Welcome to Remember 64, where this week, well, we're simply
going on a quest. Hello everyone, welcome to the
show. And hi if you're returning,
listener, reviewer and welcome if this is your first time
joining us on Remember 64, here is where we play and discuss the
good, the bad, the ugly and everything in between throughout
the N64's library. My name is David Pitrangelo, not
Brian, but I am wielding elements of power throughout my
journey in this strange medieval like world.
I am not fending off monsters, instead I am doing all I can to
fend off totally bad vibes this games gets online.
I mean come on guys, really Jiggy look back here once again.
Hello, how are you? Oh, I'm doing fantastic.
I'm here and I don't know why I think of that.
Is it? I think it's from The Hobbit
where he yells I'm going on an adventure, but you know, it's
quest so. I had never, I never watched The
Hobbit movies. I never got to them.
Well, yeah, I don't know. I'm, I'm up and down on the
whole the, the, the trilogy's good.
It's pretty good. I just, I'm just not the Lord of
the Rings guy. It's just not my thing.
That's just. Oh man.
I know, I know, I know that's hey, I might get a lot of that
this episode. So but but we have a very
special guest. Of course, we are going to be
talking about Quest 64, one of the if not the first person that
anyone's going to be thinking of out there.
If you are online in the gaming sphere, as many of us are, if
you're listening to this show, you of course know of Quest 64
official or Mike is here with us.
Welcome to remember 64. How are you?
Great. Thanks for having me guys.
Always a pleasure to talk about Quest with people who like the
Nintendo 64, as opposed to talking up the Nintendo 64 to
people who don't want to listen to it.
Yeah, no, we, I've said this a couple times where it's never
been the top of my favorites list, but as we've done this
show and continue to, I've loved it more and more than I than I
thought I I ever would. Because we get to play games
like this, You know, we get to experience games that I never
played before, Jiggy's never played before.
You know, that's a great way to sort of explore a library of of
games that there's a much more there than the typical titles,
right. So I think that's a great place
to start. Let's just head right into it,
Mike. I know that there's, you know,
you've talked about this game quite a bit with Quest 64 and
everything, but let's start from like the beginning with where,
when, how with the Nintendo 64. What what's, what's your story
with it? My parents got my younger
brother and I in Nintendo 64 Christmas of 96.
It was supposed to be a surprise but there was a huge first party
controller shortage near the end of the year.
So after my dad was my dad was working full time and going to
college full time and he would get home late and it's, you
know, I live in the Northern hemisphere like you guys.
So it was dark in December by 5, you know, 5-6 o'clock, whatever.
And a bunch of nights in a row, he was just disappearing after
work. And one night my, the whole
family got in the car with him 'cause we were even going to the
grocery store. And then he said something to my
mom and we ended up driving like 45 minutes to a Best Buy that
was way out of the way. And they got a second controller
there, a Super pad 64, the like black one that's kind of oblong.
Yeah, Yeah. Yeah.
With metal stick. And so that kind of ruined the
surprise. But they had been looking for a
couple weeks for any second controller pad for my brother
and I. So then we opened it that night
and yeah, it was, it was, I mean, it was like mid to late
December, so it's not like it came really early, but they were
obviously really excited. So and it was, you know, that
that was it. My parents had always been
really good about getting us video games, but they didn't
really play a lot with us. My mom would play Bomberman and
stuff with me on occasion, but this was the first system where
they were like really involved. We made sure to get 4
controllers eventually when they became available.
We played lots of stuff together.
It was just Mario at the beginning and then I bought
Turok the next spring or summer whenever it came out in 97 with
some money. Otherwise it was just renting
things like Wave Race and whatever Blockbuster had. 9697
was pretty light on games so. But yeah, it was, I mean it was
great. I love playing games with my
with my family and eventually Quest got into the Blockbuster
rotation and after my mom saw me renting it quite a few weekends
in a row, he decided to save the family some money and just
bought. In.
I wonder, I don't know this offhand.
I actually should have. Sometimes I look this stuff up.
I want 'cause you know, there's a whole a lot of discussion
right now in the gaming space about how expensive gaming is
and what gaming games cost and stuff.
There was quite a few cartridges that were 708090 bucks
sometimes, you know in in the mid to late 90s.
This console among them. I I don't know, I wonder what I
wonder what quest cost you said oh, save some money and stuff.
It's true if you keep renting the same thing for you know, 7
bucks 8 bucks every every weekend or whatever it costs at
the time. Eventually you're going to hit
that $100 pretty quickly. So, but I wonder if it was, it
was probably like a standard 60-70 bucks I assume for the
game so. I personally, because I remember
because it was my money, I bought Turok the second week it
was out. And that was at Walmart in
Wisconsin. And that was 8999 without tax.
So it was 95 bucks my, my whole 100 bucks with to, to then have
Turok, which I wasn't enamored with when I got it, but I felt
like, you know, financially committed to playing it for six
months. You had to fend your fend
through the fog no matter what. Yeah, I know that one of the,
one of the. Records show that that was, he
said, a price higher than the current Mario Kart coming out,
and people are just up in arms about the price.
I'm like. I yeah, well, we are, we are
literally just just like what, a couple days away as we sit here
right now, a couple days away from switch to being in people's
hands. So that's one of the reasons why
this is being a big, a big discussion.
Yeah. Actually the, the Mario Kart, I,
I think I've said this, I don't know if we talked about a Jiggy
or not, but like in in Canada, the Mario Kart's almost 120
bucks. Like that's oh man, insanity.
Will that change? I have no idea.
I'm not getting a switch to at the moment anyways.
But like, I'm not eager to pay that for any game.
I don't care what it is like, you know, but but similarly,
like how you mentioned, like it was 8999 for Turok at the time.
I remember in, I guess it was in 2000 when No Mercy came out.
I was a big wrestling fan at the time and I was like, I gotta get
this one. WrestleMania 2000 was amazing.
The end and an end of your game is awesome.
My cousin had that great. That was the same thing.
It was like 90 bucks and I think I probably walked in there with,
you know, $100.00 of allowance or whatever it was and it was
gone. I, I don't regret it at all
'cause I love that game and I actually still have the actual
cartridge, but it's like, that's not nothing, especially for a
kid, you know, that is a significant cost.
So yeah, it's, it's, I mean, it's a lot now.
It's a lot then it is what it is so.
Yeah, that's I kind of like the argument is kind of like bad
faith all around. You know, there's a lot of
people our age being like, oh, you know, grow up guys, games
from, you know, and they show like a systems adjusted for
inflation or what if what we paid for late Super Nintendo
Genesis game. Like, no, it was bad that they
were expensive back then and it's bad they're expensive now.
Like hobby being expensive is bad for everybody.
Like we don't need justification for for things being too high.
The high prices are bad for everybody all the time.
Yeah, it's it sucks either way. It's it's coming out of your
wallet, you know, like it doesn't, it doesn't matter if
it's a then or now. So, so, so eventually you got
Quest and and played that one. Obviously we'll talk about that
game in a minute, but was it, were there other games that were
not the typical, like you mentioned Bomberman, you
mentioned Mario games and stuff, but like even Turok is somewhat
I, I would consider that sort of like in the realm of what a lot
of people may have played at the time and stuff.
Is there anything that was not the quote UN quote stereotypical
sort of choice for the 64 that you had 'cause I know Jiggy has
tons of those in his experience and I did not growing up.
For me, it was all very much like 90% was the typical stuff
that everybody played and everybody had.
Did you have any of those sort of like hidden gems like Quest I
would say is one of those as well.
But was there any other of those like in your rotation, whether
it's rental or ownership or anything?
I've got a few buck. Bumble was really big in our
household. Still have an affinity for that
game. My 2 cats are named Bug and
Bumble as kind. Of like a.
Fall back to to that game. My brother actually got that for
like his birthday or something and then didn't like it and then
I loved it and then he got jealous of me loving it.
And then we played the multiplayer a lot.
So that's a that was a big one. Wayne Gretzky 3D hockey.
We played a ton of. Sweet trying.
To think of other ones, See, I played a lot of sports, so NBA
Showtime is like my favorite sports game on the system.
Probably a lot of people talk about End Time because they like
the way it looks like NBA Jam, but I think Showtime was even
better than that. So we played a ton of that.
And then like you said, wrestling games.
