225 · Casino Kid

• Outwit and outplay your rivals for a chance to become the King of the Casino
• NES Longplay
• Introductions
  • Nothing like Kids, Casinos, and gambling!
  • Gambling is actually more accepted than ever now though
• Overview
  • The player challenges 8 poker and 8 blackjack opponents. The goal is to grow your cash up to $1,000,000 and take on the mystery opponent in a winner takes all game.
• Gameplay
  • Why can’t I find my freakin’ opponent
  • Final Fantasy / Dragon Warrior vibe to walking around the casino
  • Blackjack
    • Feels like the odds are better than real life? Did they actually find a way to make it easier early on?
  • Poker
    • The tells: The face, the words, the betting
    • The game crafted a moment between me and the old timer Joseph (all in hand and it gave me a full house)
  • The final battle against KING
    • Takes place in a separate Mansiomn.
    • Both have $1,000,000, and it is a test of pure Poker skills with the bet range at $10,000-$100,000!!!
  • Casino Kid JAPAN - The real version of the game
    • The Japanese version has a kid imagining himself to be the casino champion
    • possible to travel to other casinos like New York City and Japan for a substantial airfare cost.
    • Choose your own name
    • Also includes Slot Machines and Roulette
• Sequels and Spinoffs
  • Casino Kid 2
  • Are there gambling games you guys enjoy?
• EGL
• Next week - Casino Kid
• NEStalgia Byte - Tower of Druaga

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

00:00 Casino Kid, outwit and outplay your rivals for a chance to become the king of the casino.

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. Nothing like kids, casinos, and gambling, right guys? Nothing goes together better. That's basically my childhood, yeah. Gambling is actually more accepted than ever nowadays, but it seems weird that in 1989 we were getting away with the idea of a kid going into a casino and, you know, doing like an Ash Ketchum Pokemon style, like I'm a 10 year old who's going to work my way through the ranks of both poker and blackjack simultaneously to become the king of the casino. It's funny that you mentioned Ash Ketchum because that, your character, Casino Kid, when you see him close up, is Gary Oak.

01:14 Yes, he is. Confirmed. That's the only personality traits he has. That's true. No, he bobs his head. That's a personality trait. I agree. Uh, also, you know, you bring up a great point though, too, of like, this isn't just a game where you select blackjack or poker on like the main menu and then just play the game with like imaginary cash. This is a game where you have a like little hub of a casino where you can walk around and talk with the other players and try to scoop up some intel on what's going on.

01:49 And it has like a dragon warrior slash Final Fantasy style, like look to it all where, you know, like the, the people and the, uh, objects that you can't really interact with at all. You can only interact with the people, but just like that space felt like a, like an RPG in one way or another. So I was kind of sad to see that it was just a means of getting to the selectable poker and blackjack options and not something deeper where you could like find a secret or, uh, even just like, you know, see an entertainer or something.

02:29 Well, you, the way you, the way you kind of, uh, introduced this, it almost alluded to the idea that you were like uncovering some, uh, some deeper story into, into this casino and like that these characters had stories about their lives and almost something like, uh, like not like golf story, but like those games that, that, that tie in, uh, a, a simple game and, and build a world around it.

02:58 And the fact that this is just like a, a glorified menu that you have to actually, uh, actually dig and search for the next button, um, is disappointing, but it's so easily could have been, um, that, I don't know, even as, as far as I got, I thought that maybe it would turn into that. Yeah. I mean, there's, I, I, I felt exactly the same way because like this made me realize like, uh, like a type of video game that I want to see that I never knew I wanted to see before, which is what you just described. And I think this goes like a tiny bit down that road in the sense that like you are collecting,

03:46 uh, not story wise or anything, but just, just having this, um, like free roam, like casino world that you sort of live in, like you're, you're slowly basically trying to clean out all of the blackjack dealers and like all of the other like poker players and other, you know, I think it's kind of cool that like some poker players won't play you until you have enough money.

