115 · GOLGO 13: TOP SECRET EPISODE

• ONLY YOU CAN HELP HIM SAVE THE WORLD
• Introductions
  • See what I was saying Sean about the back of boxes being more demanding than Galaga’s weak IT’S ONLY A VIDEO GAME.
• Overview
  • based on the popular manga (That no one in the US probably read at the time), the player takes on the role of Golgo 13 (also known as Duke Togo), an assassin whose objective is to destroy the leader of the Drek group.
  • Golgo 13 is like the 007 codename
    • The name "Golgo 13" is a reference to the death of Jesus Christ. Golgo is short for Golgotha, the place of Jesus' crucifixion, while the number 13 is considered an unlucky number.[4] Also, Golgo 13's logo is a skeleton wearing a crown of thorns.
  • The game contains both side-scrolling Action elements and first-person shooter segments. A large portion of the game involves First Person Mazes that you must navigate through.
• Gameplay
  • Great intro!
    • Love the bullet at the start
    • Feels very cinematic
  • Side-Scrolling Action first
    • Very jank
      • Enemies who crouch are untouchable. Need to perfectly dodge all of their bullets before they shoot.
      • Bare-bones
        • One enemy at a time
        • Little interaction
        • The guys who give you “clues” are identical to the bad guys?
        • The only reward of these level layouts is because the levels are so long when you actually travel to a new country it feels nice to see that scenery.
      • What’s going on with the motorcycle enemies?
      • Cutscenes don’t really enhance the gameplay
  • FPS portion?
    • Weird intro to start. Feels like you’ve died
    • Tough using the D-Pad to lock onto enemy helicopters
    • Would’ve been the perfect Zapper Companion
  • Act 2 - SHMUP time
    • Again everything is very bare
      • It gives you enough time to deal with each enemy so you don’t have to fight others at once
    • But when enemies do come on, they are lightning fast for the most part and hard to tackle
    • At the end of Act 2 SHMUP you’re given a choice to Approach, Close Up, or Snipe the enemy. Pretty cool that they mean something
  • Cutscenes
    • Very advanced (great spritework, dialogue box, prompts player for next box)
    • The waves crashing in the ocean sound at the beginning of the game
    • There’s a cutscene in Act 2 that implies sex and even refills your health.
  • Act 3 - Scuba time
    • Still jank but more interesting than anything else so far.
      • Multiple enemies.
      • Different layouts of the ocean floor.
      • Caves to explore
      • But it feels like you’re going nowhere and easy to get lost
  • Act 3 - Mazes
    • Where the heck did this come from?
    • Usually by this time we have seen most of what a game has to offer, but now we’re being given an entirely new First Person maze compound ala Goonies II that requires a lot of guesswork and using grenades to blow up walls
  • Act 4 - The game goes camp
    • You traveled to Greece. Killed a bunch of people near the Parthenon
    • AND NOW, at The Theatre of Dionysus you kill an armed woman and several men with rocket launchers
    • I know its the theatre because it forces you to know this when you walk by these things. You’ll be in the middle of fighting enemies and it will pop up REMAINS OF POSEIDON
  • That loop continues for about another solid 2-3 hours
    • The end continues the camp. A giant robot is behind it all and you have to do a giant FPS section taking down all of his parts
    • The credits give fake actor names to everyone
    • The credits give Special Thanks to The Children and The Lost Generation
  • Joe is this your moment for the greatest Pause of all time?
    • I thought I reset the game
• Spinoffs
  • The Golgo 13 manga first came out
  • The Mafat Conspiracy
    • Sequel that comes to the NES in 1990
  • A live action film came out in 1973 and 1977
  • And two anime films exist
    • The Professional (‘83)
    • Queen Bee (‘98)
• EGL
  • Paper
  • Dialogue
  • I didn’t really like any of it

Auto-generated transcript. Each paragraph starts with its timestamp. Speakers are not identified.

00:00 Golgo 13, top secret episode. Only you can help him save the world.

00:21 And welcome to NEStalgia, a chronological exploration of every NES game released in North America. I'm Mike. I'm Sean. And I'm Joe. And you see, Sean, that's exactly what I was talking about last week with the back of the box is that they usually sound so much more dire, okay? Only you can help him save the world is a lot better than it's only a video game. It's true. It's true. And also, the title Golgo 13 is how most people know this game, but it does have the subtitle top secret episode. And for some reason to me, that just screams like DLC.

01:00 Yeah, no, I mean, it took me a while just to get it through my head what this IP is supposed to be. Like, I know that this is based on something, but there really isn't a lot of information about what it was. Yeah, so it's based on the popular manga in Japan. I'm quite certain, definitely in 1988, but probably even now still, not many people knew what Golgo 13 was. And so it's even weirder that they chose to, like, cover this whole thing under the, you know, popular manga thing when no one knew what it was. But Golgo 13, he's actually known as, like, Duke Togo or something like that. And he's an assassin who his objective is to destroy the leader of the Drek group.

01:46 I don't know what the Drek group is. I don't know if they're, like, supposed to be Russians or just, like, bad people in general. Yeah, they're, like, the Spectre. And Golgo 13 is, like, the 007, right? Yeah, well, I think they, it looks like they changed him from an assassin to being a spy in this, right? Like, it was like, he's a hitman in the manga, right? Right. And now he's a spy here because it's, like, the one thing they wanted to change to make it more family friendly. Oh, yeah. Because they still left a lot of other things in.

02:15 And I heard that Golgo 13 is actually, like, a reference to the death of Jesus. Yeah. What you told me, so, okay, we had, like, a group chat going. And I asked, what's the game this week?

02:29 And Mike texted me, Golgotha 13. So I looked that up and I see nothing about a video game. I just see a bunch of, like, Bible study things. And I was totally thrown through a loop. I had to look it up in a separate way.

02:43 And I didn't even realize I texted you that. That's just me feeling guilty about, like, the weight of this video game on our shoulders. And the game is weird to describe, to give, like, an overview of, right? We've never quite had anything that tackled so many different genres and also tried to be, like, cinematic and plot driven all at once. Does anybody want to take a stab at, like, explaining this game? Can I? I'll give it a go. And I'm sure we'll need other people to jump in because there's a lot going on here. And I think the biggest thing about this game is that it's very ambitious. Yeah. So without even talking about the plot at first, there are just, like, there are, like, seven different, like, styles of gameplay in here.

03:25 But, you know, as far as the plot, you're playing as this assassin. And you're actually walking through a side-scrolling level, going into buildings and, like, getting recon, getting information from people about where to go next and who to find. And, you know, it's giving you, like, a very cohesive story to play through. And then it uses these different, you know, it uses, like, a shmup style and an on-rail shooter style as, like, little, like, the apparatus for telling the next part of the story.