We had Attitude, we had WrestleMania 2000 and we didn't
have Revenge or or No Mercy. We had original on World Tour
Attitude in 2000. We played the hell out of 2000,
even like, just making some popcorn and setting up an entire
pay-per-view with our like, created characters.
And then you. Know a bunch of normal
characters and then watching just like the matches play out
for two hours while we ate snacks and stuff was that's
amazing. I love, I love the character
creators and some of those too, like the no mercy one I go back
to sometimes, like I put in the cartridge.
What was it like? I don't like a month ago or
something like that. I'm like, ah, I got to play a a
round of the, you know, whatever, one of the one of the
belts or something, right. And I was like, Oh yeah, a
couple years ago I made John Wick.
Like it's just a guy in a suit that kicks a lot and punches,
doesn't really do a lot of wrestling moves, but like, I
love it. It's just stuff like that.
It's just it's a blast. And he's like super overpowered,
like every kick, like takes a huge amount of damage off and
stuff. That's awesome.
So as far as Quest goes, was that, I mean, you said in, you
know, obviously it's it's hard to just sort of come across
these games and stuff Was Quest like, I guess you, you obviously
you rented it for a little bit and then when you sat down and
like fully played it, was it one of those experiences where
you're like, Oh yeah, like I remember like this, this hits
with me. Or did it sort of take some time
'cause let this happen with a lot of games that are among
favourites for people? No, it was pretty.
It was pretty instant. I'm older, so I played some, you
know, 16 bit RPGs right up until we had Nintendo 64.
I was playing Final Fantasy four or two here in the Americas
right when we got it. And I remember the like, like
culture shock that was going from, you know, that game to W
64 where everything was, you know, it was like like Grand
Theft Auto 3. I was able to like run around
in. Environments that were.
You know, like 3D modelled and, and then do random battles and
and turn based stuff. And I mean it.
I don't want to compare those two games in the, you know, like
quest 64 is like just a masterpiece, just like Final
Fantasy 4 is. But I mean, it was something, it
was enough to capture my imagination in my in my teenage
years and see how cool RPGs were going to be moving forward.
I hadn't, I didn't have a PlayStation yet, though I had
not played Final Fantasy 7. I had friends playing it and
Parasite Eve and a few other games.
I did eventually get into them and I like obviously I recognize
how great those games are, but they have a lot of that same
like Final Fantasy style abstraction where like you're in
the overworld and cloud is huge. He's the size of the.
Of the building. The High Wind and every city,
yeah, yeah. And Quest didn't have that.
It was like playing Mario RPG before Paper Mario came out.
So. It.
Was a cool combination of stuff and it just, it gripped me and I
haven't been able to let that feeling go for, you know,
decades, no. Hey, that's OK.
You don't have no one's asking you to hang on to it, Jiggy.
What about you 'cause I my, my history of it is just, I haven't
played it till now. So I'll, I'll get into details
of how I felt about it and stuff.
But what about you? Did you play this before?
Is it? Was was it among that pile that
you and your dad went through at one point?
So actually really funny. So I did own it.
I only watched it be played once.
My friend played it and I never, I just never played it.
I I had it, I owned it. I was.
In the house it was it was feet away from your, from you.
You could have. It was one of those I think I, I
got it and like a like a yard sale or something and it was
like in between or like right when I got my game cube and
everything. So I was sort of not that I
didn't go back to my N64 collection quite a bit, but when
I did, I would always go back to Banjo Kazooie or Banjo Tooie,
you know, like the games that I really loved.
Like I'd go back and just replay those before going and playing a
a bunch of different games. Like Quest just was one of those
that I had in the in the bucket, but I didn't, I didn't really
gravitate to it. Right.
For whatever reason, I had a couple games like that, you
know, but I I did have Buck Bumble.
I played that on Bomberman 64. I played that like there's some,
there's some good, good bangers in there.
I think it's just one of those like even as a kid, there's not
enough time to enjoy every game, you know?
And some games just unfortunately didn't make the
docket before I transition to the next console.
Don't even get me started on my Switch library.
And I'm getting a Switch too, so.
Oh my God. Same deal I guess.
Yeah, I was just gonna say, see, that's the issue that I run into
over the last decade. I would say 1 because, you know,
you get older, you get a job if you want to spend some money for
yourself. Like a lot of mine goes towards
video games and stuff related to video games, obviously with the
background behind me. But you know, as a kid, for me,
for me, for the 64, I didn't have a massive library, you
know, and I always gravitated towards, I mean, no mercy was
later, but like I put weeks and weeks of my life into that game.
But like I always played Mario Party.
I always played Mario 64. I always went to, you know,
Ocarina of Time eventually when I got it, always went to Banjo
cause like it was very much those ones.
Diddy Kong Racing was probably actually the game that I played
for the longest amount of time because it's so much earlier in
the life cycle of the, of the console.
But like I just, I just don't, I just, I just, it's so crazy that
like there's this console that we're talking about that I have
a podcast for and stuff. And I'm just like, yeah, I don't
know. Never never even really heard of
this game like. That's the best part.
That's the best part yeah, it is it is a lot of fun for it for me
so to to do that. But but let's let's talk about
the game itself. Let's talk about quest 64M.
We'll we'll get to you in just in just a SEC.
Obviously there's going to be, I will tell you right now, there's
going to be more than a few times that I, or more
specifically me, but that we will probably need to be
corrected on something that we're talking about, whether
it's like a fact or something like that.
Feel free to stamp all over us, man.
It's all good. But 'cause I, I, I go into this
again, I go into this with very little experience knowing of it
and never playing it. So, you know, seeing a couple
scenes here and there, but not even physically like sitting
there, like you said, Jiggy and watching anyone play it.
I never even experienced it that way.
So I've only seen some battles. I've only seen some, you know,
areas and stuff that that you can find online and stuff.
So I think my initial impression, my first, let's say
couple of hours of this was, oh, this is this is to me, this this
game looks pretty good. The character models are pretty
fun. I love how colorful it is like I
I do really like that sort of uniqueness of it.
But I do think that right off the bat I was like, oh, this
feels very early Nintendo 64, very early 3D anything which
which we run into quite a bit with this console.
It's early 3D. They're trying to figure things
out. It is what it is, right?
And I don't know that that feeling ever really left as I
played the game. I do feel like there's a lot of
points where it definitely does better than that.
It improves and feels like, oh, this is very ambitious.
This does a really good job of this or this.
But overall, my overall feeling of it was, oh, if it if this
came out maybe like a year later and they had more experience
with the console or they had a little bit more time for it to
cook. Although sounds like the
development of this wasn't exactly simple, I it would have
sort of maybe hit with me. But I'm also coming into this as
someone who did not play Final Fantasy four or two, did not get
into RPGs early, really just dabbled with them 'cause friends
had them. I don't even know if I ever
owned an RPG until Zelda. Maybe like a Korean of time, if
you want to consider that to be like a quote UN quote official
RPG. Like I was too young to sort of
get into those things probably for the Super Nintendo and the
N64 came along and it was Mario Kart and all the things that
I've that I've mentioned already, like that's kind of
what it was. So I think maybe if I had it at
that time, it would have blown me away a little bit more and
stuff. And I don't, I don't dislike the
game. I just feel like it was, even
though it took a while to get to where it is, I think with the
story of how it's sort of been developed and all these things
that we'll get into and stuff, I still felt like it was a little
bit undercooked. But I don't think it's a bad
game. I do not think it is like the
worst RPG or the worst game. There is a lot here to enjoy and
a lot of really cool ideas, especially for this time of when
these these types of games are coming out.
So absolutely, yeah. Jiggy, what?
What about you? Is there 'cause you, you played
it all the way through just like a month or so ago or a few weeks
ago or something, right? Yeah, it was, yeah, maybe a
month or two ago, I can't remember exactly, but I played
through it and it was really. So the first thing that gripped
me. I actually, I love the movement.
I I started running around as Brian and I was just like, this
feels really good. Like just.
He has definitely nailed it, that's for sure.
Nailed it running. It felt his animation.
I find his animations like. I like the animation itself,
it's just. It's so fast that it throws me
off. It's just like, chill, dude,
chill. Like I thought I had, I thought
because so I had to play this in order for me to sort of properly
get through this. I had to emulate to play this on
my Steam Deck. I didn't actually get to sit and
play it with the with the N64 specifically this time,
unfortunately. I thought it was an emulation
problem at first when he first started running.
