e e e e e e e e e e e e e e okay [Music] [Music] all right we are live what is going on everybody this is one of your hosts of the Xbox Duke podcast I am Randall thor9 the man with the million and with me as usual doing his second podcast back to back the reason why we're late the reason why we're five minutes late but people will blame me for it jez Cordon of window Central what's going on man why we're not late are we oh we are a little bit late sorry about that guys although I was here on time so I'm going to blame Rand for that no you weren a little bit late you're late yeah oh well whatever we're here now that's the important thing and uh let's not play the blame game Rand we get to do that later we're 34 three yeah I'm sure you just been biting at the you know I'm sure you've been waiting all well I'm going to say all week but literally since yesterday to talk about 343 and cuz they're they're your favorite they're your favorite Xbox developer aren't they uh yeah they're they're up there man they are they're up there baby I don't know uh but uh I don't know it is what it is it is what it is I have no idea and all that stuff oh man I'm just I'm just a happy camper today Rand I got loads of caffeine in me so let's let's go for let's go for a 5 hour show today right um I don't know if I can do a 5 hour show I don't know if I can I've been running I've been running on like not a lot of sleep because my bed was sort of broken so I had to buy a new one all right I was telling you about so it's like I could only like sleep on my left side which I can only sleep for like an hour or two before I wake up so you know it hasn't been it hasn't been the best like two weeks but got the new bed today or yesterday actually um so I'm looking forward to actually breaking it in and actually sleeping for a solid I don't know 12 18 24 hours because to catch up on the sleep I've missed over the past like week and a half you don't you don't realize how much you you you really love and need sleep until you can't sleep or you can only sleep in short increments oh dude I I do trust me trust me I had like a really bad bed situation but you can't investing in a good bed is a really good investment to make man yeah um but uh well uh well yeah we got a podcast to do we do and know it's funny right when we were starting at this my next door neighbor is like literally doing something I don't know if it's like he's doesn't sound like he's cutting the grass but he sounds like there's there's something electric running and it is so loud to me right but you guys can't hear it and neither can Jazz which is odd because you guys can always hear my dog Shakespeare when he bar barks when somebody comes to the door when you know but you guys can't hear this it's like literally right next to the window it's going to bug me all show what it's because uh noise cancellation is really good at canceling out a drone gring noise but when Shakespeare boxs it thinks oh that's that's important speech the dog's trying to contribute so it sends that right through but I can't I can't I can hear it a little bit but uh it's not bad why don't you just you know tell you go and tell your neighbor to go away just tell them you're doing a podcast like yeah I'm podcasting please can you please be quiet I've been waiting all week to podcast um yeah I just want to also make mention that uh I really appreciate appreciated all the birthday wishes last week meant a lot to me everybody that said something during the show in the chat and the people that reached out to me on Twitter um I it's just amazing like you know I don't I don't really think very much of myself I'm sure you guys probably know that so it's like it honestly makes me feel really good like brings a tear to my eye that so many people do care so uh I just wanted to let everybody know that uh you know uh you made my year so thank you guys so much but we have a lot of interesting interesting stuff to talk about because you know I was a tad bit worried about this show particularly right um because there wasn't too much new to talk about and all of a sudden every like yesterday just they just decided to drop some stuff the CMA over in the UK decided to basically be in Sony's pocketbook they're out there protecting PlayStation I did see a tweet you ratioed the the the UK government huh I did I raed the government I'm so proud of myself but yeah we're like we'll get into all that stuff in a bit yeah not only that but Halo infinite decided to break their Silence about you know Co-op cuz Co-op was supposed to come in August and then all of a sudden August ended and there was no Co-op so what happened to that uh we got a we got a road map uh Playstation buying more Studios uh Tokyo game Stuff Game Pass friends and family apparently Matt booty said some things during his Pax West thing I I haven't watched it yet so I don't know but apparently jez he said during the now this could be wrong cuz I saw it in one of the discords I'm in I believe I think it was Xbox air Discord uh I could be wrong and maybe this is misinformation and shame on me for spreading it if it's the case but I think I saw people in there saying that he mentioned that playground is really really really wanting to show Fable and Microsoft is not letting them or something I have no idea about that but you know we can talk about that in a bit yeah so that'd be I mean I want to see Fable I don't know about you guys but I certainly want to see Fable probably one game well that and like perfect well we've seen hellblade a couple times now so yeah so uh if you guys could do us a big favor make sure you hit that like button um subscribe if you're new and please share this out to let people know we are live whether you do it on Twitter or you what other social media is out there Tik should we do Tik Tok Xbox 2 Tik to t you ever think about getting in on the on you know because you don't you don't you don't like Facebook or meta no so you just do Twitter and YouTube you know but but people people you know saying like you got to have the talk you know you got to you got to be there think of think think about all the cool things you could post on there and you can become an influencer on Tik Tok J no no no bro no no no bro no no Tik Tok we will never we'll we will never do Tik Tok never I don't care I don't I don't care if Tik Tok destroy twitch YouTube Google I I'll just die with it Tik Tok sucks your stance is that we're never going to do Tik Tok just like my stance is that we're never going to have My Little Pony gameplay on the show essentially oh well dude well dude come on like democracy well you're block you're blocking Tik Tok I'm blocking My Little Pony it's a tit for T we haven't we haven't done a we haven't done a democratic poll about Tik Tok bro what we have done a democratic poll about on on Twitter is whether people want to see the Xbox series s and X version of My Little Pony gameplay footage on the Xbox 2 live show podcast and an overwhelming 75% of respondents across thousands of votes they voted yes brand they the people people won they don't they don't actually want that they just they just want me to suffer they just want me dude they're all over chat people in chat they they came here expecting My Little Pony this week and what what game do we have up there right now I don't know whatever is in there from last week well you know this this would have been the week to have it cuz I would have been like all right but you didn't have it so oh well well they haven't they haven't acquiesced my request for a review code they probably won't send you a review code cuz nobody's asking for one you're probably the only one and they're like huh huh somebody wants a review code for our My Little Pony game either way uh yeah let's uh let's get a couple of these super chats in before we dive into everything we got one from Sean Kramer who says I've I'm never awake here in Taiwan when you guys are live so here's a super chat before bed to say these pods are the best part of my week oh that's that's pretty awesome uh # more Peppa oh no no no see dude people love people love that stuff man no not Peppa it might yeah we could get some more there's um there's DLC coming from Peppa did you see are you going to play are you're not going to play it are you I'm going to play it and get some gameplay footage man oh Jesus for the next week's show of the Peppa Pig you said you were G to grab multivers footage you said you going to grab called the lamb footage and all stuff but you never do you never you never grab footage of stuff you're play well I'm well I could but it'd be World of Warcraft I'm addicted to again you were talking all this smack about it recently and now you're addicted to it again dude I what can talk smack about it while also being addicted to it I mean I suppose I suppose you could world of World of Warcraft is in its one of its worst states in history but I still I still I still can't stop World of Warcraft is is is horrible but I still play it 20 hours a day I can't stop playing it you sound like my friends when they when they were going through like Destiny like God Destiny's horrible right now but I can't stop playing it gotta grind grind grind grind grind like okay I saw Mr Matty plays on Twitter he said to me jez sell me on world because I was tweeting about World of Warcraft I said like I wish I could earn a living writing about World of Warcraft and Mr M players replied jez sell me on World of Warcraft and I was just like I can't I can't in good faith recommend it right now to anyone it is Nostalgia driving a lot of it you know but man it's h the next expansion looks really good I got that hopium round I'm sipping that hopium huffing it you know like the Halo fans right now well actually I think Halo fans have given up on hopium right now I'd like to say like as bad as World of Warcraft is or the state that it's in these days I'm glad it ain't Halo dude don't rub it in to the Halo fans that are in chat sorry I'm sorry don't rub it in it's bad enough for for the Halo fans out there that the franchise is in the state that's in you don't you don't need to rub it into them and make make fun of them make fun yeah fun of them you know it's bad enough uh Supernova in the Super Chat says Jazz for CMA 2024 ashl let'sgo yeah you should uh apply there if I was if I was part of the CMA this deal would have went through already yeah same but you know British governments not the the most honorable government out there so Microsoft just needs to you know do what son's doing Grease the wheels in the right place you know slip slip some of those MPS a little backhander you know slip that money right in there you know that's how British government works so I've heard so uh you know H that allegedly allegedly how yeah you should Sayed uh outbreak podcast thanks uh buddy for the Super Chat he says ran have a great show everyone hit the like button indeed make sure you do what he says hit that like button and uh flame says you guys want to hear a joke 343 still making Halo man the the Halo slander although it's pretty deserved um so uh Second Coming says rip Halo H geez how many Halo stuff is here how many Halo super chats that we're going to have throughout the show soless soless curve says I'm off early to listen live you're all awesome thank you you're awesome pandaman says Where's My Little Pony what the f well I mean ask Jazz I don't think is the game even out I don't think it is uh it is it is out but it's the the PS4 Xbox One version so what's coming soon is um is uh your uh your boy x 4K My Little Pony 4K ponies man that's that's what we getting 100 20 HZ Pony the end of the month oh you see being corrected in chat so I was spreading misinformation apparently Matt booty wants to talk about Fable and playground is saying no so it's the other way around oh interesting so I don't know why people were saying it was the other way in the Xbox air Discord but you know maybe they take after Nick when they no I'm not going to say it uh maybe I should have but yeah ham solo thanks buddy for the Super Chat yeah that's kind of funny like Matt Booty's like can we show Halo in playgrounds like absolutely not okay absolutely not so um I've been playing a little bit more St Char Jazz and oh yeah and man I don't know I don't know about this game I don't know about it oh I I am pretty much right now in uh in line with the reviews like I would like to me I get the same like I feel the same playing it as I did playing Crackdown 3 where it's just like it it does the cardinal sin of being boring right which is what I thought Crackdown Crackdown 3 was like it's just it's just boring right the humor is not funny the the the main missions aren't interesting or over the top like the the the city is just a blah Brown like I just I don't know man like it's just kind of it doesn't make it like it doesn't make me want to continue playing it um which is unfortunate I mean I I usually finish everything I start so I will but I just you know what what can you do right uh it's just you finish everything you start I mean normally I if I play something or I start something I finish it that's just what I do same thing with books start it finish it usually I start if I start a series I finish the series you know me too man I always finish you don't finish you don't finish anything at all what are you talking about I I finish everything what are you talking about no no you don't I'm I'm working on trying to finish of Warcraft right now man you never but that's a game that's a game can't be finished though of course it can of course one day I was like I was looking at World of warcraft's ACH because World of Warcraft has achievements right been playing this game for almost 20 years and I just almost have half the achievements oh dear but um have you been playing anything else besides Saints Row uh no that's that's a about it I do want to play um do want to play immortality which came to Xbox game pass yeah uh that game sort of came out of nowhere did yeah it did I don't really know much about it outside of FMV stuff but uh I kind of at least wanted supposedly really good though yeah I want to try it out um so I'll probably play that this week and then uh you know probably go back to S TR and finish that off and stuff uh I I'm probably just going to Mainline the the main missions in SRO uh cuz like normal I don't know about you but like when I play an open world game like I want to do everything before moving on so it's like I do all let me do this side hustle and this side hustle and this side mission and this over here and I do everything in an area and then it's like all right time to do the main mission but like with the game sort of just being boring it's kind of just like well let me just do the main mission so I can you know Beat It essentially which isn't kind of did that with d light man I was like I was I was enjoying dying like two a little bit and then I I sort of hit this W where it's like man I'm just kind of tired of these kind of games so I just started burning through the the main missions to get to the end you know um I don't know what it is about open world games these days I kind of just there's there needs to be either a spike of innovation in that sort of genre or maybe Going Back to Basics even cuz they be I feel like they' become a bit bloated and maybe Ubisoft agrees because you know we'll probably talk about it later but one of the other big news features of the week was the big leak of Assassin's Creed Mirage which supposedly takes the franchise back to its stealth and up routes and less RPG interesting and leaked and then announced really quickly but yeah yeah George he says uh gears 5 took three years full campaign multiplayer horde Forge local and online co-op Forza rizon 5 took three years open world Forge BR online I mean I don't there's I don't think is there a forge well I guess there's uh create your own stuff in for rizen 5 Battle Royale online got I ha 343 worst Xbox devs o people definitely got opinions on that's a very spicy take spicy very spicy uh God Hitman says why are gears devs helping out with State of Decay I love the show # rip Halo why are gears devs I I I think Matt booty said that during Major Nelson's podcast yesterday or something yeah I want to say I haven't listened to so um I haven't listened to it fully but he said that um and this isn't news I think this has been previously announced that um Gears of the Gears of War devs they are they are Wizards with that engine they are they're comprised of many former epic games devs they know the onreal engine inside out and backwards they made that um that demo of the Matrix you know so they are the gods of that engine they are you know up there with epic games itself for using that that engine sorry I'm choking so one of the issues that Undead Labs had with State of Decay 2 and I won't go into this in too much dep because we've got a lot to cover today but one of the issues they had with sted Decay too was that they weren't that familiar with the engine so a lot of the issues that the bugs and quirky nurse of State of Decay 2 that was because they' moved from the cry engine to Unreal Engine for the first time and they didn't have a huge amount of experience with it obviously that that Situation's improved now because they you know they've been up they've been updating um State of Decay 2 like crazy like it's it's not a true service game but they're sure as hell kind of treat like one I don't think I know any game that's been as supported as State of Decay 2 without anyone really clamoring for it I think that the community around State of Decay is really passionate it will be small but you know they've updated the hell out of that game and um we've heard that they're gonna they're continuing to update the game in partnership with woou Studios so the main Undead Labs cohort is now working on uh working on State of Decay 3 and you know being the Wizards that they are the coalitions contributing to the technological aspects of the game so this only bodes well for State of Decay 3 in my view especially because the trailer they put out for it sort of gave the impression of foto realism you know and I've criticized Microsoft in the past for having these really flashy trailers which don't represent the final product maybe it will this time with the Coalition helping out we just have to wait and see yeah I mean I I like Studios when they kind of collaborate together and help each other out right coalitions the Workhorse at least I've always described them as the Workhorse of of uh Xbox I mean Mark best Dev yeah well except for obsidian I don't know I think obsidian's markof best and then the Coalition coalition's definitely probably in the top well we did well we didn't rank the studios when we did that thing about we just kind of ranked the excitement of their next Pro projects but yeah the Coalition would definitely be near the top um yeah man the ex I don't know how the Xbox one generation would have played out without the Coalition because they they they released three games gears ultimate gears four and gears five you know so and tactics I mean well yeah and tactics too you know if you want to put that contribut yeah they contributed to that so yeah they definitely oh and then they even released hivebusters for you know the series X launch I mean they deserve more credit they they do deserve more credit and people should talk more about them and how good their games are and how great they look I mean High Busters was like holy cow right like you know interesting Busters High bu High Busters High Busters could have been like a they could have just cut that off and sold it as kind of like a Miles Morales expansion for like you know the launch of a new gen inste they basically was like it's part of Gears 5 and if you have Game Pass it's free which is another people ask me all the time why do like gear why did like Coalition give High Busters away for free DLC but then if you had if you had ultimate but you know Forza Horizon 5 doesn't give DLC away for free you know I I always get that question and it's just like I don't know how to answer that because it's like I don't know maybe it's up to the developers but I was I was told actually I was told that was an experiment with business models so um they yeah they do experiments and [ __ ] like that sometimes and that was one of them um as they're trying to figure out you know user Behavior around the subscription service because it's still new right you don't know and this this is one of the reasons why um uh the Xbox game pass family plan is only available in a couple of markets right now is because they're still they're still experimenting with user Behavior they don't know like how this is going to impact uh profitability or and stuff like that will users behave differently in a world where you know they sort of they don't have to pay for it you know so there there are a lot of experiments going on still across the board with business models and you know even Minecraft itself wasn't on Game Pass for a long time because I think they weren't sure if it needed to be or if it would actually benefit the game or benefit game pass with it being there so they're still they're still experimenting messing around with it and looking into it and stuff but but um and they won't stop you know it's not going to be the last time they do it but I do think that there was something weird about um something weird about hivebusters I kind of feel like it didn't get enough attention and press because it's damn it's it's a really great DLC but it just kind of like it just kind of shipped and was immediately forgotten I mean there wasn't huge amount to it but it was it was so cool it so well done had some amazing set pieces and had great characters a unique sort of area and it was just great I really loved Hive Busters so yeah if you're listening to this and you haven't played Hive Busters go and bloody well play it because it's actually really good it is uh my buddy jacin says Jens how bad would you have wanted to see Michael paor tell Jim Ryan that Phil was going to eat his lunch this gen that would definitely have been funny to see did you you heard about this jez at all what what he said it on his own podcast right well not not his podcast he was on David jeffy's podcast and they were talking about certain like pactor is very high on Game Pass and what it's going to do for Xbox and basically very negative towards PlayStation like he thinks they're not he thinks they need to also sort of move to a subscription service and