Today, we're talking abandoned coal mines, mutated
aliens, and the slowest walking reporter of all
time, it's Germs, Nerawareta Machi, with a PlayStation.
Groovy! Hello everyone, welcome to Retro Game
& Beyond Presents Retro Game Club. We're your
hosts, Joe, Eric, Ryan, and Jacob Vanderloski.
And today, we need to wash our hands because
we've been playing with germs for the PlayStation.
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Come like, comment, subscribe, follow, whatever
you want to do. We want to hear and see from
you guys. All right, with that being said, let's
jump into Word of the Nerd. Get those nerds!
Nerd! Nerd! We enjoy all things of the nerd.
Video games, TV, shows, comic books, movies,
music, food. So let's discuss what other things
we've been into recently. What have you guys
been doing? I finished my Walking Dead. I don't
know if I said that last time, but... Oh, nice.
Okay. yeah so you've read all of them now yep
all 193 damn it was it was pretty good i mean
the ending was okay it's it wasn't horrible or
anything but it was just it was all right but
um yeah i liked it i thought it was well worth
the read so now i'm getting into other books
now i'm trying to finish my lovecraft book And
I think I'm like a story away from Call of Cthulhu,
which I'm super excited to read. Nice, yeah.
So, I think that's it. Just reading, really.
Yeah. Yeah, I read, like I said, I think I read
like 60 issues of The Walking Dead. I want to
finish it. It's pretty good, so. It's worth it.
Yeah. For sure. Yeah. Are you going to read The
Incredibles next? Or not Incredibles. What's
it called? Invincible? invincible uh i was thinking
about it but probably down the line but i have
so many books i need to finish dude yeah didn't
you watch this show yeah yep this show's pretty
good i liked it a lot but i just have like six
books i need to read and yeah half of them i've
had for like five years yeah i was gonna say
haven't you had them for like three years Yeah,
well, one of them is everything Shakespeare wrote
that I haven't touched. I think I have like 600
books I need to read. Yeah. And like 300 video
games to play. I think that number is way higher
than that. Yeah. And it's always adding. Yeah.
Never stops. Oh, I've got like 50 tabs open of
games I need to add to the list right now. Yeah.
Dude, I've been liking Lovecraft stuff. It's
hard for me to just get into reading sometimes.
Yeah. I don't know why. I enjoy it, but... Especially
when you're reading that old English, it's really
hard. It is. Because I read to get off my phone
and not look at the screen so much, but dude,
he uses words I've never fucking heard of before.
That's because nobody's used them since the 1930s.
Well, yeah. Even before that. And I read it,
and I'm trying to figure out what it means as
a... context clue kind of way but sometimes I
have to look them up because it's just just insane
words but especially when he uses them like half
of the sentence is words I don't know so but
the nice thing is if I can understand Lovecraft
it'll help me with Shakespeare a little more
true so that was kind of my goal but like I said
I've not touched that book yet well hey reading's
the best way to learn man Yeah. Yeah, it is.
I have some good books, man. I got Lord of the
Flies. I got 1984, which I really want to read.
I've heard that's a really good book. Yeah, 1984
is awesome. And then I have Animal Farm or something.
Yeah, Animal Farm is good. I haven't read that
one. It's pretty good. It's simple. It's very
easy to follow. Yeah, yeah. I just like his writing.
It's very easy. It's nothing. Not big words.
Not over -sophisticated. Yeah. Okay. And then
I got, like, I think mom gave me, like, two Stephen
King books or something. So, just got a bunch
of shit. But, dude, that Shakespeare book's gonna
take me a long time. Yeah, it's a lot. Well,
he's poetry and plays and all kinds of stuff.
It's a fat book, dude. It's bigger than the Lovecraft
one that I have. Yeah, I have his complete works,
dude. Yeah. It's funny to me. I think I paid
20 bucks for it. It's funny to think that a man's
entire, like... His entire life is worth 20 fucking
books. Yeah, it's insane. I mean, it's old. It's
a nice book, though. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's got,
like, the ribbon for the page marker, and then
the pages are, like, gold. Yeah. Not perforated,
but the outlines of it's gold, so it's pretty
cool. I know, just imagine going back, like,
you bring Shakespeare back, it's like, hey dude,
everything you've ever written, I just paid 20
bucks for. Well, that'd probably be a lot of
money for him. I don't know. But, anyway. And
you can tell him you can read it on the thing
called the internet. Yeah. It's mine, it would
float. It's like the meme where you give a monster
to, like, a Victorian child. Yeah. Wouldn't even
know what to do. You mean the energy tree? Yeah,
the monsters. Oh, yeah, yeah. Oh, they were doing,
like, sniffing cocaine and stuff like that. Eh.
They were dying of, like, fucking dysentery.
They had no medicine back then. That's true,
yeah. Yeah, that stuff would probably just kill
them. The monster would probably just rot their
stomach out. They'd die of a gut rot. Yeah. Oh,
man. They'll have ulcerative colitis. Yeah, probably.
You don't want that. No, you don't. Anything
else? No, that's about it. Who next? I'm just
still going through my Trigones. It's pretty
good. It changes a little bit too much sometimes,
so I'm like, what the hell's going on? It's still
interesting. Is it still Vash, or is it a new
character? No, it's Vash. It's good, though.
I like it. They just released a new anime, which
is awesome. Yeah, I heard about it. Is that out
finally? I think it's out, yeah. I think there's
two episodes out. Nice. That's based off the
books you're reading now, right? Yeah, it's off
of the Maximum. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. So I'm
going to have to check that one out. Me and Sarah
have been playing a game called Split Fiction.