03:57 If that makes any sense. Like, it'll say, get to the helicopter to do this. And then suddenly you're in a shmup level. Yeah. So I don't know how cohesive it actually is because the story itself seems to be, like, if you just, if you were watching a movie but you just watched, like, three random scenes, like, throughout it, there seems to be a bacteriological weapon that you have to, that has nothing to do with you. And it sort of sounds like Cassandra G is, like, a T-virus sort of thing. But then it just drops you into Berlin.

04:35 Yeah, Berlin for no reason aside from the fact that, you know, this whole thing happened in New York. I don't really know what's going on, but it's got, yeah. Sorry. What I gathered from that beginning, the helicopter blowing up and the girl saying that, the girl telling you what happened was that it was blown up and, what is it, the CIA that they're calling them? The CIA and the KGB.

04:58 Yeah. The CIA thinks that the only person in the world who would have the accuracy to snipe out the pilot in this helicopter or something is you. Yeah. So you're trying to, like, clear your name? I think beyond all the little, all the little details in this game, it's doing its best to cover all the bases of a Cold War thriller. Yeah, I could see that. And to be honest, like, I admire the ambition in it. I really do. I want this to, I want other games to, like, take this and improve upon it greatly. But, like, take this formula a little bit.

05:36 Yeah, because, I mean, if we're just going even off of the intro, before you ever even start playing or anything like that, I think it's one of the strongest intros we've ever had for an NES game, let alone, like, anything before 3D graphics. Like, it's very, you know, even that helicopter blowing up at the Statue of Liberty is so interesting and, like, makes you wonder, like, what happened and stuff like that. I don't know. I think that the intro to that other globetrotting shooty gun game was pretty good, too. Oh, Freedom Force you're talking about, right? Yeah. Was it Freedom Force? Yeah. Freedom Force was with the Zapper, though. But, yeah, it had a great intro.

06:15 But I don't know. This one feels very cinematic. And even the game throughout has, like, cut scenes, you know, with dialogue boxes and everything like that. So I feel like it's got a lot of parts. And on paper, this sounds like an incredible game. I think the longer you play this game, the easier it, like, plays all of its cards to you. And you kind of realize, like, oh, this sounds awesome, but it doesn't play awesome.

06:42 But I think that that start, even with that cool, like, bullet shot at the beginning and then the Golgo 13, like, title screen with him, with the flashes. I thought that was really stylish. Yeah, it's all got a cool look to it. Yeah. Even that, I think this might be what you're talking about, Mike, but that close-up of his eyes. And then you see, like, I don't know if you see, like, the barrel of the sniper or the barrel. Right, that's exactly right. The scope of the sniper rifle go over his eye. That's exactly what I'm talking about. And it looks really anime to me. You know, it looks like it's straight out of anime.

07:13 Going off of, like, just the stylish touches, I also did appreciate. It took me a while to recognize what they were trying to get across. But in, like, the first, like, cut scene, I guess, you're in an airport and you just hear these weird, like, whooshing sounds. And I'm like, oh, wait, they're trying to make it sound like airplanes are taking off in the background. And I just thought, like, that's a cool thing to just try out. Yeah, it's more like waves crashing in the ocean. It's like it's so disturbing and, like, overbearing at times. And I'm not sure if it was quite something that just happened at the airport. I felt like I saw it pop up later again when you're in Greece.

07:54 But maybe that was also during the airport and I just forget. Because you've got to go to the airport all over the place no matter where you travel to. But, yeah, I think even the sprite work in general for the cut scenes was more than I anticipated the NES being able to handle. Because you can only put so many different types of, like, color palettes and designs on screen at once. And it didn't feel like anything was empty or barren during the cut scenes. It even prompts the players for the next dialogue box and stuff like that. So there was no auto scroll or anything. There was animated mouth movements.

08:34 And I also like the touch where, like, you have to choose to look behind you in order to talk to somebody. Everybody just pops up behind you. Yeah, I feel like that was just, like, a way to give you a reason to, like, show their little, like, five frames of animation. Which looked pretty nice on the NES of your character turning around.

08:59 But it was like, oh, we got to make sure we put that in there. So, like, every time you have to, like, start facing the camera and then choose to turn around to talk to the person. I think the only strange choice in terms of, like, style is when you switch between different types of levels. Because that's just white text on black. And it just feels like a miss. You know, like, they could have added. Even Act 2 or Act 3, whenever it says that. It's just the text. And it feels like it could have been a chance for, like, a big reveal of the next location. Or, like, fancy sprite work of a helicopter. Like, we could have had things there.

09:36 Yeah. Yeah, even, like, in the same style that they have that he's in the hotel looking around. You can have him, like, submerging in scuba gear underwater for, like, a couple of frames or something. Assuming that there's room to do that in this game. There's also that cutscene in the hotel, though, like, somewhere in Act 2 that totally implies that he had sex with that woman. Yeah, I figured we would get to that. But, yeah, it seems like a couple of things have gotten past the radar here.

10:06 There's some blood. Yeah, they even, like, okay, so you meet up with your contact or whoever it is. Maybe it's Cherry, one of the few named characters in the game. And she's like, I'm so happy you're here. And then it cuts to being outside of the building. And then you see a few pixels that are assumed to be you two. So they've come together. And then the window darkens. And then your life points go up very slowly.

10:44 And then it's the next day. So it's pretty obvious what happened there. Yeah, I do think it's funny, too, that, like, oh, man, like, look at this, like, this dirty imagery. And it's, like, three pixels and three pixels, like, moving towards each other. But it's just like, you're like, oh, I know what's going on here. And I thought I did know what was going on. You know, I didn't think it was that bad, the sprite work.

11:05 You know, I granted, like, they chose to make the scope of the hotel gigantic. Tentic, but, like, I could tell that those were two people. No, I'm not saying that you couldn't tell. I'm just saying it was funny that, like, oh, this is, like, the dirty part. It's raunchy. And it's just, like, it's literally just, like, it is just, like, you could tell they're supposed to be humans. Six raunchy pixels. Tiniest pixels.

12:00 All right. So moving away from the style, though, for a minute, I have to talk about my own experience of being so jazzed about this game from the start. And then immediately upon, like, starting gameplay, this is a very jank game. And I was not impressed at all from the moment I started playing. I don't know if you guys felt the same. No, I agree. The horizontal action part of the game, which is basically just a basic side-scrolling shooter slash beat-em-up,

12:33 is it goes back to all the old mistakes that these games were making with weird jump mechanics and funky hitboxes. And basically, like, you can't choose where you shoot. So all these guys are pretty much invulnerable to you unless you get them at, like, the exact moment that you need to. It's just not a fun experience. Yeah. The weirdest thing to me is that the weirdest decision to me is that you can duck. Yeah. I don't know what you had ever used the duck for because while you're ducking, you can't shoot.

