What's up everyone and welcome to the

WAN show. We have a great show lined up

for you guys today. The big news this

week is of course the massive

restructuring going on at Xbox. It was

rumored and now it has happened and uh

I got to admit I'm probably going to get

myself into trouble with this topic

because I've got a bit of a

controversial take on it.

In [clears throat] other news, oh man,

Steam might need to do something about

their refund policy. And I mean, oh man,

I'm going to get myself into trouble

with this one, too. Maybe make it worse

>> because the way that it is right now is

harming indie devs in a way that I got

to admit I didn't see coming. What else

we got going on this week? Well, the

most important news of the week above

the uh Microsoft stuff is that Hannah

Montana Linux has a modern remaster

nearly two decades later. So,

>> you went with that.

>> So, we can use that now.

>> Classic Luke.

>> That's good. That's very good.

>> Classic Luke.

>> Uh, also, I don't know, man. Why not

this? Gogg joint CEO says that the

future of gaming shouldn't come at the

expense of ownership.

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah.

>> That's pretty cool.

>> Yeah.

Oh,

[laughter]

the show is brought to you today by

Squarespace, MSI, Toshiba, and Motion

Gray, alongside our rap partner, [music]

Gbrand, our laptop partner, Razer,

[laughter]

and our

and [laughter]

and our chair partner Razer. All right,

before we jump into the Microsoft topic,

we should probably explain what's going

on here. [laughter]

>> Times are tough. [laughter]

Times Times are tough and bandwidth,

>> it's been it's been a hard

>> and compute especially are getting

>> it's been a hard year

>> are getting expensive. So Luke had the

brilliant idea. Was it you?

>> I don't know.

>> Someone someone on set. Let's blame Dan.

Uh had the brilliant idea of saving some

bandwidth on streaming on float plane

for the WAN show.

>> I think it was you and Dan.

>> Uh by by reducing the amount of movement

in the frame. So Dan came up with the

innovative idea of um

shooting Oh no, I think the plate was

me. um [laughter]

creating a plate.

>> Pretty sure the plate was you. I think

Dan brought up the idea of just like

reducing

>> Right. Right.

>> By not moving, we saved money.

>> Yeah. So, we shot a plate of the set and

then

Luke and I just have our heads poking up

through it. So, I don't know if we're

going to do this the whole time, but we

could [laughter] we could Can you Can

you look at the stats and see how much

less bandwidth we use like this? Do you

think it's significant?

>> No, I can't right now.

>> Okay. Well, someone's going to have to

look at it.

>> Someone might be able at some point.

What unique username says it was in fact

Dan. Nice solid.

Anyhow, why don't we jump right into our

first topic of the day. Xbox has hit a

giant reset button, plans a massive

corporate restructure, cutting 20% of

the workforce and offloading five, yes,

five studios. Uh they've announced 3,200

roll eliminations. So 1,600

um when when it was announced, 1,600 by

end of year on top of the 16 of 1,600

others across Microsoft's workforce. And

the aim here is shifting investment to

focus on higher priority projects. In

the case of Xbox, like Halo, Minecraft,

and The Elder Scrolls, in an open letter

written by Asha Chararma, Xbox

apparently grew their business too fast

during co making teams 40% larger than

they were at the start of this

generation.

>> Many such cases

>> with up to 14 layers of management for

decisions. Now they're cutting back as

margins are 3 to 10 times lower than the

competition and Big Green has lost 64

every dollar they invested.

[sighs and gasps]

Instead of just shutting down Five

Studios, uh, Xbox has allowed Compulsion

Games and Double Fine to uh transition

to independent studios with their IP

catalog and runway for their next games,

>> which is actually kind of cool,

>> which is actually pretty cool. Undead

Labs and Ninja Theory will be sold to

undisclosed buyers, and their games

State of Decay 3 and Senua will still be

released. Senua, I'm actually not sure.

Arcane Lion, maker of Dishonored, Death

Loop, and upcoming Blade game, is in the

initial phases of quote unquote

exploring other options. But this wasn't

the end. Later this week, ID Software

lost about half of its workforce,

approximately 90 people, and has been

reduced to the size of the team that

released Doom 2016. Meanwhile, Obsidian

lost about 25%, so this is 60 to 70

people. And Avowed 2 has been cancelled,

although a small team will continue to

work on the game in hopes of it getting

uncancled while they wait for a new

Fallout project.

>> I'm concerned about that. that feels

like that group is maybe in the the

second part of this layoff.

>> That's how I read that. Hopefully not

read that. Um, another thing I wanted to

note is that Microsoft had investments

in projects going on that were not just

in Microsoft Studios. So like IO

Interactive is one of those, the Hitman

developer who also just released the

very good uh 007 game. I heard their uh

their adaptive controller, their their

accessibility team got absolutely

>> brutalized as part of this, which uh

really sucks because that's something

that

>> those are industryleading and people use

them for things outside of just Xbox.

That's really unfortunate. Um, but yeah,

so I IO Interactive is fine to be clear,

but I think they were working on an RPG

uh or a fantasy type game, which would

be a little bit different for them. And

a lot of the funding for that somehow

some reason, not sure, maybe it's

supposed to be on Game Pass, I don't

know, was through Microsoft and that

funding is gone. So IO has had to

respond with effectively layoffs of

their own. Um, apparently the project

isn't cancelled, but I think a studio is

closed. Um, and there were some other

miscellaneous layoffs. Um,

yeah, rough.

>> We've got a quite a few discussion

questions. I am going to jump in with

one that I think is uh is going to be

maybe a little bit controversial.

Um, I love starting the show on a

controversial note.

Where where is it? I wanted to I Okay,

I'm just going to I had kind of written

I had written it down, but I can't I

can't find where I wrote it. So, I'm Let

me Let me pose this to you. I think that

we can all agree that layoffs are bad. I

I don't think they're I don't think

there's a I don't think there's a

winner. I don't think consumers win. I

don't think they're they're getting, you

know, more or better products

necessarily out of a layoff. Uh I don't

think the employees win. you know, not

having your job throws your whole life

into uncertainty. Like our our our man,

it's amazing as adults how much of like

>> I don't know about I not maybe not

everyone, but you know, for me, my job

is a huge part of my identity and my my

value. Um,

>> basically the first question after

people meet you is what do you do?

>> Yeah. Yeah. And and that's that really

is it. That's it.

>> When when you're in high school, when

you're in elementary school, it's like

what's your favorite color?

>> Yeah.

>> High school, it's like bam.

>> What are you studying? Or that's more

maybe more common. ities. What are you

studying?

>> What are you studying?

>> Post universities. What do you do?

>> What do you do? And they don't mean

titly winks tournaments on the weekend.

>> Yeah.

>> Um

and meanwhile, I don't think I don't

think it's

>> Winks tournaments on the weekend are

sick, though.

>> I don't think it's a win for for

Microsoft either. I don't think I don't

think Microsoft wants to be in a

position where they're where they're

terminating jobs.

>> No, they wanted to be in a position

where they had a 100red million Game

Pass subscriptions and they thought this

was the path there. this wasn't what

they wanted.

>> And so, so we can all agree layoffs bad

for across the board.

Can I ask a question though? And and if

the answer is if the answer is, you

know, that's a stupid question, I'm

totally I'm open to that answer. But I I

want to ask a question here.

Is it better to

expand like crazy and hire a bunch of

people and try and do all this stuff

and have layoffs?

