I've just been explaining to John that we have
no intro. This is the intro. Okay. Yeah, fine.
Fair enough. Hello. There's a new voice on the
podcast. This is my mate John. I won't say your
full name because I don't want to dox you in
front of everyone, but this is John. This is
Chinese John. Hi. Multicultural on the podcast.
Yeah, I know. All you need is, you just need
to get Leon and a couple of the other guys on
here now. Yeah. And you'll cover the whole of
UK and possibly Asia. So you might be listening
and thinking, well, who the fuck's John? Well,
John is a man that I met on World of Warcraft,
which is meaning that this podcast will be predominantly
World of Warcraft based. You know how long I've
been waiting. When Ash started playing WoW, I
was like, shit, I can finally fucking talk in
depth about this sort of stuff. And then he stopped
playing. So I was like, fuck, I don't know anyone
that's on this pod that I can talk to about World
of Warcraft. And now, this is going to be great.
Yeah. I'm so excited. And we're not even that
far away from each other. No, no. So how long
did it take you to get here? Well, today it took
a little bit longer. It took about... 45 minutes
today that's still not bad that's not bad I think
without traffic it's like half an hour yeah yeah
which is mad so we so good so we met met in a
in the world's biggest MMORPG and the geyser
lives fucking half an hour up the road so good
so so good whereas everyone else in our guild
is like halfway across the other side of the
planet yep like Ireland yep and Wales yep or
fucking Pakistan Pakistan I'm killing Storm.
Yeah. So we met up for the first time last year.
We had a guild. So we're all in the same guild,
Hooves and Hoes. I'm sure most of them will be
listening to this one. Hi. Hello. Hello, everyone.
So we had a guild meetup and it was like so surreal.
Dogs are going wild. I don't know what for. And
it was like so weird to finally meet everyone
that you play games with because I'd never done
that before. I mean, we had no idea that Miles
was like six foot seven. I just couldn't believe
it. Couldn't believe it when I saw him. But everyone
looked how I thought they would look. Yeah, yeah.
You know what I mean? Like Corey looked how Corey
should look. It's just great. So we met up, had
a great time and then... And then we met up again,
recently went to John's wedding, which again
was surreal. That was very surreal. Having the
guild at your fucking wedding. I was mad actually.
Do you know what? I was sort of thinking, because
obviously the wedding and the planning and lead
up to it was all like a whirlwind. So I didn't
really have time to think about everything. And
I was only processing it on the few days after
the wedding. And I thought, shit, the boys were
at my wedding. And then I thought, Ken and Leon,
who were at my wedding who traveled to be at
my wedding that was the first time i'd ever met
them in person yeah they were there yeah yeah
and it was it was surreal because i couldn't
believe how short leon was i know i know he said
that he was short yeah but i didn't realize how
short he actually i love you leon but you know
and kin kin i mean you were everything that i
thought you would be um my fellow my fellow yellow
brother uh love you kin That's okay, you're Chinese,
you can say that. You're 100 % Chinese, you're
sweet. I'm not advocating cross -Asian racism.
It was surreal, like you say. And Leon looks
so Arab for a Welsh man. Oh, he's so Arab. He's
got lovely eyes. He's so handsome. Fantastic
beard. He's just got that sort of... he's a great
guy yeah they're all great i love them yeah no
it was amazing so it was such a such a wholesome
day and and but in general just even like going
back to that meetup that we had last year you
know it was so nice it was so wholesome you know
we all had some beers and had some food and whatnot
and like you say everyone just looked like how
you would think they were yeah they were just
how you think and we're all just normal people
and it's lovely you know just fucking from playing
world of warcraft it's nuts And to think that
I came into Hooves, what, two, just over two
years ago? Completely randomly. Yeah. I always
forget that. So it was literally, I logged on
towards the end of Dragonflight, last patch of
the season. And I thought, you know what? I'm
going to get back into WoW. I hadn't played since
season one Dragonflight. And I thought, okay,
no one that I knew that I used to play WoW with
before was playing anymore. Either that or they
were playing classic only. So I logged on and
I was like, oh, I wonder if there's any guilds
around because no one really advertised guilds
anymore the way they used to. So I went on to
the guild finder and saw Hooves and Hoes. I was
like, haha, that's a funny name. That's exactly
what I did. So I applied for it and then I got
accepted into it. And then even when I got accepted,
it was like, obviously no one there because as
we all know, Hooves and Hoes, we get curving
and we all fuck off. But then there were a couple
of people on, and then that's when I met Leon
for the first time. He was playing on his mage,
and we were just chatting nonsense. And then
I met Connor, and then I met you, and then got
into the Discord, and that was when I was like,
oh, holy crap, these guys are really, really
awesome. It was something that, like, I've experienced
that sort of stuff before, and obviously I used
to run my own guild, and it just fucking took
over my life. That's stressful, man. Yeah, and
I've been part of other big guilds, But I was
almost a kid during that time. Being in that
sort of setting as a fully grown, mature adult
is completely different to when you're fucking
16 or like 20. And joining Hooves and Hoes, it
was like when you join a new guild, you either
stay completely silent because you're just there
because you can... probably easily get into groups
and do raids and stuff like that. Or you try
and integrate yourself with these people. And
obviously joining something like, like hooves,
everyone already knows each other. It's not easy
to integrate. Yeah. So you have to be to a degree.
I feel that to a degree, you kind of have to
be a little bit extroverted in order to get yourself
noticed. Well, yeah, you just, you have to, yeah,
it, you gotta be a bit funky. You gotta have
a personality. There's gotta be something there,
but also fucking, the discord like the discord
i've got to say is probably the main thing to
get yourself integrated into that guild in any
i think i would i'd even go as far as saying
any gaming community now in any game is discord
yeah yeah it was i still remember the very early
days of being in hooves and slowly getting to
know everyone and getting fucking confused between
tom and tim because they fucking use each other's
names as their characters and i remember being
so embarrassed because i kept calling tom tim
and tim tom and fucking people were calling me
out on it i was like i just feel like a cunt
like so stupid i was like this is so fucking
dumb um and then like learning everyone's personalities
and and and just who's, who everyone is. Yeah.
And then slowly like rising up the ranks and
then becoming an officer and fucking like being,
becoming one. Like, I feel like we're now fully
one of the, like the core. Yeah. But, but I feel
like everyone that talks in that discord is in
that core. Yes. You know what I mean? I agree.
I agree. I don't think there really is anyone
in the guild that raids with us for the last
few seasons who is, genuinely like seasonal in
the sense that they're on to play and then you
don't hear from them in Discord ever again until
the next season I don't think there is any of
that other than a couple of regulars but even
then when they come back on it's almost like
they just they never left anyway to begin with
and that's what I like about Hooves is we are
so genuinely wholesome I think what helps is
that the average age, like the median age, I
think we're all very similar. We're all at that
stage where we're in our respective careers,
we're doing our respective things and we're all
adulting and we've all got responsibilities and
things to look after and bills to pay and whatnot.
And I think as a result of that, we have a certain
way of approaching life. Whereas I can't imagine
myself meeting you guys and being the way I am
with you guys and the rest of Hooves back in
17 -year -old me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, we
started a group chat and you showed us a picture
of your burst hemorrhoid pretty fucking early
on. Okay, right. So we crossed the... That was...
That was extenuating circumstances. And just
to clarify for the people that are listening
to this right now who don't know what the fuck
Rhys is talking about, while I'm staring at his
eyeballs right now and questioning his soul as
to why he decided to bring that up, I'd just
like to clarify, if you ever get a thrombosed
hemorrhoid, I'm praying for you. That's all I
want to say. Enough said. I'm just saying we've
broken through the barrier of friendship. That's
the point that I was making. If we go back to
the very early days, the genesis of us all coming
together was when Connor did that mad recruitment
drive for hooves and then we ended up with two
fucking full raid groups. yes yeah that was hilarious
that was that was that was funny that was that
was so good that was raid team a and b yeah yeah
and that was um and you was in raid team b i
was in raid team b because i was like okay look
guys i'm new i'm new i'm new here so you know
it makes sense to keep the the original hooves
together and whatnot so this was this was this
was the first first season of uh the war within
yes yeah it was yeah raid team one and two this
was the first raid it was dragonfly No, it wasn't.
It was. No, it wasn't. It definitely was. No,
because it was Nerobar Palace. Remember. No,
it weren't. We had two raid teams for Nerobar
Palace. I remember when we were bitching about
it because I was in Valdrakon. Yeah. Are you
sure? Yeah. I'm pretty sure. I'm pretty sure.
The raid team one and two saga was when we had
Enzo. Yeah. And I was in the same raid team as
Enzo. No, that was War Within. That was Nerobar
Palace. That was Queen Gatsarek. Nah. Yeah. Nah,
there's no fucking way because we really struggled
on Queen Gatsarik. Yeah, but don't you remember
the first... Because you lot were struggling
and we were fucking flying. Yeah, in Narrowbar
Palace. Normal. Nah. It was. It was war within
season one. Look. I'm telling you. We'll continue
for another half an hour and then I'll post this
and I can guarantee that the lawmaster, Joe,
will fucking... I'm telling you, because Dragonflight,
I only joined at the very, very end of Dragonflight.
I didn't raid with you guys in Dragonflight.
It's impossible. And then I played Shaman. Was
it really the war we're in? Yeah, it was. This
expansion? I started on... I remember because
I started as... We're playing it this fucking
long. This expansion's been this fucking long.
Yeah. Well, it feels long. Fuck. I don't think
it's been that long. When did the War of Income
come out then? Yeah. Release date. August 26th,
2024. 2024? There's no way the expansion's been
out that fucking long. No, it has. It has. Here's
the World Soul Saga with our three new expansions
that are going to be a lot shorter than fucking
two years later. We're still going. Well, no,
because each expansion used to be two years.
But they've... Exactly. This is now one and a
half. This is one and a half now, isn't it? Because...
I suppose it is, yeah. Midnight's coming up.
Was it really the war we've been when we first
started? It was, yeah, yeah, yeah. I suppose
it would make sense because that was when the
recruitment drive was. Yeah, yeah. And then that's
when we had Enzo and his lackeys. Yeah, yeah,
yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah. God, what a bunch of Muppets.
So what happened for the people listening is
I was part of team one, team A, and... We went
into the raid. I can't remember the name of the
raid. Naruba Palace. Naruba Palace, yeah. And
we were flying. We were fucking flying through
that fucking raid. But we was all in Discord,
but we was in separate channels because obviously
calling out tactics and stuff is madness. So
it was, I'm pretty sure it was a 20 -man team
either side. Yeah. So there's 40 people here
raiding the same raid, but split into two groups.