they need younger blood in there to kind of do it cuz Jim's not going to do it cuz he's older right right uh and yeah he he he said he had lunch with Jim Ryan in 2019 and told him that Xbox and Game Pass is going to eat his lunch so wow that is uh man that's that's something that is something and I have to say I agree with him I saw a great article a while ago I can't remember which Outlet it was someone in chat might remember but I I think it might have been Forbes actually it might have been Paul tassi or someone like that um they basically wrote that um uh while Sony you know sticks to the this the premise of the article was basically while Sony sticks to Traditions Microsoft is changing the whole industry around them you know so even though like Sony's still ahead right now Microsoft's literally Rel Landscaping the whole industry rather than compete directly with Sony you know and I think like that's it's going to play out um you know very interestingly in the next few years but you know maybe maybe pack is wrong maybe that article's wrong Maybe I'm Wrong you know but I somehow doubt it I I saw the future at Gamescom run you did see the future and uh you got to play Xbox Cloud streaming uh on the Samsung 2022 TV is it as good as advertised because I saw like Paris talk about it when he tried it out at um uh like E3 like Danny Peña a lot of people that were out there for the Jeff Keeley stuff uh they were trying out the Samsung uh app you got to play it so tell me so is it is it truly the future I think it is but not for us I think this is the Gateway for for console audiences to reach mobile kind of Gamers right people who don't want to deal with console they don't want to set things up they don't want to pay extra money but but if their kids can get fortnite on a TV without having to go through any of those extra Hoops you know or roadblocks or anything this is going to be huge it's going to be huge for that casual non-c console audience that right now they just sort of they don't really care about console gaming they never will this is how you get those Gamers right I don't think it's going to I don't think it's going to become the main way we play games and thankfully because all this is based on Xbox Hardware it's never going to replace home consoles because it is home consoles all those users are Xbox users at the end of the day it's just their Xboxes at Microsoft server Farm not at their house and um it worked really well it worked really really well was it Flawless no it had a few skip frames here and there there was some sort of like artifacting around the edges of the screen yeah there were but again it's not for me like one of the things one of the devs told me was um in their analyses little kids especially they can't tell the difference they literally just can't tell the difference because I think you know kids have like a lower a lower threshold for like you know quality they don't they don't care if something's absolutely perfectly Flawless are they having fun playing Forza and Minecraft yeah they don't care if there's a drop frame they're not looking at the artifacting and going like oh what will digital Foundry about this you know they don't care about any of that stuff they just want to play and have fun and that's what who it's for really um and also the fact that it's sort of like um the the app on the TV Rand is based on different technology to that of the phone which is an important point right like the the encoding for the TV app is based on um it it sort of encodes the video much more quickly than the technology they're using on Android right now and I've been told that the technology that they're using on the TV will eventually come to Android but it's not there right now so this was it was also just faster and less susceptible to network fluctuations of which there was a lot at Gamescom because we were sharing the internet with everyone at Gamescom they were just running this off games gamecom uh Gamescom you know internet connection there it wasn't a special pipeline to Microsoft servers or anything it was just literally the production level xcloud so yeah and you know when going back to the original topic Michael paa when he's talking about the future that's what he's talking about really it's about finding those new to Xbox Gamers it's not about replacing your console or my console it's about finding new users bringing more money to devs and ultimately more games to devs more Innovation more business models you know if you can go to atlas and say hey you want to bring persona six to Xbox we've got 150 million users when you include the cloud and we'll put your game right front and center at the top of the TV app so everyone gets to see it right that's what it's about it's about growing the audience and I think it'll be the TV app combined with phone web and family plan I think it's going to be huge man I think it's going to be really huge and I hope it is cu I want more games and I want more stuff loads of stuff loads of stuff well you wrote an article about it right it's on Windows Central if more people want to read more so yeah uh RDX on Fett says love what Tom Warren said about the ABK deal in the UK that was uh I kind of agreed with them so did hoga I mean we'll talk about it but he basically said that it seemed like the CMA was sort of protecting Sony protecting their number one spot in the UK gaming Market rather than like protecting competition or protecting customers and consumers or whatever so yeah yeah it was uh definitely weird so hary channy thank you buddy for the Super Chat he says looks like Sony sent the same info to all the agencies that they sent to Brazil don't blame them but it's ironic the CMA which is which is designed to regulate monopolies that is protecting PlayStation a monopoly for AAA console games in UK interesting although are they well would you classify them as a monopoly for tripa games I don't think so nah I mean I I get I get his point that they're sort of like they're they're the front runner when it comes to like the sort of classic um you know what we think of as high quality AAA games whereas Microsoft's been on the back foot for a while right but the thing is if this we'll talk about it more in a bit but I don't think the cma's got a leg to stand on we'll we'll get into it a bit uh poochie's been a member for nine months says I feel like it'll be state of De K3 versus last of his factions which is pretty exciting um and Andre who's been a member for four months says if Sony felt the need to give that answer to the Brazilian government that is does that imply that these several years of caught on Playstation may not be that many after all well that's certainly something we're going to be discussing because that information came out today from Tom waren who had scoop Phil Spencer talking directly to to um to The Verge so um I know a lot of the talk CU I I I also have Twitter up right now and uh people are going back and forth and they're really focusing on just the several years thing right uh being like I told you you know like they're going to make it exclusive after the SE several years is up or whatever but um I have my own take on it which we we we'll talk about uh charging bucks says could Xbox be looking at the studios currently working on COD to take over help with current and future development of Halo when the deal closes I mean personally I think the studios that are working on COD are probably going to be busy working on COD uh and not necessarily uh looking at Halo you know maybe if XBox I do I dude I really like my idea okay of a Call of Duty Halo spin-off I really like that because I do kind of like the Halo Universe but I much prefer call of dut's combat so if they did like Call of Duty Halo ODST where you don't play as the chief and it has more Call of Duty style gameplay just a spin-off I think that would be sick and harid also says if you want to play alen Ring your choices are Xbox or PlayStation PlayStation is 80% market share in the UK Monopoly nothing to do with the excuses most of the big AAA games are only no Playstation or Xbox most people playing that on a PC does PlayStation have an 80% market share in the UK I don't think it's that high if you count PS4 okay well maybe if you count PS4 but is Xbox one was really bad is PC is is PC gaming not considered part of that market because you can you can play it on get it on PC in the UK is that considered a different Market uh I don't know I mean the thing is all these arguments are things so if if it does go to court and it will if if the CMA tries to block it which they won't because they'd have to be stupid Microsoft will take them to court and they'll win they will win and I don't think the British government wants to take Microsoft to court because frankly they can't afford it you really think British government wants to fight Microsoft in court when like you know they're wasting enough money as it is it would not be a good look you know it's like hang on say you you're fighting Microsoft in court while people can't Heat their homes and [ __ ] like that it be it'll become a big political cluster [ __ ] I think I do you want to talk about it now since we're talking about it anyway no no not right now not right now because we talking about we got a whole bunch of other stuff and we'll eventually we'll eventually get there Forte my brother we had a nice we had a nice conversation he called me you know while he was working at GameStop yesterday and we're having a nice chat and then a customer just comes up there and Forte like spends 10 minutes talking to him while I'm on the phone with him I'm like rude you know brilliant I know it's he's at work right yeah he's at work just I mean he it's I mean you consider at work it's GameStop how many people actually come in throughout the day probably like maybe five 10 you know what I mean like how many how many people actually step in through GameStop's doors uh you know okay Forte works at games oh yeah he's like I want is he a regional manager I I forget what what what's your title there I know he runs the store I don't want to say he's a regional manager but I mean like Forte brings his his PlayStation his Xbox there he's got his chair he's just sitting there and just you know plays his games plays Destiny grinds and then like every two hours somebody will come in there looking for some switch games some Pokemon stuff he sells it to him and then it's back to just chilling and playing games right isn't that isn't that what you isn't that what you do at GameStop Forte oh man uh but he says everybody's worried about Sony's pocket just because you lose the marketing deal your world won't end well apparently uh they're sort of feeling that way and see yeah we'll talk about it in a bit says armor probably not XBox exclusive after all well I never thought it would be armor core would be XBox exclusive anyone think that I mean I think some people thought so there was that Miles D article a while back where he was like a Sci-Fi from software game might be exclusive to Xbox and that's my miles dumpier voice if you guys that's uh that's a very interesting take on you know it's funny he I was talking to him earlier and he he invited me on to chatter days tomorrow and I was like I can't do it and then Gaz invited me on go live and I'm like I can't do it either I'm sorry so miles is going solo four miles I can't do I can't even do it either I wanted to offer cuz I oh Rand I have to I have to tell you something what uh we probably doing a Saturday podcast next week a Saturday podcast next what is this man we're we were getting into the groove of Fridays and then you went to Gamescom so why what's going on next week why are we doing Saturday the beach I'm hitting the beach man I'm going on vacation can't you can't you can't you podcast from the beach well I'm traveling back on Friday see so I'll be in a train I mean I could I could podcast from the train Wi-Fi but I might drop out every time we go into a tunnel so I don't think it would be a particularly great experience for those are listening but um yeah we'll probably be on Saturday next week yeah maybe even Sunday n no we don't do Sundays we we have done Sunday no no no Sundays is Sundays is a nogo it's Fridays or Saturdays oh yeah we've done Monday and Monday we could do Monday because uh no no no we'll do Saturday next week we have to do the we have to do the podcast because we're sort of kind of required to so contractor obligated yeah but that's what I mean we might have to do it Monday if uh something something goes wrong with my TR or something because this has happened before what is going on all right all right all right German TR are not the most reliable uh hardge drops another Super Chat and says console is a different Market than PC much like Blu-ray disc versus streaming and the market share is much worse everywhere else UK is one of the best markets outside of usca for Xbox okay so Alonso says jez going to into Speedo to the beach H yeah I actually bought a new swim swimwear actually I'll I'll send you pictures guys don't worry I'll I'll send you sexy pictures of me at the beach sexy pictures oh actually there's um the where I'm going there actually is a nude beach actually really you're not going there are you for real I don't know maybe I will maybe I will man what does American not have those I was surprised too I was like oh German has nude beaches all right yeah the half the beach is is designated nude beach so I I don't know I mean I would assume there's nude beaches in the US somewhere but I don't know for sure no wonder you you got the you've been using the manscape stuff you're going to a nude beach oh dear yeah flame says don't do it jez don't do it uh thank you to Simon EVS for becoming the newest member of the channel appreciate the support enjoy the emotes and Forte comes back and says not all Gamestops are dead slow Rand with ey emojis well you never know um but you know what let's talk about Halo first Halo yeah talk let's talk about Halo because let's talk about some Halo man oh man oh man oh man the reaction online uh yesterday was something else and yeah uh oh man yeah so let me let me let me bring up my tweet because I tweeted it this is what I tweeted Halo infinite really should be launching this fall don't you guys agree like now that we have the benefit of hindsight on all this and achievement says we need a manscape Simulator game you should make one jez but now that we have the benefit of hindsight it really does feel that man 343 sort of rushed the game out the door to meet the deadline to you know kind of hit that 20th anniversary uh have it out for the last holiday but we didn't know at the time that it seemed like maybe they compromised their live service uh Department I don't know what you know the live service people because man it was slow on content so it's like everybody rush rush rush get this game out but you didn't have uh like that six months of content that you need for live service already made ready to go which is kind of standard for AAA development for these live service games right they're not just making like season 3 finishing it and putting out they already have when season 3 comes out like season four and five are already made and they're working on season six one season three releases us that how it works Jaz right yeah something like that so you know people were wondering hey what's going on with Halo infinite because you know in their original Halo in their well so back to my tweet because you know uh I said does anybody remember when Co-op was delayed the first time which this was a kind of stickler when they originally announced that Halo was not going to ship with Co-op it was going to come in March and there were some Gamers that wanted it to be delayed to launch feature complete but others said that those that wanted it delayed were selfish H do you remember this I remember pepp Farm remembers pepp farmer pepp Farmer members because because it was this whole thing it was like no if the campaign and the multiplayer are ready to go don't hold it up for co-op or Forge just release it and then people were like well what about releasing a you know future Complete product with everything like all the Halo games had it's no man you're selfish you're only thinking about yourself I want to play the campaign today you know what I mean uh and here's I agree I agree with that here's Paris in the chat trolling me he says I'm right here on time ran wants everything all at once I mean you know I broke my rule yesterday Paris because one of my favorite things is Lord of the Rings so just like with Wheel of Time which is my favorite series book series I watched that week to week and I had to watch Lord of the Rings I watched the two episodes yesterday so I broke my give me everything all at once there so you it's better no no no no no oh it certainly isn't better because I want to watch the next six episodes I only broke my rule because Lord of the Rings is that important to me and I wanted to watch it so now that Paris is here though I kind of feel dirty for doing that cuz now he's going to hold it against me rip you know so yeah you know I don't know if I've ever said this on the show but I read Lord of the Rings in high school loved it right and then when the movie came out yeah a very long time ago and the movie came out Fellowship of the Ring you're you're not going to believe me but I literally saw Fellowship of the Ring at the theaters 20 times what I literally I literally went and saw Fellowship of the Ring because it was such so I remember going with my with my buddies for the midnight and then I loved it so much it touched me like I was so emotional like especially you know uh I always say like I would stop going when Bor mir's death scene uh didn't affect me like I didn't get I didn't get emotional right so uh went with my friends midnight and then I I took my other friends who didn't go like during the week and then I took my sisters to go see it and I took my brother and then I took my my rest of my family my mom and my dad then I went with like took my sister and her friend to go see it and then I went with a couple other my friends who hadn't seen it uh yeah like I was in love with that movie um and i' hadd seen it I like I said it's I saw it 20 times at the show i' I've probably seen it like i' I've watched the extended edition of that one like five times if you ask me what my favorite movie of all time is I'll tell you it's Lord of the Rings okay we get we get it Rand you like that movie yeah yeah yeah yeah you know what are you saying I should stop talking about it no it's my podcast I'll talk about whatever I want uh but Ron it's not even that good shut up you know what's better what the Matrix Matrix is pretty damn good too it's it's the big argument of my school because I don't I was like a little teenager you know when it came out everyone's like oh The Matrix is better and everyone's like no the lord of rings is better because they sort of came out similar sort of time I think but uh I don't know yeah uh Josh wants to know how does the Lord of the Rings follow from from the films it doesn't it doesn't have anything to do with the films they're like legally contractually obligated not to have anything to do with the films so oh really yeah they can't they can't mention anything from the films or anything so how does that work then because isn't it all part of the same C no because the movies just dealt with the you know uh destruction of the Ring right you know the Frodo and aorn where this is all the second age so this is all like saon grading the Rings which really wasn't touched on in the movies so yeah oh so this is like a prequel yes it is it is a prequel yes essentially interesting yes yes yes any recurring characters is Lego list in it I mean the main character is gadriel one of the other main characters is Alon uh so I mean there are characters though no not the same actors because they they're younger versions of those characters but either way back to back to gaming back to Halo back because I don't want to hear jez go off because I also have some issues with this as well but um so yeah I haven't got issues with it I think it's hilarious I know well but I was just saying the benefit of hindsight there's a lot of people saying hey launch it feature complete people were there like no no I want to play at this holiday come on man and well yeah so they released their their m road map and what do you know campaign co-op got delayed again along with Forge so on November 8th they're releasing a a winter update that'll have the forge beta campaign Network and Co-op and Mission replay uh a free 30 tier battle pass uh and two new maps Detachment and Argyle which I believe are Forge Maps they also released a 30-minute video explaining all this stuff and kind of talking about the things they're doing at the studio to like fix all the issues they're having and they apologize all this sort of stuff they also have match XP beta and it's the only time I've ever seen a game have to run a beta for XP um yeah uh a new game mode covert one flag uh they got a December event a January event and quality of life improvements and then season 3 which was originally supposed to start November 8th when they talked about all this stuff in April uh well that now begins on March 7th and that includes two new maps an arena big team battle map a new weapon uh new equipment an 100 tier battle pass includes a custom game browser in-game reporting so it only took them a year and four months to get in game reporting in uh a new game mode VIP and ex escalation I really I really hate this like like these old like game mode is like content like we got escalations coming it's new content like game modes aren't content man especially game modes that have always been in Halo uh they got a new fracture event a new narrative event uh an update to forge and more quality of life improvements and also uh because of this uh they cancelled splitscreen Co-Op campaign and um y yeah so you know what rip give me your thoughts Jaz and don't hold back say say what you mean say what you mean from your heart cuz you know what I I did see some people on reset era that um in the Xbox thread the only thread that's worth reading on that website uh they weren't too happy with you cuz they felt like you were sort of damage controlling all this stuff and uh they feel like you you you're lately you're been making excuses for the bad things Xbox has been doing so address this well first of all boohoo um second of