Or is it better to just never hire

anybody in the first place and just be

obscenely profitable? It occurred to me

just because it came up for like the

fourth time in the last few months that

Valve's a really small company. Yeah,

but are they though? Are they?

Valve chooses to have several hundred

employees while being one of, if not the

most profitable companies per headcount.

And the the reason this came up this

week was because I was I was talking

about sort of like how they just keep

acting like such a tiny little company.

Like Steam Controllers are backorded

until mid next year or something like

that. Don't don't quote me on the exact

date. And and I'm sure they're hoping

to, you know, hit it at an accelerated

schedule and all that. And they may

overd deliver. To be clear, I'm not like

I don't want to trash on Valve here, but

also, you know, we give a really hard

time to companies who overhire and lay

people off. And I feel like Valve gets a

free pass for just being like

>> not having created the jobs in the first

place

>> by the yacht manufacturer wealthy and

just never hiring anybody and then

going, "Oh, oh, woe is me. I simply

cannot do a longer press briefing for

the most important product of the year

because we're a really small. You have

to understand we're a really small

company.

[snorts]

And so I'm just wondering

why

there seems to be a double standard

here. To be clear, Microsoft created

this situation. They they wrote the

story where they're the villain of the

story. They also bought out other

studios in order [laughter] to do that

>> because they didn't have to do that.

>> So they gobbled up all the jobs and then

deleted them, which is worse.

>> Unless we don't we don't know what

situation those companies that were

gobbled up were in.

>> Like I remember talking back when back

when I toured Monolith, right? They they

talked about the difficulty of being an

independent studio. Yeah,

>> how you basically just you starve while

you develop what is hopefully a home run

hit and then and then you eat and

realistically you lay off a bunch of

people at launch anyway because you

don't need QA when you're sitting at the

like conceptualizing stage of your next

title and then you like ramp up ramp up

ramp up again and then you're starving

and then you hopefully hit a home run

again. Like it's also very challenging.

Like live service games came around

because the feast or famine nature of

the games industry is really really

challenging.

>> It is interesting that you mentioned

monolith cuz aren't they gone?

>> They are gone. But would they have been

gone anyway? I don't know.

>> That's an interesting question. One that

we unfortunately have no magic time

travel crystal ball to to ask.

>> Even if you did, I don't think you could

because I think they changed hands. I

think they went to Warner Brothers or

something. Uh, so like they they started

independent. You wouldn't know what

happened if they kept going down that

line. You wouldn't know what they

happened if they stayed with Microsoft,

although you can probably guess. Um,

yeah, it's rough because it's I mean,

it's not m Minecraft, Elder Scrolls, or

Halo.

>> Yeah, Monolith was owned by Warner

Brothers from 2004 until it shut down in

2025.

>> You know what's interesting? Shifting

investment to focus on higher priority

projects. And then outside of the

quotes, it says Halo, Minecraft, and

Elder Scrolls. Did they say that or did

we say that?

>> That is something that they've talked

about, but it might not have been as

part of that quote.

>> It's interesting to me that they didn't

mention anything from Blizzard

Activision.

>> Um,

okay. I I wouldn't read too much into

that yet.

>> Oh, I didn't mean as like a studio

closure type thing. It's just

interesting that like in their

perspectives, those are their

I want to say Halo projects, but Halo's

in the thing, so it gets complicated,

but you know what I mean,

>> right?

>> Um,

>> interesting, interesting, interesting,

interesting.

>> Halo still being something that they

glom on to is interesting because Halo

is such a strong part of Microsoft's

gaming identity, but Halo's also been

just dead for so long.

>> A really long time.

>> Yeah.

>> What would it take to resurrect Halo for

you at this point?

Oh, that's tough because so context

there is I was a huge Halo fan.

>> Basically Halo Halo raised him.

>> Yeah. Yeah.

>> Well, no, but like if you ask I I

guarantee I know the answer. If you ask

Luke what's his like biggest childhood

memory, most like [laughter]

>> So, you know where I'm going.

>> I know the one that you're referencing.

>> Christmas morning, his dad scammed him.

Just completely bamboozled him.

>> Can never trust that man.

>> Yeah. into thinking that he had gotten

like it was like clothes or something.

>> No, he he tricked us that the big box in

the corner had a crystal ball under it

that was for my mom.

>> Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But actually

supposed to keep my mom from getting us

to open it because it was for her and he

wanted it to be the big reveal at the

end for her. No one else knew that he

said this to us. So Rich and I were kept

Richard, my brother, kept getting our

family to not let us open this box and

nobody [laughter] knew why. And then at

the end under the box was an Xbox.

>> We we lift it without looking at it to

show my mom. We're looking at my mom for

her reaction and she's looking at us all

confused. And then we look under the box

and there's an Xbox and Halo and I think

there was another game. But

>> who cares?

>> There was Halo.

>> There was Halo. [laughter]

>> Yeah.

>> What an absolute legend move.

>> That was huge.

>> Uh we do have Oh, right. So yeah. What

would it take? What would it take to

make you excited about Halo again? cuz I

guarantee you it won't be making it an

Xbox exclusive. And Microsoft seems to

be back to like, oh yeah, Xbox

exclusives are important. Like, would

you buy an Xbox to play Halo? I doubt

it. 2026,

>> not current ones. Um, honestly, I think

there's a lot that they could do. Um,

Halo Infinite multiplayer

is actually pretty good.

>> I had fun,

>> but it doesn't feel completely there.

That's That's fair

>> in my opinion. I also think that the

single player like they actually had a

pretty interesting idea.

>> I was really excited to play it together

and then Luke played like a little bit

of it and he was like, "Yeah, it's lame.

Don't bother. [laughter]

>> We can still play it together if you

want. You ever play video games?"

>> Campaign Evolved is coming out.

>> Okay. Yeah,

>> we could do that instead.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Um Yeah. A recreation of the

first one. We're probably going to talk

about that later in the show, too,

because Assassin's Creed Black Flag came

out yesterday. Um,

>> have you played it already? Is it good?

>> I have thoughts there. It's going to be

a longer conversation, though, so we'll

get to that later.

>> Um, but yeah, I don't know. I think

going back to Roots a little bit, I

don't like what they've done with

Cortana.

>> Um, I don't I I think similarly to a few

different franchises, they need kind of

a reset. Okay. So, they're weighed down

by just like a convoluted stupid cannon

that was written by people who honestly

didn't understand what made Halo great

in the first place.

>> Is like I read some of the books cuz I'm

a

nerd. Uh, so I think you could go back

>> go into Master Chief's.

>> Is there enough like is there like a

time travel mechanism in in the Halo

universe?

>> No, but just do a prequel.

>> Halo one prequel.

>> You have to do a prequel. You have to do

a prequel, right, though? Like I

>> I actually think the game could be very

different cuz it could be like Jon

during the John Halo during [laughter]

during the uh uh Spartan training

program.

>> Sure.

>> Or something like that. It

>> It's got to be you

>> reach reaches in the past. I don't know.

I stopped paying attention after three.

>> It's tough because like

when your prequel, you have to like your

next game has to be like bigger and

better and more exciting and have new

mechanics, right? But a prequel can't

break the rules of the the timeline of

the of the universe. So like

>> even being so it was 1999. Okay. I was

only

13 when the Phantom Menace came out

>> and when R2-D2

fires up his rocket boosters,

I'm like I wanted to walk out of the

theater. I was like that's the dumbest

thing I've ever seen. if he had rocket

thrusters, why didn't he use them later?

