400 · Werewolf: The Last Warrior

• SLAMMIN VIDEO GAME ACTION JUST BUSTIN OUT
• Introduction
• What it is: A 1990 Data East side‑scrolling action game starring War Wolf, a man‑to‑werewolf hero out to stop Dr. Faryan and his bio‑monsters.
• Why it matters: Famous for its transformations (human → Werewolf → Super Werewolf), unusual wall/ceiling traversal, and a high‑risk, high‑reward power economy that feels different from typical NES brawlers.
• On‑air openers
• BOX ART: Werewolf busting out of the game?
• What’s more interesting in a strict one‑character action game what you are or what you do? Werwolf vs abilities like hanging to ceilings
• Release, Credits & Setup
• Premise (manual): On colony world Red Earth, Dr. Faryan awakens an ancient evil and enslaves humanity with mutants. Ken, last of a changeling tribe, can become War Wolf (Werewolf) and fight back.
• Did you know this wasn’t set on “our” Earth? Did the Red Earth framing change your expectations?
• Core Controls & Forms (teach early; ask inside each)
• Human
  • Basic punch/kick, short jump; vulnerable but precise.
  • Collect red W icons to transform to Werewolf (or to refill anger while wolfed‑out). Blue W icons revert you to human.
• Werewolf
  • Longer‑reach claw attacks (≈2× human damage), wall climb, ceiling hand‑walk, crawl into low tunnels, invincible backflip (press A+B together), and a screen‑wide Power Ray that costs your own health.
  • You remain Werewolf until health drops to ~¼, then you revert to human.
• Super Werewolf
  • Collect five white “bubble” orbs to fill the anger meter and briefly trigger a powered state (higher jump, double damage, improved reach). Time‑limited; damage drains it.
  • The manual says there is a way to use the red and blue orbs so that you can easily become Super Werewolf, but that doesn’t appear to be true
• Discuss now
• Is spending health on the Power Ray ever smart, or is it a trap for new players?
• Presentation & Feel (drop after Stage 1)
• Visuals: Large player sprite, readable enemy tells; occasional background/foreground confusion near ceiling hooks.
• Audio: Punchy Data East‑style tunes; stings sell transformations.
• Level Flow & Structure
• Five stages, each with mid‑sections and a boss; defeat all to reach Dr. Faryan.
• Frequent vertical segments built around wall/ceiling routes; some rooms are designed to make you rethink being only on the floor
• Long stretches between checkpoints; death sends you back a chunk.
• Stage & Boss Talking Points (sprinkle between beats)
• Stage 1 — Outskirts & Base
• Teaches wall cling (jump into wall to grab); first taste of blue vs. red W management.
• Boss: Mutant brute with simple tells—great place to practice A+B backflip timing.
• Stage 2 — Jungle/Facility Mix
• Adds ceiling‑hand‑walk sections; enemy placement punishes ground‑only routes.
• Boss: Spirit of Kinju‑style encounter (floating spirit patterns); safer as Super Werewolf.
• Stage 3 — Industrial Complex
• Tight shafts and conveyor‑like edges; crawl‑only tunnels hide orbs/powerups.
• Boss: Projectile patterns that reward backflip over standard jumps.
• Stage 4 — Caverns
• Tricky odd‑angle wall grabs and spike pits; long sections between health refills.
• Boss: The infamous Giant Head sequence—target cycles/lower safe lanes.
• Final Stage — Tower & Lab
• Tests everything: mid‑air wall catches, blue/red W management under pressure, and anger‑meter planning for boss phases.
• Final Boss: Dr. Faryan—multi‑phase; entering as Super Werewolf shrinks the fight.
• Beyond the Game
• Where “werewolves” come from
• Classical roots. Stories of humans turning into wolves go back to ancient Greece and Rome. The Greek tale of King Lycaon—punished by Zeus by being turned into a wolf—helped anchor the idea in religion and ritual; Romans used the term versipellis (“turn-skin”) for magical shapeshifters. Encyclopedia Britannica+2Encyclopedia Britannica+2
• Medieval Europe. By the Middle Ages, European folklore standardized the werewolf as a cursed person whose change might be tied to the full moon
• Trials and panics. Early modern Germany saw sensational “werewolf” trials—most famously Peter Stumpp (executed 1589), whose tortured confession fed pamphlets and art that spread the legend.
• Recent pop culture: the 2000s → today
• YA boom. Twilight (2008–2012) mainstreamed the “werewolves vs. vamps vs. romance” triangle, though its use of the real Quileute tribe drew criticism and cultural-accuracy debate. Screen Rant
• TV revivals. MTV’s Teen Wolf (2011–2017) reimagined the 1985 comedy as a supernatural teen drama, leading to Teen Wolf: The Movie on Paramount+ in 2023.
• Marvel’s spin. Werewolf by Night (Disney+ special, Oct 2022; “in color” version Oct 2023) framed a black-and-white monster-mash homage inside the MCU, boosting the character’s profile. EW.com+1
• Notable Werewolf Video Games — Quick Guide (Printable)
• A compact reference with one‑sentence blurbs and a simple “start here” path by interest.
• Play AS a Werewolf (core fantasy)
• Werewolf: The Apocalypse – Earthblood — modern action/stealth take on the World of Darkness IP.
• The Elder Scrolls III: Bloodmoon — expansion where you become a werewolf.
• World of Warcraft: Cataclysm — playable Worgen race
• Wolfchild — 16‑bit platformer centered on human→wolf transformations.
• Sonic Unleashed — nighttime “Werehog” levels shift to brawling platformer.
• Zelda: Twilight Princess — Link’s wolf form drives traversal and puzzle design.
• The Wolf Among Us — neo‑noir adventure starring Bigby Wolf (The Big Bad Wolf in Fables) as a detective

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

00:00 Werewolf, The Last Warrior, slamming video game action, just busting out.

00:22 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 I have now said that 400 times. Busting out? Yeah, yeah, yeah. The busting makes me feel good. No, I don't know what the back of the box was about that, but no, I said my opening spiel 400 times. I make a note that it is not prerecorded. The guys have to hear me say it every single time.

00:55 And I don't know, maybe somebody will put a compilation of the most interesting reads, but I'm not like The Simpsons where it's like a couch gag that changes. It's going to be you, isn't it? I'll do that. I promise. I'll let the fans do something for once. He's deleting it right now really fast. Yeah, yeah. No, no, no, no. That wasn't planned. He just crossed up the idea on his notes.

01:14 It's like, no, no, I'm too busy. I got to talk about a werewolf game. Oh, it's an interesting game to have for your 400th episode, but we did have like major league baseball as our 100th episode. So these things can't be giant celebrations. I just want to say it's great to be with you guys for 400 straight weeks. And it's also nice to be with Joe and Sean too. Yeah. Get it. I was talking to the fans.

01:39 It's unbelievable though. 400 weeks. That's like, no, I never thought pretty mundane. When you pitched this to us, I was like, yeah, we're not going to, we're not going to finish one episode of this. Joe, I actually remember you telling me early on, like the year it was going to end. Yeah. And 32. Yeah. 2032. So we're closer to it ending than it beginning. That's crazy. Time. And that will always be true. Even if we decide to cut this short because Mike has better things to do. Yeah. If we just go on hiatus, we did enough.

02:12 Yeah. True. What if we just copy the first 400 episodes and put them over the next, you know, for the next ones and it'll just be like, oh yeah, no, maybe people forgot about all those episodes anyways. So like by the time they get to 401, they're like, yeah, nobody remembers 10 yard fights. So they'll just make us the next episode. Right. I thought about that, but the problem is that that would get us to episode 800 and there are not 800 NES games. Well, yeah, we just stop it. We stopped whenever we need to stop. Do I keep titling them under the new titles though? Like, okay. Yeah.

02:43 In fact, I think we just tell the listeners to just go back and listen to these 400 again. Like we don't do anything. I'm just glad that we've decided to do this because of a particular werewolf with liquid metal arms that can shoot guns. This werewolf is, I gotta say it. I, whatever we say about this game, this game does go hard. Okay. Like this, no, cause like we never talk about it and we always forget or we put it as an afterthought, but even the music in this game goes hard. Like this is a, this is an awesome idea. And it's worth saying that like werewolf, the last warrior as like a subtitle is an amazing title in itself. But in Japan, this game was called war wolf. Like that's even better. That is way better.

03:33 Everything about like just the vibe of this game is like, just crank some 14 year olds, like composition notebook doodles, um, up to 11. And I feel like you've got werewolf. Sorry. War wolf. The last warrior. Yeah. War wolf. I wish this game was called war wolf. Instead. The like weakest version of this guy is called war wolf. Yeah. John F. War wolf. Yeah. Wolf was his last name and he just happened to be a werewolf. What are the odds? Crazy. Uh, the reason I read that back of the box slamming video game action, just busting out, uh, is because I didn't know what it meant until I looked at the box art for the game. Do you guys know what happens on the box art? Wait a minute. That's the reason you read the back of the box.