13:09 And then to go along with that, almost all of your enemies duck or are too short to shoot unless you're ducking. So you just can't shoot half of them until they jump or stand up, which is, like, most of the side-scrolling levels. And for a game that grounds itself in some form of realism, referencing the CIA and the KGB and, like, these detailed cutscenes, these side-scrolling action levels feel very bare bones. I mean, there's only ever one enemy at a time for the most part.

13:38 When they crouch, they're completely untouchable. So you need to do this leap in the air that is just unbelievably – like, that guy could dunk on any basketball net, the how high he jumps. And you have to perfectly dodge, like, all three of those bullets with timed jumps that you have no control over. And then maybe if they get back up, you can shoot them in the face and they die immediately.

14:01 But there's – other than that, like – and keep in mind that's one enemy at a time. There's very little interaction with anything else that's going on in these stages. I mean, you meet up with some guys who give you clues and those clues are – the clue givers are identical to the look of the bad guys. So how would you know? You have to shoot them and then find out, like, oh, wait, that was a clue giver. The only reward of these level layouts is because these levels are so long, when you actually travel to a new country, it just feels nice to see some new scenery. Yeah, definitely.

14:37 I think that the designs of the levels, like, wow, you do see a lot of Berlin and then a lot of Greece. They are nice, like, in a vacuum. Like, if I weren't exposed to them for so long at a time, I think that it's a pretty good – these are pretty good graphics all around. Yeah, I think that – yeah, the whole game looks pretty good for the most part. And I just want to go back to what you were saying, Mike, about the, you know, the, like, lack of enemies on this screen and everything.

15:08 I think for the side-scrolling stages, I would have been okay with it being, like, a slower thing because it's a spy thing. And, like, just, you know, about testing your reflexes against, like, the first person you see, etc. If, first of all, you could control where you're shooting so you could actually hit these people.

15:25 And the other thing that would have made, I think, the side-scrolling game side part better is the fact that you – in the game, you can – you're going into these buildings and finding new clues, which I thought was kind of cool. Except for the fact that there's absolutely no indication on which buildings you can go into and which you can't. So you have to completely guess where there are paths that you can go into. And there's, like – there's nothing. It could be any step you're on, you might – you can try hitting up to see if you can go into that building. I mean, there are some – there are some markers.

15:54 Like, every – every underground station that you pass, you can go into that. And then there are a couple buildings you can walk into. And, yeah, like, you are sort of pixel hunting for a while. So, but – The underground stations are the only ones that are, like, consistent, though. There are some buildings that look the same as other buildings you can go in that you can't go in. But this is, like, a play space that you're going to be in for a while and you will eventually learn it. Like, I knew which building was the Green Mansion after trying several others and failing.

16:24 So, I mean, I'm not saying that that gives this game a pass. I don't think that's correct. Right. And I might be misremembering, but I think there was at least one time where there was one – it just looked like every other completely random building that I happened to hit up on it and I happened to go inside it. And I was like, well, that's never been the case for any of these other buildings that look like this, which there are a lot of.

16:45 Yeah. So, that was a little bothering – bothersome to me. Yeah. And just describe these level layouts a little bit. They're kind of like where in the world is Carmen Sandiego where, you know, when you first go to these new areas, you have, like, a lot to explore. But as Sean said, you become acquainted with it. So, I definitely understand what you mean when, like, it's rewarding when a clue says go to the Green Mansion and you know where that is. Like, that's kind of – that's cool level processing.

17:14 But at the same time, I think what Joe was getting at was that the first thing you're ever introduced to in this game is the idea of going down into those subways. And those felt very clear as like, oh, every time I come across one of those, I could probably go in those. Like, they were inviting, whereas some of these other places that you have to go to don't necessarily read. It was a problem in Rambo. Remember, that was like a thing where, like, you wouldn't know. But this isn't as bad as Rambo. No, this is nowhere near as bad as Rambo. I do cede that it is an issue in communicating clearly to the player. But, yeah, it's nowhere near as bad as it has been before. And what's going on with those motorcycle enemies?

17:57 Like, what the heck is that about? Yeah, a little out of place, I guess. You ever heard of the motorcycle games of Berlin and Athens? That look exactly the same? Yeah. I just don't get that. It's like, you know, I could understand, like, the slow pace of the one-on-one gun duel that you're having and stuff like that. But then to just have these guys on motorcycles to just outright try to run you over just feels like you're in the wrong game, buddy.

18:23 But some of the clue givers will also just not give you clues and just tell you how unwelcome you are there. So I think that that might be because of the gangs. Yeah, but that's just, you know, Russian culture. They want you to know that you're not welcome there. You're not in Russia.

18:42 Oh, sorry. I said Berlin, so I was thinking Russia for a minute. I'm thinking of the KGB part. Berlin is in Germany. No, I know. That's what I'm saying. I'm saying that I was mixing the KGB with Berlin. Yes, yes. Okay, cool. So we can move on to the FPS portion here because I don't even know if that's the right way to describe it per se. But it felt like this would have been the perfect zapper companion if that helps picture it for anybody at home. It really does look like your gun is drawn out and you have the crosshairs and then you have to like take down, depending on the level, helicopters, tanks, fighter jets.

19:24 I thought this was all cool except for that it's tough to use that D-pad to lock on to enemy helicopters and other objects because they come by kind of in and out of the screen in this weird depth way where they try to like, you know, they get smaller and then they come up big and then they go small. But it happens so quickly that if you're not like prepared for where they might be, you're going to have to take some time to track them down.

19:48 So those are my beefs with this section. Yeah. So there are two different modes in this game that could be sort of described as the first person shooter mode. But he's talking about the pan and zoom mode. And as Joe described earlier, it's sort of closer to an on-rails shooter, but you get to control where you're looking.

20:13 I don't know if Joe has any more to say on that. No. Yeah. I was just going to say it's almost kind of like you are looking through the eyes of your character now and you're just standing on the spot going left and right like in 360 degrees. And then finding like where the enemies are in your peripherals.

20:31 And it is kind of frustrating because you will get hit by things that are not on the screen. Yeah. I noticed that it's particularly with the enemies on the ground. Yeah. Maybe it was just the way I was noticing it, but I definitely felt like I had to get the enemies on the ground first because they're going to shoot me no matter where I'm looking. But I don't remember ever getting shot after I killed all the enemies on the ground by something I wasn't looking at. Yeah. I will say, though, that at least this feels a bit more fair than the side scrolling parts.

21:01 Like if you do hit them, you hit them. And there's no hitboxing that makes it so that they can just crouch and then you miss. Yeah. This section grew on me a little bit. At first, I wasn't crazy about it because it was a little annoying to use that D-pad to control the cursor. But once I kind of got used to it, it was actually a nice way because whenever you hit anything in the game in general, but particularly in these levels, you gain quite a bit of health.