And and the whole like cannon thing

where R2-D2 has sentience because he's

like never been wiped or whatever. So

what? He forgot. He forgot he had rocket

thrusters. Like it's just so so whatever

they do in the past, they have to fight

the urge.

>> I will also point out people are saying

Reach was in the past. People really

liked Reach. I didn't play Reach until

years afterwards because I think that's

when I like first started going to

university or something. I didn't have

time. Um, and I was away from my Xbox

because I was at school. Um, but people

really liked Reach. Reach was a very

positively received game. So, I think

they could do something like Reach

again. Uh, but I would I would get off I

would get off the current timeline.

Reach around.

Dear God. [laughter] Uh uh I I I would

try to get off the current timeline or

like find some way and it's this is the

problem.

>> They could just comic book it. Why not

just reset

>> something like that?

>> Like honestly I think I think I think

Disney should do that with Star Wars

too.

>> Yeah.

>> Just reset it. Start it over cuz it's

it's gotten so convoluted. There's so

many like there's so many things that

started out as a pitch for how to sell a

toy that just make no sense in the

cannon anymore. But then I mean I I

don't know. Meanwhile, they try and do a

reboot with Harry Potter and everyone's

like, "Oh, it's stupid, man." And they

did the uh they [laughter]

that completely derailed me and I don't

know why. What's going on with my brain

today? Um Oh, right. They did the TV

show and it was just so stupid. Like, oh

my god.

>> Okay. Okay. Here's a question. Here's a

question. Oh, man. We're going to

trigger him so hard. He's already

probably got an upset heading. What do I

hate?

>> What do you hate more, the Warcraft

movie? [laughter]

>> You knew where I was going with this. Or

or Halo TV?

>> Honestly, I think the Halo TV show.

>> Really?

>> I think so. And the Warcraft movie

pissed me off.

>> But the Warcraft movie is so offensive

just because Blizzard was so good at

cinematics and [laughter] storytelling.

>> They did it. They did it live action for

some reason. Oh man, they had like they

they they had cinematics so down that I

bet I bet you you can still find it.

There's like I bet you on YouTube

there's a like Warcraft 3 all

cinematics.

>> I'm fixing it right now. There we go.

>> Warcraft 3 all cinematics.

>> Yeah. Yeah, I got you.

[laughter]

[gasps]

>> Warcraft 3 all cinematics in

chronological order 2.1 million views.

Warcraft 3 all cinematics h high quality

remastered 5.6 million views. Warcraft 3

cut scenes and cinematics pre-wo 2.3

million views.

Oh my god, man. when you can get that

many views on just the cinematics from

your game.

>> Wow.

>> Yeah.

>> And we can we can lose the plate. I

think it's I think the joke's over.

>> And then they uh and then they changed

the story and they did it live action

which is just so insane. But the Halo

one is so much worse.

>> Okay.

>> His helmet's off just like all the time.

Like nothing matters. No one that worked

on that show, as so far as I can tell,

ever played the game, ever cared

anything about the lore. Just nothing

makes any sense. It's so it's so

ridiculous. And then and then you have

like the the the

waste of Cortana, which is which is

frustrating on multiple platforms, I'm

going to say, not even levels, because

then they brought it way too early to

like the Windows assistant thing.

Whereas if Copilot now was Cortana, I

actually bet you it would have been

received better.

>> Yeah. Well, people were pretty open to

the branding of Cortana when they first

introduced and then she ended up just

garbage.

>> So useless

>> and C-pilot's garbage, but it's less

garbage than Cortana

>> and I can see a trajectory where Copilot

could kind of do Cortana things.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Eventually. Yeah, for sure.

>> The original Cortana was just never

going to go anywhere. So, it's like they

they have just burned Cortana, which is

going to burn any Halo player that like

projects himself to try to be Mr. John.

>> Okay. So, basically, um, what I'm

hearing is a miracle.

Christmas miracle is what it would take

for Luke to re-engage with the Halo

universe.

>> Basically, set off some ring

accidentally and instead of blowing up

it or like uh biological deleting or

whatever those rings do, I don't fully

remember actually. never actually really

cared. Uh,

>> yeah, it doesn't really matter

>> to be honest. Whatever the giant ring

mcguffin is, um, have one of them go off

unexpectedly and it like time warps you

or something and then just be like

whatever, just forget about it.

>> Nothing else ever happened.

>> After we released Reach, just ignore

everything.

>> The It was all a dream, full reset. I

remember I think I've told this story on

weigh before, but I had to review the

original Xbox Elite controller for a

video

>> and um I wasn't really sure what to do

and I came up with like, you know what,

I'm just going to go to Willow and rent

Halo 5

>> and put it up in the the the room up

there. And after work one day, I just

stayed back and ordered some pizza,

played Halo 5,

>> heated the pizza with PC,

>> played the [laughter]

play the campaign, and I remember

finishing the whole thing and just being

like, gross, good controller, [laughter]

>> but yeah, ick. I don't like that. Um, I

mean, hey, if they wanted to start over

on Halo, there's a lot of uh a lot of

developers out there who uh could use a

project to work on.

>> Yeah. Speaking of, you know, the really

weird

engine as far as I can tell that they're

running, maybe they should have used

IDTech.

>> Oh, dude.

>> Considering Wolfenstein feels great.

>> Uh, Indiana Jones.

>> Indiana Jones so freaking amazing.

>> Doom like,

>> oh my god, what a wellrunning and

good-looking game.

>> Like I

>> It's like my favorite engine out there,

>> dude. In a world where there's so much

Yes. rage

>> in a world

>> in a world where gamers hate poorly

optimized games.

>> Yeah, tech has been awesome,

>> dude. And and look, I'll be the first to

admit that I know nothing about, you

know, choosing an engine to develop my

game. Wouldn't know the first thing

about that. Maybe IDTE absolutely sucks

hairy donkey sack to to to work with. I

don't I don't know that. But what I do

know is man does the end result ever

look and feel good to play.

>> And so as a as a gamer that I I love

that

>> and I'm a little tired of every single

game I play being unreal.

>> We didn't have the con we didn't give

them the context yet. So the IDTech team

seems to be literally completely gone.

>> No,

>> like one person or something.

>> I think it was cut in half.

>> In half. Okay, that's not as bad as I

thought

>> because there was a ton of people saying

the whole team was gone. So, you you did

get that from people talking online. You

didn't just make that up, but I think

it's not correct.

>> Okay.

>> Okay. The note that we have in the doc

is um instead of shutting down five

studios,

IP catalog,

but this wasn't the end. Later last

week, id software lost about half its

workforce, 90 people, and has been

reduced to the size of the team that

released Doom 2016.

That's that's what I've heard. Okay.

Well,

>> now people are saying they reduced down

to 57 people, which would not be half of

its workforce. I don't know what's going

on, but I don't know that the whole team

is gone. It sounds like they were

massively

>> force reduced.

>> It's not all Unreal. It's just all made

on Unreal 5. Okay. That

>> No, no, that's what he meant.

>> That was my point.

>> Yeah. He meant Unreal Engine, not Unreal

Tournament 2004.

>> Yeah. [laughter]

Thank you. You're welcome.

