Indiana Jones and the Great Circle - The Lorehounds Play E08

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[00:01:09] Welcome to The Lorehounds Play, where The Lorehounds, your guides to pixel-based adventures. I'm Jon. I'm Brandon, and this is our eighth The Lorehounds Play podcast. This time, for Indiana Jones and the Great Circle. Before we get started, quick reminder that you can send feedback to LHP at thelorehounds.com or leave us a voicemail at thelorehounds.com slash contact, and we'll get to those questions in the next episode.

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[00:01:59] So, Brandon, we have a rating system for this now, and I want to introduce it again, because we do these podcasts so infrequently that I want to remind people. We do a green light for, we would recommend this game to anyone who likes video games. We do a yellow light for if you're really into this kind of game or this IP, try it, but maybe not for everyone, and then we have a red light for this game is bad. Don't play it.

[00:02:30] So, we're going to do a spoiler-free review and rating before we take a break, and then we're going to take a break, and we're going to go into spoilers. So, first of all, how are you? How's the gaming? How's everything? It's been a while since we've done one of these? Yeah, it has. I've been doing pretty good. A lot of work and a lot of not gaming, unfortunately, but the gaming I have been doing is pretty great.

[00:02:58] Not to spoil our coverage here, but Indiana Jones is a pretty fun game. And, of course, on my main Destiny grind, doing a lot of solo Destiny, which isn't as fun as group content Destiny. And then I just check the Fortnite store every day to see if there's pretty skins that I need to buy or dances. That's kind of all I've been doing. It's not a bad life, you know? No, it's just collecting action figures in Fortnite. It's pretty awesome.

[00:03:25] What about you? How have you been? I've not been gaming much at all. I got a little bit into gaming over the holiday break that I took from work. I took like a week and a half off of work with the kids. And I played Indiana Jones. I played a lot of Call of Duty with my high school buds. Like people I've been playing Call of Duty with since we were like 15. And that was a lot of fun. That was a lot of fun. We were yelling.

[00:03:56] We were yelling not inappropriate things. I was going to say, you used some slurs? You need to behave. No slurs. You need to behave. You need to behave. Especially now, I think they're enforcing it now, which is good. They should have always been enforcing it. But Activision, I think, is doing a better job now. But yeah, that and I started Yakuza Like a Dragon again. And I always get up to the second part. And then I give up because I'm tired. And it's like a 100-hour game.

[00:04:26] Yeah, that series has been one that I've always been pretty curious about. But I haven't dove in yet. I definitely will at some point. It's on the list of when Brandon has time to play new games, this is one of them that I will be playing. Well, when we're retired, we're going to go nuts on all these games. Oh my god. And our motor skills won't work anymore. But we're going to try. That's right. We could just do Lorehounds runs of those games.

[00:04:55] When you say Lorehounds run, this was a joke that became, we need to finish this game quickly so we can talk about the story. So we turn on easy mode for everything. And then we go through it. Did you do a Lorehounds run on this game? I did. And I actually have some stuff to say about that. I think that does a disservice to this game. Yeah. Specifically. But we can get into that when we get into it, I guess. Yeah.

[00:05:23] Let's give our spoiler-free rating and review here. So what would you tell people about this game? 10,000 Feet. This is a beautiful game visually. It is as close to being Indiana Jones as you could imagine from a game.

[00:05:51] And if I were to recommend this, or if I'm going to give my red light green light here, it is mostly a green light with an extra, extra bright green light if you're a big fan of Indiana Jones. Because, man, is it so Indiana Jones. Like, it is, like... It's better than movies about Indiana Jones have been for 40 years. Or whatever. It's true. It's true.

[00:06:19] The first three Indiana Jones movies are great. After that, really falls off. They try to bring them back a couple times and you're like, man, Harrison Ford is not doing it like he used to. And they keep trying to pass the torch and nobody's really capturing it. But they keep insisting that we're going to pass the torch to somebody else. And you just can't because Harrison Ford is just... His face. And just his mannerisms. And you just can't... You can't replace it. He's a one-of-a-kind man. It's true.

[00:06:48] And here they do use his face for this entire game. Which I think is important. It's his whole face. And Troy Baker does such a good, understated Harrison Ford. It's great. Yeah. I think I heard of Harrison Ford doing commentary on it. Like, you don't need AI to do this. Look at the art Troy Baker did by capturing my essence. You don't need a robot. You can just get Troy Baker. Right. Which, you know... It's funny because I don't know if you went at all into the production of this.

[00:07:17] But they did a lot of auditions for this. Because obviously they want to nail the indie voice. And they auditioned Troy Baker. And all the people who were on the machine games developer side said, We want Troy Baker. Troy Baker is nailing this. We want him to do it. And Todd Howard was like, Under no circumstances can it be Troy Baker. I'm not into him. I don't think this is a good idea. He's a fad. You know, this whole thing. I don't know if he said fad. But he was not into it.

[00:07:46] And then he heard the audition and said, All right. And he goes up to him and he goes, We're putting a lot of faith in you. And Troy Baker is like, But apparently after the first day, Todd Howard went up to him and was like, We made the right call. It's... Todd Howard, be nicer to people. Be nicer to people, Todd Howard. What a weirdo. But anyway. I couldn't imagine anyone doing a better job. Sort of like...

[00:08:16] Because he... He... It's... A, he nails the impression. And B, it's still acting. Like, he's not just, like, you know, Copying the way that Harrison Ford sounds. Like, everything is there. Like, he's such a good actor. He kind of acts in costume, right? Exactly. It's like a vocal costume. Yeah. And he's Joel, right? He is Joel in the last of those games. Like, an insanely different voice. Like, mannerisms, everything. Like, he's just... He's...

