Tommy sent me a picture of of a framed AI art. They have it as church, and it's just the most repulsive looking shit ever. I can probably Oh, no. I'm sure my camera won't catch it good enough. But, yeah, it's it's wild shit.
Aaron:There's people with, like, no faces. It'll be like like a pear shaped head with no face. It's really gross.
Kate:It's honestly scarier than all the scary games we picked AI. True. So true.
Aaron:Mouthwash who? AI generated bible is the move over. What I put crow
Kate:country. Yeah.
Aaron:AI generated bible. That's the real scary shit. Speaking of robots, hey, you're listening to SuperPod Saga, the one and only podcast that discusses every single video game topic in existence one episode at a time. I'm your robot, I mean, host. Whoops.
Aaron:Aaron. And before we dig in, listeners, hey. Do me a solid. Go check out superpodsaga.com. It's the...
Aaron:All the stuffs are on the website, episodes, socials, links to the show, Patreon, and Ko Fi. I just made it so everything... You know, all the same perks on both tiers. You can pick whichever one you want. You can pay me $2 or $4.
Aaron:You can pay me in chocolate milk. That'd be cool.
Kate:Oh, cigarettes and chocolate milk.
Aaron:Yeah. Yeah. A little half eaten Oreo.
Kate:Half eaten Oreo. Yeah. Wait. Are you gonna plug Chillscape or is this not the time? I just...
Kate:I love Chillscape. I'm a big fan.
Aaron:Yeah. Plug the sister show in there. Yeah. Chillscape. It's Chill VGM podcast.
Aaron:The latest one is chill racing BGM. The opening track is from a stupid butt ugly Martians game that has no right being as chill as it is. God. That show is gross. Go look it up, everybody.
Kate:Good music, though.
Aaron:Thank you. Oh, and what was your... Kate, what was your thing? Kate's PB and Jams?
Kate:Oh, yeah. Yeah. I have a radio show called Kate's PB and Jams, which you can't really find. It's hard to find, but if anyone's listening and wants to find it, you can go to kzum.org/archives.
Aaron:Wow.
Kate:Shout out to Emily who made a gorgeous website for k z u m. So maybe it actually will be easy to find after Emily got her hands on that website. But yeah, it's a it's a weekly show where I just play whatever I want, whatever the vibe is that week. So... Yes.
Kate:Yeah. It's a good time. Hoping to have both of you on the PB and Jams imminently.
Aaron:Damn right. Speaking of websites, I'm I'm always so jealous of the no small games website. I feel like...
Kate:Same.
Aaron:Oh, I went down a very deep Neo Cities rabbit hole about two months ago. I tried to make a Neo Cities website. Have you guys heard of those?
Kate:I don't know what that is. I don't know. But but please go ahead. I'll look it up.
Aaron:It's it's like basically you building a website from scratch, like just HTML, CSS, and I'm kinda, I guess, like a novice with all that, and it was it was awful. It it sucked. I I made a copy and pasted a template, and I tried my best to make it my own and like puts a... Like this link here to this blog post, and then it just... It got all wonky and broken, but yeah.
Emily:That's how you get good though. Good on you for practicing. Love that.
Aaron:I tried. I tried. Yeah. Go... Kate, Emily, go ahead and introduce yourselves and all the things you do on the Internet.
Aaron:And, oh, tell us about... All about your top three favorite snacks. Each of you, like Oh. Emily, yours. Kate, do yours.
Aaron:Yeah.
Kate:Emily, kick us
Emily:off. Hell yeah. Absolutely. Hello. I'm Emily from No Small Games.
Emily:Let's see. No Small Games is also a very conversational chill podcast where we talk about indie games exclusively. A lot of our episodes are deep dive reviews on one game per episode. Sometimes we do it just the two of us. Sometimes we do it with a guest.
Emily:The ones where we do it with the guests are much more buttoned up straight away. Professional, if
Kate:you will.
Emily:Yeah. And then once a month at the end of the month, we do a roundup episode where we talk about just we go with ham on like all the games we've been playing lately. New releases, backlog games, demos, indie game news, everything. That one's very... That one's always a little chaotic because it's just whatever we wanna talk about.
Emily:Good. And you know what? I'm gonna bump it over to Kate for the rest of the explanation of what no small games is while I think about my snacks.
Kate:I was actually gonna say your snacks for you, but I didn't wanna steamroll, but I have some guesses. I'll I'll start by talking about No Small Games still. So I'm Kate, I also go by katerblossom. I am the other half of No Small Games. And thank you so much for having us back on the show, Aaron.
Kate:We love it here. Thank And we also do nosmallgames.com, which you shouted out earlier, Aaron. Another beautiful website designed by the one and only Emily. There are plenty of articles to to take part in. There are listicle style articles and many indie game reviews.
Kate:So we also do, we also cover new releases and you can also find all of our episodes there as well. So it's a great place to go to get the whole the whole picture of No Small Games. We got a little bit about our editor Claudia over on the website as well. So we love to shout her out. She's amazing.
Kate:So yeah, it's just the three of us and it's always been the three of us since No Small Games was born. And we just... We love each other. We love Indie games. We met on Twitch.
Kate:And I feel like Emily, I don't know what your favorite snacks are, but I was gonna mention like the chocolate covered sea salt caramels from Target with the... And then also you like cheese puffs and you like the chocolate donuts and you like the giant corn and the pre sliced mild cheddar or sharp cheddar cheese, the yellow ones.
Emily:Giant So I
Kate:don't know that helps. True. Giant corn.
Emily:Some of the... I've added it. Some of those are things I was gonna talk about. Cheetos puffs for sure. Fan.
Emily:Dots pretzels, especially Oh, God, what is that called? The Buffalo ones. The Buffalo Dots pretzels. I go feral for those. We'll we'll shout out the the the chocolates, the chocolate caramels.
Emily:I need a little sweet at
Kate:the end
Emily:of the day. I need a little something sweet.
Aaron:Feel it.
Kate:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Those are the snacks that I that I think of when I hear about Emily's... Or when I saw the question, was like, let me think about Emily's favorite snacks.
Kate:My favorite snacks, I love I love anything sour. I love a nerds gummy cluster. I've been really obsessed lately with the bold flavor of Chex Mix, which I like to call boyfriend kibble, because that's what I give my boyfriend, when they need a snack. And I also feel like I've been really into it lately. And then also, what's another snack I
Aaron:like, want
Emily:a dog food bowl for him?
Aaron:Here you go, you little shit. Sorry.
Kate:Continue. But it's just like a fun thing to call it. Like, I'm like, it sounds more appetizing than like, Chex Mix bold flavor.
Emily:Wow. Wow. Disarmed Chex Mix. I'd rather have gibble than Chex... Something called Chex Mix.
Emily:That's wild.
Aaron:I just
Kate:think it's cute. I feel like... And I also really like, oh, I like corn nuts.
Emily:Do like olives?
Kate:Oh, I love olives.
Emily:Actually, surprised I didn't shout out olives for myself.
Kate:Wait. Actually --... Just corn nuts. All three of us here on the call, we're olive freaks. I think Aaron's a part of the, like, really, like, obsessed with olives club.
Kate:So I'm gonna say Olive's just because I'm in good company here.
Aaron:Damn right. You are. We have a whole we have a whole channel in our Discord just for Olive's because... Yeah. You, me, Dre, and I think Sumo Kirby were all big freaks for Olive's.