Not gonna lie, I thought something was up.
He's just, he's cooking. Yeah, He's moving.
He's booking. No, I really, I, I enjoyed it
going through. I I definitely feel I I sort of
had the same feeling that I had when we played body harvest
where there's a lot of like houses to go into.
But when you go into like it's sort of like empty areas and
kind of big open and it's not bad.
It's just I don't know if it needs more time to cook.
If if I mean, you could probably say that about anything.
It just feels a little, a little empty.
Could be early and 64. It could be just development and
everything, I don't know, But I did.
I got like a Body Harvest vibe. But I, I really overall, I was
enjoying it. I went in with the mindset, you
know, watching this guy in his Twitter glory just sharing about
the game. I'm like, this is there's no way
this is a bad game. There's just going right.
There's nobody in the 100%. I was like, there's there's
value to be had here. And like everyone always says,
oh, it's it's one of the worst N64 games and it is certainly
not. I've played far worse and even.
Like, like I said, when we were, what we were just talking about
was like, we, we played, we played Power Rangers, man.
Like this is not the worst. Yeah, you really hated that one.
Oh my God, I fucking hate that. I did not hate that one like
you. Did I just?
I think it's just a complete waste of time.
It's so funny, though, I, I think about this, and because
two games always come up in the conversation when we talk about
like the worst N64 game, and it's always Superman and this
game. And to be honest, I have fun
with both of them. Like Superman, treat Superman
like a sandbox. Go in the training mode, just
fly around. It's blast.
Yeah. Pick up the.
Car go swimming like a dolphin. I have fun with that.
This one a. Multi killer too.
If you guys haven't played multiplayer Superman, it's.
Awesome. Oh yeah.
It's like, yeah, it's like flying around in your machines
and like, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, Jiggy talked about it and
me and Jake were sitting there recording and I was like, wait,
what? That's what it is.
It's so it's such a weird thing, but I wish I I wish I played it.
I would have been just experiment with it, you know
what I mean? Just yeah.
Yeah, it's so weird. My my only issue with this game
is it's very grindy. Random battles happen like every
two seconds, but you don't get enough experience from those
battles and you have to sit there like the game itself
realistically if it wasn't so grindy would probably be like
two or three hours. Like it's a pretty short game
but with grinding it's like what, 8-9 maybe I think.
I think I I did it in yeah, probably.
I probably did it in nine ish, maybe 10.
Yeah, I mean, you could solve that by just throwing more of
those souls around the world, which I I appreciated that they
at least gave you an option to kind of level up a little bit
quicker. It's almost like they
acknowledged it and they just kind of slapped the Band-Aid on
it real quick. And I'm fine with that.
And I love collecting stuff, so it's like perfect.
But overall I, I think that the charm, for me, the charm puts it
up a peg. I really enjoyed it.
I actually really enjoy the graphics.
I love this, this sort of early N64 look it has, but it also has
sort of like a cartoony over the top style.
Yeah, I was. I liked it more than I thought I
would. So yeah, that's that's where I'm
at with it. Nice.
Mike, Tell me. Tell us how much you totally
despise this game. No, no, no.
I will not. I'm hanging up.
I will not. A lot of the feelings you guys
have are obviously valid and that resonates with the video
game community. That's why you see some of the
things you see and hear the things you hear about it.
A lot of people saw the graphics and expected it to be like when
you see Mario or Ocarina, you know, 64 graphics.
You expect a certain type of game, and this game is not that
game. It's much more traditional RPG,
just with those kinds of graphics.
You know, it's more akin to the first couple Final Fantasies or
the first couple Dragon Quest games off of the NES and SNES
where, yeah, you like, there is random battles all the time.
And with like Dragon Quests or Dragon Warrior over here, you
were one person. You weren't a party.
You were just one dude getting killed over and over again.
And that's how you your experience that was leveling up
like that was get your ass kicked and then and then pull
your bootstraps up and and go at it again.
So to, to like, if you came from that kind of game and expected a
traditional RPG, then this game is like it's pretty, it's pretty
like bang standard for, for levelling stuff.
But that's not what the Nintendo 64 was known for.
And it's it's certainly not the audience they were shooting for.
Like you said, it's it had four controller ports, like right on
the front of the system. It was for multiplayer games, It
was for having your friends over.
It was for experiencing, you know, Mario in 3D and and
Lincoln 3D for the first time. This game just like didn't
resonate with a lot of people in that same way because it's not
an established, you know, franchise and it wasn't the
genre that the system was known for.
So I like it. No, I get it.
Like, I, I understand that this game is definitely a me thing
and not an everyone thing. And I'm just trying to get it in
more people's hands, I guess. And like, give it a give it a
shot in your 30s or your 40s. You're not 12 and waiting for
your turn to, you know, play Mario Kart.
Absolutely. It.
I think it helps too to have sort of a, a base knowledge of
what you need to do in the game too, like leveling up.
I, I on live stream, I had some folks that were like, Hey, level
up your water step first so you get a healing spell, you know,
like just those little tips that you could.
Which you told me too. And I was like, oh, that's what
it does. And like I, I does the manual
tell you that I, I should have checked and maybe it does, but
yeah, it does, right. So yeah, yeah.
So really like. I mean.
Yeah, like, OK, so at the. Time would read the manual
anyways. I, I mean, I, I would have gone
through it, but but now that's not physically in front of you.
Like yes, you can find them online, but like we've said with
multiple games on this show, like I am not inclined to always
say, hey, I'm playing this game for the first time.
Let me go find the PDF of the manual.
Like you can do it, but it's just not the first thing that
pops into my head. I could have done it with this
and I didn't and and that's I fine, but I don't know that
that's necessarily a shortcoming of the game either.
Yeah, I think there's I think there's something to be said
that you can get into a game and just pick it up and play without
having to read instructions or do anything.
And I don't think, I don't think you need to look at instructions
to play this game. I'm just saying it, it helped my
experience having some people on streams being like, hey, I
suggest you level up your water spell.
You know, essentially it was like don't level up your fire.
And I was like, all right, sounds good.
And I'm so glad I followed them and actually levelled up rock
the most because that ended up being like the spells that I
would use throughout the game. Magic barrier.
It's been a minute. I can't remember, but the one
that just drops rocks from the sky, like yeah, once you once
you can watch something I. Think.
Once you can attack multiple enemies at the same time with
one attack, it's like, all right, this game is, it's
speeding up, let's do it. Yeah, I like, I, I really enjoy,
you know, for me, I have again, very little experience with RPGs
around this time. And every once in a while I'll,
I'll, I'll play 1, you know, that's newer and stuff, but I'm
just not the RP like not the quote UN quote JRPG guy, which I
know that not every RPG is a traditional JRPG that would be
made around this time or whatever, but I'm not, I'm just
not that guy. But I like the battle system in
this. I find like the sort of movement
restriction sort of balance that you have of moving around the
sort of battle arena and stuff to be really, really fun.
Because there's a lot of games that have come out in the last
20 years, let's say that. And there's even games that are
coming out today that are saying, you know, it's turn
based, but it's active. You know, that's the battle
system. And that is exactly what this
is. You know, it is an active
system. You are able to move in the
middle of an enemy's move. You're able to move around the
battlefield, but you're still taking turns to hit each other.
And I think that like, that is one of the ideas that this game
has that is better than a lot of games around this time.
I think, I think it really excels in that.
And is it like absolutely perfect every way in every way
that you you sort of execute your moves and stuff.
Sometimes you, you turn a little bit to the left or the right and
you you miss your opponent. It's like, OK, really.
Like, OK, I guess I got to sort of figure that part out or, you
know, but the fact that that the you can just sort of manipulate
the battlefield almost in a way is fantastic.
And I really, really like how they did that from the first
first battle, early, early stuff.
You realize, oh, this is doing something different here with
these battle systems, even though we are taking turns.
And I think that to me that is that was my favorite part is
that. And yes, it is OK, select your
select your move, you know, see, see buttons do that, you know,
sort of cycling through your, your abilities, like a lot of
RPGs do it from the time especially.
But I don't know, I just the that uniqueness of, of being
able to, to move around the battlefield and have the sort
of, you know, circle around you and, and be able to escape when
you get a chance to all that stuff I found to be to be great.
So I don't love random battles, but I like that I can escape
these ones without having any issue.