04:24 The reason, the reason why I, Oh, I guess that's not the reason. I guess what I meant is like why I included that part of the back of the box. Oh, cause he's like, he scratches his way out of the box, uh, as if like he were a real werewolf. Not even that. He scratched his way out of the cartridge. You can see like the computer, you can see the microprocessors and chips and stuff. It's like processes. You can see all the, they can actually see a little bit of like an NES cartridge remnant. Like that's pretty cool. But I don't know if it's, you know, like more action than a cartridge can hold is a great line. I just don't know if specifically.

04:59 It's not very well. Yeah. Right. To a werewolf. Right. Like it couldn't have been like, you know, the full moon or something like, yeah. It's like, well, the full moon is not involved in this game. So the pitch meeting wasn't like, how do we sell this werewolf games? Like, uh, how do we sell a video game? What should we do to like make these people want to buy this video game? I mean, I can see the like two degrees of separation that like maybe connect it where it's like the werewolf within you is ready to burst out at any second. And then like it burst out. You're a monster now. And then like now the werewolf bursting out of the cartridge. That's, you know, two steps, but how many steps is that?

05:34 Count the steps. I'm okay. I like that, Joe. That is a good pitch. Another good pitch is just, well, we're all out of heroes. So the werewolf will handle it. Right? Like that is a very strange introduction to the game of, you know, no more heroes. Fuzzball. It's werewolf. Like, it's like, what? Like I did. I did all the other heroes in this game universe died to the villain. And now like the werewolf werewolf guy is the only one left. Like there's, they're not explaining that. This is almost why I was kind of saying like, this is straight out of like some kids composition, notebook doodle section is like, there's so much implied like history going on here.

06:17 Like with the, just like the, the big bad, like it, it seems like he's just sort of walked in from having 300 comics of lore behind him. But this is like the first anyone's ever seen of this stuff. And it's almost like the tone is coming from that, that kid's notebook. It's like, yeah, I completely see that now that you, now that you say. And also I, I'd like to add that I think that kid is not super familiar with like how werewolves work in a lot of ways.

06:45 For sure. Like there's no full moon and like only as a werewolf can you wield a gun. Yeah. Like the werewolf shoots like one silver bullet, but like the silver bullet's supposed to be what kills you. And then your weakness is water, which is not a werewolf thing that I'm familiar with. This kid confused werewolves with the Hulk, right? Cause like you have an anger meter and you just keep getting angrier. If you collect that stuff to become the super werewolf, which is not a thing. There's no such thing as super werewolves. Is this, is the Hulk, uh, allergic to water too?

07:18 No, I, I don't think that there's probably a run of a comic and some continuity alternate reality. I'm sure, no, I'm sure it's actually the reverse, Joe. It's that like, you know, yeah, the Hulk could breathe forever on the water. It's like, you know, like they just do whatever to explain how amazing he is. That villain you're talking about, his name is Faryan. And, uh, in the manual it states that in order to get to Faryan, you've got a battle past his army of death slaves.

07:43 Yeah. That's a, I don't know what that is. It's, it's quite, it's quite the descriptor, but it's, it's powerful. It's powerful. Yeah. Death slaves is powerful, but like, so are they fighting against their will? Are they slaves of the grim reaper? And like, are we encountering all enemies in the game as death slaves? Like there's like a jungle level. Are all the things in the jungle part of the death slaves? If you read, uh, science notes, 1984, um, then you would know, uh, how the death slaves came to be. Um, that's a, that's a bad joke. Sorry. We'll leave it in. Yeah. We'll leave it in.

08:24 We'll do it live. Uh, here's an interesting, like, I feel like we don't even need to break down this game. We can just keep giving takes, uh, throughout the episode and that'll probably cover the entirety of the game. When you start the game, you're thrown into a boss fight right at the beginning. Has that ever happened so far in our run? As far as I know, I don't think so. Yeah. I'm trying to think what was that game?

08:47 I want to say maybe it was like an X-Men game where you're kind of like fighting a boss in a whole level. Oh, interesting. You know what I'm talking about? I don't think so. You're like, the, the, you're, you're like fighting a boss, but it's like not on just like one screen. You have like a whole stage. Let me look back. Um, didn't we just play an X-Men game?

09:05 I think you're thinking of, uh, you're thinking of Sonic the Hedgehog. We did that. That's what it is. No, no, no. You're thinking of the Punisher? We did the Punisher and we did Silver Surfer. No, no, no. We played an X-Men game, did we not? A long time ago and it was absolutely terrible. How long ago? Well, I will. Years ago. There was, there's a game that we definitely played. I'm going to look back and see if I can find it. Okay. Well, you do that. No, no. You do that.

09:32 What's interesting is, is though, is that that first fight, you are, uh, just Warwolf, which is confusing. We probably shouldn't say that because we should just say you're a regular person because Warwolf sounds awesome, right? Yeah. Human man. You're just a human man who fights with his fists. So really, you might as well just be a caveman. And you're fighting just a larger man who, uh, you know, it's like, there's nothing special about this guy either. And there's no explanation for who or why he is here.

10:00 But when you defeat him, then you become a werewolf with an awesome cut scene. And then like Sean mentioned, you find out that you have liquid metal, uh, razor blades for hands. Yeah. Hooks for hands. Um, all, all fine. In the middle of the screen of this boss fight, there is just a, a sign like a, like a wood post sign that says, don't knock.

10:22 Yeah. I was wondering what this is because it's, it's in the level proper as well, like over and over. And I have to imagine that this is, um, I have no proof of this, but I have to imagine that this is just some mistranslation of like, do not enter. Well, I do know what, I do know what it does.

10:40 So I don't, I didn't want to spoil it right away, but like the interesting thing is that the don't knock on, on this particular boss fight means nothing. If, if you, if you do what's intended to do on the other, don't knock things here, nothing happens. But so it's just like weird. It's like, what I couldn't figure it out. Like, do you not knock because you'll invite a werewolf in your house? Like, I just don't understand why it's that text.

11:03 But if you, if you literally punch the don't knock signs, I guess, knocking on the sign, it will occasionally reward you with a power up like an anger meter orb or, um, yeah, but that's like only like, that's a thing in all of the levels that the rest of them just don't say don't knock. No, I know. But I'm saying like, I thought maybe that was just like a joke. Like don't knock on this. But when you punch it, AKA knocking on it, that like, it actually does reward you. So you don't have to like, you don't have to listen to authority, man. I'm going to grant you 10.

11:36 Wow. Oh, right. The whole game is boss. That's what I was thinking. I see. Not bad, Joe. Good poll. Thank you. Um, I'm going to grant you that that is one interpretation, but I'm going to go with mine. Okay. I like yours as well that it's just a mistranslation or there's also an arrow pointing, uh, like to the way this to the left, the direction you're not supposed to walk in. So maybe it's just trying to like, you know, like don't do not enter or like, you know, trying to like persuade you not to play the game or something. Yeah. That villains wrote it like rad.

12:10 Yeah. Well, yeah. War Wolf's pretty rad. Yeah. Um, but it's, yeah, as far as this, uh, this opening boss fight, I think I, I get what they were going for. Cause they want you to fight a boss as, as war wolf, flip the regular guy, war, human man, human man on his way to his, his dead end office job. Uh, they want you to fight a boss and like, see, well, the company hits it takes to fight them. And then they make you the werewolf. And it's like, look, it takes two less hits to kill them.

12:40 But like, I think the idea was supposed to be like, wow, you feel so powerful now that you're, uh, I mean, you do that you're the werewolf. There, there is, there is a pretty good, uh, contrast there because if, if I did have to play the whole game, uh, as the man and not just every time I took too much damage, uh, it would be much worse.

13:00 I agree. I just feel like that, that, uh, trope or that, uh, like device that they use to try and make you like appreciate the werewolf felt a little rushed and a little unearned. Like, you know, like really, you didn't, it's like, oh yeah, here's this quick fight. You do it real quick. It's like, now you're a werewolf. It's like, oh, see how different it is. I don't know. I would like to have to earn being a werewolf a little more, you know, it's kind of like getting the running shoes or getting the bike in Pokemon. It's like, well, they made me walk slow for like a whole level before I could actually be like, oh great. This is so much better now.

13:32 I, I can see where you're coming from. The game is so like, it's not short for me because I die a lot, but there isn't, there isn't like that much game. So I wonder how much it would take.

13:45 I think like, honestly, literally just not it being the very first thing that happened. It's like, you forget about that. It's like, oh yeah, I fought that guy earlier, but like, that was like one, one minute of the game that I've been playing for like 40 minutes now.

13:56 Yeah. You also kind of like, if you're me at least take the idea of ever going back into the human form for granted. Like I, you kind of assume like, oh, I am the werewolf now and I'm just going to be this badass character. Like you can revert back to the human. Even if you take a, I think it's like a quarter, if you're down to like a quarter of your health, you revert back to the human form and then you lose like a lot of stuff. Like we were joking that like, he just does two times the damage. So just two bars instead of one. But I mean, you can't climb on the walls. You can't walk. You can't crawl on stuff. You can't do somersaults. Yeah. You can't do those invincibility backflips that are so awesome.