21:32 Yeah. Like in the side scrolling, you might gain like 10 health, but in these levels, you gain like 80 health for everyone you hit. So it was really just like a good way to kind of boost your health back up to the max, which is 200. These sections also start very strange. It almost feels like you've died.

21:51 Yeah. When you're introduced to them, there's like this flash of red that comes across the screen. I think sometimes even a bullet pops up or something like that. I can't remember what the visual cue. It's like the cameraman's hand pops up. And he shoots you. And he has a gun in it. Yeah. He shoots you. And that triggers it. Yeah. Okay. And there's nothing you can do about it. It will happen when it's going to happen. It's like simulating an ambush, but it happens so often.

22:16 Yeah. And if you go back to a spot that it happened to you before, it'll happen again at that same scene. And you do have to backtrack a little bit. So that can get a little annoying where you're like, I kind of already did this and I'm going to walk. You know, as soon as I walk on that pixel, it's going to happen again. Are there any other thoughts on this, what I would have considered a great chance for the zapper to make an appearance in this game?

22:49 Bye.

23:36 If we move on, then it seems like the best thing to talk about next would be the thing that follows afterwards, which is this shmup section of the game. And it's kind of weird to call it that because you're mostly dealing with like one enemy at a time. Like it definitely gives you enough time from when an enemy appears on screens that you don't have to fight others at once. But when enemies do come on, some of them, like the fighter jets are so lightning fast that for the most part, it's hard to tackle them as they come on the screen. And they're most likely going to hit you with their spread. I thought that was weird that not only are they fast, but they have this large spread of like they can shoot six bullets at once.

24:15 And then there's also weird choices too of having certain enemies that aren't necessarily like things that we would find in our world. There was that thing with like the glowing orbs around it. And I thought that was a strange choice. Yeah. So yeah, these segments are sort of like the bookends or like the interstitial moments between

24:41 chapters or like you're going from one place to another. And so they just switch up the gameplay style again. But while you're in there, I think that like as opposed to a lot of the shmups that we played,

24:57 because it's so bare bones, as you said, like you're way more focused on just dodging than you are trying to take anybody down because you move so slowly that all you can really do is just make sure you don't get hit. And do you feel like Golgo 13, he's trying to prove something here by doing this all in a helicopter because he's being accused of shooting down that other helicopter? He's like, no, I would fly one any day. Yeah, he's trying to prove that he's pro-helicopter. It just seems like it's a poor decision on his part. Those things just blew up over by the Statue of Liberty.

25:35 There was a worldwide grounding of helicopters and he needed to prove. That it wasn't him. You're also, I don't know, I can't say for certain whether this happens at the other ones, but at the end of the first time that you do the shmup level, you're given a choice to like either approach or what they've defined as close up or snipe the enemy. And I think that that's pretty cool that, I mean, I only chose to snipe. Wait, that was a choice? I thought those were just controls for when you sniped.

26:07 Oh, okay. I guess I was just pressing along and making it work because it does have the cursor go down. Yeah. Wow. Okay. Yeah. I guess I was doing it the same way as the game. I felt like I was in control. Yeah. Another moment of clip. No, no, no. You're controlling it. Like you, you control the, uh, uh, the scope and then you have to pixel hunt for the shooter. Right, right. So you're saying that approach and close up don't do anything other than snipe?

26:37 I, uh, so I, I think what it was, was like you find like the window or wherever the, the shooter is. Right. And then when you, when you, when you zoom, it just, you're just locked in on, on the head of the target. And then you press the other button. You can't miss. Yeah. You can't move any direction. You're, you, he will just hit his target as soon as you press the button. Okay. Got it. Yeah. So that's just, yeah. Bad, bad clarity on the game's part again. Um, but yeah, that's like another hidden mode, like snipe mode. Like that's not even described. Yeah. It felt, it was another, another weird thing that we haven't seen before. So I, I appreciate those whenever we see them, no matter how poorly they're executed.

27:20 And then next we have the scuba section of the game. Uh, something I wasn't expecting at all. I honestly did not think that they would, could add anything else. And, uh, this is definitely a lot better than, or more interesting, I should say, than anything else that, uh, I was dealing with so far in the game because there's multiple enemies. There's different layouts of the ocean floor. There's these caves to explore. Like you wouldn't think that you can go down into those pits. They look like bottomless pits that you would die if you fell into, but then they expose like a whole nother section of the underwater level that you have to go through those in order to find the secret bases.

27:58 I love that. I love that you call it the ocean floor though, because this is just like, like some river flowing through Berlin that has sharks in it. I kind of, I kind of love that. It just, it seems like because there's nothing else around, like there's no, there's nothing above you. So it seems like you're in the ocean rather than like in some river. Oh, for sure. But like, yeah, every, every visual cue that they're giving you is telling you ocean. Yeah. But like, it's, it's just like that river would probably only be however, however deep. I don't know. It's just another cute thing.

28:32 And it feels like you're going nowhere. So it is kind of easy to get lost if you're tracking around in here. You know, if you're just kind of like shooting down enemies as they come and going in a certain direction, it is possible to go in a circle or in the wrong direction and think you're heading in the right direction. I can't tell if I liked that or not. Yeah. I don't think, I don't think it's really, this game needs a component where you also need to start mapping on graph paper, but sure enough, that's coming up soon. So what were your guys' thoughts on the scuba level?

29:02 I thought it was, I thought it was also like pretty good considering everything. I think it kind of is the same, the same way I feel about all of the other levels where I guess overall, I feel like this game is kind of a jack of all trades, master of none. Like it was, it was a fine underwater level. It didn't, as if it was a standalone underwater game, it would be, it would be very lacking. Yeah. I mean, I just appreciate that it, that its design was a bit more dense than the rest of the modes, but it's so short and it's not like it did dense in terms of like enemy, enemy and mine placement and like how the backgrounds look, but it's still a very simple thing and I wouldn't want to play more scuba.

29:53 Yeah. And I did like also that they brought back the, the little on rail shooter section. Like you could just be swimming along and there's a little explosion and suddenly now you're in like an underwater on rails thing shooting at like, what are these like submarines and scuba divers instead of helicopters and. I believe they use for them is the frogmen core. Oh yeah. Yeah. Okay. Of course. Just so you know. Are the frogmen part of the Drek army?