[00:08:44] He's an incredible voice actor that was kind of off of my radar, honestly, until I've been Lorehounds Gaming, where I've played these two games I might not have played. But, yeah. Like, he's great. No complaints. If I see Troy Baker in the future, I'm like, Cool. This guy... We're in good hands. Right. And I am going to be making you play The Last of Us Part 2 next so that we can talk about it around the time The Last of Us Season 2 comes out. Very excited about it. I've been...

[00:09:13] It's been installed on my M.2 drive on my PlayStation this whole time. And I've just been ready to play it. Very nice. So, very excited. It's a great game. It's very sad. But we're not talking about sad games today. We're talking action. We're here for action. And I, too, I'm giving this a green light. And I think I would say the same thing as you. Like, if you want Indiana Jones, this is essentially an Indiana Jones movie. Yeah, a very long one. This is just... You turn this down to easy and you are playing an interactive movie for Indiana Jones.

[00:09:43] For me, I'm going to say I lowered the difficulty of the combat to easy. But I kept the difficulty of the puzzles on normal. Because you can do that differently in this game, which I think is great. More accessibility features are better. I was playing the story and I was like, I just want to be a badass Indiana Jones. I don't want to be struggling through these battles the whole time. I have some things to say about certain late game battles.

[00:10:12] But other than that, I think that this game really sings. And the reason I think it sings is because you have this really delicate, intricate balance of gameplay and cut scenes. You are constantly going from I'm picking up this item and I pick up the item and all of a sudden I'm in a cut scene where Trey Baker as Indiana Jones is explaining this historical artifact to his companion. And we are in an Indiana Jones movie. And this is a game where a lot of people were concerned

[00:10:42] when it was announced that it was going to be first person. They said, you know, if you're doing this movie based on an iconic character, how am I not? If you're doing a game rather based on an iconic character, how is it that I'm not going to see the character most of the time? Yeah. And honestly, I think it was perfect this way. I feel like I'm being Indy in a way that I don't think I would if I were third person. Yeah, they do. It is for the job of switching between first person and third person for the cut scenes

[00:11:11] works surprisingly well. Like you'd think it would be a little jarring to jump from being inside of Indy's head to, you know, on the outside. But no, it meshes perfectly. And in those moments where you're, you know, you're putting the hat on and you're seeing it in first person or you're putting your dukes up or whatever, you really feel like Indy. Like I think they, they nailed the way that that feels. Uh, and I, I think a third person game would have been fine if you wanted to do

[00:11:40] more of a God of War route where like, it's a, like a one or shot the whole time, uh, that seamlessly flows between, um, you know, cut scenes and action. But I, I really, I'm with you where I like the way that this worked because it does just feel like you're playing like a very competent game and then boom, you're clicking into a movie that still feels interactive. Right. And I think it would be a pain in the ass to do the puzzles in third person, to be honest with you. Because you were trying to closely,

[00:12:09] you're trying to closely examine things and, and I just don't think it works as well if it's third person. Also, I think I, I just appreciate the scenery more when it's a first person game. I do too, for sure. We got into this, and I do blame PlayStation for this. We got into this idea of like every cinematic movie has to be like a third person action adventure. And I, I don't think that's true. And I think this game, machines game, machine games really proved that this can be a more versatile genre than that. And I appreciate that.

[00:12:39] And I think it works too because of how, um, and I'm, this is going to sound bad, how slow the game is. I think it works really well in first person. Um, because like you're doing things like reading a journal or, you know, you're flipping things over, you're looking at stuff in your hands, you're, you know, it's, it's, it's delicate and intricate. Some of the things you're doing, which I think works really well in first person. You're looking around at walls for different things you can whip or whatever. Um, and I, I think that works really well in those moments.

[00:13:09] And then whenever it wants to do fun, uh, you know, cut scenes and stuff, it kicks out and then you can see Harrison Ford's glorious face. Uh, it's great. Yeah. Can I ask you, what's your background on Indiana Jones in general? Um, I've never been like super Egypt guy or whatever. You know, like, um, so Indiana Jones never quite appealed to me in a big way, but I have always just enjoyed catching the movie. Like Indiana Jones for

[00:13:38] me was very much a, it's on TNT or whatever back when I was a kid. Um, yeah, it was never like appointment movie for me, but if it was on, I would definitely watch it. Um, if I, if I, my Harrison Ford is, is Han Solo, obviously, but, um, you know, a lot of people's Harrison Ford is Indy, um, but not as much for me. What about you? I was shown them by my grandpa when I was a kid. I was not super into them, but I liked them.

[00:14:07] And then back a few years ago, I was doing my, my previous career was audio engineering, mostly live sound. and I, I was hired to screen outdoors, the temple of doom. And I watched it on the lawn while I'm, while I'm doing sound for it. It's, you know, it's easy to do sound for a movie. Once you get it set, you're done. So you sit there and I'm like, damn, this holds up. This is a great movie. Uh, and so that kind of got me hype on Indiana Jones for a while, but I'm not, again, like I'm like you,

[00:14:36] I'm not a super fan. I just really enjoy it when it's on. Yeah. And, and, but when I heard about this game, I was like, that sounds like it could be really good or really bad. And luckily it was really good. And I'm just excited. We're here. We're back. We're back in the era of licensed games, except it's good this time. Oh my God. Yeah. Like it's incredible because this could have been such an easy cash grab or whatever, aside from it just being on game pass and almost no one is buying it like that.