04:10 So like that kind of somewhat justifies the, like the overworld because it's like you, it, it feels a little bit like an adventure game and just the sense that also like people you talk to will give you hints about dealers or about, um, poker players and stuff like how to, how to, yeah. Like, oh, this guy bluffs a lot. Exactly. Like his face, he always does the opposite face of what, uh, of what he means or whatever.

04:38 Yeah. There's something there, you know, it's not like they did the bare minimum. I, I do agree with Sean that it is kind of just a glorified menu because you are ultimately just searching for the button, uh, that is the person that you interact with to get to the next poker or a blackjack match. However, you know, I'm not trying to say they didn't go for this kind of game, but my mind ran wild with just like the idea of even after a certain amount of money or after you beat a certain player, like dialogue would change in the casino to talk about you a little

05:10 differently. Like at first they'd shrug you off and then you'd start to become noticed. And there would be like a, a coach or a coach's corner where like the guy who mentored you could teach you like blackjack or poker strategies or something, you know, like better ways to play the game and ways to think about these games differently. Because ultimately at the end of the day, the core gameplay experience of poker and blackjack is something that is best taught outside of this game. You know, like the, you do, you have to know poker and blackjack going into this. This game isn't necessarily the teacher, uh, of that.

05:47 No. And, but we, we, we all kind of had the same expectations or at least wants out of this game because it's got so many tropes with, with like an RPG. Like it, it, it, it's got, uh, it's got dialogue. It's, it's got the same navigation. It's got a talking head. We all saw this and we all saw the potential of what like the game could have been just by how it was dressed. And, uh, there, there is, there wasn't really too much beyond the, the games of poker and, and blackjack that were presented to you. I think that I saw the potential, but the potential I was looking at, I think was maybe a little different from what you guys are talking about.

06:32 Cause I thought the overworld being just a means to get to the poker and the blackjack. I, I liked this overworld for it because it gave context to it. It didn't feel like, oh, this is a game like, okay, I I'm just playing poker game after poker game. It felt like I'm in a casino trying to clean out the, you know, trying to like work my way up and become not story wise become bigger, but just have more money so I can unlock more.

06:56 More tables or, or more players to play against what I was expecting and what I was hoping for. And, and, and like what I was like a little disappointed by as time went on was that it's like, it's just always more poker and blackjack.

07:16 growing and you're growing a reputation or whatever. I was waiting for like, okay, you know, pretty soon you're going to be able to, you know, there's going to be a Texas hold'em table. And like, I was, I was expecting to be like, there's going to be like a pie gao table or something, or there's going to be like, there's a slot machine on, on almost every tile of this game. I thought that you'd better play a slot machine. They, they put in, um, roulette tables with actual, that actually have like little grid on and stuff. You can't interact with them.

07:39 I was thinking like, oh, I'm slowly going to start unlocking new things in the casino, new ways to make money and new little challenges. And like, that was what I was looking forward to. Like, there was no point where I was like necessarily thinking like, I need to start kind of delving into like this, like a golf story style, like the backstory of these characters or anything. But I just wanted like a little more, um, a little more to do a little more to unlock.

08:04 I see that too, because I remember, uh, in the original red dead redemption, um, I, it got to a point where I ended up like using it just as a, uh, as a Texas hold'em simulator, uh, just because that mini game was so well put together. And even though the characters that you're playing with are not like named characters, um, they all had their own personalities and you actually felt like a big shot when you, when you actually like

08:35 clear, clean somebody out and they had to walk away from the table. And it felt like, oh, like now somebody else is coming to sit down. And it just, it just felt very organic and like that, that gambling and just social experience. Um, and I think that even though it's not going to look as, as pretty as, as like red dead redemption did, uh, but you could still simulate, you could still simulate that here. And I, maybe that's not exactly what you're talking about and, but it isn't as, uh, uh, uh,

09:09 as objectively RPG like as what we were describing before, but it's still like offers more of an experience. Yeah. So to ground us back here for a minute, um, the way that they have structured the game is that there are specific characters, you know, that get names, they get their own avatars, they have their own personalities that you have to find in the casino.