>> Um

>> Um Yeah. So I I don't know. I'm not

sure.

>> No, I mean like I don't know exactly

what's happening at ID, but it but it

[laughter]

but it sucks because I I really did like

that engine. Doom 2016. Like my god,

what a well-running game. And some

people have pointed out like Indiana

Jones wasn't well optimized. I don't

think Indiana Jones was about the

optimization. No, but what Indiana Jones

was was incredible looking for how it

did run.

>> Mhm.

>> Like that that's the that's the thing,

right, guys? It's all it's all relative

to what the vision of the game developer

was for that game. Their vision was

something that looked filmic.

>> Oh, wow. It's weird seeing we have a TV

over here. I can see myself move now.

It's it's odd.

>> And and and Indiana Jones

looked freaking filmic. Not all the

time, right? But there were occasional

moments in cut scenes when I was like,

"Holy [ __ ] did did Harrison Ford get

young again?" Like, "Am I watching

Indiana freaking Jones right now?"

>> Which is wild.

>> Which is which is incredible.

>> They didn't optimize for optimization.

They optimized for

>> Yes.

>> looking good.

>> Exactly. And and that's a game developer

choice. You don't have to like that

choice, but not not every game needs to

be Dota. Not every game needs to run on

absolutely every piece of hardware on

the planet uh in order to maximize how

many skins they can sell, right? Um

every everyone's got a different

strategy and that's that's fine. That's

acceptable.

>> Apparently Digital someone in chat is

saying Digital Foundry said Indiana

Jones and Doom TDA are optimized.

Indiana Jones is 100% ray traced and ran

on non-raced hardware if you know.

>> So cool.

>> Yeah. Anyways, that

sucks because I I I don't know. I don't

know if I'm well placing this, but I've

been I've been a little bit tired of

Unreal Engine running basically

everything. Um,

here's a new discussion question uh that

I assume David did this. Yeah, of course

it was David. Um, he asks, "Will Xbox

exist in 10 years?" Which I I don't

think either of us would have any way of

knowing that. But the more interesting

part of this question, in my opinion, is

who will own it?

>> Microsoft doesn't actually seem that

interested these days.

>> If Microsoft were to sell Xbox,

who would be lining up at the door to

buy it? Does Amazon still have Luna?

>> Saudi Arabia?

>> I I thought they've been pairing back

some of their like cultural

>> They bought EA investments. When When

was that?

>> They bought Niantic. Niantic. Niantic.

Whatever. Yeah, they did buy they did

buy Niantic. That was relatively recent.

Amazon Luna still exists.

>> Wow.

>> Wow. Featuring top new games courtroom

chaos

>> from Xbox.

>> Get it, Amazon. And their logo has a

hole in the middle of it.

>> I get it.

>> Get it.

>> Hey, that is actually kind of the logo

for Luna. It's an A. Anyways,

Whoa, that was loud.

That's all you get.

>> Ah, dispatch. Okay.

>> Oh,

this is Shadow of the Tomb Raider. I

will I'll never be free of this game.

[laughter]

>> I've probably spent more time in that

game than like practically any

>> Skyrim Immersive Adventure. Yeah. Okay.

Amazon is still a thing. So maybe

Amazon.

>> Load that up and scroll up slightly.

What was that cate? What was that second

last category there? What is this

category? Immersive world adventure

games. It's like oh wow. other than Alan

Wake old games.

>> Tomb Tomb Tomb

>> Skyrim.

>> I can't even click on this. Oh, I can go

here. Okay. No, we got Hogwarts Legacy.

That's in there.

>> That is newer.

>> But you also have Fallout 3 right beside

it.

>> Indiana Jones and the Great Circle.

Okay. Yeah. Well, okay. [laughter] Also

four. That's slightly newer.

>> Yeah, it's not that new anymore.

>> No, I said newer.

>> It's like 10 years old.

>> I said newer. [laughter]

Uh, I also skipped a Oh, who will own

it?

>> Who would buy Xbox?

>> Amazon is a is I think a pretty good

guess.

>> You would need to have You'd need to

have like Holy

Would Nvidia buy it?

>> I don't think Nvidia is that interested

in gaming right now. I Okay, so

>> Gbox G [laughter]

>> Nvidia hasn't

Thanks, [laughter] Dad.

>> There's There's no way it wouldn't be

the G-spot, though.

>> That's what I was getting at. We had

Xbox, we had a hole.

>> Yeah. Um, [snorts]

okay. Now, hold on. Hold on a second,

though. In all seriousness, though,

there are people at Nvidia who do still

care about gaming. That's the funny

thing about companies, right?

They're not

>> they're not they don't actually all like

march in one direction and

>> sometimes they march in very different

direction.

>> There's there's people at Nvidia who

still very much care about gaming and

wish that they could get more Foundry

time as much as any gamer does. Um and

you know when I brought up the

possibility of you know yeah could you

guys just spin off GeForce basically I

was met with absolutely not. That's our

that's our DNA. That's our that's our

history. Um, that's, you know, gaming is

a is a huge part of our culture and it's

it we would sooner cut off our left nut.

>> No matter how small your left nut is

relative to your entire body, this isn't

exactly how they put it, but they they

would sooner cut off a a key organ. Uh,

regardless of the size,

>> hear me out. Everyone's going to hate

this.

>> You know, if you're playing a video game

and there's like the this person liked

that, that person I'm going to get a

everyone hated that

Nvidia buys it, releases a console.

Well, they would

>> beats the expected price for a Steam

machine.

>> It's ARMbased

>> and the way that they do it is having it

be a very low-end machine that can play

a lot of what you're playing a lot of

the time locally, which is your friend

slop your whatever it's called machine

whatever paint the shoot the gun game.

>> Yeah.

>> Something whatever it's called.

>> Mecca chameleon. You can play that. You

can play golf with friends. You can play

Peak, you can play all those kind of

things locally. And then when you want

to play Indiana Jones in the Golden

Circle,

>> you stream it from GeForce Now.

>> GeForce Now.

>> So, so, so in order to buy Xbox, you

don't just have to have the money. You

have to have the hardware development

expertise. You have to have the games

industry software relationships,

which they definitely have. The only

companies that I could see having a

having any kind of a shot at buying the

Xbox and doing it justice would be like

probably AMD and Nvidia or I mean oh man

I guess Intel technically could. They

are technically a player. Um and then

what so what Nvidia would do then is

they would basically

just like they're doing with the RTX

Spark, right? is they would accelerate

the move towards ARMbased CPUs with

GeForce graphics for gaming. They would

use the leverage that they have with

developers to you know basically yeah

optimize for our GPUs. Oh by the way

also it runs on this thing now. I think

that there would be an expectation that

they partner with Microsoft potentially

on the operating system at least for one

generation or a couple generations.

They've already built, to your point,

they've already built the cloud

streaming infrastructure that Microsoft

uh considers a key part of the Xbox

brand with uh with their own streaming.

And as much as I hate it, and as much as

people will yell when things like

physical games and physical media gets

taken away and stuff, people's buying

patterns show that if they can take less

pain now, but higher consistent overtime

pain later, they'll almost always go

with that option. Um, debt, loans,

credit card payments,

>> um,

services like this. Um, I I've seen a

lot of comments on the Steam Machine

saying that people wish that it was

three 400 bucks, but could just play

games like Mecha Chameleon and whatever

else if they effectively released that

box,

but

you can also get more juice out of it

when you need by paying for for GeForce

Now or whatever else.

