WEEK IN GEEK: This week, Andrew finds progress in repetition as he plays the new indie video game hit, Loop Hero, by Four Quarters. D. Bethel, on the other hand, finds a lot of quirky charm––despite the somewhat very dark places the story goes––in the new SyFy show, Resident Alien, based on the Dark Horse comic series.
WEEK IN GEEK: This week, Andrew watches the Queen Latifah-starring CBS reboot of the classic crime drama, The Equalizer, while D. Bethel finds a powerful, personal, and moving story about depression and self-acceptance in the 2018 retro-styled puzzle platformer, Celeste.
I'm disappointed in the internet for not using Deep Nostalgia on Vigo the Carpathian, from Ghostbusters 2. I have fixed that. pic.twitter.com/Ql3Rcgn4V5
“Episode 36 – Dan & Andy’s Quality Audio” (13 February 2015): Where Andrew made D. Bethel watch the pilot to Andrew’s favorite show (after Star Trek…maybe), John Rogers’ Leverage by John Rogers.
“Episode 108 – Private Reasons” (29 September 2016): Where D. Bethel and Andrew discuss the surge of reboots of classic ’80s film and tv franchises.
“Sad News Theme” (28 February 2020): Where Andrew discussed his first impressions of another reboot of a classic prime time drama, MacGyver.
“For Great Justice” (19 February 2021): Where D. Bethel talks with Andrew about video game genres and their ability to tell certain kinds of stories (as it related to the bizarre news around Six Days in Fallujah).
INFO:
Visit our website at forallintents.net and leave your thoughts as comments on the page for this episode.
WEEK IN GEEK: As a buffer between episodes about the The Karate Kid movies and talking about Cobra Kai, Andrew and D. Bethel talk about what other nerdy stuff has been occupying their attentions. Andrew talks about the early access release of the Subnautica sequel with Subnautica: Below Zero while D. Bethel is pretty sure he’s playing Rebel Galaxy Outlaw incorrectly as he delivers goods across different solar systems.
If you’re dumb like I am, here’s a quick 5 minute explanation of what’s happening with GameStop and Wall Street $GME. The Robinhood Reddit bros are making millions and essentially took out an entire hedge fund. David vs Goliath. POWER OF THE INTERNET pic.twitter.com/G2iJVeBRsl
2020 was a year that upended all expectations. Though the threats that 2020 brought affected people in a variety of ways, for most it became a year of simple survival. For nerds, of course, we turn to the things that occupy our attention, inspire our imagination, or generate conversation. This year, we are looking at the things that helped us survive 2020. Today, co-host D. Bethel shares what kept him inspired throughout the year.
2020 became a year of self-reflection for most people; for creatives, it became a challenge to find inspiration in new places and ways. Working from home proved to be incredibly difficult when, all of a sudden, my creative, personal space became my classroom. Teaching, planning, and grading at my computer all day made it difficult to walk the two feet to my drawing table and work for another handful of hours on a Long John page. To that end, of all the things to provide inspiration, the sweet and sentimental video game, Spiritfarer, hit hard and unexpectedly.
On its own, Thunder Lotus’ newest game, Spiritfarer isn’t particularly notable. Yes, it looks very nice and the systems and loops are fun to juggle and the writing is top-notch. But it’s not revolutionary, at least not on its own. It’s just a good game. Honestly, that’s enough.
Spiritfarer is a management sim; playing as Stella, you takes over the role of spiritfarer––shepherding souls from death to the afterlife––from a retiring Charon. The majority of the game takes place on your boat that houses the spirits found along the way. During their tenancy, you talk to them, learn their stories, and help them get past whatever psychology holds them back from accepting their deaths. Once they have a moment of clarity, you take them to the “Everdoor” which sends them to their eternal home. For each spirit you recruit––taking the form of a different anthropomorphized animal––you do small quests to help brighten their moods. To do that, you grow crops, cook food, take them to specific locations, or harvest materials they want. With so many different spirits on your boat, your job is to keep all of these plates spinning while also maintaining your boat.
The thing about this game is not what it is, specifically, although––as I said––it’s very good. Instead, it’s about what it represents and what came before. Spiritfarer‘s Canadian developer, Thunder Lotus, is renowned for their amazing art and animation; what they can’t be accused of, however, is being stuck in a rut. Their previous game, Sundered, is a procedurally-generated Metroidvania. Before that, their first game, Jøtun, is an isometric 2D-Zelda-like that had you battling giant bosses to get into Valhalla (I played bothgames on the Dan & Rusty Video Game Power Hour years ago).
Every game differs wildly from the last, with the quality of art and music being the only link between them. This also makes them unpredictable, but not in a worrying, nervous way. There is no doubt that their next game will be beautiful and good, even if I have no idea what kind of game it will be, and that’s what I found so comforting about this game in a year like 2020.
This is not a cinematic sequence; this is just something you can do in the game. Screencap taken by the author (click for a larger version).
While Spiritfarer is wonderful, I find its success validating for the mercurial ethos of Thunder Lotus Games, and for me. Though I’m slow with the output for my western webcomic, Long John, I also know it’s not the only story I want to tell. Seeing Thunder Lotus not only bounce between genres and styles without a care but to also be successful (in terms of execution) with every game they make shows me that a similar desire to bounce around with my own creative endeavors is not only possible but can absolutely work when done with integrity, thoughtful intent, and earnest excitement. Those qualities seep through Spiritfarer on every level (pardon the pun), and they were more than welcome in a year like 2020.
WEEK IN GEEK: In the lead up to the holidays, Andrew binges the entirety (so far) of Amazon Prime’s original series, Man in the High Castle, while D. Bethel has been playing the delightful yet simple Cat Quest in short bursts.