Aaron:Now Emily too, you're in the club.
Kate:You're in the Olive channel. You're...
Aaron:I didn't think about this at all. I'm gonna immediately go with Funyuns for one of mine because I I could eat a whole, like Mhmm. Regular sized bag of Funyuns on my own because I'm a a big boy. I guess if I'm grabbing snacks, I'm grabbing some peach rings. I love me some peach rings.
Emily:Oh, fuck yeah.
Kate:Great choice.
Aaron:Honorable mention, olives, but they... Now I'm gonna scoot them over for... Oh, it's tough. Oh, it's so tough. No.
Aaron:We'll put olives in there, I guess, actually. I thought I had another one locked up, but no. Olive. So Funyuns, olives, whatever the second one was, I already forgot.
Emily:Peach rings?
Kate:Peach rings.
Aaron:Yeah. Peach
Kate:Those are so good, dude. I got a bag of those for the time in a while the other day and I ate them at the lake and it was... It hit. Oh. Hell yeah.
Aaron:It's peach rings. They used to have they used to have tropical rings back in the day.
Kate:Mhmm. Those remember
Aaron:were really good. Or the octopuses. Bring
Kate:them back. Bring them back.
Aaron:Those were good. Then, yeah, I forgot to say this, but, yeah, Emily and Kate, they were on here way back in the day before before Super Ghosts to talk about really cool influential Indie games. And then, Kate, joined me and Dre for our Steam Trash Christmas in July, and that was
Kate:So fun.
Aaron:That was quite an episode. What was it? You gifted me Tori and
Kate:I gifted Drey Ball's farm.
Aaron:Oh, yes.
Kate:B A L L Z farm and... Yeah. And then you guys gifted me a short Russian blackjack game, which was a Yes. I genuinely had a great time. And then Phoenix Force, which is actually a really fun roguelite.
Kate:So all this to say, you can find some great games on Steam for a dollar or less. It's possible.
Aaron:Damn right. We'll have to do another Steam... Well, it's... Crap. It's August now.
Aaron:We'll have do another steam... Christmas in
Kate:July's over.
Aaron:Yeah. Yeah.
Emily:No. We'll trick or treat. Oh, love it. Steam trick
Aaron:or treat. Oh, that's good. Okay. Yep.
Kate:Tricks. Tricks only.
Emily:Tricks only. It's all tricks. Oops. All tricks.
Aaron:All tricks. Okay. Alright. Let let let let's jump into Yeah. This topic Let's lock in.
Aaron:I'm I'm already almost done with my cold brew. I... Yeah. Shit.
Kate:Oh, damn. It's so late for coffee, Aaron. That's crazy.
Aaron:It's never too late.
Kate:Okay. Alright. I support you.
Aaron:Thank you. Thank you. This week, we're doing... We're putting together the definitive indie game starter packs. We've got five arguably the most...
Aaron:Well, maybe not the most popular, but five popular genres of indie games. And me, Emily Kate, we're gonna take turns adding a game to that pack. We're gonna have three games per pack. Our genres being RPG, farm slash life sim, horror, deck builder, platformer. When do you when do you pick the the first genre?
Emily:Oh, damn. Kate, do you do you have one that's speaking to you?
Kate:What genre should we do first, you mean? Yeah. Let's let's let's go platformer first. Let's get right into Cool. Cool.
Kate:Cool.
Emily:Okay. This was hard. This whole thing was hard. When when you suggested the idea, I was like, oh, that's amazing. And that's gonna be so easy.
Emily:Why did I think this was gonna be easy? I don't know.
Aaron:At first at first, I thought about, like, each of us doing our own individual starter pack. But I was like, wait, no. I can make this way more difficult than it needs to be. And so Mhmm. Ka bam.
Aaron:Came with this idea.
Emily:Oh, man. Should I go first? I'm first in the doc.
Kate:Yeah. If you'd like
Aaron:to, you can. Go for it.
Emily:I'll go first for platformer. I also haven't actually chosen. I have three here, but I think I'm gonna lock in the one that has been speaking to me the... I've been literally thinking just about what I was gonna pick for platformer all weekend.
Kate:That's why we had to get over with First Emily. Yeah. Saw how many listed here. So I Yeah.
Emily:Knew. And I'm gonna I'm gonna lock in Super Meat Boy on this. It's iconic. It is... It's very hard.
Emily:So I think it's like not a game for everyone, but it kind of is like the quintessential, precision platformer. Like it invent... It wasn't the first, but it sort of established the genre
Aaron:Mhmm.
Emily:Of precision platformer indie games. And it's super fun. Like it's hard, but I think anybody could have a great time with it. Like you you are running around as little cute meat guy. You're splatting all over, you're getting shocked to bits by, know, rotating saws and shit.
Emily:Who doesn't love that? Who doesn't love that? And at the end of the day, as soon as you die, boom, like half a second, you like pop back up where you have to start the level. So it's like, you know, you never get frustrated. You might get frustrated.
Emily:I get frustrated, but you know, it only lasts a second. And then you've died again. You blink and then, you know, you've already died again and you're trying over. So it's so it's so fun. I love this game.
Kate:I still never played it. What am I doing?
Emily:You gotta play it, Kate. What am I doing?
Aaron:Like the soundtrack rules too. Oh, yeah. Listen to The guy right at the right, the press start he's like, super meat boy. And he's like in your face with it. It's so cool.
Kate:I like the bandage girl songs. They're so soft and beautiful.
Emily:Yeah. The the levels are incredibly hard though. Yeah. They're so brutal. But yeah, that was the era of indie games where they'd just like yell at you when the the menu came up and stuff.
Emily:It's good times.
Aaron:Oh my god. I miss that era of indie game. There was this one that one of my friends next door had on their Xbox three sixty called I made a game with zombies in it. And it was just this, like, top down shooter. And the only music in the game was this dude singing, I made a game with zombies singing the title with zombies.
Aaron:And you'd just be blasting zombies, like stick figure zombies from a top down perspective. It was it was really cool.
Kate:That's actually so creepy. I love that someone did that. Yeah.
Aaron:It's awesome. Yeah. I'm... I guess, yeah, I guess I'm not surprised that you picked that over a bit trip runner and I might pronounce this wrong, roofie in the Riverside or is it roughie?
Emily:I think it's roughie in the Riverside.
Aaron:Roughie. Okay. Yeah. I'm a... I guess, yeah, that was the
Kate:Roughie in
Aaron:I mean, I I guess I would say that's the quintessential precision platformer. Yeah. Yeah. That's good. That's good.
Aaron:That's a good pick. Kate, do you wanna go first?
Kate:Yeah. Or you
Aaron:want me to...
Kate:Yeah. Me and Aaron, we're fighting to the death Mhmm. For this pic in the Google doc at the same time. Yeah. I picked Pepper Grinder.
Kate:This is such an underrated platformer. Is so unique. It's so special. I believe it came out in 2024, I wanna say. Devolver Digital published female protagonist with blue hair.
Kate:What's not to love? She's really spunky. She's really cool. She's just a girl, but she's got this really awesome like drill and she... And like you drill into the earth and you go all the way down and then you pop up and it makes a great sound like a little chain soggy and up type of sound.