And you had Connor, who's our raid leader. dipping
in and out of both raids, effectively having
to raid lead when Team B already had a raid lead,
but they were shit. So Connor, bless him, was
just having to fucking bounce in between. There
was a couple of times when I've joined Team B's
channel just to hear the screaming. And it was
exactly that. You join and it would be like people
arguing. And then you join back to Team A and
it's just nice and fucking just quaint. you know
what I mean it's just nice I mean I'll tell you
what part of the problem was is that we had too
many far too many egos in raid team B we had
a supposed raid leader who I mean I'm not going
to bother holding back because they're obviously
not in the picture anymore but He was just a
bit of a muppet who had a bit of a power trip
and him and his eight buddy lackeys or whatever
who came along with him. And he was absolutely
not the foggiest and he was so arrogant. And
obviously bearing in mind that, you know, Ray
Team 2 consisted of people who've never gamed
before with each other. Don't know each other.
No one knows who is who. And then you've got
all sorts of different egos coming from all sorts
of different directions. I definitely wasn't
instigating anything, but I was just kind of
trying to make sense of what the call -outs were
and getting shut down whenever I was asking the
questions. I was like, okay, it is what it is.
The thing is, being a raid leader has to be...
I've never done it because seeing people like
Connor having to do it puts me off of doing that
role immediately. If you're listening and you
don't know what a raid leader is, they are...
the leader of the fucking raid that you're doing
so they're the boss fights in raids in world
of warcraft with every expansion have got progressively
more mechanic heavy if you were to look at bosses
from the classic era from vanilla so like molten
core it's like one mechanic two mechanics and
you can fucking face roll everything whereas
if you look at shit now like undermine The mechanics,
the amount of shit on the floor, the stuff you've
got to dodge, the things you've got to do. It's
crazy, but it's fun. But a raid leader will have
to know every single fucking ability that these
bosses do, in what order they do them, when they
do them, what they do, who they're damaging,
what they do to people, if you need to pop defensives
for it. They need to know that raid inside out.
And at the same time, they have to play. So they
have to play that raid for the first time, the
same as everyone else, but they have to call
the shots, tell people where to be if they don't
know where to be, fucking explain the mechanics,
which I never listened to anyway, and just be
in charge. And in Connor's situation, he's having
to do that whilst tanking. Whilst tanking in
a Discord with a soundboard that is just filled
with absolute shit. And then you've got Rhys,
who is... the other tank who doesn't listen to
a word of what Connor says. And then Connor's
like, okay, we're just going to pull now and
see what happens. Yeah. He just tells me because,
because it was undermined was when I was the
first, I was tanking for the very first time.
It was the first raid I'd ever tanked. And it
was, it was very, very simple because all I had
to do was just Connor just told, stand there,
taunt when I tell you to taunt. And that's it.
And by the end of it, I got pretty comfortable
with it. But it's like, it's just something that,
I feel like a raid leader falls down to the tank.
It's very rare that you get a DPS or especially
like a healer who is the raid leader. It's always
the tank because they're the one that's solely
in charge. They're positioning and all that sort
of stuff. It's not a role that I can ever take
up. Like it panics me when I fucked about in
the discord and said, I'm now the raid leader.
People are going to think that I am the, I am
the rate. I'm not. I'm not, guys. There's no
chance. There's fucking no chance. But what I
am hoping is now that I don't go on social media
anymore, which I know, again, the Discord ripped
me because they were saying fucking the Discord
itself is social media and watching YouTube is
fucking no better than watching TikTok. It is
because I'm watching long format. Yeah, but is
Discord actually social media, though? One of
the fuckers posted it in saying that it is. I
don't think it is. They looked it up and it technically
is classed as a social media. fuck off i'm still
using it you know what i mean but what the point
i'm trying to make is it's not social media is
i'll be listening to the to the um tactics because
i won't be on my phone scrolling that's yes which
is usually what happens the minute connor starts
talking i was loading up tiktok yeah yeah yeah
yeah because i was like i'll scroll through this
for a little bit let him talk for 10 minutes
and then i'll come back and ask what are we doing
you know it's interesting sorry for the people
you've got a cold I'm still recovering from being
ill. So, like, what's interesting is that, so
do you remember, like, during season, during
the prog nights, the progression, like, so for
the people listening, we'd have what we call
prog nights, which is where, you know, we're
raiding, you know, there's 15, 20 of us or whatever,
and we're... progressing each boss and obviously
you're not going to get them down straight away,
especially the harder the bosses get. You're
going to wipe a few times. Was it Gatserek where
we really, really struggled? We really struggled
with her for a long time. We also struggled with
the boss just before her as well, actually, on
Heroic. What was the one where we spent a solid
six weeks? That was Queen Anseret. That was the
last boss of the first season. She was hard.
And then the next one was Liberation of Undermine.
There was one... I thought there was one in Dragonflight.
No. The last season. What was the last season?
Dementius. I don't think we struggled that hard
with Dementius, did we? Oh, we did a little bit,
but nothing crazy. Nothing like Queen Antwerp.
Demencia's got nerfed quite quickly. Yeah, Queen
Antwerp was just a different fucking basement.
What was interesting was how there were some
nights where we would finish at half nine or
10 p .m. And I would just genuinely feel completely
fucked. Not because we were sitting there and
trying to raid and wiping several times, but
actually what I was doing in between those pulls.
I wasn't chilling. My brain was 150 % engaged
because if we're not wiping and we're not playing
and we've got some downtime, we've got a few
minute break or whatever while people go and
pee, I wasn't taking my eyes off the screen.
I was just on my phone. Yeah. And I was scrolling
Instagram. Yeah, it's bad, man. And you're just
loading your brain with other stimulus and other
information. And you know what social media is
like with Instagram Reels and whatnot. they're
thought -provoking, right? They'll feed you stuff
which makes you question bits and pieces. And
by the end of the night, I was so, so screwed,
so tired. And I'll actually wake up the next
morning feeling exhausted. I just love that from
an outside perspective, if you was watching someone
raid, they're just sweating on a mouse and keyboard
just staring at a screen. But really, it's at
most times, 20 people doing... coordinated assault
it is pretty nuts for fucking four hours it is
pretty nuts it was one break in between it is
quite it is actually pretty intense and actually
for people like us who've spent a full day at
work especially when we're raiding on that Wednesday
night yeah we've done a full day of work and
you know depending on what it is that we do we
may or may not have been speaking to lots of
different people for the whole day or whatever
And then jumping on and then being on the same
chat channel with 20 other people. Yeah, it's
heavy, man. And, you know, dealing with potential
arguments and shit talk and, you know, having
that as a conversation for another time. But,
you know. That's for the patron. Put that behind
a paywall. Oh, there's some nuggets behind that
one. It's just a lot, man. I love it. I think
it's great. I really, really enjoy it. And, you
know, it's all looping back to what we were talking
about right at the beginning of this podcast,
which was, you know, you guys were at my wedding.
We had the meetup last year. And even though
I've only met you guys and joined the community
about two years ago, you guys are genuinely,
you know, there's a reason why it is so, I don't
know how to describe it without it sounding stupidly
corny, but it's... There's a reason why there's
such a big impact on my life as it is because
it's so ingrained in my lifestyle, in my life.
And it means so much to me because it's time
that I'm meaningfully spending doing, if that
makes sense. Yeah, because when was the very
first time you started playing well? I started
playing well when I was about 10 years old. That
was when my cousin came over from the Netherlands
and he was doing some... like a work placement
or something working in london and he's staying
at our house for a few weeks and he was playing
this on his laptop and i was like what's that
and this was burning crusade uh sunwell patch
i remember and um and he was playing a restoration
shaman he was pvping and i was like what is that
yeah i was just sat there watching madness it
was i was just like what is this is incredible
and then he made he let me create a character
on his account and that was it rest of it you
know so we've been around since the burning crusade
um on and off because i've said multiple times
before there's entire like legion and warlords
of draenor i never even touched so i skipped
out um entire expansions and there were there
were raids so like i started in the burning crusade
um but never successfully raided didn't successfully
raid through the lich king mr pandaria The guild
I was in, we did, but we weren't very good, so
we never completed. Definitely didn't get curved.
This is the first guild I've been with where
I've gotten curved consistently as well. Yeah,
exactly. It's crazy to think you play this game
that's advertised as a massively multiplayer
online, which it is, and you are playing with
other people constantly, but it's taken almost
two decades to find... a group of people you're
heard yeah that I will consistently stay with
especially now the point that we've met up and
stuff like that and the stuff that even the people
that we haven't met the stuff that we've discussed
and the arguments we've had and just like general
bonding it's just if you told anyone that didn't
play that game oh yeah no it's a great game but
you're not going to find anyone for 20 years
yeah they go well fuck that I'm not doing that
but I think and I suppose it's I guess what kind
of contributes to all of this is that different
people play the game for different reasons, right?
And I'd be lying if I was to say that when I
was younger, especially during my teenage years
when I was playing WoW on and off, I'd be lying
if I was to say that I was playing a game purely
for arcade purposes or purely for social purposes
because actually I was part of guilds as you
were, which were very sociable, et cetera, et
cetera. Like I say, this is the first time where
I've actually been able to genuinely connect
with the people and develop genuinely meaningful
relationships with them. And I think age is a
big part to play about that. Going back to that
point, I think, look, we're 30 years old now,
sort of late 20s, early 30s. We're all in our
respective stages of our lives where we kind
of don't really want to be bouncing around with
anything and actually... We just want to settle
down, man. You just want to seek a bit more consistency.
I don't want to put a different tabard on. I
just want to fucking stay with the hooves. The
tabard's horrible, but I'm going to stay with
it. Yeah, Aston, can we have a chat about that,
please? Yeah, can we change the fucking green,
please, so I can wear it with any trans... I
was making some today. Did you see the stuff
that I posted in it? What's that? Look, I'll
show you on this. Just a couple of mogs that
I made, but... I'd love to wear the guild tabard
to just show off the guild, but I can't because
it's grim. Look, here's my lumberjack transmog.
Oh, I like that very much. That's quite cool.
That's very, very good. I've changed the shield
now to something more rustic. And then this one,
Leon liked this one. I think it's because it
looks maybe kind of anime. Me with bandages.
Oh. Oh, I can see why Leon liked that one. Yeah.
I prefer the lumberjack. Yeah. But I like that
one as well. No, I think I prefer the lumberjack
one. The bandages are a shirt. The bandage, I
mean, I'm not going to lie, it looks a little
bit... It looks a little bit... Say what you
want to say. I don't want to be accused of being
homophobic. Say what you want to say. It looks
gay. It looks a little bit gay. It looks gay.
