In this episode we discuss three games each that surprised us in some way when we played them.
Game discussed:
- Deep Rock Galactic
- Lord of the Rings Online
- Mindustry
- SimCopter
- Call of Duty: Modern Warfare
- Yoshi’s Story
Tag: Video game culture
064: Octal FM 2k19
Further reading:
- EA and Activision’s $79bn games-as-a-service growth
- Emerging Trends in Games-as-a-Service (video)
- Battle passes are replacing loot boxes, but they’re not necessarily a better deal
- What Fortnite’s Battle Pass gets right
- How GaaS are changing the way we play
- Call of Duty Mobile – Legends of War soft launch article
- Artwork Personalization at Netflix
061: Get Pokémon! (Trading Cards)
We’re joined by a special guest this episode! Tom last joined us back in Episode 10 to discuss MOBAs. We’ve talked about competitive Pokémon before too, with Marti Bennett back in episode 21. This time, we turn our attention to the trading card game.
Sound-byte 014: Lucky LAN number 13
054: Year of Gaming – 2007
In this episode we talk about why we think 2007 was one of the biggest, and one our favourite, years in gaming.
- Orange Box
- You can pick up Orange Box on Steam, or mostly second-hand on Xbox 360 and PS3. The Xbox 360 version is backwards compatible on Xbox One.
- Bioshock and Uncharted
- Bioshock is available in a remastered collection of the first three games on Xbox One, PS4, and Steam, or you can still buy the first game standalone on Steam.
- Uncharted is available in a remastered collection of the first three games on PS4.
- Call of Duty 4
- Assassin’s Creed
- Assassin’s Creed Heritage Collection includes the first three main games, as well as Brotherhood and Revelations. It’s available on PS3 and Xbox 360, where it is backwards compatible on Xbox One. The Director’s Cut edition is available on Steam.
052: Stay awhile and listen
In this episode we each discuss some of our favourite video game stories.
- Bioshock 1
- Vox: Bioshock proved that video games could be art
- Bioshock 1 is available in a remastered collection of the first three games on Xbox One, PS4, and Steam, or you can still buy the first game standalone on Steam.
- Valkyria Chronicles
- Last of Us
- Polygon: Let’s talk about the ending of The Last of Us
- The Last of Us was released late in the PS3’s lifecycle, so now you can pick up the remastered edition on PS4. A sequel is in the works.
- Metal Gear Solid 3
- This is quite a tricky one to play now. There’s an HD collection of MGS games for PS3, Xbox 360, and Vita. And there was a 3DS version of MGS3.
- Half-Life 2
- You can pick up Half-Life 2 on Steam. The Orange Box includes Half-Life 2, and the Xbox 360 version is backwards compatible on Xbox One (also available on the Xbox marketplace).
Intro/Outro music: CJACKS – Runaway fashion
049: Patronise me
In this episode we discuss how (typically niche) video content creators are adapting to the thirst for consuming their (high quality) content, but have traditionally found it harder to earn money to do it. How is this affecting the consumer, the creator, and the platform?
Further reading:
- YouTube: Mid-year Update on Our Five Creator Priorities for 2018
- Social impact of YouTube
- NYTimes: How the Internet Is Saving Culture, Not Killing It
- Wired: YouTube’s Latest Shake-Up Is Bigger Than Just Ads
Intro/outro music: JACKS – Runaway Fashion
047: Get lost
In this episode we discuss some of our favourite video game worlds to get lost in. We reminisce about some worlds we’ve not visited for a while, and we discuss what it means for a game world to be ‘immersive’.
Intro/outro music: JACKS – Runaway Fashion
043: Nintendo vs. The Internet
In another ‘Octal FM are Nintendo fanboys’ episode, we take a look back at the often overlooked history of Nintendo and the Internet. It involves satellites beaming games down to a virtual village on your SNES.
Intro/outro music: JACKS – Runaway Fashion & an old modem
042: A Mostly Harmless Episode
In this episode we tell the story of the Elite game series and our story of playing the original together back at school, and some bits about the space-sim genre as a whole.
- The Guardian excerpt from Backroom Boys about David Braben and Ian Bell.
- Elite (1984) free PC download (and the Mac version)
- Or play it in an emulator in your browser.
- Elite 1984 gameplay footage (Scott Manley)
- ArcElite (the version we played) gameplay footage
- Frontier Elite 2 footage
- Frontier First Encounters gameplay footage (with updated graphics) (Scott Manley)
Intro music: JACKS – Runaway Fashion
Outro music: Strauss – Blue Danube