Kate:And so the noises are great, which I always love, but it's definitely like a retro style platformer. And there's a lot of like gems to collect, but just the mechanic of like drilling into the earth and you're you can't... It's kind of giving you like a feeling of being like a dolphin sort of like you're just like diving up and down into the earth and it's it just feels so good. It's so fluid and and it is precise, but you get that really nice like flowing feeling once you get into the into the grinding mechanic, I guess you could say. But yeah, I think it's really underrated.
Kate:I have it on Switch and Steam. I like playing it on both, but I think it plays a little bit better on on a Steam Deck. But I just... I feel like this game is just not talked about enough. So I wanted to give it a shout.
Kate:It's a great platformer, especially if you like like the retro style, if you like cute pixel art. And the bosses I will say are really hard for for me, but it is very... It's like challenging enough that it's hard, but it's not something that I feel overwhelmed by. So I I really love that one. That's a great platformer.
Aaron:I was... When I got to the last boss, I was legitimately yelling. Like it was it was just me in the house, and I I kept trying over and over and over to beat this boss. And I was like, god, damn it. I could...
Kate:It's hard. It's hard. But it just... When you get it when you get it right, it just feels so good.
Aaron:And the... What... Don't they also have, like, little little blocks that you can attach to and like swing yourself around? Yeah. Or...
Kate:I think so. Yeah. That sounds right.
Aaron:Yeah. They introduce all sorts of cool other little gimmicks as you go later on that, yeah, that game kicks ass.
Kate:Very fun.
Aaron:I I almost put Celeste for mine, but I guess if you got Super Meat Boy here, don't really need Celeste. So I'm gonna put more of a, like, a Metroidvania platformer on here, and I put SteamWorld dig two. I am a gigantic freak for the SteamWorld games. I love these goddamn games. And SteamWorld Dig two, like I said, it's a Metroidvania, but it's also pretty short.
Aaron:It's not gonna take you as long as, like, Axiom Verge or any of the other ones. It's like maybe maybe ten hours or less, maybe like eight hours. But there's all sorts of cool characters in it. Like, the the main character or... Yeah.
Aaron:The the game takes place a little bit after the the first SteamWorld dig where the the main guy, Rusty, he's at the center of the earth. He's trapped, and then you play in this girl who's looking for him. And he had all sorts of cool upgrades in Metroidvania fashion. Like, you get Mhmm. Oh my god.
Aaron:You get a jetpack toward the end of the game that completely fucking changes the whole game. And it it it ties the game. I guess, yeah, they all kind of tie into each other a little bit because, yeah, the first game, you play as Rusty. He gets trapped in the center of the earth. Steamroll Dig two, you play as...
Aaron:Shit. I forget her name. Shirley or something, I think. And then, like, right at the end of this game... Right at end of Steamworld Dig two, that ties right into the beginning of Steamworld Heist because the Mhmm.
Aaron:The Earth is split in two. And then maybe that was a spoiler, but... Yeah. SteamWorld
Emily:Dig There's
Kate:three there's three SteamWorld Dig games?
Aaron:No. It's just SteamWorld Dig one and two, and then SteamWorld Heist one and two. And
Kate:Hell yeah.
Aaron:Yeah, man. It's almost always on sale for, like, $5 or less. And like I said, it's it's short, and it's really easy to learn, and it's real fun. Because you're... You'll be...
Aaron:Like, you... You'll you'll dig through the earth, collect gems, use those gems to upgrade all your stuff, and it's just a real fun loop of just digging down as far as you can go, unlocking or getting as many gems as you can, going back up, unlocking some new stuff, and then traversing even further down. Real satisfying. Real good. I love that game.
Emily:I gotta check it out. I love some meta progression. I love unlocking shit. Love new new stuff in games. Feels great.
Emily:Love it.
Aaron:And it's it's not as difficult as like other... I I guess I wouldn't say Metroidvanias can be, but... Yeah. It it's pretty darn easy. You can you can blow through it pretty easily without even knowing that you've you've gotten to the end.
Aaron:But, yeah.
Kate:That's what's selling me on it. I'm down.
Aaron:Oh my god. Sorry. All this coffee is messing me up a little bit. We're gonna go... We're gonna we're gonna do like a snake rotation here.
Aaron:I'm gonna pick... Yeah. I'm gonna pick farm slash life sim, and then Kate can do the... You can pick the next one. Or wait.
Kate:Okay.
Aaron:No. Did Kate
Kate:Or Emily. Platformer.
Emily:I'll pick the next one.
Kate:Mhmm. Yeah. I picked platformer.
Aaron:Okay. Okay. Yeah. So me, Emily, then Kate. Okay.
Aaron:Yeah. I'm gonna pick farm slash life sim. And at first, I put Dave the diver because I really love the the the restaurant management stuff. I could I could just shut my brain off and play it like a restaurant management sim for hours and hours and hours. But I picked a true...
Aaron:Maybe it... Maybe it's life sim, Minami Lane. It was part of this bundle with Kabuto Park, and I I flew through Kabuto Park, and then now I'm playing Minami Lane. And it's just a chill little game where you're design... Or not designing, but you're putting together this, I guess, the street this...
Aaron:The street of a town that you can put in, like, ramen stands, boba shops. You can put in a park, and you're basically just trying to draw in as many people as you can. And I guess make as much money as you can, and each person that comes by, they'll say, like, oh, the ramen wasn't spicy enough for me, or the boba didn't... Wasn't... Didn't didn't have enough boba or something for me, and then you'll have to try to fulfill their needs to bring them back and then bring in more people.
Aaron:And as you go along, you'll unlock more buildings, and you can make your street just huge. And there's always like little hidden pieces of trash you can pick up for extra money or the little hidden tanooki guy. You can poke him, get more money or whatever. It's a good game. It's cool.
Kate:I love it. That's on your list because me and Emily love that game.
Aaron:It's awesome.
Emily:Good shit. Kate, do you wanna go next?
Kate:Oh yeah, this is... Oh, I put Cozy Caravan. This was a really hard one for me to think of because I'm realizing that as time goes on, I play this genre less and less, the farming and life sim. But I do do really like Cozy Caravan. This is a game where you're playing as you can choose, the character selections are very, very cute.
Kate:You can be like a cow or you can be a frog or you can be an axolotl. I think I played as an axolotl. But the character customization and the character designs of the animals in this game are probably some of the cutest I've ever seen in the entire world, in all of video games. They just look like little toys and you just wanna squeeze them and hug them and hold them and you want them to have the best life. And I will make sure that they have a good life.
Kate:But the reason why I picked this, because I've only played it in early access, which was great. I haven't gone back to play it since it had its... It's already had its one point o release, right?
Emily:Mhmm.
Kate:A while ago. I haven't gone back, to play it since its full release. But I will say, I picked it for farming sim because the farming is so simple in it and I really appreciate that. Because like, I'm not gonna remember to like go to every single little area and like water and trim and cut and harvest. And Cozy Caravan makes it really simple.
Kate:So you can just like literally pick up your crops and they like... They'll just like stack in front of you in your in your arms. So I I think that that's why I picked it just because it's like, sorry, my cat's gonna make some noise. I think that's why I picked it just because the farming is so simple and I don't have to like remember to have this like, well well not remember but like learn a complex system for farming. Which can be kind of rough for me sometimes and what has caused me to stray from the genre, I think.
Kate:But yeah, it's it's really cool. I like it a lot.
Emily:Nice. It's so cute. It like the cute aggression is strong with it.
Aaron:That's why
Kate:was looking everywhere.
Emily:It's so cute. Adorable. And you get to drive in a caravan that's driven by like a really Yeah. Big And his name's Big B.