Nice. We finally finished it today. We've been
playing that game forever, dude. That game is
long as hell. Is that the one with the two female
characters? Yeah. Yeah, okay. It's awesome. It's
actually really fun. Oh, is it? Yeah, okay. Yeah,
yeah. The concepts are really cool. Nice. I did
not expect that game to be that long. Yeah, yeah.
And then the ending got a little ridiculous.
Oh, yeah. But the game's pretty cool because
it's not incredibly difficult, but it's very
set up for if you never play video games. There's
a lot of assist and stuff. Oh, yeah, yeah. And
you can change how difficult you want it or not.
Right. But it was fun. I mean, the concept is
really cool. Yeah, I've seen that. It looked
interesting. It looked fun. Yeah, it was fun.
I think that's it, really. I don't think I haven't
watched too much stuff lately. I have one more
episode left for Devil May Cry, and I need to
finish it. Oh, yeah, yeah. I'm trying to figure
out what I want to read next after Trigon. Yep.
I really want to read those Vampire Hunter D
books. Vampire Hunter. I don't think I've seen
that. I mean, I've heard the name, but I don't
know anything about it. Yeah. The dude that did
a lot of Final Fantasy art and stuff did the
illustrations for those books. Oh, okay. Well,
now you've got me interested. Yeah, yeah. Final
Fantasy is one of my favorite series, dude. Well,
he's the one who did a lot of art design and
stuff. Oh, that's cool. All right. He didn't
write the books. He just illustrated them. No,
I got it. Yeah, yeah. Still, it's cool. Yeah,
I know. I want to read them. But apparently the
books are impossible to find. Oh, well, okay.
That's cool. Yeah. They have like the omnibuses,
but again, they have almost all of them on Amazon,
but there's like two or three that just aren't
there. And plus, they're only up to like volume
30 in America. They still haven't completely
been translated. Man, there's that many? Damn.
Yeah. Well, I guess that's what the internet's
for. Yeah, I do want to read them, but it just
kind of sucks to start reading something that
you're not going to be able to finish. But those
are just books. Yeah, other than that, not too
much. Cool. Jacob, what do you got? I got all
the endings for Silent Hill F. I really like
that game a lot. It's definitely my favorite
Silent Hill now. so i mean the story was crazy
it was so complex there were so many moving parts
but it was all so good it was it wasn't that
hard to follow either and like all the imagery
and symbolism was pretty it wasn't hard to like
decipher what was a you know what was metaphorical
for something in the real world or certain symbols
meant what they were supposed to mean. You know
what I'm saying? What, how they're, how figurative
they're supposed to be. Right. So they even have
like a UFO ending, which is like a running gag
in the game. So absolutely love that. That's
cool. Is it better than the new resident evils?
Um, I, I wouldn't say so. I, and I think that's
just cause I like the, um, like first person
shooter. I like, first -person shooters a lot,
and, you know, 7 and 8 are that. 7 and 8 also
have, like, awesome atmospheres. The, you know,
like, the swamp setting of 7 is so unsettling
and creepy. And then 8 has these beautiful, like,
castles. It's, you know, it's very European,
but it's very beautiful, I think. It's, like,
gothic. Yeah. Those two are good games, man.
They're good. Yeah, they're awesome. I know,
I need to play them. They're worth it, for sure.
I want to play the VR versions. VR versions?
Yeah, I want to play the VR versions. That's
a lot of fun, but its gameplay isn't very complex
or anything, which it makes sense. Silent Hill's
gameplay was never complex. It's pretty much
just hit, don't get hit, dodge, solve puzzles,
find out where to go. Where it's like Resident
Evil is you have to manage your inventory, you
have to upgrade stuff. But the atmosphere in
that game was pretty nice, too. The fog monster
is such a cool design. It's definitely one of
the coolest designs Silent Hill has ever had,
in my opinion. Nice. So... Yeah, I mean, I saw
some video of it. It looked pretty cool. Yeah,
the cutscenes look amazing. Yeah, yeah. They're
beautiful. But yeah, it's my favorite Silent
Hill right now. I'm going through the Silent
Hill 2 remake, and it's also pretty good. I like
how they... They changed a good amount of stuff
in that game, but when I mean change, I just
mean add, because they still have some of the
original puzzles, original weapons, stuff like
that. But it's fun so far. I don't know if I'll
like it more than F, but we'll see. Cool. But
after I finished Silent Hill F, I actually played
Life is Strange, and that's a really good game.
The story is just amazing. The original one?
Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah. I played that. I mean,
the ending was so emotional, but all the characters
were just so well written. Everybody connects
so well into everything. Yeah, that game was
pretty good. I remember liking that one. I've
never played any of the other ones after it,
though. Yeah, I only played the original. It's
a game I've been wanting to play for a while.