09:31 And, uh, they have, you know, either small purses to eventually very large purses. And so that's why they won't play you because you don't have enough money to bet against them because the hands will get bigger. You'll have to start betting more money. So you have to build your way up. And so you need to find these low stakes players first inside the casino.

09:52 And it's not like that isn't described to you, uh, as like the pitch of the game or within the manual. I was just a little surprised that they would tuck the very first like blackjack player that you would go up against all the way in the bottom right of the casino. Now I get that, like, that's a good way to get you to walk throughout the casino, but I would also walk through five or six other blackjack tables on my way thinking like, is there something I need to like, exactly. Do I need to go to a cashier first and, uh, get, take out some money or something? Like what is wrong? Why won't anybody play me?

10:30 Why can't I find my freaking opponent? I feel like they should have at least just put the very first guy right in front of you. I don't know if they needed to do that, but I feel like what they should have done, at least for me, is like, cause I like the, like having to walk through first and like explore. I like that a lot. But like, I feel like a solution that could work is like that first guy or every person that rejects you should say, the dialogue should be clearer as to why they're rejecting you. It's like saying like, no, no, no, you can't start here.

10:57 Like you need to, you need to get some more money. You need to go to like, you need to find the, the small, this, you know, the small stakes game first or something. No, no, no. It's very clear when they just say, Hey hon. Yeah. When they say I'm pretty, you know, that that's why, you know.

11:15 No, I definitely thought that something was wrong as well. And like when I looked at the manual, there was really nothing to go off of there either. So it, it, it was not the best first impression.

11:28 And I'll just say Joe, because you were, you know, we're talking about Gary and Ash and all that. Just one more Pokemon reference. That's something that happened to me in the very first time when I was six years old playing Pokemon Blue. I never like on the very first time I booted up that game, I never like encountered Professor Oak and got to choose my Pokemon because I was a good kid who didn't leave the town. Like I was like, where's Professor Oak? And so I never ventured out into the grass to find out that that's how the game starts. So yes, like it's not, I made a bigger deal of it in my notes actually. And I'm kind of calming down to it here in the episode because I'm realizing like their idea of like, you know, you should talk to everybody.

12:12 It's actually fine, but it's a little strange that the person that you need to play next isn't clearly communicated to you. If that makes more sense, like if they told you at least like, here's who you should be going after. And, you know, players gave you hints as to where they would be. It might make a little more sense. This felt more just like talk to everybody and hope that that's the person you're looking for. Or that there was just no thought placed into guiding you. It's just like, here's player one, two, three, four, five, six, seven. And we'll just put them in places that there would be somebody, but there's no design going into that progression there.

12:54 Yeah. Well, it adds insult to injury too, because there are hints as to where people are. Like it'll say like, well, Ted is to the northeast of this table or whatever, but you still don't ever know who you're looking for. Who's Ted? Yeah. Like it doesn't matter who's Ted. Ted might not be who you're looking for right now. You don't know until you find him. So it's like, it doesn't matter. You just talk to everyone. They'll give you hints about things that don't mean anything to you because they forgot the other part of the information you need for that hint to work.

13:47 And then let's start with Blackjack here because it's the easier game, I suppose, in terms of there's no, it's you versus the dealer. The character is just the dealer. The game doesn't necessarily change all that much. Whereas poker actually has some intricacies involved to it other than the cards that you're dealt.

14:10 When you start off in Blackjack, I don't know if you guys felt this way, but I certainly felt it. And I did try to reset the game and do this a few different ways. I think they might've programmed Blackjack to be easier, like that the odds are actually increased in your favor. They're better than real life in these early rounds of playing against people.

14:30 Maybe they found a way to just make sure you didn't bust too often or that they didn't give you heavy cards or that you managed to land like a bunch of 21s. But I don't know about you guys, but that was happening to me. I don't know. I thought it was more so that it was like actually like it had a deck in its memory. And when it said that it like when the dealer says, I'm going to shuffle now, like it's actually randomizing the cards again.

