
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blockbuster it's a bit like choices but american um.
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There's a british reference for people,
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It's what Netflix... Blockbuster had a chance to buy Netflix,
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didn't they? At one point as well.
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That's quite funner and a bit awkward. Another IP that came out in 1996,
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first time. Soul Edge, which is Soul Calibur.
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Yeah. The Soul Calibur series. Another big franchise, Quake.
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First Quake came out in 1996. Tomb Raider. Nice. Yeah. Crash Bandicoot.
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Crap. I mean, nice. Yeah.
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I'm just trying to throw in something a bit different. I don't actually think. What, Crasher?
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Yeah, Crash Bandicoot, Which is also a 3D platform, Super Mario 64,
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but more linear in its approach. Ironically, more like 2D Mario.
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Yes, yeah. For obvious reasons. A series, I don't know if you're familiar with
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this series, but Sakura Wars got its first game in 1996.
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It's kind of like an RPG, but it's also got this kind of visual novel social
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sim romance elements, and those are quite pronounced as well.
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They had a new game, I want to say about five years ago, maybe.
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A Rigsaw Bell. I thought you were just naming like Naruto fans trying to find
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relevance for Sakura in the story, but
yeah. Cha!
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But the one that got, I don't know whether it got kind of a semi-reboot or something.
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It was just called Sakura Wars that came out on like the PS4 and everything.
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And the character designer was the character, the mangaka of Bleach.
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Oh, sweet. So the characters... There's a game called New Sakura Wars.
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Is that... Would that be the one? That might be it.
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Yeah, the character kind of looks like... Like Bleach characters.
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I think like Shonen Jump mangakas have very distinct styles for themselves,
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right? They do, yeah. And so you automatically know when it's by that author.
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I mean, it's by design, obviously, but another IP that came out in 1996.
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Persona, got its first release.
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Persona. But the games are not available anywhere, I don't think.
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Want one. yeah i don't know if the first one got localized in north america
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at all but maybe it did but it was quite niche but maybe they'll revisit them
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at some point who knows and another ip again i don't know if you've played this
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a point and click adventure called broken sword i've heard of it yeah
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i think it's called shadow of templar the first game i think it's had a few
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remasters or re-release or remakes
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something of some nature on things but they're kind of fun the animation in them is stunning
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as well like the visual design but i think point and clicks adventures typically
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lend themselves well to that kind of stuff but yes there was a lot of
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a lot of big new ips there though pokemon resident evil that stuff's still going
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tomb raider crash bandicoot personas as big as it's ever been obviously quake
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as well and i there might be a new,
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dead or alive coming i know they've still got a bunch of those spin-offs coming
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out there's always a new dead or alive,
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in a manner of speaking but yeah so that's the kind of year 1996 that super
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mario 64 come out So let's move on to the game itself, the star of the show, Super Mario 64.
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So who's the star of the show?
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Okay, well, the second star of the show. I don't get my intro.
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You mispronounced it, Newcombe, and then I'm not the star of the show? Joshua Watsu.
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You sound a bit like Jar Jar Binks' brother, actually. What?
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Joshua Watsu, or at least a Jedi that dies in a side novel. Where were we?
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You've caught me off my... You've took me off my... I've derailed you.
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I am going to play that card that you've derailed me, yes,
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So, yeah, so Super Mario 64, well, you played it on the Switch, is that correct?
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And it's the All-Stars collection or something, or the anniversary or something?
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3D All-Stars. 3D All-Stars.
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And I played it on the Classics library, Super Mario 64. Now,
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I don't know what the differences are there. I don't believe there is other
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than the fact, it was yours, old aspect ratio. It was, yes. So maybe that's...
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Yes, I think that might be the difference.
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Maybe some... The aspect ratio. Technical, or maybe just yours runs a little
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bit better, maybe? I don't know. Maybe.
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Might have. Higher framerate? Yeah. So we both played it on a Switch and Switch 2.
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And then we believe it's basically the same experience as best as we could.
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We played, how did you play it? Did you play it as a handheld?
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Or did you, yeah, poorly.
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Or did you play it on a TV screen?
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Yeah, I played it on the, I mean, I played it half and half, actually.
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I kind of played some on the TV. And then when I was traveling,
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I played it on the handheld.
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And yeah, and I'm like yourself. I asked you at the start of the episode,
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like, had you played it before?
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I played it when I was little. I've got the N64 cartridge in my office.
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But i haven't played it recently like for like properly recently like to finish
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for a long time so it was very much like a nostalgic trip it's a bit like some
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of the games we've been playing recently halo and fable and stuff it's all coming back you know
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but i do often like every couple of years jump in and play 15 minutes of it
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on the classics library so like playing the controls it wasn't completely alien to me
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you know it was somewhat familiar but i definitely think this is an example
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of a game that was designed with the controller that the original console had
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in mind and that's that's
going to lead us into
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our conversations about it i suppose so i guess like kind of your first thoughts
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about the game what what what was your experience like with superman 64 having
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not played it for a long time since you were a kid um it was.
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Good question mark i in terms of personal preference i wasn't really a big fan
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playing it i don't have the nostalgia for it to,
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get me through some of the clunkiness of it but i could appreciate it for what
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it is in turn its place in in history of games and what it did for games at
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the time and everything like the the
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innovation it was presenting was was huge and still stuff that he's done in
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that game he's done in games that are still being done today right but i found
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like the thing that really blew me away was the the depth and
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quantity of action in the game like the amount of different things Mario can do is crazy.
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Yeah, I think they've really took the philosophy.
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I think Miyamoto spoke about this publicly a few times, even with the older
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Marios, where every action that you input into the controller has to be fun.
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Has to be delightful. And I think they've really took that, took inspiration
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from that. And you've got, there's so, so many different types of jumping,
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you know, like that you can do in the game.
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And there's, there's a lot to that as well, learning the functionality of that
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and to take it into like a 3D space now.
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I mean, it was kind of essential that you do that, but to be able to make that
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work with all these different variations was quite something.
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One thing I really liked about the jumping because you've now got this 3D space
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and that comes with it different challenges compared to just being on that kind of 2D plane.
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One thing I liked that they did was they emphasised the shadow underneath you.
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So you know when you're jumping between parts like the way you can identify,
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where you are and where you're going to land is your shadow beneath you and
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it actually changes in size as well. That continues in later Mario games as
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well like I remember that from Mario Sunshine and such.
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You would use the shadow when you're like hanging on a rope.
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To know if you are now above the platform below you and can now let go of that
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rope to then land on the platform yes yeah
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so that that is something that they continue to to use and that's quite cool
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it's rather than you know some sort of like some games later than this one would
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like be like now you can't let go at this point because you're not you would
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you would fall and you'd die and be like.
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And then eventually you'd be able to let go and stuff but this i think that's
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very clever i think one of the the bit i mean relates to this kind of stuff is the,
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i mean there's a there's so many innovations in this game that all kind of interlock together so
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because it's you know it's nintendo 64 it's 3d you've got the camera movement
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but it's it's not just about these things it's about the controller you know
00:14:21.001 --> 00:14:25.191
it's about like the fact that they innovated the analog stick and they utilize
00:14:25.191 --> 00:14:27.983
the analog stick in this game you've going from d-pad
00:14:28.100 --> 00:14:32.581
that either moves four or eight directions to this analog stick now that's 360
00:14:32.581 --> 00:14:34.468
and they keep utilizing this and they
00:14:34.770 --> 00:14:38.661
use it in a 3D space now because they you know it's part of the strengths of
00:14:38.661 --> 00:14:42.351
the I mean every game controller now has an analog stick I mean they have two
00:14:42.351 --> 00:14:47.021
but like obviously they innovated one here and they were using the C buttons to
00:14:47.401 --> 00:14:51.701
rotate the camera but then this was later turn you know this is where the innovation
00:14:51.701 --> 00:14:55.221
from this came as a platform is you then think okay well
00:14:55.541 --> 00:14:59.290
another analog stick to control the camera makes more sense than the four buttons
00:14:59.492 --> 00:15:02.821
you know it's almost like they've gone from the analog stick yeah.
00:15:03.361 --> 00:15:07.301
Well a gamecube you know the dual shock that you had with the playstation one
00:15:07.301 --> 00:15:10.501
controllers that they added later and and things like the reason i say gamecube
00:15:10.501 --> 00:15:16.021
is because it had the rather than the c button it had the yellow mini sort of analog stick didn't it,
00:15:16.501 --> 00:15:19.721
yes yeah they were definitely keeping that the premise of that one and they
00:15:19.721 --> 00:15:23.741
might have even had the kind of mini triangles attached to that i need to have a look at my i think
00:15:24.061 --> 00:15:28.631
they i think they did and i think they still had like when you would play 64
00:15:28.631 -->
00:15:33.077
games on the GameCube, like when they ported Ocarina of Time and stuff, were,
00:15:33.541 --> 00:15:37.238
recreated for it. The C button inputs were on that stick.
00:15:37.551 --> 00:15:40.866
That makes sense, yeah. Yeah, so they were still keeping kind of the naming
00:15:40.866 --> 00:15:41.876
convention there, weren't they?
00:15:42.316 --> 00:15:44.486
Keeping that alive a little bit. In fact, now I think about it,
00:15:44.486 --> 00:15:47.263
there is a C button on the Switch, isn't there?
00:15:47.455 --> 00:15:50.816
They had a Z button on the 64 and that went to GameCube as well.
00:15:50.816 --> 00:15:53.788
I think they still had Z on 64 as well. It was like a purple button.
00:15:54.516 --> 00:15:59.726
Not 64 on GameCube but the purple button and now you've got ZR and ZL for the triggers.
00:15:59.726 --> 00:16:02.456
And I mean, C makes sense when you think of what they intended the buttons to
00:16:02.456 --> 00:16:06.376
be used for because, cameras right like see for camera yeah yeah but one of
00:16:06.376 --> 00:16:10.356
one of the key innovations because obviously there were 3d games that existed
00:16:10.356 --> 00:16:13.598
before this and there were certainly 3d games you know i mentioned some of them
00:16:13.941 --> 00:16:17.250
in the at the start of the show you know you got your tomb raiders you got crushed bandicoot
00:16:17.638 --> 00:16:21.656
you got things like that that do exist where you might take um and also resident
00:16:21.656 --> 00:16:25.376
evil you know games that might have tank controls like tomb raider or resident
00:16:25.376 --> 00:16:29.396
evil but the the turning of the camera in tomb raider is quite you know clunky
00:16:29.396 --> 00:16:32.400
i mean you've got to look forward and then click and it kind of pivots very
00:16:32.598 --> 00:16:34.656
dramatic and extreme isn't it yeah,
00:16:35.356 --> 00:16:40.836
so one of the cool things that mario what super mario 64 did which is now in
00:16:40.836 --> 00:16:46.858
practically all 3d games is the formula is mario what mario does is he moves in the direction of
00:16:47.269 --> 00:16:50.553
that the player inputs based on the perspective of the camera yeah so,
00:16:51.193 --> 00:16:56.143
the controls of it controls dynamically and it's tied to the camera itself and
00:16:56.143 --> 00:17:02.327
that is literally the formula for third person 3d games now that you see today that is that is it
00:17:02.589 --> 00:17:06.993
and it was innovated in this so like you know you had 3d games that might use.