I just never really got around to it. Yeah, it's
pretty good. I remember enjoying it. Apart from
all of that, I've been reading The Fever Code,
I think it's called. It's the... second prequel
to the maze runner books um it's not bad but
i just i just kind of wish the direction was
a little bit different there's two characters
that are pretty uh important to the whole like
plot and narrative of the maze runner but they're
not talked about a lot in the maze runner books
like the first three and i felt like it would
have been more interesting if they were like
the main focus of the second prequel rather than
thomas and theresa they're like the uh two main
main characters of the original trilogy it just
would have been cooler to see like kind of a
different perspective but also see you know what
led up to the first three books or the you know
the original trilogy right yeah all right cool
yeah uh let's see what have i been doing so i
finally finished i finished mission impossible
for the ps1 so i finally got that video it's
up check out the youtube if you want to watch
that it's actually not a bad movie tie -in game
it's actually pretty decent um yeah i remember
playing that when we when we had it and i liked
that game like it's not a great game but for
like a movie game it's actually not awful there's
way worse games like movie games than that one
um but yeah that was pretty good and then i i've
been playing i like tore through ragnarok i finally
like i finished the story mode on ragnarok got
more so dude oh god such an incredible game so
good It is good. I need to play it. Dude, it's
so good, man. I know. The ending was awesome.
Do you like the ending? You like the ending?
Yeah, you didn't. There was a couple things I
didn't like. We might have to talk about that
off the podcast. Ryan, did you play that one?
No. I need to, though. I need to get it. Have
you played it, Jacob? Have you played either
one of them? Yeah, I played both, 2018 and Ragnarok.
Yeah, but I need to go back and do all the side
mission stuff and everything, but... Yeah. Yeah,
the game's sick. And then, let's see, what else?
Oh, we all played... Well, Jacob, you didn't
play, but we played Dead Island 2. Yeah, dude.
I wish that game was awesome. Oh, yeah, yeah,
yeah. I know, I want to play again so bad. Yeah,
we'll play it again. We're definitely going to
play through that game for sure. It's so good,
man. When we just booted it up and started getting
into it, I just... I was just hit with all the
nostalgia, man. It's so good. I was like, oh
man, this is just like the first one. It's so
good. I know, dude. I've been telling you guys,
that game's fucking worth it. It's really good.
It's crazy that that game was in development
for as long as it was and it came out as good
as it did. You can give it for like seven bucks.
Yeah, I know. With the DLC. It's totally worth
it. Yeah. Yeah, that was fun, man. I was having
a blast. Yeah, we're definitely going to play
all the way through that game for sure. I know.
We need to. Oh, yeah. And then the other thing
is, I've been really getting into my physical
handhelds lately. I've been bringing my Vita
to work and playing it on lunch and stuff. And
then I started bringing my Atari Lynx to work.
I have an Atari Lynx, and I've been bringing
that to work and playing that on lunch. I have
a game called Kung Food. It's like a beat -em
-up where you have to beat up vegetables and
stuff and everything. It's weird, but it's hard
as shit, man. I made it to the third level and
I can't get past it, but it's pretty fun. It's
so funny, though. I've been bringing shit into
work and people are like, what is that thing?
I'm like, oh, it's a new Nintendo Switch. People
are like, that's bigger than I thought it was,
but it's pretty funny. It's not a Nintendo Switch.
Atari Lynx are like, what the hell is that thing?
Something you'll never even know about. Yeah,
this is the only one you'll ever see in your
life, probably. Yeah. All right. That's what
I've been doing. So let us know what you guys
have been doing out there. What kind of nerdy
things you guys are doing. What stuff you've
been enjoying recently. But otherwise, it's time
to jump over to our game, which is germs. Surrounded
by mountains to the north, east, west, and the
sea to the south lies the provincial town of
Newtown. This town of three square kilometers
has various buildings, brick warehouses, a large
cathedral, a hotel, and a hospital. These buildings,
disproportionate to the current size of the town,
stand like Roman ruins. The town once prospered
thanks to the Yamasaki coal mine in the mountains
to the northwest. As time passed, the mines closed
down and the population of the town decreased.
These splendid buildings are a remnant of the
city's prosperous days. This town is where our
story takes place. In this town, you, the player,
are a newspaper reporter. You lived in Newtown
until you graduated high school. However, when
the coal mine closed, your parents lost their
jobs and your family left. About 20 years have
passed since then. By sheer chance, you are transferred
to your newspaper small branch office in Newtown.
The office only has one other employee, Takeshi
Yanagi, a young man who is your assistant. The
office is small and only has a single computer.
You receive many emails from newspaper readers
in the town, including Fujita, your closest friend,
and Naomi, who was your girlfriend for three
years in high school. From these emails, you
learn that something very strange is happening
in this town. A few days ago, a luminous body
fell in the mountains in the northern part of
the town, and something emerged from it. People
are complaining of a strange delusion and alleging
that their friends and family are turning into
people they don't recognize. Accidents are occurring
on the rail lines and roads throughout the town.
The town has become cut off from the outside
world. Fujita, who is researching energy, measures
a strange field distortion near the power plant.
Something has started to spread throughout the
town. It spreads contagiously from person to
person, turning them into horrific mutants. These
mutants feed on the life energy that other living
things emit when they themselves evolve and transform.
Okay, Germs Narowaretamachi, or translated that
would be The Targeted Town, was developed and
published by Cash in 1999 for the PlayStation.
This was a Japanese -only release, and from what
I've read, it's an incredibly rare and expensive
release. Supposedly only like 4 ,000 copies were
made. Oh, really? Yeah, it's an incredibly rare
copy game. I think this is like this was their
first like cash. This is their first game. And
I don't think they ever made another like console
game after that. So they made some like weird
online game. I read some something weird like
online MMO thing. But other than that, this is
like the only game I think they made for consoles.
So we've been doing a new thing where each game
has been picked by one of us. So this game was
picked by Jacob. So, Jacob, I wanted to ask you,
why did you pick this game? What was the interest
or desire to play this game? It just looked so
weird. There was something about its weirdness
that intrigued me. I know I mentioned this in
the last episode, but the visuals reminded me
a lot of LSD emulator for the PlayStation. And
that's a very interesting game. It's very trippy.
