[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I haven't played it, it's a great little like Zelda kind of roly. But that was, but I was not ever wanting to make that, you know, um, I never want to make a, you know, I never set out to make a strategy game, you know, for certain components of the game I never set out to.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Make a RPG. I set out to tell Judas' story. We set out to tell Judas' story.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And then certain things just sort of raise their hand and say, Hey, I might be helpful here telling that story. So we're not hardcore about any of those elements because we're, you know, we're not catering to like, you know, competitive PVP. You know, I'm not.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Obviously we're not competitive PvP, but there's certain things that audience really demands and really expects. And if you're not delivering in that, you're really screwed.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] We don't really have that problem, you know, except for, I think what people want from us is cool.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] World, a cool setting, a cool story, a cool set of tools to experiment with, but then it just sort of dashed that gameplay element came in and then I was like, well,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And this is probably one of those moments on my run where I'm on my run, I'm sweating, um, um, and I'm thinking like, and sometimes I just hits you in the notion of the.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I don't even want to say the name of the place you go to. That real key change. Narratively, that happens with that.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Was really important to me and that was tricky to figure out and create a lot of problems, um, you know, in terms of.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Thinking about the design and challenges, cause we had never made that kind of component in a game.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And you can't just assume you're going to be.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] We, you know, where you can be overly pressure, but generally I think people play our games because they want to be able to experience the experience.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, now in this game, you won't be able to, you won't be able to experience the whole thing because if you end up going, you know, really favoring one of the leaders, one of the big three.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] There's going to be things you're never going to learn about the other two and that are be quite surprising and shock you.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I think that yeah, it became a tool and then it became a huge narrative opportunity for us. So I think that for people who worry about that, I think they're going to be, Loop is going to be fairly gentle for that, but it's also, I think it may be extremely narrative rewarding for people.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I think Greg and those guys who made Hades, that was a huge comfort that when I played that game that we saw the narrative audience would embrace that loop and they'd understand the power of it as a narrative tool as well, right? Cause there's, I mean, those guys are very story oriented.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And so we were working on it, but that sort of gave me, it was a bit of a breath of relief that A, the audience, A, I saw it could be done and that the, from a heavily narrative driven experience and that the audience would fall in love with it.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] The biggest problem I think is what Lucy just said is that you have to not


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Be pissed off when you die, you have to feel like I am going to go get a new experience narratively. I'm going to be feel more powerful coming back in. I'm going to have some interesting choices.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I know, and the best rogue likes to me, death is an opportunity.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And it has to be, because, you know, the original Rogue Death is like a giant punch in the nuts. Um, and, but that some people love, that's not really for me. Like I, I played those games, but it was never, cause I got frustrated by it. I think that, um,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You tuning that curve so it doesn't feel like it's relevant, like it has to have meaning and you want to not die, but you also, when you do die,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You have to be like, okay, cool. Now there's some new opportunities for me. I can learn something more about, you know, this other place we're talking about.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, where, you know, where you go to at that moment?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I think that yeaah, there's a million ways to do it wrong, and we did it, like I think our initial pass is that we're just too punishing, and so that's what testing is for, and you know, so we just, every time, every, everybody who starts working for us, the first thing they do is they play the game, every, many people interview for us, we have them play the game, and we get, we just suck up


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You know, testing data from everybody and get their reaction things. And yeah, for a long time, we weren't getting that reaction that you're talking about, like you were looking forward to it. And you know, and what you deal with that is you make sure that.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You know, you, you give them enough reward, you give them enough, like, even like early on, it's like you go to the place and you don't have enough resources to improve yourself, right? And that's like, well.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Fuck you. Like, well, now I just died and I'm going to go back. I'm no different. And so, and that's hard because you don't gain developers because we play the game so much.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You take, we're, we tend to be really good at it. I have a super kind of advantage.