0:03

You know it, I know it. There

0:05

are just too many video games out

0:08

there, but there are never too many

0:10

letters from Triple Click listeners. Welcome

0:12

to Triple Click, where we bring

0:14

the games to you. This week,

0:16

we open the mailbag and talk

0:18

about the thousands of games. And

0:20

also what our jobs would be

0:23

if we worked in the games

0:25

industry for some reason. And video

0:27

game names, yet again. Oh, and guess

0:29

what? It's Max Fun Drive. I'm. I'm

0:31

Matty Myers. I'm Jason. I'm Jason.

0:33

And I'm Kirk Hamilton and hello. Hello.

0:35

Kirk, from now on I'm going to

0:38

be self-conscious saying I'm Jason Shrives because

0:40

I don't know if you're going to

0:42

stop it. I can't imagine why. So

0:44

we're listeners. I think they're always going

0:47

to be wondering, is this past Jason

0:49

that I'm hearing, or is it present

0:51

day, Jason? And they'll never know. Is

0:53

the show just a series of

0:55

Kirk editing together various things that

0:58

Jason and I have said to him?

1:00

We're coming up on 250 episodes, so

1:02

we are probably to the point where

1:04

that would be possible. Yeah, that's

1:06

true, but we have something far

1:08

more important to celebrate today, which

1:11

is that it is Max Fund's

1:13

annual pledge. drive the best possible

1:15

time to become a member and

1:17

we're gonna tell you more about

1:19

that during the break later in

1:21

our show but for now I'll

1:23

just say I mean you can

1:26

always go to maximum fun.org/join if

1:28

you just can't wait any longer

1:30

just go to that URL but I

1:32

also want to say like we do

1:34

every year, we are going to do

1:36

a stream together, a twitch stream. We're

1:39

going to do it on our own

1:41

twitch channel, triple click pod on Twitch

1:43

on March 27th at 8 p.m. Eastern.

1:45

So please come and tune in. We

1:48

love to do this for Max Fun

1:50

Drive and sometimes other times throughout the

1:52

year, but definitely for this time of

1:54

year because it's a super duper special

1:56

time of year. And we love to

1:59

have the listeners come by and we'll

2:01

tell you just a little bit about

2:03

how. cool Max fun is and mostly

2:05

be playing a video game and doing

2:07

our thing. So come tune in then.

2:10

And also if you wanted to see

2:12

us in person and you downloaded this

2:14

episode really early in the day and

2:16

you're in San Francisco right this second,

2:19

today at 2 p.m. We are going

2:21

to do a meetup sort of adjacent

2:23

to the fact that all of us

2:25

are in town for GDC this week

2:27

while you're listening to this if you

2:30

downloaded it right away. So today, we're

2:32

going to be at the Yerba Buena

2:34

Gardens at 2 p.m. hanging with some

2:36

listeners, whoever deans to show up and

2:39

hang with us, come say hi. So

2:41

that is that. I think I got

2:43

it all. I just talked for a

2:45

long time. You did. You didn't specify

2:47

that it's 2 p.m. Pacific. Oh, right.

2:50

That's true. So like, you know how

2:52

I said the Twitch stream was at

2:54

8 p.m. Eastern. Well, don't get confused,

2:56

because when we're in San Francisco, we're

2:59

going to be on San Francisco time.

3:01

That's the time zone we're going to

3:03

be in. Very important. We're going to

3:05

be meeting over the park at 5

3:07

p.m. To all you. San Francisco's. Can

3:10

we just say also our pin this

3:12

year for Max Fund Drive is super

3:14

cool? It's so good. We'll talk about

3:16

it later. We'll talk about it later.

3:19

We'll get excited for it. It's very

3:21

good. Pins are always really good. It's

3:23

good to get this year. Okay, it's

3:25

a good time. It's a good time

3:27

to support Triple Click and become a

3:30

member of Microsoft. It is. It always

3:32

is. But now more than ever. All

3:34

right, Jason, what are we talking about

3:36

on the show today? This week we

3:38

are doing burning questions. We are reaching

3:41

into a flaming hot bag full of

3:43

emails for all of your finalists. Oh,

3:45

wow. These questions are slow. I can

3:47

prepare it. Just a reminder you can

3:50

reach us as always at triple click

3:52

at maximum fun.org with your own. Super

3:54

hot burning questions. And these are some

3:56

real questions from real listeners. Gotta specify

3:58

that. None of these are AI, none

4:01

of these are Kirk pretending to be

4:03

a listener. As far as I know,

4:05

I'm going to be honest, he's like

4:07

scamming us. I guess Kirk could be

4:10

starting another email address to just like

4:12

scamming us. I guess Kirk could be

4:14

starting another email address to just like

4:16

send pretend emails. In fact, one of

4:18

these questions that we're feeling like a.

4:21

smoke screen. Jason is covering his tracks

4:23

right now by pointing at me. Well,

4:25

but I was a friend about it.

4:27

I didn't pretend to be somebody else.

4:30

I don't know that there's any evidence

4:32

any of us would pretend to be

4:34

somebody else. No, this is a strange

4:36

way to begin our mailbag episode because

4:38

these are all actually males from us.

4:41

Yeah, it seems a little defensive. What's

4:43

that tweet? All of the questions posed

4:45

by these emails are real t-shirt are

4:47

answered by the t-shirt. All right, let's

4:50

get on with it. Kirk, what are

4:52

going to be of this first question?

4:54

Okay, this first one comes from Mateo.

4:56

Mateo writes, some game journalists have made

4:58

the jump to game development. Ignoring the

5:01

game industry's prevalent issues in the current

5:03

state of the world, pretend it's 2015

5:05

or something. If the three of you

5:07

worked in the games industry, which jobs

5:09

would you do? My guesses are that

5:12

Jason would be working on the writing

5:14

and the story. Kirk would be doing

5:16

music and sound design, and Mandy would

5:18

be in production and maybe systems design.

5:21

Mattio misspelled my name is fine. I'm

5:23

sorry Matti's name is Matti M-A-D-D-Y not

5:25

D-I-E and I feel the need to

5:27

remind some listeners of that just as

5:29

my name is not Kurt though no

5:32

one really calls me Kurt. They seem

5:34

to have the K at the end

5:36

right. I don't know. What do the

5:38

three of you think of these, of

5:41

Mateo's guesses? Oh boy. I do appreciate

5:43

the compliment, but I'd be doing systems

5:45

design, like level design. I think that's...

5:47

really overestimating my abilities. So even if

5:49

Mateo misspelled my name, they really do

5:52

think highly of me. I think that'd

5:54

be cool, but I think it's far

5:56

more likely that I'd be like a

5:58

project manager or producer is what it's

6:01

usually called in that field. Well that

6:03

was the first. Yeah, production. Yeah, I'm

6:05

just I'm just shaven off that maybe

6:07

systems design. I'm excising it. I'm excising

6:09

it. I'm a manager through and through

6:12

a producer. Could you see yourself like

6:14

writing, so sit by systems design, I

6:16

think that means like the mechanics of

6:18

a game, like writing a combat system

6:21

or coming up with a cool encounter

6:23

system for a world or something like

6:25

that? You can't see yourself doing that.

6:27

I don't think I'd be very good

6:29

at that to be totally honest. Production

6:32

seems like a good fit for you

6:34

because production is like producers have to

6:36

wrangle people and make sure they're working

6:38

well together. I've both been wrangled by

6:40

me back at Kataku in the day.

6:43

Yeah, he's a master wrangler. It's true.

6:45

But also, yeah, a lot of people

6:47

management stuff you would be really good

6:49

at. Yeah, I could do that. Transferral

6:52

skills. I mean, when I look at

6:54

this, like, it'd be fun to write

6:56

music for a video game, but I

6:58

don't actually think I'd like to do

7:00

that. I think it'd be more fun

7:03

trying to write or write or do

7:05

narrative narrative design, but honestly. want to

7:07

make video games. That's all of our

7:09

answers right? We don't want to do

7:12

it. I think right we should kind

7:14

of throw that out there that like

7:16

at least for my part I don't

7:18

really want to make that jump I

7:20

it just doesn't seem like it would

7:23

be fun and even if it were

7:25

2015 taking Matta's framing into account I

7:27

still wouldn't want to make the jump

7:29

because you know a little bit after

7:32

2015 I got out of full-time games

7:34

journalism and I didn't get into game

7:36

development because I didn't want to. Yeah,

7:38

I also, there are many things I

7:40

would rather do before going into full-time

7:43

game development, especially having kind of heard

7:45

a lot about how the sausage is

7:47

made. Yeah, you know, and you're a

7:49

writer and have written books, and I

7:52

feel like... Surely that kind of writing,

7:54

writing nonfiction and maybe even writing fiction,

7:56

is just more appealing to you than

7:58

writing on a video game? Yeah, like,

8:00

so if you're gun to my head,

8:03

if you're like, you have to work

8:05

at a game studio writing story, like...