I mean, it has LSD in the title. Barely a game.
I know. I wonder how freaky things could get
in this game just based on its visuals. Definitely
that cover art is definitely interesting. Were
you guys able to complete this game? Technically,
yes. Yeah, I think. I beat it. I played through
it. I beat it. The story of the game is, and
of course anytime we talk about this story, there
might be some spoiler warnings here. You play
as a reporter who comes back to your hometown,
which is like it was a coal mining town, but
the coal kind of dried up and the town kind of
shriveled up. And you come back like 20 years
later as a reporter and something as strange
is going on in the town. It seems like aliens
have crashed and landed into the town and are
slowly like mutating the people into aliens.
And you're just trying to figure out. you know
trying to figure out what's going on and trying
to stop them so this game is like a um a survival
horror with rpg elements is what i would call
it so you have you you start out in your office
and you get phone calls and emails and these
phone calls and emails will kind of tell you
what you need to do and where to go and when
you go there you talk to people and i mean the
main thing you're trying to do is just kill any
of the aliens that you see there And then it
kind of gets into this loop where you talk on
the phone, you go to the spot that you need to
go to, kill the aliens, and you come back to
the office, get another phone call, and back
and forth. So when you go to these areas, it's
filled with normal people, but it's also filled
with aliens. And you can battle the aliens. And
it's kind of like a... I don't want to say like
RTS, but there is like an RPG element to it where
you set your attack, and then it's basically
just hit or miss. and then the aliens have the
same thing back where they can either hit or
miss you. It's a first -person game, and there's
no, like, aiming or anything. Like, the game
will automatically, like, select the enemy for
you, and then you either just hit or miss, depending,
like, on a roll of a dice, basically. There's,
like, a 99 .99 % chance you're going to miss.
Well, you can upgrade. The more you use a weapon,
the more you upgrade it, and then you'll start
missing less. I know, but still, dude, I mean,
out of like 100 shots, you get like three. Not
if you level up. You have to level up your weapons,
and then you'll start hitting like every time.
I know what I'm saying. It's ridiculous. Yeah,
because the game tells you how to do that. Yeah.
Like, yeah, so with the combat, the combat is,
it's very simple, but... atrocious well it's
not the combat's not atrocious it's the controls
that are atrocious the combat's very simple the
combat is attack and dodge and that's all you
really have to do but with the controls so the
controls are very non -standard this is a very
early like 3d uh game and back then controls
were just like the wild west developers did whatever
the fuck they wanted with the controllers it
was crazy yeah um so in this game triangle uh
moves forward x moves backwards l1 and r1 uh
um what do you call it uh strafe strafe strafe
to the left and the right and then l2 and r2
you have to like ready your weapon and then fire
your weapon and that's what l2 and r2 do and
then the uh d -pad like moves the camera around
so you have to learn to move forward move backward
move the camera around and strafe and shoot your
weapon all at the same time so It is tough. It's
very tough. But if you can get that down, the
battles are super easy. Once I figured out how
to do that, I never died again in a boss battle.
Yeah, if you just learn to hold the strafe button
down in one direction and know how to use the
D -pad, you're fine. You're not getting hit.
Yeah, the game becomes super easy. Then the only
challenge of the game is just figuring out where
the fuck to go. Yeah, but that doesn't mean it's
fun, though. I mean, I didn't hate it. I just,
I don't know. It's just way too easy, and it's
just not enjoyable. I don't want to hold down
a button where I'm going in a circle, and I'm
just taking a chance on if I hit an enemy or
not. Yeah, I mean, maybe it's just because I
played way more RPGs. It's fine to me. It doesn't
bother me. I will admit that it was very simple,
and it did get a little boring, but I don't know.
I didn't hate it. Like I said, another thing,
too, is once you figure that out, the challenge
with this game, and it's a very big challenge,
is figuring out where the fuck to go in this
game. Because the overworld map in this game
is massive. It's huge. It's actually very impressive
how big it is. Yes. But the thing is, is that
there's nothing in it. I mean, there's places
to go and stuff, but most of it, like, I would
say, like, 80 % of the map is nothing. Oh, it's
empty. Yeah, yeah. And I don't know if... I mean,
in general, it is still impressive, though. Yeah,
it's true. There's literally nothing there. And
I don't know if it was a choice or a physical
or like a limitation of the system, but the overworld
map has no color in it. It's all gray. No, it's
all gray scale. And they did this weird thing
where like they put red arrows, like just floating
red arrows to show you to like interesting parts
of the map. I don't know what the point of that
was. It was so weird. I don't know. Maybe because
they knew that map is so massive and there's
just not really much. It really feels like the
developers, this was the first time they ever
made a game, and they didn't really get to really
complete this game. It's what it feels like to
me, anyway. Yup, I was just about to say, they
either didn't know what they were doing, or they
rushed it. I don't understand why make such a
giant map and do nothing with it. Yeah, I don't
know. I don't know if they had more... Cut some
of the fat out, you know what I mean? Yeah, it
really could have been... condensed a lot. I
don't know if it's because they had more plans
or what it was, but yeah, it's way too big. And
another huge gripe is that your character moves
so fucking slow, dude. Did you know you could
run? Yes. You can run. It doesn't matter. It
changes nothing. I had no idea I could run until
after I beat the game. It was so slow, dude.
You move faster strafing than you do walking.