A little bit. Is it the eye patch? I don't think
it's... Or is it the trousers? I think it's the
eye patch and the bandage. Around the chest.
You don't like the bandages? It was showing that
you're hurt. Well, fuck it. I'll delete it then.
The lumberjack's cool though. I like the lumberjack.
The lumberjack one's good. The lumberjack's the
one that I'm using the most. Have you shown Steph
that one? Yeah, yeah. She liked the lumberjack
as well. I can imagine. She was a fan of that.
So was many others except for Corey. Corey give
it a six out of ten because he's fucking butthurt.
We've got this channel. right in the discord
it's it it's a channel so there's two channels
right there's one in there called hoof camp and
that's for fucking fitness and running and weights
and going to the gym and all that shit right
it's a motivational one and then we've got one
that was purely for food right because i started
a fuck i started a fucking movement and it was
me yeah I started a movement of posting my dinners
into the fucking Discord to the point where they
made a channel, right? Then other people started
jumping on it. And some of the people in that
Discord make some incredibly good food. Some
of it's very questionable, but a lot of it's
very, very good. And Corey, by the looks of it,
makes some very, very good food. All right? But
because it's Corey, he has to shit on everything.
On fucking everything. Everything has to be a
competition. He has to dig everything out. And
he kept digging out my food. And then somehow,
the motherfucker took over that channel. And
now it's called Corey's Poison Grazing Field.
I started a toast system. If you want to know
what a toast system is, it's basically a rating
system. So you go, right. You post in a fucking
picture of some... Fuck, a roast dinner. And
I'll go, yeah, that's six out of ten slices.
Six out of ten slices of toast. It's relevant
to the channel. It's a food channel. Yes. So,
therefore, the rating is food -related. It's
a very, very specific and niche metric that was
given to the food. Yeah. It works, and people
have stuck with it. That's good, all right? Well,
it's an open discussion, all right? You might
post something that I don't like. That's fine.
But I'm going to give it the rating that I want
to give it. Same as everyone's welcome to give
me the ratings that they want to give me. That's
absolutely fine. I do feel like I was kind of
cheating because when I started it, I was doing
HelloFresh. So the majority of the food that
I was doing, even though I was cooking it...
HelloFresh isn't really cooking, is it? Yeah,
but do you know what, though? HelloFresh is still
infinitely... No, you know what? No, I disagree
with what you're saying because, actually, I
don't think that's cheating. John used to fucking
run a Chinese restaurant, by the way, so a culinary
expert, really. I think, genuinely, HelloFresh
is... That's not cheating. I love it. Because
you are still using fresh ingredients. And you're
following a recipe. Do you know how much garlic
we got? Which is what most people do anyway.
What do you do when you go and buy ingredients
and you're cooking something that you've never
cooked before or you want to get inspiration
from? You look up a recipe. You either chat GPT
it or you look it up on Google or whatever. I've
got a whole cupboard full of recipe cards. HelloFresh
is absolutely no different to that. If anything,
HelloFresh is even better because you're not
wasting anything. I really like it and Steph
really likes it. The reason we stopped it was
because... Obviously, you get the introductory
prices. Did you run out of promotionals? Yeah,
I ran out of promotionals. We kept that motherfucker
going for a long old time, man. We kept it going
for a long time. Try Gusto. Yeah, that's what
we was going to do. Because I worked with a mate
who was using HelloFresh. And then he told me
that he swapped out and started using Gusto because
he ran out of fucking promotionals. And he said
that it's better. So we've been contemplating
doing it. Also, their meals are really calorific.
Ah, right. But I think you can... Said it so
that you don't want calorific meals. But anyway,
the point, a little bit of sidetrack there, but
the point being is that I was posting these meals
in, giving people the scores, and people were
giving me scores. And then Corey posted something
that looked shit. Right? So I called him out
on it. I can't remember what it was. It was a
while ago. And I said, I don't like that. So
here's fucking two out of ten slices. And he
kicked off about it. I remember. He kicked off
about it because he couldn't accept it. This
was last year, wasn't it? Yeah. So now out of
spite, he just fucking attacks everything. I
don't know why I'm doing this because we call
it truce. We call it good truce. And he sent
in the evidence of us saying, let's be friends.
And we are still friends. I'm just simply getting
the point across that he fucked one of my channels
in that Discord and then says that it's his channel.
Oh, man. Cunt. It was... I was doing quite well
containing my cough up to this point that's alright
that's alright I love it it was great oh my god
yeah no I mean this is just an example of how
how amazing and how diverse and how colourful
and wonderful our hoofs and hoes discord is we
play other games as well that's always good and
yeah and you know what like no matter no matter
how off topic and how political and how borderline
bullying our conversations can get between members
and the discord we can all we're all connected
you know and and especially after we've gotten
curve and we've done the raid for the season
and everyone inevitably just stops playing for
a while and they stop pushing mythic plus and
whatever you know we're all still connected we're
all still talking and we're all we're all still
there you know and it makes you feel like you're
not really ever stopping The only difference
is that we're not all on WoW in the same regroup
at the same time. I love that influx of when
you have the downtime that we've currently got,
end of season, people disappear for weeks at
a time because there's just nothing. Well, there's
not nothing to do. It's just the content that
most people wanted to do. They've achieved. You've
achieved your fucking... two and a half thousand
three thousand rating in mythic plus you fucking
you've got curve um can't be asked to go and
do mythic raiding so you've done what you wanted
to do it's sweet got best in slot so you're done
um and it's always fun to see the start of a
new season And then it's usually like the week
beforehand, people come back because they start
getting their shit together. And then the season
starts and then you log in and there's like 30
different people online. And you're like, fuck.
And that may seem like a small number, but you
bang 30 people in a room. It's a lot of people.
There's a lot of people with a lot of different
opinions. Yep. And it always happens. And I always
love seeing it. And then you have your first
raid and everyone's like, oh, fuck, I haven't
spoken to you in ages, blah, blah, blah. Because
we haven't. And then all of the bullshittery
that goes with it and all the trolling. It's
just fun, man. I really enjoy it. One particular
memory I have very fond of that repeated itself
for three seasons straight, well, the only three
seasons that I've been raiding with you guys,
this expansion, is that at the beginning of every
single season, me and Joe have this thing where
we just don't stop laughing for the first two
raid nights. And that's because... We're just
constantly trolling each other without words
being said. I mean, Joe, was it this season?
Yeah, season three where you played priest, wasn't
it? I think it was. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You played
priest, right? So priests have this ability called
Leap of Faith where you can select an ally and
you can click it and it will pull them. It will
yank them over to where you are as the priest.
It's very fucking annoying. And there was one
particular platform when we got to Dementius.
Yeah, because he did it to fucking me. Multiple
times. The cunt. Everyone did it to me. Oh, it
was too easy. Because who was an evoker as well?
Because they've got their own one as well. Who
played evoker? It was Leon's dad. Yeah. Fire's
home. Yeah, yeah. He wasn't actually Leon's dad,
by the way, people listening. Was he not? No,
he wasn't actually Leon's dad. We called him
Leon's dad because Leon's dad was playing at
the beginning of War Within and he was playing
in the vote. Right, yeah, okay. That's why, yeah.
Oh, yeah, okay. So Fire's Home got Leon's dad.
Yeah, it's great, great. I love it. I love how
that stuck. I didn't even realise. Okay, fair
enough. Yeah, yeah, because the Vokers can pick
you up and... fucking fly you they're dragons
they're like dragon dragon kin humanoids so they
can just pick you up and fucking fly you away
yeah basically what john's saying is that there's
with these abilities you can pick a player up
and then drop them off at a location and you
can get them where they're ever so dangerously
close to the edge of a platform because you can't
drag someone off of a platform yourself but you
can put someone right at the limit of the platform
and if that person's already moving they're running
around themselves and you pull them which was
usually me which was usually either you or me
yeah and one of the most annoying things is when
someone done it just before a pull which is always
fun that's always good start with an instant
death go what the fuck I swear I swear Joe did
it and it wiped the raid I swear he did it with
me at some point there was a couple of those
and we had to wipe the entire raid because he
fucking pulled someone I was like you motherfucker
yeah Conor's just spent 15 minutes telling everyone
exactly what to do because we're on our 10th
wipe of the night and then fucking Joe's just
flung me off the ledge. Motherfucker, I've got
to buff up again. I've got to fucking take time.
I've got to do all this shit again. Fucking hell.
And it's all these little nuggets and these little
pockets of just... you know, bullshittery and
tomfoolery. Tomfoolery. Tomfoolery. That really
just made, it made everything, it made every
wipe worth it. You know what was funny was when
the, when the UK brought out that law of age
restriction and it restricted everything. including
Reddit and Discord. So you then had to fucking
take a photo of your face and verify who you
were. Yeah, and porn and all that. Do you remember
how many channels in that Discord were then fucking
locked behind age verification because of the
shit that was in them? Max Degenerate channel,
the fucking Parliament chat. To be fair, all
things considered, I don't think Hoof's Discord
has ever really had that much. It's not the worst
Discord that I've fucking seen. It's pretty tame,
to be fair, compared to... I've seen some really
bad ones. Some really bad. If anything, there's
more NSFW stuff in our WhatsApp group chat than
there is in Discord. Yeah, probably. Yeah, I
agree to be fair, especially what's tagged there
now. Oh, yeah. Pinned. Yeah, that's one for the
Patreon, I think. How did that even happen? You
pinned it. Yeah, but why? It's your message,
you pig. Anyway, for anyone that's confused about
what's going on right now. No, it happened because
I found that game. Right. Nick A. Nick A. There
you go. Gaming podcast. Talk about that. Fucking
Nick A. Yeah. It's a gacha game. Yeah. Which
Kin introduced us to. And I didn't realise Kin
had introduced it to us. Yeah, and basically
it's... Goddess of Victory. Yeah, so as the name
implies, it's full of big titty anime girls.
It's big titty anime girls with very revealing
outfits. And I see it... Did I see it in a YouTube
video? And you thought, I need to have me some
of that. I think I saw it somewhere. So I was
like, surely not. And then found it on the Play
Store. And it had like 2 million downloads. Right?
So I downloaded it as a joke to see how weeby
it really was. And it's fucking weeby. So then
I went onto the Reddit for it. And it's just
more weebs sitting there going, no, it's a really
good story. But is it fuck? Is it fuck? Right?