14:34 Um, it's like none of that stuff all goes away. Uh, so that's like, it's kind of interesting that I kind of felt like it was like, oh, you're a human for this one moment and then you become the, the werewolf. But it's actually like, no, it's this thing where you kind of balance between human werewolf and super werewolf, depending on how well you're playing. And that's cool too. I think the pacing would have been a little weird, Joe, if you were the human for too long. Like this game clearly wasn't designed to have you be, um, just werewolf for the entire game. Human man.

15:09 And you probably could, there probably are human man speed runs, but, uh, we're going to, for the, for my sake and purposes, like the werewolf is like the form you want to be in and how you want to like make progress in this game. Yeah. I guess it just felt more like becoming a man again felt more like a punishment rather than becoming a werewolf feeling like a reward. I kind of agree, but I mean, I don't want to give this game too much credit because I'm gonna, I'm, I'm gonna give this game a lot of not credit soon, but I think that's like what it should have been. The game isn't called a man who sometimes becomes werewolf. Yeah. All werewolves are men who sometimes become werewolves.

15:52 Well, not in this kid's head probably, but yeah, you're right. Right. Yeah. So after that, don't knock screens where you're allegedly supposed to knock to get some power ups, uh, you will go to this underground area and immediately hit probably the first wall of the game. Am I, am I correct in thinking that, uh, those like death spikes that, uh, have, you can't jump over the platform.

16:18 You have, no, no, not the lightning that comes next. That's the, that's the second block roadblock. I see. The one where you have to figure out that you can climb on the ceiling. The game never taught you about it. It is in the manual, but the game never taught you about it. And then you're like, Oh, that's all I had to do was just jump up onto the ceiling. And then nothing happens. It doesn't, it doesn't connect. You don't start climbing on the wall. You just are jumping and all the while bats are spawning from one side of the screen to the other. And they hit you. And so you have to kind of like balance attacking them, making sure that they're cleared and then trying to cling to this wall.

16:51 Is the timing just really awkward? Am I really bad at this? No. Okay. The, the, okay. This is, this is where my, my tone's going to shift because we were, we were all talking about like just the aesthetic and the bad-assery of this game. But like when you actually sit down and play it, it's, it's like you dipped your NES controller in some kind of like something that's at once slippery and also really sticky, like some kind of goop that does that to you. Um, because yeah, if you try and jump and grab the ceiling or the pipe or whatever's up there, uh, it will work one out of 10 times.

17:29 Um, and then you might accidentally jump off because you've kind of been, you've just been spamming this, uh, for so long that you may not even be, be paying attention to the, uh, the feedback of the game actually like, like hooking on to the thing. So you got to do it again. And then the, the bats keep coming. And so, yeah, that it's, you have to be so precise to, to be able to actually pull this off. Yeah. And I don't know. I'm trying to remember cause I read the manual for this.

17:58 I don't, I'm trying to remember how well it describes that in the manual because another thing it doesn't describe properly that I remember was that holding up while you jump makes you jump higher, which is also a wall for me. Like how to grab onto things and how to jump high enough. Yeah. Not, not the hardest thing to figure out on your own, but like, if you don't even know you can do it, there needs to be something there to like, kind of, you will eventually

18:23 get stuck on something you didn't mean to get stuck on. And that will teach you that you can climb walls because you didn't mean to jump onto the one, uh, werewolf height wall. You meant to jump over it, but you walk too close to it. So now you're stuck and now you have to remember that you have to jump backwards and not just sort of like step away from it in order to unstick yourself. So again, slippery, sticky goop. Joe, in the manual, there's a whole section on ceiling walking and it explains that you're not Spider-Man. Like you don't have sticky palms or whatever that allow you to cling to these things.

18:59 It's your blades that, uh, you're kind of hooking onto those pipes or whatever so that you can cross. But it says to grab onto the ceiling, jump with the B button, which didn't bother me. I saw some comments online that it's like flipped between the B for jump instead of a, I don't know, kind of didn't bother me at all. I figured it out, which one does what. And then your brain just like, I don't know about you guys, but like, as long as I'm playing the game, I map my brain to that game's controls. And if I step away and start playing another game and come back like a week later, I have to like relearn the entire control scheme again.

19:34 Yeah. Does that happen? To an extent. I was, I was still getting, because I'm so used to the opposite. Uh, I was still realizing like, Hey, I'm not, I'm not doing what I'm, what I want to do. Like I, every screen I would accidentally jump.

19:49 Um, when I meant to hit something. Yeah. But it's, but like, even in a modern game, like if you walk away from, um, uh, what's a game you played recently? I don't play video games, Mike. Okay, great. Sorry. Cause I was going to do like something a little more complex, like, um, Final Fantasy seven rebirth, right? Like a game that has a very in depth action combat in real time. So you have to know what you're doing.

20:11 I played 200 hours of that game. If I jumped in right now, after a year off, I don't think I am going to know how to like, I'm going to know what I want to do, but controller wise, I'm not going to have the input skills. So I feel like my brain kind of resets all muscle memory and controller inputs other than a plastic guitar, uh, right out the window. So as soon as I'm done with them, I think you're right.

20:35 I think the same goes for me, but when you have a situation where there is sort of standards, like if you're going to play a from soft game that, you know, the, the controls are more or less going to be the exact same with some, with some very small tweaks. If you're playing a first person shooter, uh, maybe earlier, maybe like 15, 20 years ago, there was a lot more things that could be different. Um, but now it's all kind of coalesced around a standard. And I'm not saying that like the NES has a standard, but I feel like I don't know. And I don't know what the percentages of games that have a or B for jump being, but I think there's enough to say that it will throw a lot of people off. Yeah. And at least it's a button as opposed to a D pad.

21:24 Yes. But I still am okay with up his jump. So to get back to the original point, uh, Joe, you press the jump button, which is the B button. And then you have to punch up, which is the control pad and the A button together to dig into the wall theoretically, like the ceiling of it. That's what the game is saying. But the game mentions timing is crucial. It does not mention what that timing is. And I don't, I think it is. I think it's a case by case thing on like whatever little, I mean, like, are they even doing a hitbox thing? Like they have to be, I suppose. But what is the hitbox? Cause it's clearly not the pipes.

22:01 This was frustrating. Yeah. And I, I'll say that. I think that even though they don't tell you the timing, I do think that my complaint there is invalid because it does tell you in the, uh, in the manual, but I still want a valid similar complaint. So I'm just going to shift it up to under werewolf in the manual. It says, uh, your power ray will send shockwaves throughout the entire screen. Uh, it does not say what button to hit or what to do to use this power ray.

22:27 Um, and then also I want to refer back to my jumping higher. The A button is the B button is jump, but B and up is how you really jump to get anywhere. Holding up makes you jump higher. Now wait to, to do the power ray. Don't you just hold down the A button? And then after holding it for a little bit, release it.

22:47 Yep. And it does say that in the manual. And I see that right now. Okay, good. And I, I was like, I was just saw it. I was like, now your point is just perfect. Perfect. That one doesn't in there, but it is. The up jump is, is, uh, is not explained, but I mean, I think you're going to accidentally do that. Just like you can accidentally get stuck on a wall. You're going to accidentally up jump and figure that out. Yeah. I didn't accidentally. I just started experimenting after I was like stuck and I was like, there's gotta be a way to jump higher. So I figured it out. But I was a little annoyed that like, that wasn't also just like, I don't know. Just let me hold a to jump higher.

23:20 Right now you're talking about the sewers, right? That's where you got stuck. Yeah. Yeah. It's like, it is such a, there has to be something intended and it's never usually, oh, maybe it's some button input that the game didn't tell me about. Right? Like this is the first time I can think of where you're supposed to do something that the game didn't tell you in order to get back to an area and not just like, oh, I fell in the sewers. I guess I got to go back to the left and find the staircase to go back up and try to make that jump again. It's like, no, you're supposed to fall into the sewers and then just super jump out of them. What? Oh, you, okay. I see what you mean.

23:57 I, I, I saw, well, okay. But then you've got the Swami or whoever the hell like telling you about the sewers like these, and that you're going to want to maybe avoid some conflict. So I figured that you would come back out. Like it's got like split. It's just like several different, um, Oh, for sure. Split paths. Yeah. And there are certain parts where like, if you fall into the one part I'm thinking of where it's like actually impossible to jump across the,

24:23 pit. So you have to fall into the sewer. You can't make forward progress inside the sewers. That's why I was saying like, Oh, maybe I just have to go back. It's like, I wouldn't think like, Oh, I just have to super jump to reach the other side of the platform. Like I didn't know it existed. So why would I think? Yeah. Right. So it's like, Oh, maybe, yeah, maybe I should howl at the moon too. Right? Like maybe there's a button input to do that.

24:46 I do wish there was a hell at the moon. I, you know what? I actually think that that's what the, whatever superpower thing we were talking about is basically the same howling at the moon. Um, but, uh, they, the, the second, I guess, hurdle that you referenced earlier, we're supposed to backflip through a lightning ray, uh, uh, hallway.

25:09 It's gotta be the only thing that you can do though. Right? Like I've, I've, I never saw another solution, but it's not that nobody would think to do that. What? No. Why would you backflip through a room? Are you Michael Jackson? That was like, I didn't know what it wanted me to do until I went and watched somebody do it. That's exactly how I got there too. I was like, I guess because otherwise like, okay, I see a pipe up there. I was on a pipe before.