[00:15:05] They're playing it through game pass, but yeah, like they could have phoned it in and they super didn't. Yeah. And, and also with the recent track record of Bethesda, they are just not hidden lately. They, they have had some real duds the last few years. I mean, Redfall was horrendous. I'm just going to say it. It was not a good game. Uh, Deathloop was good. Deathloop was a legitimately good game. I played a lot of that. Uh, but Ghostwire Tokyo poorly reviewed. Um,

[00:15:36] Starfield got middling reviews. I think, I think they really needed a big win and this was one. This was one. I know people still want the Wolfenstein series back, which is what machine games is mostly known for. They really, the only common thing between their games is like killing Nazis. Yeah. It's like the only thing that is the, the common denominator between these games, but I, I bread and butter is destroying fascism with your hands. I never played the Wolfenstein games and I don't know if you did. No, I didn't. Um,

[00:16:06] it's another one that I always wanted to get to, but I mean like it's kind of the world war two thing where, um, I don't know if you've heard my coverage of master of the air, but I'm sort of like a half half and half with the world war two where I'm like, uh, this is okay. But it's, it's never been where I want, where I want to hang out, uh, in world. I getcha. I getcha. It gets, it gets a little overplayed. It does. But, uh, yeah, so I've never played those. I've been meaning to go back to them because I,

[00:16:35] after this, I'm like, man, this studio is great. I gotta, I gotta go check out at least the better reviewed one for the Wolfenstein. Uh, but yeah, I, I would say definitely recommend this game. I don't have much else to say for it. Spoiler free. So why don't we move on? Okay. All right. We'll be right back. And when we get back, we'll get into full spoilers

[00:17:06] and we're back. So Brandon, we've got full spoilers now. Can we talk a little bit about, about the gameplay and the different biomes? Yes. Um, first thing, uh, because it's a vibe that covers the entirety of the game. Your boy Gordy Hobb is back doing pit, like pitch perfect John Williams score. Um, we talked about him last time on the, um, Star Wars game. Uh, Oh, it's the same guy. Same guy. If, if you have to,

[00:17:35] if you have to do John Williams sounds, then you call Gordy Hobb because he crushes it every time. Like the way he weaves Indy's theme perfectly. And like you, you know, when you're talking about Marion in the beginning of the game, like he'll, he'll, he'll fold her theme in and all the themes and stuff he came up with this one were great. Like, um, yeah, Gordy Hobb undisputed champion of making John Williams ask soundtracks. Um, but yes, uh, what,

[00:18:05] what was your favorite of the biomes that we had here? Um, Hmm. I'm going to say, I'm honestly going to say Vatican city because I am just, I am a sucker for like Catholic lore, you know? Yeah. Yeah. That's why I was so excited about like the Nephilim and that whenever, like I was like, wow, they're, they're wrapping it. I mean, obviously in the movies, you know, you're, you get the spooky religious iconography and stuff,

[00:18:34] but I don't, I don't know why I was so shocked that I think maybe because I've been like specifically like listening to podcasts that are, uh, about stuff like that and, and Noah's Ark. I've, I've recently listened to like a long, uh, series about this Noah's Ark park in Kentucky. Um, so yeah, uh, yeah. So it was just like a bunch of stuff that hit me all at once. Like, wow, this is all converging in a really interesting great circle.

[00:19:05] Um, but yeah, the Vatican was great. Um, Giza was really cool. Like I said, I'm not super Egypt boy, uh, by Egypt. I just, you know, me either, you know, that the tomb rating in that way, specifically with the pyramids and all that. I've never been super into that. and you know, um, but it was like anytime you just got Nazis or, you know, the black shirts walking around and you can just kick the shit out of them. It is kind of, kind of rad. It's, it's, it's, it is rad. It's nice to beat up

[00:19:35] the Nazis. I gotta say. Yeah. Yeah. It's really fun and you can just pick anything up and, and kick the shit out of Nazis. And it's a lot of like, it's great. Right. Like it was the last war where there was like a clear bad guy and you don't have to feel badly about like, what if he has a family at home? It's like, okay, he's a Nazi though. Exactly. Yeah. Like it's a, it's, it's, it's why there's so many Nazis and zombies in video games is because, oh, these are fine to destroy with my bare hands. Right. Um,

[00:20:05] before we go into more detail on the biomes, cause I guess we could talk about those while we talk about the plot. Um, the, we talked about the cinematics and whatnot, the breakable weapons. Are you a breakable weapon? Guy. I, I have very mixed feelings on them. I think if this game didn't have so many weapons laying around everywhere, the breakable weapons would have been more of a problem, but I mean, you can pick up a, you know,

[00:20:35] anything and kick the shit out of somebody with it. So like I, it really wasn't bad and, um, I think partially doing easy combat made it a lot, uh, a lot less of an issue because you just break something. You, you fight this stupid AI and then you just go find something else and continue ass kicking. I was very bad at stealth. I was very bad at stealth for this game. so most of my fights went like,

[00:21:04] like I was BJ Blazkowicz and Wolfenstein. Oh, really? Just destroying everyone. Yeah, I was stealthed everywhere. I was stealthed everywhere. I loved, you know what it was my favorite thing to do is I would pick up a long gun and then immediately put it into melee mode. Yeah. just go behind every Nazi and just, I barely ever fired a gun. It was always my intention. it was always a problem. Yeah. It was always my intention to go stealth and then I would just get caught and then, oh,

[00:21:34] I guess I'm kicking everyone's ass in this whole room. Um, almost every time that's the way it went down. But very few like successful stealth attempts for me. It's, that's why, um, I think this game I was perhaps for me personally hurt a little bit by the Lorehounds run. Um, I think one day, uh, in that mythical, you know, period of time where I have time to play video games. I think this is going to be a game that

[00:22:04] ages very well because visually it's going to look better. It's going to look even better. It's going to scale on systems in the future, uh, and, and look gorgeous. But also if you kick everything up difficulty wise, um, I think that it would be a lot better personally. Uh, it, it would feel more rewarding. There is something to be said about the power fantasy of just like, you know, who gives a shit going there, guns a blazing, swinging fists, um, and, you know,

[00:22:33] getting a little bit more help for the puzzles and whatnot. But I think it would be, it would have, uh, a 25 hour, uh, you know, play through with some work. I think, I think this game is good enough to where that would probably be a better experience. Sorry to, to cut off onto that little diversion. Um, but yeah, I think, I think that's right though. I mean, I, I did enjoy, I, I think because I did take more time, I didn't feel that way as much

[00:23:03] because I did play this over a break. I, I don't know my exact hour count, but at least for the first few biomes, I did take my time. It was really when I got to Sukutai that I started to be like, all right, wrap the plot up. So then I started like, uh, you know, rushing through things a little bit more, but mostly I was just, I mean, part of it was I, I played it before you, so I had more time to do this. Right. but though I did give you fair warning in, in, in fairness. And, uh,

[00:23:32] so I, I did give it time. I did do a lot of exploration. I didn't really do any side quests because they didn't really interest me. I didn't really feel the need to only did some side quests. Uh, you know, I did one or two. Yeah. I followed a couple of rabbit trails because I was interested in the moment, but, um, uh, I, I have also heard good reporting on the side quests in that they're all in some way kind of tied into the main story. So they're, they're apparently worth doing.