30:26 Yeah. They appear from the rear firing underwater spear guns. Got it. Okay. You know, I would say though, as we're working through all these modes, it's really cool that all these things are popping up, but also like thematically, it's pretty impressive. The idea that you went from like doing some investigative research in Berlin to then like, okay, cool. I get involved in a shootout with some helicopters to then finding out what you have to do next, meeting up with a girl in a hotel room, then boarding a helicopter and, and taking down enemy fighter jets and stuff like that. Sniping a guy going underwater to scuba dive to find a secret base. Like it's all cool stuff. It just sucks that it's not good.

31:11 Yeah. Although, yeah, I agree though. It feels like it's like a James Bond movie. Like you're going to all these different like action set pieces, quote unquote. It's like uncharted. But you go to all these little different like action set pieces and you, and you play in different styles and you know, it's just, it feels like you're on like this long mission. That's like an actual like evolving mission. That's not just like the same thing over and over again. Because James Bond, or I'm sorry, Duke Togo, I'm sure in the manga doesn't just shoot guys. He's also a womanizer and he's also a professional helicopter pilot and he's also a really good, good like maze.

31:54 He's really good at mazes. I don't know if any, if anything in this show that he was really good at mazes, but. Well, you're just playing. At least not the way I played it. I was playing for like a, like a more, a little more bad at mazes play style, you know? Yeah, for sure. That's like the character I was going with. The next thing that happens after you get to the base though, is, is the maze section of the game, which is first person, which is what Sean was alluding to is the second

32:21 first person part of this game. But like what, where the heck did this come from? And did anybody else like imagine like that this was going to happen when they entered the base? I was expecting what, what also happens when you're in the bases, which is the side scrolling part. But then when I switched to this first person thing that was kind of like, um, Goonies 2 esque where you have to like, you know, you don't, thankfully you don't have to select like moving forward and stuff like that for each thing.

32:49 Or just like, I guess you do have to randomly do stuff though. Like who thought about the grenades to blow up the walls? I had to watch a video for that. Yeah. No, it took me some time. I just pressed the button and it worked just by accident. But, but I will say initially seeing this, like the actual first person element of it was pretty well executed for an NES game.

33:09 This reminds me of, uh, like either, I forgot if it was Doom or if it was Wolfenstein for the TI-84, uh, just in, in terms of how you navigate, uh, it, it, because it's so simple, uh, looking. But I mean, I, what, what I, what I meant to say is I kind of wish that for this game, I did not read the manual because I wanted to be surprised by this, but I already knew it was coming. And they even have the, the, the whole map for the maze, uh, like written out for you at the back of the manual. So that was, it was just unfortunate, uh, my experience. Now I didn't read the manual, so I actually wasn't using the map.

33:55 Oh, I wasn't reading the map either. Didn't even think that there would be one in there. Okay. Yeah. Cause I, cause, cause as much as I thought this was a cool idea to do, and even though it is like, yeah, the gameplay, maybe they could have like told you a few things on like what to do and like how to shoot or how to throw your grenades or everything. But, uh, this was like, I don't know if they needed to make this quite as complex of a maze with no landmarks or anything.

34:19 Cause it was like, there are like two levels and it took me forever to get out of this thing. And I guess like it needed a, it needed a bit of a bigger payoff or change of scenery for like resolution of these things. Cause you keep going through them. Uh, and for the most part, you're just greeted by the same kind of like grunt who you have to shoot and knock out or blow up a wall that you hope has a hole in it. So this way you can go through to the next part. Like there, there's nothing in terms of set design.

34:49 I think Sean, your TI-84 example is spot on because they didn't do anything to make like even, you know, and this would have looked stupid in the game, but the walls, in my opinion, should have been somewhat different colored in a way that would help you like, okay, cool. I did see this part before I've seen that color. So I don't want to go back this way. Like it needed that in certain respects, because this isn't, I think you're right. Yeah. This isn't fun to traverse because if, if you thought the, uh, if you thought it was easy to get lost in the scuba section, I pity anybody who got lost there because in this maze part,

35:24 yeah, you're just, yeah, you're just walking around and you're like, all right, I guess this is where I'm going. And then you say, oh no, actually this was just a dead end. I need to go all the way back. Where is back? I found the hardest part is sometimes when I step forward, you know, an extra step that I didn't want to do, I would just press the back button, but then I wasn't sure, did that turn me around or did I just step backwards? Oh, that turned you around. And at that point I'm like, I'm completely confused. Yeah. I had the same problem where like, if, if, as soon as you do that, you're completely disoriented because there is no forward there.

36:01 I, I, and you didn't remember what that stuff looked like behind you anyway. You don't have like, you know, it's not visually distinctive enough. So even when you turn around, it's like, yeah, it's good to know you're, you're backwards now, but like you don't, you don't notice that as you turn around. Yeah. I just stopped pressing the down button altogether. And if I had to turn around, I would like turn all the way, I would do like a long wide turn all the way around so I could keep everything in perspective as I was turning. And that sounds ridiculous, but like, that's the only way I could like keep my bearings. So did anybody actually make it through this first maze? I'm just checking. There's no shame.

36:37 I made it through, but like not by any of my own volition. I just stumbled through and finally made it out. Yeah. I just sort of randomly did it. I think it's cool. Cause I, I didn't, uh, I made it through, but I totally used a guide. I wasn't, I was, I didn't have the patience or fortitude to, uh, make it through this in a way that was going to be enjoyable for me.

36:59 Like it just seemed like for me, this wasn't what I was, I was already not loving the game. And for this to come up, it was like, well, if I want to see what happens next, I'm going to need some help. So this is where I turned to help. And I imagine this is where a lot of people called the Nintendo hotline on Nintendo power. They probably, a lot of people called in and asked for help. And then what would you do if you were on the hotline? How do you describe to somebody where to go next?

37:23 Up, left, down, left, down. But, but fun fact, guys, uh, Mike, Mike didn't have the patience or fortitude. Uh, patience and fortitude are the names of the lions outside the New York public library. And you can know that fortitude is the one over on 42nd street because of 42. Because we both read the same Reddit post. Because we are the same person. That's true. I'm still not convinced that you're not. Sean and I look alike and Joe and I sound alike. So we're all just kind of in hell together.

37:59 I got one last, one last question for you guys on these, on these mazes is, do you think it would have been like a little more fun if, if it just said, if it just gave you the information, the exit is on the Northern wall or the Southern wall or something. So at least you had that. And then I feel like it would be a little more puzzly. You'd be like, okay, how can I get to the Southern wall when there's this blocking me here and that blocking me there? Here it was just like, I don't even know, I don't even have a clue where to start looking for the exit.

38:25 I, I think that that is a half measure, uh, just because like it, it implies that that's going to make it more fun. And I don't think that just having that extra little bit of information makes this game more fun. I think, I think it would make it more fun. It probably wouldn't make it the most fun. It could be. I mean, it definitely wouldn't make it like great, but I think I would have like enjoyed a little more trying to figure it out.