25:32 Like it's a slightly different sprite this time. And I'm like, I'm again, I'm trying to time it. And there is like this sort of little hole that you can go through. It looks like it's navigable. Um, so I spent, because this is, we didn't mention this, but each level is timed. So I probably wasted 120 of the maximum, like 250 seconds trying to time this stupid jump to, to go above the lightning hallway. And I'm like, okay, screw it. Maybe I just got to power through it and I'll have enough life. But like it, you're just going to keep getting shocked and then you will first become human man and then you will die.

26:11 Um, and then, yeah, it's like, I guess you just got a backflip. You gotta, you gotta matrix it. Yeah. And, and honestly the backflip, it makes sense, I guess the way it works, but it's not, it's not like, it doesn't feel good to do. You have to face the opposite way that you want to go because you're backflipping. But my brain just cannot get around that. Like you have to face left and then hold the backflip button to go right. But then if you hold the right D pad button, you're going to go left. And like, I'm just too wired to hold the direction that I want to be moving. So that really threw me off. And like, I'm just too wired to move.

27:22 I'm so glad you mentioned the timer, Sean, because this is one of the first games I can think of too, where like sometimes the timer is there and it's just kind of like, okay, I don't know why they're trying to make me rush through the stage, but like, whatever, 500 seconds, 400 seconds. Sure. This was the first game in recent memory where I like, I died several times because I ran out of time.

27:41 Yep. Oh, and I don't, I don't know what that's about. Like you never feel like in super Mario brothers, you always like hear maybe the fast music on the later stages. And sometimes maybe like a few levels will give you a quick call, but you never ever like have a moment early on where you're like, Oh shit, I'm going to die because of the time or not because I suck at the game. This is the kind of game where it's like, I guess maybe I'm just like not good at the traversal of being the werewolf, but like, Holy shit, this, this guy is clunky as hell to control.

28:13 Yep. Well, this one is like the, the best example of like why I don't like timers. I think because I mean, could anyone, could you even put yourself in the mind of the person that pitched this and like, tell me like, what does it, what does it bring to this game that the game doesn't already have? Like, does it give you a sense of like urgency? Like there's enemies coming at you all the time and everything feels like intense. It's this really short timer. It does nothing other than I guess like artificially inflate the time of the game because you die more often.

28:44 It's gotta be that because again, this isn't a very long game at all. So I think that that's just another thing so that you can't just, you can't just sort of like tiptoe through each level just to make it so that, you know, you can't, you can't rent it and be done with it. Right. Joe, you mentioned the enemies and they are, they are brutal at times. There are some areas that are very manageable and you get like one enemy at a time or whatever, but on some of these more open areas, there are sometimes like three to four enemies that just kind of like spawn in from anywhere.

29:24 Yeah, this is an issue that we had before, like early on in the podcast when like, oh, it's like a side-scrolling action game. You're just gonna get a bunch of crap thrown at you.

29:36 I know that the spawns are all like, not all of them, but most of the spawns are like hand-placed, but then you've got areas where you just get like hit by a falling leaf. And apparently that's supposed to hurt you. And that just keeps happening randomly.

29:54 And especially on like the city level with the sewers, if you're on, if you're top side, you're going to be attacked by like some dude with either a shopping cart or a pogo stick. I can't tell, um, a, some kind of, uh, almost Xenomorph monster and people are throwing bricks and Molotov cocktails all at the same time. And it's just chaos. The people throwing the bricks is like the icing on the cake too. Cause that's the one that hits you the most. Like the, at least the guy is like, yeah, he's got annoying movement, but he's like a large sprites. You can kind of avoid it. But whatever reason the bricks and the bombs are just like, it's bombarding. It's happening so often that it's littering the screen.

30:37 You would think it's like, okay, they throw the bomb and then I wait for it to blow up. And then I just walk through, but it's like, no, you have to like be really precise with your timing or else you're just going to get hit by the next one. They throw, that's how fast they throw them. That stuff happens. And then later on too, like if you're like me and experimented with just infinite health to, to make it through the rest of this game. Uh, there are later on, there's a bunch of like ninjas that are supposed to be lightning fast or whatever. So they, you know, like ninjas are. And so they have like teleporting moves or what have you, but the illusion of it.

31:11 It's so hard to read where they are and where they're going and when they're going to attack. Cause sometimes they're just like on the screen, not necessarily attacking you that you will just get hit a lot by that. Even with infinite health, it was amazing how much of this game I was still like just being hit stunned by other enemies because they were constantly barraging me.

31:33 It's a little too much. And I don't love when you have a lot of different enemies moving in different patterns on screen at the same time. Cause then it just becomes kind of impossible. Like you, you can't really dodge. You can't really attack. You can't really like take in what you're seeing. Cause they're coming in from all different directions too. It just feels, it feels numbing to the point where I'm like, I don't think I want to keep playing this. And that's not a great feel.

32:01 Even early on, there's the second boss of the game, or maybe it's the first one, that green guy who, um. The goop guy? Yeah, the goop guy. Yeah. You attack him and he's like a pushover. You can just like attack him six times in a row before he does anything. But the thing he does is like devastating. It's, he turns into two green balls that are invincible.

32:21 Right. And they just chew around the screen. And I can't decide. The first time I did it, they were, these green balls just whipping around. Like it's like a super ball, like bouncy ball that someone like whipped at the wall, just bouncing around everywhere. There's no avoiding it. And that went for a long time and I died. But then when I got back to it, that only lasted for like five seconds. And then it went back. I was like, I don't know what determines when this thing ends. But the first time I was, I just could not avoid it.

32:45 I couldn't tell either. I thought it was maybe like once one hits you, uh, that one goes away. And then there's like a second ball. And then like maybe once that, I don't know. Uh, I was able to survive it, but I could not tell any kind of logic to it. Yeah. And it's made worse by the fact that there's a, did we mention? A fast timer in this game and you have to just kind of wait this out. And it's like, what if you're down to like 30 seconds? Like you're not, it might take 30 seconds for them to come off screen.

33:14 There are, uh, there is one fun enemy though. And it's in the, uh, the second level of the game before the goop guy, those, um, those guys with the guns, they're wearing blue or whatever.

33:28 Oh, the hoes. Yeah. And they go, Oh, you know, I've never seen that before, but that is fun. They're like, Oh, and then they shoot you. So funny. What's funny is, is that if they come in from the left side of the screen, they are, you know, the, the sprite is flipped obviously. So instead of saying, Oh, they say, Oh, I was a fan of these guys, but partially because they're the only ones that drop like gun ammo. Um, and also because they, they're, they're fairly easy to come by, but they're also just so silly.

34:01 Like, but between the, the, them being the only time that you just see text on a screen, aside from when you walk past that street fight that I guess happens. Um, uh, they also just look like something out of Power Rangers. It's very funny. Yeah.

34:17 The, the fight, the street fight, are you talking about the guys who, after you finish the fight, start yelling fight? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Cause that's strange, right? It's like you finished the boss fight and then they're like fight and then you see another boss, but then he just leaves the screen and you leave the screen.

34:37 I couldn't tell if that was like supposed to be a, it felt like a glitch. Playing with, playing with your, uh, expectations or if there was a fight happening behind the wall or if, yeah, it was just bad scripting. I don't know. Did anyone play around with the super werewolf form? Did you, were you able to get to a super werewolf? Uh, I got the super werewolf like maybe once or twice, but I, I mean, yeah, I, I didn't really notice too much of the benefits to it. To be honest, I was by most of the time in regular werewolf form. I mean, it's just the double damage thing is probably the most useful. Glow. Yeah. You glow. And you have a higher jump naturally.

35:19 Your jumps already so high though. I'm not sure I've noticed the difference. Especially in like, in the levels that aren't open. Like a lot of these are narrow hallways. I don't say it helps. It might hurt. Right. Oh, it extends your claws too, I believe. I think, I think your, yeah, your claws have a little more reach.

35:36 Well, there's also a way supposedly to get to it from werewolf straight to super werewolf. Oh, I'm so glad you brought this up. This is something that is written in the manual and I'm checking and double checking and triple checking. Because it's in the manual and I, and I saw it as well. And I can tell you that to this day, no one knows what that means. Okay. Because the way they're describing it is like you get a blue W, which is, which usually hurts you, but you have to do something else with it. But I don't know what else you could do with it.

36:10 Like, I think that's what it says in the manual. Yeah, the manual says that it's a, it's a Farian, the villain of the game's trick is these blue W's that, you know, because a red W will transform you into the werewolf. The blue W will basically revert you back to the human form. It says if you're already human, it will make you lose life points. However, there is a way to turn the tables on Farian and use his blue W in combination with a red one to go directly to super werewolf status. What does that mean? That doesn't mean anything to me, but also it seems like maybe Farian wrote the manual and he's trying to trick it out like collecting these. Yeah, like it's part of the trick.

36:51 It's gotta be. I, I, I kind of like that. The idea that Farian, that's so, he's so tricky that just like the werewolf, he has come out of the game and is interacting with us in the real world. So we love this game. Essential. No. Well, hold on. Hold on. Both of those things have to happen later in the episode. Okay. First, I would like to talk about other werewolf games.