[00:24:02] So that's why I'm saying like in the future, whenever I, uh, come back to this game, I think there's going to be so much more there to dig into. Um, yeah, I am excited for, perhaps 40 year old Brandon to get to that in a couple of years. Fair enough. Uh, let's, let's do the main plot synopsis here for the first part. After dreaming about the plot of Raiders of the Lost Ark, Lost Ark, the Lost Ark, Indiana Jones wakes up to find a giant man stealing an artifact

[00:24:32] from the college. He follows the clues to Vatican City where he impersonates a priest and meets his new companion, Gina, who is looking for her sister. They solve puzzles in the Vatican and discover the church's store of artifacts guarded by the Nephilim Order of Giants. Nazi archaeologist Voss arrives, takes several pieces of the Great Circle, and flees with Indiana and Gina catching a ride. Yes.

[00:25:02] Two things. Um, I was really surprised to see the late great Tony Todd, uh, as, um, oh no, what's his name? Locus. Uh, it is Tony Todd. He is in this. Yeah. I didn't realize that was, that was, uh, Tony Todd. Oh, yeah. Uh, I think it's his last role as well. It is. Yeah. I'm looking at his Wikipedia now. Yeah. Like I was like shocked to see his face like, oh shit, it's Candyman. Uh, so I was just, uh,

[00:25:32] and him as a giant was pretty wild as well. Um, that, and I'll say a controversial thing to say, but what an incredible Nazi that boss is. Uh, yeah. What a, what a, what a great character. Um, you know, I, I hadn't watched the Indiana Jones films in a while, so I'm like, is this guy from the movies? He perfectly nails, he's not, he perfectly nails the vibe of like a cartoon villain. Uh, a cartoon in the, uh,

[00:26:02] you know, Indiana Jones is a giant cartoon sense. Um, but yeah, like he, he was incredible and yeah, they, they obviously have like a shared history because they're always, um, going back and forth and they know each other. So you, it would make sense that they would be in, um, in, uh, like you, you'd have thought that he was in, a previous movie or something. Yeah, exactly. So I'm, I'm like, is there a history here? Did I miss something? And I went back and I watched Raiders of the Lost Ark after this and he's not

[00:26:32] in it at all, but you do, I, I do love that they recreated the intro for the very beginning. Yeah, that was really cool. And it took me a minute to realize what was happening until I, I think I saw Alfred Molina and I was like, oh shit, this is literally just the beginning. People complained about his design too. Why? They were like, he doesn't look like Alfred Molina. I was like, he doesn't look like him now, but it looks like him then. Yeah. Like if you, if you compare it A to B, it's pretty

[00:27:01] on the nose. Like, yeah, I thought that was a really cool way to introduce the game. to do a tutorial, you get to use the whip for the first time. Yeah, it's good stuff. It's good stuff. Did you like using the whip? Did that make you feel like Indiana Jones? Because it made me feel like Indiana Jones. I, yes, I thought the whip was pretty cool. It is also very slow. It feels like as far as like a device, like a, you know, a video game device to get you from A to B,

[00:27:31] like a hook shot or something. It is maybe the slowest version of a thing for this. And I think it works because it's indie. I love how creaky and like, like he's always grunting and whining trying to climb things because it's hard to do. But then you're also like, but I'm using a freaking whip to climb a wall and that's awesome. It is rad. Yes. And the whip is also fun to use in combat too. Yeah, I think the whip is an excellent, obviously you need

[00:28:01] the whip with indie. And that whip crack sound is so good. I've been listening to a lot of like drag grace music though. So that whip crack sound, it always gets me. Fair enough. I was actually, I didn't get your opinion on the breakable weapons. Did you have anything more to say about that? I don't think so. I get too far away. I was a little bit frustrated for a minute because I couldn't repair my pistol, my revolver, but then I found like seven more repair kits and I never had a shortage again. Yeah.

[00:28:31] Yeah, I think, I don't know if that changes on the difficulty of the game, but I was never short on like food or repair kits or anything like that. Yeah. Yeah. There was zero scarcity in this game. I was always at full health with my fortified food and stuff like that. So like everything, I was always fine. So if you listen or play it on hard, you let us know if there's suddenly no food around starving. What do you think of Gina, his companion? You need a beautiful companion every Indiana Jones movie, right?

[00:29:01] There was no exception to that rule. Gorgeous, very fun. Strambo. I like being called Strambo by her. That was fun. Let's do it for you. Yeah. Yeah. I like it. Anytime, like, you know, that's, that's kind of like a way to call just someone weirdo, which I think works pretty well for Indy. But yeah, I found her very charming. it's, you know, chasing the sister down.