It's not really a good story, okay? Not that
I've stayed long enough to find out about the
story, but I did stay long enough to work out
the mechanics of how the game works. And it's
like any combat interaction, there's an autoplay
button on there, so it will just play it for
you. You can obviously auto -scroll on the quest
information and all that shit. So you're just
staring at boobs and ass, but the way that it
works is you're like... You're a commander. So
it's basically your harem. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
yeah, yeah. You know the demographic that it's
fucking centred towards because of the way the
dialogue is. I noticed it straight away because
it is like you're in charge and they make you
aware constantly, these fucking, these anime
girls. You're the commander. You're in charge.
I'm just going to draw a parallel here. I'm going
to draw a parallel here. That is precisely the
tactic that World of Warcraft employed in the
last meaningful content patch of The War Within.
When they made Zalatath, who's, by the way, the
main villain, for those that don't know. At the
moment. At the moment, throughout all of the
whole entire cycle. Until we inevitably kill
her next expansion and then the winter will be.
To clarify, to spell this out for you guys, Zalatath
is... She's... She has been claimed as the villain
mummy since the start of this expansion and this
saga because she's somewhat attractive. This
was inevitably going to come up in this podcast.
Go on. You knew this. I know exactly what's going
on. Zalatav's feet. In particular. For some reason.
the devs and the designers were preying on the
foot fetish community. They nailed the foot fetish.
So they put, like, extra detail in her feet.
It just gives us a bad name for playing WoW because
it isn't like this, but for whatever reason...
She's barefoot. She's barefoot. Whenever you
see her, she's barefoot. She's barefoot. She's
got toe rings. Like, she's manicured. And the
feet look really, really, really, really... Real.
Real. And nice, dare I say. In every cut scene,
obviously, so... So Zalatath is sort of like
this shadow priest being, not ethereal, but has
magical powers. And so she hovers, she floats
a lot. She doesn't have to walk around. So every
fucking cut scene that involved her was always
her gracefully flowing down into frame. And obviously
the first thing that comes into frame is her
fucking feet. Even to the point where there was
multiple cinematics where for some reason it
would be zoomed in on her feet. And it become
a meme because the minute you see it, and I will
never forget. So when you finish a raid and you
get curved, when you kill the last boss, there's
always a cinematic, right? And it either finishes
the story on it or it leads on. It's a progression
in the story, right? And I will never forget.
what the raid when she shows up at the end and
literally when we just finished it and everyone
in the discord feet feet as a joke because it
was it was just straight away screen goes black
and then boom it's her feet straight on the screen
and i was like It's funny, but at the same time,
the person that's designing this has a foot fetish
because this has never been like this. 100%.
And it hasn't been like it since. The way they've
done the villain arc is that they've... Albeit
it is a new tactic that they've taken on with
this new saga and this trio of expansions, but
they've really, really honed in on what... they
know cells and okay that's boobies arse and feet
and feet and and now going back to the point
that i was making and drawing the parallel here
is that um in in that patch so in in this patch
after you've killed the final boss in the final
raid of the war within expansion you actually
kind of no no actually no sorry in the content
leading up to that raid sorry we are working
together with Zalatath in order to take down
Dementius, who's the ultimate biggest threat,
who could wipe out everything. So you kind of
strike this bargain with Zalatath. In doing so,
when you're doing these quests and doing that
storyline, leading up to that raid, that final
raid in the last season of this expansion, and
you're working together with Zalatath, Zalatath
makes you feel like you are the champion and
you are special. Because she always says, my
champion. This is what you're capable of. My
champion. She says it in a certain tone where
you just know that there's people that have a
poster of her up on their wall. Absolute boner.
100 % definitely there were people that were
clipping that and just replaying it on repeat.
Of course. On a loop. There was that fucking,
wasn't there that wee corer? There was that wee
corer. Who sent that? Who sent that command?
Was it Matt? I think so. I think it might have
been Matt. Correct me if I'm wrong, Matt. But
it was you, you dirty fucker. It was, wasn't
it? So you could get Zalataf's feet pop up when
you were bloodlusting. Yeah, and it would just
literally be her zoomed up feet on your screen
whilst you're trying to play the game. Yeah.
Oh, that was so unhinged. That was so funny.
That was so good. But yeah, no, no, go back to
that point. I mean, you're absolutely right.
There's parallels here. That's definitely what
Blizzard did. That's what they did. They employed
that coercion tactic to make the player feel...
And this is the thing, right? I have a friend,
a Romanian friend who plays the game. She's not
in our guild. She plays Alliance, but we're Battle
.net friends. We've been Battle .net friends
for a long time. And she's quite good. She's
like, you know, three and a half K Rio and whatever.
And I remember talking to her. I was like, have
you been doing these quests? And, you know, Zalatav,
mommy talking to you. And she goes, yeah, I mean,
I'm fully straight. She's a woman, right? She
said her words were, I'm fully straight. And
I'm a bit confused now. Yeah. Like, genuinely.
They knew what they were doing. They 100 % knew
what they were doing. And this is exactly what
this Nikkei game is. This is a mobile gacha game
where the outfits are extremely revealing but
they're also locked behind a paywall. So, and
like I say, you're the commander and they keep
fucking letting you know that you're the commander
and you're in charge and we must do what you
say. Rah, rah, rah. And then when you get to
the very brief combat. that I experienced from
it before I went, no, this is just too weird,
is you're like behind a wall and then there's
robots in front of you and you peek over and
shoot them. But the character it was making me
play is when you peek over and shoot them, it's
just whole arse. It's just arse the whole time.
So it's like, no wonder you've got an auto mechanic
on this because there'll be people that are just
staring. At arse. One hand on penis. And I didn't
realise that it was the game that fucking Kin
played. And then he tried to explain to me the
same as every other fucking weave on Reddit.
No, the story is really good. It's really good.
The plot's really good. Get fucked. Get fucked.
Is it good? I'm not going to find out because
I'm not going to play it. It's gone. But get
fucked. And when I was scrolling, there was one
geezer on this fucking Reddit. And he was complaining.
um and obviously looking for support because
basically his wife kept having a go at him when
he was playing it because she was like you're
just playing that because you like to stare at
the boobs and i and he was complaining saying
what do i do to convince her that it is actually
a really good story and that's why i'm playing
it you go no it's not That's not why you're playing
it, is it? No, it definitely is. If you want
to convince me that the story's fucking amazing
and you're not playing it because you're looking
at revealing women for the entire time, get rid
of them off of the fucking thumbnail for the
game. And then see how many people download it.
Because I can guarantee you they won't be downloading.
They won't be. Get rid of the cosmetic shop.
Get rid of that. You fuckers. Typical fucking...
gacha game almost almost immediately when you
log in gives you a load of loot boxes for free
that obviously give you this really really cool
hero that you can play yeah really fucking rare
yeah and you think oh shit you get it on the
first box do you know what so i was i i that
leads me that reminds me of warhammer tacticus
yeah yeah because that's a mobile game I was
looking at that the other day and I did play
it before I used to play it a lot and I can safely
say I've only ever spent £10 on it total but
the problem is that I'm such a I love 40k I fucking
love it ever since you guys introduced me to
it have you guys to thank for that. Oh, really?
You weren't in? Well, don't thank me because
I'm not into Warhammer. That's all fucking Connor.
I'd always heard of it. Yeah. I never knew what
it was and I never understood it. Yeah. Until,
basically, the group chat, you guys, Connor,
Leon, you guys, Joe, Ken, basically said, just
pick it up. You know, look into it. See what
you want to do. And then I started reading Horace
Harrison. Excuse me. I've been hooked ever since.
But I love 40K. And I love any opportunity to
be able to explore it visually. Visually, audio,
or whatever. Whatever means, as you know, 40K.
Let me intake the content. Exactly. And Tacticus,
I thought, was a... fucking fantastic opportunity
to do that because actually all of the artwork
is accurate yeah yeah all of the models are accurate
and actually the law that you can glean off of
taxicus is accurate um the but i was disappointed
Because, again, all mobile games are set up in
the same way. Every single fucking one. You've
got to spend money in order to be able to...
It's a grind. And you grind, grind, grind, grind,
grind. You've got to sink time. You've got to
sink money into it to be able to get what you
want. So, for example, in my head, I had the
idea of wanting to unlock all of the Dark Angels
characters on Tactica. That is... literally impossible
unless you're spending hundreds of pounds because
yeah you have to get a very specific type of
currency that you have to spend a very specific
amount of money on in order to be able to open
a box of a very specific type to be able to unlock
the dark angels characters so so in my head i'm
thinking okay i really want to play tactics i
really want to unlock all of the dark angels
characters five or six of them um and then i'll
be happy i don't care about the other ones yeah
um but you can't Because it's so specific and
so targeted. And that was really a big letdown
for me. But that's how they make money. Well,
every mobile game's like that. Exactly. I haven't
set myself the task of it, but have trawled through
the Play Store to find decent mobile games. Obviously,
Diablo Immortal was a very good one. I've mentioned
it on the podcast before. Me and Steph actually
went on holiday and spent the entire holiday
playing Diablo Immortal because it was just so
engaging and so fun. And then... I hit the point
where it becomes pay to win. And I was like,
right, this is no longer fun. And it isn't. And
then there's some really ridiculous number, like
thousands of pounds that you had to spend to
statistically get the things that you would want.
And if you look through any game on the Play
Store that you don't have to pay for... They
are, every single one of them. They're structured
the same way. Yeah, every single one. Fallout
Shelter, I played quite a lot of. When I come
away from social media, because you're addicted
to it, so you'll find something else to take
up your time. Fallout Shelter was the withdrawal
helper, if you will. I don't play it anymore
because I don't want to. But even that in itself,
it's not pay to win. But everything's time -gated.
