The Giant Beastcast: Episode 62

Yes, it's time to brighten part of my day with Giant Beastcast. This what happens when you work freelance and work at home. This is how exciting it gets.

Oh no. Something to top the clip-on tie insult? I am both eager and terrified.

This is the best time to be listening to video game podcasts

Yep..... I guess ill listen to this while playing dreamcast games.

Ah, the ol' woodland twin-toilet.

I ended up getting way more value out of my Wii U than I initially anticipated, so I'm pretty happy with it. Nice to be back on it regularly now too with Tokyo Mirage Sessions.

Guess I could say the same of Vita too - I've ended up playing a lot more on it than I was actually expecting to when I bought it.

Oh, also I could totally go for the Pokéwatch thing - I don't like having my phone out the whole time I'm walking anywhere but that's the only way to have it register. That said, by the time it arrives I might have fallen off too much to warrant it. As a side note, I love Vinny's small selection of go-to Pokémon names. Gotta love that Chimchar!

Another shortcast? I hope this isn't a regular thing now. :(

1 Hour and 30 Minutes, that short. Okay then.

boy this one GOES. best wishes to you vinny

yasss

Now we know Austin was adding another hour or so to each podcast :P

Love my Vita ... and really enjoyed a shitload of games, too many to list here, but fuuuuuuuuck I can't even begin to describe how much I played and loved Spelunky on it. I feel Spelunky alone justifies the Vita if you have commutes you can play a portable on.

Like the podcast but I truly miss Austin. His enthusiasm and positivity really brought something to my day.

Nothing against the crew. I've been a fan of Vinny and Alex for years and Jeff Bakalar too since he started with the GBEast podcast.

I just notice the lack of Austin. I hope he starts putting out content soon.

Edit: I would use the poke watch thing if it wasn't expensive and I could use it while I'm just taking a walk. I've been walking more but I don't enjoy having to take my phone out. Plus I'm ambivalent about catching them or playing. It's fun just to see where they are located around my small town. Our local rail trail has a few at spots that are not that common.

I not know how they chose the spots. I have friends that are going to places in town and noticing things they have never seen. So it's been ok.

Edit2: have you guys not seen Game of Thrones? There are several young actresses in it. (Maisie Williams)Also in the Hunger Games?

(Willow Shields)

Hope everything is ok now Vinny. <3

Speaking of Pokemon Go, another great new feature has been added:

Gaming Safety FTW: The Pokémon In Pokémon Go Will Now Scream When A Player Is Within A Mile Of A Registered Sex Offender

The best part of waking up, is Beastcast in your cup!

@jetlag: That is awesome!

@meierthered: Compared to the usually 2+ hour length, I would consider 1.5 hours comparatively short. It's no big deal. I just prefer the casts to be longer. That's all.

I rather enjoy these shorter Beastcasts. I do miss Austin, but I still love me a Beastcast. Thanks ya'll

The Boys Are Bakalar in Town

Well, I tried

@twitterlegend: Maybe you should go Bakalar to the drawing board....

SUP BEASTARDS!! MISSED YOU!

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@jetlag: @alex:

@razzuel: its summer, less games to be played and less news about, give it a couple of months and they'll be 2+ hours again

Firewatch delivering on what was expected, except for the trick where people were disappointed because it wasn't the mystery they were led to believe.

I feel the same way about the randomization/procedural generation/rogulites in the indie scene as Vinny. Or maybe I shouldn't say that, I don't know what exactly he thinks. What I mean is I don't like it, and it feels like obvious padding. It's a trend just like how AAA games have trends, just more convenient and cheaper for a small team.

(I like the content portion of the internet. Giant Bomb, for instance, is pretty good! It's the social stuff that's awful. My day never gets better if I look at twitter.)

We happy few, we band of beasts.

And these people call themselves gamesmen? Pfft it is absolutely possible to have a 48 hour gaming marathon.

Putting some kind of explicit time "quota" or whatever on the podcast would be kinda crappy, if you ask me. I'd rather let the chemistry take the podcast as far as it needs to go, and let the shooting off the cuff naturally take over as the moment demands it.