[00:29:30] Her plot just, it felt very, very simple. But I think she does really well for service for the story and she's great with him. Like they've just got so much good chemistry. I like that she bullies him and he's just kind of trying to be nice. It's good. Yep. Yep. But that's also Indy's thing too. Like he, he also is like kind of curmudgeonly when you first meet him and you have to work your way into him. And, and Troy Baker

[00:30:00] nails it, right? Like he starts off really reserved with her and then he's making jokes with her by the end and he cares about her. It's, it's great. I mean, you got to remember the first Indiana Jones movie where he literally just like leaves his companion tied up because he's like, this is inconvenient to my plan. So he, he can be a little cold too. Yes, it is Harrison Ford. Yep. Well, everyone arrives in Giza where Indiana finds the idol of Ra before losing it to Vos. Gina rescues

[00:30:30] Indiana and the two travel to the Himalayas where they climb to a Nazi ship on top of a mountain. There they find Gina's sister Laura frozen to death. They discover that Laura used one of the pieces of the Great Circle and spoke a damic, accidentally teleporting them to the mountain. Indiana uses the stone to transport them to wartime Shanghai where they escape on a plane and fly to Sukathai. There, they recover another stone, but Gina and the stones are taken by Vos.

[00:31:01] I went through a lot there because we're kind of just, I mean, you're in the Vatican for a while and it feels like you're in Giza for a while, but everywhere else, kind of, you just fly right through. Yeah, it's just globetrotting at this point. You're just moving throughout the world at a pretty fast clip, especially from, yeah, like, in the Vatican and then in Giza, you feel kind of like based and then from there you're just like zooming throughout the whole world. Yeah. Sometimes literally on a plane, but,

[00:31:30] I do love when you get the plane and they go on the map and you have the dotted line and you're like, oh shit, we're doing the thing. Yeah. the thing. Yeah. That's what I mean. Like, they really captured the vibe of the movies here. Yeah. Yeah, the first time, I think the first time I remember them doing that was on the blimp when you're on the way to Giza, they kind of do that thing too, where it's the shot of the map and the red dotted line

[00:32:00] of where you're going. Yeah, that was really cool. I found the scene with Gina's sister, Laura, I found that pretty affecting. I like the way that Indy handled that with her. Yeah. probably one of the more affecting emotional beats of the game, I think. Yeah. It was a good, I kind of foresaw it, the whole, like, she actually was voluntarily

[00:32:30] working with the Nazis, but it was a good twist because you felt for the character anyway. And you see how a character who was so vehemently opposed to the Nazis was so hurt that her sister was like, anything for my science. For sure. Yeah, and I mean, you know, it did a good job of humanizing Gina a little bit because she kind of was just sort of a trope, a walking trope of a hard-hitting reporter or

[00:32:59] whatever on a special mission to find my sister. We talked about she's a very legitimate nun. That's right. That's right. I forgot. But yeah, very fun, very fun. Adamic, Adam, I thought that was cool. They're being like, this is when you start to get into some of the religious iconography and stuff in a fun

[00:33:28] way where they're tying together all the flood myths. Or is that, I guess that's closer to the ziggurat next. Right now we have this great circle. You have all these Adamic words that can do different things. We don't ever get an answer to what everything does, but we certainly get the answer to the teleporting one. That one just nopes you right out. Yeah. Yeah. And I like that

[00:33:57] it feels natural. It feels like a natural progression where he's figuring it out at some point and then he gets more confident with it later. The puzzles all feel like they're revealing something. You could learn more about things by picking up papers and reading all about different artifacts and how they were significant. I did read a lot of them. I didn't read all of them, but you can learn a lot just by picking things up. Yeah, and I think the camera mechanic

[00:34:27] was really well done in this game in that way. You take pictures of things and then Indy himself will expound upon stuff and sprinkle lore in. I thought that was really well done. Anytime you're like... It'll do the flash up for the camera so you can take a picture and then Indy will talk about it. Also, the way the camera does the hints, too. Which is very cool. You take one picture, it gives you a simple hint. You take another picture, it gives

[00:34:57] you a more specific hint, and it keeps getting more specific until it's giving you all the hints out. Figure the fucking thing out already. Yeah. I think I only had to Google one specific puzzle, and it was back in the Vatican, and it was just because I didn't see the thing that was sitting over this weird lump. Most of the puzzles I was pretty able to figure out without too much trouble. Yeah, I hear you.

[00:35:27] They were mostly very doable. I don't remember. I may have looked up one, but you're right. They were all pretty much figure outable. I think the coolest one was the one with all the blood at the stages of the crucifixion. That, to me, was the coolest one. Yeah, more of that Christian iconography. You got me with it. You just got me with it. Yeah, it sucks, but I'll watch The Da Vinci Code once in a while. Yeah, hell yeah.

[00:35:58] It's fun. It's fun stuff. You know, the new Pope, the young Pope, very good shows, all that kind of stuff. I just was gonna watch Conclave this week. I'm gonna finally watch that. So we got plenty of nice Catholic lore around. The lore, the lore of Catholicism is just pretty rad. I'm into the lore. Yeah. I'm here for the lore. You are, you are a lore hound. That is the name of this podcast.

[00:36:28] What else do we have here? Did you have, out of these three, did any of these other ones interest you? The Sukatai one, they had that cool water puzzle that you had to sort of get the water to move from one side to the other. I think that they did a good job with all of these puzzles feeling different as well. I think that back in the Vatican, I think the lava puzzle was probably the coolest. That's pretty cool, yeah. Yeah, where you're, and you got the shield

[00:36:58] and whatnot, but yeah, none of the puzzles in this specific one, except for the water puzzle, are in the blood, are screaming out to me. the plane was really cool. Yeah. And the, you know, the shooting, you could shoot the tail off of your plane, by the way, whoops. Oh, don't do that. Did you enjoy the snake battle? The giant basilisk, basically? Yeah, all the snake

[00:37:27] shit was really fun in this. I think they did it, they did just enough to where it wasn't like, you know, like a, too cute. They didn't get too cute with the snakes. I don't know. I did get real spooked when I saw like all the snake skins on the walls. Yeah. I mean, the design was fantastic. Amazing. it was. Yeah, like Indy has his history of not, basically the only thing he's afraid

[00:37:57] of is snakes. So like, I love, I love that they, they use that. And apparently like in the beginning level, the tutorial, if you go through the waterfall, there's a little snake cameo where it freaks out about one tiny little snake. But yeah, him and I can't remember the lady's name, but she loved snakes. And like the part where like she's doing some exposition with Gina and Indy has to feed the snake.