Yeah, I don't mind. I don't mind random battles like
I love, I love Pokémon, but at least you have the security of
knowing you, you need to be in the grass to engage.
So you could potentially like avoid it.
I love Mega Man Battle Network, which is a little bit more like
this like as if you're on the net, you're running around,
you're going to encounter random battles.
I just felt like they were really, really frequent.
Like you can't go like 3 steps without getting a battle.
And if you, if you do, if you do like have a stretch where you
start running, you're like, whoa, what's wrong?
Like, am I about to encounter a boss or something?
Like something's about to happen.
But the battle system, it's, it's funny, I just made that
Pokémon comparison, but it's like it took what, 25 years?
And now a Pokémon Legends is kind of following this framework
of like an active battle where you can like run around in the
middle of it. Oh does it do it that way?
I have no experience. Pokémon Legends does, yeah.
I know it's not the only game that does it, but it's I, I.
It's, yeah, it's, it's cool. I like that aspect too.
It also gives you some, some extra challenge trying to like
aim your attacks and things. Cause not all attacks lock on
like the rock attacks. There's the one that comes in
from the side. It just like rolls in and yeah,
if you can aim it right, if you can kind of line it up right,
you can hit multiple enemies and if you can't, kind of suck.
I'm a I'm a huge Pokémon Legends RCS fan too.
There's probably something to be said about those two.
Also the aesthetic style, you know, I was probably drawn to a
for a certain reason. They got a, they got a lot of
same stuff going on so. Dude, Legends was that was like
one of my, I'm excited for the new one, but that was like, that
was so refreshing to me when I played that game.
I hadn't been hooked on Pokémon since like Soul Silver.
I, I think maybe I, I played X&Y and I did really like X&Y.
But then like since then I've been kind of like, yeah, OK.
And then legends came out and I was like, this slaps.
This was. Awesome.
I have so little Pokémon, as we've talked about so little
Pokémon experience the before. Before we get too, too far into
it, I wanted to sort of mention, I wanted to find, Speaking of
like reading the manual and stuff every once in a while I
want to sort of find like how, how was this game sort of
described at the time? Like for me, I don't have the
box for this. I don't have, you know, I, I
sifted through sort of some magazines and stuff like that.
But the back of the box, for example, is a fun way to sort of
look like, how did they, how did they sell this to you at
Blockbuster? For example, if, although not
every blockbuster, not every rental place had the boxes out.
Sometimes it was in their own. I don't know if that's how it
was in in your guys stores, but it was like the cartridge, the
actual box for the game wasn't on display.
It was the plastic box that just had the name of the game or the
movie on it. And yeah, OK, wasn't just me.
I thought maybe it was just a Canadian thing.
I don't know. So the back of the box it see it
says a massive adventure RPG. So this might give people an
idea if they don't quite know exactly what it is.
But I can also, we can also obviously describe the story and
stuff too. But it's just Keltland, right?
Or my in my print out that's it's Keltland, right?
That's the way I say it. That's right.
Yeah, yeah. I don't know why I questioned
myself, but Keltland has been cast into chaos by the theft of
Elf Hill's book. The The Mystical volume contains
the secrets of the Spirit Tamers control Brian, a magician's
apprentice, as he explores the expansive countryside and
villages on his quest. If he does not reclaim the book,
the Kingdom of Keltland will be cast Into Darkness forever,
including over 50 deadly spells, fifty 100 characters in it, and
unique battle engine boom. Yeah, that sounds sounds pretty
epic. I I always laugh every time
because I forget his name is just Brian.
Which is. Just like the most normal name
you could have given him. It's so.
Funny. It's awesome.
It's so funny I he's. A normal dude, he's just an
apprentice. He's just a little guy and it's
in obviously it's, it's Countland.
So it's it's like inspired by, you know, Celtic Scottish stuff
and that Brian is like a super traditional boy name from that
time and that place. And people like like to make fun
of it, but like man, like she's just a normal guy.
Why? Why wouldn't he?
Why would he have some crazy name like Cloud or Squaw?
Would he just? Like a normal?
Is it like a like a 12 year old kid running?
Around I just felt like what is the name of the the book?
Or L tail. It's just like L tail when you
throw in names like that, Yeah, then Brian feels off.
It's like if everyone had a normal name it'd be one thing,
but it's like stop the all these like crazy.
Stop the evil. Stop the evil, Ryan.
Oh, no, here comes Paul. Like just things like that.
It's I, I found it to be really weird.
I thought maybe it was like, oh, it's a lost in translation type
thing, which does happen from time to time, right, With games
that are released. But this was as far as I
remember, as far as I can remember, the this was released
in North America. Was it first or it was OK?
And then there was one of the differences too is again, I'm
just going off of sort of some of the notes I wrote down and
stuff like that too. Is that like through the
development, there were supposed to be, or there could have been
multiple characters that you could choose or play as, which
is really interesting. I, I don't know why I didn't
have it in my notes, but Mike, what's, what's what they were,
they were all like sort of different classes, were they
not? Yeah, they are character models
that are still in the game. They just were kind of cut from
the from the playable. Yeah.
So you'll find, yeah, you'll find Flora eventually in the
game. She's a little red and blue, got
a little sword kind of thing. She was one of one of the
support characters. And then Kiliak, who ends up
being the pirate on the ship that you meet with Khalil later
on, he was the third kind of like tank, tank character.
But those were the three playable that got.
Yeah, obviously that got chopped.
Yeah, lots of things got chopped, but what we got was
pretty cool, so. Yeah, yeah, it's it.
I think I think that could have been pretty interesting to sort
of have a choice whether whether it's a team thing or whether
you're playing individual like like you do in this.
I think I think it sets itself apart like you mentioned
earlier, Mike, how like you are adventuring on your own, you
know, and I think that sort of reminds me a little bit of of
the name thing where it's like, yeah, he is just this kid, yes.
He's just, he's not some wizard yet.
He's not this big fantastical character yet and his name's
just Brian. But I think like the expectation
is, oh, it's an RPG. You know, it's has this turn
based system. It's this, it's Final Fantasy.
So someone has to be named blah, blah, whatever, Sir.
This that's I think where some of that comes from.
And I like that. It just doesn't care.
And it's just, you know, it's it's Brian and we're doing our
own thing pretty much from the beginning, whether it's a name,
whether it's the way the characters look, whether it's
the high on caffeine run that he has, like whatever it is like
it's do, it's doing its thing. So.
I had to give him a fancy hairstyle though.
That's that's a requirement of any RPG main character and they
nailed it. It's alfalfa, is what it is.
Alfalfa. Yeah.
What did what did you Jiggy? What did you think of sort of
like the story and stuff? Was that, did that kind of sort
of keep you going or was it more like I, I just, you know, I like
the battles, I like the areas, I like the sort of, what did you
think of sort of. As Oh yeah, absolutely.
That's what kept me going. I wanted, I wanted to see what
happened. It I, I wouldn't say that the
battles kept me going. I I, I got frustrated with how
grindy it was. That was, that was that was the
only, that really was the only thing that I was just like, man,
if I didn't have to sit here and grind to progress to fight this
boss that I want. Like I just want to fight.
I want to, but I'm kind of one of those people to like I'm not
I'm either super into a side quest and I forgo the main quest
and I'm just like, oh, that side quest was amazing.
And then I never like and then I just keep going down that rabbit
hole and keep doing amazing side quests and never finish the
story or I'm all into the story and I just forego like most, if
not all of the side quests. Like it's just kind of how I how
I play games. I don't know.
It kind of depends on what draws me in.
Side quests almost feel like because it's an option, I have
more of a choice of like, oh, like like a game like Witcher
that's like massive. I still have not finished it and
I just, every time I go into the game, side quest, side quest,
side quest. But for quest appropriately
titled, the quest was the main draw for me.
Yeah. And I liked, I liked seeing the
new bosses too. Like every time I felt like
every boss was pretty unique and different 'cause you start out
with the thief and then it just gets like really weird at the
end. And I like fully wanted it to
get weird and it it delivered and it was awesome.
I, I was gonna say I'm glad that this like this game is, is
despite Brian being the hero, this game's weird around Brian
in a lot of ways and. You know what, because I'm
looking at it now, looking at the monsters that popped up,
that was one thing that made the grinding like more tolerable
because like occasionally new monsters would pop up that I
hadn't seen. And I was like, oh, that's neat.