38:51 If I was like, if I had any idea, even what I was looking for, granted, I guess I could have just looked in the manual and then I would have had, uh, the map, but see what you really needed here was a, uh, a chance to sneak up on the grunts inside the maze. And instead of killing them, you could be presented with the choice of also just kind of interrogating them. And then they could give you a piece of information similar to the clues you get in the side-scrolling stages.

39:32 So basically, I think we've covered all of like the basic, uh, uh, modes of this game. And then I just got to Greece and was told to go to a theater and I thought I got to the theater and then nothing happened. Uh, how far did you guys get in this game? I got just past that part in Greece. I think I'm trying to remember. I got to another maze. And then I was like, okay, there's a second maze shortly after the first maze.

40:04 Sean, here's the thing about your, um, about what you did in Greece that you did wrong. Okay. Cause act four is actually where the game goes camp on you completely and gets really silly. Oh, that's when it goes camp. Yeah. That's when it goes camp because you have to, you have to kill every single person that is every single enemy that's available to you before you get to the theater. Because then there's a cut scene that activates telling you that you've killed everyone here. You're a madman. And then when you get to the theater, when you get to the theater, all of a sudden you start killing women now too. There's an armed girl. I saw that. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. And then there's the several men with the rocket launchers. Did you do that? For sure.

40:45 Okay. So that's what you needed to do. And you know, it's the theater because it forces you to know these things. They, every time you walk by, they pop up. So you have like, you know, if you walk past the remains of Poseidon, you could be in the middle of, an enemy could be like drop kicking you in the middle of this thing. And it just pops up text where everybody else freezes. Hold up. Hold up. This is the remains of Poseidon.

41:08 Right. And I just, I don't know what, what happened here, but, um, this is about where I decided like, Oh, I've seen everything. I'm good. I think that's exactly what happened. I think it was just because like, it gave me the text box. Like you are at the theater of Dionysus and somebody told me to come here and nothing's happening. That's when I just turned the game off. And Joe, I know you said you lasted a little bit longer, uh, maybe an additional maze or so, but there's several more mazes that you actually have to go to. And eventually you make your way to Antarctica.

41:44 Uh, yeah. And, um, or some kind of snow place, I guess. Uh, I assumed it was Antarctica. It's just, it's just polar ice caps everywhere. So it could be the North pole, I guess, instead. Definitely no buildings or anything.

41:58 Um, and then even after that, you find yourself in like some secret lair, uh, which gets into the end of the game territory where you find out that, um, a giant robot of all things is actually behind everything. Oh, I see. Yeah, totally. That makes sense. Yeah. And you have to, you have to do it another very long. One of those, uh, what did you call that mode, Sean? The FPS one where you're in like a dual shootout pan and. So pan and zoom, right? Pan and zoom. Yeah. Yeah. So you're in that pan and zoom style with this giant robot and you have to shoot out all of its parts. Uh, it doesn't really look like it fights back that much, but some enemies fight back with you, but it seemed like the player I was watching handled it pretty easily.

42:44 Uh, and then you're just, that's it. You're greeted with the credits. They give fake actor names to everyone. Perfect. Like, so it has like their real name and their fake actor name. Well, I thought it was just their, um, their name in the game and then like as person who did this, right? Like it would be like the name, their character name. It would be like whatever, uh, cherry, whatever as girl from hotel room. That's what I was seeing. There was one that was like Oz Windham as man from fixer. Right. Yeah. Well, that is true.

43:16 Oz Windham, I would assume was being the character name and then man from fixer being like, he's from fixer, like the organization or whatever. Right. But okay. I can understand what you're saying. So they're not fake actor names, but it does feel weird to have it be like Tiffany as illegit gunsmith.

43:33 Because there was one that was like, what's, what's the guy condor you're looking for? It was like condor as guy who's dead or something like that. Killed spy. Yeah. Killed spy. It was an amazing moment though. When he's, he's in, you run into him in, uh, like a Berlin underground, uh, station. And he's going to tell you some important information. And then he drops to the, to the floor, apparently shot. And then he's like, Oh, okay. Then I won't tell you.

44:04 Yeah. He says like, he gives his, his, his like sentence saying that he's not going to be able to tell you is so much longer than like it would take for him to just tell you the information.

44:18 Yeah. And he's also like the funniest looking character in the game. What? It's funny. Looking to have a mustache, Mike. Oh, am I thinking of someone? I'm thinking of the short stubby guy. Oh yeah. His name is like, his name is something where it's like fake big man or something like that. Yeah. I guess that's who I'm thinking of. But anyway, it seemed weird because everybody else was about exactly the same height. And then they just drew this like short fat guy who constantly like just interrupts your conversations.

44:47 Poor guy. Uh, yeah. So, I mean, that was, that's the end of the game. Uh, they also do a special shout out to the children. They say special thanks to the children at the very end of the credits and the lost generation. Whoa. Okay. And I, and I was like, all right, yeah, it's just like crazy to the stuff they throw in these games.

45:12 And to all of the works we lost in the library of Alexandria. Right. You know, at that point. Yeah, true. Like special thanks to everyone who's ever lived on earth. Like, uh, Joe, I think, uh, it's time for your moment in the spotlight though. There's something you've probably been dying to tell us. You predicted it. And it's not so much about the pause sound itself, but it's about the fact that the pause screen takes you to this.

45:43 It, correct me if I'm wrong. It is actually what I was talking about before. The like closeup of, of his face, like in this beautiful anime style. It's like a whole different, it's like not a menu or anything. Joe, I thought I reset the game. It's just like, here's a picture. Really? So did I. I thought I screwed something up. I love that. It's just like, it gives you a different caption than what the game actually is. It's like, instead of like the man with the golden gun, it's like, go, go 13, the man with the custom M 16. Yeah, that's right.

46:16 So Joe, it was just like, no, that was really it. It was just like, it was just funny to me that it wasn't like, we've seen either games just completely freeze fine or go to another screen that has some information or some, menu on it. This was just like, ah, this is a cool picture. Let's let them look at this while they're paused.

46:34 So I thought that was a, that was a nice addition to the, uh, asterisk pause sound list because it's not really about a sound, but there's also, yeah, it's not really a sound. It's, it's like a whole music track. Yeah. Oh, that's right. It is a different music. I didn't even think of that though. Cause I was so, I was so just surprised by the image and it doesn't, it does kind of change the music. Yeah. It doesn't have like a very pause feel to it. It's, it's very active. It's very energetic music.

47:01 I was very surprised. And I thought of you right away. Oh, I I'm glad. I'm glad I've, I've had that effect. I always think of Joe when I pause a game or a movie. When you pause a movie. Yeah, that's true. We don't talk about movie pause menus, movie pause sounds. Yeah. And usually just like the stopping of sound, but I, I still think of, of Joe. Well, there's different ones. There's like the sound when like a VHS pauses versus the sound. And it sounds like it's struggling. Yeah. Uh, any other surprises in this game that we haven't talked about?