I could see people going for it. I think

that's also a more natural route to

something like GeForce Now than pretty

much anyone else is offering at the

moment. Um,

>> but I mean from Nvidia's perspective, I

could also just see them going, "Well,

yeah, but also just we just don't need

to do that at all.

>> You know, we could just not we uh we're

already building GeForce Now. Yes,

>> we already are going to have, you know,

RTX Spark.

>> We'll just sell the shovel that is

GeForce Now to some other company or

whatever else."

>> Yeah. But I just I just I don't think I

would I don't think I could see anyone

other than them pulling it off doing it

justice.

>> Could you see Sony buying them just for

the studios? No.

>> And the expertise or anything?

>> No. If anything, I mean, Sony [snorts]

has been pairing down their their

development teams as well right now. I

don't think they're in a I don't think

they're in a big acquisition move. I

mean, what was that what was that

catastrophic

>> I agree. Yeah, just poking

>> um game that they that they launched for

like a few days and they spent like

hundreds of millions of dollars

developing.

>> Yeah, that's the one.

>> Concord. You're talking about Concord.

>> Yeah,

>> Sony's been very frustrating because

they had such a strong they were the

like strong single player game platform.

And honestly, I think that's why they

won a bunch of generations in a row. And

then they seem to have just gotten so

>> so enamored with live service hardons

for the whole live service idea.

>> Live service

>> and it's like it's not

>> live service games. It seems to be like

just

>> trying to brute force with single

player.

>> I almost feel like you'd be better off

just trying to brute force win the

lottery than try to win in the live

service game.

>> And if you win, it's massive. Yeah, if

you win, it's massive. But you probably

won't

>> go the lottery. [laughter]

>> Well, yeah, it really does seem like

>> that's an interesting comparison.

>> You could save yourself if if Sony had

spent apparently according to my AI

overview here, Sony was estimated to

have spent $400 million to develop

Concord. If Sony had bought $400 million

in Lotto Max tickets,

>> I mean, they would have done better. the

wor they literally would have done

better

>> because they at least wouldn't have lost

the money that they spent.

>> They would have won the small prizes.

>> They Yeah, they wouldn't have lost the

money that they spent running the

servers for it then. At least they would

have just

>> just put the money in an incinerator.

That's the worst case scenario with the

lotto. You can't

>> Don't you win little things?

>> Yeah, probably.

>> I don't I literally I don't think I've

ever played a traditional

>> So, it depends how many numbers you get.

I think I I haven't I have no

familiarity beyond how 649 worked when I

was a kid. So, take that for what it is.

But yeah, no, if even if they bought

like scratchers, they might have at

least gotten, you know, 150 million

here. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

>> Cuz a cuz a lot of like the the odds a

lot of the time are actually like

mandated. like they could have gone to

the casino

and just put it in the slot machine,

>> which is unfortunately supern normal

these days,

>> and gotten more money out of it than

developing Concord.

>> Yeah.

>> I mean, obviously hindsight's 2020,

though. Like, I, you know, I'm not

saying that I would have been a Sony

exec and I would have been sitting

around the boardroom table pitching, why

don't we play slot machines?

Like, obviously, yeah, they had to try

something. But

>> I feel like you do that if you're trying

to just completely trash on somebody's

idea. That's the only cuz cuz you're

basically saying instead of deleting 400

million, why don't we delete 250 million

or whatever.

>> Um, yeah. And I'm sure they didn't

intend to spend million.

>> So like it's there's there's no like

super serious way to actually [snorts]

>> project that idea. Um.

>> Oh, sure. Sure.

>> Hit us, Dan.

>> Yeah, Cody sent this comment. I have to

read it to you. If Nvidia bought Xbox,

they would rename it to RTXbox.

[laughter]

>> Thank you, Cody. That was actually worth

waiting for.

>> That was pretty good.

>> Good job. [laughter]

>> Xbox.

>> Nice. [snorts]

>> Oh, man.

>> Where were we?

>> I I we kind of skipped a question. You

asked me um would it be better to just

not hire in a in a Valve way or over

hire in a Microsoft way?

>> I'm just asking I'm just asking

questions. I'm just asking questions. My

my default route would be to prefer to

go the Valve way, but I have to admit

>> it's not a terrible point, is it? There

is no not only is it not a terrible

point the points that you made earlier

but also

is it noble to have tried to create a

job

and have succeeded for some amount of

time and then eventually fail or is it

more noble to have never created the job

in the first place but not have fired

someone

>> like tell me this okay let's say

>> kind of tough

>> let's say

>> I think there is a I think the true

answer is that there's a middle ground I

think Microsoft went way too hard We

knew that the whole time. We were

calling it out the entire time as people

were as they were buying up too many

studios and doing all this crazy stuff.

And I think we've been chirping Valve

for forever for being understaffed. I

think there's a middle ground. But

>> but let's let's bring it closer to home.

Like if if Linus Media Group, if

Umbrella Corporation were to say, "Look,

something isn't working." Is it is it

better for those people to have been

paid for two or three or five or 10

years or however long it is and gain a

bunch of experience that presumably they

take with them somewhere else or is it

better for me to have just taken all

that money and put it in a dragon pile

during that time? Like I think that's

the question.

>> Yeah.

>> And I don't know the answer.

>> I think in some cases it's tough and I

think for certain people they're going

to see it different ways.

>> Well, yeah. I mean everything's

everything's easy to pontificate about

philosophize about

>> until it's until it's your job.

>> Yeah.

>> Until it's until it's your art, right?

Like that's the thing you got to

remember especially like games industry,

content creation industry. This isn't

just for a lot of the people who work

here or who work at a game studio. This

is not just a job.

Like they're creating something. They

put a little bit of their soul in

everything they create.

>> Yeah. And that's it's really cool.

>> And there's some there's some there's

there's different types of pain on both

ends of the duration spectrum. Like if

somebody just got hired and then that

happened, there's a there's a certain

type of pain because they just left what

might have been a fairly stable job

>> or disrupted their life

>> or moved or something like that. Yeah.

Um, and then there's the other one where

like someone might be, you know,

uh, lifer level career dedicated to a

certain place and then that gets bumped

because when stuff like this happens,

>> the layoffs are rarely clean.

>> Like when Microsoft is announcing, hey,

we did 1,600 layoffs today and we're

going to be doing 1,600 more by the end

of the year. There's no way

>> stress that creates.

>> There's for one. Yeah. And there's no

way that that was clean. there's nowhere

that like of course there's going to be

people that maybe shouldn't be there for

a variety of reasons and

>> at that volume there's no way that you

perfectly cut all of those. You know,

you're going to get some people that is

a really bad loss for your company and

you just didn't necessarily realize it

when it was happening. Um, and that's

going to burn them. And also, it's

interesting that they pointed out in

here like, okay, Obsidian lost 90 people

and now they're at the team size that

they were at when they released Doom

2016.

>> No, sorry. You mean ID?

>> What did I say?

>> You said Obsidian and Doom. So, I assume

>> I don't know why I said Obsidian. I

meant ID. Uh, I think I read that but

meant the other one cuz I was trying to

find it in the notes, but yeah, ID. So,

the same size when they released Doom

2016, but are are they at the same

energy?