Yeah. I hate when games do that. It's such an
odd... decision. They don't know why. I think
it's just because you're moving twice, basically.
You know what I mean? You're moving left and
forward, so you cover double the amount of ground.
You also have a car that you can get into and
drive around. Dude, that car is useless. You
literally get stuck on pebbles. If you hit a
curb, you're stuck. Yeah, you're premature. Plus,
with the way that control schemes are nowadays
getting into that car and trying to control that
thing oh dude difficult man because it's the
same movement buttons yeah and it's so hard to
like like you've been playing racing games for
the past 10 years you get in that car it makes
it's so convoluted it makes no sense oh it's
awful yeah it's not to mention like when you
get in the car you cannot look at your map at
all so not that that really helps but i'm just
saying you can you just can't do it while you're
moving Yeah. Oh, really? Yeah, you can't be moving.
You can't move. If you stop the car, then you
can open the map. Wow. Yeah. That would have
been nice to know. Safety first. Not really.
Yeah. The map doesn't help that much, in my opinion.
And it's so weird because you have an entire
map of the city. So if you hit the select button,
it opens up the city or the map. And then if
you hit it again, it zooms into one area of the
map. It's just some random area. Yeah, it's not
necessarily the map area where you're at. Is
that based off of the maps that you buy? No.
You know what those do? They just put a marker
on the map. So it just says if you buy the hospital
map, it just tells you where on the map the hospital
is. Yeah, that's what that does. I mean, I guess
that's nice, but... Yeah, it's weird. And that
zoomed in area isn't like anything significant
either. No, it's just random. Yeah, I have no
idea. It's really weird. It's not even like where
you start the game or anything. No. What if that
was like a coding thing? Like I said, I don't
know what they were doing. They thought they
knew what they were doing. I don't know. And
they couldn't close the map and just one button
had to be two? I don't know. I want to say that,
you know, for the time, but this came out in
the same year that Dino Crisis did. Yeah. I mean,
this is pretty late into the PS1's life, for
sure. Dino Crisis was a hell of a lot better
than this. I will say... Controls and stuff.
I will say, part of this is... The game itself
physically came with a map of the city. Which...
Okay. That was probably required to play the
game, you know? Yeah. They decided that that
would be a requirement to actually play the game.
And, you know, since we play the game the way
we are, we kind of lose that. But I did find...
There is an interactive fan -made map that you
can use that will tell you where everything was.
That was really nice. Yeah, I use that every
once in a while. I feel like if you really want
to get the experience of this game, you kind
of have to use that. Yeah, that would make more
sense. I don't know, man. I just looked it up,
too. Driver 2 came out a year after this. Really?
Driver 2 was 2000? Was that late? Mm -hmm. Damn.
So, I don't know, man. Driving around on that
city was way better. Oh, yeah, for sure. Driver
2 is one of the best games on the PS1. You know,
I'm curious because, dude, do you remember playing
Driver 2? Hell yeah, yeah. Played the shit out
of it. Do you remember sitting there for like
10 minutes waiting for that map to load? Yeah,
oh yeah, the loading times were crazy, yeah.
I'm curious of what the loading times were like
on this game. Well, that was weird too. When
you first start the game, it does like that countdown.
I feel like it's loading everything in that countdown.
I think that's why that has that weird... Yeah,
but it's going fast for us, so is it actually
going that fast on physical hardware? I think
if you don't speed it up, it's pretty close,
yeah. I think the emulation keeps it pretty close,
but... Well, I'm just saying, I play Driver 2
on emulation, and it loads in like a minute.
Yeah, yeah. Oh, I know, it takes a while, I know.
Well, I'm just saying, it took like one minute
on emulation, but... in in real world it takes
like five to ten minutes yeah i mean i have the
game i'll try it but yeah i mean i don't know
it's definitely a a weird design choice for sure
you you move around the map and when you do eventually
figure out where you need to go you can go into
these buildings and there's like the church there's
the hospital so basically what will happen is
certain areas get um taken over by the aliens
and you have to go inside and go and and kill
them and stuff so when you go in these areas
uh i mean some of these areas are the maps inside
the buildings are pretty big too on some of them
like the hospital hospital was huge man yeah
massive the hotel the hotel was huge dude i was
running around the freaking hotel for like 30
minutes trying to figure out where to go i know
i was in there for a while yeah there's like
a pool and like a outlook and cafe it was like
what Yeah. So you try to go through these areas
and you're basically trying to get to the end
to find like the main boss of the area. And then
you have to attack them and kill them, which
some of these aliens are. I mean, the aliens
are pretty cool. I like the design. Yeah, yeah.
They're pretty cool. And then to like also like
every person, everyone that looks like a human
that you meet, you're like, is this a alien or
is this a person like you don't know until you
talk to him, which is pretty cool. Yeah. I don't
know if you notice, but the aliens have a different
color text to them. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I like
when you do either kill a person or an alien.
There's like a dog tag and information about
them. Yeah, that was crazy. Every single character
in this game has a backstory to it. Even the
animals. It's crazy. Not much, but it is a little
detail. It's crazy, though, because they had
names, their age, and everything. They would
say if they had like kids or when you started,
went to the power plant and stuff, it says how
long they worked there, like what their position
was and shit. Yeah, that was crazy. It's like,
dude, it's insane. Yeah. It's a lot of detail
in there for sure. Yeah. But again, I just, this
game is just so fucking weird, man. Like they
put so much time and effort into that, but some
of the other choices they make is just so odd.
It definitely does feel unfinished and Unpolished.