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] For as many games I play, I'm embarrassingly bad at games. You suck? Oh yea. And so I'm a little better at detecting when the thing's frustrating. Cause you know, when you have, especially QA guys who are beating up the game all day, they're so good at it. They're just like, I don't need any of that shit.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That's special. That's how it is that I can play the game and be the user. Even if it's something I've worked on, I can dumb myself down enough from what I know. And like,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Designers hate me cause I'll, they'll give me the controller and I'll do exactly the thing that they did, that they didn't. Cause designers can often play the game, uh, an encounter, whatever the way they want it to be played because, and that's, and it's very normal and very natural. It's not a, it's not a failing and they're so close to it. I cause I'm, you know.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Once I remove from that, I can come into things and even things I know about, I can sort of intentionally put a dumb myself down.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And uhm, but even so compared to the new, new, entirely new user, I'm sure I'm even like, well, this is fine, but you really have to test to see.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You know, what's the right amount of stuff so the player feels happy when that happens. And not just like this is, you know, we need our audience, the people who've been following us, you know, they followed us from System Shock 2, which is quite different from Bioshock. System Shock 2 is brutal. It's survival, like Resident Evil was our balance inspiration for that.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And that's brutal. Every pistol bullet counts, you know, in that game. And Bioshock was much more about a game that we wanted you to get through. Uhm, this game, I think,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Systemically is closer to, it's somewhere between Bioshock and System Shock 2. It's more on that side than towards Bioshock Infinite in terms of, you know, the sort of action versus.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Strat planning and very much stealth. It's much more back in that space. And I'm happy about that because I, I sort of that's, you know, I like that sort of.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Of stuff, and so we spent a lot of time getting back to that place and giving the player a lot of agency and how they...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You know, how they get out and how they grow themselves and how they develop as a character.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But uhm, you can definitely, uhm, you can definitely


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Screw that up and especially for an audience who may not be expecting that from us.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So we want to make sure there, you know, we spent a lot of time making sure this is going to be a, a plus for them, not, not a minus.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] We, so yeah, I mean, I think, you know, it's funny cause the initial reaction, we have this on Bioshock Invented too. I remember we had.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Different headlines when we announced the game, it's like, oh, it's just a Bioshock reskin or oh, it's nothing like Bioshock. They're just gonna, they just want to call Bioshock because it'd make, you know, Bioshock made a lot of money.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And it's frustrating at first because, you know, there's not people who don't know much about the game. And one of the reasons we didn't want to talk about it out of context is...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I didn't want to really have that conversation. I wanted, you know, this is a kind of weird way we're sort of, this is like our, the equivalent of like our first cover story, you know, having these conversations with you.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Where we wanted, instead of me telling people it's gonna be okay, we wanted people to experience and that's dangerous and risky for us because, you know, I don't.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Guys are gonna have your own opinions, you know, uhm, but I think that,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] The best thing to do is to show people how it works because we're not trying to fit into a particular category. You know, we've never, our games have been weird hybrids of a bunch of stuff, but at the end of the day, it's really about what it, you know, what is Jack's journey through Rapture? What is.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Booker's journey through Columbia, what is, you know, Judas's journey on the Mayflower.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, in other places. Uhm, but uhm, and uhm, so I think it's very easy though to get freaked out and scared and I think that's not unhealthy to be scared.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I think though you shouldn't be motivated by fear. You should know there's gonna, you have to be aware of this is not trivial, especially when you take on something you haven't really done before as a development team. You have to be aware that you have that. You're gonna, you're gonna stumble for a while. You have to.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You know, and you don't want to, and you're never going to be like, so we're just making a clone of X, Y, or Z because anytime you make a clone of X, Y, or Z, you guess what? It's not going to be as good as X, Y, or Z because the thing you're inspired by was driven by powerful inspiration and passion.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So, you know, I'm not going to make an FTL. I'm not going to make XCOM, you know, like those, you know, those games are inspiring to me, but I can't make those games. I'm never going to make that kind of game as well as Jake Solomon is going to make.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Or, you know, or, or, you know, the, um, or, you know, the, or any of these other developers. So you have to have humility, but you also have to a bit of courage.