14:56 Like that's what I thought. Yeah, I thought that way too. I like that you could because because they kept adding the shuffling in there. I thought that that was because they were trying to make it feel like or make it realistic. Not even just make it feel, but like actually have it be like so that it's impossible to get. Oh, there's five aces in the last five hands or whatever. Right. So you didn't feel like it was any easier than real life Blackjack. I wouldn't say so. No, I felt like Blackjack was the I mean, just by the nature of it was the harder game to to play in this game because it took a lot longer.

15:31 And like you can't use like the sometimes very obvious tells of the poker players against them. So like, you know, a lot of it came down more to luck. And it is strange in a game that has characters with personalities and identities and facial expressions that Blackjack becomes a game that is just based on the odds of the cards, which is, I guess, why I was maybe reading into the cards.

15:54 I was receiving a little more thinking that the game was trying to nudge me a little bit early on. But it seems like from your guys gameplay experience, that wasn't the case. So I got to wonder why choose Blackjack as a game at all. Make just double down on the poker aspect of this and cover, you know, two or three different types of poker games. You could do five card draw. You could do Jack's Wild.

16:20 You could do Texas Hold'em. Do that and then just rely on the mechanics you've created in the poker system because the Blackjack system feels like I'm not playing a specific person. I'm just going up against the actual casino. Yeah. And, you know, on my gut reaction is to say that like if if you're only going to have one form of poker, because I totally agree if you're going to have a bunch of forms of poker, that that should be the direction you go. But if you're going to just have one form of poker, my gut reaction is to say, well, then it might as well have Blackjack in there to break it up because poker gets boring.

16:54 But I guess if I put that into practice on the way that I actually feel when I'm playing the game, I'm usually only playing Blackjack to make more money so I can go back to playing poker because I would much rather be playing poker in this game than Blackjack because I feel like I can, you know, I'm actually making, I don't know, you have a little more agency in poker. And it's just a little more fun in a setting that's like, that's like a, what do you call it? Like a simulated setting. I feel it's a little more fun to play poker because, you know, they went through the trouble of putting these characters with their different tells or, or sometimes like sneaky reverse tells or whatever.

17:33 That black and, you know, Blackjack also the maximum bets on it. You bet once and then you're, it's harder to gain a lot of money. Whereas like poker, you can, you know, you obviously you can rack up a pretty big, a pretty big pot in one hand and like you can make those games go quicker, whether that means you're losing faster or winning faster. Yeah.

17:51 And, and I'd say while, while poker definitely is the main draw and it's just because like Blackjack is like the simpler, less interesting game and it's more or less automated. So it doesn't matter that you've got like a talking head across the table from you. Like the, the, the dealer isn't trying to beat you. It's just like doing things to, that will probably end up beating you. Um, but I do think that like, if you've got it, if you've already got it, then there's no reason to remove it.

18:25 I just don't think maybe you, that should have been what you were locked into for the first couple of tables. Yeah. I think it all makes sense. Uh, I would still push for them to just go all in on the poker system since they're trying to create personalities around the characters.

18:40 But I agree. If you, if you program Blackjack, the more options, the better, because like Joe said, you see other games in the casino, but you can't play them. Yeah. Right. I want to play roulette. Let's get into the meat and potatoes here of the game. That is the poker. Uh, it is five card draw. Uh, and this, the reason why I say it's so much better and we've kind of alluded to it is because all of the characters actually have various tells and personality traits to them on the way they talk or the way they look that help you with the kind of poker game you might be playing. And yes, especially at the beginning, it's very telegraphed, but I don't mind that. I don't mind that at all because that's what makes it interesting.

19:47 That's like, that is in some ways teaching you about, you know, real life tells in a way that like, yeah, are comically bad, but I'm here for it in this video game. Because ultimately like, that's what this is. It's just like a fun interpretation of poker in a casino with personalities that, uh, you know, probably aren't as good as the money they have. So with the tells, with the tells here, you've got their face, which changes based on the cards that they get in the hands that they win or lose. Uh, they can have like very shocked eyes or they can have like those Japanese eyes with the upside down frownies. Um, you know what I'm talking about. Yeah. The anime eyes. Um, great.