8:07

like material guess would definitely be my

8:09

answer but like the thought of writing

8:11

and a game where you have so

8:14

little control over like how you're writing

8:16

appears how much change even like that

8:18

is so unappealing to me I would

8:20

rather if I ever left journalism my

8:23

first choice would be like holding myself

8:25

up in my office and just writing

8:27

books where you have complete control over

8:29

your story every writer who thinks about

8:31

getting into video games should play the

8:34

writer will do something Matthew Burns and

8:36

Tom Bissell's twine game about a writer

8:38

on a video game, that will maybe

8:40

put the fear of... reality into and

8:43

make you change course. Yeah. I know

8:45

a couple of video game writers who

8:47

listen to the show and if they

8:49

are listening to this right now they

8:51

are probably having to take a break

8:54

because they're too depressed. Listen, don't be

8:56

depressed. None of us are entering the

8:58

field. So that's true. We're not competing.

9:00

And hey, what do we know? Maybe

9:03

your job is great. We respect everything

9:05

that you're doing and we know how

9:07

hard it is and I really do

9:09

mean that. And when it's done well,

9:11

it's all the more impressive to me

9:14

because I truly don't think I can

9:16

do it. And I'm not being sarcastic

9:18

at all. Cosine. Yeah, and that said,

9:20

I mean, there's so many cool kind

9:23

of narrative experiments being done in the

9:25

indie space and there's so many cool

9:27

story games out there that I feel

9:29

like you could and maybe I could

9:31

in theory get a lot of satisfaction

9:34

out of that sort of thing. It's

9:36

just like the thought of joining. a

9:38

AAA studio and becoming a writer is

9:40

just so unappealing to me. I feel

9:42

similarly about music and video games where

9:45

so much exciting composition and musical experimentation

9:47

is going on in games with this

9:49

interactivity, this play you can do with

9:51

the player. There's really really cool stuff

9:54

there. Working on something like that would

9:56

be really cool. It's just very unlikely

9:58

that you get to start there. Well,

10:00

very unlikely you would get to make

10:02

money there. Right. And also, audio design

10:05

is just really tough. You know, every

10:07

audio designer, everyone who's worked in an

10:09

audio department on games, that is a

10:11

very, very hard place to be in

10:14

terms of where your placement is in

10:16

the trench warfare. It's just a hard

10:18

role to fill. Huge respect to everyone

10:20

who does it is a very hard

10:22

job. In other words, I think if

10:25

the three of us ever decide to

10:27

quit journalism, we'll all just make a

10:29

game together. Right. We need a programmer,

10:31

though. But we do have a pretty

10:34

good lineup. We're going to start a

10:36

name consultancy. Right. That's what's easier. If

10:38

we make a game, though, we'll just

10:40

have a really good name on it.

10:42

We just prefer rubbernecking and being annoying

10:45

and saying what we think other people

10:47

should do. Maybe we should make a

10:49

game about naming games. That's pretty good

10:51

actually. Well you have to pick names

10:53

and then like... Uh-huh and that's the

10:56

whole game. Like you are... a CEO

10:58

who's clueless about what the game is

11:00

about and you're like going into the

11:02

pitch meeting and you're like okay what

11:05

about spider mansion and you're like looking

11:07

at everyone's faces and they're like no

11:09

name wars what if it gives you

11:11

okay it'll give you like a one

11:13

paragraph description and then you have to

11:16

pick one of three selections and like

11:18

yeah there's a right answer it's it

11:20

might seem subjective but there's a correct

11:22

answer I think we're on a Let's

11:25

put a pin in it. Let's put

11:27

a pin in that. Okay, we'll save

11:29

it. Let's get to the next question.

11:31

Maddie, read this one, please. Okay, this

11:33

one's from Martin, who writes, the movie

11:36

industry and video games share a lot

11:38

of common attributes. Cost. a lot to

11:40

make, need both creativity and technology, long

11:42

timelines, hard to predict, consumer tastes, etc.

11:45

Yet, crunch does not seem to plague

11:47

movie making, but it's a persistent issue

11:49

with game development. Is there something that

11:51

movie producers are doing better than gaming

11:53

studio directors? What can game devs learn

11:56

from the movie production process to avoid

11:58

crunches? So, okay, so I thought this

12:00

was an interesting question. So, crunch for

12:02

people who don't know is an industry

12:05

term referring to excessive periods of overtime,

12:07

working long hours for long periods of

12:09

time. Crunch absolutely plagues movie making. Right,

12:11

okay, good. I'm glad that's where we

12:13

started. Just kind of like infamous stories

12:16

over the years about movies where people

12:18

had to work insane hours. I mean,

12:20

every time I read a book, I

12:22

was just kind of skimming through this

12:24

book about the West Wing that came

12:27

out a few months ago. It's called

12:29

What's Next. And I haven't really read

12:31

it. It's a little bit puffy for

12:33

my taste, but skimming through it. coming

12:36

back in again the next morning. So

12:38

the premise of this question is a

12:40

little bit flawed, but I do think

12:42

there's one part of this equation that

12:44

is different for movie making, which is

12:47

that in movies, every single person on

12:49

set, or most of the people on

12:51

set, are part of a union, a

12:53

different kind of union, and they are

12:56

very restricted in like set hours, set

12:58

lunch breaks, set overtime pay. So if

13:00

they work past X number of hours,

13:02

they get time and half or double

13:04

time or whatever. looks like. And so

13:07

that I think makes a big deal

13:09

because that means when you're making a

13:11

movie you have to be a lot

13:13

smarter about your timeline and your decision-making

13:16

ahead of the movie and obviously there

13:18

are all sorts of like techniques that

13:20

people can use to make up for

13:22

shortcomings there like reshoots which are infamous

13:24

in the MCU world as an example

13:27

but for the most part movie producers

13:29

have to plan and they have to

13:31

know a lot more about what they're

13:33

doing. before they go into production. That

13:36

said, it's very difficult for games to

13:38

do that because in games you have

13:40

to figure out if something is fun

13:42

and works and in movies you do

13:44

not. In movies you just point a

13:47

camera at something and in games you

13:49

can discover midway through production that your

13:51

main feature is actually not very fun.

13:53

But I think that the one thing

13:55

that I think more game makers could

13:58

learn from the movie world is... planning

14:00

more planning oh I thought you were

14:02

going to say unions but yeah sure

14:04

well unions are part of that and

14:07

unions force more planning because you know

14:09

that you're burning so much more money

14:11

every single hour you like right now

14:13

when it comes to crunch if you're

14:15

a game producer or game executive you

14:18

can kind of schedule crunch into your

14:20

planning or at least know that like

14:22

as a backup plan you'll just make

14:24

people crunch because there's no downside for

14:27

you like that isn't a downside on

14:29

the current project. Whereas in the movie

14:31

business, if you are shooting, you know

14:33

every minute you go after 12 o'clock

14:35

or whatever, after 12 hours or whatever,

14:38

you are just like burning through so

14:40

much money that you are incentivized not

14:42

to put in that extra over time

14:44

because it costs so much. So that's

14:47

a part of the equation too for

14:49

sure. Yeah, there's also so much more

14:51

going on with a movie shoot. I

14:53

mean, if you're shooting on location, if

14:55

you're doing something kind of difficult, where

14:58

if you miscalculate... and go long, or

15:00

if you've ever read the story of

15:02

any hellish movie shoot, you know, something

15:04

like The Abyss or Mad Max Fury

15:07

Road. Yep. These movies that were very,

15:09

very difficult to make, because they were

15:11

out in the desert, you know, were

15:13

on a boat in the middle of

15:15

the ocean, they were doing something very,

15:18

very difficult. So if you miscalculate, you're

15:20

also putting your actors through it, you're

15:22

putting your crew through this incredibly difficult,

15:24

The stakes are a little lower in

15:26

a certain sense because you can just

15:29

say Well, mostly we're all just at

15:31

computers. We're just trying to crack this

15:33

thing and get it working. But because

15:35

the stakes are lower, it's a little

15:38

easier, I would imagine, to just say,

15:40

well, yeah, we're just going to stay

15:42

late for two weeks, because it doesn't

15:44

feel quite as bad as, well, we're

15:46

going to stay out in this hurricane

15:49

or whatever, in this storm in the

15:51

middle of the desert for a week,

15:53

trying to get this shot while we

15:55

all have sunburn and we're getting, you

15:58

know, dysentery, dysentery or whatever, or whatever.

16:00

As a result of that, I think

16:02

maybe it can sometimes feel easier to

16:04

slide into crunch in video games, and

16:06

it also means that the comparison you

16:09

know, isn't quite as one-to-one. It's a

16:11

pretty significant difference between the two things.