Yeah, it really does. It's very convoluted. Some
areas of the game are very fleshed out and good,
but some of the other ones are just so subpar.
Yeah, I agree. I agree. It's weird. It's pretty
crazy, though, too, because this is an open world
game on the PS1, which was still a pretty fairly
new idea for the time. This game has like, you
know, there's the story beats, but there's also
like side missions that if you don't go and do
them right away, you can actually miss like half
the game, basically. I mean, you guys know. Yeah.
Yeah. Thanks. You know, in this game, you can
get everything for free. Yeah, that's another
thing. You just ask for something and the NPC's
like, yep, here you go. There's no money or exchange
or anything. You can go to a surplus store and
just get any kind of weapon and that's it. Just
say, I want this. There you go. I was going to
say, this game kind of felt like a life simulator
inside of a horror game. You have to eat to keep
your health up. If you take too much damage,
you'll start bleeding out and you can die. Yeah,
you have to, like, sleep and stuff. Like, if
you don't sleep long enough, you'll, like, get
tired and start losing. And it's crazy, like,
how much, like, life simulation is in this game.
I feel like they spent a lot of time on that
part of the game, you know? Yeah, I think the
things they spent a lot of time on, they should
have spent it somewhere else. Yeah, could be.
I went into one of the restaurants and, like,
ate to restore health. I could have sworn, like...
Apparently I got a stomach ache and that made
me take damage or something. Yeah, I did the
same. Okay. That's kind of funny. Yeah, I think
it's if you eat too much, right? I think I just
ate the wrong thing or something. Oh, really?
I only took one block of damage, so. I wasn't
paying attention because I had it on fast forward,
but I noticed I took damage. That's crazy. I
was like, what the hell happened? There's also,
too, if you die in this, if you die, quote unquote,
in this game. you wake back up as an alien or
like a mutated alien and then um you can play
you can play through as the game is that and
then i think characters will like uh react differently
to you and stuff and everything yeah i think
there's different text um yeah or they even just
completely ignore you or some of them will attack
you too oh yeah yeah yeah uh do you know could
you die as a mutant i don't know i didn't i didn't
try that i didn't try that you can but then you
can get healed also yeah you can go to the hospital
and they'll give you drugs with no side effects
i don't know how do they know how to cure that
i don't know i don't know i just like how they're
like there's no side effects known yet yeah okay
that's awesome but yeah then you can also go
on a date with your girlfriend or your ex -girlfriend
i guess yeah Yeah, people will, like, follow
you, but not really. Doesn't she end up... Well,
I don't want to be spoiled. Doesn't she end up
being an alien? Or mutated? She, like, goes into
the mines with you and says she, like, feels
stuff, but then... That was the end of it. I
never heard anything after that. I thought you
had to, like, fight her. No, I didn't. I thought
she attacked you at one point. Unless there's
different endings. That's not the ending I got.
Oh, okay. I don't know. I fought myself. Did
you go to the conscious elevator or whatever
it's called? Dude, I don't know. Yeah, you fought
yourself. Yeah, yeah. Because that's what I did.
The round shaft in the middle of the mines after
you went to the sewers or whatever? Yep. Yeah,
okay. I don't know, whatever I did in that speedrun
video. Yeah. Yeah, you fight like your alien
self. Yeah, yeah, okay. Pretty much, yeah. I
think that's every ending, I think. Okay. Maybe
it's not, I don't know. Yeah, I'm not sure. I'm
pretty sure there's only one ending to this game.
Yeah. but how you get there is different i don't
know who knows yeah i was fighting this one boss
and that that's in that morgue where you have
to like keep you know you keep running around
them in circles he's like three bodies stacked
on top of each other whatever yeah or something
like that but the freaking you know the gurneys
are in the way yeah but it kept locking onto
the door and i couldn't move So I had to, like,
press X, and then it would move. It was, dude,
I couldn't move. Yeah, the gurneys, like, not
hitboxes, but they're way bigger than what they
look like. But then I would go away from them,
and I would be, like, ten steps away from the
door, but it would, like, lock me onto the door
to open it. But I didn't want to open the door
because it was in the middle of a boss fight.
Yeah, this game has a weird thing where you have
to walk into stuff and then it'll lock you into
an action. So to interact with stuff, you have
to walk into it and then it will lock you into
that action. You can cancel it, but you have
to walk away. Like even with the car, sometimes
when you get out of the car and you're trying
to walk away from the car, it'll lock you in.
You're like, I don't want to get back in the
car. It keeps locking you into the car. And you
can't... unless if you cancel that action. Right,
until you back out of it. Yeah, it's annoying.
Oh, dude. Because I was trying to walk away from
the door, but you can't do anything. Right, yeah.
I was getting so mad, dude. I know what you're
talking about. It's annoying. I'm in the middle
of a boss fight. Yeah. Dude, there were times
where I was walking and I would just get stuck
in the wall. And I had to back out of the wall.
I was like, Jesus Christ. Well, dude, and if
you get on the sidewalk or in the grass, you
slow down even more. Yeah. Oh, God, dude. It
was terrible. Thank God for Fast Forward. Dude,
I probably would not have completed this game
without it, for sure. Yeah, it's... That'll be
in the final verdict. All right. Anything else?
Let's go ahead and jump over to graphics. So,
graphics for this game, they're fine. I mean,
they look like a PS1 game, you know? They're
decent. Yeah. They're not... They're not anything
to write home about. No, but I mean, for a PS1
game, I think they stand out pretty well. Yeah,
I don't know. The aliens are definitely wacky
looking. Yeah, I like the, I like the, you know.