00:17:07.613 --> 00:17:11.343
Where they have static cameras or you had 3d games that might be tank controls
00:17:11.343 --> 00:17:14.063
or something they're trying to figure it all out but this was the one where
00:17:14.063 --> 00:17:18.702
it's kind of okay this is how we should move forward doing 3d games this is it
00:17:19.050 --> 00:17:22.873
you know it's not saying that it's the most perfect like function of
00:17:23.253 --> 00:17:27.153
it no but this is absolutely where like you know if your cam the camera's changed
00:17:27.153 --> 00:17:30.823
and then you're moving in that direction you know it's it feels really good
00:17:30.823 --> 00:17:32.393
in fact whilst it does feel,
00:17:32.873 --> 00:17:37.163
a touch clunky to play it today it doesn't feel alien you know it still feels
00:17:37.163 --> 00:17:41.473
like oh okay i understand how to move here whereas obviously i've got some friends
00:17:41.473 --> 00:17:44.943
you know i remember at university we play some old games And so some of the
00:17:44.943 --> 00:17:47.390
people I went to uni with, I went to uni a couple of years ago.
00:17:47.948 --> 00:17:51.389
Later than my age group so i was with people about three or four years younger
00:17:51.389 --> 00:17:56.736
sometimes and so they hadn't played that kind of 90s generation of 3d some of them
00:17:57.166 --> 00:18:01.249
and it was so alien to them to play a game like that you know like it was it
00:18:01.249 --> 00:18:05.109
was a peculiar to them so it's it's an example there isn't it like of the of
00:18:05.109 --> 00:18:06.875
the jump between things that has
00:18:07.072 --> 00:18:11.049
occurred or whatever i guess we could talk about the what it meant for the game
00:18:11.049 --> 00:18:13.341
to transition from 2d to 3d from a
00:18:13.690 --> 00:18:17.619
guess level design and game design perspective outside of because we obviously
00:18:17.619 --> 00:18:21.519
talked about what it innovated but what did it translate from the 2d and what
00:18:21.519 --> 00:18:25.369
did that become in the 3d like for example the levels are well
00:18:25.729 --> 00:18:29.949
first of all you've got a hub world which wasn't hugely popular around that time to have a
00:18:30.389 --> 00:18:33.889
static world you would explore then go into levels from that world
00:18:34.249 --> 00:18:37.959
really there's more of a list of levels if I'm remembering correctly so for
00:18:37.959 --> 00:18:41.989
example in like donkey kong country in the 90s on the super nintendo
00:18:42.343 --> 00:18:46.069
you would have a hub world that you entered levels between and you could re-enter
00:18:46.069 --> 00:18:49.953
the levels and play them again and there was things there was secrets to find on those
00:18:50.279 --> 00:18:54.389
like in those hub worlds but they weren't levels the hub world wasn't a level
00:18:54.389 --> 00:19:00.209
that you played in if you know what i mean it was a it was a different screen whereas this is you know.
00:19:00.849 --> 00:19:06.289
Mario operates and functions in this hub world the same way he functions in
00:19:06.289 --> 00:19:09.409
the levels and i think that's that's kind of the distinct difference for me,
00:19:09.869 --> 00:19:13.631
yeah yeah that's that's more what i'm talking about yeah and you see that with
00:19:13.875 --> 00:19:17.959
you know like other games that came after right with stuff like spyro
and and
00:19:17.959 --> 00:19:21.789
even racing games you know like so well some of the like crash bandicoots had
00:19:21.789 --> 00:19:23.749
hub worlds and stuff didn't they um,
00:19:24.358 --> 00:19:27.441
or had some version of a hub world that you were jumping to levels from.
00:19:28.300 --> 00:19:31.703
Rather than just a map but now i felt that the big sort of
00:19:31.999 --> 00:19:36.764
difference came when you actually enter a level and in a 2d mario obviously
00:19:36.764 --> 00:19:40.254
for all that time of its existence before it was go from point a to point b
00:19:40.254 --> 00:19:43.644
get to the end overcome the challenges and it was more like a very linear sort
00:19:43.644 --> 00:19:46.030
of experience but you could tackle the challenges in
00:19:46.436 --> 00:19:50.434
usually a multitude of ways depending on how the level was built but this them
00:19:50.434 --> 00:19:54.714
they're more sandboxing they're like little sandbox levels that have an amount
00:19:54.714 --> 00:19:59.044
of objectives within that some of them are present like at the same time.
00:19:59.260 --> 00:20:03.234
The first star I got was for freeing the chain chompling in the first level
00:20:03.234 --> 00:20:07.704
rather than doing, I think I got three stars before I did the first or two stars
00:20:07.704 --> 00:20:12.127
before I did the, what the level wanted me to do, which is just walk through the level.
00:20:12.348 --> 00:20:15.114
And it's those first, like that sort of like first star was just like,
00:20:15.114 --> 00:20:17.114
oh look, this is what the level looks like.
00:20:17.114 --> 00:20:20.484
Here's the end. And now you can go back and do all the other stuff.
00:20:20.484 --> 00:20:24.364
Well, I felt myself more interested and going and doing exploring and finding
00:20:24.364 --> 00:20:28.094
the bits and bobs to get and that that was such that's such a different experience
00:20:28.094 --> 00:20:31.964
isn't it from what mario was known for at the time yeah you're taking you're
00:20:32.004 --> 00:20:34.959
taking something like super mario brothers particularly
00:20:35.365 --> 00:20:40.602
where it's kind of left to right and now you're entering a level and there are not just.
00:20:41.324 --> 00:20:45.755
Not just one objective that isn't just get to the flag and you know pull yeah pull it up
00:20:46.173 --> 00:20:49.584
but it's also there are other things to do and other things that will exit the
00:20:49.584 --> 00:20:54.164
level for you now i know there were some different exits in super mario world
00:20:54.164 --> 00:20:57.365
you know you could find secret exits that that would open other levels
00:20:57.753 --> 00:21:01.724
you know and and of course you had warp holes that could take you to later levels
00:21:01.724 --> 00:21:05.548
in super mario brothers and stuff but it's it's about the objective specifically,
00:21:06.007 --> 00:21:11.454
yeah and as someone i didn't play super mario odyssey too long ago
and and it
00:21:11.454 --> 00:21:16.131
really feels like that game isn't an evolution of this concept directly.
00:21:16.519 --> 00:21:19.045
It feels almost, for me, it almost feels like a,
00:21:19.532 --> 00:21:24.169
a bit of a sequel to super mario 64 in in some way there's a lot of um there's
00:21:24.169 --> 00:21:26.169
a lot of variety in the gameplay as well and,
00:21:26.629 --> 00:21:30.103
because of this new 3d space they really could really feel,
00:21:30.556 --> 00:21:34.279
through the objectives how they were playing with it like right we've built
00:21:34.279 --> 00:21:40.569
this really nice system with the these new camera controls it's a lot more fluid to play
00:21:40.929 --> 00:21:43.749
we've got all these different actions you can take and this different movement
00:21:43.749 --> 00:21:45.649
system and how you're going to get from point a to point b,
00:21:46.305 --> 00:21:50.389
we've got non-linear levels what can we do in this space and a lot of the time
00:21:50.389 --> 00:21:53.379
when you jump into a level you're like oh well this time it's a race this time
00:21:53.379 --> 00:21:56.661
it's sliding down a slide and you're on your belly and it's completely different game
00:21:56.845 --> 00:22:00.039
let alone anything else it's like collect a certain amount of coins which is
00:22:00.039 --> 00:22:01.611
more like a treasure hunt or,
00:22:02.099 --> 00:22:07.409
you know find a secret or fly around or like the variety penguin or whatever
00:22:07.409 --> 00:22:10.449
i've lost my baby yeah throw it off the edge of the map and giggle, you know.
00:22:11.203 --> 00:22:16.370
Now, the variety of gameplay is wild.
00:22:16.487 --> 00:22:19.629
Considering that they came from something so linear and went into this,
00:22:19.629 --> 00:22:22.029
it's just like, oh, they just blew the doors open and just went,
00:22:22.029 --> 00:22:23.149
right, we are doing everything.
00:22:23.569 --> 00:22:27.089
This is what 3D platformers are now. This is all the actions you can take.
00:22:27.089 --> 00:22:29.969
This is all the variety of gameplay within it. Yeah, and it's like,
00:22:29.969 --> 00:22:34.329
we spoke about the jumping, but it's, you know, I think they introduced punching
00:22:34.329 --> 00:22:37.924
and kicking, you know, and things like that. And also being able to grab,
00:22:38.552 --> 00:22:41.878
pick things i mean you could pick things in earlier super marios and stuff but
00:22:42.174 --> 00:22:46.361
but like i think grabbing it in a 3d context you know the like the infamous
00:22:46.361 --> 00:22:49.411
conclusion where you fight bowser and you can grab his tail and you're using
00:22:49.411 --> 00:22:52.861
the analog stick to spin and you're spinning him down on the spot that's that's
00:22:52.861 --> 00:22:55.339
a perfect demonstration of what's great about the
00:22:55.780 --> 00:22:59.631
the evolution of 3d in this game you know taking it into a three-dimensional
00:22:59.631 --> 00:23:03.081
space and being able to do stuff like that i mean it's i mean it really was
00:23:03.081 --> 00:23:05.651
like a fantastic system seller and of
00:23:06.031 --> 00:23:10.136
for the nintendo 64 in that regard and the controller itself yeah definitely
00:23:10.403 --> 00:23:13.781
another one part of the mechanics you know the ground pound was innovated in
00:23:13.781 --> 00:23:16.011
this so they use that and that's used
00:23:16.371 --> 00:23:19.436
in other games in different forms as well but the ground pound is something
00:23:19.656 --> 00:23:23.891
it's just another way to experiment with the world so you see things now and
00:23:23.891 --> 00:23:26.089
i mean i'm seeing this with this.