Kate:Yeah. And the... What's the frog's name that you love? Is... Bubba.
Kate:Bubba. Yeah.
Emily:And he wears overalls. And he wears jammies at night.
Kate:The the characters are so memorable and cute. Like, it's it's really adorable. There's also like strawberry cows in the game, which I know people love. And I I honestly like, I'm not really drawn towards games like this anymore, but they're... This is a farming sim that's doing it right in my opinion.
Kate:And it like, it feels like a big game, but it's just constrained enough that I don't ever feel like lost or overwhelmed. So I think that's really important to me when it comes to farming Sims.
Aaron:That's cool. I appreciate that too. That's one of the... I mean, I... For a second, I thought about putting Stardew Valley in there because I also don't play a lot of farm slash life sims, but that would be cheating to put Stardew Valley in there.
Kate:That's what I thought, Aaron, because I was gonna put that there too. Because truly, I have like a hundred and sixty hours in that game, I was like, would be the honest pick.
Aaron:Yeah.
Emily:Yeah. So mine actually is like, if you want something like Stardew, Fields of Mystria. I... Okay. I'm about to say something like maybe kind of inflammatory.
Emily:People might disagree and that's okay. But I really think that Fields of Mystria is the better version of a Stardew like game. A lot about there's a lot about Fields of Mystria that is exactly like Stardew, but then a lot of things where they've improved all kinds of quality of life stuff. I think the farming is less annoying. I personally prefer the art style in Fields of Mystria.
Emily:And this is something that Kate's heard me say a lot like, I find the pixel art in Stardew Valley really hard to like look at and understand what I'm seeing.
Kate:Like all the
Emily:little pixel art things. I'm like, is that a radish or somebody's underpants? Like, I I don't know. I can't tell. It's like...
Kate:It's one of the two.
Emily:It's one of them. But Fields of Mystery has this great... You're still looking at pixel art. So if you love pixel art, that's what you're gonna get. But it's got like really nice defined lines around everything, which I feel makes it a lot easier to look at and understand what I'm seeing.
Emily:And the characters are really cute. I find them compelling and interesting. And Mhmm. I think something... An issue that I have a little bit with Stardew is I feel like you can kind of tell that every character was written by one person.
Emily:Yeah. And for Fields of Mystery, feel like there's maybe a little bit more diversity in the in the narratives and like how different characters are written.
Aaron:That's cool.
Emily:Dude. It's a it's a great time.
Kate:You're so right about that. I feel like you... I I really agree with you. Like I have way more hours in Stardew than Fields of Mystery, but I I really can't argue with that because it is... It's like the better version.
Kate:Like farming is easier. It's easier to look at. Like the characters are really like... Yeah. Like more diverse and more nuanced.
Kate:I think the only thing that I don't love yet about Fields of Mystery is the music. Because like I'm obsessed with the Starter music and I'm like... No.
Emily:That's so real though. Starter music is unmatched. Unmatched. Yeah. In any farm...
Aaron:It sounds like Minecraft levels.
Emily:My god.
Kate:Yeah. Mhmm. Mhmm. Yeah. But Fields of Mystery really is so so much better.
Kate:Because it's like, what do they do in the farming in that game that makes it way better than Stardew? It's like, is it auto? Like you don't have to water? Or there's something that that's easier about? Or maybe it's the way you store items in Fields of Mystria is different and more simplified than in Stardew Valley.
Emily:I think so. I'm trying to remember too. And I had I had... So I had put sixty hours into it two years ago. And then the one point o just came out.
Emily:So I played like five or six hours yesterday. Hell yeah. So... But I started a new farm. So I'm trying to remember everything.
Emily:You don't have to take your watering can to the well to fill it up, which is really nice. Oh,
Aaron:thank god.
Emily:And there's other stuff like that too. Yeah. Just like little easy things to make your life easier that just didn't need to be so annoying in Stardew. So true.
Aaron:I like that. I'm looking at a bunch of screenshots of this game, and I like that the the character portraits, like, you're talking to them and stuff, they look very anime. It's got like a Mhmm.
Emily:Yeah.
Aaron:Like... And it's it's really fine detail too. Like, I almost couldn't tell that this was pixel art, but then, of course, if you look close, you can see, like, the little ridges and junk. But yeah, that looks really good.
Kate:Yeah. Beautiful. Beautiful game. Nice.
Aaron:What's... I forget who picked... No. Yeah.
Kate:It's Emily's turn, think to pick a... It's my turn.
Emily:I'm gonna make this hard on us, because we all picked two games for this next one. I'm gonna make us talk about horror now. Oh, no.
Aaron:Yes.
Emily:Who's gonna start off? I think, you know what, Kate? I think you haven't started off
Kate:a I'll pack start. Yeah. I... For horror, I picked Sorry We're Closed as my number one choice because it is really... It's offering so much.
Kate:It's a survival horror game, but it's also really gay and really good pixel art and really good colors. Great soundtrack, honestly, like the boss fights in that game are all like, I guess, hip hop music. And it's very interesting to like enter a boss fight in in this game, because otherwise you're hearing like some really nice like, sort of like more ambient horror lo fi is what I'm gonna call it. And then all of a sudden you're like, oh, we're we're in like a really tense boss fight and there's this like really great hip hop music supporting this boss fight. So the music is a really big standout to me, but I just think it's so creative and it's beautiful to look at.
Kate:It sounds great. And genuinely, I was really invested in all of the characters and the storylines in Sorry We're Closed. And this is the first game that this studio, A la Mode Games has ever made. And I just think it's so impressive. For a debut title, it's just...
Kate:It checks all the boxes. And also I'm newer at the survival horror genre, so I appreciated that this one had approachability accessibility settings. So like, you could turn on a function where you have infinite water and water is what you need to basically like keep living, I guess, or keep going in the game, I think.
Aaron:True.
Kate:When you're in those like And survival horror it just... It was a very positive experience for me. And I think when I beat the final boss in that game, I had felt really awesome and accomplished. And it's like seven, eight hours. So I think it's...
Kate:It offers a lot in a really nice package between like the horror and the romance. Because it definitely is terrifying at times. But then also just like the complexities between all of the characters and their emotions and what they're going through. It's doing so much, but it's doing it very well. So...
Kate:But I was on the edge of my seat and I was very scared playing it. Sorry, we're closed. And then I'll also give a brief shout out to Oxenfree, which is one of the first horror games that I ever played that genuinely scared me. And I streamed that whole thing on my first playthrough and I was really scared. So I was glad to have my chat there because I was like, this shit's scary, man.
Kate:Like, there... It's... And on its surface, you you might not really think that it would be super scary, but there are some jump scares in that game that go pretty hard. And I don't mind jump scares. I kinda like them actually.
Kate:But I think overall, it's just a really, really great like narrative horror game and your choices do actually matter. So yeah, those are those are like the two that came to mind thinking about horror. And I think they're also ones that would be great in a starter pack of of indie games. I think people could get through those pretty quickly and and then have a good time. Mhmm.
Aaron:That's a cool pack. Yeah. I like the the the chunky, like, PS one and sixty four visuals of Sorry We're Closed. I think that was a really cool choice because I feel like
Kate:Yeah.
Aaron:That visual style alone will draw in a lot of people. I forget the names of some of these games, but there were a bunch that, came out, like, what, maybe ten or so year... Like, there's just... There's one just called, like, back in 1999 or something like that that that I played a long ass time ago that was really cool. But yeah, that game...