It was kind of like the same, the same draw I get from Pokémon
with a random battle. You're like, oh, that's a new
one. You know, right.
It it was it was cool. And they especially when they
got kind of like spooky and freaky looking.
I was like, this is this game has like why?
But I love it. Why is it doing it?
Yeah, that's fair. Yeah.
These these particular ones that we have pulled up here where
he's he's running through the forest and and fighting these
big sort of, you know, trees, demon trees, Yeah.
Demon trees, yeah. Yeah, they got.
Frog Night. Yeah, yeah, it was like lots of
lots of epic epically designed. Like it's just they got together
and they were just like think of ideas and they just drew out
these characters and they're like, sure, that could be sure.
Just threw into the game. It's like there's no there's no
cohesion, but that's what makes it cohesive.
You know, it's like that's. Awesome.
That's true, 'cause some of the enemies pop up in it and it, it
felt like to me, a lot of the time I was like, oh, this this,
this guy, this guy doesn't belong here.
Like, sure, a tree in a forest. OK, that's fine.
But then. Yeah, no, absolutely.
That makes sense. But then there's, you know,
there's a a mix of different characters in random areas and
like, is it really that bad? No, but also.
It's like it not making sense is what makes sense.
And I, I, I'm into it, I like it.
It's silly. Like you got any like favorites,
like areas, enemies, bosses, things like that?
So kind of going through some of that stuff.
Big Mouth is a community favorite.
It's the alligator crocodile looking thing at the beginning.
We may, we have lots of fun. Bing Chan is one of the world
record speed runners and his wife has done like some crazy
Big Mouth art. So Big Mouth his friend.
We all, we all love Big mouth. Later on, we always anybody who
streams the game for the first time or when we watch speed runs
or when people are doing races, everybody celebrates.
When you get to Mammon's realm and you're on the blue yellow
path where it's just blue, yellow, blue, yellow, like
bricks all the way across. That's a that's another personal
favorite and fun like community favorite time.
Like you said, the music does some really crazy things when
you're in the like trippy Mammon's realm after anything
after Baragun, I guess at the end is is lots of fun.
The weirder it gets, the better, I guess some of the other
enemies like I, I, I've been like jokingly doing this because
I'm ramping up for, you know, quest anniversary month here.
But like I've just been picking random enemies and then like
saying I'm going to post about their lore and then just like
showing a picture of them. And that's the entire lore.
Because obviously, like you're looking at here, like the blood
gel with the eyeball with the eyeball side of it.
That's the whole story. Like if you play the game like
you fully understand it's just some, some weird dude with, you
know, with a, a character model you're not gonna see anywhere
else or only in like crazy RPGs. And you just understand that
that's part of the game. Like that's why I'm playing this
since I'm I'm playing it for the weird dudes.
Yeah, that's, that's The thing is, is I it almost because so
when you're running around, especially early, I was like,
oh, I was a little underwhelmed about the world itself 'cause I
was like, oh, this is like like Jiggy you mentioned sort of
going into the buildings. The body Harvest thing is
actually a really good comparison because it's it's got
some size to it. This I think feels a little bit
more closed off because there's more, there's actually more like
literally walls and cliffs around you.
Whereas in Body Harvest it's kind of just like they don't put
walls, but you, you just can't go over that Cliff sometimes or
you just can't go in that area. So they just sort of make it
look open, but really it is sometimes an invisible wall.
So I was like, oh, this is very like empty.
There's not enough to do here. And, and ever from time to time
I still got that feeling. I don't, I don't think it's very
populated per SE, but it's always populated with different
weird freaking enemies and, and, and I think that like that
really like leans into its personality, whatever the
personality is of this game. I don't even know how to define
it. It's it's so mixed, which is
kind of like what we've been talking about.
It's like it's fun, it's colorful, but it's also really
strange and crazy. And I think it's sort of hits
this weird like middle ground where I, I, I can't quite put my
finger on it. And again, I didn't dislike
playing it and stuff, but every once in a while I was like, oh,
I wish this did this or I wish this did this.
You know, I, I think the one thing that is a big part of this
and we're talking about sort of some of the levelling systems,
is it, it doesn't level like a traditional RPG or now a game
would. If it's a action game that has
RPG elements, you know, sort of built into it where you have
some levelling and stuff like that.
You don't level with experience per SE.
You level with the more you use a spell and you then you collect
these little are they wisps? Is that what they're called?
I can't remember exactly what the name is.
I think. Are they just souls?
Is that what it is? The little little ones, things
that you collect throughout the the game?
I like the idea, but I don't know.
I don't know if it's like like it looks like just like an
environmental like, oh, there's a a raindrop or oh, there's like
a steam coming out of the ground.
I was like, sometimes I like, I didn't know that that's what I
was looking for and it looked like it was almost like a
mistake sometimes because of where they're.
Placed the the Donkey Kong 64 fan of me just loves collecting
crap. So like looking for those was
like part of the fun for me. Yeah, I would yeah, I would I
would say put more make it make me level up like let me get God
tier. I wanna, I wanna be, I wanna be
50 by like the Second World on everything.
Like, it would have been fantastic.
It is fun when you're super strong in this you're that's
true. Like it does take a lot of that
grinding, which is not my favorite mechanic in in any
game, regardless if it's RPG or I guess those are mostly RPGs.
But but yeah, when you are overpowered, when Brian is is
kicking ass with his with his spells, like it's pretty cool.
And I don't know if it's because like, oh, it's just some kid
killing a bunch of monsters and bugs and whatever.
It's like, oh, that feels so unexpected.
I don't know if that's part of what the feel is.
But it's underpowered though. It's like.
Yeah. Terrifying because you're in a,
in a like when I first go into The Cave, like the first cave
you go into and like everyone that was watching my stream were
like, oh, watch out for the Wyvern or whatever it was.
And I was like, oh, OK. And they're like, yeah, you
probably, you probably won't encounter it like right away,
but just be aware that it's in there.
First encounter. Like it popped up and I was
like, oh, no, This is why you were talking about this giant
freaking dragon thing. And no, it's like I am not even
close to being enough to fight this right now.
Yeah, that for me, games in general, when they do that
doesn't really doesn't matter if it's this one or not.
It's like I, I don't know if I love that mechanic in general
where it's like you don't know that you need to be way more
buffed up or levelled up or something to be anywhere close
to being prepared for this, you know?
Do I need everything spelled out for me?
No, I don't think that. I think there's fun and
exploration like finding the souls and stuff too.
I was like, I found a couple early on and I didn't know that
that was one of the mechanics. And I was like, oh, this is
cool, great, I get to find these things.
But I do wish there was more actually.
And I do wish there was like a little bit like, I don't know,
instead of them just being in like this random corner of an
empty space. I wish there was like, I don't
know. I don't know what it is.
I don't know what would solve it per SE, but I feel like I wanted
them to be implemented in a more organic way, but I don't know
how it like I don't know if it's part of like a reward or maybe
I'm just looking for a more traditional RPG system and it's
just not there. And that's that's a me thing.
Did you guys, did you guys visit the start menu screen a lot and
like like look at your progression and look at your
stats? And eventually, yes, eventually
I did. Occasionally, yeah, the.
The system itself is like big if you've played Final Fantasy 2,
which is the one that we didn't get over here until later they
got we got it on PlayStation and stuff.
But it does this exact same kind of like leveling system where
like it's just use based or we have we eventually got it in
something like like Oblivion, like The Elder Scrolls game.
So you like jump and it levels your agility, that kind of
thing. But that like the, once you
start like exploring the menu and like really honing in on
what it's doing, then it like makes more sense.
Like getting hit like by spells, like increases your defense.
And you know, then you see your defense meter go up as stuff
hits you. And the same with MP, like every
time you use win cutter 2 and like eight of those little win
cutters hit all eight of those give you all the successful
hits, give you MP and then your MP bar, you know, you have a
longer MP bar, let's you heal more, which lets you know, yada,
yada, yada. So it is like traditional.
But once again, if you didn't have the manual or you didn't
like go digging and like really make yourself cognizant and tune
yourself into what's going on. Yeah, it's, it's, it is like an
obtuse way. It's not like, oh, I killed a
guy and I got 3 experience points.
It's I let this enemy beat on me for 15 minutes and I ended up
getting like 10 points in the defense and, and three HP and
like it's very like, like Excel spreadsheet kind of stuff and
not so much, you know, a number and, you know, number goes up
kind of stock. Yeah, yeah.