Yes. Everything takes time and you can spend
Nuka -Cola to fucking speed things up and it
gives you a load of that and then lets you use
it and in some cases makes you use it and then
introduces that you want more, you can fucking
pay for it or you can get it from Quest and blah,
blah, blah. And it's like you can play it without
paying for it, but it's not so fun. no and that's
the same with so many mobile games because you
think right these games are free they have to
get their money somewhere but it's nice isn't
it because I didn't realise but mobile games
the sector of the gaming industry that makes
the most amount of money is mobile games yeah
not triple A's it's mobile games because they're
all fucking they're all so easily accessible
but they're all pay pay to win or pay to play
microtransactions yeah through the fucking roof
yeah and you know you look at League of Legends
for example and then when they released Teamfight
Tactics which is which a lot of people actually
play on their mobile only rather than on the
PC but also Wild Rift which is their mobile version
of League of Legends well same with one of the
biggest fucking games in the world PUBG mobile
mobile PUBG Mobile is actually ridiculous. Like,
you know what? I've actually got nothing but
respect for them because obviously that's NetEase,
isn't it? That's the Chinese company that make
pretty much all of the big mobile games. And
PUBG Mobile, my God, like I did not realize how
much money it was generating until, I can't even
remember what the numbers are, but I remember
seeing them and I thought, what? Let me have
a look, see what their revenue is. PUBG Mobile
generated over $10 billion in lifetime revenue
as of 2023. $10 billion since 2023. Solidifying
its position as one of the highest -grossing
mobile games worldwide, the game, including a
Chinese version, Game for Peace, frequently ranks
as a top -two revenue generator, with China contributing
over 60 % of total earnings. That is crazy. It's
got annual revenue. In 2022, revenue was approximately
$1 .5 billion. And in 2021, it reached over $2
billion. China contributes 60 .3%. of revenue
followed by the united states 10 .7 and japan
3 .7 uh the game has exceeded 1 billion global
downloads with india leading in total installs
at 21 .8 and at peak the game generated a record
of 2 .6 billion dollars in 2020 wow yeah that
is crazy what 10 billion dollars It says the
game's revenue is driven by a consistent live
ops model featuring seasonal content collaborations
and a high -performing esports ecosystem. Ah,
yeah, fine. Fair play. We've got statistics from
2025. Or we've got statistics from 2026, to be
fair. Let's have a look. Launched in December
2017. Spent almost an entire year in Steam's
early access. Throughout the year, the team finally
tuned the PUBG experience and it launched on
next... Oh, this is for console. Blah, blah,
blah. So, while PUBG generated global popularity,
it struggled to compete in the United States.
Mobile was already starting to ascend in 2019.
In March 2020, when the world went into its first
lockdown, PUBG Mobile made $270 million a month
in revenue. Oh, my God. Because COVID was big
for gaming, man. It may have really fucked some
studios. I remember... The games that were already
out did really fucking well. Warzone. Warzone
was a mad one. Fucking Nintendo with the Switch.
The amount of people that went and bought a Switch
and then threw them in the bin after. Has made...
So PUBG Mobile made $1 .1 billion revenue in
2024. A slight decrease on the year prior. 25
million people play PUBG Mobile daily. Daily.
Daily. 25 million people play PUBG Mobile daily
and 50 million more play Game for Peace. So there's
75 million people playing that game and its partner
Game for Peace in China daily. daily that is
actually crazy that is actually nuts in 2014
pub sorry 2024 pub g mobile was downloaded 101
million times a slight increase on 2023 that
is and it launched in 9th of february 2018 have
you ever played pub g on the pc i played it me
and me and my best mate mark we fiended it on
um yeah on console yeah we were we because we
were really really good at um H1Z1. Oh, right.
Yeah, nice. We were very fucking good at that.
And I think when we played on PlayStation in
the first season, my claim to fame, I was in
the 0. It was either 0 .01 % or 0 .1 % for that
first season. I was fucking, I was on that cunt.
Damn. I was playing heavy. And we were very,
very good. And then PUBG came out. So we gave
that a go. And we fucking loved it. But the only
problem with PUBG is that it was very, very long
games. Yeah, very long games. And it was also...
Very tactical. Very unforgiving. Yes. And we
spend a lot of time... At some points, the longest
games were like 45 minutes long and you could
go an entire game without seeing people and then
just get popped at the very end. But the game
itself, very, very fun. And then we sort of stepped
away from the Battle Royale model. So, yeah.
So I haven't played the mobile version, but I
spent countless hours playing it on console.
So I know it. I know it very well. Got a lot
of very good clips from it. I used to play it
on PC, like in the early days when PUBG was...
before the mobile version was even a thing. The
revenue on this is mad. So from 2018, $172 million.
2019, $1 .5 billion. What? And then 2020, $2
.5 billion. 2021, $2 billion. 2022, $1 .5 billion.
So it slowly goes down. But they were the...
They were the main innovator of Battle Royale,
though, if you think about it. Weren't they?
Yeah. They were, weren't they? Battle Royale
Genesis was... PUBG were the ones that really
blew the Battle Royale model into outer space.
What's the genesis? And then Call of Duty responded
with Warzone and The Dance. Originated from the
1999 novel and 2000 film of the same name. Yeah,
the Japanese film. Lasting tropes like Forced
Man. This concept was popularized in gaming through
mods for Armor 2 and Armor 3, eventually leading
to a fully -fledged commercial titles such as
PlayerUnknown's PUBG. Yeah, exactly, yeah. So
PUBG and then, I guess, then what did you have
after? H1Z1 was not a genesis to Battle Royales,
but it was definitely because H1Z1 was a mod
off of DayZ. Right, gotcha. Kind of. Of the same
thing. But yeah. I guess you could say. Armor.
Armor 1. Oh sorry. Armor 2. Armor 3. And then
PUBG. Yeah. So yeah. Yeah. Let's say. PUBG was
the first. I think stand alone. I think so. This
is just a battle royale. Yeah. This is what this
is. Yeah. Spawned the entire genre. Because then
very very quickly. Apex Legends came out. Apex
Legends was fun. To be fair. It was very very
refreshing. But yeah. Warzone. I mean. To be
fair. I think it's safe to say that. King of
Battle Royale now these days is probably Warzone,
no? Either Warzone or Fortnite is the prevailing...
Yeah, for a while. I think Fortnite probably
does better in terms of revenue generation than
Warzone, but I think Warzone is... I mean, you
play it and you think, do you know what? I fucking
hate them. Really? Yeah, yeah. I find them so
incredibly boring. It's the fix of constantly...
fighting for something and then when you finally
win and then you win again and then you win again
and you win again and then you go this is just
the same loop it's just boring I just find it
boring I don't know why I feel like maybe it's
just because I'm getting older because like even
like Battlefield 6 loved it I think it's an incredible
game I don't play it and I won't play it again
because I'm just not interested in it Yeah. Ark
Raiders, I think, is fantastic. And whenever
I play it, I have so much fun. These are games
which, I mean, Battlefield 6, Ark Raiders, I
mean, I've not played Ark Raiders, so I can't
really say much for it, excuse me. But what I
will say is that Battlefield 6, it was only really
fun for me when I was playing with people. Same
here. When I was squatted up. Yeah. And we're
just twatting people in a tank. Yeah, that's
exactly what I was doing. Or we're running around
twatting people in the tanks. Yeah. Or, you know,
again, I'd imagine it would be the same with
Ark Raiders. Like, I play Warzone every now and
then. I've got a friend of mine, close friend
of mine, Robert, who the only game we ever play
together is Warzone because, you know, he's never
really in a country. And when we do play, Warzone
is one of those games where you can pick up and
it doesn't matter how bad or good you are, you
can still jump in and just join the action. But
Warzone, I mean, it's pretty polished, apart
from the hackers. but it's annoyingly polished,
despite the amount of... Well, it's because of
how much fucking money they make off of it. Yeah,
and do you know what's right? So they've partnered
with Fallout in their most recent content. Yeah,
yeah. And you can literally run around as the
dude from Fallout, and you can run around in
power armors. Or the ghoul. Yeah, and... Oh,
I can't remember his name. Maximus is the power
armor geyser. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I don't know,
man. It's weird. It's just, I remember I got
killed by a really janky animated outline character
thing. Do you know Butthead? What are they called?
Beavis and Butthead. Beavis and Butthead? Yeah.
I got killed in a game of Warzone by Beavis.
And I was like... What the fuck is happening?
And then Nicki Minaj come running around the
corner. And then fucking Nicki Minaj, yeah, and
then Snoop Dogg. And I'm like, but Beavis. I
was like, what? What happened? And then I go
into the cash store, onto the store. Yeah. Where
you can buy stuff with cop points. And I see
Beavis and Butthead there. Don't get me wrong.
It's incredibly funny. Or like Family Guy and
then the Simpsons and shit. But like... Fortnite's
always been very, very good at its cosmetics.
Yes. Can't take it away from it. And I loved
Fortnite when it first came out. I played that
game fucking so much. How did you get into Fortnite?
I absolutely loved it for a long time. And they
nail their cosmetics and their collaborations.
I logged into Fortnite not crazy long ago and
I didn't understand what the fuck was going on.
Really? Because it's a completely different game.
How much has changed? Completely different. Wow.
You've still got the Battle Royale, but the amount
of different modes and community things and just
the menu, I was like... Overwhelming. A Fortnite
kid understands this. An adult mind does not.
I don't get this. This is too much for me, so
I'm immediately backing out. I can't do this.
But yeah, the cosmetics are great, and they do
a really good job at designing them. And it's
only natural that any other Battle Royale looks
at that and goes, I want a piece of that. Oh,
yeah, because the amount of money that they're
making from those partnerships. Yeah, but sometimes
it just goes too far over, which is exactly what
fucking Warzone did, and you end up with ridiculous
collaborations. The Stranger Things one was weird.
Yeah, yeah. It was weird. And then you just end
up with... The backlash that Battlefield received
when they brought out some operators for Battlefield
6 and just the skins were slightly too colourful
and everyone kicked off because they were like,
you said this was going to be realism and you
fucking brought out an operator in a bright green
outfit. The outfit itself is tactical but it's
bright green. That's not the case. So they dialed
it down. You can always see the sneakiness of
the company's Obviously think like, what can
we get away with? What can we get away with?
Fucking World of Warcraft, where I've spoken
about it a couple of times in this, with the
Brutasaur. Yes. So if you're not aware of what
I'm talking about, in Battle for Azeroth, there
was a mount that was brought out called the Brutasaur
mount. And it was gold cap, I think, to buy it.
Or if not, it was extremely expensive. Stupidly
expensive. You had to be a whale to be able to
fucking afford this or do some serious gold purchasing.
And the unique thing about this mount is that,
When you mounted up, you had an auctioneer on
the side of it and a mailbox, right? Was it a
mailbox or was it a repair? No, so that one was
the auctioneer and repair bot. And repair bot.