37:16 Can't think of any. Right? Isn't there a, isn't there a Legend of Zelda where you're like a werewolf? Is that a Twilight game? There's a, there's a Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess game. Oh, wow. We were both on it. I guess they were, yeah. I never thought about that, Sean. The Twilight may be a reference to, to Twilight. But yes, Link turns into a wolf in that one. We have a running joke on our Discord just about how terrible this game is. We, we consistently call it one of the worst games of all time. It is not. It is not one of the worst games of all time. However, it's definitely one of the more disappointing Zelda games. Oh. Maybe the most disappointing is in Zelda 2.

37:57 I was disappointed in Zelda 2. I know. I was just trying to rile up people again. Look at me. Oh, I'm riled. There's another werewolf game, Sonic Unleashed. Sonic turns into a werehog.

38:10 I could think of like, you know, it would be a pretty cool game. Like if, if we made like a modern werewolf thing where, you know, you get, you get really mad. Is that, is that a thing? Is anger, so anger isn't a werewolf thing. No, it's just a full moon. Yeah. But, but Sean, you're our, you're our CRPG guy. Did you play Elder Scrolls 3?

38:33 Uh, yeah. I know you could turn into a vampire. I didn't know you could turn into a werewolf. There was apparently. Well, you could turn into a werewolf in 5 and 4, I think too. Yeah, 5, I think. I don't know if you can do it in 4, but 5 as well. But 5 is referencing this thing in 3 because you go to the same island. It, it was DLC called Elder Scrolls 3 Blood Moon.

38:52 And that expansion, you become a werewolf. And then, yes, you go back to that. Good. Look at Joe. Joe knows his stuff. In 5, you go back to it. I'm a big, big Skyrim and Oblivion fan. Uh, there was a more recent werewolf game where you, you know, you play as a werewolf, but it has pretty bad reviews. It's called Werewolf the Apocalypse Earthblood. And it's like, is that two subtitles? That's too many subtitles. Yeah, werewolf the Apocalypse Earthblood.

39:18 And it's kind of like a, an action stealth game. And I'm like, why would a werewolf need to be stealthy? Yeah, I feel like all werewolves do are just like, be like, more animalistic. I thought that was their shtick. And there is a werewolf, uh, or werewolf-like race in World of Warcraft called the Worgans. But we, we don't play any of that shit, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. What are we, nerds? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, oh, and then there's the Wolf Among Us.

39:48 Uh, which, uh. Oh, yeah. But that's like. Oh, yeah. That doesn't matter. Not, you're not, yeah, yeah, yeah. No werewolf stuff. But like, yeah, I mean, the big bad wolf, right? He is a big bad wolf that's also like a hard-boiled dude. Yeah, so, so if we're counting wolf games, man, we could open this whole thing up, right? Is Okami, is that a wolf? He's a wolf. That's a wolf. There you go, look. But he's not a werewolf. Yeah, these are like, you're talking only games that you play as a werewolf or that include werewolves? Well, now we're just thinking about wolves. Right, this segment is called. Just wolves in general. This segment is now called, where are the wolves?

40:24 Werewolves. Werewolves? Swearwolves? What are frogs? Frogs. Like, what are, what are frogs? Yeah, what are frogs? It's an amphibian. Okay, great. And then I just have to mention this because I was doing a little bit of just trying to make sure I know enough about werewolves to talk about them if we had to on this show.

40:44 And I'm glad Joe brought up most of those things about like, silver bullets are supposed to kill these guys, but he's shooting them and that there's no full moon. And so we brought up most of that stuff. But in my research, I came across, now we all know about the Salem witch trials, but in Germany, they had like kind of the same thing with werewolf trials. Did you guys know about this? Well, that's so much cooler. Was it dudes this time? Yeah, they killed a guy. Oh, they're accusing him of a werewolf.

41:14 But if you're a werewolf, like with witches, it's like, oh, we got to see if they sink underwater and like put a fish on their head and see if they twitch or something. But like with a werewolf, it's just like you can definitively prove it. Just like wait until the full moon and see if they turn into werewolf. Well, maybe they had the common sense to think like, oh, maybe that's just in the stories and you could actually suppress it. In this, you have to be angry and pick up a little red W in conjunction with a blue W.

41:42 But like were there tests? Did you do enough research to see if there were like werewolf tests? Well, the problem is, is that this guy, Peter Stump, and I'm not going to commit any slander against this guy because that's a pretty terrible way to die. It's pretty bad. This is in the 1500s. It's pretty bad to like be killed because people thought you were a werewolf. Like that's insane, right? Imagine if that's on your tombstone. I feel like that would be a pretty good way to go. I mean, that's what people... He was beheaded. That was the end of... I guess that's how you kill a werewolf. You behead them. I never heard that. I guess I just would have appreciated more like testing.

42:20 Yeah, right? Because so he is though, he's like all about it in a weird way. He confessed to participating in black magic since he was 12 years old. He said that the devil gave him a magic belt when he was a kid. Like he has the ability to metamorphosize. So he was like asking for it in a way, right? He's a werewolf. That is that he was a werewolf.

42:44 Yeah. He's like, he's kind of creating a lot of the lore if you think about it. He says that wearing the belt transformed him into a wolf and that like removing the belt made him transform back into a human. Yeah. Then give him the belt. Right, right, right. Where's the belt? I guess conveniently lost that day. But he also said that he would...

43:02 Not he said this, but he was rumored to have like consumed a lot of blood. Okay. I mean, that's just more vampire stuff though. Okay. So this is like the Salem witch trials. Like the reason we call things witch hunts is because like, oh, we're just like trying to find something wrong with this person so we can attack him or we're looking for a witch and we're finding all these little things.

43:24 This guy was not being like witch hunted. This guy was like making up that he was a werewolf and trying to sell everybody that he's a werewolf. Almost like he was using it as an excuse to kill 14 children. Yeah. He was drinking blood. Like, all right. Like, I know I no longer feel any sympathy. He confessed to killing and eating 14 children and two pregnant women. Well, he was just executed.

43:50 I don't believe he did any of that now. Right. I just I think he was just asked. This is like death by cop, you know, just trying to do it. The coolest ways to pull out your wallet to show. Yeah. Right. But but his Wikipedia stub is pretty cool. It says that he's a German farmer, alleged serial killer who was accused of witchcraft, cannibalism and werewolfery. Now, werewolfery is just again, a new term for me. It's like foolery. Yeah. Werewolfery.

44:20 But, you know, I just thought that out of all the things I learned about werewolves this week, not much of it. The only other thing I thought was interesting was that like werewolves go back to ancient Greece. I didn't know that they went back that far.

44:32 Would have thought it went farther. Yeah. Oh, interesting. Well, I guess like, yeah, theoretically. But I don't know, I feel like most werewolf lore is isn't like that quicker time with the with the witches and stuff. Right. Like there's witches. There's don't bring the Quakers into this. I mean, like that. They didn't do anything like they brought themselves. They were chill dudes. Right. They were chill dudes. All right. And we'll go back to keeping this a chill episode in our final segment. The Essential Games List.

45:04 Werewolf the Last Warrior does go hard, but it is also hard to play this game. And I came up with that on the fly. So I deserve some kind of credit. But also, I just want to say that as I was playing this game again, like a couple hours before this record, just to make sure to confirm my beliefs, because I was like, oh, maybe this is actually like if you're if you like difficult NES games, we could recommend this. Maybe. I don't think even that's the case because the controls are so poor. If you just want to see what this game's about, you know, I can't stop you play on a full moon night.

45:40 But for the most part, like the part that bothers me the most is like, you know, the the littered with enemies screens and the sometimes confusing like, oh, you got a backflip to get through these electric rays. Like that stuff is just like it's not telegraph. So that's that feels bad. The problem is the minute to minute gameplay and control of the werewolf.

46:01 Doesn't feel cool. You know, we were talking in the past on other episodes about like transformations, whether they are in platformers or whether they are in shmups. Right. There are there are certain transformations that like, oh, I get it. I finally collected all the power ups and now I feel like a badass. I didn't feel like the werewolf really controlled all that better than the man. Other than the fact that he's like obviously stronger and, you know, a different sprite. But like it didn't feel like, oh, you want to be the werewolf because that's where the tight gameplay is. There is no tight gameplay in this game. So it's a no for me. Sean. Yeah.

46:40 This has excellent presentation, at least like visually and and just vibes. It's got terrible, but like so bad. It's good storytelling. Like we didn't talk about this in the show, but like there is a moment where there's just like this description that you died off screen and that the world is lost. And then in the same paragraph says, but somehow you overcame it and you're back. And that just drops you into the next level. It's it's so sophomoric. It's it's hilarious. It is. Um, but, uh, all that stuff's great. But again, like the the controls are so bad. It feels so bad to play this game that you can't. I can't put it there. Um, but still it'll stick in my memory. Not essential. Joe. Yeah, it.