You you get a plus like that you.
Know, by the way, I I remembered something else I didn't like.
There's no mini map. There's a compass, but there's
no mini map and I did have to open up the start menu and like,
it's not it, it's not the first thing.
It needs to be the first thing. I fucking hate that it's.
Like can you just like at least lock it on that screen?
I hate when games do that in general.
It does. It doesn't matter what game it
is. It's like if this is a game
where like exploration or sort of, you know, you have a quest
to go north, you have a quest to go this this many meters or
whatever, like just just make the map.
It doesn't have to be the most detailed thing.
Even in this compass is is something.
But the compass doesn't do anything in in like a cave like
we're looking at right now. It doesn't do anything.
You just look for an open space and you're like, OK, I'm going
to walk this way. And like that's where it's sort
of kind of guiding you to go and that's fine.
But in an open space, like it's just, it could just be right
under or on top of the compass and just be a very basic, here's
a house where you started, here's the general area where
you need to go, and that's it. Or.
Press Start and it's the first thing.
Everyone on my stream was just like telling you they're like,
use your compass, use your compass.
And I'm like, it's not instinctual to me.
I'm not used to using your compass.
I'm not going to remember that. Do you also hate analogs?
Go north. I'm like, Oh my gosh, fine.
Jiggy, do you hate analog clocks?
Can you read those? I can read those, but just.
It's such a waste of time when when I can just look at my
phone, 'cause we have an analog. Now that you say that we have,
we have clocks in my office and I will never look at them.
I'm always just like. One of the so I'm I'm big into
like print media, like magazine strategy guide, stuff like that.
And one of the things I did last year was destroy one of my
quests prima guides because there was no scan of it online.
And the cool thing about that is the really detailed maps that
are in it. So I, you know, scanned it with
a crappy Epson like desktop printer and put it up on archive
so everybody can do. Because that's makes a big
difference if you're especially if you're just a streamer who's
just trying to get through the game and have some fun and enjoy
it with your friends online, Like having the maps of the
dungeon and having the map the overworld is, is.
Yeah. And it it makes the game more
fun. I mean, one of we didn't talk a
lot about regional differences, but one of the.
Yeah, yeah. That was, that's something I
meant to talk about. And then I just sort of, yeah.
We'll just touch one of the the important things is they on the
the big map, which you talked about on the start screen is
they let you have a like oblivion style, like destination
marker. So you could drop a pin and then
on the map, you could kind of see which way you were going,
which is, you know, and the, the the road signs were legible.
So when you'd run up to them, it would tell you this city is this
way, this city is this way, this city is this way.
The Cave is just. That'd be so none of.
That. Like.
Yeah, none of that made the the Rush translation over here, and
El Tail came out almost a year later, so they fixed all that
stuff for the Japanese release. Yeah, it so.
So tell me, have you, have you played the Japanese release or,
or? Yeah.
Is it? On a couple copies of.
Is it, I mean, there's there's these quality of life things
like UI and things like that that, that make part of it more
enjoyable and stuff. But like, does it largely play
the same otherwise? Like is there a massive
difference? Yeah, OK.
Oh, it's mostly the same. There's like there's significant
things like there's critical hits and like like if you, so if
you end up doing a lot of like staff bonks, like the hitting
with the staff, there's like kind of a Mario paper Mario
timed double hit mechanic. So if you like press the staff
button right when you're hitting correctly, you can get like two
hits instead of one kind of thing.
But as far as like mechanically, pretty much the same.
You got more items from the monsters.
They realized that they weren't dropping as much, which, you
know, was hindering people's like progression.
And they added, you guys saw the end.
There's a big long like cutscene at the end of the Japanese one.
It takes about 10 minutes to get through it.
That gives you like where is everybody afterwards and all
that stuff. And that wasn't, you know, it's
just an end screen. There's a translated version of
it online that you can, you can like read through and see the
see the screens. It's really cool.
But all that stuff I think would have helped, like Quest Legacy
in the Americas, 'cause, you know, I don't want to call us
like simple, but, you know, having stuff handed to us during
a time when, like, video games were really important culturally
would have done a lot for people's, like, overall
perception of the games. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I think that's that's a very good point.
I think it's it's almost like the the Japanese, you said it
was roughly a year later. It's almost like it's like a
director's cut. Like it's kind of like that kind
of thing where it's like, yeah, we realized like, let's add
these things that we couldn't do or let's make these changes or
whatever. And then you mentioned this sort
of time mechanic. I forgot that.
I sort of looked up that that was the case.
I instinctually tried to do that when I started playing this game
on all of the moves, not just the not just the staff hit the
staff bonk thing. I was like, oh, it feels like it
like it 'cause it just the way that it's presented, the way
that the spells work, the way that he hits them with the
staff, like it feels like it was meant to have that.
So it totally makes sense that that would be something that
would be introduced that they would, you know, use at least in
in some way. I think that could have
actually, as much as I enjoyed the the battle system as is, I
found like, I feel like that could have just added 'cause I
think like we, we've done an episode on it, but Paper Mario,
for example, is just fucking fantastic and.
Part of it. Yeah, part of it is that I love
it. It's.
Outstanding. You should have loved it.
And it's still the only one that I've played.
I need to play the other ones. And, and, and you know that that
mechanic is in a whole bunch of games now, not just that
franchise, obviously. So a very big game that's
amazing. That's out right now.
As we talked about this uses that almost exactly.
Everybody needs to go play Expedition 33.
It's amazing. It's a I'm trying to think like
what the yeah, you know what, my biggest yeah, just my biggest
gripe is is the random battles like I just even in Pokémon,
like early Pokémon, which is I only have experience in the
first two gens, maybe 2 1/2, even though you have to walk
through grass in those games. I'm just like, are you like, are
you kidding me? Like I it just that's not your
capability. Just not anymore.
Jiggy, you, you talked about how
you have to walk through grass and you know, doing color.
Did you, did you stay on the roads in this game?
Because let me tell you, there is a heat like a heat map
mechanic where if you stay on the roads and in the center,
like the frequency of the battles is lower.
And the further you get away from the roads into the grass
and then to the, the battle frequency is significantly
higher. So if you're trying to like cut
corners and get places faster, that really like increases your.
100% that's exactly what I did. I'd always be the shortest,
shortest line to my destination. That was me.
Wow, I did not know that and that might change one of my
biggest gripes honestly. I mean, it's still 90.
Let's be clear, it's still frequent and it's still
frequent. Like even on the roads it's not
like you're getting like 5 minutes without a a battle
because you're running on the road.
It's just a less frequent. Oh man, well, I mean we're
talking, we're talking, we're talking literally like 3 steps
and that's Brian steps which are very fast.
And then it's like another battle and I'm like, and then
I'll always, I think what it is too.
It's the combination of not only the frequency of the battle, but
not having enough MP and you regenerate your MP by running by
running. So then I'd be like, OK, I need
to get my MP back up so I can actually, you know, attack and
battle. I have three MP.
I've got to escape this battle, escape, walk three steps, gain
like two more MPA battle. And I'm like, I can't fight
right now. Like leave me alone.
And now damn it, one of the thing, it's not a huge deal, but
it's a little strange that you have all these towns and there's
no like shops per SE. Like you can't, you can't buy
items. Items are either given to you by
MNPC or they're like in a treasure chest.
And it's just, I don't know that that's one of those things.
I'm like, if you had a shop and I could like just buy a bunch of
like, not that I was ever lacking either.
Like that's another thing. I feel like they're they're
fairly generous, but I would want the the good items that are
like 150 health, you know, versus 10 MP.
Like, I'm not going to use something like there's no
currency. System at all like there's no
it's just go in, walk into a walk into a, a a house or
building or whatever. If someone's in there, they
might give you something great. Now you got something out of it.
Walk around that corner. You find a chest great.
Maybe you'll you'll get something that's that's used a
lot. Of it and.
Stuff I like. Chess, I like that, but it just,
it feels like, it feels like an RPG thing just to have a shop so
you can like get items or or accessories or something.
And yeah, it's just give more, give more use to the towns, give
more, give more use to them. So like it's never like been
confirmed, but like diegetically because we're creating you know,
Quest 64 lore as we go through the years here.
There's not a lot of like development history of the game
outside of like pictures and like stuff like that.
But the last boss is Mammon, who is the the brother of hell
that's associated with greed and wealth.