Yeah. So, again, if you don't know what I'm on
about. in World of Warcraft and most MMOs there's
a market called an auction and it's where players
can sell things and you can buy things and it's
basically the main economy for the server that
you're playing on and you can really fuck up
that economy by fucking around with the auction
house and that has been done multiple times in
the past but yeah it's your main economy player
driven economy and so they're only located in
main cities or some really really niche areas
so if you wanted something and you were out in
the open world you had to go all the way to a
main city and then travel back to where you were
and it was time consuming and annoying so they
brought out this mount where if you had enough
gold it would have the auctioneer on it um which
was great very unique when the battle for azeroth
expansion was done that mount disappeared yes
right so became very very unique so the only
people that would have that like once that expansion
was done it was done you could never get that
amount again the only time you could ever get
it was on something called the black market which
only which is a well it's a black market where
three or four items will go on go on there every
in a rotation yeah and people can bid on them
and they they go for ridiculous amounts of gold
and they're sometimes unclaimed black market
containers that you can get where You can get
absolutely anything from them. You can get absolute
shit or you can get some of the best fucking
mounts, cosmetics that are so hard to obtain
or no longer obtainable. But it's a gamble and
it can cost you a hell of a lot of money. And
every now and then the Brutal Mount will pop
up and it would always go for gold cap, which
was what? 9 ,999 ,000 something or 9 ,999, whatever
it is. So very, very cool mount to have. fast
forward to a couple of expansions after which
was was it the war within when they brought it
out or was it it's this one it was it was this
season it was season two so so blizzard announced
a in -game a shop mount that you can buy because
they've got a section on the shop where you can
buy mounts and there's quite a few some really
cool ones um They in no way impede your gameplay
whatsoever. The cosmetics you can buy on World
of Warcraft, there's no pay to win aspect from
Blizzard themselves. They announced a gilded
Brutosaur, which is the same thing as the current
Brutosaur, except this one had a mailbox attached
to it as well. So if you buy anything off the
auction house, it sends it to you in your mail,
and then you go to a mailbox, and then boom,
you've got it. So effectively, what it meant
is that you could mount up... buy something from
the auction house wherever you are in the world
and receive it in your mailbox in exactly the
same place because what you'd have to do previously
with just a Brutosaurus is stand outside a mailbox
or use a toy or whatever that would summon an
in -game mailbox for you so they popped it up
on the store for what was it 60 quid 60 quid
yeah 60 quid 60 pounds right and everyone went
fucking wild and the world of warcraft community
is very similar to most communities where if
you're telling me that it's unobtainable and
i can obtain it i'm gonna buy it and i think
i was one of the very few people in our guild
that didn't purchase i also didn't yeah and i
came so fucking close to purchasing it and the
only reason i didn't was because every other
fucker bought one So I was like, well, realistically,
the only times I'm really going to need it, someone
in this guild is going to have it. So I'm going
to let someone else fucking spend the money.
So I've got the numbers here as to how much revenue
Blizzard generated from releasing that. Just
one mount. Just that one mount. Not even, and
it's a nice looking mount. They re -skinned it.
Yeah. And they put like these emblems on it that...
basically represented each expansion or something
and bearing in mind it's a limited thing as well
so they had it for a limited amount of time on
the store you can't get it anymore but they didn't
design them out from the ground up let's not
get confused with that they just took a current
model and reskinned it it was a reskin and then
added a different fuck it added a mailbox onto
it exactly literally it's probably I don't know
like 15 lines of code yeah so we are looking
at so actually so we said 60 quid right Yeah.
It was $90 actually in the US. So it was 15 to
nearly 20 million US dollars in revenue that
Blizzard generated as of early 2025. Owned by
over 12 % of players. The mount is considered
one of the most successful high value in -game
store items. Yeah. That is nuts. What an incredible,
incredible fucking business model to release
a mount years prior that was incredibly hard
to obtain anyway and then... get rid of it, say
it's never coming back unless it's on the black
market, which again is incredibly hard to obtain,
and then release a very, very, very similar mount
that does exactly the same thing on the store
for a very high price, and then just let people
go fucking wild. What it also did was open up
a load of discussion about... a lot of mounts
that you cannot obtain anymore, like the Swift
Spectral Tiger mount, the Rooster Chicken mount,
which is something that I really fucking want,
the Blizzard Bear, the BlizzCon Bear. Yes. So
these mounts I'm talking about were from a trading
card game from the Burning Crusade era where
you would buy these trading cards and then you
could scratch a code off the back and you had
a chance of obtaining a mount. And these sell
for incredible amounts of gold. You can still
buy them today because people obviously have
the cards with the codes and they never cash
them in. So you can still get them. But if I
was to get hold of a Swift Spectral Tiger card
with the loot unclaimed, seven and a half grand.
Wow. Seven and a half. Seven and a half grand.
And this is the wild thing. I wanted that. There
are people that will... gladly pay that money.
Yeah. They will. There are. There are. In fact,
I can think of one person in my head right now
who would. Who? Oh, I think we should save that
for the Patreon. It's just a mad sum of money.
It's madness because the mountain doesn't even
do anything. That is a Gucci bag. Yes. That is
seven and a half grand. I mean, what? let's see
here's a fun exercise what if you had seven and
a half grand I'm not spending it on a mount no
you're not so what would you spend it on I'd
probably do something boring like put it towards
a mortgage or get a new fucking fence yeah mate
you know what I'd put that into getting a fucking
I don't know I'd probably redecorate Yeah, you
put it into something fucking practical. It's
not a mount in a game. But what I'm saying is
that that is a statement for anyone who's running
around with one of those mounts. It's a statement
because you're looking at that guy and that geezer
has either been playing for a very, very long
time and was very lucky or has spent a hell of
a lot of money. But do you know what? That does
then lead you to realise though, this is one
of the beautiful things I think about MMOs and
gaming in general is that you will have people
from literally all walks of life. convening on
that one platform yeah so so you will have you
will have um for example you can have a very
giga rich and successful person yeah in life
who is you know i wouldn't say i don't have a
thing to worry about but you know they're pretty
well set up and money's not a problem for them
yeah you're gonna have people people like that
playing with someone who's probably two months
behind in rent you know and and you know it kind
of levels the playing field and you know even
if we were to look inward at hoofs we obviously
we don't know what the backgrounds are of every
single person in there yeah you know one one
thing i can say for sure is that we've got people
from all sorts of different backgrounds of all
sorts of different stations of life all sorts
of in stages of life um and it's quite interesting
isn't it because you can have a giga giga rich
person who has all of the gizmos and gadgets
but you can actually also similarly have someone
who's really really really good at the game which
said super rich and successful person will look
at and think oh my god you are so good at this
game teach me yeah help me but then in an outside
world in an outside world they would never interact
with each other right not not to say that that
said rich person would be like get away from
me you dirty peasant but but you see where i'm
coming from yeah the likelihood of them ever
interacting with each other is almost non -existent
yeah they don't entertain in the same circle
exactly whereas on on a game yeah It happens.
But even, let's say you and I, for example, what
would have been the likelihood of me and you
meeting? We wouldn't have. We wouldn't have because
the industry that you work in is a completely
different industry to what I work in. It's the
same with Leon. I mean, Leon wouldn't have met
anyone because he lives on the edge of the world.
He lives in a fucking field in Wales. He lives
in nowhere. Cunt lives nowhere. to be fair though
he can go surfing whenever he wants that's pretty
cool yeah but he might as well live at fucking
Point Nemo like he doesn't live anywhere it looks
lovely where he lives don't get me wrong I really
like it but he lives nowhere what was his train
journey to your wedding like 16 hours some bullshit
like that mine was a 10 minute drive yeah it's
just it's just fucking that's the whole that's
the That's the whole point of it, isn't it? Massively
multiplayer online. Oh, no, it's great. We're
very lucky to be in the grips of exactly what
this game is designed for. Yes. We are one of
the very, very few communities where that is...
that is a driver and it's remained what it is
today. And do you know what? There aren't actually
that many games out there that can state that
this has remained the case. I think there are
a lot of games out there that started off this
way, but inevitably just... Well, they just don't
stay. Look, Wales is always going to be number
one for a very long time. I... Me personally,
there's never going to be anything that will
unseat it for me because it's just such a big
part of my life. And every single person who
has ever played World of Warcraft and is as addicted
to it as we are, because that's what we are as
addicts, right? We'll have all tried to play
something else to get away from it. 100%. We've
all tried ESO, Final Fantasy, Guild Wars, Guild
Wars 2, New World, fucking anything. Ion. Yep,
anything that comes out. Even Diablo to a point.
And all that Korean game that came out a while
ago that was extremely popular and then... Last
Epoch. Fell short. Last Epoch that was, I think.
I think it was Last something. I know the one
you're on about, but it wasn't that. Asmongold
played it quite a bit. Last... I swear it was
Last Epoch. E -P -O -C -H. I'm pretty sure it
was. I think it was a South Korean. I'm pretty
sure it was Last Epoch. I think. No, it wasn't
that. Last... South... Korean... Korean... Last
Tiddy? MMO? I really want to find it now because
it's going to piss me off. You're not talking
about terror. Lost Ark. Lost Ark. Lost Ark. There
you go. Lost Ark. Played that for a bit. Fucking
Black Desert Online. Yeah. There's all this shit.
Even once human. Yeah. But nothing, nothing,
nothing, nothing is ever the same. No. As well.
They've done something. That is like crack. I
don't know what it is. So there was a comment
on a YouTube short that I watched of Ashes of
Creation. So obviously there's been a lot of
controversy surrounding Ashes of Creation because
they've gone into early access on Steam for 50
quid. And yes, they do make a disclaimer and
say, look, it's not a complete game. This is
what you are purchasing. It's not a complete
game, even though we have a fully functioning
cash shop, which interestingly works perfectly.
Yeah. You put time and effort into that one.
Not the fucking rest of the game. So there was
a comment on a short that was talked about. So
there was a short that someone that purchased
the early access is playing around with Asher's
creation, which by the way, looks very good.
It's got a lot of potential. There's a lot of
bones there for them to work with. And someone,
the creator, the person that uploaded the video
was talking about the movement. And how the feedback,
the haptic feedback and how fluid it feels. And
they said the potential for it is there, but
it needs some refining. It's not snappy. And
there was someone that made a comment that really
stuck with me. And they said, the gold standard
for character and player movement and animation
is World of Warcraft. And has always been World
of Warcraft, even back in vanilla. the snappiness
of the character movement I agree even if you
go back and play classic WoW now and vanilla
you will think oh these movements they look janky
but they feel the same because it's you know
it's old animations but they are responsive to
the point where you know playing a caster you
cast a spell and all of the classic handies that
are listening to me saying this right now you'll
know exactly what I mean even back in vanilla
wow went your cast bar that was accurate to 0
.1 milliseconds yeah yeah yeah on on the delay
in the feedback yeah right which is why you're
able to overlap your spell casting because it
was that responsive yeah so but how often can
you get that and say that with any other mmo
you can't you can't the closest the closest that
you would have is final fantasy online exactly
and i played a hell of a lot of it when i was
trying to get away from world of warcraft i remember
putting it in the discord i was like i think
i'm i'm moving to final fantasy and those fucking
cunts where you have to put almost 200 hours
worth of playtime into it just to start getting
into the story fuck off i'm not doing that and
i didn't i tell you what really irked me about
Final Fantasy was the fact that you didn't have
specific classes that you would create the characters
to be in so you could be a job yeah at first
I thought what a great idea but then it quickly
realised it takes away the identity yeah all
identity from your character because you can
be whatever you want yeah 100 % me and Ash obviously
played it and we were playing it parallel to
each other and sometimes we did play together
and For him, it's different because he's never
played an MMO before, so he's completely blind
to it. Whereas for me, you always compare. You
always compare. You can't get away from it. And
the art style is not my kind of art style. It's
so similar to WoW, but different. Yes. Where
you sit and you go, I can understand why people
find this so popular and why it is the second
best, but it's the second best. And it's the
second best for a reason. Now, WoW has the upper
hand because it was the first one of its kind
to come out. It set the example, but what it
did that so many games aren't able to retain
is leading that example. Yes, and actually keep
developing that. Yeah, you go, we are number
one and we are the first game to come out of
this kind and we are the best. And we are the
best because we're the only one, but we are the
best. and then to be able to maintain it for
two decades and go, no, we are the fucking best,
regardless of if we have our downward slopes
or whatever, we are the best. Well, it's cyclical,
isn't it? World of Warcraft has always been cyclical
in terms of what? you know, their ups and downs.