[00:38:27] Yeah, yeah, yeah. That was done really That was good too. That was good too. Did you enjoy his student who was like leading you through that and yeah, working with the Nazis and she was terrible in the end? Yeah, that was pretty cool. And she was just so salty that he didn't remember her. I thought, I thought she was fun. He got so many students and also like you picked one of the hardest fields to get into and you're so mad that you're not getting into it. Yeah, but I thought that was

[00:38:57] pretty well done. Her just kicking it, her doing the scar and Mufasa kicking him into the temple or whatever. Yep. Very cool. She, yeah, I wouldn't have minded more of her as well. Yeah. Yeah. All the side characters were really well done in this, I thought. Yeah, and they all felt really authentically indie too. Although I didn't really care about the blonde Nazi guy. He was kind of a nobody. It's hard though when

[00:39:27] you put him next to Voss because Voss is so good. Right. You're just like, let me just fight Voss. Yeah, the blonde guy's only thing is that he was just like super extra, you know, in love with Hitler. That's kind of his whole thing. That's his whole thing. It's quite a thing to be. Yeah, it's striking, but not quite as striking as Voss, who is wonderful. I love his karate. Oh, well, let's get to the karate. Let's get to the karate, Brandon. Yeah. Indiana teams up with Locus,

[00:39:57] one of the Nephilim, to attack the Nazi camp at the Ziggurat of Ur. After rescuing Gina, they find Noah's Ark, which was the original home of the Great Circle. Voss activates the Great Circle and it turns on him. Well, the world floods around them. Indiana beats Voss, and Locus stops the destruction by teleporting the Ark away. Gina and Indiana part ways. And this is where I have to sing the Dayman song from Always Sunny. He's a master of karate and friendship for everyone.

[00:40:28] Yeah. Um, man, Voss pulling out that he's a master of the Japanese art of karate was so good. Um, so goofy. Um, yeah, in a, in a just purely awesome way. Um, and I like how, like, he was almost, uh, he was doing, like, flying, like, scorpion kicks and shit whenever you're fighting him. Like, I, I don't know. I,

[00:40:58] I, I loved all of that. And he, he almost had, like, the same, uh, fighting mechanics as the giants did. Because all the giants kind of fought the same. It was like, like, the God of War ogres. Yeah. Where it's like, oh, this is the same fight with a different skin on it. Um, and it was kind of the same with Voss, but he was, um, you know, doing karate. Uh, well, I had to cheese this and then I found out that if you

[00:41:28] just run away from him, he will whip you back and it does no damage to you. Oh, so I would just get three hits in, run away, have him whip me back, get three hits in, run away, repeat. There you go. Well, that works. I choose it. I was very salty that he had the whip, but, um, it was cool. It was cool that he did. Um, Locus, um, you know, teaming up with you was kind of, it was a big moment. I thought that was pretty rad.

[00:41:58] and, um, all of this Noah's Ark shit was really cool to me. Um, how, like, they tied in all of the world's flood myths being the same thing. Um, being basically the same story or different facets of the same story. I thought that was really neat. Um, yeah, and the idea that he had to use the stones to go gather up all the animals. Yeah. The whole thing. That was cool. That was cool. It really, like, and it's simple, you know, there's,

[00:42:28] it's not too crazy of an idea. It's Noah's Ark is a thing that everyone knows about. Uh, even if you didn't grow up religious, it's like such a fundamental story. Just add some teleportation and you're done. Yeah, straight up and a crazy laser and a giant. Um, but yeah, I, I loved all that. The, the, the way that the, the flood started was really cool and a little chilling where like it, it looked like nothing happened at first and then, you know, you just get the little droplets of rain and

[00:42:58] then all hell breaks loose and it's flooding. Right. Um, I thought the Ark actually looked really cool. Uh, and on, on looks, uh, this game does such a good job of just making all of the biomes and all of the, um, like skyboxes and stuff just look so cool. There's one, one specific part back in the Vatican where you're, uh, climbing on the roofs and stuff and it's nighttime and you're looking out over the city and it's incredible. Um, and sort of the

[00:43:28] same thing towards the end here, uh, with the Ark. I think this game is going to be, I, I kind of newer hardware and this is going to be a game that looks great and looks better and better the, the farther out we get kind of, I think, um, don't worry, we'll buy it more. We'll buy it five more times. We'll get it on our smart fridges. Todd Howard will see to it. Exactly. Uh, but with the, the, the excellent like facial

[00:43:57] capture and music and visuals, I think this is going to be one that, that we're really gonna, it's, it's a, it's a great addition to your library. Um, but yeah, the, the visuals were great here, um, with the flood and the, the fight, uh, fight was fun. Um, I thought it was horse shit. I hated it. I hated the fight. I just have to say it. I love this game. I hate the fight. And I, I thought it was completely underwhelming to have the final battle

[00:44:27] of this, like insane story with like super powered rocks be literally just fist fighting an old man. Just a fist fight. Yeah. Uh, did you do any of the underground like fighting pits? No. Okay. I did a bunch of those. So maybe that I was poised a little better to do the, uh, to, to do the, the fight. Uh, it was a hard fight. I think I had to start it over a couple of times, but I think it took me like two hours to like finally like I, I was so

[00:44:57] bad. I ended up looking up on Reddit, how to cheese it and they were like, oh, just run away. Yeah. God damn it. I hate this stupid fight. Yeah. Yeah. I, they, they definitely could have done something, um, a little bigger with that. like incorporate the stones in some way, you know? Yeah. You could be boss up and maybe like turn him into like a big monster or something that you got to fight. I mean, that's such a video game thing though. Or just like

[00:45:27] teleport us to like in the middle of the sky and then we're like punching each other in the sky and make it a quick time event and then teleport us back to the arc and you know what I mean? Like, yeah, do something like that. Just not, not like standing on the deck and just like, oh man, fight. Yeah. Or the, the, the whip where you're both sort of hanging over like a gang plank and kicking each other. Yeah. Uh, yeah, that was, that was a little silly. Um, but over, look, overall great game. I just, I, I'm going to

[00:45:57] complain about the last fight. For sure. Yeah, I came here to complain about it. Um, did you get the secret ending? Cause I didn't. I didn't either. I, but I did Google it. Yeah. So there's a secret ending apparently from Wikipedia, Indiana discovers a hidden mural showing more locations of the great circle pointing at the South Pole and, uh, there's footprints. So probably Locus survived. Yeah. Which is great. I like Locus a lot.