00:23:26.542 --> 00:23:31.721
Like i guess it's kind of like miyamoto led studios within nintendo this this
00:23:31.721 --> 00:23:36.381
desire of giving you a bunch of mechanics that are actually tools that you can
00:23:36.381 --> 00:23:40.479
experiment with the world in and we we've spoke we covered the first zelda
00:23:40.896 --> 00:23:46.461
the nes one and and you and again that's a miyamoto game and you can see the
00:23:46.461 --> 00:23:50.031
philosophy from that game you can see it present in this one even though it's
00:23:50.031 --> 00:23:54.961
zelda and mario and they're two different franchises one's a platformer one's more like an adventure
00:23:55.315 --> 00:23:58.971
puzzler yeah but and i mean you see that i mean i mentioned odyssey but you
00:23:58.971 --> 00:24:02.491
can see it in breath of the wild taking the mechanics and just exploring and
00:24:02.491 --> 00:24:07.613
interacting that kind of sandbox element and i guess that's part of his design philosophy isn't it
00:24:07.997 --> 00:24:11.811
you know clearly you know it's it's play but it's experimenting it's sandbox
00:24:12.171 --> 00:24:14.831
and i think there's something to that i think i think there's definitely they're
00:24:14.831 --> 00:24:19.096
retaining because they used to be a games or toy or card company
00:24:19.461 --> 00:24:22.981
and they're retaining that element of play you know they're not even though
00:24:22.981 --> 00:24:27.351
they're innovating things such as camera controls, which is kind of,
00:24:28.024 --> 00:24:30.764
being drawn perhaps from a cinematic space,
00:24:31.471 --> 00:24:36.476
they're still retaining this key element of play that comes with games or video games, you know?
00:24:36.952 --> 00:24:41.769
And it's an interesting blend. Yeah, absolutely. Discovery is a great sort of,
00:24:42.409 --> 00:24:47.079
euphoric tool where you can give a player a sense of accomplishment through
00:24:47.079 --> 00:24:49.009
them. You just give them...
00:24:49.849 --> 00:24:54.239
We've talked about tutorialization in games before and we've talked a lot away
00:24:54.239 --> 00:24:57.947
from the podcast about how games these days hold your hand quite massively,
00:24:58.081 --> 00:25:01.749
especially like AAA titles are so
afraid of people not touching
00:25:02.049 --> 00:25:06.529
content that they will paint yellow triangles pointing in the direction of where
00:25:06.529 --> 00:25:07.943
you need to go, for example.
00:25:08.210 --> 00:25:11.415
I like the yellow paint on things that are climbable. Exactly. Yeah.
00:25:11.815 --> 00:25:16.549
Or like, you know, you've got a fart line to follow. But at most in this game,
00:25:16.929 --> 00:25:20.429
I don't like the tutorialization for about half of it in this game.
00:25:20.429 --> 00:25:23.809
I don't like the signs that they give you because it's a lot of text in a small
00:25:23.809 --> 00:25:27.249
space that is thrown at you and it's usually about stuff you don't need to know yet.
00:25:27.249 --> 00:25:31.199
But then the other half of the tutorialization comes in through the way that
00:25:31.199 --> 00:25:34.529
the game presents challenges to you, which I really like, which is very Portal-esque
00:25:34.569 --> 00:25:38.149
because we spoke about it in the Portal 2 episode where the whole first.
00:25:38.901 --> 00:25:43.629
Boss in Mario is to beat that bomb and you pick him up.
00:25:43.629 --> 00:25:46.839
So you learn, pick up the enemy and you have to learn it to progress.
00:25:46.839 --> 00:25:49.489
And it doesn't teach you that unless you read a sign.
00:25:49.767 --> 00:25:53.639
It doesn't may stop you and go, hold on a minute, you must throw to do whatever.
00:25:53.639 --> 00:25:54.632
It's just like, just figure it out.
00:25:54.899 --> 00:25:58.889
And it doesn't hold your hand too much. It's just like the player will figure
00:25:58.889 --> 00:26:02.119
it out at some point on how to beat him. Yeah, and the next boss you face,
00:26:02.119 --> 00:26:04.889
you beat with a ground pound. Exactly. Basically, you're just learning these
00:26:04.889 --> 00:26:09.069
mechanics through the gameplay, which is always a pleasure.
00:26:09.626 --> 00:26:15.348
I did find a little bit of antithesis to what we've been saying in that the
00:26:15.348 --> 00:26:17.548
boss fights reminded me of it, which is all I'm talking about now,
00:26:17.548 --> 00:26:19.071
just before I forget. Yeah, no, it is.
00:26:19.222 --> 00:26:22.240
How the design of this game is all about discovery, exploration,
00:26:22.652 --> 00:26:26.498
non-linearity in a lot of ways of like, you know, finding secrets and finding
00:26:26.498 --> 00:26:28.730
your own way to achieve the tasks.
00:26:28.870 --> 00:26:32.910
There was a few times the game physically stopped me and told me no,
00:26:33.090 --> 00:26:35.618
like truly just went, no, you cannot do that.
00:26:35.658 --> 00:26:37.966
Here's a ball of text telling you, you cannot do that.
00:26:38.309 --> 00:26:42.538
The two examples was that first boss fight i threw him off the level you know
00:26:42.538 --> 00:26:46.347
and then we're like no you can't do that you've got to throw him inside the thing like what what,
00:26:46.847 --> 00:26:50.753
it's harder for me to
do this to get into the edge and throw him than it is,
00:26:51.206 --> 00:26:55.218
to do it so i'm not allowed to do that okay i'll do it your way and then i did
00:26:55.218 --> 00:26:57.358
a race but the race you're
00:26:57.718 --> 00:27:01.353
you unlock these this new way to travel around the level from these cannons
00:27:01.667 --> 00:27:05.458
in that first level you can jump into and fire yourself so i use the cannons
00:27:05.458 --> 00:27:08.368
to win the race and the game was like no no you might have gotten to the end
00:27:08.368 --> 00:27:11.938
first but you're not supposed to do that so go back and do it the way we want
00:27:11.938 --> 00:27:14.676
you to do it and i found that really like what the hell.
00:27:16.238 --> 00:27:20.388
What what do you mean i can't do you you gave me this tool yeah but you need
00:27:20.388 --> 00:27:23.148
to get the star off the bomb guys so it's no good throwing him off the cliff
00:27:23.148 --> 00:27:27.383
is it you need to get the star you can't you've got to pick up his corpse but i want the fight.
00:27:28.578 --> 00:27:33.328
Do you know i'm just playing yeah i i understand what you're um there's a few
00:27:33.328 --> 00:27:37.391
of those that popped cropped up of these moments of just like the game actually
00:27:37.617 --> 00:27:40.670
it wasn't just like oh this didn't work let me try something else
00:27:41.077 --> 00:27:43.730
the game physically stopped me and said no don't do that,
00:27:44.297 --> 00:27:47.368
And I found that very jarring. That really put me off, to be honest.
00:27:47.746 --> 00:27:52.505
I think when it puts you in a kind of rigid moment of the game,
00:27:52.505 --> 00:27:57.562
like a more instanced moment. So let's say it's win a race or beat this boss.
00:27:57.951 --> 00:28:02.884
I think that's when it takes, that's when it wants you to complete it in a certain way.
00:28:03.099 --> 00:28:08.215
I think, whereas when it's in the level and it's about exploring that level
00:28:08.215 --> 00:28:10.744
and it's the sandbox part of the level, not like when
00:28:11.139 --> 00:28:14.245
you imagine like a boss fight and it's like okay now there's flames all around
00:28:14.245 --> 00:28:17.685
the ring and it's like fight time they want you in that moment and they want
00:28:17.685 --> 00:28:22.235
you to play it a certain way doesn't separate those moments though to teach you that or tell you that,
00:28:22.775 --> 00:28:26.565
it gives you that feedback it doesn't it puts the race in the level you've been
00:28:26.565 --> 00:28:30.034
exploring previously it puts the boss fight in the level that you've been exploring,
00:28:30.695 --> 00:28:33.673
you as the player have no inclination that
00:28:33.871 --> 00:28:37.695
you are doing something wrong and i went back and i read the text of the guy
00:28:37.695 --> 00:28:41.515
talking just to make sure i hadn't missed a bit of dialogue saying hey we are
00:28:41.515 --> 00:28:45.365
going to run this race these are the checkpoints go to the end now none of that
00:28:45.365 --> 00:28:46.553
it was just beat me to this
00:28:46.860 --> 00:28:49.955
this flag and i was like okay cool i'll go beat you to the flag oh i got here
00:28:49.955 --> 00:28:51.887
first i'm not allowed fuck me i guess.
00:28:53.983 --> 00:28:56.865
Anyway i just wanted to bring that up because i thought that was really jarring
00:28:56.865 --> 00:29:00.545
considering the philosophy that seems to go into the rest of the game and i
00:29:00.545 --> 00:29:04.275
didn't encounter that in for example like zelda there was no moment in zelda
00:29:04.275 --> 00:29:05.735
where the game stops you and goes no no,
00:29:06.415 --> 00:29:09.587
you're not you're not supposed to use the bomb here like i know the bomb worked
00:29:09.796 --> 00:29:13.545
you technically succeeded but no no no we're going to respawn the boss and you're
00:29:13.545 --> 00:29:15.995
going to do it without the bomb now yeah i wonder if that's um,
00:29:16.611 --> 00:29:20.765
i wonder if that's the challenges of the pivot to 3d where you know in a three-dimensional
00:29:20.765 --> 00:29:25.516
space where more thing the player can do more things that even surprise
00:29:25.928 --> 00:29:29.125
i say surprise the developer they were aware of it which is why they made you
00:29:29.125 --> 00:29:33.285
do it again but here's the thing does it matter should it have mattered to those
00:29:33.285 --> 00:29:37.025
developers that i used the cannons to finish the race.
00:29:37.655 --> 00:29:41.085
To stop me and know that I haven't finished the race in the way they wanted
00:29:41.085 --> 00:29:45.035
me to, they had to do extra work. It wasn't just...