I mean, they started going on downward trajectory
when they released. So it was after Rafa Lich
King and then Cataclysm. Yeah. Cataclysm was
sort of like the herald of the first downward
trend after Rafa Lich King. Rafa Lich King was
absolute peak. I mean, back then, back then,
there was like, was it? 17 million concurrent
players every day. They really hit the fucking
gold mine with Wrath of the Lich King. Wrath
of the Lich King was insane. The fact that that
was the second expansion in World of Warcraft
and to this day it is still regarded as the most
popular. The best one. And I think, so they started
going on a downward trend with Cataclysm and
then subsequently Mists of Pandaria and then
subsequently Warlords of Draenor. But it then
peaked again at Legion. And I think Legion was
a really, really good example of how they combined
modern innovation with what they knew was best
about WoW. Don't get me wrong, I don't think
Legion was perfect, but by bringing back in and
putting the emphasis on the artefacts, the weapons,
the artefact weapons and those power systems,
etc. I think what you had is you had... So, WoW,
much like Warhammer... has such a rich lore.
Yes. Base. Yeah. And there's so many different
avenues that you can explore. Um, I'm, I'm exploring
them right now in, in, in written format. Yeah.
Yeah. And you have always had your, um, your
main, main characters when it comes to the law.
Hmm. With, um, Illidan. Yes. Fucking Arthas.
Yeah. And their, their backstories. Yeah. Um,
Frow, Jaina, your, your main, main people, Rafa
the Lich King, was obviously centered around
Arthas Menethil. Yes, correct. So the Lich King
and how he came to be and then how you've overthrown
him and incredible expansion. And then Rafa the
Lich King, very centered around Illidan and that
story. Same with the Burning Crusade. The Burning
Crusade was entirely centered around fucking
Illidan. Yeah. This big fucking... demon hunter
lord crazy looking fucking geezer you are not
prepared you are not prepared and then obviously
the legion I know it wasn't purely centred around
Illidan but obviously he had a massive part to
play within that expansion even though I didn't
play it I know the lore surrounding it and these
are things where if you grew up with WoW Like
if you brought out an expansion now where the
Lich King was involved in it quite heavily, it
would go fucking mad. It would if they executed
it in a dynamic way. Correctly. Law accurate.
Because right now he's gone. Well, in the most
pathetic way possible as well, which is the sad
part. Yeah, he's gone. He's a little wisp and
he's just gone. So that resonates with the players
because you've got such a strong structure. Whereas
like now, obviously it's... You split off into
all different directions in the story, right,
and got quite shit. Dragonflight was, I think,
one of the best expansions that Blizzard has
made in terms of innovation and driving the genre
forwards because of the amount of different changes
they implemented and all the systems. I think
that was the perfectly executed thing to incorporate
all of these. crazy new mechanics but story wise
it was fucking well although my dragon flight
story was wet as fuck it was bullshit it was
actually diabolical it was just wet and i think
and i will state that and i agree with you dragon
flight was definitely the staging ground expansion
for them to be able to test and implement new
technologies to set the set the groundwork for
the war within and this saga and Midnight. So
I can tolerate Dragonflight. There's a reason
why I didn't play Dragonflight Season 2 and 3.
Because there were four seasons in Dragonflight,
wasn't there? Yeah. In fact, I didn't even play
Season 4, really, until the very, very end when
we were doing... I was just doing... You know,
you were able to do the raids for those... Ruby
things that you could pick up to buy gear. Yeah,
yeah, yeah. That was it. That's all I came back
for. And to understand it. But... Dragonflight,
great expansion for systems testing. But man,
I agree with you. The story was absolute cack.
It was so bad. You want grit and the community's
calling out for I want to see some blood. What
I want to see is, it's always been Horde and
Alliance has always been the two factions that
are always fighting against each other, but then
there's always been a common enemy, but we've
always been fighting against each other regardless.
And then slowly, it's kind of with the Lich King,
the Alliance and the Horde were coming together,
but still remaining that hatred between each
other. And then with the likes of Mists of Pandaria,
it was slowly... coming together and then you
had fucking warlords but then then bfa kind of
gave us hope that that it was set it was going
to be that bloodbath again yeah because she had
sylvanas at the helm yeah who was going to be
she was a psycho she was arguably one of the
best villains in world of warcraft period irrespective
of whether she was a leader of the war or not
because she was just she was messed up in the
head and she was she was unhinged because guess
what the lich king stole her soul yeah and And
we had this amazing character in Sylvanas. And
what did they do to her in Shadowlands? They
gave her soul back. Yeah. Why would you give,
arguably, the most iconic and nut -headed villain
in the whole of your universe a consciousness?
Yeah. Why would you do that? Yeah, yeah. Why
would you give her soul back? Keep her a villain.
Keep her a villain? And if it means that her
arc ends in tragedy, then you know that her arc
ends in tragedy. Yeah, let it end in tragedy.
Let it end in tragedy. That's what we're crying
for. Let someone fucking die. And then you can,
with that tragedy, with that arc, you can do
a lot of things with the spin -off. Why is Khadgar
in a wheelchair? Why is Khadgar in a wheelchair?
Why is he in a wheelchair? Why is one of the
most powerful mages... in the fucking game, currently
sat in a wheelchair because he used some of his
spells. And just to clarify... Get up! Just to
clarify, you know, we're all for inclusivity.
I'm not digging wheelchair users, by the way.
Yeah, exactly. You know what I mean? We're all
in for inclusivity. But this cunt lifted Dalaran.
He lifted Dalaran, agreed. An entire city. And
he spirit -bombed... What was his fucking name?
Was it Archimonde? I can't remember. He spirit
-bombed a demon in the face. Yeah. What the fuck?
We just want... Let someone important die. Let
them go. Let it be something crazy. Let Vol 'jin
happen again. Let it be something mega. You know
what? I've always been a Horde person, as have
you. And Thrall has always been a very... In
fact, I play Shaman. primarily because I model
him off of Thrall because Thrall's an enhancement
shaman and I play enhancement shaman and actually
one of my transmogs is based off of him but I
have a really really really bad feeling that
in either this saga or the next so either Midnight
or the next expansion one of them's gonna die
Thrall or Jaina or even what's Pussyboy what's
his name Oh, fucking... That's mad that I can't
remember his name as well. That's how irrelevant
he's been. That's how irrelevant he's been. But
I love him. Anduin. Anduin, that's it. There
we go. So I have a feeling that one of those
three... I'm not that person anymore! Great cinematic.
I love that cinematic. It's really good. I have
a feeling one of those three are going to die.
They have to. They have to. I think they will.
I think they... I would love to see the war chief...
What is this? So while we're on the topic, you
just mentioned Warchief. Who is our Warchief?
We don't have one. That's what I was about to
say. We have a council. We have a council. And
the Forsaken have a council. Everyone loved Vol
'jin, man. It's about councils. We all know that
councils don't work. I mean, if you draw... Okay,
right, fine. I mean, we're definitely not making
this a political podcast, but if you're going
to draw parallels here between, you know, governing
systems and whatnot, we all know for a fact that
the most amount of stability comes from dictatorships
and communism. Yes. Right, if you're going to
apply it in a game sense... It's the same thing.
It's Warchief. Warchief. Warchief. Yeah, give
me a Warchief. Give me a Warchief. Give me a
leader back. Give me a commander. Yeah. Bane...
Well, obviously Bane's dead, but... Wait, no.
Yeah, Bane's dead. No, Ken's dead. Bane's still
alive. Yes, yes, yes, yes. He's on the council.
Yeah, yeah, he's on the council. But, like, you
need a Warchief back. It's just the wishy -washiness
of it. Like, I'm not saying that it's necessarily
a problem, because obviously there's a bigger
picture. We're all friends. But Frau has always
been... seeing that bigger picture especially
when you know his backstory and the lore behind
him yeah um you understand where he comes from
as a character but as the horde as an entirety
and the same with the alliance let's have that
conflict back because you're never going to be
able to join the two and i feel like it shouldn't
be joined either can you imagine An interracial
orc and human... Wait, no, there is one. An interracial
human and orc baby. Corona is, isn't she? Possibly.
I'd imagine that would be a thing if they've...
I think we might need to fact check that. I was
pretty sure Corona is a half human, half orc.
That was in a Warcraft movie, wasn't it? Yeah.
Can you imagine a Tauren gnome? Yeah, there is
a whole half -orc thing conceived violently during
war crimes and are not accepted by either faction.
But the half -orcs do exist. They are a thing.
Half -orcs are commonly known as half -tusks
in Persco and Zehorastria. I'm not going to try
and pronounce that. I don't even think that's
not World of Warcraft, that section. But there
are canonically half -orcs. I'm pretty sure Corona
is one of those. But it's just that... They need
to get out of the same gameplay loop that they've
been in the last couple expansions and the last
seasons where it's like, here's the big bad guy.
Quick, let's all join together and kill the big
bad guy. We've killed them and now there's another
big bad guy. Oh no, this person who was helping
us is now another bad guy. Let's kill them. Oh
no, they've seen the error of their ways. Now
they must be punished but not murdered. I guess
though, credit where credit's due. That's kind
of... That's kind of what Blizzard have been
trying to do, though, isn't it? Because that's
what they've done with this. With Chris Metzen
coming back, that's the direction that they're
taking it to. The war within Midnight. Zalatath
is the overarching villain. It's a long, stretched
-out story that needs to come to an end. But
also, you need a... You need a burning crusade
back. You need a battle for Azeroth. Because
I didn't think BFA was that bad. I just thought
it was very long. I thought BFA was alright until
they went a bit... too much with the additional
powers. Yeah. The corruptions. Yeah, the corruption
was fucking mad. So season one was actually,
season one BFA was probably one of the best experiences
I'd had in WoW for a long, long time. Because
it was pure, here's a new island, here's both
of these factions fighting. Since Rathalich King.