16:13

It's also when you're in video games,

16:15

because it's an office job and you're

16:18

kind of doing your work individually as

16:20

opposed to on a set that is

16:22

coordinated shooting, like on a movie set,

16:24

you can't have just like the lighting

16:26

guy crunching because it's all just kind

16:29

of like a giant collaborative effort as

16:31

opposed to doing games where a programmer

16:33

could be off crunching at home and

16:35

you might even... not even know like

16:38

it's very easy to slide into that

16:40

yeah yeah and something that occurs to

16:42

me in talking about that is that

16:44

as movies have become more digital and

16:46

more like video games that kind of

16:49

crunch has actually become more prevalent I'm

16:51

thinking of the reporting on across the

16:53

spiderverse which was a notorious and very

16:55

very difficult production and reading the story

16:57

of that it was all animated it

17:00

really just felt like one of your

17:02

Bloomberg stories Jason I mean it was

17:04

so similar in terms of everything in

17:06

the creative direction, the way that the

17:09

work worked, and certainly the crunch. Yeah,

17:11

you know, that's really interesting, because yeah,

17:13

it's much easier to not plan when

17:15

you don't have to worry about, okay,

17:17

our actors are only available for 14

17:20

days in the Mojave Desert, and that's

17:22

where we're going, and like, we need

17:24

to get this all now, or else

17:26

we're never gonna get it, if you're

17:29

like... The season is gonna change, the

17:31

weather will be like, like, we have

17:33

to do this before sunset. decision makers

17:35

you can like reverse reverse reverse course

17:37

for and not really have any ramifications

17:40

because you're just animating in a computer.

17:42

Yeah, that's a good point. I feel

17:44

like it's also worth noting before we

17:46

wrap on this that movies have been

17:49

around for like a hundred years and

17:51

that there's a pretty locked in standard

17:53

for how a movie is made and

17:55

video games are relatively young. And I

17:57

just think it's worth remembering that. Like

18:00

a lot of the organizational problems that

18:02

people run into with video games are

18:04

because it's still nascent. I mean, yeah,

18:06

it's been a few decades by now.

18:09

There's sort of a standard for how

18:11

a AAA and a double A video

18:13

game should be made. But movies have

18:15

a lot on games in terms of

18:17

just time and experience and just citing

18:20

past examples of movies and being like,

18:22

well this worked for this movie. There's

18:24

decades upon decades of examples to point

18:26

to. Yeah, not just nascent, but also

18:28

changing drastically from your ear. Yeah, that

18:31

too. Yeah. But the animation comparison is

18:33

very apt. I mean, woof. Those sonic

18:35

redesigns. I mean we remember hearing about

18:37

that. Yeah, yeah, there's a lot of

18:40

similarity. Next question is from Sammy, who

18:42

writes, I first discovered your podcast from

18:44

my gamer boyfriend, and she never listened

18:46

to a podcast before triple click, so

18:48

thanks for all the fun time. And

18:51

insightful information, you're very welcome, Sammy. Sammy

18:53

says, I'm curious if any of you

18:55

know or have heard from other sources

18:57

what the process tends to be for

19:00

pitching game ideas. Is it significantly different

19:02

from how movies, movies, books, and other

19:04

media get pitched? How did the initial

19:06

stages of pre-development? compare. This is an

19:08

interesting one. I've talked to some people

19:11

who've pitched, though I would say I'm

19:13

not sure that I'm the most well-informed

19:15

person to answer this question. Yeah, well

19:17

let me try to feel this one

19:20

and or at least kind of give

19:22

a basic answer, which is that it's

19:24

really drastically different depending on what the

19:26

game company is. So like if you're

19:28

at a big AAA game company, a

19:31

naughty dog or something like that, then

19:33

the pitching and the game like deciding

19:35

what's happening next is happening at a

19:37

pretty high level like most people at

19:40

the studio probably just have no input

19:42

in that maybe they can give their

19:44

feedback or something and be like I

19:46

want to work on this but like

19:48

those decisions are happening at a high

19:51

level at a company like double fine,

19:53

which we've talked about quite a lot.

19:55

They have like their own prototyping process

19:57

called Amnesia Fortnay, where everyone stops what

19:59

they're doing for two weeks and works

20:02

on a bunch of cool game ideas

20:04

that could then potentially turn into games

20:06

for the studio. So like in theory,

20:08

anyone could pitch an idea and have

20:11

it turn into something. At other companies,

20:13

I've heard of like votes and polls

20:15

and people being like, what do we

20:17

want to do next? Let's try to

20:19

figure that out. And some companies, a

20:22

lot of it is determined by executive

20:24

mandates and what publishers are looking for.

20:26

If you're a smaller company and you're

20:28

not owned by a big publisher, it

20:31

might be just what you can get

20:33

funded, like you might be taking around

20:35

your pitches and trying to get funding

20:37

everywhere. So it's all over the place.

20:39

It really can drastically differ as opposed

20:42

to movies can also differ a little

20:44

bit, but a lot of times it's

20:46

a more linear process like a screenwriter

20:48

rights of screenplay and they shop it

20:51

gets rewritten five. times before it's made,

20:53

but in general, yeah. But in general,

20:55

it's a pretty linear process or a

20:57

studio decides we need to make the

20:59

next Iron Man. So we're going to

21:02

hire a screenwriter for that. And that's

21:04

kind of how it goes. Books. are

21:06

very similar to screen writing in that

21:08

either an author can shop an idea

21:11

around or maybe an editor at a

21:13

book publisher, like has an idea or

21:15

a publisher really wants a book about

21:17

X topic, and so they might be

21:19

looking and talking to agents to try

21:22

to figure out if there's a writer

21:24

out there who's fitting for that. Is

21:26

that nonfiction versus fiction? I'm guessing you're

21:28

kind of talking about nonfiction? Yeah, that

21:30

would be nonfiction, although with fiction I

21:33

guess if it's like, like, cereals, then,

21:35

they might have a story. in mind

21:37

and hire someone. But in books, I

21:39

think 99. percent of the time. It's

21:42

just the writer, the author, making a

21:44

pitch and the publishers deciding whether or

21:46

not they're interested. So in games, I

21:48

would say it's a little bit more

21:50

all over the place than books or

21:53

film. Yeah, all I really know from

21:55

people I've talked to who've pitched is

21:57

that it can be incredibly sold as

21:59

trying to do and it's really grueling

22:02

and difficult press. Yeah. That's really true

22:04

for everyone who's ever pitched anything though.

22:06

Pitching just sucks. Yeah, it does mean,

22:08

I mean I recommend the double fine

22:10

documentary that we're constantly recommending to Sammy

22:13

because I feel like that process is

22:15

so cool and is a great insight

22:17

into a pretty specific pitching process for

22:19

games and how they could get made.

22:22

I feel like that gave me a

22:24

lot of insight into what that could

22:26

look like in a positive way. I

22:28

don't know. I mean, maybe other studios

22:30

could look to that. I don't know.

22:33

Might be cool. Yeah, and a lot

22:35

of times, by the way, it's like,

22:37

there's like momentum, so like you'll feel

22:39

something in the air. And I don't

22:42

know exactly, I don't think the doc

22:44

even shows exactly how Psychonuts too was

22:46

pitched, it just kind of shows, exactly

22:48

how Psychonuts too was pitched, it just

22:50

kind of shows Tim Schaefer being like,

22:53

next kind of shows Tim Schaefer being

22:55

like, like, it feels like there's something

22:57

in the air here, we're all excited.

22:59

it because I think that like when

23:01

a studio leader gets a vibe that

23:04

like people aren't excited about something that

23:06

can kind of change things and so

23:08

I think there is a little bit

23:10

of kind of democratic input but usually

23:13

the decision itself is made at the

23:15

high. highest levels. You can think about

23:17

all of these service games that have

23:19

failed or been canceled and how they

23:21

were pitched and when they were pitched,

23:24

right? There was all this energy and

23:26

inertia and momentum around service games. Everyone

23:28

was very excited to green light things.

23:30

And then we all saw how that

23:33

went. Yeah, man. Well, that's the problem

23:35

with pitching is that you pitch something

23:37

and then it doesn't come out for

23:39

another five years, six years. Trust me,

23:41

in six years, I'm telling you. It's

23:44

going to be all about just ace

23:46

attorney clones. That's all the way down.

23:48

Well, but I also wonder how many

23:50

of those examples were games that were

23:53

pitched one way and then the pitch

23:55

was accepted contingent upon it. being a

23:57

live service game or having some other

23:59

element name that trend from the past

24:01

several years where games got kind of

24:04

shifted and sometimes that makeover can work

24:06

and sometimes it doesn't. So I don't

24:08

even know if all of those live

24:10

service games were really connected to that

24:13

when they were initially pitched. That's true.