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, especially, you know, sometimes I'll say things and the team will be like, and sometimes they're really right. There are some versions of like.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Hacking and things like that in the game that, you know, I'll probably talk about this at some point that were my ideas that were really dumb.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] They're very good about not telling you so, but I think they know that if it's not working and it's not testing, I will, I don't, I won't.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I won't hold on to it just because I think it's a cool idea and it came from me. Uhm, but you know, you're gonna, you're gonna make mistakes and.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Um, and you also can't let, you know, test initial testing drive you like, Oh, if you have a bad reaction initially. Okay. Well that's okay. Well they're wrong.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You then have to tweak and polish and tune and see if you get to the places where people say.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Looking forward to that. And that's once you start hearing that, we kept getting closer to that.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And there was a lot of time where it, cause you can hear that feedback and issue. I think we're totally in the wrong direction. Certain, as I said, certain things we have been totally in the wrong direction on, but then you just need the, you know, can you.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Yeah, it, you know, we had a, it was a lot harder than.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Bioshock, and I told this story before, I went to a Rockefeller Center one day and I was like, oh, I know what Bioshock looks like. And that was great. And Art Deco is uhm.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Excuse me, it, it, it reads very well, uhm, in a, in a low poly setting, cause it was, you know, it's, it's, it is pretty simple, but very bold.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And with, you know, infinite neoclassicism was, you know, a big inspiration from the time period and that, but getting like the quality of sunlight, like, like.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You know, took a long time, you know, like just what is, what is, what kind of blue is the sky? Those things take a long time.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Um, Neo, Victorian, and we have a bunch of different styles, but they're all unified by.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And they're, they draw a lot of inspiration from a bunch of different architectural periods, but they're also embedded with technology everywhere. And when you look out the window,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You're seeing a weird planet and asteroids and all this other stuff in the sky. So it is a very strange mix and it wasn't something like with it was with Bioshock. Once I knew it was Deco, that was a relatively straightforward path. It's a relatively straightforward path.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] This took a lot more trial and error and we've been through a lot more architectural styles on this, but sort of once we sort of.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Leaned into, cause I do like drawing from existing architectural styles cause hey,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, and that's, you know, there are parts of the game that, you know, as you play, cause more content, more content is going to feel more barren, but sometimes you'll come into a room and it feels, you know, much more, you know, where it has to be. Cause that's, our games have always been, even back to System Shock 2.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It always felt very important to me that it doesn't feel like you're in a sanitized combat arena, but this is where people worked and where they lived and they, you know, ate and they had sex and they...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That was tricky though. And it took a, we kissed a lot. That's many frogs were kissing along the way, but eventually, you know, we, we sort of landed on that style and then pushing into like particular lighting setups of.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Sort of heavy noir, you know, high contrast lighting, you know, you see a lot of that shutter effects and things like that and, um,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So, you know, sort of leaning into that and there, I think we drew a lot of inspiration from, you know, we were talking about, um, um,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Oh, a cinematographer I was just talking about, uhm, from, from, yeah, from Roger Deakins, you know, like from Blade Runner 2049, you know.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You know, his use of color, you know, we draw a lot of that and we're trying to tightly control the color space.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, but you know, those are things we've done all along, but I think it's much more effective.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But I'm always inspired by, you know, I think when I was, I took a class in high school about dystopias and that's where I first read, you know, Orwell and Huxley and Brave New World and Animal Farm in 1984. And I was, what I love about those stories is how thawed out the worlds are, you know, you know, they're,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] There's so much detail about the world and, and these are just, you know, dystopian places, but they're not like some evil dictator came along and decided to ruin everything for everybody. Things happen for a reason.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And unattended, unattended consequences is something, you know, when we talk, obviously in infant, there's a lot of conversations, but unintended consequence, even in rapture, you know, people's,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Attachment to ideology, Andrew Ryan's attachment to this sort of, you know, uhm,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Anarcho-capitalist ideology, ideology, but then when the tables turn on him, you know, he's the losing one. Maybe he doesn't hold up to those principles. You know, we are, we all have feet of clay. And so, you know, my reaction to sort of. Ideology is always, you know, that.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] How does it impact the real world? You know, when you, when hits reality, you know, in Bioshock was an exercise in that the fountain head, she could arrange it. So everything worked out.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I love the book, but you know, I don't know. So Bioshock was my like, well, what do you put like more real people in that situation for the good and the bad? And Rapture is an amazing place, but you know.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] There are problems. This situation, this game, the first thing I thought about is