RELEVANT LINKS:
The charming Nintendo Direct where Mario & Zelda creator, Shigeru Miyamoto, guides us through the new Super Nintendo World theme park:
WEEK IN GEEK: This week, Andrew watches the recent Netflix-made video game documentary series, High Score, and gets inspired to finally check out the very strange––and controversial?––game, Night Trap. D. Bethel finds serenity as the ferryman of the dead while playing Thunder Lotus Games’ Spiritfarer, a game that is a far cry from their previous games.
“Episode 107 – Spock’s Screams” (23 September 2016): Where D. Bethel discusses playing Thunder Lotus Games’ first game, Jøtun.
“Shortcast 28 – Linguistic Bravado” (11 August 2017): Where D. Bethel discusses his time with Thunder Lotus Games’ second game (to which he contributed through Kickstarter), Sundered.
In two of the “Dan & Rusty Video Game Power Hour” shows, D. Bethel plays a bit of Jøtun:
INFO:
Visit our website at forallintents.net and leave your thoughts as comments on the page for this episode.
#CAPITALISM: With Disney taking ownership of the 4th of May, Andrew and D. Bethel talk about the role of ownership in public discourse for a bit.
MUNDANE FANTASY: Looking at where the world is now, and with the meteoric landing of Animal Crossing: New Horizons, D. Bethel and Andrew wonder––why do we love playing games about working…and love them?
WEEK IN GEEK: This week, after giving a brief update on the announcement of IMDb TV’s revival of Leverage, Andrew talks about his experience playing Coldwild Games‘ delightful trading simulation game, Merchant of the Skies while D. Bethel finally got around to watching Netflix’s The Witcher.
RELEVANT EPISODES:
Episode 31 – “Post-Op Dan” (09 Jan. 2015): Where Andrew discusses his impressions of John Rogers’ post-Leverage show, The Librarians.
WEEK IN GEEK: This week, Andrew dives into the CBS All Access archives to get caught up on the surprisingly good––and suprisingly different––remake of the ’80s action show, MacGyver, while D. Bethel dives into the surprisingly compelling Zelda clone/shopkeep simulator by Digital Sun, Moonlighter.
“Episode 108 – Private Reasons” (29 Sep. 2016): Were D. Bethel and Andrew discuss another successful (at the time) television reboot of a popular ’80s action property, Lethal Weapon.
This year we are hosting a variety of looks back at 2019 as hosts and friends-of-the-show offer up the things that defined the year for them. Today we have our other co-host, Andrew Asplund, looking at the 2019 that was (to him).
For all intents and purposes, 2019 was a big year for all things nerdy and geeky. There were big movies, big video games, big TV shows, and big just about everything. When I looked back on the year, something stood out to me and it is encapsulated pretty well by my experience at PAX West back in September: despite being at one of the biggest game conventions in the United States, my notable memory from that event was my experience at the nearby parallel event, the Seattle Indies Expo.
What I realized was that 2019 became the year in which I began actively seeking out small studio and independent video game titles in lieu of more standard, big studio content. This isn’t mean to suggest that I never really played indie games before or that I entirely eschew big studio content. It’s more that my overall preference (at least with respect to video games) has changed enough that I noticed.
Exceptions aside, it’s hard not to see the AAA video game market as a testament to … playing it safe. It’s a place where companies are willing to spend millions (or tens of millions) of dollars on a game title, which means their willingness to deviate from the standard of “what works” is minimal, to say the least.
From Indies With Love
In contrast, my interest in indie content, whether it be small studios of one or two developers or larger “triple-I” studios, has increased significantly. This year, I have dedicated seemingly countless hours to playing indie games. And, to an extent, I feel like that’s what has come to define my memory of 2019, at least insomuch as it relates to nerdy and geeky content.
I’m not necessarily looking for games that are this indie. Image source: 3909 LLC.
It’s not that I’m on some adventure to play especially bizarre video games. I’m far from somebody who is looking for video games that are #hashtag #edgy. As important and envelope-pushing as a game like Lucas Pope’s Papers, Please is, it’s not the kind of game I want to spend hundreds or even tens of hours playing. But, there’s something about a lot of these indie titles that I engage with. So often, these are games that a small group of people put a lot of work and feeling into. Not to say that big budget AAA games don’t have work and feeling. It just resonates with me that indie titles feel more less like a million dollar dog-pile and more like something that I could do with my friends.
It helps that 2019 was also the year that I completed a certificate in web development. What I originally started as something that might help me build a cool cooking website turned into something else entirely. An in-class assignment putting together a basic adventure game opened my eyes to the web as a tool for delivering game content; this eventually took me down a path of extremely amateurish game development. I started to really relate to the … allure of indie game development.
This is the kind of stuff big AAA studios just don’t do much anymore. Image Source: Picklefeet Games
Perhaps, for all intents and purposes, that’s why the Seattle Indies Expo became such a benchmark for my 2019 and a reflection of something that had been going on for me since the year began. Getting to actually meet the developers of games like Wildfire Swap, The Wind and Wilting Blossom, or Monster Jaunt really gave it all perspective. Maybe it’s just a little dose of childhood fantasy given perspective. As a young person I always dreamt of making games “when I grow up.” In a sense, 2019 was the year that I finally remembered that.
In the end, my look back on 2019 is a personal one. I have been playing a lot more indie games than I used to. I have started following more indie developers on Twitter and other social media. Honestly, I’m just trying to pay more attention to all of the creative people out there making their mark on gaming. And, as we move into 2020, I hope to start getting more involved in those communities as well.