So like what we've speculated over time is that the whole game
is trying to show you like every town is willing to give and give
with, you know, no capitalism, no currency, nothing like costs
anything. The end boss is literally greed,
you know, So yeah, it could have used money and the sequel, like
did have a currency like thing in it.
Obviously it never came out. But like, it is cool to think
that, you know, everywhere you go people are giving you things
for, you know, you get the wings to return to the towns for free.
If you don't have, you know, if you don't have dewdrops or mint
leaves or bread, somebody is willing to give you one for free
because you are the one that's going on this quest.
Yeah, it would be traditional to have like, shops.
But like, like I said, energetically or like within the
lore of the game, it's it's cool to that like there is no greed.
There is no like no hoarding of stuff, you know, and, and
killing a bunch of enemies just to buy more, just to have more
things and buy more stuff because the end boss is
literally, you know, the the greediest, most hoardy demon in
hell. So that's.
I love that. That's a great.
I never I hadn't heard that that's I'm going to go with
that. I like where that's going.
That's pretty sweet. You know, it, it's not a it's
not a massive issue. I don't think either of us are
are saying that, but it's, it does feel like sometimes like I,
I think for for me, and I think Jiggy, you touched on it a bit
too, is, is like, I wish there was more interaction and things
to to a reason to keep me in the towns.
You know, whether they were bigger, whether, you know, I
like meeting people. I like sort of discovering those
in RPGs and, and sort of not every dialogue has to have a big
dialogue tree that leads you to a bunch of that site 'cause
that's totally fine. I will go into a town or an RPG
and just talk to everybody, even if they're not giving me
anything 'cause I just like it helps you really like live in
the world. And some of the characters, you
know, they, they give you a sense of that you do have an
idea of kind of what's going on and stuff.
But you know, it's, it's not terrible, but give me a little
bit more to care about why I want to keep this town safe, you
know, for example, or why I want to.
Yeah, I love stuff like that. I love the the concept of NPC
saying just like stupid things. Like I I would love to just have
an NPC just go up to and he just says like I like bread and like
that's it. Like there's nothing else.
You know, I'd be like, I like that guy.
Well then, give me some bread. I need some health.
Let's go give. Me.
Some bread doesn't give you bread, that's the thing.
Oh yeah, he's the only one that doesn't.
Give you. Totally unrelated.
Gives you bread. That guy just likes bread.
You have to find the Baker to get the bread.
You can't just talk to the guy that likes the bread.
Yeah. And he's not even in the bakery.
Yeah, I, I think, I think overall I would still, I, I
think we sort of touched on it a bit, but I, I would, I'd
recommend people check this out. Like I, I don't think that that
you're going to, I don't know that a lot of people are going
to say like, oh, this was the greatest RPG experience I've
had. But I don't think it's, it needs
to be like a lot of these games that we've played have some
pieces of them that are, you know, it's, it's imperfect, but
So what even games now have tons of that.
So embrace what this like offers for you.
I think it just does take some getting used to if you haven't
played a game that is 1 of this era, 'cause I'm sure there's
some people listening to this or that have seen the game or seen
yourself like online that that don't have experience with a lot
of games from this time. This.
I don't know. Would you say, Mike, that this
was like, this could be like a good starting off point?
Or would it be something like, oh, maybe it's after you've
played a couple RPGs of the era, then move on to this?
Because I feel like it has a vibe of that, but I don't know
if that's the way to go or not. I mean, I just not like I've
never seen anybody post that Like Quest is baby's first RPG
or something like that. Sure.
OK. But I mean, honestly, I mean,
it's a good like starter RPG, but I would think you would get
more enjoyment out of it, especially like exploring the
leveling system and the combat mechanics and all that stuff.
If you have your foot, you know, in the pool already had played
some, some other some more, some more traditional, especially
like 2G2D, like Super Nintendo or Nintendo RPGs or Sega RPGs.
But it's not a requirement. I, I, I think anybody can pick
this game up and enjoy whether you like RPGs or not.
But I also think you could be immediately turned off before
you even get to the first boss by, you know, getting getting
your ass handed to you before the 1st, you know, before you
get to Dondran or Mel, you know, like it.
It just you can be that way for some people.
Yeah. And it doesn't click with you
then and then you decide you never want to pick it up.
And I get it, like it, it so I, I don't, I suggest it to
everybody, but I suggest a lot of Nintendo 64 games to
everybody. It's it's part of who I am.
It's like if if you haven't, I get it, you don't like sports
games, but like if you haven't tried things like, you know, NBA
Hang time or you know, international superstar soccer,
like you're missing out on some like really cool period piece
video games and like a whole branch of like history.
Like you don't have to be in the simulation sports to play a game
that's, you know, well put together and mechanically fun
and stuff. So and with Quest, even if
you're not into RPGs, maybe the vibe will click with you and
they can just be a vibes thing. That's fine.
Yeah, I, I think I got that's me.
And not that I dislike RPGs, but like I said before, it's not,
it's not the first thing I go to.
Like, I don't gravitate towards them and say I just need to dig
into a, you know, whatever, However long hours, hours of an
RPGI just have that itch. I never really do.
But when I give them a chance and I, and I play them a little
bit more or, and I just say, like, I got, I got, I'm going to
put myself into this. And a lot of the time it works
out, you know, but it's just not the first thing that comes to
mind, so. For me with with RPGs in
particular and the reason why I kind of like this one, RPGs tend
to be really over complicated and explain everything in like
the first like 20-30 minutes. It takes forever to get.
Going, it takes forever to get going and like start into the
game. This kind of throws you in and
you're just like you're there and you got to figure it out.
I appreciate that. I like that more because I don't
like when you have tutorial, tutorial upon tutorial and it
just keeps going. And my instinct when that
happens is to skip it. And I'll be like, if I play for
like an hour, I'll probably figure it out.
And if I can't figure it out, it's too complicated and I don't
want to play it. And I have.
Like you guys played poker battle yet?
Has that been on the on? The no, that's, I mean, it's on
the docket, but I've never played it and I just hear it's
like the deep N64 RPG. That's all I know.
Godspeed to you guys then be the first hour of the game is
literally a tutorial. So do you need it like to be
perfectly honest to understand the game?
If you don't have like a like a fully wrote out beginner's guide
from a friend that's played it, you need that first hour of the
game. But it is hot.
Like you can be, you know, 30% done with Quest 64 by the time
Ogre Battle 64's tutorial is done.
Yeah, yeah, I feel like it's it's a trend with adding so many
mechanics in RPGs. That that's what it is, is it's
it's sort of adding and adding that and you're right, that's
actually a really good thing. I mean, maybe that's that's
something we should have said like off the top, is that off
the top? This game does just say like,
hey, this is the situation. Go yeah, go, go down get get out
of the castle and and figure it go and then hope there's a
thief. OK, go.
And it's just one sort of like lead you to a boss to another,
to another and stuff. And all that is is good.
I like that that approach, that approach that this has is it
feel like, yes, it's an RPG, but it just feels like like even
more of an adventure game. I don't even know if that's
really makes sense to differentiate them.
But, you know, a traditional action adventure game is get in
there and get shit done. Whether it's, you know, fast
pace or slow pace doesn't really matter.
That's what this is sort of presenting in an RPG sort of
shell, I guess, in a way. Yeah, Yeah.
I think, I think that's good. I think that's a good thing.
So it's good. The only thing we haven't gone
to, I wanted to. I don't know if this is the
right place to do or not, but the music, the music's awesome
in this game. I found the music to be one of
the best parts. I loved it.
I don't know if you guys have the same feel, but I want to see
if this is this. I can't remember exactly all the
music but. Oh yeah.
I can't hear it, but I'm just going to trust you guys that
it's great. Probably holy playing some of
that. But yeah, Mastanici Amano, the
composer of this, is like, he'll really like prolific composer.
He's like done stuff, yeah, on video.
This is his only like Nintendo 64 video game credit.
But he did like Onamisha 3. He did a bunch of other video
games and then he was he did music for Evangelion, like the 3
+ 1 movie and for some of the Berserk anime episodes.
And he's like all over the place, did some Quinn Tarantino
movies and stuff too. It was it was cool that they had
such an experienced composer in the game.
And I, I have this. I love the music so.
It's great. Every time the battle started, I
was like, yeah, here we go. It was.