Aaron:Sorry We're Closed does look really cool and sound really cool.
Kate:Yeah. I'm glad you called out like the style of graphics because I'm not familiar with that era really. But yeah, it's a... It does have that like that PS one style, I guess, which is really appealing to me.
Aaron:I'm trying to find this game that I'm thinking of. Steam game nineteen ninety nine Type and sounds. What is it? What am I trying to find? It...
Aaron:I... Yeah. I give up seven or 98 or 99 in the name. I forget. Skip it.
Kate:Let us know listeners. They'll find the chat helpful sound.
Emily:Let us know.
Aaron:Emily, do you wanna go you wanna go next?
Emily:Yeah. I'll go next. I love that we we all have some great PS one style graphics True. Showing up here. So my first pick was Fear the Spotlight, which is actually kind of similar.
Emily:Like this is also a survival horror game in the same kind of vein as like your Silent Hill, your Resident Evil. It's made by Cozy Game Pals and was... It was the debut game published by, Blumhouse Studios. Oh, And this that's is a great one because it's it's pretty short. It's divided in two basically, and each half is probably about five hours long or so.
Emily:And ultimately, it's not the scariest game in the world. I think that they do dramatic tension and kind of psychological horror very, very well. I personally was scared shitless, but I recognize that most people who love horror are probably not gonna find this like intensely scary. But I think that they do the tension and that sort of feeling of dread really, really well. And the narrative is incredible.
Emily:The story that you learn about both protagonists and kind of some other backstory, It's all very, very well told. And because it's not the scariest thing in the world, there aren't a lot of like, there's no gore. There's not a lot of jump scares. It makes it great for gamers of any age or gamers to play with their kids if they have kids who are ready for horror. So I think it's a it's a great game.
Emily:And then I also had... I couldn't not include my personal favorite horror game, Indie game of all time, the Mortuary Assistant, which is much much Oh
Aaron:my god.
Emily:You're playing as Rebecca who's starting her job as a mortuary assistant.
Kate:Name always kills me.
Emily:I'm sorry. And there's like, you're the crazy thing is the not scary part of the game is while you're just like cutting up bodies to like embalm them because you're in a mortuary. But then also there's like demons who will pop out at you. And I don't know. I think at this point, find it kind of cozy.
Emily:Yeah. Make it make sense that I was more scared by fear the spotlight than the mortuary assistant. But Nice. That's something for me and my therapist figure out at some point. But, yeah, these are both great games that I think people should pick up.
Kate:I feel like the... Like Emily being so scared of Fear the Spotlight was funny. Because I feel like you were texting me when there's a particular... Actually, I won't say that because it's a huge spoiler. But anyway, yeah.
Kate:I love watching Emily stream the mortuary assistant because like I'm absolutely mortified and horrified. And she's just like acting super normal playing as Rebecca just like another day at the funeral home. Just like embalming bodies like it's no big deal.
Aaron:That's the ultimate life sim right there. Yeah. I almost have to get in the spotlight. The mortuary assistant. Damn it.
Aaron:Holy shit. I now have to make the difficult choice between my... You know what?
Emily:You don't. We didn't. Yeah. Say both of them, Aaron.
Kate:These are both great games. Don't hold yourself back.
Aaron:Okay. Fuck them. So I'm gonna say the one that had the most to say about for last. Mouthwashing was really, really cool. Not at all what I expected that game to be.
Aaron:Because Jerry and then... Or Jerry hyped it up, and then Dave Jackson tells in the backlog. He had that episode about it, hyped it up. And, of course, I didn't listen to the spoiler part. I was like, nope.
Aaron:I hopped off. Yeah. Played that game for myself. Of course, super short. It was, like, three...
Aaron:No. Five hours. God, the story in that game is so good. Like, the way that they they break it up and and give it to you in a non, in a nonlinear manner. And they they feed you little bits by little bits by little bits.
Aaron:And then when you slowly piece it together by the end, it's like, oh, wait. He he did that to her? Oh, shit. And then, like, he did that because of that. Yeah.
Aaron:It's mouthwashing is really good. It's cheap. Go support them devs. The the visual style also. Another PS one looking ass game.
Aaron:It's great. And the the sound design is really, really cool too because you'll just. There's not a whole lot of music unless, like, people are talking or it's a cutscene, but you'll hear, like, the the groans of the of the ship and shit. It's it's really, really cool. But the one that I have the most to say about is Crow Country because that game that game, whoops.
Aaron:That game is so good.
Kate:Oh, yeah.
Aaron:This one, yet another chunky polygon s PS one n 64 looking game, but you're going to this... The the titular Crow Country, this amusement park, and it's shut down because of someone did something forever ago. I'm not gonna spoil that. But the story, again, not at all what I was expecting from the game. It went to places.
Aaron:I expected it to just be, basically, like, Resident Evil one where it's just like, oh, no. They they did this. Whatever. Yeah. Nice.
Aaron:Totally not what I expected in the the actual, gunplay and the way you can solve all these different optional little puzzles throughout the park to get upgrades for not just your character, but for your guns and stuff. Like, you can get the running shoes that make the game a breeze. You can get little laser sight for your handgun, all sorts of cool stuff. And it just... It makes going out of your way to solve these simple ass puzzles so rewarding.
Aaron:But, yeah, by the end, I was... Like, right at the end, I don't know about you guys, but I accidentally saved everybody and got the best ending. So hooray for me. That was cool. Damn.
Emily:Damn. Good on you. I don't... I... At least one person died.
Emily:RIP. I don't even remember who.
Aaron:I didn't even know that anybody could die until I until I read a little bit more into the story. Like, I thought everybody survived by default because that's what happened. But hell, yeah.
Kate:Mara is... Frost is such an iconic, like, looking character. Like, her outfit and her little purple bob and her white shoes and, like, she's she's so fucking iconic. I love her.
Aaron:She's... Yeah. Oh my god. In that first save room, I forgot I forgot what the name of the room is called, but it's got that fireplace and the couch in front of the fireplace and, like, the little side table with the the cup of whiskey. Oh my god.
Aaron:And then the the save theme music or Crazy music
Kate:in Crow country.
Aaron:Yeah. Save room music is so good. Oh, goddamn. What's... I think we have...
Kate:Goddamn.
Aaron:Goddamn. We have two left. Before we do that, I say we take an ad break because I've got a good one whipped together.
Kate:Oh, hell yeah.
Aaron:We'll hear a word from our sponsor and be be right back. Alright. Kate and Emily, you might have heard of these before. Pet Rocks, we're bringing them back. They're back and better than ever.
Aaron:Move over Pokemon. There's a new king in town. It's Stevie Bros Pet Rocks. They're they're pet rocks. They do everything the rocks do, like sit, rock and roll.
Aaron:In the immortal words of ACDC, to those of you who rock, we salute you. And that goes to Stevie Bros pet rocks as well. Yeah. Kate and Emily, what are what are your favorite features or whatever of of Stevie Rose pet rocks?
Kate:I love that you can also use the pet rocks as a weapon and as self defense when needed. It's just like really helpful to have... It's kind of like having a guard dog, but like in a different, like more whimsical way. Guard rock. Whimsical.
Kate:Guard rock.
Emily:Yeah. Guard rock. Imagining you're just like...... Just never run away,
Aaron:you know.