00:29:45.440 --> 00:29:51.717
Player is on level player starts race player reaches the end the flag it's they've
00:29:51.717 --> 00:29:56.267
got secret checkpoints along the levels or something that yeah tells the game
00:29:56.267 --> 00:29:57.514
that you've traveled the path,
00:29:57.973 --> 00:30:03.975
i think ultimately they want they want you to win it earnestly perhaps because later on,
00:30:04.417 --> 00:30:08.247
you are going to need to know how to do that and if you won it in a different
00:30:08.247 --> 00:30:12.807
way then you may not have learned that that process if that makes sense maybe
00:30:12.807 --> 00:30:14.761
that's probably the the thinking here we
00:30:15.127 --> 00:30:20.560
we want them to learn how to slide down like this especially with like the camera and everything else,
00:30:21.089 --> 00:30:25.397
if they maybe if they cheese it they might not learn there's nothing to learn
00:30:25.397 --> 00:30:28.607
in that level that you didn't learn through the first bit of traveling up to
00:30:28.607 --> 00:30:29.607
that point so there's not,
00:30:30.187 --> 00:30:34.647
i don't necessarily agree but that maybe that's the logic right yeah exactly
00:30:34.647 --> 00:30:38.537
i was going to say it's not necessarily the
answer that they should have come
00:30:38.537 --> 00:30:40.795
to but maybe it was the logic of,
00:30:41.271 --> 00:30:44.667
well you might be able to cheese this first one but you can't cheese the other
00:30:44.667 --> 00:30:48.287
one so you need to learn to do it properly but then again.
00:30:49.007 --> 00:30:54.867
Why allow me to go into the like I know future because I played a lot of Sunshine growing up
00:30:55.187 --> 00:30:59.787
Mario Sunshine I know when you load a level they change the instance of the
00:30:59.787 --> 00:31:03.407
level a little bit and they do it in this so once you beat the first boss you
00:31:03.407 --> 00:31:07.787
unlock the cannons So why not, when I load up the race, put the cannons back
00:31:07.787 --> 00:31:10.011
in the ground? Just revert it to that previous...
00:31:10.947 --> 00:31:13.715
Why is it an option there if you don't want the player to touch it?
00:31:14.365 --> 00:31:17.737
It's an interesting thought. Yeah, I wonder if that was... I mean,
00:31:17.737 --> 00:31:20.692
it clearly wasn't an oversight because if someone does it, they stop them.
00:31:21.041 --> 00:31:24.067
But I wonder if it was a time constraints thing or something where they needed to...
00:31:24.387 --> 00:31:27.827
Well, that's always the excuse, isn't it? There's time constraints stuff.
00:31:27.827 --> 00:31:30.847
We've said that in every episode. Well, maybe it was time constraints.
00:31:31.307 --> 00:31:35.912
Well, the only thing that makes me think Something like that is just the fact that they do stop you.
00:31:36.092 --> 00:31:39.801
You know, obviously what you've thought of is a solution and it makes sense.
00:31:40.248 --> 00:31:46.664
So regardless of the reason for it, it's a small complaint in an otherwise very
00:31:46.664 --> 00:31:51.614
good game, to be fair. So it was just a moment of friction there between me
00:31:51.614 --> 00:31:53.695
and the game that I didn't quite enjoy.
00:31:53.858 --> 00:31:58.937
And it reminded me of, because in fact, what I wanted to do was finish that level completely.
00:31:59.135 --> 00:32:04.614
And I couldn't do it because I didn't have 10 stars and didn't unlock the hat
00:32:04.614 --> 00:32:06.304
with wings, I think, or something.
00:32:06.304 --> 00:32:12.494
Because you need the red box to unlock to do that, the last star that I hadn't done.
00:32:12.494 --> 00:32:16.914
The tower of the wing cap. Yeah, I needed the wing cap to get the last star
00:32:16.914 --> 00:32:19.984
on the first level to go, right, I'm done with that. Let's move on to the next
00:32:19.984 --> 00:32:21.606
one. And that was just something I wanted to do.
00:32:22.529 --> 00:32:27.164
But then it was like, maybe I misread it when it popped up saying,
00:32:27.164 --> 00:32:31.444
hey, there's a secret switch you have to click to unlock this box.
00:32:31.444 --> 00:32:34.714
So I must have spent 20 minutes wandering around that bloody level looking for
00:32:34.714 --> 00:32:38.184
a secret switch, thinking i've been everywhere where is it is it off the edge
00:32:38.184 --> 00:32:41.784
of the map trying to shoot myself off the edge of the map only to pop onto google
00:32:41.784 --> 00:32:44.504
really quick and find out that the switch isn't it's not a,
00:32:44.984 --> 00:32:46.584
thing you unlock per level it's
00:32:46.584 --> 00:32:50.072
a thing you unlock for the whole game and it's in the castle somewhere
00:32:50.444 --> 00:32:54.414
and i was like oh okay so i've wasted my time maybe that's a me problem there
00:32:54.722 --> 00:32:58.874
but we discussed this didn't we where you have this sort of metroidvania sort
00:32:58.874 --> 00:33:01.073
of progression system like this there is a sort of
00:33:01.415 --> 00:33:06.802
quote-unquote meta progression through mario where you will not unlock areas of the castle through
00:33:07.005 --> 00:33:10.924
obtaining stars and there are secrets to be found and then there's this cap
00:33:10.924 --> 00:33:14.724
this power you need to unlock to access something from an earlier level so you
00:33:14.724 --> 00:33:19.274
have to go back on yourself to an early level to then experience this bit of
00:33:19.274 --> 00:33:20.502
content that was put there
00:33:20.862 --> 00:33:23.451
And we discussed this in conjunction with like Spyro 2, didn't we,
00:33:23.451 --> 00:33:25.737
where you unlock swimming and climbing and such?
00:33:25.958 --> 00:33:30.051
Yeah. And you have to come back to levels. And I think you made a great point
00:33:30.051 --> 00:33:31.941
how something like this,
00:33:32.266 --> 00:33:36.939
where in Metroidvania games, when you unlock a new power and come back to areas,
00:33:37.154 --> 00:33:41.357
you sort of look at those areas in a new way and you experience those areas in a new way.
00:33:42.117 --> 00:33:44.931
And sort of have a fresh take on the zone.
00:33:44.931 --> 00:33:49.411
Whereas something like I experienced in Spyro 2 especially, and in this game
00:33:49.411 --> 00:33:54.244
a little bit, where it's not I'm experiencing this level in a new way.
00:33:54.488 --> 00:33:57.106
It's I'm being told I can't do this yet.
00:33:57.379 --> 00:34:01.251
I have to come back later to then play the hat bit. And it's...
00:34:01.745 --> 00:34:06.061
For me, it was like, well, why not just have the HAP stuff later on so I don't
00:34:06.061 --> 00:34:09.338
have to come back here to fly around this level as well.
00:34:09.466 --> 00:34:13.491
It's about reusing content and stuff like that, but there's a lot of that sort
00:34:13.491 --> 00:34:18.071
of design in a game I don't enjoy. I don't enjoy it when you are playing a game
00:34:18.071 --> 00:34:22.631
and it says you need this power to play this content. And it's like,
00:34:22.631 --> 00:34:23.951
oh, so I have to come back. Great.
00:34:24.471 --> 00:34:29.571
I can't finish this now and now move on. I think what works for me in Super
00:34:29.571 --> 00:34:33.931
Mario 64
is a lot of secret content also exists in the castle itself,
00:34:33.931 --> 00:34:35.117
which is kind of the hub world.
00:34:35.250 --> 00:34:40.111
So you walk around those little grounds at the beginning and you see things
00:34:40.111 --> 00:34:46.061
that you just can't interact with properly yet, but you make a mental note of those things.
00:34:46.061 --> 00:34:49.211
So when you're exploring, you're coming in and out of levels and you're going
00:34:49.211 --> 00:34:53.891
to this hub world, when you do unlock new things or when you do gain new powers
00:34:53.891 --> 00:34:56.651
or whatever, you have a mental note of this hub world already,
00:34:56.811 --> 00:34:59.731
like, oh, I can go back to the drawbridge under the water.
00:34:59.731 --> 00:35:03.931
Yeah that's the hub though yes yeah but i think that the hub is a great place to,
00:35:04.411 --> 00:35:09.361
utilize those additions even though it's you've already been here it's yeah
00:35:09.361 --> 00:35:12.971
you are in that world aren't you when you revisit that area several times you're
00:35:12.971 --> 00:35:16.401
always going to be coming back to the hub world yeah i do think there's it's
00:35:16.401 --> 00:35:19.031
it's i think because it's in the hub world when you did it
00:35:19.411 --> 00:35:21.751
i think i went to like a courtyard with the
00:35:22.151 --> 00:35:25.851
star statue or something and there's a few signposts and whatnot and a couple
00:35:25.851 --> 00:35:29.241
of them might have things that reference stuff that you don't have yet i experience
00:35:29.241 --> 00:35:33.424
that a lot too where it's like here's how to fly with the red hat i don't have that.
00:35:34.799 --> 00:35:38.701
I don't care but then you get a bit excited there's a red hat or there's a wing
00:35:38.701 --> 00:35:43.371
cap or something you know like yeah there's something to look forward to moving forward yeah it's uh,
00:35:44.091 --> 00:35:49.731
it's it's or dread or dread yeah dread more controls i remember those that are
00:35:49.731 --> 00:35:54.856
those hat levels being quite hard for uh the young lad that played it.
00:35:55.829 --> 00:35:58.769
When i was a boy like those those were not easy for a
00:35:59.189 --> 00:36:02.749
wee baby josh you mentioned to me when we were playing the game because we message
00:36:02.749 --> 00:36:07.069
each other sometimes we don't like spoil each other's viewpoints too much but
00:36:07.069 --> 00:36:11.734
we occasionally throw a line or two and you mentioned to me about some challenges with the camera,
00:36:12.209 --> 00:36:15.289
yeah we've seen since looked up that the camera's a bit of a,
00:36:15.789 --> 00:36:19.149
was a point of what's the word i'm looking for criticism when it was released
00:36:19.149 --> 00:36:22.499
i look on the wikipedia stuff and reception to the camera was not because it
00:36:22.499 --> 00:36:25.209
is the clunkiest part of the game isn't it there's a lot of the time with the
00:36:25.209
--> 00:36:28.950
cameras fighting you i don't know what you experienced what was your experience with the camera
00:36:29.194 --> 00:36:31.277
i think because it's buttons
00:36:31.573 --> 00:36:35.794
and it's not at this point an analog stick i do think it has its challenges
00:36:36.095 --> 00:36:39.579
it's also inverted isn't it so it's like left and it'll go a different way like
00:36:39.579 --> 00:36:43.939
rotate round weirdly none of that was the problem i had with it but i i think
00:36:43.939 --> 00:36:45.629
if it was because it's kind of
00:36:46.049 --> 00:36:50.469
it turns in corners doesn't it like quarters yeah if uh if i'm right and there's
00:36:50.469 --> 00:36:53.489
also a button that kind of brings you close to mario,
00:36:54.049 --> 00:36:58.169
yeah you get almost you get like as close to first person they're willing to give you,
00:36:58.789 --> 00:37:02.169
a way to look it's a way to look up and down isn't it really yeah i mean i do
00:37:02.169 --> 00:37:04.809
have to say like it's it's great to be able like
00:37:05.169 --> 00:37:10.159
because it's early 3d as well it's still great to see how expressive mario is
00:37:10.159 --> 00:37:12.839
in everything that he does like all these different jumps and everything it
00:37:12.839 --> 00:37:17.769
doesn't feel like ugly 3d animation There's personality present in here.