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] How can I make a dystopia where everybody can understand how it happened? You know, so the basic setup is that there's a.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, you know, guy named Rosenberg and he has a, and this is funny cause we, this is before COVID and before, you know, the appearance of large language models like chat GPT, you know, appear on the environment, but was using essentially a


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Predictive large language model that is using data from the past with the future, which is generally how these things work. You know, when you large language models to some degree are.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Very fancy autocomplete, right? They look at a huge corpus of data and they use the past to predict the future.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Same kind of like when you read history, it's sometimes easier. If you read enough history, it's more easy to predict the future because patterns tend to emerge.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So I wanted though, I thought there's another reaction to infinite. I don't think like, it was very hard to get on board with Comstock's vision, you know, of Columbia. And that was, I sort of painted myself in a corner there because I didn't really have a good defense for him.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You know, uhm, cause it's kind of a terrible society. And I think I wasn't, I didn't think it, I hadn't thought, I kind of painted myself, of course, too late for me to back out.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, of that corner I painted myself into making this world be more understandable and more gettable.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] This game starts with a kid who grew up, it's funny, originally he wasn't in his backstory because COVID hadn't happened, but he's had a, his mother had died.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And his father was very religious and his mother, he wouldn't get treatment for the mother because of his religious beliefs and his mother died. And he sort of cursed his father and cursed God and said, I'm going to make sure that, you know, um, um, that I'm going to.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Keep, I'm going to make sure this doesn't happen again. So he originally develops a predictive technology for health outcomes. You know, basically the most fancy, you know, the critical crystal everybody has in their hand. That's a data storage device of your molecular state at every second of your life.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] He, if you have that data, and you've, and then you've placed it.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Work to reduce privacy laws and we have a huge corpus of data about health outcomes. You can start predicting, you can start predicting.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And become more, it's a bit of a fuck you to God, right? No, I'm, you know, all medicine is a bit of a fuck you to God, right? And I don't mean that in a bad way, right? It's saying we're not gonna let the natural thing take its course. We're gonna intervene. And he wants to intervene.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And one day his prediction algorithm tells him that a plague is coming, you know, in the belly carried around in the belly of.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] 50 billion rat fleas or 50 trillion rat fleas, which is how the black death spread around.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, and this is before COVID, it's funny, uhm, and uhm,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And now we incorporated his backstory that he's been through a plague already, which is very convenient for our story and very inconvenient for all the rest of us in the world.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And he has a real mission and an understandable mission is literally about the survival of the human species. And we haven't done that. We don't, I don't tend to make games about the universe is in danger. You know, it kind of, you know, a lot of superhero movies and I'm a huge superhero fan.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It is a bit like every time that, you know, the universe is in danger. Sometimes the stakes being a bit lower is nice, but this game, I want to make a very grounding game, grounded game.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Invites a group of people on board the ship for a generational many year journey to fly to Proxima Centauri where they can start a new, you know, continue human civilization. Most people think they're cranks, you know, and we never actually, you know, well actually I won't get into that just yet. And lots of things go wrong.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And the mission, as I call it, the capital and mission, getting the proximate and continuing the survival of the species is at risk. Certain catastrophes happen and he starts losing and they're human, they're results of human error.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Cause the stakes are so high, he creates an, you know, he engineers creation of an extremely dark and dystopic society that you see on the Mayflower.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Well, mostly- Without spoiling- No, no, I think, yeah, like-