24:15

Though I guess one thing I've learned

24:17

from Jason's reporting is that as often

24:19

as not the people pitching the game

24:21

are the ones who made the decision

24:24

to make it what it was, and

24:26

it wasn't, the people pitching the game

24:28

are the ones who made the decision

24:30

to make it what it was, and

24:32

it wasn't actually Right, you kind of

24:35

mold yourself to the person you're pitching

24:37

to. That's true. And also, you're getting,

24:39

like while you're making these decisions, you're

24:41

getting PowerPoint presentations from executives being like,

24:44

here's why the future is live service.

24:46

And here's in the middle of the

24:48

pitch saying, we're going to make a

24:50

suicide squad game, it's going to be

24:52

cool. And you're watching their attention. how

24:55

we when we were at Kataku like

24:57

it wasn't traffic was always a big

24:59

discussion at gocker media like there was

25:01

always chart B would it was always

25:04

up we always talked about like oh

25:06

this this this story is a big

25:08

hit like it's getting lots of views

25:10

all people care about it it's resonating

25:12

people yeah the big board but like

25:15

there was never a conversation internally that

25:17

was like every story it has to

25:19

do great traffic but like it was

25:21

implicitly understood yeah of course you were

25:24

like it was you were rewarded if

25:26

a story did good it. This is

25:28

a story people care about. Like there

25:30

are lots of legitimately good reasons to

25:32

care about traffic. Think about that on

25:35

a bigger scale when you're talking about

25:37

a project worth billions of dollars where

25:39

it's kind of like they might not

25:41

be saying to you, hey this has

25:44

to be a service game, but it's

25:46

kind of it's kind of understood from

25:48

the conversations you are having when they

25:50

are on earnings calls being like the

25:52

future of E. A is live service.

25:55

Like it's very clear what they really

25:57

want and you know it's going to

25:59

be just kind of a constant like

26:01

uphill about. like resistance if you try

26:03

to pitch something that they don't want.

26:06

So it's a little bit more nuanced

26:08

than just like the studio heads made

26:10

the decision. Yeah, that makes sense. All

26:12

right, next question, Kirk. This comes from

26:15

Marta, who writes, it's no secret that

26:17

the current industry crisis is in part

26:19

caused by how many games there are.

26:21

Do you think steams should reintroduce their

26:23

green light process or that there should

26:26

generally be any process to lower the

26:28

amount of yearly releases? She writes in

26:30

2024 there were 19,000 plus games released

26:32

on Steam Alone apparently. Or do you

26:35

think that a good game will always

26:37

defend itself? What other risks do you

26:39

see associated with how games are being

26:41

made now? And by made, I presume

26:43

she also means release now. So yeah,

26:46

I don't know. What do we think?

26:48

Should Green Light come back? Should we

26:50

tell people what Green Light is? Please

26:52

don't remember. Yeah, go ahead, Maddie. Okay,

26:55

so Green Light was something that Steam

26:57

introduced whereby it as a storefront. would,

26:59

as the title implies, either green light

27:01

a game and it would appear on

27:03

Steam Storefront or it would get rejected.

27:06

And the application process was like pretty

27:08

broke and just confusing for people, at

27:10

least according to a lot of the

27:12

indie developers that I talked to in

27:15

that time period when Green Light existed,

27:17

it was really unclear why or how

27:19

Steam would green light these games. People

27:21

would try to game the system. in

27:23

a lot of different ways and there

27:26

became emergent methodologies for gaming the system

27:28

that game developers would use. It really

27:30

just introduced additional problems, but I think

27:32

part of why it existed was because

27:34

in the early days, Steam was kind

27:37

of prestigious. Like it didn't have every

27:39

game on its platform, but it was

27:41

still a really important PC gaming storefront.

27:43

And then when Indies came to the

27:46

platform, I think, you know, the Steamhead

27:48

Han shows, Gabe Newell was out there

27:50

being like, all right. How are we

27:52

going to decide what's on our platform?

27:54

And it's a totally different ball game

27:57

now. There's tons and tons and tons

27:59

of video games on there. There's all

28:01

kinds of stuff, some of which is

28:03

shovel wear. And that is part of

28:06

the issue, I would guess. I remember

28:08

that if you were in the IGF,

28:10

if you were a finalist in the

28:12

independent games festival, you got on to

28:14

steam and that that was as big

28:17

of a deal as winning in the

28:19

IGF just because it was so huge

28:21

to have your indie game on steam

28:23

because there were just people who would

28:26

look on steam and because there weren't

28:28

19,000 or whatever the number is new

28:30

games, they could just find you. And

28:32

that was a better world for those

28:34

developers and that was a lot of

28:37

good games because the IGF, you know.

28:39

tends to have some of the best

28:41

games featured, but at the same time

28:43

that also left a lot of people

28:45

out in the cold. Yeah, I do

28:48

remember fans could vote right on them

28:50

and that was also it was a

28:52

point at least where I remember there

28:54

being because I remember people were pitching

28:57

us a lot of Kataku being like

28:59

hey we want this to get green

29:01

light Yeah, it was sort of the

29:03

new Kickstarter there was a period that

29:05

whole period when we were at Kataku

29:08

first there was the Kickstarter era where

29:10

people would write and say my game

29:12

has a Kickstarter please please write about

29:14

it and you'd feel like you could

29:17

help them out, but then didn't want

29:19

to feel that responsibility toward them and

29:21

then green light felt very much the

29:23

same. Yeah, especially because as a reporter

29:25

you don't know if the game is

29:28

good or not, especially in the kickstarter

29:30

phase, but also in the green light

29:32

phase sometimes it's just like I don't

29:34

know anything about this. Why do I

29:37

support this? And it just became, I

29:39

mean, now it's an explosion. It's the

29:41

Indianapolis. Yes, so let's get to the

29:43

question. So the question is, like, should

29:45

there be some sort of gatekeeping or

29:48

should there be some process in place

29:50

to reduce the number of releases? Because

29:52

it's true, I think it's kind of

29:54

an accepted fact. We talked about this

29:57

a couple weeks ago and we did

29:59

our episode about why the video game

30:01

industry has fallen apart. One of the

30:03

biggest factors is just the complete and

30:05

utter oversaturation of games. can be a

30:08

really good thing for players because they're

30:10

more cooler, new, they're more cool new

30:12

games coming out every week than there

30:14

ever have been in the history of

30:16

videos. A challenging time for podcasters as

30:19

evidenced by last week's episode. And also

30:21

for discoverability and for making games and

30:23

releasing them and getting them noticed. And

30:25

there are a lot of problems with

30:28

that. It's kind of, it's very much

30:30

a double-edged sword where there's a lot

30:32

of good and a lot of bad

30:34

that comes with it. Should there be.

30:36

gatekeeping process of some sort? And what

30:39

would it look like? I mean it's

30:41

so hard to know. So I think

30:43

about podcasts a lot because one of

30:45

the things that I love about podcast

30:48

is that they're distributed via RSS and

30:50

I think RSS is the great hope

30:52

for the future. It's this open platform

30:54

that anyone can use. You know, I

30:56

put my shows, I put strong songs,

30:59

for example, on an RSS feed, anyone

31:01

can listen to it, and there's no

31:03

gatekeeper. I'm not reliant on a platform

31:05

the way that a YouTube is reliant

31:08

on YouTube. And yet at the same

31:10

time, there are these podcast gatekeepers like

31:12

Apple Podcasts and Spotify, two of the

31:14

big ones, and you put your RSS

31:16

feed into those services and then you

31:19

get distributed that way. And I like

31:21

that a lot. I mean, I think

31:23

that the openness, the fundamental openness of

31:25

RSS, is a really wonderful thing. It's

31:28

not a one-to-one comparison, but when you

31:30

think about steam being an open platform

31:32

that, you know, you pay some fee

31:34

or something and you can list your

31:36

game, That openness strikes me as a

31:39

good thing. Like I'm not sure, just

31:41

my gut tells me that moving away

31:43

from that. I mean, podcast also, I've

31:45

a discovery. probability problem. So it hasn't,

31:47

this isn't a problem. As a, perhaps

31:50

as a result of that openness, it

31:52

has the same exact problem. So yes,

31:54

it's a good thing, but also has

31:56

that same pros and cons, I suppose.

31:59

Yeah. That's sort of right. That's sort

32:01

of right. That's sort of what makes

32:03

me think of what makes me think

32:05

of it. And it's sort of what

32:07

makes me think of it. And it's

32:10

sort of what makes me think of

32:12

the way we're going. I agree, it's

32:14

hard to imagine any sort of gatekeeping

32:16

system that would work in a fair

32:19

and just kind of in a way

32:21

that makes people happy. On the other

32:23

hand, like maybe there are better options

32:25

that don't go backwards but go forwards,

32:27

maybe there are better options for discoverability

32:30

and maybe there are other methods that

32:32

can be used for discoverability? I don't

32:34

know. A large part of me feels

32:36

like this is just the world and

32:39

this is just like where we have

32:41

to adapt. to now is just this.