00:37:18.065 --> 00:37:21.890
The flow of the way you move is brilliant. It's so good.
00:37:23.132 --> 00:37:25.483
The thing I found with the camera that was quite frustrating,
00:37:26.093 --> 00:37:28.670
there was two things. First of all, it kept making a noise at me every time
00:37:28.670 --> 00:37:29.970
I turned it, and I was like, shut up.
00:37:31.440 --> 00:37:36.460
My God. I don't need a beep or a swoosh every time I want to turn the camera
00:37:36.460 --> 00:37:38.420
slightly. That was driving me nuts.
00:37:38.880 --> 00:37:44.100
And then the other thing was, they've got two different camera systems in the
00:37:44.100 --> 00:37:45.050
game, haven't they really?
00:37:45.050 --> 00:37:50.439
They've got a sort of hybrid between giving the player control, like.
00:37:51.066 --> 00:37:54.520
Being able to shift it left and right and rotate the camera 360
00:37:54.752 --> 00:37:57.968
and then they have set camera points for certain parts of the levels
00:37:58.148 --> 00:38:03.947
and those two systems collide a lot i found it quite frustrating to be walking around
00:38:04.098 --> 00:38:07.940
having full control of my camera and then having it stolen off me for a moment
00:38:07.940 --> 00:38:11.410
completely in the opposite so maybe i'm turning the camera left to look left
00:38:11.410 --> 00:38:14.820
then i take one step forward and it snaps the camera around to the left looking
00:38:14.820 --> 00:38:17.171
to the right i'm like no no i was trying to look left
00:38:17.519 --> 00:38:21.761
i was trying to look where i'm going and the camera kept being taken from me
00:38:22.121 --> 00:38:25.370
to the point where again i keep using the first level as a lot of reference
00:38:25.370 --> 00:38:27.270
but it's my first experience of those things
00:38:27.531 --> 00:38:31.510
there was a certain area on that first level that is sort of off to the left
00:38:31.510 --> 00:38:32.918
off the beaten path a little bit
00:38:33.081 --> 00:38:37.020
to get the camera to look at it without walking into it felt impossible for
00:38:37.020 --> 00:38:39.750
me for a moment because it was like it would not let me turn the camera any
00:38:39.750 --> 00:38:42.930
further it's like no you can't turn more that way the camera is now here fixed
00:38:42.930 --> 00:38:47.420
here you've got this sort of like 120 angle that you can flick a little bit in between there.
00:38:47.420 --> 00:38:51.640
I then took three steps away further into the level where it then gave me bad
00:38:51.640 --> 00:38:54.571
control of the camera and I could turn the camera the whole way around and look at it.
00:38:54.949 --> 00:38:57.435
And it was like, what is this little anchor point for the camera here?
00:38:57.435 --> 00:39:01.555
Get it gone. What are we doing? Get out of here. Just give me control of the camera.
00:39:03.152 --> 00:39:05.462
And that was really frustrating for me because it was just like,
00:39:05.596 --> 00:39:07.146
I wish you'd have done one or the other.
00:39:07.465 --> 00:39:12.195
Either give me control or don't give me control. Don't give me a little bit
00:39:12.195 --> 00:39:14.471
of both and keep having them fight.
00:39:14.692 --> 00:39:18.325
Yeah, I think it's finding that I can understand why they want to,
00:39:18.325 --> 00:39:23.075
in certain moments, take control of the camera so that they can do some like
00:39:23.075 --> 00:39:26.121
quite specific platform elements perhaps,
00:39:26.695 --> 00:39:30.695
through direction but if when it goes into those moments i didn't test it enough now i'm,
00:39:31.255 --> 00:39:34.895
like i'm trying to think about it is it just you can also still change the camera
00:39:34.895 --> 00:39:39.635
but it's just more fixed it becomes limited you could sort of wiggle it like,
00:39:40.175 --> 00:39:44.435
maybe one or two clicks left or right and they've got more it's more defined
00:39:44.435 --> 00:39:47.825
it's almost like you're changing the camera you're not rotating it a traditional
00:39:47.825 --> 00:39:50.495
way, you're just changing the camera angle, like specifically.
00:39:51.795 --> 00:39:55.971
Sort of. It's the same rotation as you'd expect when the camera's behind Mario,
00:39:56.186 --> 00:39:59.175
but it's now off to one side or something or from a specific angle.
00:39:59.175 --> 00:40:02.625
Yeah, it's not from behind third person. It's now from an angle.
00:40:02.625 --> 00:40:06.890
But later Mario, they clearly learned from this because later Mario games do give you both,
00:40:07.372 --> 00:40:11.167
where there are sections of the game where
you cannot move the camera and it
00:40:11.167 --> 00:40:12.910
gives you a fixed perspective.
00:40:13.049 --> 00:40:15.497
And there are sections of the game where you fully have control of the camera.
00:40:15.497 --> 00:40:19.977
It never tries to do both at the same time, which this game does sometimes.
00:40:19.977 --> 00:40:23.497
And usually when the camera is taken from you, like I have lots of memories
00:40:23.497 --> 00:40:27.357
of Sunshine, that was my main Mario game growing up, there are sections of that
00:40:27.357 --> 00:40:31.127
game where the camera is like, let's say for example you go underground into
00:40:31.127 --> 00:40:32.687
the sewer system underneath,
00:40:33.247 --> 00:40:38.847
the hub world, the camera goes top down and follows your shadow underneath and you've got the.
00:40:39.627 --> 00:40:43.517
Music playing, or there's certain levels where it takes a zoomed out almost
00:40:43.517 --> 00:40:47.847
isometric angle or a side-on angle, and it's like, oh, this is a special level
00:40:47.847 --> 00:40:50.779
that has a special camera angle, and there's a reason we're doing it,
00:40:51.104 --> 00:40:54.965
is to add difficulty or add a certain challenge to this,
00:40:55.453 --> 00:40:59.848
level by using the camera to add that challenge and i do feel like they learned
00:40:59.848 --> 00:41:03.908
that from this game yeah and that's utilized brilliantly sunshine was gamecube
00:41:03.908 --> 00:41:06.911
wasn't it yes yeah i was just trying to order the,
00:41:07.370 --> 00:41:10.208
ones in my head because sunshine was gamecube galaxy was we
00:41:10.548 --> 00:41:14.718
which is and then unfortunate for me because sunshine was my main mario game
00:41:14.718 --> 00:41:19.478
i never clicked with another mario game because it's so it's like 64 it's like
00:41:19.478 --> 00:41:24.203
elevated 64 obviously developed more and older and better system and stuff.
00:41:24.395 --> 00:41:29.388
Plus the flood mechanic with your little water pump.
00:41:29.728 --> 00:41:33.408
And that game, I really liked everything about that game growing up.
00:41:33.408 --> 00:41:37.328
So whenever I played any other Mario game, I was like, what the hell? Where's my hover?
00:41:38.545 --> 00:41:41.978
Where's my water gun to shoot people with? Why aren't the levels laid out in
00:41:41.978 --> 00:41:46.948
the way that I like them laid out? Why aren't I exploring a hub world in this one?
00:41:47.608 --> 00:41:50.265
Like I played Galaxy afterwards and I just bounced right off it.
00:41:50.700 --> 00:41:56.068
I was like, nope. No, thank you. I wanted to just go back to the camera element as well in 64.
00:41:56.068 --> 00:42:00.948
And I wonder if, like, I was thinking about the camera in 64 and also what you
00:42:00.948 --> 00:42:04.988
said about breaking up into different moments and the guy in the cloud,
00:42:04.988 --> 00:42:07.288
is it Latvia or something?
00:42:07.828 --> 00:42:09.973
Lakituba? That's a country, yes.
00:42:10.628 --> 00:42:13.458
What is the chap's name with the cloud and the fishing map? It's where you can
00:42:13.458 --> 00:42:16.888
do come from. I'm just putting in, I'm trying to get him now. Lakitu.
00:42:17.248 --> 00:42:20.740
Lakitu. Right. That's the, thank you very much, Gesundheit.
00:42:21.408 --> 00:42:23.788
The point about the camera I was going to make there is they,
00:42:24.108 --> 00:42:26.828
I think when I, when I play, you see it quite early on as well,
00:42:26.828 --> 00:42:29.608
when you're going around the mountain, you've got the balls or whatever,
00:42:29.608 --> 00:42:32.469
and then you've also got going up the snowy thing and stuff like that.
00:42:33.088 --> 00:42:36.598
I think that they were trying like, cause they used him with a camera as though
00:42:36.598 --> 00:42:41.252
it was like part of a TV thing or a report on the news or whatever of Mario and what's happening.
00:42:41.710 --> 00:42:45.142
I wonder if what their intent with that was to try and do, and with the sound
00:42:45.142 --> 00:42:50.512
effect of the rotation, I think maybe because people weren't familiar with the
00:42:50.512 --> 00:42:53.106
camera being controlled by the player at the time,
00:42:53.355 --> 00:42:57.425
I wonder if they were trying to contextualize it in a way that people would understand.
00:42:58.122 --> 00:43:00.292
The camera moves and the camera functions.
00:43:00.292 --> 00:43:04.617
So when you're going around and it's changed the camera to something that's
00:43:04.733 --> 00:43:09.282
not behind anymore, it's now a perspective that you might get on like a news
00:43:09.282 --> 00:43:12.002
report, you know, if someone's like, and there's a man climbing a building and
00:43:12.002 --> 00:43:13.312
it's on fire, you know, that kind of thing.