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] They all have, they all have a bit of experiences I've been through. You know, Tom feels that, you know, everything is falling apart around him.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] No, I've been on projects where I kind of felt everything is falling apart around me and I felt I wasn't capable of, you know, of steering the ship. But.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Somebody's got to, right? And so he's just the guys like, things have changed. I now found out I'm a machine and not a person. All my memories are implants.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I didn't, you know, most of the things in my life that I thought I did, I didn't do, you know, I'm, and his reaction is don't care. Keep going. Keep going. Cause he, if he stops.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And for Nefertiti, when she found out she was a machine, and this is all because, you know, Judas's actions, you know, cause and, and so he just continues on. I remember they were a family.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] No, that's an important part of the story. It's about a fa- it's part of family breakup story.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Hope is basically their adopted daughter who's, you know, family died or they thought their family died in this catastrophe. I, you know, I mentioned that I felt the ship that caused a lot of, a lot of the stuff. They thought they were loving, they were loving family. They had.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Complicated family dynamics that we all do, but they were together. And then this thing happens. Tom says we're staying on mission.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Hope falls into a pit of existential suicidal despair because


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You know, there's, I don't know if you found the audio log where she's talking about her dysmorphic feelings about her body because she thought she was flesh and blood. And now she feels the electricity and gears moving inside of her. And it's extremely upsetting and distressing. She's not what she thought she was. The ship's.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Thomas, the sort of security officer of the ship, he kept everything in order. He's keeping on with that mission.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Hope was the human, she thought she was the most empathetic human like who was ever created. And she, and her relationships with people, she was the ship's matchmaker, the ship's therapist and.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But she's full of s-s-s-cortisol sensors and, and she can smell.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And she doesn't know what to do. She, it's too painful for her to live. So what she wants out of Judas is to help her end it because her body won't, the security of, you know, the, the, the basically her, her, her software won't let her die.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And she wants to end it because she can't live with the pain of what she has.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, nefertito keke is this thought she was this world famous biologist who had this mother who was driving her to be great.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And she, you know, she cured a certain type of cancer, you know, she thought, well, not for her mother's, you know, find out, but, um,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But uhm, and she's, she was miserable in the Mayflower because she had to keep humans alive in space. She had to keep people, she had to,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] As a biologist had to make sure that people could survive on Proxima and really they don't know what they're, what's on Proxima. They don't know. Cause when you're.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You know, we don't really know anything about any exoplanets. We know, we can sense, you know, we think we, we speculate about water on them. We speculate, could there be light based on the Goldilocks principle? And if you're familiar with that, we, you're not too far from the sun, but not too close to the sun. There's all these things you can guess.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] They don't really know what they're getting into, so Nefertiti kind of thinks she's set up to fail. And when she finds out she's a machine and that all her bugs can be fixed in code.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And she can build a society where, you know, she tells Judas, Judas, as you might've mentioned, has some mental health problems of her own and is struggling and has, you know, her weirdness and her anxiety and her inability to interact with people. And for details of those are all bugs that can be fixed, you know, and that's a promise she makes to Judas and she's.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] thrilled with her electricity, relieved of all this shame and all this guilt.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Perfect machines in a way that's very hard to perfect people. The question is, you know, what's kept and what's lost in that, you know, in that quest for perfection.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So I was, you know, able to explore, you know, Tom, the guys to sort of stick with it because he doesn't know what else to do and hope the person who has to.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Come to terms with she's not what she thought she was and never tease desire for perfection. These are all things I've, you know.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I think we've all had experience with, maybe not in the exact specifics. I have more of the specifics probably, but I think we try to make them relatable as humans, even though they're not.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And that they're all, but they've also done terrible things, you know, every character in this game has done.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Some pretty terrible things, even you, you know, I did not want to make a character who's some kind of archetype, perfect heroine. She's pretty messed up and she acted out of rage and she created this situation. But you also, you know, if you've seen the reckoning room sequence, you kind of understand why she's deeply angry and that anger creates, you know, acts, she acts on that anger.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Talking about like this particular moment, cause I think history, you know, there's this great line, history doesn't repeat, but it rhymes.