[00:46:26] He deserved it. Yeah. Yeah. He just, he just wanted to take care of his shit and he didn't want to be bothered. Poor guy. Like I got my job. I'm doing it. Yeah. And Tony Todd did such a good job, especially there at the end whenever like he's really super not wanting this flood to happen and he's just sort of like warning everyone quietly. Um, just such a good job of acting there. Um, uh, I've just the, the horror of it all of knowing what was going to

[00:46:56] happen, especially knowing that he's, he's going to have to grab this, this fucking mast and, uh, or the, what do you call the, the, the steering wheel on a boat? There's no way of knowing, you know, that you're right. But yeah, it looked like it was really painful for him to have to use that. So yeah. And that, uh, I think Voss did have a pretty cool death with that laser beam. That would be the helm. Helm mast is what I said. And that was very wrong. Mast is where the sail goes.

[00:47:26] And we met playing sea of thieves. So you should honestly though, that was the best time I ever had playing sea of thieves was we were all just like getting fake drunk and, with, with the grog and, and playing throwing up maybe we should do a sea of thieves podcast one day. That'd be cool. I wouldn't mind, especially since there's so much more to the game now. Yeah. I haven't played it mostly since then. Oh, I haven't played it either, but I've just,

[00:47:55] you know, had my ear to the ground a little bit and there's, uh, there's a couple of people I know that, that are very into the game. So, which is, is happening a lot with games. Yeah. It used to be like you wanted to play a game right away, but man, wait, if there's a game that you want, wait, because it's just going to get better with time. I know, especially like I was eyeing Civ 7. I like Civ 6 a lot. Yeah. And the Civ 7 reviews are like, just don't buy it right now. Like, it's just broken in a lot of

[00:48:25] ways. Yeah. I'm like, all right, well, then I'll just wait till it's on sale and then it'll probably be better by then anyway. Absolutely. It definitely will be. That's what Baldur's Gate 3 is one that I desperately have been wanting to play because it's just everything about it is just straight up for me. But, you know, the longer I wait, apparently the better it's going to be because they even just now released a patch for it. Yep. So, yeah. Yeah. I've tried playing it several times. I played like 20 hours of it, but I just

[00:48:55] every time I try to play it, I'd need a brain off game at night if I'm going to play something. Yeah. And it's just such a brain on game. Yeah, very much so. So, I think we should do that one eventually, but that is like a long-term project. Yeah, because I'm going to devote like 80 hours to that game at the very least. Yep. And also the combat is so slow because it's D&D combat. So, yeah. Well, I had fun tonight, Brandon. Did you have fun? I did.

[00:49:24] I am excited to play this game in the future. I had fun playing it in the present. Well, in the past now. But, yeah, what a cool little game that caught me completely off guard. I did not expect it to be as cool as it was. Agreed. Agreed. Well, I expected it to be pretty good because it's, you know, Bethesda at least is always pretty good, but it was great. It was a great game and that surprised me. Oh, I did see that they're working on DLC for it.

[00:49:54] Oh, are they? Yes, which surprised me. So, maybe we might actually find some more going on with Locus. Maybe we'll get the great square. Yeah, the great rectangle. I would like that. Very good. Any other closing thoughts on the game? I don't think so. Indy's hat is sentient. I know, I know. It's so silly.

[00:50:24] One thing on the Skill Up review, a very fun, good reviewer that I know, he pointed out how the lighting in this game is and going along with the crazy good visuals, none of the lighting is realistic, but it is all so beautiful and cinematic, especially like, the sunset scenes and whatnot. I love that they

[00:50:53] stuck with keeping everything cinematic as opposed to drowning in reality. I agree with that. I play video games to have fun and not to see more of real life. Yeah, we definitely have. Yeah, that's pretty much all I got. Play this game. Greenlight. Yeah, green light all the way. Get on your plane and fly it from Shanghai to Sukutai and have a great time. Yeah,

[00:51:23] big win for Xbox, by the way, who needs a win right now. I don't know if you know this, but my Xbox is right here in my hand, my phone. Because everything's an Xbox now. Everything's an Xbox. We didn't really get into the gaming news because it's been so long that it's hard to signal a piece of news. I'm also like, there are so many other podcasts that do gaming news all the time and I was like, is it really worth it for us to say some bullshit about something happening this week?

[00:51:53] Nah, not about this week, but maybe big things. One of the big things being the Xbox is pretty much pivoting completely to being more of a platform now rather than a box in your house. Did something new happen like this week? No. Other than the last few months, you mean? Pretty much just the last few months that and this being like one of the only Xbox wins in a minute that I can think of big win

[00:52:23] with Indie for Xbox. Of course, you're going to be able to play Indie on your PlayStation sometime soon. Oh, how did it? Did you play it on your PC at all? Not at all. I only played it on Xbox. How about you? I played a little bit on PC. My PC is actually showing some age on it now, unfortunately, because obviously it's really well optimized for Xbox. It worked great on the Series X and Series S. And after some tweaking, finally,