I feel they're little kiddish, I guess. Yeah,
they're a little color. They have like a weird
color to them, yeah, but. Yeah, they're vibrant
colors and stuff. Yeah, the only thing that really
is weird to me was just the overworld map was
no color. Such a weird design choice. Yeah, that
was very weird. Just very dreary looking. Maybe
because of the alien invasion. I don't know.
I don't know what they were going for there,
but it was weird. Yeah, I'm not too sure. But,
yeah, I mean, the graphics are fine. I think
they look decent. There's no cutscenes to talk
of in this game, which is crazy. No FMV. There's
not even, like, an intro. It's just a splash
screen, then you're right into the game. You
start right at your desk. Yeah. Yeah. Not much
else to talk about there. I mean, same thing
with the next section, which is sound. There's
not much here. I think there's like seven songs
in the entire game, and it's just kind of like
a ten -second loop for all of them. Yeah, it's
just like a baroque, like how they did their
ambient noises. Just like ambient noises, yeah.
The sound effects were simple. I mean, there
was a sound effect every time you killed somebody.
Yeah. Just like a wolf howl. Yeah, it was a weird
noise, yeah. It was an odd noise, yeah. All right,
there's not really too much more, I think, to
talk about. What do you guys, you guys have anything
else to say about germs before we move on to
achievements here? All right, achievements. So
this game has 43 achievements worth 300 points.
Did you guys master this game? No. No. Yeah,
I haven't either. I think I'm going to try. I
got like 30 achievements, I think, already, so.
I will not. No. You guys want to go back and
play this game no more? No, I'm done with the
game. Okay. I don't want to play it anymore.
I don't know. I think I just have to finish some
boss fights and stuff, so I'll probably go back
and finish it. Yeah. Plus, you can get through
this game pretty quickly. Yeah, the overall set
does not look difficult at all. It's just...
No, the set itself is pretty... The difficulty
comes from playing the game. Yeah, it's pretty
much just play the game. I mean, you have to
do a little extra to find some of the... Because
there's nine missable ones. Which is kind of
a pain in the ass, but like I said, you can get
through this game kind of quickly, so it's not
too big of a deal. So I would say a pretty moderate
difficulty here. Yeah, I don't think there's
anything majorly difficult in this set. A decent
set, and it's not really worth that many points
anyway. Yeah, for 43 achievements? Yeah, for
300 points, that's pretty low. Yeah, it is. Alright,
just like the rest of the game, not much to talk
about here. Yep. pretty much so with that being
said let's jump over to the final verdict All
right, here we are at the final verdict. We don't
use scores or numberings here. We use a very
simple system. Did you enjoy the game? And would
you recommend a game? Because that's what it's
all about, right? So, Jacob, this was your game,
so we're going to make you go last for this one.
But who wants to go first for the final verdict
for germs? I'll go first. I'll go first. Okay,
okay. Did I enjoy the game? No. Why or why not?
I just don't think there's enough here to really
enjoy. I really wanted to like this game, but
it's way too simple. There's just not enough
gameplay, in my opinion. If you're very interested
in the game and you want to know more about the
game, I would just watch somebody else play the
game. I don't think there's enough here to physically
play it yourself. So you would recommend a game,
right? Definitely not. Nah, I wouldn't. If you
want to play this game, I would just watch somebody
else play it. Okay. That's fair. Brian, what
do you got? There's just really nothing to this
game. I didn't really hate it, but I didn't really
enjoy it either. There's just nothing to it.
Anything crazy. It's not anything new. And it's
just not... It's just not an impressive game.
So... I might recommend it, maybe, if you like
weirder shit, like, you know, the non -known,
lesser -known games, and that's probably why
this game is. Well, there's a reason it only
sold 4 ,000 copies. Well, that's exactly, yeah.
Yeah. I mean, like I said, this game, it has
a good amount of stuff that it's very fleshed
out. The NPCs have their own backstory. There's
a good amount of stuff in this game that they
did good on, but not, in my opinion, where it
really matters. The combat is just so easy and
just boring. It's more of a chore than it is
you figuring it out. you feeling accomplished
that you figure it out it's so i probably wouldn't
recommend it but like i said if you like the
niche kind of like non -known shit sure try it
out but it's not impressive in any way okay yeah
i mean you know i actually think i did like enjoy
this game i i like the idea that you're a reporter
and you get to go to your office and you get
these calls and you have to go out and investigate
these things. It is true. It is a very simple
game because you got to, like I said, you get
into that loop, you go out, you fight the alien.
Once you learn the combat, there's like no challenge
to this game at all. But I don't know. There
was just something I did like running around
the town. And then once I found that map, I learned
that you kind of actually had to use the map
to play the game. I feel like it kind of made
it a little bit more enjoyable. So, I don't know.
I did like this game. There are some good aspects
of this game. For sure, yeah. And I know in a
couple of our past episodes, we bitched about
how we like simple stuff. But there's a point
to where it's too simple. Sure, yeah. And it
just drags on, you know? Sure. Yeah, I mean,
like I said, my biggest complaint with this game
is how slow it is. It is far too slow. Yes. Yeah.
But looking past that, I think I still did enjoy
this game. You know what it is? You know what
this game really reminds me of? It really reminds
me of like these new PC games that try to like
emulate like the old PS1 games. Like those ones
are like homages to like the old PC one or PlayStation
games. That's what this really reminds me of.