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And if you look at say social shaming, this is not a new thing, you know, you look at.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Cultural revolution, you know, in Maoist China, you look at the Red Scare here, you look at the Salem witch trials, there's a million things you could look at historically.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Or, you know, in, in, um, in East Germany and the Stasi and, you know, kids reporting on their parents, um, because it's a very powerful tool, right? You know, there's a line, um,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You don't need to, uhm, you don't need prisons if you can turn people into their own wardens.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So you can enforce norms, sometimes for the good, like there's lots of good norms, like don't murder people, right? Don't be awful to people. Don't, you know, but then there's norms that are.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, particularly over a time period. And particularly to us, ideology. And often in sort of authoritarian societies you get


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And use, use the, you know, sometimes they use the law, right? Sometimes they use norm, quite often they use norms, you know.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Hey, that woman's dressed like a slut, right? You know, there, there are.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Norms are used to shame people, but often they're tools of social control.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And also individual competition, you know, during the sandwich trials, you had people who would turn in.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Their neighbors because they were competitors, or they were mad at them or they, you know.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] They've thought they're white, they, you know, they were, they were competing for a woman. You know, this is, this is people often then use this, they use it, people use it for, can use it. No, again, this is, this is, I'm not.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I'm not trying to come down on one side or the other because I'm way more interested in just exploring these questions and having a particular opinion on them because I don't know everything, you know.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But I like exploring these things, especially things that tend to return to society over and over and over again. And we think we learned the lesson and we think we're in some unique time where now it's now it's the right time to bring out a particular tool.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But then over the, over the fullness of time, these often become times you look back on and say that must, you know, was that necessarily the best way to go about improvement or societal change? Um, so Mayflower, the Mayflower has every reason.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] They think it's literally existential, well it is literally existential. Now, what they do to...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Judas and she is a person who does not fit and she's, you know, we have, there's this ranking system on the ship that's based on.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, social credit, SoCred. It's actually the money on the ship. Every time you get a like, it's a dollar. And every time you get a dislike, it's a minus dollar. So people who are in the negative space are what you call violators. People who are in the positive space are what you call pilgrims. And you know, so there's this whole incentive to


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Get approval, public approval, but of course you could also post something that


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Turns out the result isn't what you want. You can end up as a violator for doing that. So there's this whole, there's no, there's no, you don't ship has sexism. There's no racism that those aren't topics on the ship, but there's always something that there's an in-group and an out-group in every society. And we've dealt with it. No, we, this is not the first time we've dealt with these topics in our games.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But especially to incentivize and make it the economy of the world.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You can definitely get perverse outcomes and you know, a lot of people on the ship spend time trying to figure out how can I advance myself, you know.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Can I advance myself at by doing things myself or at the expense of others? You know, also the ship is designed because.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] They don't want people doing any real jobs. They don't want people, you know.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Deciding who they fall in love with. You know, there's a whole, all aspects of social control because they don't want people raising children.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Because that creates instability and instability.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Creates problems and problems creates catastrophes and then the mission might fail. So the stakes are high enough for everybody can tell them says, well, I'm doing this for a very, very good reason. And they're not entirely wrong, but.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] She had problems of her own. She, she was a person who can't obey, who can't go along with things. She does make problems. She is.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Reacts to things and, and gets pissed off and doesn't follow the rules and not in a, not necessarily always in an adorable charming way, right? She, she really fucks with people.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And, but they push her far enough and she becomes the very thing that they accused her of all along.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Would she have become that if not in that society? Don't know. You know, what might she been if she was in a different place?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Well, yeaah, we know we needed a way to get around, you know, and