20:31 They also like, you know, what they say, uh, is very important. So obviously at the beginning, it's very, um, obvious with, I forget the name of the first guy, but he's like an old man and he pretty much tells you that he has a bad hand. But like later on, it's a little more like ambiguous. Like I wonder if that's the good or the bad tell for, for this character. And then also you have the betting because that, you know, if, if they're not confident in their hands, early players might fold.

21:00 Sooner on like calling, you know, like putting up a bunch of money up front, they might not want to risk that, but later players with bigger purses are willing to throw down that money. So it does become a bit more of a strategy. And yes, it's not the most, uh, deeply detailed poker game we'll ever play.

21:18 But I thought for NES standards, and especially because they took the time to give these people's names and identities, it did feel more real than I expected. Yeah. I mean, even though we, uh, we were all kind of disappointed with how, with, with the setting of the game and what it could have been and what it was like, I still do think that this is better than just like, okay, so like whether you'd like to play poker or blackjack and then just do it. And then you'll come back to this menu when you're done. So I think that the world of the game is still, it's still worth it.

21:55 Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That, that's, I totally agree with that too. I mean, I, I, I think this, I would have almost no interest in just playing, uh, you know, like a, like one of those, whatever, like a windows blackjack game or a windows poker game. Um, but this, I, I, I, I played this for a while. I was, I, I, I was, you know, it got me into the little gambling addiction of these little, these little fictional dollars that I'm, uh, that I'm racking up here. Are you okay, Jim? Yes, I'm okay. I'm okay. I'm, uh, I'm, I'm getting help.

22:29 Okay. I don't want to make this mistake twice because I already said that blackjack felt like my odds were improved, but maybe this one happened to you guys because it feels way too specific for me. At the end of my first poker face off with that old timer, um, his name is Joseph. I'm looking it up now. Uh, sorry, Joe. No, no relation. No relation. Um, yeah, the, this old timer at the very end when he's like low on money, he basically told me that he was going to go all in on the hand and I had a choice to accept or whatever. He said, no matter what, I'm going all in on the next hand.

23:03 He did. And the cards that it gave me was a immediate three of a kind and two dud cards. So I held the three of a kind and I let the two dud cards go and it gave me a pair creating a full house for an obvious win. And I thought that was a great, like, that was like a, it crafted a moment inside the game. There's no way that was an accident. No, I think it was an accident. Uh, if this, if it turns out that, that this game is making up deals, um, or, or like it's got pre, uh, pre cut, uh, like dealers and it's like always in the same order. Like that, that's, that can't happen. Yeah. That's not a, that's not a gambling game. It just has to simulate a deck.

23:50 Yeah. Also just, so I just felt lucky. Yeah. I think that both times you got, you got lucky because based on, cause I, like I said, I played a lot of this and, uh, I feel like I, I didn't notice any pattern of like it being in my favor. I also saved a lot and like, um, or whatever, that long ass password. Um, and like, you know, cause I lost, you know, plenty of times too. So like, I feel like, yeah, you just should go to a real casino right now, Mike, because you are on a hot streak.

24:19 You're wasting it all on this video game. Yeah. Right, right. My hot streak's over as of this recording. But what'd you guys think of, forget about old timer Joe, cause he kind of telegraphs it. The later poker battles, I think it's fun to call them battles. Um, did they, did that like, did it, did it enhance? Like, do you feel like the tells got a little more difficult and a little more like fun to decipher? Or was it just like, now it's just about the cards you get and less about the, the characters?

24:49 Well, I faced someone and I can't remember the name, might've been Ted. I can't remember if someone where his tells were like all opposite. So that was kind of interesting. It took a second to like figure that out. And then later on I ran into someone in the casino who told me that that was the case.