00:43:13.312 --> 00:43:17.718
And it's got this shot of them in a helicopter filming or, you know, some rubbish like that.
00:43:18.130 --> 00:43:22.072
But like, you've got this angle. I wonder if the idea of wrapping it up in a
00:43:22.072 --> 00:43:24.109
kind of recording like that,
00:43:24.520 --> 00:43:29.086
is to help people kind of contextualize it in their own mind so that they can
00:43:29.086 --> 00:43:29.956
understand these controls.
00:43:29.956 --> 00:43:33.645
Because you've got to understand, I suppose, to jump back into this time period,
00:43:33.842 --> 00:43:37.566
like camera controls for this, it's brand new.
00:43:37.566 --> 00:43:42.366
People aren't familiar with how this works. It might feel very alien and strange
00:43:42.366 --> 00:43:43.906
to people, especially at the beginning.
00:43:43.906 --> 00:43:47.926
So I think by providing them with something familiar, like contextualizing it
00:43:47.926 --> 00:43:52.526
with something familiar that they can associate with and kind of understand
00:43:52.526 --> 00:43:55.303
the framework of, I think it's a nice way of kind of
00:43:55.663 --> 00:44:00.106
offering that little olive branch
or that connecting piece to kind of help people
00:44:00.286 --> 00:44:02.642
with understanding the rotation elements and things.
00:44:02.817 --> 00:44:06.626
And perhaps the sound, you know, you spoke about there being two separate kind
00:44:06.626 --> 00:44:08.603
of views. There's the behind that you can rotate.
00:44:08.818 --> 00:44:12.866
And then there's the viewpoint when you're going up something a bit more curated,
00:44:12.866 --> 00:44:14.251
shall we say, by the designers.
00:44:14.582 --> 00:44:18.442
Maybe that sound effect exists to illustrate to the player that this,
00:44:18.802 --> 00:44:23.057
you've manually pressed that compared to we're now changing the camera.
00:44:23.417 --> 00:44:25.696
Does that make sense? Like, oh, did I fat finger that? You know,
00:44:25.696 --> 00:44:26.876
little things like that, perhaps.
00:44:27.452 --> 00:44:30.766
There might have been some thought process there in wrapping it up in a certain
00:44:30.766 --> 00:44:34.266
way. And then also, you know, because the sound effect is an indicator to the
00:44:34.266 --> 00:44:37.288
player that there's been an input, essentially, right?
00:44:37.573 --> 00:44:41.676
So maybe they felt that was also an important part at this stage.
00:44:41.676 --> 00:44:43.646
Obviously, it's something that they haven't retained, right?
00:44:43.646 --> 00:44:46.626
So it's clearly something they've identified that isn't something that how things
00:44:46.626 --> 00:44:49.906
should continue to function. But I can understand perhaps at this moment in
00:44:49.906 --> 00:44:53.954
time, why they felt the need to put things in a certain way.
00:44:54.215 --> 00:44:56.946
And there was another thing I thought that was quite interesting that I wanted
00:44:56.946 --> 00:45:01.201
to touch on is they have wrapped it up in a kind of television broadcast style.
00:45:01.375 --> 00:45:06.176
And I wonder, like, because I was looking at, you know, Super Mario All-Stars,
00:45:06.176 --> 00:45:10.896
for example, the one on the Super Nintendo, and it's like a stage play.
00:45:10.896 --> 00:45:14.236
And there's always been like a performance element to it, you know,
00:45:14.236 --> 00:45:18.216
in this presentation. And you think of like Super Mario Brothers 2,
00:45:18.436 --> 00:45:21.543
which has like the curtains coming across and stuff.
00:45:21.804 --> 00:45:26.384
I wonder how meta this kind of Super Mario stuff really is and whether they're all just.
00:45:27.018 --> 00:45:30.651
Actors of characters and it's kind of just actually,
00:45:31.171 --> 00:45:34.661
it's a performance art you know like it's like whether it's like the characters
00:45:34.661 --> 00:45:38.381
are just playing roles and they're entertaining you through a screen you know
00:45:38.381 --> 00:45:40.231
i know it sounds a bit daft but like they present it
00:45:40.671 --> 00:45:44.201
you're in the sauce where are you fucking swimming in that shit i'm down a thread
00:45:44.201 --> 00:45:48.531
now aren't i you're right in the catch-up just going i'm down the green green
00:45:48.531 --> 00:45:55.331
shoe hole it's all actors man it's all actors Bowser's just Luigi in a turtle suit,
00:45:58.151 --> 00:46:03.651
I think yeah but I just find that the decision to shoot it as like a television
00:46:03.651 --> 00:46:05.189
thing in Super Mario 64 and then
00:46:05.607 --> 00:46:08.539
some of the Matt Super Mario Brothers stuff to do it like a stage play,
00:46:09.019 --> 00:46:13.805
I just found the entertainment aspect to like wrapping it up in that fabric
00:46:13.805 --> 00:46:16.135
as well. I know what the truth is. I figured it out. You were like,
00:46:16.135 --> 00:46:20.455
there's going to be some bold twat in 2026 who's going to play this game and
00:46:20.455 --> 00:46:22.207
he's going to hate that noise so I'm going to put it in.
00:46:22.370 --> 00:46:24.848
That's what they're doing. Are you doing the ASMR version right now?
00:46:26.543 --> 00:46:29.935
I'm looking at the audio sound and I'm like, I'm going to have to bump him up
00:46:29.935 --> 00:46:32.415
there in the edit. Well, my bad. No, it's all right.
00:46:32.855 --> 00:46:35.895
Was there anything else about Super Mario 64? I mean, the problem is we could
00:46:35.895 --> 00:46:38.788
yak for about six hours. I'm getting this sort of like...
00:46:39.154 --> 00:46:42.615
I guess, character in these podcasts, where I'm just moaning about everything,
00:46:42.975 --> 00:46:45.995
everything, what I don't like, what is criticism.
00:46:45.995 --> 00:46:49.785
It feels weird to criticize this game, consider it like using,
00:46:49.785 --> 00:46:52.945
like, as you said, you thought it was a very good point about why certain things
00:46:52.945 --> 00:46:55.193
might have been taken. And that's all fine.
00:46:55.530 --> 00:47:00.835
But I find, like, it's hard to play these games without modern sensibility coming
00:47:00.835 --> 00:47:03.499
to your head, isn't it? And like, what should be done and things like that.
00:47:03.620 --> 00:47:06.675
Because obviously we develop in a very different time to these games. Yes.
00:47:07.415 --> 00:47:12.125
The choices that I would make obviously don't apply in these situations.
00:47:12.125 --> 00:47:13.115
And they don't apply to...
00:47:13.435 --> 00:47:16.645
I mean, okay, so let's look at... Clearly, there's things they've refined,
00:47:16.645 --> 00:47:20.235
because you've had Sunshine, Galaxy, Odyssey, etc.
00:47:20.757 --> 00:47:25.465
But let's look at some of the stuff that has evolved from there.
00:47:25.465 --> 00:47:27.758
There's been a countless number of things that...
00:47:27.975 --> 00:47:32.945
The third-person camera control stuff is a staple. It is the formula that exists
00:47:32.945 --> 00:47:34.753
in games today in some form.
00:47:34.880 --> 00:47:37.580
You know, even like the perspective of the character...
00:47:37.986 --> 00:47:40.734
You know, and the way that they move.
The only thing that I did find interesting,
00:47:40.734 --> 00:47:44.474
though, with the Mario movement is he's got this kind of, like he almost has
00:47:44.474 --> 00:47:48.004
to get running, you know, like he has to build up speed. He's got like acceleration.
00:47:49.504 --> 00:47:52.834
And I actually quite like that, to be honest. Like I feel in a lot of games
00:47:52.834 --> 00:47:54.902
now, like it feels a bit floaty.
00:47:55.024 --> 00:47:59.927
Yeah, and I know platformers aren't, 3D platformers aren't as,
00:48:00.259 --> 00:48:04.564
I don't want to say common, but they aren't as prominent on game consoles as they used to be.
00:48:04.564 --> 00:48:07.854
I know Astro Bot one game of the year recently and stuff, and that's highly
00:48:07.854 --> 00:48:12.729
praised but they're not at the they're not at the height of the powers that they were in the kind of
00:48:12.961 --> 00:48:16.924
80s 90s and early 2000s yeah they've kind of gone out of fashion a little bit
00:48:16.924 --> 00:48:20.347
so i understand that like i am referencing games that feel,
00:48:20.924 --> 00:48:24.254
the control differently that aren't of the same genre but i do feel that like
00:48:24.254 --> 00:48:27.824
i kind of like the weight behind mario here i mean i know it makes it creates
00:48:27.824 --> 00:48:30.554
challenges because he runs and he doesn't just stop you know there's a little
00:48:30.554 --> 00:48:34.804
bit of a stutter you know there's a little bit and maybe that's a bit of usability design and refinement,
00:48:35.328 --> 00:48:39.536
that's gained there, but I do kind of like that, and I think it's an important element of...
00:48:39.699 --> 00:48:43.104
Well, you see a lot, like even like the level where you slide,
00:48:43.604 --> 00:48:46.394
well, there's several levels in there where you slide on your belly down ramps
00:48:46.394 --> 00:48:52.598
and stuff, that's just snowboarding games. That's like modern snowboarding games put in...
00:48:52.725 --> 00:48:55.784
Like I was looking up for another N64 game that I used to really enjoy,
00:48:55.784 --> 00:48:57.199
which is Snowboard Kids.
00:48:57.403 --> 00:49:02.344
That came out in 97 in Japan, end of December 97, so 98 for us.
00:49:02.344 --> 00:49:06.424
And that's like, that game is just those levels, but you can jump.
00:49:07.284 --> 00:49:10.294
Like, it's those levels, but a full game.
00:49:10.294 --> 00:49:13.184
And the amount of stuff that is in this game that you could.
00:49:14.144 --> 00:49:17.404
There are almost certainly games out there that you can just point to and go,
00:49:17.404 --> 00:49:21.494
that's just this Mario level, but they've made a whole game about it because
00:49:21.494 --> 00:49:24.391
it was so fun. Yeah, and there is something too going down...
00:49:24.715 --> 00:49:28.306
There is that momentum that you get in 3D, especially. Because there's that
00:49:28.306 --> 00:49:32.721
game I showed you ages ago now. It must have been like 10, 15 years ago on the Super Nintendo.