all uh I don't damage control h because I don't care about it you know uh damage control is not something I'm I'm interested in doing so damage controlling is a very lazy way of someone discrediting your opinion because actually coming up with a robust response would take the firing of synapses and brain power which very few people on reset era actually have access to um oh Ran's Ran's gone away so we miss my great monologue but anyway I digress you mute Randall muted again my God man what what what do you what do you mean they can't even hear you what are you doing that's so important man R Ran's baning me guys again again well anyway um I uh I just um I really want Rand here for this because I I I want I want to upset him but I don't think they should have delayed the game why should they have delayed the game you know it's been out for a year it's racked up millions of hours of millions of hours of Play It's it service millions of players and a lot of people who complain about it still play it so they're getting some form of enjoyment out of it and um at the end of the day you know know it's all it's a case of messaging you know if this was a game that was launched in open Beta or Early Access no one would be complaining you know they'd be having fun with it they'd be patient stuff like that what it's all about really is the positioning they promised things didn't deliver they sold the game for full price at launch they acted like it's a full price game but if this was like grounded and they branded it as Early Access and that had been the the messaging all along nobody will be upset about it you know so when you think about like what you actually like what are you getting here um if you're still enjoying it you know yeah they've screwed up the messaging but are you still enjoying it it's really it's kind of hard for me because you know I'm not a Halo fan so I'm sort of like I'm not I can't sort of put myself in the shoes of someone who cares Split Screen Co-op because I haven't played a split screen Co-op game for 15 years it's nostalgic it's nice to think about we all remember playing Halo 1 and two on the original Xbox you know but split screen games barely exist anymore you know Destiny doesn't have split screen CB does it I don't think you know Borderlands is the only open world shooter that has split screen carb as far as I'm aware and it looks like a cartoon you know so if you want visual Fidelity in your campaign in your open world campaign there's potentially going to be technological issues you know and um and this is ultimately a question of messaging for me because they were they were promising Split Screen Co-op and then later on they were saying like oh we haven't got split screen co-op in because we don't even know how the respawn system works and it's kind of like hang on a sec you've promised Bonnie Ross gone on stage and promised Blitz Screen Co-op and then later on you come out with a blog post saying the reason we don't have split screen carp yet or Carp at all is because we don't know how this the the respawn system is going to work hang on a sec how can you promise something without even knowing if you've got the engine to deliver this system and the truth is um the truth of the matter is I think there's just been a lot of lies thrown around 343 I think I think people have been lying I think uh you know the J podcast de slide $5 thanks for that buddy he says here is to the jez podcast the coin is a skill yeah I think like I think someone because Bonnie Ross is not developing the engine right she relies on someone to tell her what the engine is capable of so clearly there's been a miscommunication somewhere along the line here Bonnie Ross I don't think she she went out of a way to lie and deceive her audience because it's her job to Delight the audience it's not her job to lie to the audience what she said was she believed that there would be there would be um campaign co-op and there would be split screen C because someone at 343 had told her as much you know they told her they could get this into the game and then she communicated that to the audience and now we have another sort of like oh dear we are we're in a position now where we been caught with our pants down and lying to the audience right so at the end of the day this is a structural issue at 343 that they need to be transparent about and fix you know why isn't Bonnie Ross getting the correct information why isn't she getting the correct information what can be done to fix whether or not someone's getting the correct information what is the issue here you know why why are we having to explain away lies and why are we having to explain away you know failed promises being kept and all that kind of stuff and uh John John John gay in the chat says fire whoever did it I think they already did because I think from what I've heard is that the previous Studio head whose name I can't remember off the top of my head but he's not there anymore I think um I've been told by a few people that he wasn't forthcoming with the the situation with Halo infinite you know and that that's why he was sort of he moved on and that's why we now have Joseph Staton Joseph Staton is revamping 343 he's restructuring and he's a sort of old school Microsoft guy Joseph Staten right he's an old school Microsoft guy he's been there for a long time he's produced a lot of games with Microsoft and he's well liked at Microsoft too you know he's he's very very popular and he's known for being like a guy that delivers you know and he understands all of Microsoft's internal processes and he understands what communication needs to happen between the various Departments of Microsoft in order to deliver what they you know promising so again while nobody wants to hear this and I know lazy people are going to say oh my God it's damage control just be angry I want to feed off your negativity you know because it's it's super lazy to sort of Just Cause something damage controlling when it's not like going along with the mob anger you know it's really easy to do that it's super [ __ ] lazy too right um the fact of the matter is that 343 and Halo is just sort of a bust right now but I also think they can recover I think they can pull off a no man Sky rather than an Anthem and I think they can sort of redeem the game deliver the service that people were hoping for and expecting and uh ultimately you know turn Halo infinite into something that it could be you know reach its full potential how long will that take I have no idea will people care by then I also have no idea that's for Halo fans to decide right that's ultimately like if there's nobody playing Halo um then there's no point even trying right I mean I've got to believe that Halo infinite is in a better State than Battlefield 2042 right now you know cuz I'm a battlefield guy I don't care about Halo I don't give a damn thing I don't give a damn thing about uh um Halo I don't enjoy the gameplay I don't really care about the universe that much you know but I care about it on behalf of you know you guys because you guys care about Halo and he's very popular in the Xbox ecosystem I've always been a gears guy I've always been a battlefield guy so I'm like the way you guys are feeling about Halo right now is the way I feel about Battlefield what the hell is he a on to Battlefield look at Battlefield Battlefield is a mess right now as a franchise right I'm back but um maybe they can will pull it back I mean Rand I just I'll just I'll just round off what I was saying right okay because I'm not going to I'm not going to repeat everything that I said well you don't have basically said that like were you listening no I I had to go upstairs well I just you know for this for the sake of the for the sake of the discussion right I was basically just saying that um you know in a sort of roundabout way that I think there's been miscommunication at 343 internally I think the only I think the former creative director who's now I can't remember is it Chris Chris uh Chris Lee is the yeah former was he the he's the former one right MH now from what I've heard is that there were promises being made that sort of got miscommunicated Lost in Translation during the covid stuff or whatever and that led to promises being made that ultimately they didn't even have plans in place for like Split Screen Co-op the engine was never designed for Split Screen Co-op they didn't even have a plan for Co-Op they didn't even know how the respawn system would work you know and all this kind of stuff so they're promising things that they didn't even have a plan for so there's been miscommunication and now also like um you know we're in a place now where Joseph staten's in charge and basically Rand in a roundabout way I was just kind of saying like I think that they're heading in the right direction and that Halo infinite can eventually do a no man sky and sort of rise from the ashes and become the game that people want it to be but you're not allowed to be have any sort of positivity about Halo or your damage controlling because all the YouTubers have spoken right every YouTuber now hates Halo and you've got to be angry we've all got to be angry guys all of us together we've got to be angry non-stop anger anger anger anger every clickbait tile every editorial has to be angry or negative you can't have any positivity or any any hope or in the possibility that Joseph st's restructure will eventually lead to a sort of No Man's Sky Renaissance for the game you can't have anything like that if you do that you're damage controlling your damage controlling Well w w you're you're a Halo Fanboy even though I don't like Halo you know but I think like because I'm not a Halo fan I can sort of see it in a sort of less emotional way and just be like well you know I've sort of seen other games come back from this kind of state I look at Final Fantasy 14 where I'm Reborn went from like the worst MMO to arguably the top MMO you know and stuff like that and people saying what positivity it's been six years in development yeah I mean theyve screwed up but what what are you going to do you you're going to be angry for the next year or you're just going to be like well screw it I'll play something else you know at some point you kind of have to let go and just accept that there's nothing you can do about it voice your displeasure constructively but you're not entitled to be con nonstop angry about it because it just doesn't help anyone you know I don't care you know how do you feel Rand are you are you on that are you on the are you sipping the r hle right now on for Halo I mean I'm not angry because I'm not playing Halo infinite and I I've already said before I wasn't coming back to Halo infinite until the Battle Royale mode comes out so them delaying the stuff doesn't matter to me but uh I will say in in the the grander picture of things I I don't know is 343 the right Studio to to have Halo I just sort of feel that they've had three swings at it four if you want to count Master Chief and all of them have problems to a certain extent right like Halo 4 good campaign bad multiplayer right Master Chief Collection broken for years until they fixed it and became good but still launch broken which was inexcusable Halo 5 bad campaign great multiplayer and then this we thought would was all right this is this is it third times the charm and the campaign was pretty good I think I gave the game like an 8.5 uh I thought multiplayer was pretty solid and we were like oh the king's back you know you go look at some of the reviews from back in uh you know when it launched live was like the king is back um except obviously nobody you knew that their live service um was going to basically be the downfall of Halo infinite um so I don't know I I I think they've had management problems for the longest time I just I sort of feel like you went from Halo being the flagship franchise for x box to now it it's it's not at all and it's not necessarily because I don't think Halo became less popular I think it's because other games became more popular and Halo's Halo's sort of um misuse mismanagement over the years has you know uh deflated it in in people's eyes I mean I'm not going to say Minecraft is Xbox is Flagship because Minecraft's everywhere right and I'm not going to say Call of Duty will eventually be Xbox's Flagship because that's going to be everywhere so like a game that is only on Xbox what is the flagship now forever it was it was Halo I mean Phil Spencer even said in 2011 if we lose our way with Halo we lose our way with Xbox I mean it certainly just seems like they've lost their way with Halo infinite and what are the problem s with Halo infinite was it you know is is it a tech problem is it is the engine that bad I mean we'd always heard her stories about Destiny like Destiny's engine was really bad and it was one of the reasons why they couldn't really make a lot of content quickly so they had to shove it to move to Destiny 2 uh so you know they could actually uh work on it better is is the slip Stace engine causing a ton of problems uh was the the management and and and you know uh the the scope of the game uh not uh you know pitched well to everybody working on it uh obviously you know the pandemic doesn't help but I don't know like it certainly seems like other Studios have managed well with their live services in a time where I mean you're going to be sitting here a year and like a few months after launch of Halo infinite and you got what six new maps four of them Arena and two big Team Battle but two of them Forge Maps it's like are people doing a postmortem on what exactly went wrong and if the people are responsible for what went wrong if they're still at that studio then they got major problem like anybody who is responsible for the way Halo infinite is right now needs to be I think shown the door because I mean how many how many chances do you get to basically uh have to because it definitely it's like every time that 343 gets a hold of Halo it's like it was really popular and now it's it's probably at its least popular point and and the whole reason for going to freeo play was to sort of bring it back up to the popularity it used to have and that didn't work out at all right nobody plays it on PC that was the whole supposed to be the big thing oh it's PC and it's free to play but it doesn't really seem that that worked out at all so I I I I don't know I'm I'm I'm flabbergasted that uh I'm flabbergasted that this has gone on as long as it has right to a franchise that arguably could be should be bigger right um and and it's just to a a studio that is you know Microsoft's biggest studio with the biggest budget and it doesn't really seem that way right it doesn't seem like they're the studio with the biggest budget because it certainly doesn't seem like it when you play Halo infinite so it just makes you like scratch your head be like what happened with this game and then you have the promises like okay Split Screen Co-op being cancelled right now I haven't played a scrip Screen Co-op game in forever so I don't care I never would have played it however you can't go on stage and say all future Halo games will have split screen and then cancel and then not have split screen in your next game like you shouldn't be making promises in perpetuity that's just like it's like Bonnie Russ said that in 2015 2016 or whatever and they they got the cheap hit like all future Halo games will have split screen it was like Yay right but now because of you know the engine and the way it is and all the problems that they do have like I think they even said in the video like yeah we pulled people away from doing split screen because we have we had other issues that are more important than needy fixing so you made a promise and you broke your promise so you only have yourself to blame so that's I mean don't do that I mean come on that's so I understand why people are are are it's like you you said you were going to do this and you didn't do it you lied we upset I get it um you know I I've given 343 three chances right I starting to think maybe it's time for someone else to have the Reigns of Halo you know what maybe maybe 343 should work on something new where they're not constrained by what Halo needs to be or what the fans expect of it make have them make a new a new IP where they can they can put all their creativity in it and do something new and give Halo to a new steward Paul hang you want a studio that has no experience with Halo whatsoever to make a Halo game over 343 like it's it's I think what you're arguing for is that Halo dies I mean because I there is no Studio that can do Halo if 34 Fe can't do Halo then nobody can in my view I don't know I don't I don't there is no there is nobody but Bungie who would make sense and that ship is sail Bungie's gone Sony have them that's the end of it I think you're arguing for the death of Halo there's no there's no one that can take that on there's no one that can take on that challenge I don't think I think like if if um if 343 can't do it then maybe the fact of the matter is Halo's just gotten to a point where it can't meet the expectations of its fans and it can't adapt to meet new audiences and find new players so I think we just we just kill it Ian man all good things all good things come to an at some point and I'm not advocating for the death of Halo you think you think it's so bad that it needs to die that's that's not what I'm saying at all I'm saying maybe there's someone out there that could uh could have take it I'm not even saying like you could talk you could talk about spin-offs give you know what if machine games could do a spin-off Halo like you you can't put that out you can't put that into the world without having a plan for it you can't just say Xbox I don't I don't need to have a plan yeah but like it's just it's just it's just wishful thinking at that point man it's it's just wishful thinking like that they could barely spin up a studio to make perfect dark you know they had to bring in they had to bring in like they had to bring in Crystal Dynamics all the original team from the initiative left you know and you want him to make you want him to make you want him to make a new studio for Halo no I'm not saying you need to make AUD my perception of the Halo Community is that they are restlessly critical yes they are they're they are you yeah and you what you want a new studio to give it a go I don't think that's that's that's vaguely logical from what I don't know I just said you know they've they've had 3 43s have plenty of opportunities and it seems like they can't get it right and and okay sure I can give the benefit of Doubt to Joseph ston he hasn't really been there long enough it certainly seems like this is his show now he's cleaning house so you might be right maybe two years from now maybe if you deleted Halo infinite today completely forgot about it and then two years from now you load it up maybe it does have that sort of No Man's Sky Renaissance where it's like oh my God look at all the stuff that's in Halo infinite now all that needed was time right but still it's like it never never never should have gotten to that point it never should have gotten to the point where this happened like like I said Microsoft's biggest Studio their biggest IP and it just seems to be continually mismanaged over and over and over and over again so could it end up like no man's Sky yeah it could but could it end up like Anthem maybe I think both both are possibilities you know it it's yeah it it it's sort of sad to see what Halo has become I mean there there's some PE there are some people in the chat who like really offended that I'm not taking a view of like oh my God [ __ ] 343 because like I I've been through this with World of Warcraft right and I had to bring it back to that game but World of Warcraft is a service game and it's had serious Peaks and serious troughs like Warlords of dreno for example expansion was no notorious for having a yearlong Content drought or something in that region it was miserable and I have no idea developmentally why that happened like what happened on the dev side to to create such a long content drought and cataclysm had a Content drought as well like really bad and these were like early service games which you also have to pay a subscription for you know I did Rand I stopped playing it I took a break I played something else you know I can't bring myself to to be consumed with rage and entitlement like there's something about Halo that makes people feel like really angry I kind of feel like I don't get it I honestly don't get it I really don't get it like I I love I love World of Warcraft as much as anyone loves Halo but like when Wow's bad I'm just kind of like I'll stop playing it for a while and I'll play something else maybe World of Warcraft will get better again maybe 343 will sort things out give Joseph Staten a chance that's how like my mentality is like Jersey Stan only just come in give him a chance like World of Warcraft dragonfly is the first expansion under Mikey Bara I'm going to give it a chance you know I don't like I don't get this sort of Witch Hunt mentality of like someone someone needs to be on the chop block for this Chris Lee has already been ousted they've already restructured Halo you know what who what more do you want you know and a lot of people talk about Bonnie Ross replacing Bonnie Ross but Bonnie Ross doesn't develop the game she's more on the business side managing the whole franchise and maybe she hasn't done a great job of that a lot of people didn't like the TV show but qualitatively I was in a pub and the there was the table next to us they were discussing the Halo TV show and they were saying have you seen the Halo TV show it's really good and they but they were also saying I've never played the games you know so maybe the TV show is made for people who've never played the games to maybe bring them into the franchise I don't know but the fact of the matter is Halo clearly makes enough money for Bonnie to keep her job you know whereas like in World of Warcraft if everybody stopped playing it I'm sure somebody would get fired you know but the fact of the matter is World of Warcraft still makes money hand over fist even when it's in its you know relatively bad State there's lots of stuff to play and I don't know why people want to want to feel like they're somehow victimized by the game being bad and like we get bombarded with all these content and all these tweets and you know this is you know we're enraged and it's just