It's good, It's good. Yeah, that was one of the things
that I was like always. I was, you know, Mike, you
mentioned a little while a vibe. It's always vibe in the music.
I was always. I like the sound effects, the
music. There's all the sound design in
this is really good. Some of it sounds simplistic,
but I I don't mind that at all. Like I just, it's fine.
I don't care if it's just a little ping when you find
something or a little ping when you set off a you know, he
opened the chest a little sort of.
Also the animation of him opening chests is fantastic.
He just smack just. And it's quick.
It's Alzheimer.
Yeah, yeah. It's, it's he's got, he's got
more muscles behind those arms, these tiny little arms than we
thought. He just and boom.
Oh. Yeah, it's absolutely.
And that stick is so durable. Crazy.
Right. So much abuse and it's just not
a scratch on it. And it it it doesn't break when
you use it too many times. Weird.
No, not at all. How that's like, you know, weird
how how in RPGs that just doesn't doesn't happen
sometimes. I don't know.
I don't know about that. I didn't didn't realize that
back then. Everything was just made more
durable I guess. The good old days I feel like.
I just don't make them like they used.
To they just don't make them like they used to.
Mike, I know that that your, your sales pitch to a lot of
people is like, yeah, you, you, you should play this game.
You should give it a shot and stuff.
Do you, do you feel like, like I know that you have a lot of love
for this game and stuff? Is is it one that you feel like,
Oh no, this also just holds up? Or is it just like, just try it
and give it a shot? Like is there something extra
there? Or is it more just like, you
know, this is just just go for it?
I'm so I'm kind of like a naysayer for people who say
that, you know, I art doesn't, you know, it doesn't hold up.
Things don't like a or age well, or I guess is the way that you
hear it with a lot not really my thing.
I, you know, I totally believe like, you know, I don't want to
call this game the Mona Lisa, but like the Mona Lisa, you can
tell it was painted, you know, over many years ago.
Or, you know, you can watch the original Star Wars movies from
decades ago and know that they were made, you know, 40 years
ago and still enjoy them without being like, oh, these, you know,
these practical effects don't hold up to today's stuff.
You know, the, I'm, I'm a big proponent of, you know, meeting
a game where it's from, you know, meeting a game on its own
terms. So going back to Nintendo 64,
yeah, I, I think it's great holding up.
I think it plays like a Nintendo 64 game.
Like if you're, if you like Nintendo 64, there shouldn't be
a bigger pitch than to like play more Nintendo 64 file games.
And we're getting, we're seeing that resurgence now with ES1 and
N64 graphics coming back into games like like Crow Country and
like KIRO Quest just came out. With Mark.
Kirkos But I mean, people have nostalgia for this.
I'm not blind to my own nostalgia for the system or this
game or 90s and stuff. Like I obviously like it more
than people who didn't live through it and play through it.
But there's still something for, if you like video games, like I
would think that you would like want to go back and see why, why
platformers and this, you know, like so Jiggy's games, Donkey
Kong and and Banjo, like why, why are those so popular in the
90s and why don't we have them now?
It's because that was that was the thing that was the that was
the environment, that was the games we played.
And this is just one of those games.
It's a very like Nintendo 64 coded traditional RPG that's got
a lot of that same aura to it. Yeah, yeah, it's got that's that
late late to mid 90 or mid to late 90s sixty 4 vibe with this
awkward generation of of consoles and games and there's
something to be experienced there that is that is great,
which is exactly what we're going going through games like
this and stuff. Jiggy I I think you're kind of
on the same page. Let's check this game out right.
Let's. Yeah, absolutely.
I think, yeah, I think you should go play it.
I think you'll you'll be like me and going in with the
expectation that it's not one of the worst games on N64, which
why do people say that? I just I like I can there's
certain games I could be like, OK, like you can justify this.
Like Sonic O 6 is like the the like I was so hyped for that
game that was the biggest let down ever because it's a glitchy
mess. I can't do anything like the
demo was better than the actual game, but this is a game that I
played through. I played in its entirety.
I got to the end. I I don't see why people rag on
it so much genuinely, I it, it plays fine.
The graphics are good like music's great.
It's got a nice story it's charming.
I I think it's worth a shot. Am I gonna go replay it 50,000
times? No, but I don't regret playing
through it. I think it's worth the play
through. So yeah, give it a shot,
especially if you like N64, like he said that was that was the
best. Like you like N64?
Play this game. Add this to the list.
Yeah, exactly. Yeah.
Before we get out of here, Mike, if anyone hasn't found you
online, if, if you're on other shows, if you're doing other,
you know, you said June is a big month for Quest 64, all that
stuff. Once you don't, you plug your
work out there. Yeah, I don't do a lot anymore.
It's mostly just Blue Sky right now.
Yeah, Quest 64 official on Blue Sky.
I try to just trying to change the the gaming discourse.
I guess I'm an an algorithm manipulator.
I like to make people look at the things that I'm listening to
and the things that I want to want people to see.
It's just trying to make things more positive, getting the good
podcasts out there, getting people playing games.
It's kind of my passion before I get too burnt out with being
online and disappear forever. I'm not making any money from
any of this. So once again, just like the
game, it's all vibes based. I'll just disappear.
Nobody will ever hear from me again.
But yeah, June is is quest diversity.
June 10th is the anniversary of the game.
It'll be 27 years this year though.
There'll be lots of I got lots of people streaming the game.
It's some some rather big name streamers coming on to do some
stuff. I just did 2 episodes with Pixel
Project radio. Rick Firestone over there did a
great job putting up with me for like 6 hours of Quest podcasts
to do, like in depth story Beat looks at both of the N64 and the
Game Boy Color RPG games which just released today when we're
recording. But I don't know when this
episode will come out, but it'll already be out then.
So but yeah, lots of stuff going on.
We'll have lots of giveaways this month.
I'll be giving away a bunch of copies of Quest and promoting a
bunch of other stuff. And then in July, I disappear
for a couple weeks and that's it.
So as as you should take a load off, man, Take a load off.
It's all good. Yeah.
And Jiggy, you're busy as as usual, I think.
As I always say, right? Oh absolutely.
We're wrapping up Mumbo May, finishing off actually tying it
in sort of with the GBA episode we did with the Banjo Grunty's
Revenge. As of as of this release, that
would be already out. So if you want to play and
listen to us talk about the two Banjo Kazooie GBA games took a
little detour into Handheld land, we talked about those.
Yeah, long, but you get you get the analysis and discussion on
it. And then I did a, a mysteries
video on, well, I'm, I'm doing a mysteries video.
By the time this recording comes out, it'll be out Grunty's
Revenge Mysteries. So that'll be pretty fun.
Just kind of make some cool connections there.
And finishing Mumbo May and jumping into Jumbo June and just
continuing it 'cause I loved it. And I will be doing some switch
to content though I will say that much 'cause I'm pumped for
it. I'm excited.
So she's gonna be out. Nice.
Good times. You can find remember 64 on if
you're listening to this, you probably know that it's on
podcast feeds, of course, so you can find it there.
YouTube as well, video versions of all these episodes.
If you are listening to this, you can check out that things
that we're referencing that we're talking about and look at
our beautiful faces of course. And also just random videos that
I come up with like Mike with his meme extraordinaire on his
account. Every once in a while I come up
with a stupid idea in the middle of the night and I'm like, hey,
I'm going to make a really silly video out of that and I do that
or it'll be short clips from episodes and things like that.
So you can check that out on YouTube as well.
Remember 64, of course, you can support the show at
patreon.com/remember 64 show every single episode you can get
early and you can make sure that you, you know, have a little bit
of extra content here and there when I can find the chance and
have the energy. But kids, am I right?
So yeah, that's that's pretty much and and work God life.
But we got we got a plan. If if you're, if you haven't
checked it yet, check on socials as well.
Remember 64 show mostly blue sky Instagram every once in a while
on Tiktok as well. That's where you'll find it.
And got some pretty good games coming up as well after after
this one. So some racing games.
Looking to try to get perfect dark in at some point as well
but. Another rare game?
Let's. Yeah, another rare game, but
yeah, a lot of good stuff coming up in the next couple of months,
so stay tuned. And Mike, thanks so much for
joining us and putting up with our experience through this
game. No thanks for having me, it was
great. Jiggy, we'll talk to you soon.
Thanks everyone for for listening and watching and catch
you next time I remember 64 Ciao.
Let's be do the the outro.