00:49:32.982 --> 00:49:37.176
That kid's clown crazy chase. That 2D one, you're racing and I think there's
00:49:37.176 --> 00:49:40.766
a bomb that's set on and you've got to get to the, defuse the bomb at the end
00:49:40.766 --> 00:49:43.264
of the racetrack before or whatever.
00:49:43.480 --> 00:49:47.216
But that's 2D and you don't have that momentum.
00:49:47.216 --> 00:49:50.656
I mean, it's like beautifully animated and there's so much charm and character
00:49:50.656 --> 00:49:54.036
and personality and all that stuff. But you don't have that momentum until,
00:49:54.036 --> 00:49:56.886
for me, these kind of 3D games started to bring it to the table.
00:49:56.886 --> 00:50:01.226
Sonic the Hedgehog did well. That's true, yeah. Sonic.
00:50:02.246 --> 00:50:05.746
That was their whole thing, wasn't it? It was the momentum aspect to it is that
00:50:06.186 --> 00:50:08.846
they could do it. And there was a lot of Sonic where you would go up ramps and
00:50:08.846 --> 00:50:13.385
then you would have the gravity hit you and fall back down and you'd have hang time and stuff.
00:50:13.600 --> 00:50:17.626
They put a lot of effort into making that work. But what Mario has done is bring
00:50:17.626 --> 00:50:23.296
it into a 3D space but on a smaller scale, isn't it? Yeah. Because you're not
00:50:23.296 --> 00:50:26.238
having to go up Mach 3 or whatever Sonic does to do that.
00:50:26.639 --> 00:50:30.866
And then when you get the Sonic 3D games, I do think the momentum in those games is great.
00:50:31.626 --> 00:50:34.946
I know me and you spoke a lot about Sonic Adventure 2 because we both played
00:50:34.946 --> 00:50:39.506
that growing up. And that game, the first level where you're running towards
00:50:39.506 --> 00:50:45.039
the camera away from the big truck, the momentum in that is very good. But this game does it.
00:50:45.230 --> 00:50:49.296
Every action you're taking, you feel the weight of Mario. You feel his fat belly
00:50:49.296 --> 00:50:50.586
flopping around as you're jumping there.
00:50:51.446 --> 00:50:54.626
Yeah, no, you feel all the different types of jumps and they feel very distinct
00:50:54.626 --> 00:50:58.459
and different. Also, you have to learn how to execute them and refine them.
00:50:58.674 --> 00:51:02.045
I also think we speak about it at work a lot.
00:51:02.546 --> 00:51:07.242
This and i mentioned miyamoto's philosophy about every part of the game has
00:51:07.242 --> 00:51:10.832
to be fun and delightful you know kind of and that includes movement like movement
00:51:10.832 --> 00:51:14.934
is such an important part of a game even if you're just walking or running or
00:51:15.212 --> 00:51:18.652
whatever and it's got to and if you're playing a game where you do that,
00:51:19.252 --> 00:51:23.182
the the majority of the time or a player is going to spend most of their time
00:51:23.182 --> 00:51:28.302
moving then that that should be something that
is delightful is enjoyable doesn't
00:51:28.302 --> 00:51:33.368
feel like a chore and this is a game i know it's a platformer and obviously it's,
00:51:33.872 --> 00:51:37.002
the movement and the jumping is an important part of the gameplay mechanics
00:51:37.002 --> 00:51:41.432
themselves but it's it's such an important element in regardless of the game
00:51:41.432 --> 00:51:45.352
that you're making and there's games like a you know want like we quite like
00:51:45.352 --> 00:51:47.552
that xenoblade chronicles x moving in that,
00:51:48.327 --> 00:51:51.462
like that jump when you're sprinting where you know you're outstretching the
00:51:51.462 --> 00:51:54.532
arms and there's real momentum behind that you know and and then you do the
00:51:54.532 --> 00:51:58.042
superhero landing if you're really high stuff like that's a lot of fun And I
00:51:58.042 --> 00:52:01.832
think those parts of things that you want to, when you're making a game,
00:52:02.632 --> 00:52:06.442
I think even like when we made like UFO, like that game on Steam,
00:52:06.442 --> 00:52:08.552
UFO, Unfortunately, Fortunate Organisms, when.
00:52:09.451 --> 00:52:13.592
We were designing like the movement of the UFO itself, we wanted it to have,
00:52:13.592 --> 00:52:16.882
we didn't want it to be like the player was perfectly in control,
00:52:16.882 --> 00:52:18.742
could stop exactly when they wanted.
00:52:18.742 --> 00:52:22.412
You know, we wanted some tug, we wanted some acceleration, we wanted some deceleration.
00:52:22.412 --> 00:52:24.702
We wanted those moments because that was part of the challenge.
00:52:24.859 --> 00:52:26.530
You know, you were trying to balance that,
00:52:26.937 --> 00:52:30.808
controlling it and picking up people and and you know destroying objects and
00:52:30.808 --> 00:52:35.308
everything else well there's another game that we worked on which i won't say yet.
00:52:36.168 --> 00:52:40.897
But that has great sort of movement in that very physics space sort of like
00:52:41.047 --> 00:52:45.068
that that flow and shift like if you try and turn around it's not a 10 on a
00:52:45.068 --> 00:52:48.338
dime there's a there's a curve to it and stuff every part of the game should
00:52:48.338 --> 00:52:49.865
be enjoyable that's just
00:52:50.039 --> 00:52:53.188
you're playing a game to have fun so why not make every aspect of it fun and
00:52:53.188 --> 00:52:55.641
I do feel like sometimes games forget that.
00:52:55.774 --> 00:53:01.448
I think it's an important lesson from playing Super Mario 64 or I think that's
00:53:01.448 --> 00:53:04.628
probably one of the aspects of Miyamoto's games that I quite enjoy.
00:53:04.628 --> 00:53:07.808
I remember he did an interview in his show. It's quite the test of time though,
00:53:07.808 --> 00:53:10.989
isn't it? They're just fun. Yeah, I like where they come up.
00:53:11.768 --> 00:53:13.048
Where he draws the fun from.
00:53:13.388 --> 00:53:16.978
I think he spoke about Star Fox and
you're going through the gates or whatever
00:53:16.978 --> 00:53:19.668
and he just got that from when he was a child.
00:53:19.668 --> 00:53:23.818
There's something he just enjoys about the Torrey gates, just going under them,
00:53:23.818 --> 00:53:27.958
like through them under them. Like there's just a, like just doing it and making,
00:53:27.958 --> 00:53:30.558
you know, even if there's one like in the path, he's not going to go around
00:53:30.558 --> 00:53:31.307
it, he's going to go through it.
00:53:31.429 --> 00:53:35.018
There's a desire in his inner being to just do that. Yeah. And it's like,
00:53:35.018 --> 00:53:36.967
well, if you can gamify that, you know.
00:53:37.187 --> 00:53:41.598
Moving to like other Nintendo movies like Pokemon is based around bug catching
00:53:41.598 --> 00:53:48.068
and that's just a child's pastime in Japan. And Zelda exploring caves and things like that, right?
00:53:48.568 --> 00:53:53.338
Yeah. Yeah, it's childhood whimsy and childhood games that are then taken and
00:53:53.338 --> 00:53:56.618
given magic and given a world and given a place and purpose.
00:53:56.618 --> 00:54:01.421
And that's where the sandbox genre element comes from, a sandbox in a kid's
00:54:01.566 --> 00:54:06.728
playground, right? And I feel like we've, not we, but developers are forgetting
00:54:06.728 --> 00:54:08.148
that. The games are supposed to be fun. Yeah.
00:54:10.453 --> 00:54:14.395
There's this spectrum when you when you're putting together a game particularly
00:54:14.395 --> 00:54:17.595
you know you do need to make money from games and everything and there's this
00:54:17.595 --> 00:54:22.644
spectrum isn't there between art and play on one side and then business on the other,
00:54:23.137 --> 00:54:26.875
and i think it was edmund is it mcmillan or something that the chap who did
00:54:26.875 --> 00:54:29.842
supermate boy and barnum isaac he spoke about it,
00:54:30.312 --> 00:54:34.375
and it's definitely finding where you are on that spectrum and the type of game
00:54:34.375 --> 00:54:38.125
and typically with indie because you want to develop a game that's perhaps a
00:54:38.125 --> 00:54:43.185
bit more niche you try to lean more into the art side because a triple a game that needs to catch,
00:54:44.145 --> 00:54:47.655
large amounts of people in a broad net will try and be more more to the other
00:54:47.655 --> 00:54:50.965
way you know more often than not because they they need one sad they need.
00:54:52.445 --> 00:54:55.025
They need it to be a commercial success obviously so they need to reach as many
00:54:55.025 --> 00:54:58.415
people so they need to accommodate as many different things so they need to
00:54:58.415 --> 00:55:02.815
put glowing lines tell you where to go otherwise you won't buy the game there's
00:55:02.815 --> 00:55:05.575
a there's a deeper challenge to that isn't there like with I know,
00:55:05.575 --> 00:55:07.305
I'm being very surface level,
00:55:08.188 --> 00:55:10.731
but it is a hot topic. A yellow paint surface level.
00:55:11.705 --> 00:55:17.255
Yeah, yeah, exactly. Just a TLDR is there's certain gameplay aspects in certain
00:55:17.255 --> 00:55:22.096
games that are being sort of like simplified and washed over because...
00:55:23.240 --> 00:55:27.154
They would only be there for fun, perhaps, and not there for purpose,
00:55:27.154 --> 00:55:30.604
or maybe not even experienced by all players. And that's something I think a
00:55:30.604 --> 00:55:34.183
AAA game struggle with, is putting content in that isn't for everybody.
00:55:34.333 --> 00:55:38.895
They want everyone to play 100% of their game. I think what I appreciate about
00:55:39.023 --> 00:55:42.604
a lot of Nintendo games, obviously they have different studios internally.
00:55:42.604 --> 00:55:46.604
I don't want to say Miyamoto Studios, but the ones that are coming from that philosophy.
00:55:47.264 --> 00:55:50.474
I think the thing I appreciate about them is they have a clear intent behind
00:55:50.474 --> 00:55:51.734
what they're trying to achieve.
00:55:51.734 --> 00:55:56.534
It's trying to capture the essence of play and they trust in what they're doing,
00:55:56.534 --> 00:56:00.565
trust that if people, if a person picks up the game and plays it,
00:56:00.832 --> 00:56:04.211
then there's something for them because they've designed it in a specific way
00:56:04.490 --> 00:56:08.194
that will capture people's imagination that we all had as children.