[00:52:53] I got it to work pretty good on my PC. But yeah. I'm at the point where I'm probably going to, you know, when I do, which probably won't be for a while, but when I do upgrade to things, I will probably go PlayStation next-gen and PC because honestly, Xbox is kind of signaling to me, stop buying our consoles. Right. And so I'm going to listen, you know, and if I'm going to be worried about having a digital game library follow me, I'd rather be in ecosystems

[00:53:23] that are for sure going to continue. Yeah, I'm probably going to keep Xboxes because I have such a big backlog and, you know, digital library in it already. but I'm just going to always have a PlayStation and an Xbox, I think. I think it's going to be a thing just because I, especially because like the Series S is so small and I can take it with me when I travel. Yeah, the Series S, maybe I'll get like the cheap version of the next. I would. That's what I would do, especially if you have games. I just think that

[00:53:53] I'm not going to, I'm not going to want to spend money on two consoles and if I want to maximize the games I can play, I already have a PC, it'd be easier for me to just upgrade this. Yeah. And then have the PlayStation for those exclusive. For sure. Yeah, it's hard, it's a hard thing to want to buy an Xbox going forward because it doesn't They're making it hard. I keep trying to let them, because I want, here's the thing, like I don't want a fanboy for either of them. I just want them to have competition with each other so that it drives

[00:54:23] the prices down and makes them want to make better games, all that jazz. And I don't think Xbox has been a worthy competitor in a while. Yeah, if they pivot to just making I mean, because my thing is I don't want to put a PC in my living room. Yeah. But I'm very comfortable with having an Xbox in my living room which is basically just a gaming PC. Yeah. So if that going forward is the plan for Xbox, then I'll still have them because it's still a convenient package all in one

[00:54:53] that's got all my games from going back years on it. But I mean, you can kind of do the same thing with PlayStation and it's hard for me to switch to PlayStation because I like the Xbox controller better. I do prefer the Xbox controller. That's the way you interface with the system. So I mean, like default, I'm always going to want to hold my elite controllers. So well, it's been a fun month for the Lorehounds play. I should I shouldn't even say month because who knows when the fuck we'll be back. This is such a we try Brandon. We try Brandon.

[00:55:23] We do dads. And well, we well, you know, we cover a ton of TV on the Lorehounds. It's much easier for me to watch an hour of TV and then talk about it than it is for me to play a 20 hour game and then talk about it and then find time where I'm not either working and you're not recording for four or five other podcasts that week. So they're killing us this spring with all the severance the last of us and or and the wheel of time are all overlapping. Yeah, I am thankful we

[00:55:53] just got wheel of time screeners. So we're going to be going to be ahead on that a little bit, but it's going to be hard if we didn't get that. I think we'd be done for. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know how you guys do it. You are prolific. We try. We try. We're horrific. Real quick programming notes. Radioactive Ramblings is doing their Invincible Season 3 coverage. We've got We'll Shift Dust and the Star Wars Kind of Timeline podcast. Those are Alicia's feeds. I'm not sure what

[00:56:22] she's doing on them next, but she's got more coming after she's done with her Oscars coverage. Then we've got Properly Howard Movie Review just finished their A Few Good Film series where they do a bunch of movie reviews based on the movie A Few Good Men. It has to be a movie related to actors or production people with A Few Good Men. And then on the main Lorehounds feed, Alicia is wrapping up her Oscars coverage. I'm not sure when this podcast is going to come out, so it might be wrapped up already.

[00:56:53] But wrapping up her Oscars coverage, and she's been doing a great job doing awards season with all that. I don't watch movies, as we all know, and so Alicia tells me what movies I should watch. And we're doing Wheel of Time next on the main Lorehounds feed. On the Severance feed with Properly Howard, we are covering the four of us doing all of Severance season two, and it's been a killer season, so everyone should be checking that out and listening to the podcast. We're having a lot of laughs.

[00:57:22] It's always fun to talk to Steve and Anthony. We're always joking around, and we're having a great time. I just am about to put out a Silmarillion story, too, with Aaron from Lord of the Rings. We are doing of the Ruin of Valerian and the Fall of Fingolfin. And if you don't know what that means, join us and we'll tell you. All right. Quick thank yous. We have our Discord server boosters. Aaron K, Tiller the Thriller, Dork of the Ninjas, Doove71, Athena

[00:57:51] A, Tina, Lestu, Nancy M, Ghost of Partition, Radioactive Richard, Lore Masters, Samartian, Michael G, Michelle E, Brian P, SC, Peter OH, Bettina W, Adam S, Nancy M, Doove71, Brian 8063, Frederick H, Sarah L, Gareth C, Matthew M, Sarah M, DJ Miwa, Andra B, Kwong Yu, DeadeyeJediBob, Nathan T, Alex V, SubZero, Aaron K, Dally V, Mothership61, Narls?

[00:58:21] Kathy W, Lestu, Jeffrey B, Elisa U, Neil F, Ben B, Scott F, Stephen N, Julia F, Kali S, Ilmariel, and Adrian. Thank you, everyone. It's always been fun. Brandon, can they catch you on the blue skies? Yeah, you sure can. Anywhere I want you to find me, you can find me at BrandonTheBard. And you can find me on my PlayStation soon

[00:58:50] playing The Last of Us 2. Very nice. Very excited. Well, we'll see you for The Last of Us. The Lorehounds Podcast is produced and published by The Lorehounds. You can send questions and feedback and voicemails at thelorehounds.com slash contact. Get early and add-free access to all Lorehounds Podcasts at patreon.com slash thelorehounds. Any opinions stated are ours personally and do not reflect the opinion of or belong to any employers or other entities. Thanks for listening.

[00:59:20] The Wheel of Time turns and ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. In one podcast called The Lorehounds by Some, a weekly recap with tons of analysis, two Wheel of Time superfans will lead you through a world of powerful magic, tricky prophecies, and cutthroat politics. Join me, John, and my co-host Alicia for weekly coverage of Season 3 by searching your podcast app for the Lorehounds. Dovyeandi se tovassegin,

[00:59:50] it's time to roll the dice.