25:05 Um, and then I, yeah, sometimes people just don't have tells. You came to the conclusion. Yeah. I, I, I mean, I thought that all of the over the top facial animations were, were fun, but I, I wasn't really, uh, yeah. Unless one of the people walking around the oddly like horny bunny girls telling me that like, uh, that so-and-so usually does this or so-and-so's face does that. Um, I didn't really notice any specific personalities between them except like some were funnier looking than others. Sean, this is now the second episode in a row where you have mentioned, uh, and you know, no, no problems here, but you mentioned Jessica Rabbit and you said you're familiar with her.

25:51 Now you're specifically calling out the bunny girls. There are other characters that you don't play, uh, against that just happen to be in the casino. Did you not find them as interesting as the bunny girls? I just want to say that it's just, we haven't really spoken about the elephant in the room, but the fact that there is a, a game in which a kid goes into a casino and gambles around women in, in bunny costumes. Um, and like, you're, you're just, you're, you're being told like gamble more, gamble more, gamble the most money. And so that you can be the gambling King. It's just very strange that this was targeted for kids. I don't know how it got here. I don't think any other gambling game in the past has ever been targeted at kids.

26:41 I agree with you. That was my, that was my argument at the beginning of this thing was just that this is very strange because they could have at least made it like, I don't know, like a little, a little more playful, like not with dollars or something. Or like that there's a, you know, you're saving up for an NES or something at the end of this. Like that's the grand prize of this poker competition.

27:06 Anything would have helped, uh, contextualize it. Right? Yeah. I think so. But like, I know that the NES was, was marketed towards kids, but like, like, haven't we had games before that like, were more like, oh, this is like more for like the parent or something. Like, even like golf. But you're casino kid. That's. And you're obviously underage. Don't forget what I said. Yes. Correct. I like how willing you were to give it up. I was like, yeah, you know, like that's kind of a glaring right in my face that says kid on the, on the cover of this game. So I concede.

28:21 Well, Sean, what do you make of then the, the giant ending of this game where you are warped to another, a separate mansion that, uh, is where the king is, he's described. He's just called King. You face off against him. Both of you have $1 million and it's just poker. Uh, they've decided that blackjack doesn't matter at all. It's just a pure poker skills competition with a betting range of a minimum bet of $10,000 all the way up to a maximum bet of $100,000 for this high stakes game. I thought that they were just doing casino Royale. Yeah. I thought at a certain point we were going to get to the whipping testicles part of the, you know, of the game.

29:10 Well, you can't really revive an episode after you say something like that.

29:17 So the, this mansion that you go to, you, did you guys, I'm assuming you guys didn't get there. I did not get that, but it would take a long time to get to this mansion. It is very evil mansion. And the music's evil. Yeah. And the lightning is evil. And you, you play against like a shrouded in a hood king with, you can't see his face. So you, I guess he has no tells. I guess that's the, that's the idea. Joe, is the lightning evil or is that just ambience? It's like, I'm not sure. Lightning is inherently evil. Yeah. Well, when it's in that context, it's evil. Yes. Okay. But also, can we talk about the way King is dressed?

29:57 Yeah. Please do. It's the most, yeah. This is like what, when you watch World Series of Poker, they're always going to have like a hat and a, and some sunglasses and a burka, you know, just so that they, so that you can't see any of their tells. Like Joe was saying. Yeah. He looks like a ninja. They're going to wear the first letter of their name on their head. So you know who they are, but because you can't see their face. With an arrow pointing to it.

30:27 Obviously that's a spade, but it doesn't look like it. Like it looks like an arrow pointing to the K. I am K. It's just a very weird ending. Not one that I thought was necessary. I feel like it could have all just still happened at the casino. This implies that like you've been kidnapped because you've made so much money at his casino. I think so. I think that makes sense. The reason it was a little lackluster for me is because it's just like whenever you, you beat the final, whoever you're, you're facing. You don't even go back to the hub.

31:01 You're just now at this castle. Like you should have at least had to like go get in a limo or something. Like, and like drive to the place or, or just walk out the door. But it's like, you don't even know what's going on. You just win a hand. And then suddenly it's like castle is there.