47:34 It doesn't feel great to play. I mean, you both kind of said this. I don't have too much more to add. It just it just it kind of feels sticky. It kind of feels like like I don't I get what they're trying to do. I appreciate the way they're doing it, but I don't ever feel like a badass werewolf. Really? I mean, I don't feel that different as a werewolf as I do as the guy. You know, it takes fewer hits to kill things. But like, I don't know, just overall mediocre experience. I'm going to say not essential. I feel like I don't feel that different as a werewolf than I do as a guy would be like if you've had a werewolf. Yeah, in like therapy, he might say that.

48:14 Yeah, that's true. I like that. It's worth mentioning the werewolf version of the game doesn't change anything really. It has a really awesome box art, though, of the of the werewolf with his blades for hands or whatever. Edward werewolf.

48:35 But it's it changes one thing in the manual. That's very strange. And it's probably it's probably just a weird translation or whatever. But I guess not because it goes into it a little more than just one line. But this takes place on red earth instead of I forgot about that. Yeah, what is red earth? Is this like future Mars?

48:57 Right. But like, why even bother? Why bother changing like again? Oh, my suspension of disbelief. Like, here's the other thing that we forgot to mention. Like we never I doubt that maybe Mike, you did after you turn on invincibility. But once you beat the game, you get this really cool image of of the werewolf holding the American flag. So is there like in America on red earth? Well, red earth just has to be like earth to right earth to America one.

49:30 There's only one America. Make that the art for this episode, please. Yeah. I mean, that it is pretty awesome because he's also implied to be naked, but just hairy enough on the bottom half. Like you don't write anything.

49:43 Sean, since you saw the ending, you also must have seen that there is a cliffhanger. Oh, yeah. Yeah. There's an end credit scene. I can't even tell what it's supposed to be. Maybe it's supposed to be like another big bad, but like it just so you get just like a little slice of something. And I don't know what it's supposed to be. So, yeah, it's just next time. And thankfully, there wasn't one. Darn. It would have taken place on blue earth. I'm sure. We're blue earth. I think you just blew yourself.

50:20 We're not done, though. Yeah, we're not done. Of course not. Because it's our 400th episode. And you know what I always like to do on those 100 landmark episodes is have a little trivia contest. Do you have a name for this game? Nope. I don't. We could workshop one. Whose line is it anyway? There we go. Perfect. Never been done before. On episode 500, maybe I'll have a name for this. It's evolving every 100 episodes.

50:50 Yeah. But all right. If anyone doesn't remember what we do here, normally I have a list of quotes that we've said before. And I award Sean and Mike, who are on a team, points for whenever they can decide who said this quote. And an additional point usually for if they can tell me what episode it was in. Okay. Last time we did this, well, the first time we did this, friend of the show, Mark Pascualato, played the game first. And you guys tried to beat him, which you did. The second time we did it, your goal was to beat your previous record percentage, which was 50% exactly. Okay. And you tied it. So this time I'm hoping you can beat it.

51:39 So we're only as good as a coin flip? Yeah. You're only as good as a coin flip. Now I will say that sometimes these are pretty difficult to decide what episode it was from. I think that's like sometimes that's the harder thing. Sometimes it's easier, depending on the context. But that's included in the percentage? We were also right about that 50% of the time? Each one is worth a point. Okay. So you need to... This is nuts. Got it. This game today will be worth, I believe, a total of 39 points. So you need to get like at least 20 points to beat your previous record.

52:16 I'm not feeling good about it. I'm feeling absolutely great. I know everything I've ever said. We know that about you, Sean. That's one thing we know about you. You never forget something you said on the podcast.

52:31 All right. Well, let's get started then. Question number one, a quote you need to answer. There's only one where you don't have to answer both, so I'll let you know. Trick question. You have to answer both.

52:43 Here's the quote. He's only the bad guy if you don't believe in, I guess if you're not a fan of tax evasion. Mike. Interesting. Sure, I'll say me. Okay. Do you want that answer first or do you want to decide what episode? We want to say it's me first. It is you. Okay, great. Great. I don't know what game that's from. Tax evasion. Well, Yoshi evades his taxes. Before you keep going, two things I forgot to mention, just so you know. These are tools in your arsenal.

53:16 One, all of these quotes are from somewhere from episode 300 to episode 400. Okay. And some of these quotes, like multiple will be from the same game. So keep that in mind. That could be helpful. Uh-oh. Okay. Can you read the quote one more time? He's only the bad guy if you don't believe in, I guess if you're like not a fan of tax evasion. Okay. So is it like Casino Kid? Yeah. I was going to say either Casino Kid or the one where you trade stocks. But I don't think there's like a villain in that game. Is there? No, that's a, yeah, that's a good call. There's probably no villain in, ah, shit. But Wall Street Kid, though, could be it as well. And that sucks. Maybe we were saying that you play the villain.

54:05 Hmm. Yeah. If you play the villain, then you're Wall Street Kid, right? Yeah. Let's go with that. I think. Okay. Wall Street Kid. It is not Wall Street Kid, although that's probably the guess that I would have made too. This is a tough one because this is from Street Fighter 2010, the game that I couldn't remember earlier. I think we were talking about Scooby-Doo.

54:31 We got to talking about Scooby-Doo. Oh, my goodness. Wow. This is going to be ridiculous. I'm only going to get them in the context of the game. No, that's great. I love it. You're at 50% right now. Yeah, we're good. We're good. All right. Next. The quote is, are you in your name?

54:49 Now, that's Sean. I know that that is Sean. That was me. That is Sean. I don't remember. I don't remember what game it was. No, we were doing it because we were doing something with like the name screens, you know, where like you type in your name or whatever. No, no. Where you type in your name. Okay. Are you in your name? Okay. So, it was Sean, but maybe it wasn't. Maybe it was like Sesame Street.

55:15 I know it had something to do with like, it was, oh, Spot? Spot? Cool Spot. Not Cool Spot. Something about Spot. Oh my God. You're right. Right, right, right, right. Spot the one that's like the Othello. Spot the video game. Give us some grace on it for something exact title. No, you're going Sean, Spot the video game? Yes. Correct on both accounts. See, they're not all crazy hard. Yeah, I know. You could get there. Spot. Because Spot is in the name Spot. Right, right. Some of them are crazy hard though, so just keep that in mind.

55:53 All right, next. And also, I'm sorry. And they're also having an HD mode in the game too that removes the NES graphical style. Hmm. Well, that's got to be me. We laughed at the idea that like the NES graphical style could be removed revealing the HD mode underneath it. Right, right, right. Okay. So this was about a game that was remastered or remade or something. But then again, it could have been about something entirely different. If it could also be about Scooby-Doo, so. Joe, could you possibly be one of the persons who says the line? Yeah. Oh, okay, okay. So maybe this is a Joe thing.

56:30 It sounds like a Mike-ism, but. It does sound like me, but I guess I'm just thinking that's like a Joe quip, you know? Like I mentioned that there's a remake and then Joe says, yeah, and they're also removing the NES graphics. Yeah, I see that. I can go with Joe on this. Okay, but I don't have the faintest idea. What game it is, yeah. They're removing the NES graphics. I'll give you the tiniest of hints. This is an out-of-the-box hard one. Out-of-the-box hard. There's a few of those, so. You got to think outside the box on this one. It's like the trolley problem.

57:11 Can you read the quote in full one more time? And they're also having an HD mode in the game, too, that removes the NES graphical style. I don't know. Pictionary? Sure. Yeah. Joe Pictionary. It is not me. You should have gone with your gut. It is Mike. And it was the Nostalgia Patreon mailbag. Wow. Okay. We are not going to do this.

57:42 Keep going. All right, next one. You wouldn't say all the powers of, you know, Mahatma Gandhi in your hands, right? If you were playing some kind of like 1945 Indian independence adventure.

58:00 Is this Mike? I thought the first half was me. I thought the first half was me, but then the whole 1945 India independence adventure was like way too sophisticated. I don't think I even know when India got independence. So, I think this might have been Joe then. No, but I mean, it could be me. I don't want to get screwed on this. Because I know that India got its independence in 1948. Okay. So, you have to learn that later.

58:30 You have no reason to bring up India at all though, right? Would I? No, do you? That's what I'm saying. Like, did you have an interest? You only talk about things you haven't interested.

58:42 I mean, I don't have disinterest, but I guess I, okay, we have, we're going to need to read the thing back again. You wouldn't say all the powers of, you know, Mahatma Gandhi in your hands, right? If you were playing some kind of like 1945 Indian independence adventure.

59:00 Okay. So, maybe this is. So, it's got to be like one of those strategy games. Or something. Right, right. But we, okay, it's from the past hundred. So, was Romance in the last hundred? Ooh. Let's see. No. Romance was not in the last hundred. But it has to be one of those like Koei strategy games. Was it Genghis Khan? Is that one? Oh, that's interesting. Yeah, that's a good call, right? Because Genghis Khan is also a bad dude. He's a bad dude. So, they probably will. All the power. All the power of Genghis Khan in your hands. But I also know that Joe has. I skip all those episodes. Very strategically skipped those episodes. So, it's got to be.