And I can pretty much guarantee you no

because Doom 2016 coming out

was kind of massive. I don't know

necessarily how well the game sold, but

that was a refresh of Doom. It was

received super super well and the like

engine was

>> mindblowing. That was Vulcan. That was

like the the beginning of the change.

Like that was a that was a huge deal. A

lot of people were talking about it.

There's a lot of energy. There's a lot

of positive momentum. There was a lot of

potential energy.

And then when you get half your

workforce laid off and they're like,

"Well, you're back the size you were

when you released that

>> chop real good game. Keep going."

>> And you have all these extra years of

experience, so surely you're much better

at doing whatever it is that you do.

>> Yeah. Your potential energy is going to

be real low probably, I assume.

So it's it's it's these situations are

tough. [sighs]

Ah, I I I

>> ugly man.

>> I don't envy

anyone involved.

>> No,

>> I and and to be clear, I'm sure there

are absolute complete sociopaths at

Microsoft involved in these decisions

who don't care about the impact they're

having. But I also genuinely believe in

my heart of hearts that there are people

for whom these decisions are are like

agonizingly difficult. And then on the

other side for the people who are losing

their jobs, I'm sure there are people

who were not really that engaged who

were looking elsewhere already. And on

the other end of the spectrum, I'm sure

there were people for whom working at

this company was their life.

>> Their identity and they

>> What do you do? I work for Microsoft.

>> Yeah.

Yeah.

>> I work at Xbox.

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah. Yeah. It's tough. And like I don't

know, we've talked about on this show. I

I was told after we talked about Xbox a

little while ago that Halo Infinite cost

$800 million to make. Like something was

going to break here. It's been

apparently they've been basically

looting Minecraft

uh and and a couple other things, but

mostly Minecraft for like years to make

all these other things and it just it

hasn't been working out. There there's

been a lot of duds along the way.

There's been great games along the way

as well. Um

>> but I mean we talked about this

yesterday. I I was or yesterday we

talked about this last time on WAN show

where like I was coming in ready to go

guns blazing. How could you possibly do

anything that harms double fine? And

then we were looking at their games and

we're like wait I'm sorry this is your

big game of the year pottery fighting

each other that had like a peak

concurrent player count of like less

than a couple thousand players or

something like that. Like oh my god no

wonder this isn't working.

>> Yeah. There's a qu discussion question

again from David. I really like the

questions he came up with this time. Um

um other than Forsa Horizon 6, when was

the last system selling Xbox game in

your opinion?

>> Forsa Horizon 5

>> and not everybody's into racing games. I

don't give two [ __ ] about them.

>> I really like Fors Horizon 6. I would

not buy a console for it. It's not It's

not a console selling game to me. It's a

lot of people. It's a Oh, I I agree.

>> For me, it's still a fantastic add-on.

>> If I'm buying that console, I'm going to

get Forsa Horizon 6. Sure.

>> But it's not quite a console selling

game for me.

>> A good Halo.

>> That's the thing, man. If they release

one good Halo, we're back, baby. I'm not

even kidding. I'm not even like I can't

I can't even stress that enough. one

good Halo game,

everybody will come back. I I like I it

would happen.

>> You know what a funny thing is to me,

and I'm I'm going to completely derail

this, but like why does it have to be

Halo?

>> Okay, there's there's so many great

>> something special about Halo.

>> There's there's so many great

intellectual properties out there. Like

how is it that Microsoft doesn't just go

to Terry Brooks and be like, "Okay,

we're going to do Shinara."

>> Like,

>> it's it's like it's like a fantasy

novel.

15 20 novels or something like that.

Bestselling for like decades. Like there

there's IPs out there. You're Microsoft.

You have

>> Oh, I've seen this.

>> Enough money to buy The Earth and all

the heavens. Um, apparently there was a

Shinhara game back in the day. Okay. I

had no idea. Uh, and Raikenclaw says,

"Kids don't know those novels." Yeah,

kids didn't know Halo either. It doesn't

matter. The point is there's amazing

there's like there's like an entire

small home library worth of lore to mine

here,

license it, and make a great new IP.

Like why is it that we can only do like

weird stuff like Kilm fighter that no

one cares about?

>> That's double fine. Double fine. That's

true. This is true. This is fair enough.

>> But still or or remake remake another

remake something.

>> I think I mean I think they I think they

could. I'm just saying

>> if if you if you want to knock it out of

the freaking park, it's got to be Halo.

If you want to do well, maybe Shinara or

something like that. But if it's a new

IP, I think it's going to be tough.

>> But you can't have, and you're probably

right about like what the first one

needs to be, but they also have to just

in the holster. They're going to have to

have a lineup of new IPs.

>> I think so. You got to blow it out of

the park with Halo and then you got to

follow it up, which is which is another

problem that they have to be completely

honest. But I'm I'm I'm looking this up.

Somebody in chat said the last good Halo

game was released by Bungie. So I wanted

to go verify it. The last Halo game that

Bungie released was Halo Reach. So, that

person is just completely correct.

[laughter]

So, we've talked about this on the show

a bunch of times. One of my massive pet

peeve things that has happened to a

bunch of my favorite IPs,

>> Star Wars and Halo being two of them, is

you get people that come in and they

hire a team based around the idea of

hiring people that hate the thing that

they're building. This happened with

Halo. You can go find it. Um, they hired

people to work on Halo who hated Halo.

Uh, this happened with Star Wars. You

can go and find it. They hired people to

work on Star Wars that hated Star Wars.

This can't be a thing. You can find

people and the reason why they did it

for both is cuz they wanted to like

renew it and bring some new ideas and

stuff like that

>> and and make it appeal to a broader

audience.

>> Sure.

>> That's the key.

>> Halo appealed to everyone.

>> Enough people.

>> Uh, it would have been fine. Star Wars

also appealed to an incredible amount of

people. Um, I don't think that was

needed for either. Ship Management Sim

Pillar of Autumn.

>> Come on, you play it. There's [laughter]

so many genres that would be perfect.

>> I probably would.

>> Yeah, you would. Hell yeah, you would.

>> I like FTL style game, but a halo would

be sick.

>> And you're in charge of the Pillar of

Autumn and you got to defend it from

>> That would be so attack.

Oh my god. a like more highly produced

FTL with more story involved and it's

you getting the Pillar of Autumn out of

this like horrible scenario. I would

play the hell out of that.

>> Smaller teams like there's so many

companies that ship out there like Star

Wars um the new the new Gal Galactic

Racers or whatever it's called that's

coming out is done by the burnout team.

It's not done by

>> Yeah.

>> Like just do something fun.

>> Okay. Yeah. But like I don't know. I

think 343 is going to need

some type of a a staffing refresh.

Sorry.

>> Oh, actually, yeah. Galactic Racer is

coming really soon.

>> That game looks so cool. October.

>> I'm stoked.

>> Oh my god.

>> So stoked. Especially with the Pedigree.

>> It It does look legitimately

>> so sad. Insanely cool.

>> And this is what they could do with the

Halo franchise. It just be like, you

know, oh, you're a studio and you make

really good ship management sims. Here's

our IP. Go and do something cool with

that.

>> Yeah. How about we both win? You know,

create win.

>> So dope.

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah.

>> And the Berno people being behind this

is like a perfect fit.

>> Oh, yeah.

>> So cool.

>> Oh, that looks awesome.

>> Just give your IP to different studios

this year.

>> Do not preurchase it.

>> Don't pre- purchase anything ever.