Kate:Oh, wow. Good job. You don't have to microchip them.
Emily:I'm a bad cheat. Yeah.
Aaron:This... The whole home defense, I'm imagining you, like, rolling... Slowly rolling a boulder on top of a burglar or something.
Kate:Like, you get the giant pet rock available. You get the biggest one available for self defense. So you can just roll it onto the intruders.
Aaron:Damn right. Yeah. I'm sorry, Emily. What... What's your favorite feature?
Emily:Oh, I love that they never run away. You save so much money on vet bills. You don't have to microchip them.
Aaron:You don't
Emily:have to spay or neuter them to my knowledge.
Aaron:That's true. That's so true. Yeah. And you know what? Beep beep beep beep.
Aaron:This just in. Stevie Bros Pet Rocks, they have different flavors too. We can flavor them. I don't know. It's the first thing that came to mind.
Aaron:We can flavor them too. So, yeah, you can lick your rocks if you want to.
Kate:But they're still your pets.
Aaron:That's true. Yeah. Lick responsibly. They have they have all sorts of cool accessories for them. You can get cool hats.
Aaron:You can get a a cool little like bow tie or just a necktie. You can get a shirt for them.
Kate:Emily would put hers in a bow tie. No doubt.
Emily:I would. I'd buy all the hats. I mean, is the point. That's the point of any game that has hats. Right?
Emily:Is to collect all the hats.
Kate:Collect them all.
Emily:That's what I want in real life too. With my pet Oh,
Aaron:you can get little mustaches too. That'd cool. Little like twirly mustache or get, like, a goatee.
Kate:I would get one of those because I'm insufferable and my pet will be as well.
Aaron:Sorry. Install some, like, lasers on him or something too. So wherever you go, he's like, and it's like a little disco ball, basically.
Kate:Sounds like very multipurpose. Like, yeah, like helps with home invasions is there for you, can be a disco ball, don't have to microchip it. What's not to love about a pet rock?
Aaron:So many uses. So many more uses that... Than people realize. You could hammer it nails.
Kate:Just... You don't even need a hammer. Just...
Emily:Yeah.
Aaron:Hold down paper. Shit. What's... What else? What else?
Aaron:We need...
Kate:Roll it down the stairs if you need some noises.
Aaron:Bingo. There you go.
Kate:Yeah.
Emily:Break your window. If you need to escape your home.
Kate:That's good....
Emily:You run out.
Kate:Yeah. In a fire. Yeah.
Aaron:Damn. That's good. There you go sponsor. There's four. Thank you Stevie Bros Pet Rocks for sponsoring this episode.
Aaron:And we're back and I forget whose turn it is. So we can...
Emily:I think it's Kate's turn.
Kate:Is it my turn to pick a category?
Emily:I think it's your turn.
Aaron:Thank you for keeping track of this. Thank you so much.
Kate:You know what? I just wanna... I'm gonna pick deck builder because I'm like, I don't really know what to say here. So because I think I've only played one deck builder game in earnest. But I think, is it my turn to go first or is someone else's turn to explain their game first?
Aaron:You can go first if Yeah. You
Kate:Okay. I'll just go first because it's it's easy and short. I pick Slay the Spire because I'm not really a deck builder girly though I would like to be and I think I maybe am, but just haven't quite explored that genre as much as I would like. I will say I've been playing a lot of vampire survivors lately, and I did try the vampire survivors. What is it called?
Kate:Vampire crawlers, the deck builder. It's like, it also has the title of Vampire Survivors in the name of the game, which always throws me. But it's like the deck builder version of Vampire Survivors. That demo was awesome. So I'm still waiting for the the right time to dive into that full release.
Kate:But anyway, I picked Slay the Spire just because this is a game I picked up when I didn't even know what video game genres were. Like I was just like, oh, I like this game. Like it it looks cool and there's lots of cool cards. So I was deck building before I even knew what that meant, but then I just never picked up another one. But anyway, yeah, a really great game.
Kate:It's a classic I feel like. I think I would say pretty approachable as far as deck builders go, but for some reason I can only win as the silent. So I always play as the silent. I've never had a successful run with any of the other characters. But the bosses are really cool and you do have to do math, but like I'm not really ever doing the math.
Kate:I'm sort of just like going in with confidence and I've made it out okay several times. Also great sound effect for when you're leveling up the cards. And I love the music. It's very like exciting and immersive and I'm always on the edge of my seat when I'm playing Slay the Spire. So yeah, that's that's my pick.
Kate:It's the it's the titular deck builder, but I also would love to jump into Slay the Spire two. I have not jumped into that yet, but I I would love to get the chance. So I think my next, deck builders will be that and will be Slay the Spire two and the Vampire Crawlers deck builder. So that's all I gotta say about that, but this is our girl Emily genre. So I'm excited to hear from I her about
Emily:had a such a hard time picking this because I didn't know if I wanted to go with like a deep cut or an obvious pick. I I decided to go with an obvious pick. I picked Velotro.
Aaron:Oh,
Emily:yeah. I don't call it Bellatro. I'm sorry to everybody who's gonna get mad about that.
Aaron:No. It's it's fine. We we call it Bellatro here. Anybody that says Bellatro is is objectively valid. Get
Kate:out of here.
Emily:Sorry, The Bellatro house here. I just... I I'm... I will stand 10 toes down on this game. I think it's a fantastic game.
Emily:I think the game design is near perfect. Mhmm. I also think it's a great place for a lot of people to start with the deck builder because it's based on making poker hands. Most people have at least encountered the concept of, you know, three of a kind, four of a kind, full house. Right?
Emily:So it's a little bit more approachable, I think. The other thing that I love is because it's based on poker, it doesn't have a ton of like its own custom terminology, which even in deck builders that I love can drive me nuts when they have to have their own like proprietary name for every like status condition or something. And then you need like tool tips. I've seen games that have tool tips on tool tips on tool tips to explain exactly what like a card effect does. And I don't really want that in my life a lot of the time.
Emily:And Bellatio is like pretty straightforward. Every card is like in a sentence, can say what it does and understand it. So I love that. I also think if you're new to deck building, it's
Kate:kind
Emily:of nice that you only have to think about like your score and you're not necessarily thinking about like getting hurt or, you know, like a kind of combat situation. So I think it's very approachable and it's so fun. And it kinda like sparked its own genre. So I think it's a good starting point for people too. I
Aaron:also think the musical... I'm gonna say this for like probably every single game. Yeah. The music is really good. And I like the the trippy swirly backgrounds and the, like, the the low...
Aaron:Or not low res. The, like, CRT, like, video poker visuals, and it has... Reminds me of of going to the the rural Iowa bars that had video poker, and it'd be, like, real grainy and and and like goopy looking. But, yeah, blush...
Emily:I love a little goopy poker.
Kate:Goopy poker.... The rural Iowa bars. We should all head over there. That'd be fun. Yeah.
Aaron:Oh, dude. We get some mini tacos and...
Kate:Oh, hell yeah.
Emily:Damn. I'm on my way.
Kate:I'm I'm already there waiting for y'all.
Aaron:Cool fun Aaron fact. I have put so many hours into Slay the Spire, but I have never once beaten it because I always get fucked over by something.
Emily:That's so hard.
Aaron:Like, I'll get to the last boss. The like, the dog boss is the bane of my existence. I'll almost always get that. Then I'll get so close to beating it, but then I'll be missing like one card or I'll be missing like one armor and then I'll die. Yeah.