I would even say that BFA season one was better
than Legion for me. Season two was okay because
that was when they introduced that neck thing.
You know, that legendary neck that you could
change the power on. Yeah, yeah, the Azurite.
Yeah, yeah, exactly. Which is fine. You could
deal with that. But then they introduced corruptions.
Yeah. And corruptions were a crazy, crazy time.
And that was when it started getting ridiculous.
Like, that broke the game. And I primarily PvP'd
back then, so... Yeah. You had these guys...
People running at full corruption. Yeah, like
rogues with a nine stack of that bleed thing
that I did. Or... a blood decay with, with a
six stack of twilight devastation, which meant
that that beam would come down and just one shot
you. Um, you know, and, and, and I, that really
broke the game for me. And I, I, they, they were
heading in such a great direction and then they
just absolutely fucked it. And there's a reason
why they never brought that mechanic back. They
never brought that structure back, but the, the,
the Azurite neck piece that obviously you have
that in forms of like the Reshi wraps that we
have now that that's a system that. That does
work to a point. I feel like it was tested very
well with Legion, with the legendary artifacts,
but the takeaway from Legion is that it completely
fucked you from wanting to get any other weapons
because you were locked to it. Whereas a cape,
yeah, I can take that. A belt, yeah, sweet. And
also, they made it, the Reshiram is not an active
ability. no it just did it was just there yeah
and it would just do something yeah it would
you you you like randomly one shot something
oh how did i do that oh okay that's what it was
and it made and it makes sense for the you didn't
have to push it and you couldn't change what
it did yeah which is what they didn't bfa but
like i think again they made it clear they learned
their lessons from shadowland but this is this
is why i've got respect in blizzard right now
because And this is why I'm fully behind them
with the way in which they're taking the game
development. Because they listen to what we said
about Shadowlands, for example. The Covenant,
the borrowed power. And there inevitably being
a meta as a result of you being a Retribution
Paladin that was either Bastion or whatever.
Oh God, that shit. And then they'd fucking change
it around with every patch. Exactly. So you'd
have to completely change the whole Covenant
and there was no skips. And then grind it, yeah.
Fuck. Everything was time -gated. renowned system
that they had implemented because it was a renowned
system wasn't it and it was and it was it was
locked yeah and it was a fucking hell like this
is they've learned they've learned from all of
that yeah and actually i'm really really happy
with the way in which the direction they're going
at the moment because again sort of playing to
us being you know late 20s early 30s um i've
got a kid on the way like i'm fully conscious
and aware of the fact that i'm not gonna have
as much time in the world as I used to. I'm not
that I had that much to play with anyway before.
But when you've got limited time and you've got
a busy lifestyle and you've got things to do,
you appreciate when developers understand that
they respect that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, you
know, with you and your running, for example,
and me and my, well, incoming baby and obviously
trying to maintain my fitness goals. You actually
don't really have much time to play other than
the time that you prescribe for when you're raiding
with all the lads. And so you don't want to be
or have to be spending hours and hours and hours
catching up and grinding on the other stuff.
For you to have the option to do that still is
good for the more hardcore players. That's fine.
But I've already accepted the fact that I am
not going to fall within that percentile. Never
have, never will. Well, you think like with the
pre -patch at the moment, Leon's already pretty
much finished it. I've barely touched it. I know
there's not a lot of content in it anyway. I've
done one quest. Yeah, but all I've done is get
the title and that's it. I haven't got the mounts
from it. I literally did that and then went straight
into some Mythic Plus with them boys. So for
me... yeah, I could log on after this pod and
then just absolutely steamroll it and then sit
there and go, well, there's no content in this
pre -patch. But... The point being is that there
shouldn't have to be loads of content for you
to smash through because we all know that as
mature adults, that is not a sustainable way
of approaching any game. The game's designed
for adults. Yes. It's not designed for children
to get into it. And they recognise that actually...
the vast majority of the people still playing
this game are the people that were playing with
us way back when. And most of those people are
in their 30s and 40s now. If you introduced a
fucking 15 -year -old into this and how much
shit is involved is madness. I think it's a difficult
one to balance in terms of if you're a brand
new player trying to get into World of Warcraft
right now, fuck that. Because there's just so
much shit. But I mean, I haven't played through
the new... I haven't either. The new player experience.
I'm tempted to. I know Leon was complaining about
it because he made a character and then he said
it literally just drops you in battle for it
in... What the fuck is the... The dragon one.
Dragonfly. Dragonfly. Why did I feel... It just
drops you in Dragonfly. The story's changed.
Yeah. But he was saying like... It doesn't let
you leave. You can't leave the areas. It keeps
you in there, which I guess, yeah, kind of good
because then if you are a new player, you're
forced to have that introduction. I think that
is the right thing to do. Otherwise, there's
a whole other world of just shit that you could
get lost in. I think if I remember correctly,
you can choose the experience you decide to do
at the start. So when you create your character...
you can choose to have just a completely open
world experience or you can choose to follow
their new player experience. And I think if you
choose to go through their new player experience,
you have to have a locked and linear path to
follow. I'll have to check it out. Because I
had the same problem when I tried playing Final
Fantasy. Yeah. And ESO. When I tried getting
into them, these were at the times where I was
completely off of WoW. I had no one to play with.
I was done with WoW. I needed something different.
And I wanted to try something new. So I went
and logged into ESO. Obviously, ESO's model is
you purchase the expansions, but there's also
DLC packs that you can download. Yeah, yeah.
I was so overwhelmed. I didn't know what to do.
Yeah, it's mad. What do I do? Do I follow this
quest? Do I go that quest? Do I do this? ESO's
got a similar structure to what we've got with
WoW, in that if you have a current up -to -date
sub, all you have to do is buy the current expansion,
and then you've got access to the previous. Yeah,
yeah, yeah. But the problem with ESO was I didn't
know whether the content I was doing was up -to
-date or not. Yeah, because when you start the
game, obviously it asks you which portal you
want to go through. Yeah, yeah. And I go, what
do you mean what portal? And then some are locked
and some aren't. But if you've started the game
with a sub already, then they're all unlocked
for you because if you subscribe to it, then
they're all unlocked. And yeah, you go, I don't
know. And then it doesn't matter which place
you go to, regardless, you still get the main
story given to you where you have to then traverse
through the original zones. In the main story.
I was so confused. I was so, so confused. I think
actually the fact that they've got that new player
zone experience thing where you are literally
forcing you to do. I think that's a good thing
because as a new player, as a completely new
player, that is what you're looking for. Yeah,
because the main story quest line in ESO is very,
very good, especially for leveling and getting
the skill points and everything. But it's when
you finish that. Then what? Then what? There's
a million different things. There's no direction.
Exactly. Well, I'll just pick a zone and start
leveling through that. Yeah, exactly. So I think
this new player thing, they guide you through
it. They lock you into that. This is what you're
going to do up until you hit level 80 or whatever.
And even then, you've got to finish that campaign
and that storyline. And then once you hit that
certain point. Here's the open game. Here, you
can do whatever the fuck you want. Because you'll
know the basics by then to crack on. Because
throwing someone in something like World of Warcraft,
in any MMO that they don't know, you go, oh,
fuck, this is overwhelming. Overwhelming, 100%.
Fucking Final Fantasy, it's fixed now. But when
I was getting into it, the amount of hours and
content, it was like the second expansion that
you would have to get to before the game got
good. I remember I was part of a guild or community
or whatever. I'd put, I think it was something
crazy, like I'd already sunk in like 70 or 80
hours into the game. And I remember saying to
him, I was like, when does it get good? I was
like, I'm not having fun here. I'm skipping cut
scenes, which I very rarely do. I was like, I'm
not enjoying this. This feels like an absolute
grind. And they were like, yep, someone showed
me a website and it put it all into chapters.
and i found the point where i was at and they
were like get through the the initial story and
then after the first expansion the first there
was like the first expansion is when it really
opens up yeah i'm like sweet cool found the drop
down list of the original story and it's fucking
ginormous and then i was like right i'm on this
quest so i'm right at the end that's great and
then did it and then you've got the the is it
an epilogue or a prologue? Yeah. In between.
Yeah. An epilogue? Epilogue, yeah. One of those
two, I can't remember which one. So you've got
to do that before you get into the first expansion
of Final Fantasy Online. And I played for a good
15, 20 hours. And I just felt like there was
no progression for what I was doing. And I messaged
and I said, when do you get into the first expansion
then? And they're like, oh, it can take... It
can take nearly 100 hours. Before the game really
opens up, it's about 100 hours. Thanks, buddy.
I went, what? And I found the same thing, like
the list. And it was just as big as the initial
fucking story. And that's when I stopped. That's
when I stopped doing it. I'm not doing this.
I am... I remember doing a whole episode about
it and complaining to Ash about it because he
had the same fucking gripes. I was like, I am
not playing a game where I have to put hundreds
of hours into it to get to the baseline of the
game. I said, I'm not fucking doing it. And then
shortly after they introduced a skip where they
got rid of all of that. And I was like, I'm not
touching it, but thank fuck. Because that is
so dumb. So what World of Warcraft's doing, it
does make perfect sense in locking you into that.
I'll have to experience it. I'll probably make
a new character today and just see what that's
like. Because we obviously had the Isle thing
where it got you from level 1 to 10. It was like
the first 10, 15 levels. Yeah, first 10 levels.
Yeah, Exile's Reach. Exile's Reach, yeah, where
it would make you do a dungeon. It would give
you the very, very basics of the game, but they
were very, very basic. Yeah. And then it would
thrust you into the open world. Off you go. That's
just too much. Yeah, whereas now, fair enough,
I'll play it and then we'll see. Yeah, I agree.
I think I'll do the same. And we'll fucking leave
it there, brother. Yeah, I think that's a good
one. How far did we go there? Hour and 45. that's
pretty decent and i've been wanting to talk about
wow for a long time that flew by very quick and
to be fair to be fair we didn't even i mean we
diverged a little bit didn't we yeah yeah but
um i mean i'm sure there will be more to come
in the future of course there will because this
has been great more specific and i suppose what
we could probably could do the suggestion is
we can always get some feedback from from your
listeners From the Discord. From the Discord
and see what they want us to talk about. Tell
me how many slices that was, Corey. Fucking how
many was that, motherfucker? See you later, everyone.
Thanks for coming, John. I love it. See you.
Bye.