really hard for me to feel that way when the game is free you know what ex yeah multipliers for but that's where the problem that's not that's not an excuse though I what why is it an excuse CU it's not an excuse it just like they owe you [ __ ] nothing Rand it doesn't matter they owe you nothing what do they owe you what do they owe you like being free You Want Blood okay here here's what I here's what I say I've said it before being free or being in Game Pass isn't excuse isn't an excuse for low quality effort or yeah but but that means the game's bad and you stop playing it it doesn't mean they give you blood what what do you want from them just game the game [ __ ] the [ __ ] game well all I'm saying is the idea that like it's free so don't complain about it is absurd you know yeah but like do we need a year do we how many podcasts have we done about Halo being [ __ ] well quit to be fair qu playing if a game [ __ ] quit playing it yeah I'm just tired of this I'm just tired of this [ __ ] man I don't know I I I don't like that mentality just like oh it's free so what do you expect it's B whatever like but you call it [ __ ] make your point that it's bad but that's that's that's that's the end of the discussion if Halo is irredeemable then why why even bother with it why does Halo get this like I just saw today um what what's that game called now splitgate split gate development is ended that was supposed to be a service game and development on that has ended because nobody wants to play it anymore cuz it's boring nobody's screaming about that everyone just quit playing it because it was bad yeah now if everyone quit playing Halo because it's bad people would lose their jobs and then things would change you know I mean come on comparing split gate to Halo I mean you're talking about a game that literally is what a year or two old versus one of the stalwarts of gaming one of the reasons Xbox even exists I mean they're not necessarily Fair comparisons I'm just saying like do we need a year long rage session about Halo being bad I I just say I I've been this has happened in other service games we don't need to care this much you know well like I said I don't particularly care I'm not going to play until the Battle Royale comes out I'm disappointed in what I see as a studio that seems to constantly have management problems or what have you leading to the decline in Halo overall I I I think that something Xbox should have nipped in the butt and fixed a long time ago and I mean nobody forced Halo infinite to be a live service they decided to make it a live service and they're not providing content for a said live service so I understand why people who are playing it might be like where's my content and you know what's even funnyer is that none of the content that we're really doing is really like any different than any of the content that came to Halo 5 4 or three you know was map packs within a certain time I mean Halo 5 had you know like war zone that like it's really no different than any of the other Halo stuff outside of like the microtransaction action core stuff that they constantly have in the battle passes it just seems for whatever reason it's taking longer for 343 to get the content out and if you're a Halo fan and you're constantly playing it and that's what your game is I I mean and you like are you not supposed to be disappointed if you're looking you know 343 said these things and they didn't deliver are you're just supposed to be like well it's free so can't complain sorry like I don't know I'm not saying don't playing I'm saying surely they know sure of course they they don't know now of course they know I just I just think we're a point where we're Beyond complaining and we just quit the game no if it was any other franchise or any other franchise that didn't have this history people probably would quit quit it like the splitgate or whatever but this is Halo like it's that almost has like a message where like what happens in but it happens in Warcraft 2o it's like when there's when Warcraft is bad people stop playing and blizzard shows that in their in their financials they're like yeah people have stop playing because there's no content but they'll come back when the expansion comes in this is isn't this not how live service games work I think ultimately that the point here is that Halo shouldn't have been a service game probably not they probably were not ready to actually do a live service game and it shows now if Joseph staton's refiguring reconfiguring the studio to actually be able to do that maybe you see the fruits of that in 2024 but that's like asking like hey just wait two years for Halo to be good why then why' you even release the game in 2021 it should be coming out this year hell maybe it shouldn't even be coming out until 2023 until they actually had like two seasons under like two seasons completed but then people would say well they actually needed to put it out to figure out was wrong now they know what's wrong and who who they need to get rid of so Joseph stain can kind of come over and take like I I get all the different arguments to me I'm just sad to see the state that sort of Halo has fallen to do I want it to get better 100% absolutely I want Halo to be great again right will that happen I I hope so I hope I hope in two years we can do a show you know uh and be like hey man look at Halo look at the Resurgence man Joseph ston was the right guy guy they have proper leadership in at 343 now I'm excited for the future of Halo under the leadership of Joseph ston that is something I think everybody in chat and everybody on the internet and me and you would be like that is that is the Hope and the dream you know but do they make it into that time because this is a very competitive market there's plenty of free-to-play games and more free to-play games coming out maybe nobody comes back to Halo you mentioned like well Bonnie Ross must be fine because Halo makes enough money are they making enough money because I I I think if I had to take a guess at this very moment they're not hitting their player counts and if they're not hitting their player counts or their projected player counts of where they were been at they're probably also not hitting their projected Revenue either right so who knows I have no idea who knows if they're making the money that they should be making either way how much how much was the Halo deal Worth to Paramount you know it's not just that it's not just the game it's like it's a whole business and I think there there could be an argument made that Halo is I you know I in fact I wouldn't even say it's an argument that could be made Halo is being mismanaged yes you 100% 100% completely mismanaged and been been mismanaged for a long time I yes but it's also kind of like okay we all know this collectively as a group of people we know this and I think people are kind of like they won't let it go you know they don't want to let it go but we've been three you said there's been we've been through this for three games now and people still won't let it go I feel like world Warcraft had three bad expansions that would be it because Halo Halo means a lot to a lot of people you know at least that is what I was saying about it I just I've sort of moved away from the multiplayer that Halo is and I'm look like hey it be Battle Royale or nothing baby you know it just that I don't I don't know what else to say about it I'm kind of we've T probably talked about this a lot uh so maybe we're just running over the same old points again but um there's a lot of emotion wrapped up in it sure but I feel like there's there's it's gotten to a point where there's too much emotion the thing is I'm not I'm not to meing I'm not emotional about people are on Twitter and stuff people come to me making arguments that makes no sense and people tripping over themselves to say say that I'm damage controlling for 343 I don't give a crap if 343 was shut down tomorrow I would not I would not feel a flicker of emotion I'd feel bad for the devs who were losing their jobs but if Halo disappeared tomorrow I'd be like oh good now gears can get more money I don't care about Halo at all so this is not damage control this is me attempting to have a slightly different perspective that goes beyond the borders of mob rule which is honestly as someone from the outside that's how I perceive a lot of the the Halo narrative and a lot of that the Halo Discord honestly feels like it revolves around mob rule you know when I compare it directly to like um the way people talk about OverWatch or World of Warcraft or communities that I I am invested in is very different and maybe that's just because like like the only people left playing World of Warcraft and OverWatch and people have been so abused by it that they don't know any better anymore I certainly think that's probably the case of a lot of Blizzard games but I think it's it's kind of like that people want it to be better they want they want to feel that you know the the franchise they're invested in is hitting the potential that it can hit and I totally get that but it's also at a point where like well what what do you want though you know what what do you actually want that's realistic that can happen right now right this minute you know you can choose to be angry about it for the next six months while you wait for season 3 or you can just play something else because like speaking completely in terms of practicality 343 knows how pissed off everyone is you have to believe that so no amount of of attacking their devs on Twitter is going to help at this point you know and and at that point it's kind of like well are you just choosing to be angry still like I I don't I don't get that mentality if it's me I just like stop playing the game that thinks bad now and I think honestly if you really want to send a message for 343 you've got to stop playing the game cuz the only thing that will really move the needle is the pocketbook right stop byy bu in the microtransactions stop participating reduce those monthly active users that's how you really send a message to the big wigs at Microsoft is like hey you are killing the franchise here with you with the strategy and we need to go in a change of direction right because that's ultimately like um that's why Mikey bar is now running blizzard is because the the old the previous CEO of Blizzard was ousted for be for his part in the you know the inaction over all the scandals and stuff so I don't know I think like the frustration on my part is just like what do people want speaking completely practically you can't magic content out of thin air you can't do it so at that point you're just choosing to be mad I don't know that's how I feel about it because we've known for a year that the game's in in a well almost a year that the game's in a bad State the live service it's not it's not news you know I don't know whatever all right well yeah that's the Halo talk uh let me get some of these uh super chats what what's chat saying about all this Jazz what are they saying Chev says uh they need to move MCC devs to infinite for Content I don't think there's many devs on Master Chief Collection I think there's maybe like 10 or 12 there's really not that many for at least from what I was told uh Krabs are evil says imagine fumbling as much as 343 please Jaz speak to Phil get him a pint sorted outmate I know that that's the thing they know they know how bad things are but it's all just time right Dan says why does 343 get the blame but not Xbox game studios or Microsoft well I mean that that's that's a good point actually because we've heard before that you know some of the issues with 343 is Microsoft's uh tax policies revolving contractors which is actually an issue with um It's actually an issue with Washington State I believe from what I've heard so you know is there something Microsoft could be doing on its end as a structural level to improve the situation you know maybe there is we don't know what it is without without having a an a Frank on the record conversation with Bonnie Ross we don't know how much Microsoft is to blame about this but for my money I think yeah they probably do share a bit of the blame and and uh probably less they're not getting as much attention about it uh yeah I would agree with you I'd agree with you there's there's blame there's blame to go around right um you can blame Phil Spencer you can blame Matt booty you can blame Bonnie Ross you can blame the leads at 343 for poor planning whatever I mean you know blame Rand that's not my fault it's definitely not my fault you you didn't make enough videos being mad about it that's what it is yeah if You' have made 10 more videos about how terrible 343 is the game would be in amazing state right now I don't really like to make I don't really like to make mean spirited content about something you know what I mean dude that's that's that's that's not everyone on Twitter says you have to be angry to get what you want yeah but the thing is I'm not angry I don't play Halo so I I'm just disappointed to see one of my favorite franchises like Fall From Grace like how is Forza rizon 5 bigger than Halo infinite Halo infinite's got a freeto playay multiplayer and Forza Rison 5 is paid like how did Forza Horizon become the flagship of Xbox it yeah that that is the you were asking earlier what's the flagship of Xbox it's Forza it's Forza and maybe it it maybe it'll be Elder Scrolls when it comes out maybe you know I'm just saying like how how did you get there like a spin-off of Forza becomes bigger than Halo and is more played than you look at the most played charts on Xbox fors is more played than how is that possible and it just speaks to you know my thing of like maybe 343 is not the one cut out to run to to to to have the franchise you know but you probably like I hope Joseph ston is the man for the job if if he can clean everything out and get a Clear Vision and two years from now we're like man Halo's amazing again everybody's happy that'll be the perfect fairy tale ending to all this you know yeah people it feels like we're all almost every podcast the solution is yes Forza is a better game true Ali says because Forza is a better game it is a better game 100% fors Horizon has been a better franchise for a longer time now than Halo is you know but like you're talking about where Halo's popularity was and where Forza started from nothing it's just interesting to see the D like one franchise rise while the other franchise Falls you know and this the mismanagement of 343 and what's going on here is also leads to the talk of does Xbox Matt booty and Phil Spencer know what they're actually doing with Studios cuz if you can't manage your biggest Studio with your biggest IP how are you going to manage all these other Studios and that constant perception that you know they have management problems with other Studios is also largely because of how 343 has been handling Halo for you know since you know since basically Master Chief Collection either way moving on from that I'm me get the rest of these super chats um Chris R says see a thieves went through a life service pain it took a while but now they have four different teams making staggered content now they're in a good shape indeed and maybe that's the future of Halo you know their first few seasons or whatever weren't the best and I mean see thieves also launched with the lack of content you know you go look at the reviews for that game I think it's like a 60 and meta but you know it's one of the Xbox's biggest new IP of last gen I mean you can make the argument SE a thieves bigger than Halo at this point you know did Microsoft give an update well has Microsoft given an update about how many players Halo infinite played since they said 20 million have they said it's reached 30 million yet no I I think SE thieves got the 30 didn't it I mean yeah see th it might be a bigger game but I think like Halo infinite's the one you recognize right I think this is this is ultimately another source of like the anger around Halo like even if you're not a Halo fan it's Phil Spencer himself said it it damages the perception of Xbox itself when your Flagship franchise is being mismanaged so badly especially in a world that Microsoft wants to live in Microsoft wants to live in the service Game World you know they got to see a thieves they're about to put out grounded 1.0 they're trying to buy activis blizzard King for all the service games there Diablo 4 is a service game you got World of Warcraft and all the other service games and they wanted to make Halo a service game you know they dabbled a bit with the service model in Halo 5 and uh you think they would have applied some of that learning to Halo infinite but for what forever reason they didn't they really didn't and that that is the the scariest thing about this for me someone who doesn't care about Halo he's like you know do you are you casting that sort of Doubt over everything now with Halo because that's the one franchise where you'd think they could nail it but thank God we have Falls at Horizon right yeah achievement says 343 delayed the season not because it won't be ready by November but to ensure that it's closer to season 4 launch and 3 months seasonal releases in 2023 that they do need to get that three-month release Cadence cuz 6 months and 10 months aren't aren't uh they aren't very they're they're not good they're not good at all three months is the right spot and they did say like it's kind of funny that um Diablo moall came out in what may and it's already on season 4 I know it's a mobile game but it's just like how's Diablo mortal you know run rocking a better service than Halo infinite now oh man def side says here's to the jez podcast according to skillup laughing my ass off yeah did did Skil up was was Skil up in here did I miss Skil up in the chat or I don't think so I think he said it somewhere else oh okay okay Andrew says uh the Andrew says so is Bonnie Ross then 343's P Putin I don't know I mean she's been she's in charge of 343 it's her baby right uh Gaston says now that Rand is gone jez can you talk about how awesome a turnbas Peppa Pig MLP crossover walking simulator with payin elements would be oh my God that would be so sick in fact put three4 three on that oh jeez I can't screw that up right no man if they did do that like 343 be coming out with a with a some kind of like Dev blog saying oh the season two of Peppa Pig free to play P we game has been delayed because of Developmental problems oh God can you imagine yeah uh metal Moro says acman did a great video on the Halo downfall recommend watching uh Miguel says Bungie was Halo what acman Lost His Channel right his YouTube but he got a well he was demonetized but he's remonetized so oh that's good good for him Bungie was Halo says Miguel they gave Microsoft and 343 the blueprint on how to handle Halo moving forward anthologies ODST reach for example toad pack shakure says the studio that makes split makes split gate literally explain their ending development because they are building a new FPS on Unreal Engine 5 with all the new talent and Investments they've gotten yeah they put out that statement earlier that's fair I was just sort of I was just sort of reaching for an example of a of a service game that just quietly shut down I mean there's there's loads like uh I don't know like Ubisoft Battle Royale you know stuff like yeah yeah it's cuz like nobody nobody cares or feels invested in the franchise um but you know if you if you go on like Xbox Live and look at one of the most popular games being played right now Halo is still pretty high on that list so like it's it's kind of almost like is there a is there a division of opinion here I honestly don't know are most people just playing Halo happily and ignoring all the drama surrounding it the Casual free to-play audience or you know is there a serious problem with it I honestly don't know I'm just asking that question for the sake of sake of discussion you know yeah um JD gamer says Halo infinite is not a bad game if it had launched as every other Halo launched we would have celebrated as the best Halo since Halo 3 it is a mediocre live service lacking in content though shaking my head and uh flame says I have more faith in SPL splitgate devs than 343 just saying yeah maybe Microsoft should buy them yeah um let's see is there any more uh yeah there is um you know damn I don't know if I should say this on the podcast let just say it yeah but it was something say it okay all right I'll say it I'll say it I'm not going to say who told it to who told this to me and where this person even worked but he was in the industry and he told me that the only only thing 343 was good at was spending a lot of money well he actually used the word [ __ ] ton was spending a [ __ ] ton of money to make mediocre games yeah see that's where my anger is is thinking about how that money could have gone to gears you know and I joke about it right but seriously imagine if that money had gone to gears five and having a bigger team and sort of because that they had they had some serious Ambitions for Gears 5 you know they had like uh you know there semiopen World things and like the very mild sort of uh progression system with the robot imagine if they had had a bigger budget a bigger team to hire more devs and they could have pushed that out there and I also think about Gear's tactics which I heard had a DLC planned which was scrapped and also had a management layer which would have taken the game to the next level because unlike they basically made an XCOM game that had less features than XCOM because it had no management layer it had no like you know you have to manage your base and resources and stuff like that there was very little of that in Gears tactics and I heard that they had that planned but it was scrapped you know because they wanted to keep the budget lower now I think like all the money that has been wasted on Halo infinite could have gone to those games or any game you know any game it doesn't have to be gears just because I like it got have gone to any games any of these Innovative stud Studios and it's been squandered at 343 you know arguably um you know massach Chief Collection screw up and then You' got this screw up and having to fix this and all the technical debt they've got to run through and rehash the engine and all that kind of stuff that's where the anger comes from for me and it's kind of like I agree that there has to be you know a point where they just say enough's enough you know enough's