Aaron:Oh,
Kate:I I love to lose at that game. Yeah. It's great.
Emily:I love to
Aaron:lose at these types of... Speaking of losing Wildfrost, holy shit. Yeah. That game used to be super brutal, but they updated it quite a bit. It's...
Aaron:I mean, it's it's still a deck builder, but there's a lot of strategy into it too because you're... You'd be put... Putting cards on a grid, and you have, like, your your leader and then your party characters. And you'll pick up different party characters as you go, or you'll you'll free them from ice. So a choice of, like, three or whatever.
Aaron:And they each do all sorts of cool shit. Like, you can synergize in really cool ways with your leader. Then the the different weapons and cards that you can unlock as you go along. Shit. It...
Aaron:There's shit... There is... There's so much to the game. I don't wanna keep you all here for, two hours, but it is...
Kate:It's like hard. It's... There's a lot going on there. I played the demo and it was too hard for me, but I would love to watch Emily play it. So much so in fact that I gave it to her for Christmas.
Kate:I pretty
Emily:have to confess, I haven't played it yet, and it's only because I'm afraid that once I start...
Kate:She's afraid.
Emily:I'm... I I'm not gonna play anything else for a while. So I I have to pick it. Right now, we're like between seasons. So like right now might be a good time for me to start
Kate:playing it.
Aaron:Do it. Do it. And then if you talk about it on the show, I'll come on and I'll take over for, like, four hours because I love that game so much. It's...
Kate:Aaron has something to say about Weld Frost.
Aaron:It's legitimately my favorite deck builder because of, like, how much there is there. Like, there's so much going on all the time. Like, each card at the bottom has, like, a countdown timer. And at... When that when that timer reaches zero, they'll they'll attack and do whatever the hell they do.
Aaron:Whatever it says on the card, like, they'll and apply plus one. This game also has its own, like, bullshit status effects. Like, there's was there shroom, which is just poison. I don't know why they didn't just call it poison. There's darkness or whatever, which is just makes you take double damage.
Aaron:But, yeah, you have to really pay attention to the enemy's timers and position your characters just right. Because, like, with with the grid, you can position a character behind another character so that when the enemy attacks, they'll attack the one up front instead. Basically, use them as a meat shield, save the one that's almost dead. Like I said, it used to be it used to be a lot more brutal because if one of your teammates got knocked down in battle, they'd be out for the for the rest of the the battle, but then you can bring it back afterward, but they would have... I think their HP would be halved or something like that.
Aaron:It'd be halved or, like, a good chunk of it would be taken out, but they don't do that anymore. If someone dies, you'll get them right back at the end of the battle, full health. Nothing like that. But, yeah, it's fucking brutal. It's it's good though.
Kate:That's cool to know there were some updates. That's awesome.
Aaron:It's a lot of updates. They added so much new shit. I'm afraid to go back because I haven't played for a while. And I'm afraid if I start it up again, I'm gonna get hooked unlocking all the new shit because they had a new pets. Oh, I didn't even talk about the pets.
Aaron:Oh, shit. There's a
Kate:We don't play this anytime soon. I'm scared.
Emily:I'm so scared. This will after you.
Aaron:Say goodbye to the rest of your life. Sorry.
Kate:There's a bug in my room that's... I'm battling right now.
Aaron:Get him. Get his ass. Use your pet rock. That's another listener. Stevie Gross pet rocks can also be used to dispose of pests and other vermin.
Kate:That's right. Shout out to the sponsor.
Aaron:I forget who goes next, but I'm just gonna start us off on the old RPGs. Hello. I picked Lisa the Painful, and I I had a a very painful inner battle with this one. I almost put a Mori. And, thankfully, Emily beat me to Torchlight two because I almost put that as well too.
Aaron:And there was a bunch of them. But Lisa, the painful is... I mean, it's kind of short ish, but it's it's... It tackles some really, really heavy, like, mature themes through its story, like, all all sorts of really dark, nasty shit. But it's also really funny and stupid in parts, so it's hard to recommend this this game to anybody.
Aaron:Like, the... I I can't really say anything about the story without spoiling it. Never mind. But... Yeah.
Aaron:Yeah. It'll it'll talk about, like, really depressing shit one minute, and then it'll be... You'll get, like, this helmet from a character that you beat, they'll be like, it smells like body odor and wet baloney or something stupid. And you'll laugh to yourself, chuckle to yourself a couple times. What's really, really cool about it is that there's just a shit ton of recruitable characters, and they all have different move sets and abilities and shit.
Aaron:Like, you you have your main cat... Holy shit. You have your main guy, Brad, who... You'll do combos in combat. Like, you'll do combinations of a b x y or whatever the keyboard commands are.
Aaron:I think they're just WASD or something. But then there's other characters that'll use, like, my boy... Oh, what's his name? Wildborn? He has this pack of wild squirrels that he can send out, and they'll do a shit ton of damage.
Aaron:He can also equip whips, and he can do, like, multiple attacks in one turn, just lashing at him and shit. And then my other boy, I think his name was Eddie. He has this, like, diving helmet on, and his only weapon is a guitar. And you play different notes on the guitar to play different songs that'll heal your teammates or inflict sleep on the enemies or make their ears bleed or do all sorts of goofy shit. And then there's just, like, stupid jokey dumb characters like Farty Hernandez whose only attacks is driving a fucking semi truck over the enemies.
Aaron:It's got really low accuracy, but when it does hit, it fucking hits. But... Yeah. He sucks. Don't use Farty Hernandez, listeners.
Kate:If you're listening, don't use him.
Aaron:Yeah. Don't use Farty. And, yeah, again, it's hard to recommend it to to people because, like, the humor is so good. It's so funny and so stupid at times. But then, yeah, it'll be real sad and depressing and just fucking terrible, but try it.
Aaron:It's it's fun. It's good.
Kate:Yeah. I I didn't realize it was published by Serenity Forge. That's cool. And it's a... I love a dark humor, psychological horror.
Kate:It looks cool.
Aaron:It's it's really really good. And again, it's like fifteen hours, I think. It won't be long. And if you do play it, please let me know which characters you you recruit because I would love to know. Wow.
Aaron:As long as he's not farty. I fucking hate him so much.
Kate:Don't let don't let us know if you're...
Emily:Everyone will recruit farty. To make Aaron mad.
Aaron:The funny part is he also has, like... He has three other brothers. There's, like, Fardy, Lardy, and I forgot what the other one is, but they all have that... I think it's Marty, actually. They all have, like, the same type of name, but, you know, just different, like, first letter or something.
Aaron:Let's make a whole party out of that. Oh, party. That also sounds like it too. Sorry. Someone else go next.
Aaron:Please take the mic.
Kate:Emily, go. I'll go. I'll go.
Emily:Party party. Party party. No.
Aaron:God damn it.
Emily:God. So I had to pick Torchlight two. For me, this is RPGs. Like, Torchlight two is the ultimate feel good good time run around hack slash loot. I want to like find cool new weapons.
Emily:I want to like I want to spend fifteen minutes looking at my inventory trying to figure out which weapons and what armor I'm keeping and what I'm selling and what I'm upgrading. It's got a really cool world, but the story is basically meaningless. Like, I I think that it's perfectly for whenever this came out like 2012, I think. It's like a perfectly serviceable story, but that is not the reason to play. It is a cool universe.