I don't know. I think it's a really cool. They
try to do so much like. I feel like the PlayStation
was the first system that developers looked at
and were like, we can do anything. There's no
limitations. Because there's so many weird and
esoteric games on this system. And this is definitely
one that they looked at and were like, let's
do this gigantic thing. And they definitely didn't
finish it and they definitely didn't get exactly
where they wanted to be. But it's cool to see
that they at least tried. With all that being
said, would I recommend this game? No, probably
not. It's just too simple, and the controls are
friggin' awful, and there's just so much you
have to do. There's a lot of work you have to
do to get into the game, and I just don't think
it's worth it. So I wouldn't recommend it, but
I did enjoy it. I didn't see that coming. I didn't
see that coming. No? You thought I would recommend
it? Is this the first game that you didn't recommend?
I don't know. I'd have to look again. I don't
think so, but... Okay. All right. Now to the
person who picked the game, Jacob, what do you
think? So I enjoyed aspects of this game, but
overall I didn't really enjoy this game. As you
guys said, it's very slow. The combat is just
super simple. And the sense of direction kind
of sucks. And there's cool things here, but only
so much of it is fleshed out. Like, you know,
why have such a big city? If there's only so
much to do in it. It's bland, soggy, and hideous.
I would not recommend it because of that. There's
not really much to it. None of the stuff that
it advertises is really that great. Kind of half...
I don't want to say it's like half of a game,
because there's definitely a game here, but it's...
Again, there's always so much to it. There's
not a lot of polish to it. Yeah. It was a very
ambitious project that they just didn't quite
complete, for sure. Get a hold of. I mean, a
good portion of your gameplay is going to be
walking. Slowly walking. Very slowly. And getting
stuck on the sidewalk. And it's not going to
be driving because driving is even worse. It's
horrendous. You can increase your car speed in
this game, but why? Yeah, you just run into the
sidewalk more. All right, that's the final verdict.
What do you, the gamers out there, think of this
game? Let us know what you think. But now we're
going to jump over to our next game, which we're
going to be playing Sweet Home for the Famicom.
Yet another Japanese -only survival horror game.
It wasn't even playing, is the funny thing. It
was. It was totally playing. It wasn't. Alright.
Do you guys have any prior experience with this
game? No. Nope. You guys don't know anything
about this game? I mean, I know a little bit
about it, but I haven't seen gameplay or anything
like that. I just know this is a very big inspiration
for Resident Evil. Yeah. I've actually played
and beaten this game, so I know it pretty well.
Oh, okay. But I'm looking forward to playing
it again, so... Nice, okay. Let's take a look
at the front of the art here. So we got big old
Japanese hiragana here that says, uh... It's
a Capcom game. And you got, like, a bunch of
faces. Like, one's just screaming into the other
there. One's gnashing his teeth back there. Yeah,
yeah, yeah. Some guy's got an axe up here. It's
pretty crazy looking. But it's in a border. I
like how the border turns into dripping blood
at the bottom. Yeah, it's pretty cool. It is
definitely intriguing. I like how it says in
big letters RPG right here. Yeah. This box, too,
is supposed to be like a gold, like a shiny gold,
which is pretty cool. I just noticed the dude
with the glasses. I didn't even see that. He's
got, like, 80s glasses on. I don't know. What's
the dude in the bottom doing? He's, like, holding
out, like, a C for Crips or something? I don't
know what that is. He's got... It looks like
a fucked up, like, Sphinx in the bottom middle
or something. It looks weird. This is a very
strange image, yeah. This is probably made before
Photoshop, too, which is crazy. Alright. Let's
go ahead and jump to the back of the box here.
And the text is crudely translated. We got, How
many will be able to escape? The cursed residents
of Mamiya. Five people from the local TV station
enter the long -time abandoned mansion in fear.
The door closes. The ceiling collapses. The struggle
to survive starts. Can they find the exit? How
many of the five people make it out alive from
the mansion? Sounds interesting. So do you play
as five different people? Yes, you have five
characters that you have to switch between. Wow.
Hmm. And any of them can die at any moment. Nice.
Damn. Yeah. I don't even know what the achievements
are going to look like. It's just like until
dawn. Hmm. Never heard of them. Okay. Who's dawn?
Alright. But you only get two screenshots and
they don't really show much of this game. What?
Is that Mechagodzilla there? Yeah, it looks like
it. What's the one you like? Oh, Rogan? Gigan?
Oh, yeah, Gigan. It's a knight. No, that looks
like Mechagodzilla. Mecha. It's a knight. Who's
a knight? Yeah. Mecha Knight? Meta Knight? Nah.
Alright. I think it's time to end this podcast.
What do you think? Yeah. I mean... I honestly,
this is probably one of like the only RPGs I
was interested in. Yeah. Okay. Cause I'm just
not a big RPG guy, but I, I do want to see where
resident evil got their inspiration from. And
it's this, it's kind of reminded me of splatter
house a little bit. Yeah. Yeah. Just of like
the design and stuff and everything design, like
eerie in like a house, you know, inside setting.
So I'm actually pretty, intrigued to play this
game all right yeah i'm i'm excited to play it
again um i think i've the first time i played
through this i used a guy the entire time so
this time i think i'm just gonna go blind and
see if see how far i can get again so is this
game difficult kind of i mean the hard part is
just like trying to keep everyone alive but i
don't know i think i think you guys will like
it so we'll see but all right Let us know, you
gamers out there, if you guys are excited, what
experience you have with this game. Otherwise,
we'll see you for the next one. Peace. Peace
out. Say goodbye, Eric. See you guys.