47:33 It's a little, it's a little, not exactly in the game, but just, it sounds like we, the three of us all got like relatively close to each other with how far we got. Um, and I've had played for quite a long time. So then when I looked up the playthrough online of a person who plays much quicker than I do, who gets through this game a lot quicker than I do, they were only like at the point that I was at, they were only like 30, not even 30 minutes into an hour and a half playthrough. Wow. Which just shows you how long this game is. And it's worth noting that it's that long without any form of save.

48:07 Oh God. Yeah. Right. So it's, I think it's like, you know, if we're thinking about the core video gamers in 1987, it's, it's 1988. It's mostly children at that time, uh, or teenagers.

48:21 But even, yeah, the, the children that are dedicated to the game. But for the most part, I think what that, what that means to me is this is forget about like whether they can figure it out or not. It's just games back then were a little different. And so I think this is like, we're looking at more for first playthrough of like a solid five to maybe maximum 10 hours to beat this game. And you have to do it all in one sitting. So I can't imagine any kid really being able to pull that off without like tricking their parents into thinking like, oh, I turned off the game. I'll go to bed. But they just left it on overnight.

48:53 I mean, I did that with Super Smash Brothers Melee. I left it on for 24 hours to unlock Mewtwo. And that's still the stupidest requirement ever to unlock a character. Mike, you know that if you do that, like the, the, the government will come and turn off your computer. I'm sorry. We'll turn off your GameCube. Yeah. It's a bandwidth issue. Yeah. We just don't have that kind of electricity lying around. Yeah. We don't have that. We need access to those resources at all times, especially now more than ever. Okay. Exactly.

49:22 Turn off the lights whenever you're not using them. Okay. All my lights are off right now. What next? Yeah. I was going to say, we're just, we're just talking. We can all be in the dark. If you've turned off the lights, I feel like you've done your job. Okay. I feel like you've done your part. Okay. Now it's up to the corporations to step up.

49:39 We should all be in the dark. Like our listeners probably are when they listen to us. Yes. Mike, I have a question for you, Mike. Please. Do you have any information on Vic Tokai? You know, what's interesting about Vic Tokai, I happen to have a little bit of information on them because it is not one man, contrary to popular belief. Dave, it's not a guy named Vic. They are a Japanese video game developer, but more importantly, they were a telecommunications company. Okay. So they really didn't, they just kind of dabbled in video games for a while. And by a while, for a while, I mean like a long ass time too though. We're talking about all the way up to the Saturn.

50:20 They were doing video games. I feel like it's, I don't want to sell them short here, but if I list off games they've made, they're most likely, I would say it's a hundred percent chance you've never heard of them. Okay. Give it a shot. Okay. So King Salmon. Oh yeah. King Salmon. King Salmon was my favorite game about.

50:48 Oh, you're so close. Yeah. About fishing, you know, just, just the act of fishing. It was. Why did you look it up? Outside of Vancouver Island. Why did you look it up? Well, I wanted to know exactly where, you know? Gotcha. Yeah. But they might still be making like mobile games now because they're still,

51:08 they're still up and running. So they are still a telecommunications company. First and foremost, I wouldn't be surprised if they made Android and iOS games, but they're not, they're not working on any switch games anytime soon or anything like that. I think they, oh yeah. It looks like they dropped the Vic. So they just wanted to go by Tokay. Yeah. I mean, and we have some games to look forward to from them, including, uh, this game called, uh, bump and jump, which I own. I bought it at a garage sale and I hated it. So I can't wait till we get to that one. Nice. And, um, what was another one? Uh, kid cool. And the quest for the seven wonder herbs.

51:48 Like, okay. Wonder herb. Sounds like, this feels like we're in like a, like a Rick and Morty interdimensional cable episode. The whole company. Bump and jump or whatever. It's just the whole company feels like that. It feels like you've never heard of this one before. I've great. Give me, if I give some names of some other developers that we've only even ever had one game for on this system so far, there's a chance you've heard of them. Uh, you know, like Jalico. I heard of Jalico before all this. I hadn't. Okay. Um, Hudson soft. You've heard of Hudson soft.

52:23 Maybe. I, I feel like I had, but that also might just be me misremembering because now I've heard of them. Got it. Okay. Now, yeah. Now that, now that we've covered it, Hudson soft. Everybody knows because they have the mascot with the B in the cartoon drawing. Oh yeah. The B,

52:40 the B. Yeah. No, no, seriously. If you, if you saw this B, you would know right away that you've seen this on many startup screens. I think Hudson soft is now owned by Konami and I think they made the turbo graphic 16.

52:50 To begergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergergerger

53:39 Let's get, uh, talking about spinoffs, because you know there were. Let's hear it. Thank you for humoring me. Uh, so obviously, as we already covered here, the Golgo 13 manga, uh, came out first, and that was actually way back in, like, 1968, I think. 68 or 67. So this is, like, one of the first mangas that, like, would have ever came anywhere else, you know?

54:04 Uh, but I don't recall anybody talking about this or it being on, like, Adult Swim or anything like that, so I feel like it didn't get picked up by Western audiences, at least. So there was an anime as well? There was an anime. Uh, there's two anime films. There's The Professional, uh, Golgo 13 The Professional, which came out in 1983, and Golgo 13 Queen Bee, which came out in 1998, and is clearly about Beyonce.

54:34 He's trying to take down Beyonce, uh, before she becomes too powerful. But yes, there was also an anime that ran, uh, in the 80s as well, so, uh, that's something you can just find on YouTube if you're at all interested. You can watch probably the whole anime on YouTube. But there were also some live-action films that came out, one in 1973 and one in 1977.

54:55 So if you're interested in seeing what Duke Togo would look like in the flesh, uh, I think the guy they casted for the 77 one is close. Yeah, he's good. I love that. I love those sideburns. It makes me feel better about mine. Uh, and then it's, we have to mention this because, uh, it, we're gonna cover it someday. Uh, Vic Takai made another game that was released on the NES in 1990 known as the, I'm gonna pronounce it wrong because I don't know how else you would say it, but the Moffat Conspiracy.

55:32 And that is actually, in Japan, it was just called Golgo 13, the Moffat Conspiracy. So this is the sequel to, uh, the game that we played today. Wow. So we will have to play another Golgo 13 game on the NES. You know, I can't wait. I'm looking into some of this, uh, Golgo 13 stuff and it is, uh, very 18 plus, I have to say. Yes, uh, there's even, I believe they just like, early on in one of the anime episodes, they just like flash a nipple and entire sex scene going on and you're just like, not prepared for that. No, I'm not. Especially now in my NES. Right. yeah. Is it, is it three or four pixels of two different people? Oh no, this is, more detailed. This is full blown pencil on paper.