Emily:Serviceable. It's got a good story in that. It has a story. But like the universe is really cool. It's got kind of a cool like, not quite steampunk exactly vibe.
Emily:But the world design is neat. And it's it's procedurally generated. So a lot of the maps are gonna be completely unique every time you play. I've replayed it like three times.
Kate:Hell yeah.
Emily:And it's sort of like top down sort of isometric style graphics. And it's great. And it was Indie at the time. The Torchlight series is no longer Indie, but it was back then. It was like a combo of devs.
Emily:The guy who made Fate, which is a very very old Oh, yeah. RPG kind of rogue like that I will, stand behind for all of time even though it wasn't particularly good. I loved it. And folks from, Blizzard who worked on, Diablo two got together. So it's very Diablo two like
Aaron:Oh, yeah.
Emily:Cool. If that's your jam.
Aaron:I love that game. That was
Emily:So good.
Aaron:That was Diablo four before Diablo four. I'll I'll stand by it. Diablo three felt molasses slow compared to Torchlight two because that game, yeah, you can totally shut your brain off and you can just mow through that game. Yeah. And the classes are really fun too.
Aaron:Like, if I remember right, they each have, like, three different subclasses or something.
Emily:Yeah. Yeah. That sounds right.
Aaron:I think my last playthrough, was... Whatever the barbarian is called, it's like barbarian or warrior or berserker or something. And there was a whole subclass for, like, oh, like, werebear or, like, lunar bear moves or something. Their their own goofy word for werewolf or something.
Emily:Yeah. Because you turn into a werewolf or something. Yeah. With one of those. Yeah.
Emily:Yeah. So many cool effects and like great skill trees. It's just so good. It's so good.
Aaron:It is.
Emily:I'd play it
Aaron:right now.
Emily:I'll watch it right this second. You think I will?
Aaron:I think it's... It is co op, isn't it? Is it only like local No. Co op or
Emily:They have online co op. And it still works. I've played online co op in the last twelve months. Nice.
Aaron:I will also say I love that you can send your pet back to town to sell shit for you. You don't have to do it yourself. Yeah.
Kate:Oh, that's cool.
Aaron:Yeah. Diablo four. God damn it. That shit drives me nuts. You have to go back to town to sell your stuff in Diablo four.
Aaron:That sucks.
Emily:Crazy. Kate?
Kate:Okay. I I haven't played a ton of RPGs to my knowledge and to my understanding what an RPG is. It's quite possible I've played many of them. But one that I did play and really enjoy that I think would be great in a starter pack is Stray Gods, the role playing musical. It's it's cool because, yeah, in this game you...
Kate:It's got a lot of like Greek mythology, iconic characters. I think there's a DLC where you can play as Orpheus. Right? Isn't it called like Orpheus DLC? Yeah.
Kate:But it's really cool because they... There's original music in here and it is very much like a musical. So songs will happen based on the choices that you make. You might not see all the songs in your playthrough because yeah, your choices really matter in this game. But I just love the vibes of it.
Kate:I love musicals anyway though. And it's really fascinating because you're playing as this person who's like trying to solve the mystery of the last muse's death. So the stakes are really high right from the get go. And, I just like how well it blends like action and adventure and storytelling with something like musicals and romance. So it's like offering a lot, especially to people like me who enjoy those things because you can...
Kate:There are a lot of different... Well, there's a lot of hot people in it, is really important to me. And then lots of, yes, like lots of really cool romanceable characters, but also just like great music that happens at very exciting moments. And it's short. I wanna say the whole thing is maybe like 10, 11.
Kate:It might even be less than that. But yeah. And and the art is beautiful. It's got kind of like a like a comic book style, I wanna say. Okay.
Kate:Art style. But I think this is one of those games that I... One of the first games that I played where I got to experience like, oh, my choices do matter. And I think like there were some... I had some critiques about it in that regard, but I think overall, it's it's a really great RPG for a starter pack.
Kate:And I love I love musicals. So it's fun. It's fun to see an indie game take a big swing like that and be like, let's make a role playing musical. Like, just think it's a really cool and unique idea. So...
Aaron:That is cool. Yeah. The I'll allow it. Goddamn it. If...
Kate:You'll allow it.
Aaron:Yeah. It's an RPG in the same way that like Disco Elysium is an RPG where like it's all about Yeah. Choice and then affecting the story and all that stuff. Yeah.
Kate:Because... Yeah. RPGs are so long and I I... Like, I haven't played a ton of them yet, especially like the indie ones. So...
Kate:But I was gonna say Thirsty Suitors, which I feel like is definitely an RPG, but I think I talked about that game last time I was on the show. So try to switch it up a little bit. Get straight gods in there.
Aaron:Let's, to recap everything that we've talked about, all the packs that we've thrown together. Again, listeners, these are the definitive indie game starter packs, trademark, trademark, trademark, trademark, copyright. For our RPG starter pack, we've got Torchlight two, Stray Gods, the role playing musical, and Lisa the Painful. For farm slash life sim, we've got Fields of Mystria, Cozy Caravan, and Minami Lane. Horror, we've got...
Aaron:Emily, you picked Fear the Spotlight. Right?
Kate:Yeah.
Aaron:Okay. Okay. Horror, we've got fear the spotlight, sorry we're closed, and crow country. Fuck it. And also the mortuary assistant, oxen free and mouthwashing.
Aaron:Deck builders, Bellatro, Slay the Spire, Wildfrost. And for platformers, we've got Super Meat Boy, Pepper Grinder, and Steam World Dig two. I think those are some damn fine picks.
Kate:Love it.
Emily:I stand behind all of these. I think I'd be very happy if they did like little mini Humble Bundles for any, you know, for these. I think that would be a great pack. 100%.
Aaron:Maybe we need to do volume two of this. No. I can't think of any other... Are there any other genres that we might have missed?
Kate:Rhythm. Rhythm game.
Aaron:Oh, god damn it. Yeah. Okay.
Emily:Puzzle might
Kate:game. Puzzle. Yes. Puzzles. City builder.
Aaron:Damn.
Kate:Rhythm puzzle, city builder, fucking... Whatchamacallit?
Emily:Shooter. First of
Kate:Yes. Gambling games, roguelite roguelite gambling games. Damn. Dating Sims, if you will.
Aaron:Yeah. We might need to do a volume two for this.
Kate:Metroidvania cooking game. There's so many now.
Aaron:Oh, we should do cooking games. That'd be cool. Or like management Sims. Yeah. There's all sorts of stuff I'm sure we could throw on here.
Aaron:Gosh. Well, yeah. Thanks everybody for for listening. Kate, Emily, thank you so much for coming back onto the show. It was great having you as always.
Emily:Thanks, Aaron. Thanks for having us.
Aaron:Absolutely. I will definitely have to cook up a part two. And, yeah. Well, before we go, let's, thank the... Everybody who supports the show over there on Patreon.
Aaron:We got Pimp Pimp, Dean Martin, You Can Eat That Crust, Will, Dave c, Quest sixty four, one on Nintendo 64 game, Stormageddon, Kevin Demo, Grumpy Duck, Jeff Miners, Trey, Bar Silence, a me... Video game music podcast, and Jared Schrader. That always takes the breath right out of me because all these names are so long. Thank you everybody for supporting the show, doing what you do. Go ahead and support the show for 2 or $4 a month, all that cool stuff.
Aaron:Okay. Bye.
Kate:Bye. Bye.
Aaron:Okay. Bye.