59:41 I just don't think I said that. So, maybe it was you. I don't know. Oof. It's tough. Yeah, I'm going to stick with my gut. Me, Genghis Khan. It was you. But it was episode 330, Shinjin the Ruler. Shinjin the Ruler. Damn it. Shinjin the Ruler. We were so close. Can we get half a point for that? I would give Sean a point if he could tell us anything about Shinjin the Ruler. It was like the same stuff. It was the same thing. It was like rice. You counted rice and stuff. Probably. You're not wrong. It was kind of the same stuff.

1:00:20 It's okay. We don't need to do it. All right. Next. And then for like two seconds, a flying saucer UFO flies by going. And I was like shook. I was like, what on earth was that? Okay. Now, that's Joe. Okay. Yeah. Oh, that second part was also the quote. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I think that's Joe. And I think if I recall. The flying saucer game happens in Sesame Street, right?

1:00:50 Maybe. I guess I was thinking way back before that. But. What? How far back? It was before it could be. It's before it could be. And then a flying saucer comes in this. Mm. Oof. Now, you're making me second guess myself. But like, did we have. We had a recent Sesame Street game. I don't know why I keep going to Sesame Street. Yeah. Why? The UFO was Sesame Street. I'll give you a little more. I'm going to paraphrase a little bit more of what came before this quote. Okay. Just that. It was. It was just my party and no one on the other side of the screen. And then for like two seconds, a flying saucer, you go, et cetera, et cetera. Okay. So it's an RPG. We hope. Well.

1:01:34 Flying saucer. Oof. I don't know. Well, okay. So of the RPGs we've played, right? Uh-huh. We played Final Fantasy. True. I can't think of a UFO in Final Fantasy. Oh. Man, I keep thinking. Dragon Warrior didn't have one. What was the more sci-fi one? Was that in the last hundred? We all liked it. Sci-fi RPG? Yeah. I don't know video games anymore. Come on. Was it sci-fi or it's Crystallis? Crystallis was sci-fi? Yeah. Was it not? I don't think you have a party in Crystallis. Oh, man. It was like. Maybe you're right. It wasn't that. It's like. It's a single word. But also like. Maybe it's Cosmopolis Galen. What about Destiny of an Emperor?

1:02:29 You have a large party in that game. Destiny of an Emperor. That's the one with the like. Never ending. Chinese RPG. You just keep it. You have like. You can get like a hundred people in your party. Oh. Oh, I remember that.

1:02:45 Oh, look. That could be it. I do. That is it. Why would a UFO be in that? I mean, maybe there was just some weird thing, but. I think we go with it. Yeah, let's do it. Okay. But who said it? Joe, right? Joe said it. All right. Joe said it. Destiny of an Emperor. It was me. It was not Destiny of an Emperor. It was from Final Fantasy. I'm referring to. I'm talking about Final Fantasy VIII. Sean, I was hoping that maybe you were familiar with this. We talked about in the episode that there was a. Easter egg in Final Fantasy VIII. That I like saw when I was a kid and it scared the shit out of me.

1:03:20 I totally. Totally forgot about that. I think it leads to like a side quest or something. If you. If you find all the UFOs. Got it. All right. Moving on. I think it's going to be a tough one for the game, but maybe not. I don't know. Honey, I'm going to read the paper. And she goes, that's not the paper. That's this episode of Nostalgia.

1:03:43 Okay. Honestly, next time you should just fast rip all of these. All of these quotes. You know, like that's the game. Like these are priceless quotes. Honey, I'm going to read the paper. That's not the paper. That's this week's episode of Nostalgia. It's 100% Mike.

1:04:00 But I have no idea what it could possibly be. I'm going to read the paper. No, it's. Can we get. Can we get like a line leading up to it? Or do you have that at all? Yeah. To be honest, I don't know. Don't spend too much time. I don't know if there's any much. Okay. If there's much context here. Skate or die too. All right. It was Mike. Okay. And it was Metal Gear.

1:04:22 Okay. And I don't remember why. Some of these I had written down like throughout this past like year or whatever. Others I went back and listened to this week. So those ones I have more context to. Otherwise, I'm just like, I wrote this down because I thought it was funny at the time. Okay. That is so funny. You have six points. Snake's Revenge. Interesting. All right. Next one. Can't he just dream drop back there?

1:04:48 Okay. I think this was me. Kingdom Hearts reference. Yeah. That seems like something Sean would say. Okay. But we did a game about dreams though, right? Yeah. Little Nemo, the Dream Master. Let's just do that then. Cool. Little Nemo, the Dream Master and Sean. It was Sean and it was also Final Fantasy. We're talking about Garland and how he goes back in time. But we kept referring back to the connections of Kingdom Hearts, Final Fantasy. You talked about everyone getting Nordic at one point. I do. I do like to talk about that. Fantastic. Wow. Go back and listen to that one, folks. All right. Here's a lob ball for you.

1:05:30 Are there not images on the screen that are fighting? Oh, my God. Image fight. But who said it? That's a you. That's a Mike. I don't know. That could be a Joe. Could be. Yeah, that's true. We haven't had a lot of Joes yet. You said Mike. I said Joe. I think we need Joe to come in and tiebreak it. Yeah. I'm just going to sabotage. Yeah. Oh.

1:05:56 I feel like I wouldn't be that on the nose. Let's go with Joe. All right. Joe said it. Image fight. It is Joe and it is image fight. Correct. Nice. All right. You needed that. You needed that too there. All right. Everyone knows how shorts work. Your hands up. Your mouth's open. Your shorts are going to fall down.

1:06:20 Everyone knows how shorts work. It's definitely not me. It's not me either. Right. So that sounds like a Joe one too. But would he really put himself back to back like that? That's like an hour metagaming. But it does sound exactly like something Joe would say. Everyone knows how shorts work. You put your hands up. Your mouth drops. And your shorts drop. Mm. So is that. But whose shorts would have dropped? I don't know. Who wears shorts? Right. I was thinking like Maniac Mansion maybe. Oh. But nobody in there drops their shorts. That's true. Oh. Dick Tracy.

1:06:55 That sounds right. That's like we got like some weird cartoony comic book stuff. Right. Okay. Bugs Bunny's birthday blowout. Nobody would wear shorts. No. I think he was going around. Yeah. I don't know. Everyone knows how shorts work.

1:07:13 Your hands up. Your mouth's open. Your shorts are going to fall down. So good. Let's stick with Dick Tracy. All right. Dick Tracy. Joe. It was me. But it was from Punch Out featuring Mr. Dream. Oh. Which is awesome. Every time you punch him his hands go up his mouth open his shorts fall down. Whoever that is. So this wasn't actually said since like 2018. It wasn't said since but this episode was released. It was released. That's true. It's 351. Got it. All right. Next one. My opening line I think captured it pretty well. Redacted. I said. Five seconds to understand a lifetime to master or at least get seriously good at. Okay. So that's me. Yeah. And I do remember this. It's a puzzle game.

1:08:04 Yeah. Was this. I think it's Loops. Right. I think you're right. I think it's Loops. Okay. Loops and me. It is not Loops. God freaking darn it. And it is not you. I'm getting really. You're going to guys are going to hate me at the end of this. Wait. Can I get a second guess on what game it was? You don't have to give me any points. But how is it not Loops? A lifetime to master. You're so close. Orb 3D. So. Oh, no. Yeah. Pipe Dream. You're so close, but not close enough because I'm a tricky son of a bitch. It's from the Nostalgia AI recap of Pipe Dream. Oh, my God. And the person who said it was male AI voice. Recapping your opening line. He called it his opening line. That's not cool. Oh, my gosh. That's crazy. You're right. Nostalgia AI.

1:08:55 um all right this one you only need to get the person who said it not the game okay who's your favorite final fantasy character matoya i don't even know what that is matoya's cave matoya's cave uh so that's joe said that okay correct i don't remember what episode was a plates episode but i wrote it down i just didn't write down the episode um all right next oh wait guys stop right now stop right now this episode is officially longer than the game could ever be oh my god yeah so i think this is me that's me oh it's you oh no no it might be you you're right you're right but i

1:09:34 think it was me i think you also commented on how short it was but is it time lord is that a game that has like it uh game remember because time yes it has to be time lord because time lord has a set like it can only be this long yeah right you're right time time lord has like a time limit to beat the game okay yeah let's go with that and me and time lord yeah it is mike it is not time lord it is snoopy's silly sports spectacular which also could so some reason could only be like 37 minutes exactly because there was a time limit or something like that oh man i feel like time lord also had the time there was something with time like actual real time with that game i can't remember you had like a

1:10:23 yeah you had an exact amount of seconds or whatever yeah that sounds familiar but not when we said it it's not when you said it i know i get it all right yeah also his thing like blowing the bubble and floating into the air this is a little scarier than the others he just starts like floating away and then he falls banging into the walls the whole way down you know and then he just trots away with his lanky weird self i i need the whole quote again yeah also his thing like blowing the bubbles and floating up in the air this is a little scarier than the others he just starts like floating away and then he falls banging into the walls the whole way down you know then he just trots away with his