32:43

glut of games coming out all the

32:45

time and that's just what we have

32:47

to find a way to navigate and

32:50

what game makers have to figure out

32:52

how to deal with because like I

32:54

don't see this changing. The game I'm

32:56

playing now I mean this game I'm

32:59

obsessing over and won't stop telling you

33:01

to about blueprints which we'll talk about

33:03

more in the future. What's it called?

33:05

I mean you should text me about

33:07

it a few more times. I was

33:10

thinking about that in the consciousness of

33:12

this conversation. It's like here's like here's

33:14

a game that has this dude and

33:16

a couple other people and just came

33:18

out of nowhere and there are going

33:21

to be games like this every single

33:23

year that just completely come out of

33:25

nowhere and blow us away and that's

33:27

obviously a good thing it's not a

33:30

problem but it's also just like yeah

33:32

I mean that just feels like what

33:34

the future looks like is just this

33:36

massive glut of games that just keeps

33:38

growing and growing and maybe it's on

33:41

people like us and people with platforms

33:43

to be curators and I don't know.

33:45

I don't know if there's any answer

33:47

to this? I mean I think that

33:50

is the answer. I actually do think

33:52

the answer is human curators and this

33:54

is the kind of question that makes

33:56

me really depressed about so many video

33:58

game publications closing, which isn't what Mart

34:01

is asking about, but it's what it

34:03

makes me think of because I'm like,

34:05

there's really nothing better than a human

34:07

person curating a list based on their

34:10

taste, and then you understand what that

34:12

person's taste is, and you're like, okay,

34:14

I usually like things from this games

34:16

critic that I'm following, or music critic,

34:18

or book critic, list goes on. And

34:21

this is semi-related, I've recently gotten really

34:23

into watching music DJ's on twitch because

34:25

the music rights have been sorted out

34:27

over there and it's just a way

34:30

that I'm discovering new music now is

34:32

by just watching DJ's play it because

34:34

obviously there's so much new music constantly

34:36

how would you ever discover it and

34:38

the way to discover it is by

34:41

a human person who makes it their

34:43

life's work or passion to be like

34:45

here's some new stuff to check out

34:47

and like that's our responsibility. I mean

34:49

not to get all corny about it

34:52

but like it is our responsibility to

34:54

tell people about blueprints or whatever it

34:56

is. I just I always hope we're

34:58

not the only ones you know I

35:01

want there to be other people out

35:03

there like us doing it. Yeah and

35:05

also the problem with that is that

35:07

it's so it's like determined by our

35:09

personal taste because the three of us

35:12

I mean we're not going to be

35:14

up in triple click like recommending the

35:16

best I don't know sports games. every

35:18

single week that come out. And so

35:21

it's a little unfortunate that like the

35:23

curator is even there, it's so limited

35:25

to what we like and care about.

35:27

Yeah. But I'm sure there's curators for

35:29

that. We're limited by our human capabilities

35:32

and this is somewhere where AI is

35:34

going to become more and more noticeable.

35:36

Like AI DJs are already a thing

35:38

on Spotify and you know, I think

35:41

some people get something out of that

35:43

and I could imagine. an AI's capability

35:45

to look at a vast amount of

35:47

information and sort through it is helpful

35:49

in this instance because like you were

35:52

just saying Jason a human being can

35:54

only play so many games and I

35:56

mean forget about music movies books it

35:58

is possible to read most of the

36:01

big new books each year it's possible

36:03

to watch most of the movies So

36:05

music is a lot harder, there's a

36:07

ton of it, but with games, I

36:09

mean, games are so huge, they take

36:12

so much time, it's just not possible.

36:14

So you do start to see a

36:16

world where they build an AI that

36:18

can do this because it's able to.

36:20

But then you lose the humanity of

36:23

it, you lose the humanity of it,

36:25

you lose getting this actual human being.

36:27

Yeah, how can an AI possibly tell

36:29

whether a game is good or not?

36:32

do like, it'll go through a bunch

36:34

of things or whatever, who knows, I

36:36

can imagine a bunch of ways that'll

36:38

work. It won't replace humans though, it's

36:40

just we have to kind of lean

36:43

into the humanity you were describing as

36:45

our limitation, the thing that makes us

36:47

not able to play every single game,

36:49

and just go with what we like,

36:52

and then the... connection to us as

36:54

people is the thing that actually makes

36:56

our recommendation hold weight with people. And

36:58

I think that's already true of Triple

37:00

Click. We don't have time to play

37:03

nearly every game that we want to.

37:05

There are so many games I'd love

37:07

to play if I had time and

37:09

I just don't, but at the same

37:12

time I am still myself and I

37:14

think that my... my experience, my understanding,

37:16

my way of explaining and understanding games,

37:18

is useful to some people just in

37:20

the same way that other people are

37:23

useful to me because we like to

37:25

have those human connections. So hopefully we

37:27

can keep sight of that as well

37:29

in this world of infinite media. to

37:32

the point that only machines can process

37:34

it all and make recommendations. Well, as

37:36

long as an AI isn't going to

37:38

become the new steam green light and

37:40

deciding whether it means to be allowed

37:43

or not. Yeah, hopefully not. I mean,

37:45

that's like what's happening on Spotify, right?

37:47

Is there's an AI DJ that's recommending

37:49

music to thousands or millions of people.

37:51

Well, but I mean allowing something to

37:54

exist on the platform in the first

37:56

place would be my concern. Anyway, let's

37:58

keep going, Maddie, next question. Okay, this

38:00

one's from Dom, who writes, I recently

38:03

received a board game from a Kickstarter

38:05

I pledged for called Aridia, the Paths

38:07

We Dare Tread. And imagine my surprise

38:09

when I discovered that our very own

38:11

Kirk Hamilton composed the official music for

38:14

the game. The idea of composing music

38:16

for a medium that doesn't typically call

38:18

for it is so interesting to me,

38:20

and I was wondering if Kirk could

38:23

speak a little bit on his experience.

38:25

How did this partnership come about? What

38:27

were the challenges that he faced during

38:29

the composing process? Are there any interesting

38:31

anecdotes he can share about his experience?

38:34

I would love to talk about this.

38:36

I'll be brief. This is the kind

38:38

of thing I could talk about at

38:40

length and maybe Will on Strong Songs

38:43

or something. But this was a very,

38:45

very fun project that I completed a

38:47

while ago that the game is just

38:49

now coming out. This is a game

38:51

from far off games called Aridia the

38:54

Paths We Dare Tread. As Maddie said,

38:56

it is similar to Gloom Haven. copy

38:58

of it since I did the music

39:00

and It's the most unbelievable box I've

39:03

ever seen in my life. I still

39:05

haven't posted a picture of this. It

39:07

is so awesome. It weighs, I think,

39:09

24 pounds, I weight it. It is

39:11

a box the size of a car.

39:14

And it has so much stuff at

39:16

it, it's such a cool game. I

39:18

still haven't had it, it's such a

39:20

cool game. I still haven't had a

39:22

chance to play it, but I really

39:25

want to with my board game group,

39:27

because it looks very cool. some success

39:29

with past games. He's well known in

39:31

the community and did a Kickstarter for

39:34

Aridia, you know, pitching it as I

39:36

want to make a big, you know,

39:38

persistent role-playing game adventure that people can

39:40

play through, you know, where you have

39:42

a character and it's like a big

39:45

D&D campaign, but it's, you know, a

39:47

tabletop game similar to something like Lumhaven.

39:49

was very successful Kickstarter and as one

39:51

of the stretch goals, he had me

39:54

come on as the composer. The reason

39:56

for that was actually that he hired

39:58

me to write music just for the

40:00

Kickstarter trailer. So it started with me

40:02

just writing the theme music for Aridia

40:05

that just played on the little Kickstarter

40:07

video that sort of showed what they

40:09

were envisioning for the game. Then the

40:11

stretch goal came and that was, hey,

40:14

do you want to actually... try writing

40:16

some music for this game. So I

40:18

said, sure, I'll do it. So I'm

40:20

now composing five tracks. There's a kind

40:22

of field music and a town theme.

40:25

There's a battle theme. There's a boss

40:27

theme and a kind of magical mystical

40:29

theme. And the idea with the game

40:31

is that as you're playing, some cards

40:34

that you draw that have certain activities

40:36

or actions or events will have a

40:38

little color-coded music. Q written on the

40:40

card and then you are to play

40:42

that track of the five tracks and

40:45

you can kind of put it on

40:47

repeat because I wrote them all to

40:49

be able to just loop and then

40:51

you know action music like fighting music

40:53

kind of plays when you're in a

40:56

fight or really peaceful chill that music

40:58

plays if you're in the town that

41:00

kind of thing. The biggest challenge, I'll

41:02

just cite one thing, because I think

41:05

this is, it was interesting for me

41:07

as a composer and is actually relevant

41:09

to video games as well, so much

41:11

of what I had to do, and

41:13

I worked with Cody on each piece,

41:16

so much of what I had to

41:18

do was remove stuff. I would write

41:20

this kind of elaborate piece of music

41:22

and send it to Cody, and he'd

41:25

say, this is cool. But there's too

41:27

much. There's too much melody. There's too

41:29

much going on. And so we just

41:31

kept pulling stuff out. And the eventual

41:33

versions that we wound up with were

41:36

very stripped down because it has to

41:38

be in the background. It can't be

41:40

super distracting. And I've actually gone and

41:42

used this music. During my Dungeons and

41:45

Dragons campaigns with my friends. I'll put

41:47

it on when we're in a fight.