The only young actress I can think of right now is Chloe Moretz from... Kick Ass?

That's actually pretty hard. What happened to all the young actors? Maybe they are all busy doing John Green movies.

@wandrecanada: pretty sure Children of Men happened and we can all look forward to our dystopian doom.

@wandrecanada said:

Man, I was going to say Elle Fanning, who I still mostly associate with Super 8. In my mind that movie came out like, 2 years ago, but it turns out it was 5. Oh god, time, what is happening to you?

Anyway there are definitely young actors out there. Somewhere.

It seems like the 90-minute running time for this episode can be partially attributed to Alex being pressed for time. He mentions some embargoed press event he has to go to at the end of the podcast.

Man hearing the talk about the handheld consoles was a big bummer. I still love my Vita and new 3DS. To be honest I have yet to play a single phone game that feels worthwhile.

Natalia Dyer from Stranger Things. That's yer Max. ;)

Unverified pure brain speculation, but I would imagine the reason to keep the phone line speaker on during the initial handshake is incase you call a wrong number or the number is no longer valid and can hear if a human picks up on the other end or if you get a phone switch board recording. I imagine it would be the same thing for fax machines.

Didn't they start the Beastcast saying they didn't want it to be 3+ hours like Bombcast? Two hours is the sweet spot for me.

I hope you do a Quick Look for Zero Escape 3 when you get to it.

@dave_tacitus said:

Man, I dunno, she has very attractive features. Max isn't supposed to be like, gorgeous.

Max seems like the kinda role where you would do an open casting call and just find some unknown who suits the character.

Is We Happy Few gonna be like Dead Island, where its trailer implies one thing, then the realities of the gameplay are something else entirely? Not in a "bullshot" sort of way, but in a way where the trailer implied a certain amount of story and then that isn't that important in the final product which is very mechanics driven?

@bisonhero: She's got the whole slightly nerdy outsider thing going on in Stranger Things, though, plus the waif-like quality Max has in the game.

I'd love it if the original voice actress for Max got a chance, but she looks totally different from the game character. She's in her late 20s too.

"If you wanna get dangerously intoxicated, I got a turkey baster."

Why is everyone so harsh on We Happy Few? Jesus christ. This game is getting way more scrutiny from this site than any other early access game I've ever seen. It's 6 months to a year out! Holy shit. None of the concerns from you guys even seem realistic at this point in development considering the devs said the game is considered an alpha at best right now. All of your concerns seem to boil down to it being a survival game, as if there was some sort of bait and switch from the goddamn INTRO. It's just an INTRO. I don't get how that misrepresents the game at all. You walk around and interact with the environment. How is that misrepresenting the gameplay? I just don't get it. Even explaining your point of view it just comes off as "I don't like this genre", "this isn't what I wanted".

@mechanized: If the only exposure one has to We Happy Few before the Early Access was the demo at Microsoft's E3 Conference this year, then I'd say that the disappointment makes sense. It's just because that intro they showed off is so wonderful, that finding out the game is a roguelike, survival game can be pretty disappointing. I think the GB staff was expecting a linear, story-based game from We Happy Few (something akin to Bioshock), but that's just not what it is. And that's fine. I just think people expected something different.

Man, Vinny has a pretty good Country Joe and The Fish impression.

It's weird to me that Alex had almost the opposite impression of Headlander than Brad did. Brad complained about the controls when you're not just the head and Alex specifically said it felt really good. Maybe Brad being Brad at video games?

Wait, is that line from Alex about not cooking for 10 years serious? That had to be hyperbole for the sake of the ad, there's just no way someone could go that long without feeling constantly sick.

If you do not have more stuff to discuss, do not extend the podcast for the sake of more content. It only dilutes the parts that are enjoyable to listen to.

TLDR: Quality over quantity

@vinny You should really check out Steins Gate on vita. There's not 'puzzle' element but there's a unique choice mechanic with your cell phone, and it has an amazing story.

Is that pic from Jersey?

Jeff has said recently that in the case of the Bombcast they don't try to go for 3 hours, it just happens to get around that length. Whatever length it would naturally end up being, it should end up being.

Pilot-to-Bombardier had me laughing for a solid minute