enough we can't we can't keep doing this anymore it's a money black hole all you know we could be doing other things you know how do you how do you even approach that conversation because Halo is Microsoft's biggest franchise was was it's the most recognizable franchise this side of Minecraft you know yeah well yeah well fores probably is recognizable now after after called after they get Call of Duty and it'll be take one step down but uh batn in the Super Chat says all I'm hearing is that we have to wait even more yeah that's the thing about you know right you know wait more for Halo to get better I guess or maybe not maybe it doesn't get better who knows Highlander says I have more faith in World of Warcraft coming Xbox before 343 fixes Halo maybe when ABK is done they can get some people from Cod to help with Halo I don't think world of warcraft's ever come in a console is it jez I think we've talked about that before on the show I'm pretty sure you said it wasn't yeah it's never comeing a console uh Kai there might do some kind of well spin-off action game or something like that I think there'll be some kind of wow on Console but it won't be World of Warcraft itself uh Kai he says do you think Microsoft's handoff approach to their Studios is a bit too hands off yeah I always see this coming back up as well because it's weird because during the 360 gen they were kind of criticized for being two handson with their Studios and now their approach is sort of hands off let them be creative right and some people are like well maybe you're two hands off maybe you sort of need that you know you need to parent them a little bit more and be like all right well it's time to finish this up we need to get these games out like you can be creative for for so much but there's still deadlines um we'll find out when these games start releasing Kai if the their hands-off approach is the right approach you know if Blade 2 comes out if AOW comes out and these games are all amazing uh that'll answer your question I think because at the end of the day what we want is great games I personally don't want mediocre boring bad games so if a game has to take an extra year to come out why do you play Walking simulators then because walking Sims are great especially ones with amazing Stories I'm just saying I'm perfectly I'm perfectly okay with waiting more time waiting or like a studio spending more time to create a better product like if were just say hey hellblade 2 could come out in three years but it it couldn't be as good as it can if it came out in four years I'd be like take the extra year give me the best version of hellblade 2 that you can you know so yeah that's where I'm at I don't know if any I don't know if anybody else is the same way where like maybe maybe you're like I don't really care just give me this the product as fast as possible personally I just want the best product so I'm okay with them taking more time we've already been through a gen where you know we had mediocre games I don't want to go through that anymore I'm sorry I just I just don't uh metal morbo says life service bubble is real achievement says spawncast said Microsoft never owned Bungie true question mark uh they didn't did they they just had some kind of very close relationship contract or something like that I mean I'm not 100% sure either way frankly someone in chat might know better I mean spawn I mean is it spawn wave who said that or is it someone on the spawncast I mean I think I think the idea that Microsoft didn't own Bungie somebody's got to know in chat I mean Microsoft owned Bungie because then Bungie because then Bungie bought themselves out from under under Minecraft or Microsoft and then Microsoft had stocked I mean I mean this would be easy just Google it let's see Google Microsoft Microsoft buys I'm sure there's an article here from 2000 uh bunge uh yeah it said Microsoft acquired Bungie in 2000 yeah I mean okay so that's really strange that they let them go I think I think very strange I think everybody was going to leave the studio I think it was one of those things where like their contracts were ending or something with like major players and those people were just going to just leave and then take everybody with them so it like Xbox is like well uh yeah I don't know is there like I would love to know more about it but then interesting that's weird I I don't know the idea that they didn't own Bungie that's I don't know I guess I guess that's wrong at least according to this I guess there's some there's some confusion about exactly what the deal entitled but yeah they know CLE clearly they had like um usually when a company gets bought out what happens is they get like they got a they get a retainer um they get some kind of retainer where it's like you've we'll buy your company and you have to you have to work you have to work with us for the next five years or something or or it be like a non-compete agreement like you can leave but you're not allowed to join a competing game developer or start your own game development company for the next five years or something like that and I saw that in my own company when Windows Central got purchased by a bigger company um a lot of our exec who became multi-millionaires overnight not me sadly um they uh they still had to they still had to work for the company for a little while to like you know smooth out the transition and uh you know provide their expertise because that's ultimately what they were buying is that their expertise and and stuff like that so maybe like that's ultimately what happened here they they bought the company and stuff like that and they were just kind of like well our contract our non-compete contracts are over now this is what we're planning to do we're going to leave and make a new studio um and Microsoft probably thought well this is probably the best scenario in that situation but maybe it'll happen again Sony the there's there's a there's a universe out there where Microsoft lets Bungie make Destiny and then they still have 343 have Halo or Bungie never leaves Xbox but Bungie is making Destiny in fact I I think I think there was a Xbox could have published Destiny there was that chance but eventually went with Activision so um yeah I I I still remember reading that like news I think when when when that broke it was like oh uh Bungie and Microsoft have split up right like Bungie bought their freedom back for Microsoft I was like excuse me like what because at the time it was just like you know Bungie were the were the king you know and it was just like you're losing your your best developer like crazy um what else we got here uh Danny passion official says Destiny 2 has similar issues until forsaken yeah it took them a little bit to uh get their live service stuff down but they got it rolling now man people people are loving uh the destiny 2 Live service seasons and expansions uh Raiden blade says earlier today made a mistake on Boom show that I had 400 410 days in Halo I was wrong I spent 19 days 18 hours 58 minutes I play and enjoy this game every day 343 take as much time as you like no rushing says Raiden blade yeah see it's it's really annoying because there is there is a difference of opinion here but if you if you like come out with any sort of positivity about Halo right now you get attacked and told you damage controll and stuff because there's a sort of mob mentality about it which is honestly why I don't cover Halo partially you know because um I uh well a I got Brendan Lowry to cover it and he actually really loves Halo but also because the the community terrifies me yeah the community can be not I would not want to be a 343 Community manager put it that way I've seen some of the [ __ ] I have to put up with and it's not it's not nice so well that was a lot longer discussion talking about Haler than I thought but I guess we needed to it now let's talk about uh Activision Blizzard deal and the CMA um do I need to set this up should I set this up yes I guess I guess I should set it up mayy set it up you got you got to set it up we got to get the right information right that's the whole point so obviously everybody knows Microsoft bought Activision and all these government bodies are looking into it to see if it would harm competition in their local areas and uh we know Saudi Arabia passed it uh we talked maybe like a month ago where the Brazilian commission had published their findings that asked a whole bunch of PE third parties about the deal and pretty much everybody uh was like not a big deal perfectly okay just part of the business you know from Warner Brothers to Google to all all the third parties were like ah whatever not a big deal except for Sony they didn't like it they were like we can't lose Cod it's too important to us and uh Game Pass we just takes forever to compete with that just Sony's against the deal in fact I I I think I think behind the scenes jez I think I think Jim dance moves ry's making some calls to some lobbyists I think they Sony's trying to get the deal blocked because a lot of the answers a lot of the things that the CMA is saying in these documents are almost verbatim What Sony was saying to the Brazilian commission so I think I think I think Jim Ryan's snitching I think he's I think he's snitching to All The Regulators to get this deal blocked or if not maybe not blocked but maybe postpone long enough but it certainly seems to me at least that Sony doesn't want Xbox to own Call of Duty they're scared about the potential that that game could do on Game Pass and it would be best for Sony for this deal to get blocked am I the only one that feels that way no I think uh that's pretty much you hit the nail on the head there for my my money I think like um and I agree with you that the this the things the CMA said um are pretty much they're all Sony talking points from that Brazil stuff I will say well Rand Bobby cotic had an interesting statement about it I don't know if you read this but he implied there was more than just one country that had appr yes he said yeah well we know about Saudi Arabia but we don't know about any of the others so yeah but the thing is like what might what the fact of the matter is this is not going to get blocked because Sony can like they can delay they can set they can they can do their back you know the the the little calls with the you know the you European reg the UK regulator and um frankly the UK regulator is worth try the UK government is garbage and they and the the current minister of technology in the UK asked Microsoft at a at a hearing when Microsoft was going to shut down algorithms did you did you know this they can just shut down their algorithms huh yeah yeah the you the the the head of all technology in the UK the minister asked Microsoft when they were going to get rid of algorithms you know the mathematical concept of algorithms apparently Microsoft has control over that so I don't think the CMA knows jack [ __ ] and everything they said is literally what Sony told them to say batim like you said and the fact of the matter is if this goes to court which it would they would lose they would lose hardcore styly and cost the taxpayer millions of dollars uh pounds probably so I don't think the CMA wants this to go to court and as soon as they actually sit there and Microsoft and talk it through they'll realize they haven't got a [ __ ] leg to stand on and they'll just let it pass because they don't want it to go to court and I'll tell you why they don't want it to go to court it's because the UK has no [ __ ] money UK government has no money and if it goes to court it'll be a hell of a lot of waste of time EV wasting everyone's time because Microsoft's in third place you know you don't regulate a company from being in third place you know this is about competing with tensent and Amazon and all these other companies and this is about shareholders getting their right to a return on their investment in Activision which ain't going to happen any other way because Activision share price is never going back up to what it used to be under any circumstances the only way they get a return on their money is if this deal goes through and um Gamers want it to happen Microsoft Activision shareholders voted for it to happen the only people who don't want it to happen right now is Sony and they don't have a legal mechanic to stop this from happening because it doesn't put Microsoft in first place it doesn't harm competition it enhances competition because it forces Sony to try harder you know if Microsoft comes and says well we'll make Call of Duty $60 how does that harm consumers you know while Sony's pricing its games at $70 you know and Microsoft can come back and say well we'll price will price this game at uh $60 you know that helps consumers so how how can they argue that it doesn't help consumers it'll also Force Sony to make more service games to compete you know in the spirit of competition so you know there there's a there's a there's a slew of legal arguments Eagle Easy Legal arguments and concessions that Microsoft can make so for my money I think this is ultimately going to end with Microsoft putting it in writing not just marketing but some kind of you know agreement like Call of Duty will remain on PlayStation for however many years after the fact and uh they'll just put it in legal EAS for The Regulators to understand and then they'll investigate it and be like oh [ __ ] we don't want to take this to court [ __ ] that noise and then they it'll just sail through and that'll be it that's that's how I feel about that I have literally no faith in any UK government institution to do anything for consumers right now so H even even if there was a a vague vague competitions risk right now they wouldn't block it so ultimately it's going to be about what benefits them the competitions body and for them the benefit is not having to go to court so that's what it'll go through it's not about consumers it's about how much you know how much money they can get out of it and when they realize they can't get any money out of it they'll let it go through because that's how the UK government works so I I'll read some of the things here from their their finding just for people maybe haven't heard or for any of the audio listeners on Spotify and iTunes which by the way uh do us a big favor make sure you uh leave us a review on uh Spotify or iTunes five star review would be great um and if you're listening live here on YouTube make sure you hit that like button and uh if you haven't sub subscribed yet please do hit that subscribe button uh they said CMA says they're concerned that Microsoft could use its control over popular games like Call of Duty and World of Warcraft post merger to harm Rivals including recent and future Rivals and multi-game subscription services and cloud gaming um they also go on to say that um they're concerned that if Microsoft buys Activision it could harm Rivals including recent and future entrance into gaming by refusing them access to Activision Blizzard games or providing access on much worse terms uh and that they've received evidence about the potential impact of combining Activision Blizzard with Microsoft's broader ecosystem Microsoft already has a leading gaming console a leading Cloud platform and a leading PC operating system all of which which could be important to its success in cloud gaming true I would agree with all that however I said this in my video jez but does Microsoft really have a leading gaming console is is is is is is being third place out of three uh entrance leading gaming cons is would you would you classify that I mean the PlayStation guys love to say that Xbox is always last place can you really say that Xbox has a leading gaming console in a market where they're dead last every single time I don't know sure leading get even more crazy when you factory mobile yeah and they say they're concerned that Microsoft could leverage Activision Blizzard games together with Microsoft strength across the console the cloud and the PC operating systems to damage competition and the Nays market for cloud gaming Services um okay fair enough I think everybody knew this deal was going to be scrutinized um I didn't think it should be should be scr I mean it should yeah you know um I didn't think it was going to just pass willy-nilly I didn't I I didn't think this was going to pass this year I've been saying that since the beginning uh there's a lot of people hopeful that it would you know a lot of people hopeful that it would either pass uh in September or October it doesn't really look like that's the case but the interesting thing isn't like that they're going for an in-depth investigation it's that it's the PlayStation stuff because it doesn't make any sense to me at all right um this quote here that it says the CMA is is concerned that having full control over this powerful catalog especially in light of Microsoft's already strong position in gaming consoles operating systems and Cloud infrastructure could result in Microsoft harming consumers by impairing Sony's Microsoft's closest gaming Rial ability to compete like the idea so that like the idea that consumers would be hurt because Sony's hurt is absurd like so you're they're basically saying so if Microsoft gets stronger which then Sony would get weaker that hurts consumers like excuse me it this whole thing reads like the CMA is trying to protect a market par participant instead of the market itself like they're worried that like throughout this whole thing they're worried that Sony losing their number one uh position in this market would harm consumers it's it's really dumb when you're factoring the fact that Sony just put up the price of the PlayStation 5 in the UK as well and they's been a very strong advocate of of $70 games in the UK as well mean whereas Microsoft hasn't so the idea that Sony's Market position helps consumers is [ __ ] not only on the face of it but on the reality side of it yeah and Sony's harming consumers with its price gouging well so Sony raises the price of the console harming consumers and Sony also raised the price of its games harming consumers so the idea that consumers are harmed because Sony is harmed is [ __ ] stupid right there's my my one f word I can say uh for the podcast so it doesn't get demonetized well yeah I know I've said like 10 probably CU you're you were very pass about Halo sorry sorry but it's like it's it's sort of like well what about Sony using their market leader position leveraging that to hurt Microsoft like they're the market leader but they've been doing some pretty pretty interesting things behind the scenes to make sure that Microsoft doesn't uh get any stronger I mean you talk about these third party exclusives Final Fantasy 7 remake Street Fighter 5 all these things that they've been doing are designed specifically to harm Microsoft's position you know not money hading Street Fighter 5 last gen basically destroyed any chance of the fighting genre taking off on Xbox which hurt Microsoft's position and Sony used their their market leader position to get that deal cheaper than what it would have cost Microsoft because Microsoft didn't have uh as big of a user base so it's easier for Sony to get these deals because of how big they are but God forbid Microsoft competes the moment Microsoft competes all of a sudden we can't have that because if Sony's impacted that's bad for consumers it's I think um yeah I I think Sony Sony should be careful what he wishes for here because if this did go to court Microsoft would have to pull out all the dirty laundry like Sony blocking C crossplay that doesn't help [ __ ] consumers like Sony charging a tax for uh for lost Revenue quote unquote for for crossplay gaming forcing consumers to buy the more expensive console to play with their friends that harms consumers so I think if this did go to court Sony better watch out what it wishes for because a lot of this [ __ ] might come back to bite them in the ass in fact part of me that it does go to court because I think it would be really fun mean the drama would be hilarious if it went to court we have another Apple epic thing but I want I want this deal to go through before Diablo comes out so Diablo can be on Game Pass I don't want this thing to drag out forever which helps consumers uh but look this PlayStation currently has a larger share of the console gaming Market than Xbox but the CMA considers that Call of Duty is sufficiently important that losing access to it or losing access on competitive terms could significantly impact Sony's revenues and user base the impact is likely to be felt especially at the launch of Next Generation consoles where Gamers make fresh decisions about what console to buy I mean this reads like just pure PlayStation propaganda like Jim Ryan's literally feeding them lines uh about what to say the CMA believes that the merger could therefore significantly weaken Microsoft's closest rival to the detriment of overall competition in the console gaming I don't get that so like the idea that Microsoft getting stronger by buying Activision Blizzard weakens competition in console gaming because Sony gets weaker because Sony's revenues decrease and their user base decreases therefore the competition decreases like what and like this idea here that uh not having Call of Duty is sufficiently important right they say here CMA considers that Call of Duty is sufficient sufficiently important that losing access to it you know it would impact Sony's Revenue in user base Nintendo doesn't have a goddamn problem running their whole ecosystem and their Hardware business and software Business Without Call of Duty the they sell more than PlayStation there's no Call of Duty on that console and you can make the argument it's doing better than playst how are they doing as well as they they are without Call of Duty you know how like so that's why like it's this is just delay slash formalities and that all their talking points are so many talking points and when it comes down to like full-blown scrutiny and they they start to realize that if this did go to court they would lose hand over fist I think it'll they'll just be like oh yeah [ __ ] we're not touching this and to be honest I don't think Sony wants them to touch this because Microsoft will go dragging up all the stuff about Sony farming developers and charging a premium and forcing Gamers to buy that premium with their crossplay blocking practices I think I think this is just a load of hot air really and they going on to say as the market for as the