31:32 Guys, I can't take this any longer. I need to tell you about Casino Kid Japan. Casino Kid Japan. Yes. The Famicom version of this game. Which is obviously not known as Casino Kid Japan. It's known as $1,000,000,000 kid. And is based on the manga of the same series, $1,000,000,000 kid. It is the game that we have been describing all along. And this is just, we in North America, we're just given the stripped down version of that very same game. In Casino Kid Japan, which I will now call the $1,000,000,000 kid. Picture the same exact game.

32:13 But instead, the Japanese version has a kid imagining himself to be the casino champion. So it's not like he's actually at the casino. We see that it's like a little bit of a dream sequence, if you will. You can choose your own name. So give yourself an identity to behind your player character. It is possible to travel to other casinos, such as New York City and Japan.

32:38 But you actually have to pay the airfare costs, too, to change to these casinos. On top of that, the casino that you're in isn't a, it's not like a fake version of the Golden Nugget Casino. It actually is the Golden Nugget Casino in Las Vegas. So it actually has the correct sprites with the title of it and everything to look like the Las Vegas Strip. But here comes the kicker. It also includes slot machines and roulette in the game. They were just removed for the North America version. Oh, that breaks my heart. That kids in North America were robbed of more gambling.

33:18 Yeah, maybe it's because like slot machines and roulette have even less decisions to make. And it just is more pure gambling. No, I played a little bit of the $1 million kid. And I got to tell you, it's just like, it's not even fair that we would have, you know, we just did a whole episode. I couldn't reveal it at the beginning, obviously, because it would make talking about it useless. But it stings, right? To know that we just spent, you know, 30 minutes talking about the inferior version of this game. Wow. I guess we're going to have to do Nostalgia Bites about it. Yes, please. Who plugged Nostalgia Bites?

34:02 It's a deep cut, folks. It's not that deep. You have to listen to the episodes. One episode early. You have to listen to the episodes to get that. Anyway, now that I've revealed probably what they were terrified that we would find out. You know, I'm sure when the company is Sofel, which is all capitals, S-O-F-E-L, which stands for Software Engineering Laboratory.

34:28 They are, I believe, defunct. I don't think they've really made anything in a very long time. But when they heard NostalgiaCast was going to be a podcast that played every NES game in Crown on the corner, they were like, oh, I hope they don't find out that the North Americans got a stripped down version of our game. But we did, so now we have to talk about whether the version that we got, known as Casino Kid, not $1 million kid, is an essential game on the essential games list.

35:00 Joe, you don't get the vote first. I was going to say, what? We're breaking. I thought this was the year of Sean. No, it's the year of Sean. And so, Sean, give us your vote.

35:10 I'm not going to, I'm just going to reiterate that I am disappointed that, like, this isn't in a world where, like, everybody grows up to gamble and, like, being a pro gambler is like being a Pokemon trainer. And, like, yeah, you go from town to town and, like, the hub of every town is their casino. And there's, like, a romanceable bunny girl somewhere in each town. Like, I'm not saying that I don't not want not that. What? I'm not saying that.

35:43 But I am saying that it's just, like, it's just video poker. It's video poker with some talking heads. And so while it is charming and I thought, like, the moment-to-moment gamble play was good, I can't say that this is an essential game. I would, I'd like to play the Famicom version, though. Joe. So I'm going to start out my vote as if I never heard about this Famicom version and just talk about what I, what I was going to say. And that is, I'm going to totally, you know, throw suspense aside and lead with, I will, I'm not voting this essential.

36:30 But I think this is a really cool idea for a game. And I, I, I had a lot more fun with this than I thought I would. Like I said, I never really just, like, sit down and play, like, you know, solitaire on the computer or whatever. Like any card games or, or like, just like a poker game that doesn't, you know, that's not physically in the real world.