56:25 I mean, and we'll talk about this, uh, in 2030 when we get up to 1990 on the NES, but, uh, it is weird that they don't call it Golgo 13, the Moffat conspiracy, or even episode two, which is another thing they call it in the Japanese one. I guess this game did not sell that well and they didn't want to go on the Golgo 13 name because if you look at the gameplay for Moffat conspiracy, you can tell that that's Golgo again. Like it looks just like it. Well, we, we have had some issues recently with sequels not, uh, fully disclosing their lineage. That is true. All right. And if no one has anything else, we are going to get into the essential games list.

57:09 Joe, uh, you have to vote. Everybody in America has to vote. Um, please tell us your vote for the essential games list. I thought this game was pretty cool at first, uh, especially because of how ambitious it was. And it almost feels like it's trying to be something that it like, that the technology is not ready for it yet. Like I, I,

57:32 I am thinking of some, like, I can't think of any specifics, but it almost feels like, like a lot of like PS2 games would have like, oh, there's the section where you fly the helicopter and there's a section where you're in like the turret and it's a little more like those, uh, on rail shooters. And then there's the section where you're underwater and things like that. We, we haven't had too many games that like really change up the gameplay that much. And I thought that was kind of cool. Um, but I think the biggest, like, uh,

57:57 thesis statement of how I feel about this is that it is a jack of all trades, master of none, where I, I think that it does all these things. It's really cool. That's trying to fit all them in, but none of them, they're all at best mediocre. And some of them are just, are, are worse than that. Um, and I think that hurts it. But that being said, I think, I think this is a play it just because it's so interesting that it's trying to do all this extra stuff, but definitely not essential. And Sean, uh, I agree that, um, I think that people, uh, would be interested in, you know, at least like taking a look at this game. Uh,

58:35 but it just, yeah, just because of just how random it can be. Um, but as a, uh, as a game and as like a story based game, as that's how I would classify it to an extent. Um, I think this does a better job, uh, than some of the previous games that we have, especially like even metal gear, uh, just because it's a little bit more clear and there's a little bit more of a voice, um, within the dialogue. And you do get a little bit more context from the game, uh, but it's still nowhere near where this is supposed to be, uh, for it to be an actual, uh, an actual experience, a full experience.

59:18 Um, that being said, the gameplay from moment to moment, isn't that great. It's totally fine for, for the most part, but, uh, in, in the one sequence that you play the most, the side scrolling, it's complete jank. So that just makes the whole game less enjoyable. So it's, it's totally not essential, but it's definitely a, a fun curiosity. Yeah. I mean, I think, I think we all have that, uh, general idea of like, if you told me this game on the back of the box, you could sell it to me. I would have probably bought this in like 1988.

59:54 You know, if I, if the back of the box told me it had all these different things going on, I would think, wow, this is like seven games in one. I have to get ahold of this. Uh, one thing that, we didn't touch upon too much because it's, it's not really that important in the grand scheme of things, but the dialogue in this game goes a lot further than any, NES game we've really had so far. Uh, I mean like the, the weakness of like dragon powers dialogue was just like the weakest translation along with so many different errors too. It was like, it was like, what am I reading in this game? I didn't really have that problem. Yeah. There was a couple of like

1:00:28 misspellings here and there, but I might even make those same misspellings. So I'm not saying like that, uh, you know, the game has to be perfect. I thought it was actually really cool that it had this coherent plot and thematically and aesthetically this game is all there. I think the problem is, is I didn't really like any of it. I didn't really enjoy my time with this game at all,

1:00:47 even though I kept saying, wow, this is so cool. Um, so I think it's really neat. And I think that's one of the fun things that we get to do, uh, as we go through this show is that we get the chance to play games that likely not a large group of people played or will ever play again. And so I'm really glad that hidden things like this can still surprise us on the system, but I cannot say that like the, the population, the mass population of gamers need to go back and see this one. Uh, there's, there's a lot of like

1:01:18 things that have been placed down for future games to maybe like pick up on, but I feel like future games also just did the same thing and wound up stealing things from movies, like how go, go 13 kind of does it rather than say, oh, well, you know, go, go 13. I doubt anybody recognized this game when they were later making, um, things that would surpass it. I agree. So not essential from us today. Uh, but it'll get another shot with the Moffat conspiracy. Maybe that game will clean up every little detail. Uh, but you know, I would say like go, go 13 in general, whether you look at the manga or the anime or the live action film or this video game, it's a mood, right? It definitely has an aesthetic.

1:02:04 Yeah, I like it. I, I was looking at like some of the, uh, gifts for the, um, for the anime. And I was like, I could totally see this being like a show you just find at 2am and you're like, Oh, what's this? And that's all I have to say about that. Thank you guys so much for reinforcing my feelings. Uh, I am Michael Esposito. You can find me on at Esposito film on Twitter. Next week we'll be covering, uh, I think it's Jackal. Is it Jackal?

1:02:36 I knew right away that that's where it was going. And yes, it is. It is Jackal, the, uh, Konami classic. So, uh, I've never played Jackal before. Have you guys? Never heard of it. I haven't, but I watched the game grumps play it. Okay. So you'll have to withdraw from the essential games list for that vote. Yes. Right. I'm biased. You're just going to re, you're just going to re-say all of their fun little quips. Yeah. I'll, yeah, both of them. It'll be like, I'm two people talking to each other. Uh, and, uh, speaking of nostalgia, a lot of people,

1:03:07 uh, we just want to thank you guys for everybody who's thrown out recommendations on Twitter. I saw a lot of people, uh, tagging us and saying like, Hey, you should listen to nostalgia cast. They're cool podcasts that plays every NS game in chronological order. It's like, wow, it's sticking. The idea is sticking.

1:03:23 Yeah. I appreciate that. There was a, look, a few episodes ago, we did suggest to people that they recommended to people that would specifically not like it. And we have gotten a lot more hate mail. So we do appreciate, uh, that you are following these, uh, recommendations. Yeah. And in trying times like these, when you can't, uh, go outside and tell somebody face to face, you might as well just tell them over the internet. And I think whether that's Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, um,

1:03:54 what's that app? Kayak, uh, the one that's Kayak's the one that lets you search for the flights. Uh, tell people on Kayak. Yeah. Or they're not using it for anything else right now. Right. Trip advisor. Yeah. I think now during, yeah, I think during this time, I think this is the time we're going to start really seeing people start becoming vocal on the internet. Web 2.0. Right. Uh, it's going to really, it's going to really kick in now. So again, we'll see you guys next Friday and, um, I hope you had a great April 17th. I don't know.