market for multi-game subscription gaming service grows Microsoft could use its control over Activision Blizzard content to foreclose Rivals including recent and future entrance into gaming as well as more established players such as Sony so once again protecting Sony but last time I checked Sony is the market leader in the UK right they've sold the most they make the most Sony was the first one out with a game Subscription Service PlayStation Now launched in like 2014 uh 2013 four years before Game Pass Sony had first mover advantage on subscription services and you know what they completely screwed it up PlayStation I was an abject failure and not only that Sony had first mover advantage on cloud gaming because PlayStation Now was streaming they had that in 2013 it took how many years five six years before Xbox could do it like the idea that Sony's done all these things first and they failed at it and here comes Microsoft later on with a better subscription service and a better cloud gaming service but yet they might be penalized because they actually have a better product simply because Sony might be stopped from doing like what do you mean Sony might be stopped Sony is purposefully not putting their own games in their own subscription service and you can make the argument since PlayStation games seem to be a little bit more popular than Xbox games right that if Sony were to put God of War on a subscription service how many people would subscribe to a PlayStation plus plus PlayStation extra to play God of War day one or Last of Us remake day one or the new Spider-Man 2 or any of these big AAA games single player games that they have maybe the business models don't work but there's no denying that Sony's games are incredibly popular right so I don't see like okay you don't get Call of Duty any anymore or and considering Activision never put any of their games never put Call of Duty in any subscription service and suddenly like that could harm Sony who doesn't even put their own games on there who who you make the argument that right now PlayStation Plus has close to 50 million subs and Xbox game pass has last time 25 million so they're already double what is really what what's really going on here right like how is Microsoft penalized for doing things better later and you know Sony already had Sony already tried these things and failed but but the idea here is the CMA is like well it'll harm competition because it'll harm because it harm Sony and they might not be a like Google stadia entered the market pretty easily they may not be doing very well but they entered the market Call of Duty is not on Google stadia you know it entered and it's just it's it's hard to enter this Market because you know you need your own set of games like Nintendo's got their stuff Xbox is their stuff PlayStation is their stuff it's a reason to actually you know buy the system invest invest in the ecosystem so Google stadia was sort of just kind of up [ __ ] creek without a paddle because they were coming in so late nobody really wants to switch digital ecosystems uh they they cancelled their own first-party development stuff so there's really no reason to get stadum because it's not like they have any exclusives you know what I mean like the idea here uh that it it would somehow stop it is I don't know it's it's all future looking but I don't know this this this all reads just like oh my God Sony's in trouble therefore the this is a mon this is a monopoly and it's going to impact competition I was stunned when I read this oh breno says Cod is on PlayStation Plus but not the new one which Cod is on which Cod is on PlayStation Plus I didn't think they put any cards on Playstation did they I have no idea I don't know yeah I think I think the whole argument just falls apart under scrutiny and it will if it comes to that but yeah was just it's just another road bump and there's probably going to be more along the way I'm interested what America says ultimately because that's where a lot of the money for this is ultimately held up it's America so well but then Phil Spencer responded uh you know obviously he he knew what was going on and he wrote an he wrote an article on the blog on the blog uh basically going over it was basically a response to the thing saying that like actually Xbox owning Activision uh is good because it's good for these reasons like people will be able to to play Things cheaper cuz games are in in you know Game Pass uh developers can take advantage of that you know more people can play because of mobile etc etc etc uh even kind of take shots at Apple here he definitely take shots at Sony because they cause them industry leaders you know like he says the gaming industry today is robust and dynamic industry leaders including tenset and Sony continue to expand their deep and extensive libraries of games as well as other entertainment Brands and franchises but it's know 10et and Sony just bought into from software so it's like they're tenset and Sony is going to be continuing to acquire their own stuff and the idea that like Microsoft acquiring something shouldn't happen because it might affect Sony is a bad thing like where's the where do you draw the line between just competition where what you do does affect your rival and and it hurts them and that's just okay because that is the definition of competition versus like where's the line where it's like okay uh this is really monopolistic and you just can't come back from this and this is just like you you are stomping out the competition because I don't get that with with Call of Duty but apparently Sony feels that way but um Phil did say that uh they're going to intend to make Activision blizzards much love Library games including OverWatch Diablo and Call of Duty available in Game Pass that's the first time we really mentioned those so OverWatch Diablo Call of Duty in Game Pass he doesn't mention day one but I'm assuming that's what it will be um and then he said uh in doing so we will pursue a principled path we've heard that this deal might take franchises like Call of Duty away from places places where people currently play them that's why as we said before we are committed to making the same version of Call of Duty available on PlayStation on the same day the game launches elsewhere we will continue to enable people to play with each other what it's currently not what happens because Sony money hats the Bayer so well that'll be better for consumers as well well I mean they're just saying the same version of Call of Duty so it's like I don't think that really falls under betas it's like hey Call of Duty is available it's available you know on playst I IM the same time I don't I imagine they would and they they do par the only the only thing that won't be par is Game Pass sure I agree so you got Phil saying that Call of Duty is going to be on PlayStation the same day uh you know and um then we got more information today from Tom Warren over at The Verge where Phil said quote in January we provided a signed agreement to Sony to guarantee Call of Duty on Playstation with future and content parody for at least several more years beyond the Sony current Sony contract an offer that goes well beyond typical gaming industry agreements now so that's almost like calling out Jim Ryan being like you can't use this argument because we've signed this agreement yes um so you you were right from the very beginning I remember chat hating on you when you had your hot that day when we did that emergency podcast you're like hey Phil's a nice guy Call of Duty's uh what you call it a ritual Call of Duty's a ritual Call of Duty makes way too much money Call of Duty is going to be multiplatform they're going to Minecraft it and uh chat hated you that day chat hated you and maybe some of them are hating you today for your Halo take but either way my great Halo it sounds like you you you were going to be right the whole time cuz they've talked about this you know where Phil made his tweet about how you know oh we have a desire to put put it on PlayStation or keep it on PlayStation and we kind of sat there and like what what did Phil really mean he used the word desire like I desire to be super skinny which I'm actually trying to get to I lost like 20 pounds by the way so far so oh nice so far so good Rand skinny yeah you know Randal skinny and then when I get super skinny we'll be on camera you know feeling good about ourselves it's it'll be a whole thing uh but yeah so feel feeling good about myself cuz you know diets are hard and I'm only eating like 1300 calories so uh I'm trying to do my best but either way you know we talked about you remember that right going over Phil's thing like what does he mean by desire what does this really mean um and then well you get this thing about coming the same day and it's like okay well that's really apparent you got Brad Smith saying that you know what Brad Smith said which I don't have the quote in front of me um and now you have this one where mirrored what Phil said yeah and now you have this one where Phil's like we signed a you know we signed an agreement with Sony back in January that we weren't going to do it now the hangup here people have is the uh quote here about uh that we've signed so we provided a signed agreement to Sony to guarantee Call of Duty on Playstation with feature and content parity for at least several more years beyond the current Sony contract so I believe Jason shrier said that Sony contract ends with the the the the next track game cuz they had marketing contract for Modern Warfare 2 war zone 2 and Treyarch's next game which we know got delayed to 2024 so play Call of Duty had to be on Playstation until then Phil say we already signed the contract and it's going to be for at least several more years now of course uh people are saying that like oh well you know that's you know this going to go exclusive right cuz they only signed it for several more years you know what does that what does that mean um and I I'll let you answer so what do you what do you does this Phil's thing where like okay you know what Call of Duty remain multiplatform for the rest of the generation several more years because me several more years I I when I think of several I the number four Pops to mind right four and I have no I can't speak to how long he's talking about I'm not look I'm not saying tell me how long you think it'll lasts but just give me your your whole vibe on this are are you more or less confident of Call of Duty be be remaining Minecrafted essentially uh because you know there are people kind of fighting about this quote I want I want to know what you say because I I have a on it the reason Phil and Co always speak in these terms of you know for the foreseeable future or the next several years or whatever they give vague timelines because they're massive business that are subject to massive Market forces nobody could have predicted the market T turmoil that's going on right now Energy prices in the UK have rened by like 100% And they're going to rise by even more no one could have predicted that was going to happen well they probably could have done if they' actually like looked to you know further beyond the nose and their faces but oh well let's a whole another political discussion I'm too too exhausted to have right now but anyway um nobody could have foreseen some of this stuff so they don't want to say like it'll be on Co it'll be on Playstation forever because what if Sony goes out of business what if Sony um you know offers them because right now and a lot of people don't know this but Sony Microsoft are paying for the privilege to have Call of Duty on their system right now they are paying for Content acquisition it's not just like Activision agrees to publish it on there for free they're they're actually paying for it same with fortnite same with other games you know so they're paying for Content acquisition now if um if Sony turns around and like yeah we're not going to we're not going to pay for this anymore you just have to put it there for free even though the Call of Duty business model being as vast you know the amount of developers that are working on it right now part of that is because it's funded by the fees the Activision charges to these companies right son turned around is just like no we're not paying for it anymore then then Microsoft probably would pull it you know or if if so if if things between Sony and Microsoft got so hostile that they couldn't work together anymore then yeah maybe they would pull it but I don't think that's going to happen and I tell you why I don't think it's going to happen it's because Minecraft's still on Playstation right and we even we even got to a Minecraft VR which something I didn't think would happen um because I'd heard Sony was trying to get concessions for that as well so uh but they did eventually work out a deal because ultimately um they the idea is that everyone in the end will make money because people will buy the games they'll buy the microtransactions blah blah blah blah blah I don't think there's a scenario where Sony wouldn't want to pay up to get Call of Duty on there I don't think there's a scenario where Microsoft wouldn't want to pay up the uh the fee for all the microtransactions on Playstation so um when Phil speaks about you know several years he's just being brutally honest you know he's just he's just giving it the facts that it is you can't predict the future you can't just tell if the world's going to explode you know the people talk about like um you know an act often times in insurance claims there's always like an act of God Clause isn't there in insurance claims yes because um and that's like that's extreme unforeseeable circumstances which you know can can break the terms of a of an insurance claim you know and uh you know like a you know crazy volcano or meteorite or something you know if you if you took out you took out a loone on a massive building or Insurance on a massive building and it gets destroyed by a UFO or an alien space weapon you know how could an insurance company have accounted for that it's like it's one of those extremely unlikely scenarios so when Phil speaking about that that's the term that's the terminology he's really speaking about it's kind of like it's kind of like their act of God Insurance claim Phil's not trying to pull the wool over anyone's eyes there's no conspiracy theory I know the internet loves a conspiracy theory in 2022 but it's just legal ease basically you know I think it would be I think it'll be on Playstation permanently as long as Playstation still exists as long as Call of Duty is still a popular franchise I think it will still be on Playstation um I think like look I know there's a lot of people parsing the language of what is uh you know several years that that give them an out but to me like you wouldn't sign an agreement saying that Call of Duty is going to remain on PlayStation and perpetuity you're just not going to do that so it's like you you have it for a few years and then you probably then sign another contract for another few years and then rinson repeat as long as you want Call of Duty on there now I think Michael paor and I think even hog law I could be mistaken um I think they expect a like them like the FTC and these people to have like a consent degree where like it's going to be required that Call of Duty remains on Playstation right so and that's one of the reasons why uh you know Microsoft has been kind of from day one saying that they want the game on PlayStation cuz I think one of the first things they decided when they bought Activision that Call of Duty was going to be multiplatform I think that was one of the first things they decided that that's what they were going to do right so like they're okay with their actually then being a consent degree that Call of Duty remains multiplatform because that was something they already decided to do so I don't really think it means anything they they knew I mean they know that's what that's where all the contention would be bus from a business perspective revolve entirely around Call of Duty because that's where that's where all the money is like set with fortnite it's one of the major drivers of the entire console Market you know outside of Nintendo obviously but um for Sony and Playstation their entire business model revolves around the ritual that is the ritual that is the annualized Call of Duty you know so uh yeah yeah but the thing is they're they're using several more years because they're not going to sign a contract that says forever cuz who signs a contract that says forever so it's like it'll be whatever three years four years and then you'll sign a new contract you know maybe maybe then it's like you maybe you get game pass on there I don't know I'm just saying like it it's not strange to me and I don't really think it means anything Sinister like in four years once these new councils come out oh baby call Call of Duty is going to be exclusive I don't really think that's the intent I think it's just like you know what here you go we're being forward with you better than most you know industry uh deals right can you imagine if like Xbox got an agreement from Square Unix where they said hey you know the next few final fantasies will come to come to Xbox and then then Sony would never been able to put Final Fantasy remake and and and 16 exclusive right so Microsoft just like yeah okay for a few years and then when that contract comes to not time to renegotiate they'll do it again um so I don't know is is Call of Duty exclusive 20 years from now maybe that's a different story maybe maybe at some point Sony doesn't want Call of Duty anymore maybe you know like maybe Xbox transition so many people from PlayStation to Xbox to play Call of Duty that call play doesn't doesn't want want it so when Xbox comes to renegotiate they're like we don't want Call of Duty anymore they're like okay you don't want it fine you know we offered it to you you don't want it that's what it is but I don't really think it means anything other than like you're just not going to sign a contract forever um but yeah we have some super chats achievement says if Microsoft has to make written exclusively verbiage do you think they'll die on the hill of Call of Duty or all IP sir they want exclusives I really don't think the CMA and all those places care about Diablo or OverWatch or any un unannounced games I think it all I mean Call of Duty is specifically mentioned for a reason so um they'll probably be fine with Call of Duty uh you know being consent agreed to be uh multiplatform forever or for a certain amount of time but I don't think you know I don't think like it I don't think you'll see the CMA or any of these places like you know what by the way if you do make a Spyro game that shit's got to be multiplatform too you know I I don't think that's yeah it's all about Cod it's just all about Call of Duty um hackit says I'm not surprised Microsoft already owns the PC market this new deal has the potential to put Microsoft position own the whole console Market as well does Microsoft fall the whole PC market I mean like sure they do windows but Al runs the PC gaming Market not Microsoft right so I I I don't really agree with that I mean like sure they own windows so they own the the PC market but they don't own the gaming Market on PC am I am I right on this Jaz do people view like the Microsoft is owning the gaming Market on PC or is the PC Market the gaming Market I mean they shouldn't view Microsoft as owning the PC gaming Market because they bloody well do not right so I mean they they're not they're not going to start pre-installing Call of Duty on windows are they I tell you what they might pre-install though Candy Crush I mean there's no mention of I mean it's already pre-installed on most Windows Mach and that's the whole thing like he says potential and that's just all this is it's like oh it might happen but like even with call of Duty and all this stuff I mean who even knows if XBox becomes would own quote unquote the console Market I mean is it possible maybe sure but there's a lot of ground to make up between PlayStation and Nintendo for Xbox to like own the market right uh but yeah murky murky says I feel like Sony's giving Microsoft enough enough reason power to say nah you don't play nice so you don't get to play with toys anymore bro uh what else we got here uh Joe says Xbox can lose money and undercut the industry they are true D true two trillion dollar company think bigger guys yeah I mean that's that's uh that's the excuse people use about game pass that it it's you can't compete with it because Xbox because Microsoft can just you know uh essentially lose money forever but at the same time how does that hurt consumers if XBox it helps consumers yeah like it hurts Sony I'll agree with you on that it hurts Sony but it doesn't necessarily hurt consumers if you're offering these things for a cheaper price now okay maybe if you made a thing where like everybody gets in a Game Pass Game Pass 10 bucks and then Microsoft's like haha Game Pass is 40 bucks okay maybe you have you would have a point there but um I don't necessarily think that's something that's going to happen and it's it's sort of like you're presenting Sony as just like a a a a helpless baby in all this right when they've been the mar they've been the market leader like three or what four of the last five gens they've dominated they aren't some Mom and Pop shop right like a lot they're literally a billion dooll corporation that has next to Nintendo the biggest worldwide gaming brand I don't know this idea that oh Sony lost Call of Duty oh well guess what guys Sony's out of business I just find laughable or the idea that well Microsoft's got Call of Duty now Microsoft is this Behemoth I also sort of F uh almost as crazy you know it it it's it it seems I know it seems like people are are not giving enough credit to PlayStation for you know the business that they've built over the past Generations just say well they can undercut everybody Sony's [ __ ] you know what are you going to do am I crazy nah you're right I think like Call of juty could leave PlayStation entirely and I think they'd be all right if if they sort of pivoted a bit more to Casual audiences and stuff like that and they do eventually come out with the last of a service game that actually is really good I think that's going to be potent that could be a potentially big difference makeer for Sony on that level but in the short term I think it's all just hot air and