41:49

I put on the battle music because

41:51

I haven't had a chance to play

41:53

already. I might release new versions of

41:56

the tracks that or like five times

41:58

as long, just so you don't have

42:00

to put it on loop and it'll

42:02

just play for 15 minutes, where I

42:05

just copy paste the thing basically five

42:07

times in a row and maybe make

42:09

a couple little changes. Anyways, that was

42:11

the one interesting challenge for me as

42:13

a composer, is remove, remove, remove, less

42:16

timbrell variety, less melody, just it has

42:18

to kind of. really good in the

42:20

background. So it was a super fun

42:22

process. You can listen to the music

42:24

on my SoundCloud and I'm going to

42:27

put it up on band camp at

42:29

some point and actually, you know, make

42:31

it for sale for anyone who wants

42:33

it. But anybody who bought the game

42:36

gets a copy of the music. And

42:38

it was really cool. That game is

42:40

amazing. We'll put a link in the

42:42

show. People should go check it out.

42:44

It looks like a really awesome game

42:47

and it's been getting good reviews too.

42:57

Yeah, I hope you talk more in

42:59

depth on the process on strong songs

43:01

as you say to you would. I

43:04

probably will at some point. Yeah, that's

43:06

awesome. Let's slip in one more question.

43:08

This is a fun one. This is

43:11

from Ricardo. Ricardo says, hello guys, I

43:13

hope you're all fine and dandy. I'm

43:15

making a game that's similar in style

43:17

of Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles, my life

43:20

as a king. I was wondering if

43:22

you could help me with being a

43:24

soundboard for some names I'm considering. For

43:27

context, I'm half Italian and half English

43:29

and wanted to have a blended name

43:31

to pay homage to my roots. Anyway,

43:34

here are some of the names I've

43:36

got. Let me know what you think.

43:38

Sauvrano's Will. Domenio Eterno. Reign deluche. Throne

43:41

bound. Domenians call. All right, first of

43:43

all Ricardo, I just want to say

43:45

that from now on to listen to

43:48

the rest of the podcast We will

43:50

be charging a hundred dollars an hour

43:52

for services Okay, spider mansion consulting is

43:55

now in session All right, let's let's

43:57

put our money where our mouth is

43:59

and give give her Ricardo some suggestions.

44:02

Please Kirk, go first. Okay, so just

44:04

looking at all of these, I would

44:06

say that I think that dominion bound

44:09

is the strongest name of the ones

44:11

that we have just listed, though I

44:13

don't think that it's incredibly strong. Hard

44:16

to say with like the first throne,

44:18

throne bound is not a pleasant word

44:20

to say. Well, and the thing about

44:22

throne bound as a concept, it's like

44:25

being stuck in a chair. Right. That

44:27

doesn't sound fun. It's not very active.

44:29

So here's my other thought. Looking through

44:32

all of these, looking through all of

44:34

these. could work. Diminio, that could be

44:36

the name of a game, not bad

44:39

at all. Eterno, so maybe like less

44:41

is more. Too much like eternal, which

44:43

is too common, a word, and games.

44:46

I would mix eterno. I think it's

44:48

different enough for what it's worth. So

44:50

Savrano, so if this is a game

44:53

about being a king and kind of

44:55

like doing cool stuff, I never actually

44:57

played... final message crystal chronic souls my

45:00

life is a king but this is

45:02

a game as being a king and

45:04

doing stuff. Savrano means king and Italian

45:07

so if he wants to blend Italian

45:09

and English I think you could play

45:11

around with that you could do some

45:14

alliteration thing if this is a game

45:16

about killing a king like slay the

45:18

Savrano would be a fun name maybe

45:21

you can play around with Savrano and

45:23

like another word that is relevant maybe

45:25

another word that starts with an S

45:27

you could you could you could find

45:30

something a little catchier than Savrano's will.

45:32

Will is kind of a soft, boring

45:34

word. I'm gonna look up what you

45:37

actually do in life as a chronic

45:39

final fantasy. I like just Savrano for

45:41

what it's worth. I think a one-word

45:44

title is pretty powerful. It's a little

45:46

tough. Yeah, dominion's call, I think that

45:48

something's something is generally... Not my favorite

45:51

structure, like call of dominion is a

45:53

stronger name. It sounds a little like

45:55

call of duty, but call of dominion

45:58

I would say is stronger than dominion's

46:00

call if we're just punching up any

46:02

of these individually. Strong Savrano strong songs.

46:05

Yeah Savrano's song Strength of Savrano. Hmm.

46:07

That's a little bit It's tricky, I

46:09

mean, I'm not wild about any of

46:12

these names, Ricardo, I will say that.

46:14

So I think you should keep working

46:16

on it. And I think if we

46:19

were really workshoping this, we would actually

46:21

talk through what the game really is,

46:23

who the characters are, and what you

46:26

do in it. Yeah, what are the

46:28

verbs? Is really what I want to

46:30

do? Right, like what do you do

46:32

in the game, and then how can

46:35

you convey that? game to me? You

46:37

know, like what type of game it

46:39

is in a way that I think

46:42

it is helpful when a name does.

46:44

Great feedback. Yeah. That said, I would

46:46

not recommend like other people emailing burning

46:49

questions with the line of suggestions because

46:51

we're not going to do this every

46:53

single time we do have burning questions.

46:56

Every burning questions just becomes a name,

46:58

brainstorming, I think if you go listen

47:00

to our episode. I mean, some of

47:03

the tips that we talked about, I

47:05

mean, catchy is first and foremost, something

47:07

memorable. first and foremost, what you want

47:10

to go for. Something unexpected, like I

47:12

don't know, not this, because I don't

47:14

know if it fits this game, but

47:17

something like sad, Sad Savrano, where you're

47:19

kind of like, oh, who is the

47:21

Savrano? Why are they sad? Something that

47:24

plays around with kind of, and especially

47:26

I'm respecting that Ricardo wants to have

47:28

the blended Italian and English gear, and

47:31

I think you can do that. You

47:33

just need to find a catchy way

47:35

to do it. Savrano, like Savrano's steel

47:37

or like something like that. Yeah, that's

47:40

that's better. or like something implying like

47:42

a climb or like a battle or

47:44

what again what are you doing in

47:47

the game as part of my hang

47:49

up here where it's like if you

47:51

have a verb in there or something

47:54

that describes yes so my life is

47:56

a king I was just skimming through

47:58

the Wikipedia page it's like a city

48:01

building okay sure you have to like

48:03

build yourself a new kingdom so it's

48:05

like Savrano's Empire. Yeah, so yeah, something

48:08

like that. That's why you get like

48:10

call of dominion kind of tells you

48:12

that this is a game about about

48:15

taking dominion over or something. Yeah, yeah.

48:17

Um, Savrano City. Savrano Spire. Savrano Spire.

48:19

I think. Yeah. Sivrano the Spire. Save

48:22

Sivrano. Slick Sivrano, sly Sivrano. Yeah, there

48:24

are a lot of ways you can

48:26

play around with this. As long as

48:29

it's an alliteration, really. I like the

48:31

alliteration. Well, I just think it feels

48:33

punchier. If you're going to take like

48:36

the Italian name and you want it

48:38

to feel a little punchier, I think

48:40

adding a little, or like something like

48:42

Savrano's Will, which is his original suggestion,

48:45

that to me feels pretty weak work,

48:47

because Will is a weak work work.

48:49

and also because you don't, you can't

48:52

really tell what Savrano is from it.

48:54

Like if you're going to use the

48:56

Italian word, it's helpful to make it

48:59

clear what it is in the title.

49:01

Anyway. Savrano's dominion. Yeah, God, no. Sorry,

49:03

that's just way too, like... It's too

49:06

long? Like two three syllable words. Dominion

49:08

is a tough word. Dominion is like

49:10

one of those that I feel like

49:13

is in a lot of game names

49:15

or a lot of names in general

49:17

that just kind of like flies, goes

49:20

in one ear and another ear. Yeah,

49:22

I mean that's what's tough about this

49:24

list, right? Is it's like will dominion,

49:27

rain, throne, call? Like all of these

49:29

I'm like, these are very familiar. Well

49:31

Ricardo we could do this for hours

49:34

as you can tell you've really I

49:36

think we'd get there I feel like

49:38

we would get there if we actually

49:41

really sat down and spent a spend

49:43

an hour or two on this for

49:45

sure at some point you'd have to

49:47

start paying us I think I got

49:50

it okay Savrano's suburbs perfect That's the

49:52

city builder of your dreams. All right.