1:11:05 lanky weird self oh boy yeah this is oh boy this is a lot yeah i feel like it's you i don't think i would say lanky weird self but maybe i did yeah because words um lanky blowing a bubble bubble blowing falling down a wall oh man i'm lost it's so much easier to be the guy reading the questions on these right right i feel like little nemo but i'm i'm i'm just basically saying the same games over and over again so i have like a bias here let's just go with little nemo and i guess me wait wait what

1:11:55 okay hold on his lanky self who's lanky i don't know there's lanky kong i don't know who that is so that's one of donkey kong's family members how dare you i'll tell you this person's not i think the reason that it was said lanky weird self is because this person shouldn't be lanky you shouldn't be lanky as lanky as lanky as he is in this game and we commented on like wow why is he so lanky

1:12:20 as lanky as he is in the game darn yeah i i i've given up i know i don't i i we have to guess who said it though right yeah yeah who said it and so so joe said it we'll just say um and uh yeah i guess little nemo i did say it good and it is from big birds sesame street big bird titan speak and i believe it was ernie that was like way too tall oh the little victory and he bounces into the wall as he falls down i vaguely remember that now i know this feels dire but like you guys got 13 points

1:12:57 there's still i don't know there's still quite a few questions left it's not that crazy that you get more than 19 points here i think you're on a good track okay all right all right i appreciate the encouragement um all right next one oh that's the end of my contract now that feels like a sean thing to say it does sound like of me saying i do like to say i'm gonna quit the show pretty often yeah but but there's zero context clues for the game so we might as well just pick a random game um let's say

1:13:25 uh let's say mule i don't remember what game that is i don't think you were on that episode you weren't even on mule i think i knew that um that was a real episode i thought the only episode i ever missed was uh uh it was a real no no we do some secretly without you yeah yeah yeah mike's without sean uh let's think about this there's 673 games so maybe it was the halfway point that

1:13:53 would have been like 330 something um i mean i'm just i'm i'm i have no idea that was a made up oh wow i definitely didn't play this game mule you would like it uh yeah let's say circus caper circus caper sean circus sure it is sean and it was your line of thinking might have almost gotten you there mike but it was episode 300 pin bot and the only reason i thought like maybe you should

1:14:22 remember this because you said it in episode 300 said that's the end of my contract and then i let you know that because i was getting ready for this game i listened to episode 200 and you had said it in episode 200 as well so it's happening in every every hundredth episode you make well at least we know that episode 400 will be my last it is yeah my contract um all right so now that you said it again

1:14:47 i'll use it next time too um he didn't let me look at any of his carts so he wouldn't allow it uh casino kid any of his carts any of his cards oh carts at those cards you wouldn't let me look at any of his carts i i don't know was there mike were you ever telling us a story about someone that had nes games but wouldn't let you look at them no i would never tell a story like that

1:15:19 any of his carts um no would it be me no okay joe joe joe joe and why not uh solar jet man it was joe and it was palamedes when mike said like sean don't be mad but joe and i played this together then there was something we were talking about that like we didn't know and mike was like it's on the cartridge oh no i would say it's on the cartridge because you guys never fucking looked

1:15:50 well yeah because we because we weren't playing it on the cartridge but i didn't want to admit that we didn't play it on a cartridge yeah so yeah right all right that's 15 points okay here comes a two pointer you get just like this little slice of something and i'm not sure what it's supposed to be oh wow okay never mind uh that's gotta be me a little slice of something and that's here it's supposed

1:16:13 to be uh oh it's like that's pictionary right like oh yeah um or maybe that wait what's the one is a classic concentration actually oh good call good call i'm gonna go still me though maybe uh it's okay let's go with my classic concentration sadly it was sean episode 400 werewolf the last it was like after your essential games vote it was like the last thing you said before we started this game what the fuck are you talking about you get a little slice of something i'm not sure what it's supposed to be you just said that and you didn't know

1:16:55 i don't even remember what why you said it but i wrote it down as you were saying it you get a little slice of something you're not sure oh my god it's the it's the it's the to be continued oh yeah yeah that's right oh wow that's that was devious and that was not nice that was that was i thought that was gonna be like oh they're gonna just laugh and be like okay i just said that yeah no way it's a little it's not it's not quite as iconic as yeah i had to make this one i did have to make this one a little yeah a little more obscure because originally i had one where it was like if you had a redacted say that and like if you had a redacted in like therapy he'd say that he would have gotten that immediately that's true i would have gotten that um

1:17:42 all right let's see okay uh so you guys are gonna be i'm just gonna i'm gonna hmm i'm looking to see like how many how many hints i should give you here but oh no i'm not gonna give you a hint so you guys are gonna be doing some amphetamine version of redacted and just you know i was waiting for the you know nothing after the you know

1:18:04 amphetamine version of redacted and the redacted is a puzzle game amphetamine version of tetris no dr mario and yeah so dr mario is the game we're talking about amphetamine version of tetris of tetris oh i gotcha yeah yeah oh sorry yeah totally get it now uh kind of feels like it kind of feels like a you thing yeah yeah let's say me dr mario it is sean and wow dr mario makes so much sense but it is not dr mario it's palamedes i knew it was palamedes

1:18:41 why'd you say dr mario no no i meant like in the back of my head i knew but the obvious answer felt safer it's true it's true all right two more questions and you have 16 points so we just we need to get three out of four you need well you need a three out of four to tie okay you need to get four out of four to win this happened like last time too almost exactly like this well hold on 39 so we would get 20 out of 39 i guess that's true yeah yeah you're right you're right yeah no you got 16 so three out of four you get three more you get 19 yeah so it's actually below yeah 50

1:19:20 percent yeah we we lost it we'll round it up to the tie yeah to the 0.5 um all right but like it's a pretty creepy ending right it's like he turns into a giant cytoplasm-esque thing wow actually i'm sorry turns into a giant like cybo plasm-esque thing cybo yeah and then we laughed at that's a made-up word so it's a made-up word and it was still used as like ask like we all knew what cybo plasm was like yeah that's a hundred percent me um but what what would turn you into a cybo plasm-esque

1:19:59 thing oh low g gravity man that's what i was gonna say i didn't know the name of it but it's the one where you just sort of all puzzled it on spaceship right i'll tell you this no no no that's um that's solar jet man i'll tell you this this is a game that has already been an answer oh so it's definitely not low g um cybo plasm-esque snoopy right did did pipe dream have no pipe dream wasn't the answer snake's revenge that's metal gear yeah um pipe dream didn't have an ending it also wasn't uh an

1:20:39 episode that was used already that was the ai version um right but maybe there's some uh weird like melting into cybo plasm in sesame street um i say we go with snake's revenge snake's revenge mike and snake's revenge mike and snake's revenge incorrect it is mike it is not snake's revenge it was street fighter 2010 oh right yeah so we had a scooby-doo reference and now a cybo plasm reference great all right last one of the cybo plasm references of our time

1:21:19 the last one and if you get two right here you'll still we'll call it still tie to last year you haven't yeah we rambled up so um what i think was really unfair with a lot of those episodes is that they were always like no it's just like mirrors but it's like in this cartoon you can make a mirror do whatever you want it to

1:21:41 uh i'm gonna say joe okay joe and it's got to be a cartoon then yeah but we talked about cartoons and games that we that aren't based on cartoons of course of course say the quote again what i think was really unfair with a lot of those episodes is that they were always like no no it's just like mirrors but like in this cartoon a mirror can you can make a mirror do whatever you want it to

1:22:06 yeah we were we literally just say bullshit yeah i've never actually nonsensical and i feel so bad that everybody had to listen to that line in particular yeah yeah there's no actual like there's no wordsmithing when it comes to there's there's yeah there was no substance yeah um so which one were we talking about was it we were talking about scooby-doo in what episode scooby-doo the one we just talked about street fighter 2010 yeah let's just do that no it can't be that again can it i did he said multiple i don't know if he said two or three

1:22:44 um all right but who said it joe yeah all right so joe said it mirrors what about bugs bunny were there mirrors in bugs bunny no okay joe bugs bunny's birthday blowout is that is that where you're going bugs bunny yeah no there are mirrors in scooby-doo and it is street fighter 2010 see oh my god and it was sean anyways oh wow so we double loss on that one well i i i just buried you sean with

1:23:17 that comment it's okay i was like yeah i said stupid shit yeah i say a lot of that well i think everything i heard uh makes me want to quit the podcast yeah last the last 20 quotes have been absolute garbage thank god our uh well now that that's good thing because sean's contract yeah yeah um and you know for the record i i clearly picked these based on what i think will be interesting

1:23:42 quotes and not what i think will be a fair game to play oh of course of course yeah i i like almost all of these quotes uh out of context except for that great yeah that one in particular just really pissed me off but what was the ninth what was the ninth quote the ninth quote i don't have numbered but uh just count one two three nine i think was everyone knows how shorts work your hands up your

1:24:10 mouth's open and your shorts are gonna fall down that's an all-time line that's a meme for this show now everybody knows how shorts work yeah we're gonna make it happen how do we uh how do we end this it was about to end john i thought that was gonna be the end okay it was about to end all right should we end it now we can wait here until next week's episode now okay okay what damn it i won't stop i won't stop until i hit the hour and a half so you got a minute from now yeah you got 80 seconds or i could just lie to the listener and stop right now you