it it'll go through in the end Bren breno says how is like Amazon price hikes yeah but everything goes up in price Netflix raises their prices Amazon raises their prices nothing stays the same price forever you know like it's just normal course yeah things rise with inflation generally like generally speaking like Xbox is like almost an outlier where they I feel like Xbox does price Rises less than some of the other companies out there you know Microsoft still holding out on $60 games and we we you know we both discussed the idea that they could eventually go to $70 but they've they've held out so far you know for whatever reason um so uh yeah I don't know I think it'll all come down to like what's provable in court and what isn't and Microsoft has a hell of a lot of examples to point to with Minecraft and [ __ ] like that so yeah uh MDR Mitten says uh I'd be fully invested in the televised court case Sony stepped on a b yeah yeah oh God no oh man can you imagine if they televis that oh that would be that would be a nightmare for coverage uh Raiden blade said if Sony causes the deal to fail watch Microsoft go to every third party and buy exclusive for all all of them for 20 years and keep them time for two years keep poking the Xbox well I don't think the deal is going to fall fail um uh don't think so you know if it did that would be Jim Ryan's greatest achievement I'd say it right i' say it right now if somehow the deal got blocked and Xbox and Microsoft had to pay $3 billion to Activision Blizzard and Activision Blizzard became independent again I'd be like that's Jim Ryan's biggest accomplishment getting getting that deal blocked I I'd slowly put that on Jim dance moves line Ryan yeah uh let's see Darren says even if PlayStation dropped to fifth that shouldn't matter especially to Regulators because competition with gaming would still exist make zero sense indeed it does but got to protect PlayStation and number one at all costs because somehow if they're impacted that's bad for consumers somehow uh kiwi says what what if Sony sells to Amazon or apple I mean special Nick has been making the case that Sony's going to sell Apple but then again uh Sony's a company that uh Japan really protects and Apple's big bad American company so they might be like nah you're not buying them neither to Amazon but who knows who knows uh what the future future holds uh see what else um Dan says jez tweeting hard for a trillion dollar company what what does that mean jez what were you Tweeting hard for somebody I don't know someone got triggered I guess tweeting hard for a trillion dollar company uh yeah triggered triggered guy sad how how dare you how dare you how dare I tweet my opinions God yeah uh Playstation bought u a new studio Savage Studio mobile uh yeah and I saw you respond to col Mor Ari and said uh some L lines of um this is just them following the footsteps of of Xbox one: one right mobile now all these sort of things PC right yeah makes a lot of sense mobile there's a lot of money in Mobile so we saw most money yeah we saw Phil talk about one of the reasons they biggest reason they wanted Activision was for mobile for for king um and they didn't have a platform so I'm not surprised Sony is going after more mobile Studios and you can make the argument after m Microsoft acquires Activision Blizzard that maybe Microsoft should go after more mobile Studios although nobody in chat would like that and either I or you would cuz I want that Warner Brothers and that Capcom uh but you can make the argument that probably from a business perspective going after more mobile Studios is probably the right business move you know especially if you want to get after three billion Gamers so um what else we got here uh The Game Pass friends and families officially launched in Ireland and Colombia and I believe who's that Microsoft account that begins with a Jaz ER gr or gr what whatever you know what I'm talking about the one that always finds back backend stuff on the servers know AO Lumia yeah he he tweeted he recently tweeted the that the uh Xbox friends and family is As on the US server and I think it's been being tested since April is what is what he was saying or something so around when I leaked it if you remember right yeah so some of the info about uh the official launch of this is let's see here let me let me get the information um yeah with the friends and family plan all five members enjoy the benefits of Game Pass ultimate with their own unique access to all the games on Game Pass ultimate content and benefits regardless of the device they play on so there's like one person who controls it all and he can invite uh four other people but they have to live in the same country um that in um in Ireland it'll cost what is it1 uh which comes out to about $24.99 here in the US which seems about right that's a actually no it's pretty much reach Perry right now but I have heard it is going to be 20 in the US I actually heard that back when I originally leaked it but I didn't want to add that information in case it was wrong because I knew a lot of people would be like oh my God that's so cheap that can't be true it is a very it is a very aggressive price point 25 bucks considering ultimate is 15 bucks so it's not that much more and you can get four friends on it is it really that crazy because um for example I bought uh YouTube family premium today and that's $17 yeah I bought it because I'm uh I'm trying out YouTube music instead of Spotify for a bit oh okay say long but um because like I share Spotify with a bunch of family members I was like well I try YouTube family for a bit and um it's only a little bit more expensive than just you know buying uh what YouTube premium by itself and I think it's because like they their analysis on user behavior is that the extra members perhaps don't use it as much as the uh as the main account holder so it's actually like it's not a big loss but I suppose like if everyone was constantly using it maybe that wouldn't be so great but I don't know we'll have to see yeah and uh there there's some like limits I think like uh the person who is paying for the account can invite up to eight people in a calendar year like that's it and like the people who and I think you can only join someone else's thing like twice a year or something like that so there are restrictions on how many people you can invite and then how many times you can join someone else's uh thing so um I wonder when it's going to officially launch here in the states probably for this fall maybe um yeah I think it's probably pretty close I wonder if they were like preparing to have it ready for Starfield and redfall you know like make a push be like here's Starfield here's redfall We Got Game Pass family you know like let's make a big splash out of this and then those games got delayed but we you know you still have Game Pass family coming out so uh look for that soon if it's if they're testing it in the US I mean it's probably not not that long from now until we get an official announcement here um RDX on Fett says PS5 is now $50 more than series X in Canada and Edwin says uh Xbox needs a platinum achievement equiv equivalent I agree I would love that I would love for there to be a platinum achievement uh or like a badge or something oh actually I can't talk about that yet oh you were going to say something no oh okay well what are you talking I just had a bit of a cough there sorry okay let's talk after let's talk after the show shall we let's talk after the show okay yeah what I mean about your cough we can talk about that after the show oh okay cool cool um let's see what else here uh Xbox Tokyo game show jez Xbox announced that they were going to have a presentation at Tokyo game show let me see if I can get the information here um they said the show will take place on September 15th at 2: a.m. Pacific time 5:00 a.m. eastern and according to Xbox it will be a show curated for players in Japan and Asia we invite fans to tune in to the Tokyo game show where you can expect to see updates on existing titles from Xbox game studios and titles launching from developer partners that we hope will Delight players here in Japan and Asia around the world I did see that uh this past week from mitsu reported that Xbox sold like 16,000 or 20,000 consoles for Xbox or something like that most since launch day it's most since launch day so it's you know doing well um what do what should we expect from um what should we expect from Tokyo game show anything I don't think there's anything going to be majorly new but hey I could be completely wrong maybe there's got some like super secret thing partnership they're going to announce or a new game or something they did say they they're going to be announcing games from their partners and they have been operating there for quite a while you know trying to make deals and trying to you know meet new devs and fun people and stuff like that so maybe we could see some of the fruits of those labors but honestly I have no information really I mean I know that Phil Spencer is going to be there I think is that confirmed or did I just leak that I don't know did you did you just leak that I might been I mean he I mean he previous years he's done like a video is he actually going to be there at this time uh I don't know if he's going to be there physically or if he's just presenting or something but Bill's involved put it that way which he wasn't involved at Gamescom Phil where where where was your attendance in Gamescom Phil you know Phil always Ducks Gamescom for some reason man I don't think he I don't think he likes I could have sworn Phil had some video for Gamescom though no yeah but he wasn't there oh he doesn't need to be there though he doesn't need to be there Greenberg was there was there yeah was there all you need is Greenberg you don't Phil Phil's got bigger fish to fry bigger fish than Germany bigger fish than Gamescom there is no bigger fish than Gamescom he's got a he's got a call Gamescom makes E3 look like a little little tiny event in someone's closet you don't know big Gamescom is man it makes E3 look you know what you didn't visit my friend gopher he was upset oh I didn't know he's there yeah I told you he was there and I even told you what Booth he was at well I forgot wow so you didn't remind me I did remind you I don't remember that dude it's really bad cuz like a friend of mine was like oh man we should meet up with Gamescom and I was like oh yeah we should and then like I messaged him later and I was like oh man I didn't know you were at Gamescom we should have met up and I was like wait we talked about this you did know I was at Gamescom I was like oh yeah [ __ ] cuz my memor just bad oh well RDX RDX on F says PS5 digitals $120 more than series s in Canada and that PS5 games are $90 here too which is outrageous they're pretty expensive in Canada that's for sure um one of your leaks jez project Dragon sort of in the news again because oh yeah IO interactive basically talked about uh their future and they talked about how they're doing really well and you how Game Pass really helped out this past uh fiscal year but then they said said not to expect much revenue or profit for you know fiscal year 2024 and 2025 uh which seems to imply that their bond game and project Dragon might not be releasing until after 2025 so but but that falls in line with what I remember this was why I told jez not to leak that game because that game was like so far out I'm like there's no point leaking project dragon because that game's 2025 2026 but Jaz was like I have to they leak to themselves I had no choice yeah yeah yeah but but yeah I when I leaked that game it was like it had basically just being approved I don't think any development you were concerned that it might get canceled because you didn't even know if it could green lit it was just that like yeah yeah but then they're putting out job ads for project Dragon which is so funny but uh I don't know it is what it is but yeah we're going to be waiting a while to see that but I think it's fine because I'd rather have a well executed game because from what I read it was pretty ambitious you know di Diablo and Warcraft both referenced as influences on the game so yeah oh that Warcraft reference on the Diablo reference got you really excited yeah got me feelings BR yeah metal morbo says games is to E3 as Spiel is to Gen Con I have no idea what Spiel isans no idea what that means I don't know [Music] um Assassin's Creed Mirage was leaked and announced by uh Ubisoft they got a showcase coming on the 10th where they're going to reveal it and there's talk at least rumors surrounding that this game is going to be more going back to like Assassin's Creed 1 sort of mechanics and getting away from the big RPG stuff that Assassin's Creed's been been known for um which might actually be welcome at least for me um yeah I was actually like oh wow that's pretty cool they've actually listened to people so um I gonna give Ubisoft the benefit of the doubt on this and yeah that's that's amazing considering how you feel about Ubisoft yeah I Haven I have not been very kind to Ubisoft in the last year two years years three years but you know this uh this is the kind of news that I think people want to hear for Assassin's Creed I kind of like the idea of Assassin's Creed as an RPG but they don't fully commit to it I don't know and also I just don't need games that go on forever I thought Assassin's Creed 1 was big enough God and now they're like thousands of hours long I don't know yeah I say as I put 10,000 hours into Warcraft is that how many hours you have in Warcraft I have about 14,000 hours now I think 14,000 Jesus I need to I need to add up all my characters because I got loads of characters too I it's new character I made just last week I've already got three days played on it so what's that 2 4 six yeah maths maths anyways you know what let's uh let's take some questions uh if you guys any any questions make sure to put them in chat we'll do our best to go through them all uh thank you guys so much for being here um we uh appreciate it as always keep in mind jez says that we might be doing the show on Saturday next week uh maybe even Monday depending on German Ingenuity on their trains apparently it's not very good so definitely for sure right now not not on Friday 100% right you're is that what 100% for sure not on Friday is what you're saying right 100% for sure 100% not for sure so uh not on Friday for sure yes so hit the like button before you guys leave if you're leaving subscribe if you're new um and yeah thank you for being here as always you guys are amazing love doing the podcast with jez love doing the podcast with uh everybody in chat and uh thank you for anybody who's lurking you you matter as well or anybody listening on iTunes and Spotify we appreciate and love each and every one of you who takes the time out of your day to listen to me and jez ramble on for hours and hours and hours about Xbox and gaming news you know when we started this podcast five years ago did you think one we'd have over thousands of people listening live every week and you know all the the numbers we like did you have Envision that when we start started this no I just thought it'd be a fun little little hobby you know did you envision a manscape partnership did you imagine how how smooth your boss would be five years later because a manscaped smooth all right so let's see here uh dark says happy to technically enjoying my favorite podcast and my birthday thanks guys oh happy birthday man if your birthday is today or tomorrow uh happy birthday birthday hope your hope your day is amazing uh Georgie says you guys talk about Matt Booty's comments on Perfect Dark and Fable we kind of mentioned it but neither neither me or jez really knows what he says in fact I kind of flipped what Matt said about Fable uh because that stuff happened like right when we were going live so we haven't seen uh his comments on either we know that like basically he wants to show Fable but they don't want to show Fable and I think he's I think I saw on Twitter that Perfect Dark he compared to like Bond and Jason Bourne or something I don't know like I said I haven't seen the interview so I don't really know uh Raj patal says Hey jez do you expect a series 3 Elite controller next year and could you please for the entire Xbox Community asfi to fire Bonnie Ross and fix 343 please um there's a rumor I think from uh I'm not sure where he's from but there is there is a Xbox leaker who has I believe had accurate information in the past who said they are working on a series 3 for next year I have no information of my own on that right now but I kind of believe it I kind of believe that um they are going to continue with the Elite Series um and I've heard that they have been working on recently actually I've heard that they have been working on improving the reliability of the series controllers um with manufactur and stuff like that so yeah I think they are going to keep working on those it is one of the most popular accessories that sell in the market so I don't think they're going to stop selling them because they are so popular so Xbox and their controllers baby you know there's there's always there's always three things you can count on death taxes and Xbox making new controllers certain certain as the Sunrise uh wiia he says did you see IGN Francis score for the last us remake saying that although it was a 7.5 as a remake it was scored to 10 because it was a masterpiece uh yeah I did see that being shared around um I actually though haven't really read any reviews for The Last of Us so uh I hope anybody who's buying it and playing it loves Last of Us and is having a great time with it uh I'm probably not going to play it uh although I don't know it's on PC eventually it'll be on PC yes but not right not at launch not right now oh oh that's awkward why is that I mean Sony hasn't done a day and dat PC game yet though so oh okay well Sony offered me a review code for Last of Us on the PS5 on the PS5 yeah well bro I and I replied um I don't have a PS5 could I have the P PC version please I don't know why I just I just autop pooled PC version request because that's what that's what I always do because I don't have a PlayStation and they didn't reply so maybe they thought I was trolling or something look out for your boy Rand you know you didn't give me a birthday present you know what I did I didn't I got you I got I got you a I got you a podcast membership with bluewire podcast oh yeah yeah that's true um very if they send you a I did get you I did get you a gift I got you a Peppa Pig Rebrand Jesus that was that that was literally that was literally my birthday gift to you all right well I paid sha lebre money for that oh I that's oh okay I'm just saying I'm just saying when if they offer you God of War just give it to me nah come on nah I tell you I'll give it to you I'll give it to you right if you agree to run My Little Pony gameplay footage on on the podcast I I agree 100% if if you if if they give you if they give if they give it to you three episodes you want three EP what yeah I want three episodes no no no no no one episode of complete My Little Pony as long as you get me God of War early I I and you can pick the show and we can have My Little Pony on there 100% I'm a man of my I'm willing to shake on this as long as it's early it can't be like the day before or the day of it's got to be like you know three days week earlyer a review for God of War maybe I don't know but I mean think about it this this is the way to get My Little Pony on the I will gladly gladly put it on there for God of War early 100% right in fact you should probably email that person back like can you put me on list for God of War really early please uh maybe maybe I to be fair if they send me a code for God of War I think pretty sure they'll expect a review out of it so but I don't review PlayStation games because I don't have one hello I did I have actually reviewed one PlayStation game in my life that was a Final Fantasy 7 remake on Android central.com that's the first and only PlayStation game I've ever reviewed Raj Patel says okay what about a well-written article director to fil other higher-ups I'm looking into 343 so basically he wants you to write about 343 in Halo the thing is that they know all this stuff there's literally nothing I could write that they don't already know you know and I know like you maybe it's like you want me to you know sort of voice what everyone's opinion and stuff but they already know everyone's opinion on this stuff there's like there's nothing more I could say that hasn't already been said I promise you and there's nothing that that I could say that they don't already know and that they don't already you know trying to fix you know I think I think that's part of like why people are so angry maybe they don't they don't realize that they are trying to fix things or something it's not like they're resting on their Laurels here they they are desperate trying to fix this I know they are so it's there's just nothing more that can be said about it yeah shout out to IR bear 32 becoming the newest member of the Channel thank you so much for all the support enjoy the emotes uh let's see what other questions we got here uh Gary says a simple solution to fix Halo infinite is for 343 to hire Forge modders content creators the same way but do the hired modders like the ones on Fallout London okay Ryan says could Microsoft do something to make the Xbox avatars more engaging I mean they probably could but I think avatars are dead right uh I don't the way the placement is on the dashboard I don't I sort of feel like avatars are you know did I did I ever tell you I have a buddy who literally during the 360 gen when the avatars came out he literally bought and I'm not I'm not exaggerating every single week he bought something clothing item for his Avatar every week I know I know other people that do that there are people spending money on avatars you know I think honestly a lot of this stuff like avatars and achievements and even the game DVR a lot of that development time is being soaked up by xcode right now um but uh I think avatars are dead unless they're going to use him for like one versus 100 if one versus 100 come out anymore CU didn't the guy who was in charge of that team leave or something like Kip whatever his name was yeah I think so but I I don't think they're fully completely dead yet but I don't think they're going to do anything with it in the near