49:54

It's the same city killer. It's coming

49:57

at you. Thank you again to everybody

49:59

who sent in their questions. Let's take

50:01

a break and talk about Max Fun

50:04

Drive. So don't skip ahead for this

50:06

one because it's going to be fun.

50:08

It's going to be us going at

50:11

it live talking about Max Fun Drive.

50:13

What does that? Mead, what does it

50:15

all mean? Well, you know, if you're

50:18

regular listener every week, we tell you

50:20

to go maximum fun.org/join. We're like, become

50:22

a member. Pay $5 a month, you

50:25

get the monthly bonus episode. That hasn't

50:27

changed. That's still true now. But during

50:29

Max Fun Drive, if you... bump up

50:32

your membership if you bump it up

50:34

to say $10 a month, if you

50:36

bump it up to say $20 a

50:39

month, you get something extra and you

50:41

only get that something extra if you

50:43

do that during this specific time period.

50:46

And the extras are really, really cool.

50:48

Like this $10 one? Okay. So every

50:50

year we get to design an enamel

50:52

pin, and we've had some really cool

50:55

pins in the past. And I feel

50:57

like I say every year it's my

50:59

favorite pin, but actually though, this is

51:02

my new favorite triple click. It's a

51:04

good one. It's really, really good. So

51:06

if you become an upgrading member to

51:09

$10 a month, you can become the

51:11

proud owner of a lowercase G pin

51:13

that has a game controller on it,

51:16

and it's in the triple click colors.

51:18

So if you know, you know, you

51:20

know. Like this is one of those

51:23

pins where it's like, okay, yeah, I'm

51:25

a lower case G gamer. I'm not

51:27

like a weird, elitist gamer with a

51:30

capital G whose exclusionary and mean. No,

51:32

I'm lower case G. I'm really cool.

51:34

I'm inclusive and open and I'm down.

51:37

That is what it means. That's what

51:39

the pin means. It means you're part

51:41

of the club. So yeah, the $10

51:44

per month. That's, that's. really freaking cool.

51:46

If you want to say to all

51:48

your friends, hey, I play video games,

51:51

but I do not check credit kataku

51:53

in action, then this is the thing

51:55

for you. Exactly. But also, if you

51:57

were to upgrade to $20 a month,

52:00

I guess we should say like the

52:02

theme this year of Max Fun Drive

52:04

is like spring break. So, and there's

52:07

some like very Lisa Frank inspired designs.

52:09

And also, it's like a classic setup

52:11

where if you. you know, join at

52:14

$20, you still get the pin and

52:16

you also get the $20 reward, which

52:18

is like a decision between a really

52:21

cute hat or like a Lisa Frank

52:23

towel for example, or you can go

52:25

to $35, you get like this this

52:28

cooler bag and then you get all

52:30

the previous rewards, etc, etc. etc. You

52:32

can find all of that stuff at

52:35

maximum fun.org/join. But I mean, the most

52:37

important thing here is the pin that

52:39

we especially decide for all of you,

52:42

right? Don't delay, don't put it off,

52:44

don't procrastinate it, just go ahead and

52:46

type that URL into your address bar.

52:49

I know that's always a stopping point

52:51

for people. I include myself in this.

52:53

It's like, I'll just get to it

52:56

later. You're gonna forget, just do it

52:58

right now. Go ahead. And just to

53:00

be clear, you can sign up for

53:02

a new membership. and you'll get rewards

53:05

if you sign up at 10 bucks

53:07

or you can boost like you was

53:09

saying right you can boost your existing

53:12

membership both of those things totally valid

53:14

so whoever you are wherever you're at

53:16

you can get yourself some cool bonus

53:19

stuff and you can get that pin

53:21

one way or another yeah which is

53:23

really all that really matters yeah you

53:26

just you want the pin I mean

53:28

I guess what really matters is that

53:30

you're like supporting the show and us

53:33

not having ads and like us being

53:35

part of a really cool podcast network

53:37

that supports us and we love them

53:40

and we love them and and we

53:42

feel supported by them and that's why

53:44

we still work with them. Dada yada.

53:47

Dada. Dada. Dada. Support artists. People making

53:49

stuff they love. You want the pin.

53:51

You want the freaking pin. We're here

53:54

for the stuff. All right, so that's

53:56

that's that. maximfun.org/join. Happy Max Fun Drive

53:58

to all of you. And

54:03

we are back, Kirk, Ronnie. It

54:06

is time for one more thing.

54:08

I will go first. I just

54:10

read a cool book that I

54:12

want to tell you guys about.

54:14

It's called Dead Money by Jacob

54:16

Kerr. Jacob Kerr, Kerr, Kerr. Jacob

54:19

Kerr is a longtime Airbnb executive

54:21

slash tech guy who lived in

54:23

San Francisco for a long time.

54:25

And he has written this book,

54:27

his first novel that is a.

54:29

twisty thriller set in the world

54:32

of tech. And it starts off

54:34

with the CEO slash whiz kid

54:36

founder of this book's fictional version

54:38

of Uber, which is called Journey.

54:40

And their slogan, man, I didn't

54:42

write it down, but it's hilarious.

54:44

It's like, it's not about the

54:47

journey, like something like that, somebody

54:49

called. And so this guy is

54:51

found dead and this woman who

54:53

is a, who works for a

54:55

big venture capital firm and is

54:57

also kind of like a. lawyer

55:00

slash investigator is paired up with

55:02

an FBI agent to investigate what

55:04

happened and it goes on this

55:06

fantastic path through Silicon Valley and

55:08

all the tropes that go with

55:10

it from like the the co-founder

55:12

who's been sidelined and given the

55:15

bullshit title like chief whatever it

55:17

was probably like an invention officer

55:19

or something to the the VC

55:21

firms and the the billionaires who

55:23

are fighting over which startups they

55:25

get to invest in even though

55:28

none of them are actually profitable

55:30

and It's got it all in

55:32

there. You have the woman who's

55:34

like, lots of things that will

55:36

make me mad. No, actually it'll

55:38

make you very delighted and entertained

55:41

because it's so fun to read.

55:43

This book is really good and

55:45

I'm surprised that it's this guy's

55:47

first novel because it's so well

55:49

structured and well well written and

55:51

just very compelling book. I really

55:53

enjoyed it. I really liked it

55:56

a lot and it has a

55:58

lot of twists and turns like

56:00

it goes in directions that... but

56:02

maybe aren't entirely unexpected, but are

56:04

certainly fun to read because

56:06

they don't. They're surprising.

56:08

I'll say that. They're

56:11

surprising and satisfying and

56:13

interesting. And the main

56:15

character is this kind

56:17

of... six foot one bad ass

56:20

woman who has a really

56:22

interesting backstory that is explored

56:24

in the book. And I

56:26

think I'll just leave it

56:28

at that because she's really

56:30

interesting and you should read

56:32

it to learn more about

56:34

her. And it does some

56:37

good lampooning slash capturing of

56:39

Silicon Valley as you go

56:41

in a very fun way

56:43

that never feels like... annoying

56:45

to a degree that you would react like

56:47

that, Kirk. Like the characters just feel believable

56:49

and interesting and real and you might hate

56:51

them all or hate most of them, but

56:54

a lot of them get what's coming to

56:56

them. So that's fun to read. Anyway, I

56:58

really enjoyed it. I recommend it. It's called

57:00

Dead Money by Jacob Kerr. You should check

57:02

it out. It's a cool book. Maddie, what's

57:04

your one more thing? All right, my

57:06

one more thing is a TV

57:09

show a sitcom is called We

57:11

Are Lady Parts and it's about

57:13

a band a punk rock band

57:16

called Lady Parts. It's fictional. It's

57:18

a sitcom and it's it's a

57:20

British sitcom and it's all about

57:23

these sort of 20-something-ish Muslim girls.

57:25

They're all Muslim girls women I

57:27

should say that live in Britain

57:30

and they're in this punk rock

57:32

band together and some of them

57:34

feel different types of ways about

57:36

Islam but they're all like cool rebel girls

57:39

and the music in this is so freaking

57:41

good like that alone I feel like you

57:43

too would love is just the music of

57:45

the show but also it's really funny like

57:48

at the start of the show it kind

57:50

of feels like it's gonna be like a

57:52

romcom about like the main character who ends

57:55

up being the lead guitarist in the band

57:57

and she like totally slays on the guitar

57:59

it's amazing, but like, you know, she's

58:01

like, oh, I should be like focusing

58:03

on getting married and like settling down

58:05

with a nice Muslim guy and all

58:07

that. But of course, she gets seduced

58:09

by the world of rock and roll

58:12

and joins this band and her life

58:14

goes in this different direction. That's like

58:16

exciting and fun, but she's like very

58:18

torn about it because she's also like

58:20

kind of conservative. And so like it

58:22

kind of follows her, the main character,

58:24

but all the other characters are great.