>> But even even like, okay, even that

being said, and I completely agree with

Dan, to be honest. I I think you can do

sidebar things. There's been a ton of

examples lately. Mecha Chameleon is a

great version of it where small fun

games with your friends can sell like

gang busters. Do that kind of stuff with

these IPs and in these universes, but

keep them small games and keep them

cheap. Um, and have them be group games

that you can play with friends and I

think it would I think it would go

pretty well.

>> It's hard. Um,

like it it's it's it's hard to do

because people who uh succeed at doing

something expect raises.

>> Yeah,

>> you can't just keep things cheap. You

you could what you could do is you could

just lay off all the people who now are

paid more and hire new fresh people who

are cheap and you could keep costs down

that way, but I guarantee you nobody

would like you for it. Is that is that

your employment track into the mainline

game developer pool though?

>> I mean, yeah, possibly. But then you I

think you just you eventually end up

with that pool being too big and then

you end up with Concord because what are

they going to work on now?

>> Yeah.

>> All right, we should probably Yeah. Uh

Andre

528 says, "Wait, is this still just the

first topic?" Do we do we want to talk

about uh Assassin's Creed now? It

shouldn't be too long.

>> All right. Oh, yeah. Oh, really? Luke is

gonna talk about an Assassin's Creed

game. It won't be too long.

>> Buckles in. Do you [laughter] want some

more? Do you want some more water?

Maybe.

>> Uh, okay. So,

>> we're going to be here for hours.

>> We could be, but I'll try. Um, okay. So,

first thing that's interesting to me is

the reviews. I see mostly positive here.

I don't remember how to break it out.

>> See? Yeah. Can I see?

>> You can do by language on the left

there.

>> Boom. Mostly negative under simplified

Chinese.

>> Oh, interesting. Yeah, but don't they

like review bomb stuff if it has a bad

translation, which makes sense.

>> I think they do that, but apparently uh

I thought most of Okay, so I I I do

think that's a bit of a thing. And I

mean,

>> yeah, fair.

>> That's fair.

>> Yeah,

>> it is language broken out reviews.

>> Yeah. And if the translation sucks, then

sure. But what I've read online is that

this isn't actually necessarily because

the translation sucks. Yeah. What I've

read is that it's because of things like

the microtransactions and stuff like

that, which I think is kind of funny.

>> Wait, sorry. What? So, Chinese gamers

don't like microtransactions? Am I

missing something here? Isn't that the

land what brinen Impact? [laughter]

>> Uh, it's the land what br

mechanics. Um, but it's it's it's

interesting to me because

I don't know if my memor is perfect on

this. I looked in the microtransaction

store, so I saw everyone was pissed

about it.

>> Um, and

>> horse armor, right?

>> It seemed like the things that you could

buy to me were effectively the same

things that you could buy last time.

So, just like last time, it just won't,

right?

>> And it's fine,

>> right?

Okay. So, it didn't really bother me

about that. I mean, I don't like it. In

every single Assassin's Creed game for a

long time, there's been some type of

really annoying mechanic and you could

just have it not be annoying for the low

low price of whatever they're charging

for the thing. Like, you can get free

treasure maps or you can get free like

resources for your ship or whatever

else. Got it.

>> Um, but I just whatever. I'm not going

to do that. Um,

and other than that it's fine. I I I saw

some people pointing out like the

graphics aren't that great. To be

honest, for the price of the game and

the fact that it's a re-release,

>> I think the graphics could be a lot

better. I think the movement is clunkier

than I remember and I remember the

movement being clunky. To be clear,

>> I don't think I'm actually looking at it

with rose tinted goggles. They also

redid the combat because the

>> wasn't the combat what everyone liked?

the the ship combat was what I really

liked. Um I don't know I haven't

actually unlocked the ship yet cuz I

haven't played a ton. I think I played

for like an hour.

>> Um

>> the but the the like groundbased

fighting combat to be kind of in between

I would say the new games which are more

like RPG like combat and the old games

which

>> the old games were

kind of weird. The combat was a little

broken. You could just like perma a

counter and then you just sort of win.

So it could be like a circle of people

around you and you're still going to win

the fight, which is like a little

absurd, right? But the new games have

the same kind of problem, but it's

because it's an RPG and you're just like

spamming abilities. Like in the new in

the not the newest in the newest one

I've played, which is like three old at

this point. Um because I decided that I

was going to do every quest in the game

before I finished it. And now I'm like

over 100 hours in and I'm not even

close. So I'm just never going to play

another Assassin's Creed game as far as

I can tell. I play it like twice a year

at this point. [laughter] I'm just still

stuck.

Uh anyways, I you you like my character

has armor on it that makes people take

more fire damage and I have an ability

that lights my weapon on fire and then

I'll just light people on like this has

this is not Assassin's Creed anymore,

>> right?

>> At all. The new games are just so far

gone. But anyways, um this one is is a

totally different combat style.

>> Assassin. Shouldn't you not be on fire?

>> No, I have a Warhammer,

>> right? And I ride a horse into combat,

>> right? [laughter]

>> Like an assassin does.

>> Totally. Yeah. Um it's it's Yeah, it's

honestly going back and so I I I the

like first island you end up on, which

is the tutorial where you're kind of

running around. I for some reason cuz

I'm weird, I used to try to speedrun

that first tutorial island

>> and without thinking I was just like 3/4

through it and I had done like full

sprint. I remembered every single path

and stuff and there was a nostalgia like

oh yeah I'm kind of like home again. I

haven't played this game forever. I used

to play this game all the time.

>> Um and then the same kind of things war

on me which is that game until you get

your ship sucks

>> and I don't have my ship yet. So it's

just kind of like okay just wait wasting

time until I get the only good part of

this game. And then I'm sitting there

playing the game but my brain is too

busy working on like why is Ubisoft so

stupid? How did they release this game

which the only good part was the ships

and then they never released another

they didn't release like a ship game.

They have other Assassin's Creed games

that had ships in it but they didn't

understand that it wasn't the fact that

it was Assassin's Creed and ships. It

was just the fact that it was just

ships. And then they finally announced

Skull and Bones and everyone's like,

"Oh, wow. You're finally doing the most

obvious thing in the world.

>> Quadruple A.

>> Great." and then they spend a billion

years working on it and they change the

idea so many freaking times and they

call it quadruple A and then it blows

and then they sell it for like $3 and no

one plays it anyways and it's just like

what is wrong with you guys? And I think

that's what a lot of the reviews are on

the game is just like

[sighs]

okay you got me right I bought this

nostalgia game for 80 Canadian.

>> Did you really spend that much? It cost

that much? It it costs 80 Canadian. I

don't think I spent that much on it. I

think there's been currency changes and

stuff since then.

>> Um but these are the these are the

prices.

>> And then on launch.

>> Yeah,

>> they did this

which is like I think someone told it up

there it was like $85

worth of DLC. But to be clear, you don't

need any of it. Just ignore it.

Whatever.

>> Right. Uh, and then people were also

annoyed that like when you launch the

game, you can flip through the menu and

see the other Assassin's Creed games in

a timeline and like launch them from

there because they're really trying to

get you onto the new Assassin's Creed

games. Like that doesn't really bother

me. It takes 4 seconds to skip past it,

whatever. There's things that are

annoying and there's things that I I

don't ne I think people are overblown

on, but ultimately I just keep come

coming back to like um

I am not surprised

by this.