term however you know I think like um actually I can't talk about it we'll talk about it after the show we'll talk about it after the show we're gonna have a good after the show discussion here guys I can't wait to pick have a have a private interview with jez about some of these things wow uh cang Cent says Rand I got a Kindle do you suggest any books I've read Wheel of Time and thinking about beginning Brandon Sanderson okay well that is a load of question uh Brandon sanderson's amazing you could start at misor uh or his big series Stormlight Archive I recommend both Wheel of Time means you're probably into if you like Wheel of Time you're probably into like Epic Fantasy um the first slot the first law Universe first raw trilogy trilogy by Joe Amber comi is amazing I highly recommend that of course Song of Ice and Fire you know Game of Thrones is is one of the best fantasy stories out there even if you kind of know what happens it's still incredible um what else me I really like Robin Hobs uh real of the elderling series it's like my second favorite series uh with uh first one's like assassins Apprentice uh if you want to check that out um I also love The Dark Tower by Stephen King uh I'm a big big fan of Stephen King in fact he's got a new book coming out next week called fairy tale which I have pre-ordered I cannot wait to read that uh so Dark Tower is amazing um I'm trying to think what other series I've read recently oh Red Rising if you're into sci-fi at the Red Rising Saga is fantastic like the first book is kind of just okay it's kind of a it's kind of a Hunger Games clone set in like space but man book two and three are the step up and like storytelling is so noticeable that I I couldn't believe like the things he was doing it basically almost kind of became Star Wars in a way um so if you're really into sci-fi Red Rising is definitely a franchise or a franchise a series I'd recommend I'm currently reading right now uh the sun series by Christopher Rocko it's scii it's kind of like Dune um it's like science fiction so it's set set in like 16,000 years in the future but it's kind of like more fantasy-ish like Dune is even though it's science fiction uh first book is called Empire of Silence they're big boy books too they're like 800 Pages uh I'm really enjoying it's first person as well so there's a lot of books uh those are some of the ones i' i' I'd recommend so yeah uh let's see what else we got here um read a book yeah I know you read a book about World of Warcraft uh hery says any news on expansion cards lower prices new ter 4 terabyte version you heard anything jez about uh that's a good question I haven't heard anything um but yeah they really need to do something about that maybe the CMA could look into competition in the Xbox storage Market instead yeah right geez yeah I haven't another a damn thing sorry guys uh sat Question Time says any word on the series s this drive add-on I want to make my Series S more special I can't imagine them making a dis Drive add-on do do you I don't think they'll do a dis Drive add-on sadly because I don't know if USB is fast enough to deliver some of that stuff I think like you probably could install uh a game or watch a movie over USB maybe but maybe Microsoft just doesn't think there's enough demand for that that's interesting you know because I actually have a I have a disc drive USB disc drive for my PC because I haven't had a laptop with a disc drive in God knows how long so they just don't make him anymore right um but not every now and then every now and then very rarely I think damn I actually need a dis drive for this or something so then I ended up buying a portable DVD drive I don't know that's an interesting question I might I might ask around about that see what Microsoft's thought process is with regards to that because that is interesting but I haven't heard anything yeah uh let's see Frizzle says hi guys love you too my question do you guys think Sony's legitimately paying off Regulators like CMA to block the ABK deal no when what I'm saying like Jim dance moves lion Ryan making phone calls it's just kind of jokes but clearly Sony is telling The Regulators what they told the Brazilian commission you know like that is 100% what's happening there's no no one's paying off anybody and if people are saying that they're probably just joking I can't imagine they being uh serious with that so no I don't I have really doubt that God can you imagine can you imagine you know it's just it's funny like I there's there's almost a part of me that just kind of like wants to see the deal get blocked just to see your reaction because you could have two things this year where you said 100% were happening that didn't happen you know what well with Starfield 100% coming this year that was you that wasn't me that was you that was you I was the one being like you sure changing reality right now you said it was going to launch last year no you said he was going to launch last year what no that's that's even worse you said was last that was special Nick that said that that wasn't that wasn't Rand Thor yeah but you agreed with him you agreed with him I remember well I mean I I had my I had my Pie in the Sky thing where they were going to launch Forza Halo and Starfield the same holiday yeah exactly so you you said it was what you said was even worse no no no no so you said it was going to come last year I remember because someone in my news team was like oh your buddy said this what want to write an article about it yeah I was like oh God what is ran doing putting that out there because obviously it's not going to happen why do ran want to get everyone all disappointed and then I spoke to you and I was like Rand you can't you can't just put the [ __ ] out there bro that's why this is like character assassination right now oh manett uh Peter donelly says one of the best YouTube shows around you guys are awesome thank you that's a High Praise there's a lot of great YouTube shows around the fact that you choose us is uh well makes it's makes it all worth it really uh NC says any rumors chance we'll see a new Killer Instinct soon best XBox exclusive in the last decade I mean I hope I hope we do but I mean I haven't heard any new rumors or anything and I don't think you have either right no I haven't heard a damn thing it's a shame because you know one would hope that this could be especially in a world where the fighting game genre is kind of blowing up now isn't it you got like multivers 20 million you know like it's Street Fighter 6 is probably going to do incredibly well Mortal Kombat 12 probably going to come out soon some point like it fighting genra is doing better than ever it seems time it's time for Killer Instinct 2 let's go uh shark cop says if this acquisition goes through how long do you think it will take before another major acquisition not long if it goes through let's say it goes through like March 20th I think Xbox acquires take to the 21st are you serious no yeah like the Activision Blizzard deal gets approved on the 20th and the next day they go by take two yeah well I was I was I wasn't sure because you were silent I was like wait well you I was waiting for you to say something oh man I don't think they'll buy take two I mean what do they have they only have Grand Theft order right yeah surely a better purchase would be Capcom that's yeah Warner Brothers Discovery a lot of uh turmo going on there maybe they can get the gaming division out from underneath South stnick whatever his name is it seems like he's burning the company down around him you know but isn't isn't the gaming division the one part of the company that is doing okay with all that [ __ ] I don't know I think I didn't I hear that that he was being kind of hands off with that [ __ ] I don't know could be wrong about that I guess uh let's see what else here we got a question from Justin uh after the Activision Blizzard acquisition deal finalizes where do you think Xbox will look for Acquisitions large publishes like EA or individual Studios this kind of ties in with the other question we just had um interesting though um I think they they'll continue to look to shore up where they're weak right now yes um I think with Activision they pretty much have mobile covered but I think they might they might look further into PC I think one of the things they'll want to do is find a studio that can sort of help out with Age of Empire FR as a franchise because right now they're they're leaning heavily on Relic and I don't know how long that whole deal is going to BL you know and um I don't know if world's Edge to Studio by itself is big enough to actually fully take on development of like age five or whatever not that they're probably not even thinking about age five right now but they have to be thinking about in the future right I think strategy games is is an area Microsoft's very interested and expanding into one game that I didn't talk about um was uh Minecraft Legends which um I wrote an article about today um so if you are interested in Minecraft Legends go and check that out on Windows Central I wrote a whole preview of Minecraft Legends because I actually got to check it out in detail and interview the devs as well because I didn't really understand fully what this game actually was frankly but now I do it's it's a full-blown strategy game like it's it's not a hack and slash at all I thought it was sort of like halfway between the two kind of like Overlord or something but the main character is basically just an advanced cursor you go around sending units out controlling massive armies building buildings and all that kind of stuff it's a full-blown strategy game and clearly Microsoft thinks is like you know a big for them to expand into like I always thought strategy games were kind of Niche but maybe there's something about the business model of a strategy game which lends itself really well to monetization I know Paradox comes Paradox has like hundreds of DLC for its strategy games so there's clear there's clearly a business model that works there right but um I don't know did you see I I think either PC or mobile they'll probably push further into did you see that or certain Affinity to help Halo out yeah certain Affinity is probably yeah you you got to get them uh maybe maybe you give certain Affinity Halo there you go new Dev on Halo certain Affinity right um did you see that Paradox game I forget the name of it right now but it was supposed to come to PC game pass and then they they announced that not only is it not coming to PC game pass anymore it's not even coming to the Microsoft store is it what V what game is that is that Victoria 3 yes Victoria 3 yeah they they what what did they say about it they said after discussions with their Partners uh no longer comeing Game Pass or the Microsoft store oh my God that's really bad actually I don't know what that means crus Kings did really poorly I might have to look into that because that's a bit of a oh dear you shouldn't you you should go look into it uh maybe Crusader Kings did really badly I don't know thano says did you hear that Konami has a sequel to beloved franchise at TGs um yeah there's a lot of rumors surrounding Konami uh I think VGC Andy Robinson said that he heard that s Hill supposed to be announced this month I also heard that from another friend of mine supposed to be sound Hill 2 remake by Bluer team and maybe even being a timed exclusive to PlayStation I think um Metal Gear supposed entirely unexpected Metal Gear is supposed to be getting like they're supposed to remastering the whole franchise like Metal Gear 1 2 and three or something or remaking three and remastering the other two something like that uh there's yeah I don't know but like I don't think it's supposed to be at TGs or something but yeah I guess konami's got you know they're going to be making games again from their big franchises so that'd be something uh I would I'm I'm interested in seeing this Silent Hill 2 by blubber team it would be very interesting very interesting I I honestly don't know how I feel about this like I I have a love ha relationship with blueba Team like I think they do some things really well like atmosphere but I think their their writing is pretty bad like they they have no they have no sense of subtlety and they're kind of bludging you with all of their sort of like their narrative Hooks and stuff there's like no subtlety in what they putting across but they lack the conviction to go full-blown Gore fest with it it's like they write gory but don't present gory it's hard to explain but um I don't know I think like I really love Sonic Hill it's one of my favorite franchise of all time remember getting Silent Hill for Christmas one year and it was like one of my favorite Christmas presents ever just slapping silent 2 in my PlayStation and you know very christmy kind of game I suppose it has snow in it or is it meant to be Ash I don't know but um I haven't really done any games with real Combat I know they hired a combat Dev and they have been beefing up the studio to accommodate combat not that the emphasis on solent Hill was ever combat really but it is a big part of that sense of vulnerability you get I just wonder if they're going to do the game Justice ultimately because a lot of the third party Studios that um a lot of third party Studios that Konami has chosen to handle solent Hill have just been terrible over the years or at least not they don't live up to team silent you know maybe not maybe Terrible's a bit harsh but they're just not on team science level it's it's it's one thing to do your own games right um like uh the medium but oh boy people love sound Hill People adore sound Hill too yes do uh so you better be careful because if you screw that up people are going to come for you you know uh Mario Roberto Francisco says I have a question why your wallpaper uses PlayStation controllers I'm relatively new here I don't know um sea Le made the overlay and I think he was just using Xbox controllers cuz you know we talk about PlayStation we play Playstation games uh so it's just random controllers just floating through floating in the background uh that's that's the reason uh let's see see any any more oh there's sha lebre the one the only the master um one bad mother says valve blocking Paradox from Game Pass I thought it would be valve would it I don't think valve would do that Marco R says uh recommend Red Rising board game from ston mailer that's right they do have a red Rising board game don't they I got nobody to play board games with so I just read the books and play games and stuff uh Darren says Ubisoft is shutting down multiple 360 multiplayer servers this month should we expect more 360 shutdowns in the future probably I mean the end of the day yeah those games are never going to you know those server based games are never going to live forever you know um because it's not cost effective to keep running the servers right yeah definitely so yeah you should definitely expect more to go down definitely uh Frizzle says do you have any interest in sci-fi have you read any 40K books I do like sci-fi a lot um fantasy is my preferred genre but uh I what I do normally is I'll read a series and I'll I'll flip genres to keep it fresh so if I read Epic Fantasy and then I'll read a Sci-Fi and then I'll sometimes go to contemporary like read some Stephen King or stuff like that so yeah I mean currently right now I'm reading the sun eater which is a Sci-Fi fr sci-fi book or sci-fi series um so yeah I I do love me some sci-fi but I have not read any Warhammer or any 40K stuff so John says The Dark Tower movie sucked indeed it did but it doesn't matter I still love The Dark Tower uh Childish Bambino says will George R Martin never finished Winds of Winter in the final book uh which I believe is a dream of spring ah gez man I've been waiting literally forever for like I started reading Game of Thrones or Song of Ice and Fire when Storm of Swords came out forget what year that was it was in the 90s and it was just like I remember telling people if they adapted to a TV show it would be one of the greatest TV shows ever made as long as it's done right and they did it right and it was until the final season and it's been 11 years since I think he released a with dragons and like a lot of people have lost faith with him finishing it but he says he's working on it so I I think maybe he releases Winds of Winter but I'm not sure he releases the final book he's getting old he's getting up there in age so do people really like books this much hell yeah bro all your favorite things are books your favorite movies they're all they're all adapted from some sort of source books are amazing bro you have think you have to imagine [ __ ] talking about the best best thing imagine use your own imagination uh childish manino also says how you liking Vinland Saga you know okay so I really like it I really like it I'm on episode 16 here's the thing okay this is going to go into my thing about my diet right so my thing is I don't normally or I don't normally eat a lot during the day at least my diet my I my diet right now is I basically eat something every two hours you got lunch I breakfast I wake up I have breakfast two hours later I have some peanuts right like two handfuls of peanuts uh then like two hours later I'll have a protein bar and then two hours later I have lunch two hours later I'll have like two hardboiled eggs two hours later I'll have uh like a thing of bag of popcorn two hours later I'll have dinner and then two hours later I'll have these other uh the bag of chips I I like that are good and then two hours later I have chicken and broccoli so it's just like small portions but eating every two hours so I don't get hungry right and it works for me you know but how I used to be was I don't really I used to not normally eat too much during the day and then when I would get online at the end of the night to watch something on TV from Netflix or Amazon Prime I I would h i i h would have to eat something so like I'd be sitting there watching Vinland Saga but to watch Vinland Saga I'd have to order something from door Dash and I was pretty much doing that like I don't know three to four days a week every month so um right now the hardest thing about the dieting and all that stuff is when I want to watch something on Netflix or anything else my brain tells me I should be ordering food and I need to be eating food while watching stuff because that's how I've consumed all my TV shows on all these streaming services for years now is that I watch a show or I watch a movie I'm eating something uh so yeah I know that feel yeah it's um a lot of a lot of diet stuff's about having habits you've learned over your whole life and it's hard to break those habits yeah God I know I lost five pounds this week though that's good see now I'm on the diet you're on the diet we're gonna get healthy together jez you know yeah man Georgie says can patreon members listen to your after show talks I mean me and J still need to talk about if we're doing you know things we would do for a patreon the thing with the the thing with after there's a really no after show because jez is tired because what time is it by you right now it's like what almost midnight it's one in the morning yeah your girlfriend's probably mad at you so most of the time we talk for we talk for a few minutes and then it's over so we don't really because it's so late for jez we don't really have a show but we'll come up if we do uh patreon we'll come up with some stuff uh click says uh if Xbox ever put out uh bgm on homepage settings or their storefront like in the Wii what style genre gaming soundtrack would you want playing in the background ooh ooh you know how PlayStation has the song that plays when you're on the dashboard Jazz that's what he's talking about what song would you want to play oh man kedler filth of fil I'm joking I was cradle of fils on mind cuz I saw have you have you heard kleri they're like a British goth black metal band they um they're doing a they're doing a collab with Ed shiran it's like pop star is really intriguing so they were on they were on my mind at the moment but uh God I don't know I I I do I did just get a Pang of nostalgia when you said when you said PlayStation the dashboard music because like didn't didn't there other consoles have that like the PS2 and stuff or am I just thinking of like yeah they did relaxing kind of music they did I just like something kind of chill like it doesn't have to be like a full-blown like music track but like if it was like yeah something relaxing like what what if you loaded up the Xbox and like vigil for Mass effects started playing oh man that would be great some something smooth and reacing yeah uh Jesse Derby says Sony 10 cent this deal cuz they don't shave nuts shy okay interesting um let's see any more any more uh see Justin says what do you think will happen with 343 if they move Halo to a new team I mean Jess says that's not going to happen but I would like to see them make something new so I mean I just don't know who'd make it like you just you're trading one problem for another with that with that scenario in my view maybe Raven software could do it Raven that'd be interesting maybe give it to one of the Call of Duty teams uh sparhawk says have you ever tried any lit RPG books I don't think so I don't think I have at least I don't know what those are but I'm going to say no Mr good cat says I'm waiting for the end of the king King King King killer Chronicles I have the first two books but I'm definitely not going to read them until the third one comes out because what's the point although maybe I should read them because everybody says they're really good uh I think that's I think that's it I think we're all caught up with everything so thank you guys so much for being here hopefully we kept you company on this Friday whether you're driving somewhere or working or whatever or just chilling uh support is always amazing and uh you know it's kind of crazy like we was like what are we going to talk about this week and then we had a lot of stuff to talk about although you know uh Halo took up a lot of that although I wasn't here for some of the Halo talk but either way uh hope you guys enjoyed the show we'll be back remember Saturday not Friday because jez is going to be at the nude beach so with this Peppa Pig hanging out oh God so uh before you guys go hit the like button subscribe if you're new and have a good rest of the weekend keep it gaming take care everybody later for