58:26

And there's like a queer storyline that's

58:28

awesome and unexpected and fun and you

58:30

just get to know all the different

58:32

women in the band and you love

58:34

them but like best of all the

58:36

music is just really really good and

58:38

I've been in bands and so like

58:40

I can really relate to like the

58:42

fights that some of the characters have

58:44

and like the tension and all that

58:46

but yeah this is just like great

58:48

even if you haven't been in a

58:50

band it's just funny and fun and

58:52

about like these really specific human characters

58:55

and what their life experiences are and

58:57

I think It's awesome. Nita Mansour is

58:59

the person who created the show and

59:01

I think she's just like brilliant based

59:03

on this. I think it's awesome and

59:05

I hope she gets to do a

59:07

million more things. So yeah I really

59:09

recommend the show. It's on Peacock. It's

59:11

only 12 episodes and they wrap everything

59:13

up. So hey what's your excuse? It's

59:15

called We Are Lady Parts. It's really

59:17

good. That sounds great. Finish this off.

59:19

When I think of bands fighting movies

59:21

or TV, I always think of Almost

59:23

Famous. Your looks are becoming a problem.

59:25

I actually need a mentor. I said

59:27

spinal tap was an inspiration for this

59:29

because it's a comedy show for sure.

59:31

So like that's maybe a little closer

59:33

to the vibe. Oh, I know. That

59:36

just always makes you think of that.

59:38

Oh, yeah. I don't know. Almost famous

59:40

is pretty funny. It's also dark. Especially

59:42

it's depiction of that band. My one

59:44

more thing is notifications on all of

59:46

your devices. because I want all of

59:48

our listeners to be thinking about the

59:50

role of notifications in their life because

59:52

I have been over the last week

59:54

and it made me realize that, man,

59:56

notifications are very insidious. and they kind

59:58

of pile up in ways you don't

1:00:00

realize. They're like dust bunnies under your

1:00:02

couch. I am, as listeners probably know,

1:00:04

always trying to really keep control of

1:00:06

my attention and keep my digital distractions.

1:00:08

at a minimum because the more distracted

1:00:10

I am, the less happy I am,

1:00:12

it's pretty much that simple. I'm also

1:00:14

less productive, I don't feel as creative

1:00:17

and focused, but really I just sort

1:00:19

of feel bummed out and depressed when

1:00:21

there are a million things pulling at

1:00:23

my attention at all times. And in

1:00:25

this modern technological era, it is very

1:00:27

easy to have a million things pulling

1:00:29

at your attention. So I just wanted

1:00:31

to mention notifications because I went through

1:00:33

on my phone and checked my notification

1:00:35

settings, which you know now has its

1:00:37

own, use an iPhone, it has its

1:00:39

own menu, and I swear, you know

1:00:41

how every app wants to send you

1:00:43

notifications, whenever you install a new app,

1:00:45

the first thing that it asks is,

1:00:47

hey, turn on notifications, can we send

1:00:49

you notifications? First of all, I think

1:00:51

that that should be a sign right

1:00:53

there, that notifications are bad and that

1:00:55

you should never let an app do

1:00:57

it. The fact that they're so into

1:01:00

having notifications turned on tells me everything

1:01:02

I need to know about how little

1:01:04

I want them turned on. It's like

1:01:06

when a restaurant is like no shirt,

1:01:08

no shoes, no service. I mean, come

1:01:10

on, like now I just want to

1:01:12

go in without a shirt to spite

1:01:14

you. It's exactly like that. It's pretty

1:01:16

much the exact same thing. Perfect analogy.

1:01:18

So anyways, I went through and looked

1:01:20

at my notifications and realized that there

1:01:22

were just a ton turned on, just

1:01:24

various things, you know, even... like extraneous

1:01:26

things and essential things my calendar for

1:01:28

example or my messages app they just

1:01:30

are sending me notifications all the time

1:01:32

and as a result when I'm working

1:01:34

my computer up in the corner there's

1:01:36

always a few things there I log

1:01:38

in and there's just a couple things

1:01:41

up there oh this is updated oh

1:01:43

this is some new thing at this

1:01:45

website oh you've got these messages from

1:01:47

this person even having notifications from messages

1:01:49

from messages on my lock screen is

1:01:51

kind of an issue wait why is

1:01:53

that an initiative notification because I wanted

1:01:55

to start there and just See, okay,

1:01:57

I don't have a ton going on

1:01:59

today. If someone needs to call me,

1:02:01

they can call me if there's an

1:02:03

emergency. I'm gonna turn them all off

1:02:05

and see how it goes. So I

1:02:07

did that just to see what it

1:02:09

would be like. And it was great.

1:02:11

I really, I have no notes. It

1:02:13

was fantastic. Looking at my phone and

1:02:15

no longer seeing that I have all

1:02:17

these messages. is wonderful. I really appreciate

1:02:20

it. I can open my phone

1:02:22

and then I'll see the little

1:02:24

badge on the messages app and

1:02:26

I know, oh, some people have

1:02:28

messaged me and then I can

1:02:30

hit it and look at it.

1:02:32

But I don't need to actually

1:02:34

look at my lock screen while

1:02:36

I'm working and see. Jason Shrier

1:02:38

says, Blueprints is so amazing. Oh

1:02:40

my God. You know, I don't

1:02:42

need to have that immediately told

1:02:44

to me. That's like 911 emergency

1:02:46

levels. Good point. Yeah, I think

1:02:48

if you're going to do this,

1:02:50

you should leave on notifications for

1:02:52

your podcast co-host and a couple

1:02:54

other people. Maybe your wife, like,

1:02:56

a couple people should have fun.

1:02:58

You know, I don't think there's

1:03:00

a way to do that though.

1:03:03

I kind of wish there was.

1:03:05

I guess it maybe if you

1:03:07

had like some special setting with

1:03:09

your favorites or something. I think

1:03:11

there is a way to do

1:03:13

it. turn off almost everything. Like

1:03:15

go way, go even further than

1:03:17

you think, and then you can

1:03:19

always add things back if you

1:03:21

find, oh, you know, actually, I

1:03:23

missed a couple notifications I wish

1:03:25

I'd gotten from messages or a

1:03:27

calendar thing or whatever. Go ahead,

1:03:29

turn it back on. But I

1:03:31

would say just try that, try

1:03:33

turning it off, and you might

1:03:35

be surprised at how... just how

1:03:37

much better it makes every moment

1:03:39

interacting with technology feel to not

1:03:41

constantly have all these little bugs

1:03:43

at your periphery, just throwing things

1:03:45

at you when you're trying to

1:03:47

focus on one thing. So that's

1:03:49

my one more thing. It's just

1:03:51

a little idea for anyone out

1:03:54

there who wants to explore it.

1:03:56

Yeah. Yeah. It works for me

1:03:58

really well. Yeah, exactly. I'm not

1:04:00

as I'm not as extreme as

1:04:02

you. Like Jason can still text

1:04:04

me, for example, but you know,

1:04:06

that's just, well, I mean, I

1:04:08

still get, to be clear, I

1:04:10

still get text messages. I'm talking

1:04:12

about notifications. I'm not blocking anything.

1:04:14

It's just about having the notifications

1:04:16

jumping at me. No, I know

1:04:18

what you mean. I know what

1:04:20

you mean. I think it really

1:04:22

works. Especially if you're trying to

1:04:24

concentrate. Good to know. All right,

1:04:26

that is that for this week's

1:04:28

episode. We hope to see some

1:04:30

of you later today in Yerba

1:04:32

Buena Park, Yerba Buena Gardens. As

1:04:34

for the rest of you, we

1:04:36

will see you all next week.

1:04:38

Yeah, see you next week. Bye.

1:04:40

Triple Click is produced by Jason

1:04:42

Schreyer, Maddie Myers, and me, Kirk

1:04:45

Hamilton. I added mixed the show

1:04:47

and also wrote our theme music.

1:04:49

Our show art is by Tom

1:04:51

DJ. Some of the games and

1:04:53

products we talked about on this

1:04:55

episode may have been sent to

1:04:57

us for free for review consideration.

1:04:59

You can find a link to

1:05:01

our ethics policy in the Show

1:05:03

Notes. Triple Click is a proud

1:05:05

member of the Maximum Fun Podcast

1:05:07

Network, and if you like our

1:05:09

show, we hope you'll consider supporting

1:05:11

us by becoming a member at

1:05:13

Maximum fun.org/join. Join. Find us on

1:05:15

twitter.org, send email the Triple Click

1:05:17

at Maximum fun.org, and find a

1:05:19

link to our discord in the

1:05:21

Show Notes. Thanks for listening for

1:05:23

listening. See you.