[snorts]

Makes complete sense to me.

>> Wow. They're close. They're like almost

a penny stock.

>> They're almost gone. And it's like,

yeah, it makes sense. You've pissed away

like almost every title you have.

>> Wow. That's kind of wild actually.

>> And it was incredibly unnecessary.

>> Yeah. It's amazing how much Expedition

33 felt like what an Ubisoft

>> or Squaresoft game from their heydays

should have been.

>> Yep.

>> Um, hey, just for fun, how many people

do you think are playing Skull and Bones

right now?

16.

>> Actually, no. Quite a bit better than

that. Okay.

>> 325.

>> Oh, wow. That's actually like genuinely

a lot better than I would have thought.

>> Yeah. 325. Good job, Ubisoft. How much

did they spend making that? Hundreds of

millions.

>> So much money. And like I I I just have

to come back to again.

Okay. When was when was Skull and Bones

announced?

>> Oh man. A thousand years ago.

Apparently, I've searched this before on

this laptop. Nice. Uh, officially

announced in 2017.

Um,

for context, there's 6,000 people almost

playing Expedition 33 right now.

>> Yeah. And Skull and Bones is

multiplayer.

>> Yikes.

>> Yeah.

>> Oh, yikes.

>> So, you you would expect a longer tale

in a multiplayer game. Um, so it was

announced in 2017, released in 2024,

pivoted on like a million times. Yeah.

>> I I I just I keep coming back to like

>> this is kind of similar to the Halo

thing.

>> Yeah.

>> We're like, man, they own they own

Splinter Cell.

>> When's the last Splinter Cell game

that's come out?

>> I actually don't know.

Uh,

the last full standalone game according

to AI is Splintercell Blacklist from

August 2013.

>> Bro,

what's going on, man? There's like no

good single player FPS games. One

released

007 and everybody's like, "Wow,

>> let's all play this." All right, we

should move on. I think this is still

our first topic. Is Dan even there

anymore?

>> I don't think so.

>> And he's gone.

>> I think he abandoned us.

>> Nice. Okay. What do you want to jump

into?

>> Hannah Montana.

>> Really?

>> Let's come up for air. Hannah Montana

Linux gets modern remaster after nearly

two decades, almost as long as it's been

since uh Ubisoft released a good game.

Uh it's called Sweet Nibs and its new

version, version 26, is built on Debbian

with a reskin of KDE Plasma. Developer

and YouTuber Noah Kaggle has released

this version, a modern remaster of the

infamous 2009 meme dro that was

abandoned and almost immediately after

release. Uh there's a bunch of stats

about it which no one's going to care

about.

>> Hot pink Hannah Montana branding. Very

nice.

>> That hot pink bank hot pink Hannah

Montana branding can be yours if you are

using KDE Plasma 6. Um

where is it? the original in 2009

legendary Linux meme, but yeah, it's a

skin for KDE. So, you don't actually

have to get the probably best DRO that

there is, Hannah Montana Linux. Um, if

you want your system to be pink,

>> pretty terminal.

>> Um,

yeah,

you could grab the background and you

could skin your KD and you'd be fine.

>> Uh, okay. Amazing New Worlds.

>> Thank you. Uh,

>> you should do an I switched.

>> Do we not even know who the original

developer of Hannah Montana Linux was?

>> I don't think so. I think it was

anonymous.

>> That is That's pretty wild. You can

still download it, by the way, but it

would be we we actually did a video a

little while ago um trying out random

weird Linux distros and Hannah Montana

Linux was one of them. And I don't think

we were even able to get it working

without using a VM or something like

that. Like I I think it required a

workound. Don't quote me on that. I know

I know some of them did. More usable

than Temple OS. I'll give it that.

Okay. Well, thank you for that. Um why

don't I pick something?

>> Yeah.

>> Did you know this? This blew my mind.

Did you know that you can play HalfLife

2 at over a 100 frames per second?

>> Yes.

>> In your browser?

>> Wow.

I'm going to do it right now.

>> Okay. Yeah, that's actually sick.

>> Developersh

uh reportedly a high school student and

98006

have

>> I think sure have released a fully

playable browser port of HalfLife 2

after about 3 months of work. The game

runs natively in your browser using Web

Assembly to run the engine code and

WebGL2 to talk directly to your GPU. You

It saves files live in your browser

storage. And the full developer console

works for cheats. It reportedly can hit

over 100 FPS maxed out even on

integrated graphics, which I have

considerably better than right here

thanks to our laptop partner Razer.

Um, the site serves the entire game for

free with no proof of ownership check

and the port is built on leaked source

engine code. So, there is no sign

whatsoever that Valve has authorized any

of this. Uh, Valve has historically been

pretty chill about fan projects. But,

this one leans a little closer to fullon

piracy/taking

of their IP, which as we remember from

Dbrand's companion cube adventure. Um,

Valve don't take kindly to known bugs

include characters rendering with empty

eye sockets since the facial animation

system had to be disabled entirely to

keep the port stable. Uh, I and I'm

going to give it a shot.

So, I've got my got my gaming mouse in

my backpack here.

>> Specifically a gaming mouse for gamers.

>> Yeah, for gamers. It's like a Yeah. No,

it's okay.

>> Yeah, it's a Super Strike X. It's

definitely for gamers.

>> All right. How do you like it? Um, I

haven't actually used it for gaming

much. This will be the first time I've

actually gamed on it.

>> That sounds very Linus.

>> I've just been using it as my mouse.

>> That sounds very Linus.

>> Yeah, for like work.

>> Inviting this guy to play video games

for months, dude.

>> Yeah, you never messaged me. That is so

not even true. When's the last time you

messaged me to play games?

>> I talked to you about it literally last

week.

>> When did you message me to play games?

>> All right, I'll do that then.

>> Yeah, that's what I thought.

>> I'll do that then.

>> Next time. Think before you talk [ __ ]

[laughter]

I don't remember where that line is

from. That's a line, though. It's not

That's not how I talk to him.

>> I can't believe you've done this.

>> I can't believe you've done this.

[laughter]

>> Uh, okay. Okay. So, here we go. Um, web

Halflife 2. Okay. Oh, wow. You can even

you can play episode one and episode

two. Uh, where's episode three? Hold on.

Let me try and scroll here. Haha, I'm

just kidding. Okay. Downloading map

background 01. Uh, full screen,

obviously.

I don't know how long this is going to

take.

>> It takes a wee bit. It'll It will I I

did it on mine already.

>> Oh, you did. Oh, okay. Cool.

>> Yeah.

>> Sick.

>> Oh, I didn't full screen mine.

>> Here we go.

>> Yeah. No, that's fine.

>> You're good. You're good.

>> Yeah. New game. Okay. Uh, can I go to a

different chapter? Uh, evidently no. I

don't remember how this interface works.

So, sure. Start new game. Let's go. Or

wait. Oh, shoot. I should have checked

the options. Get more resolution.

>> Time to be stuck for a while, I think.

>> Okay, cool.

>> Oh,

never mind.

>> Okay, while we get through maybe like

some cutsceny stuff. Uh, what should we

do? A quick top. Oh. Oh, a CW

announcement and then explain and do two

coms. Um, my screen is covered.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I got it.

>> Cool.

>> End of season. an end of season apparel

sale.

>> Oh yeah, we've got lots of good stuff in

here.