36:55 But just contextualizing it like this and kind of giving me the progress of, like, okay, like I already kind of, I already cleaned out this guy. Like, I've moved on to the next one. Like, I've gained enough money now to face this person. Like, now, now I could actually, like, feel this growth. I really, really liked that. And I think that this is a, like, a cool template to, like, what I wish more games down the road. Maybe they did, and I just don't know about them. But, like, had improved on and done more things where it's like, yeah, okay, now you're unlocking new types of games. Now you're unlocking, you know, yeah, some, maybe something that you do with your money. You know, like, like paying for airfare.

37:34 Or, um, or even, like, I'm not even sure that having to clean out every table and every other player is, like, the best option for, like, how you make progress. So, like, maybe there's room for improvement there, too.

37:51 But, like, this just was so unique and different. And I'm a sucker for something with, like, a hub world like this where it's, like, you know, just a small little hub world. But it's, like, over here there's something that you can unlock later. And there's a little mini game over here. And there's a little thing over here. And you can talk to this person and get a hint about what to do next and whatever. So, all that being said, I am really excited to kind of give, uh, give One Million Dollar Kit a try and see if that kind of scratches the itch a little more now.

38:19 Um, I know I'm rambling here, too. But, uh, I feel like a game like this is not necessarily something that, like, is best tied to your TV. But, like, something that would be, you know, a little more accessible if it was, like, on my phone. And it's, like, something that I'm, you know, doing on the subway or something. But, like, I feel like I'm making some progress.

38:39 Um, so, yeah. Long-winded way of saying not essential, but really cool. You should check it out. All right. I like that. And, uh, I didn't feel like you were rambling. You did a great job, Joe. Thank you. Great job, Joe. Thanks, everyone. Sean could use a little work. That's not true. It never is true. Everything I say is a lie, including... Including that I did a good job. Casino Kid. Casino Kid is an essential game. That would be a lie.

39:03 But here's the scoop. Casino Kid 2. It's going to take a while, but we are getting it in 1993 on the NES. So, we have another shot. Okay? I'm definitely not going to put this one on knowing what I know. Heck, I wouldn't even put $1 million kid on the, like, theoretical Famicom essential games list. But Casino Kid 2 has a chance to say, you know what? This time we are doing the RPG things. And I look forward to that. In the meantime, if you want to spend more time doing, like, casino stuff, I would just recommend, like, you know, yeah, you got to get through, like, a ton of story stuff. But the Yakuza games have, like, really cool casinos in them where you can play, like, blackjack,

39:42 poker, roulette, mahjong, all that stuff. So, that's very alive and fun. And those characters have personalities, obviously. But then there's even some older video games that I think are worth mentioning, like Vegas Steaks on the Super Nintendo. I played that a lot in my, like, high school years for some reason. Cooking game? Vegas Steaks? Yes. Yeah. No, it's like a tent fishing game. It's a camping game. It was a failed steak business, actually. But that and Golden Nugget 64, also another good one that I played in my childhood.

40:19 That one less for, like, personalities and actually, like, exploring a casino, but just because it had a lot of different casino games that you could play on the N64, no less. So, that's fun. So, there are other options out there. I can't give this one, but I'm not saying, like, no casino game could make it on the essential games list. I think there's something charming about an 8-bit casino that you wander around and meet people and play against them in poker battles. You heard me right. I'm going to be referring to poker as battles going forward. In real life, too.

40:52 Now, if you want more nostalgia, last week you probably had no idea where to go. You were like, ah, that's confusing. Where do I go if I want more? That's weird because I always put in the show notes the website and all that, which is www.nostalgiacast.com. I also have a link to our Patreon where you can get bonus episodes of Nostalgia, and that's patreon.com slash nostalgia.

41:15 So, if you don't look at the show notes, now you know. But you can also email us directly on the website or tweet at us on Twitter, at NostalgiaCast. These are all ways you can get in contact with us. But you could also just, if you live in, like, a major city, there's a good chance you have pigeons just wandering around the streets. I'd say talk to them and say, go to Michael Esposito, at Esposito Film on Twitter, and go send him this message. The pigeon might look at you confused for a minute, but it will probably fly off. So, the next time you see a pigeon flying in your city, know that that pigeon might very well be flying to me.

42:16 The pigeon might be flying in your city.