00:56:08.194 --> 00:56:11.724
And I think there's something there to be said for that rather than being overly
00:56:11.724 --> 00:56:14.654
concerned with accommodating every different
00:56:14.828 --> 00:56:18.634
type of person that might not want to play a game or might not want friction
00:56:18.634 --> 00:56:22.164
or a challenge or this or that you know i think sometimes you've got to have
00:56:22.164 --> 00:56:26.067
some belief in what you're making and trust that the game can be
00:56:26.276 --> 00:56:29.614
can appeal to people if it's really good at what it does you know there's stuff
00:56:29.614 --> 00:56:32.984
like boulder's gate recently that i say recently but that's
00:56:33.344 --> 00:56:37.444
that's a that's a i think that's a hardcore game and that's sold over 20 million
00:56:37.444 --> 00:56:39.364
copies that's not a game that's like.
00:56:40.004 --> 00:56:43.994
Super simple but it's a game that's a lot of people if you've never played a
00:56:43.994 --> 00:56:47.114
game before and you drop into a game like boulder's gate, there's going to be
00:56:47.114 --> 00:56:48.925
a disconnect. There's going to be a lot to learn.
00:56:49.047 --> 00:56:53.784
Yeah, and I think what they did is they trusted the systems that they have in place. They trusted in
00:56:54.172 --> 00:56:57.979
their learned experience over many years of developing games of the same genre
00:56:57.979 --> 00:57:02.019
and same kind of formula and they didn't overly concern
themselves with trying
00:57:02.019 --> 00:57:05.202
to be something it's not you know or appeal to the type of
00:57:05.544 --> 00:57:08.889
people who might not like this game regardless of what they do you know you've
00:57:08.889 --> 00:57:12.459
got to understand you can't capture literally everyone but there's a pool of
00:57:12.459 --> 00:57:16.809
people that there's millions of people definitely that can enjoy a certain
00:57:17.129 --> 00:57:22.158
genre and style of game if it's done exceptionally well you know there's talks for years about
00:57:22.419 --> 00:57:25.759
turn-based rpgs being terrible people don't care about and this and the other
00:57:25.759 --> 00:57:30.689
but then you see pokemon sell like hotcakes now if turn-based rpgs truly people
00:57:30.689 --> 00:57:32.333
couldn't stomach them at all
00:57:32.548 --> 00:57:35.379
they would not be touching pokemon because those are the mechanics you know
00:57:35.379 --> 00:57:39.845
so there's clearly a way you can wrap it up that people love it and enjoy it so it's it's
00:57:40.094 --> 00:57:43.329
it's about trusting in what you're putting together and wrapping it up in a
00:57:43.329 --> 00:57:46.249
way that you know with intent that people can
00:57:46.689 --> 00:57:49.749
enjoy and embrace it and And I think that's something that I wish.
00:57:50.189 --> 00:57:54.019
Obviously, I think I have to feel for some, like I know quite a few people who
00:57:54.019 --> 00:57:55.390
are working in the AAA space.
00:57:55.686 --> 00:57:59.129
And a lot of, there's a couple of things, you've obviously got time constraints,
00:57:59.129 --> 00:58:04.339
you've got resource, limited resources, pressure from up above to design and
00:58:04.339 --> 00:58:09.158
implement things in games that they might not necessarily agree with or whatever.
00:58:09.583 --> 00:58:12.553
You know, and need to facilitate things. And then you have to put resources
00:58:12.553 --> 00:58:15.503
into doing that rather than focusing on the core experience,
00:58:15.503 --> 00:58:17.733
you know. There's all these different variables up in play.
00:58:18.193 --> 00:58:21.833
But so that is, like, it's never just as simple as, like, oh,
00:58:21.833 --> 00:58:24.043
a designer there doesn't understand this or doesn't understand that.
00:58:24.287 --> 00:58:28.643
They understand that the yellow page is there. I don't like this lazy design
00:58:28.643 --> 00:58:33.073
word a lot of people who don't really understand what it's like to make a game,
00:58:33.073 --> 00:58:37.045
throw around. It's like, this is lazy. Oh, the Pokemon, there's a laser. It's like, they're not.
00:58:37.295 --> 00:58:41.403
They get they get they get a piece of bread and a bit of butter and they go
00:58:41.403 --> 00:58:46.583
and make a game off that that's their budget and then also make it in 12 months
00:58:46.583 --> 00:58:47.793
so we can have a yearly you know.
00:58:49.493 --> 00:58:54.253
There's a there's a tremendous turn like you know they have a limited pool of resources and then it's
00:58:54.633 --> 00:58:57.533
and by resources i mean development budget that they've got to do it in a certain
00:58:57.533 --> 00:59:01.663
time and that also means the limited resources means that they can't hire more
00:59:01.663 --> 00:59:05.713
people or extend the development time these these things affect that i would
00:59:05.713 --> 00:59:08.053
love to get into because we've
00:59:08.433 --> 00:59:10.873
obviously not this episode I think we're going to wrap up in a minute but,
00:59:11.777 --> 00:59:13.763
I think I would love to get into talking
00:59:13.763 --> 00:59:17.259
about because we've talked about transition from 2D to 3D there are
00:59:17.683 --> 00:59:21.313
several games that we've played that have made that transition that have not
00:59:21.313 --> 00:59:25.053
done it in such a graceful way as Barry O clearly did back in the day because
00:59:25.413 --> 00:59:28.573
this is like a masterclass in how to do it really considering.
00:59:29.533 --> 00:59:31.253
Some of the problems that even
00:59:31.633 --> 00:59:37.070
modern day companies bump up against when trying to move from 2D to 3D.
00:59:37.198 --> 00:59:40.722
Just look at Pokemon Scarlet and Violet, for example, compared to,
00:59:41.168 --> 00:59:46.641
sword and shield the the the graphical fidelity's night and day on those two
00:59:46.641 --> 00:59:51.121
games but but why is always the question i'd love to get into that in a in another well it's,
00:59:51.641 --> 00:59:56.121
like tim schaefer spoke about super mario 64 and you know like obviously it's
00:59:56.121 --> 01:00:00.431
the jump from 2d to 3d but it's also the innovations of the 3d the camera work
01:00:00.431 --> 01:00:04.541
and everything and he said super mario 64 was like an epiphany it was
01:00:04.921 --> 01:00:09.158
something that just it became a thing and you saw it and you were like
01:00:09.551 --> 01:00:13.381
oh my god this is it this is how 3d games are made this is how,
01:00:13.841 --> 01:00:16.721
cameras are going to function this is it these are the control schemes this
01:00:16.721 --> 01:00:20.221
is that they just needed someone to break the mold yeah,
01:00:20.912 --> 01:00:26.581
gabe newell said this was to cvg in 2011 he said mario 64 is still my favorite
01:00:26.581 --> 01:00:31.231
game of all time the controls are still pretty much unrivaled and they convinced
01:00:31.231 --> 01:00:35.541
him it convinced him when he played that game that video games were art you know yeah and
01:00:35.961 --> 01:00:42.660
i got another quote actually from dan hauser who was the co-founder of rockstar you know did gta and
01:00:43.043 --> 01:00:48.081
things he said any developer who's made who makes 3d games who says that they've
01:00:48.081 --> 01:00:52.241
not borrowed something from super mario 64 or ocarina of time is lying.
01:00:53.801 --> 01:00:57.921
At least in some form you know yeah
yeah i think that's a nice way to end and
01:00:57.921 --> 01:01:03.351
we'll um yes we'll talk about so our next game on the on the podcast is going
01:01:03.351 --> 01:01:08.452
to be Streets of Rage 2, which is a side-scrolling beat-em-up by Sega. And we're going to...
01:01:08.725 --> 01:01:11.001
I think we're playing the classics version, but it's the classics version from
01:01:11.001 --> 01:01:14.651
the Sega Mega Drive slash Genesis era, which was also...
01:01:14.721 --> 01:01:16.910
I think it was a popular arcade game at the time as well.
01:01:17.335 --> 01:01:20.213
But yeah streets of rage 2 now you haven't played this one have you,
01:01:20.693 --> 01:01:25.476
no i've never touched um i have played some games like it on like arcades and stuff
01:01:25.703 --> 01:01:28.463
don't know what the titles of those games were i'm sure there was a teenage
01:01:28.463 --> 01:01:32.183
mutant ninja tower one at one point but yes i've not played that one so we'll
01:01:32.183 --> 01:01:35.423
spin that up we'll play that together i believe yeah we can play it co-op which
01:01:35.423 --> 01:01:39.762
is going to be exciting and it's all on the same screen so we want to split screen silliness
01:01:39.971 --> 01:01:45.353
revisit watching john play a video game oh gosh what are you doing i'm just looking in the bin why,
01:01:46.313 --> 01:01:47.995
because i want chicken.
01:01:49.573 --> 01:01:55.353
Is that a reference to the game i think it is uh i remember playing um no no okay well,
01:01:56.650 --> 01:02:01.093
there was tech tech and three had a mini a mini game on it that was doing
01:02:01.413 --> 01:02:05.153
kind of streets of rage double dragon inspired side-scrolling beat them up and
01:02:05.153 --> 01:02:08.934
one of the pickups on it was you know like a big an actual full roast chicken
01:02:09.178 --> 01:02:12.363
and when you would pick up to recover your health chicken there was just it
01:02:12.363 --> 01:02:15.013
was almost like mortal kombat you know where they just throw in that kind of
01:02:15.013 --> 01:02:18.213
audio line and it was just like chicken yeah it was just uh,
01:02:18.773 --> 01:02:22.503
it's quite amusing but anyway yeah streets of rage 2 is the next episode and
01:02:22.503 --> 01:02:25.543
then we go into spooky season and why not just say it now we're going to also
01:02:25.543 --> 01:02:29.813
yeah we're going to be playing amnesia the dark descent after streets of rage 2 which we're both,
01:02:30.573 --> 01:02:33.573
very excited for i'm excited for that i only played half an hour of it when
01:02:33.573 --> 01:02:38.993
it came out because i was a sniveling coward but no longer now i shall now i'm
01:02:38.993 --> 01:02:42.763
older wiser and bolder and i shall venture forth into the descent with my head
01:02:42.763 --> 01:02:45.113
held high and my sphincter clenched. Famous last words.
01:02:46.733 --> 01:02:51.823
That has been the latest episode of Indie Devs Play and we will catch you guys on the next one. Ciao.