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I didn't want it just to be some random thing because everything wants to be tied into the narrative and...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Start thinking about it. Could it help tell Judas the story? And look, I had a weird experience 10 years ago is my wife had wanted a dog for a long time and that was a constant conversation. We used to call it New Versus Simpsons episode.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Brought him home the first day. She brought him home the first day and I went, was out for a run and I came back. She was out shopping for him and he was in his little, um,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] What I learned to love about a dog, kind of like Judas, they don't judge you.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] They are completely honest. There's no bullshit. You know, daddy, give me that fucking food. You know, uhm, sorry. I use the word daddy. We don't have kids. So I'm one of those lame people saying, you know,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Yeah, so he said, you know, like he's very straightforward. He's very honest. He's not, you know, we do. A lot of times we were working on this character originally because, you know, as.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You do, he is the crap, he is a big mechanical craft you used to navigate the surface, scutting.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, and he modelled, you know, he's roughly modelled off query.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So that big snout, cause my character is designed to like dig out, you know, chipmunks out of holes. Um, and, um, but he's also not, um,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Kirby's, he's an element of chaos in my life, which I'm pretty structured and ordered.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And he stops and makes you not be that way because he'll go off and do something completely chaotic.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And he's not, you know, originally people just assumed he'd be like Lassie and he'd be helping you and doing all these great things for you and obeying you. And I'm like, no, that's not the character here. The character is a dog who is kind of crazy and Kirby's got a lot of, uh, you know, aggression issues. And so, you know, I had to deal with that and he's, you know, he's, he's sometimes like, you know, he,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] He makes us laugh constantly. He's just really, really funny because he's not that great dog who's, you know, he's not a show dog, you know, in any way, shape or he's just himself. And like, you know, channeling a bit of myself.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I was really interested in the relationship that Judas would have with something like that. And then digging into why she made this thing and why it exists.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I just wanted to incorporate that into the experience because I thought like Judas.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I can spend a day with Kirby and there's no social anxiety or anything like that. You know, I just hang out with the dude because you can't, you can't really screw it up. Um, you know, the same way and he doesn't, you never have to wonder like, you know, especially when you get


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Celebrity or power, whatever. There's lots of times people meet you and they, and they want something. Now I know exactly what Kirby wants from me. He wants his food. He wants his belly rubs. He makes no beef. He makes no beef. There's no, there's no.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] No intrigue, it's very straight forward. And that's really, really, really nice. And so...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I want to develop this relationship and it solely unfolds over time where you understand why she built this thing that sometimes you'll encounter scenes where the dog is really fuck shit up for you.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And, um, so I just, I just, you know, it's another element I like brought in, but obviously brought in through a filter. He's a giant robot that you do that you ride around the surface of the, um.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] The surface of the Mayflower who has a disturbing amount of autonomy at times.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Like a friendly songbird. The artist did a great job, like bringing him to life and designing him. Cause they were like, I'm like, you know, cause.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And so, you know, the snout became his longest now became like the cockpit. And yeah, over time you'll get upgrades to him. Oh, awesome. Okay.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Yeah, it took a lot of work to get right, but I think the animators really took to him and you know, we send reference videos from Curb and you know, and they, you know, sort of animate off him. They've done a great job.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Well, originally we had sort of more standard robots in the game that you dealt with. And then I was like, why are these robots on the ship? What is their function on the ship? Cause we always try to go back to why.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Why is this thing here? Everything in the game. Why is it here? And if we don't have an answer for that, it's the wrong thing.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So we had a whole class of robots that, and you probably, um, and they weren't very relatable and they weren't very interesting. And then I was like, well, why would they be on the ship? And there is a.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] There, I mean the computers are weird, right, like Alexa is...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Not a woman, right? She is a bunch of weird code and algorithms and stuff like that, but yet there's a mask of interface, right? And.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And I, and that could be very disturbing. Like I think we're talking about, you know, chat, GBT, it's sort of even.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Start scolding you about things. It's a level of interface that I don't really like, but I was thinking if you're making a bunch of robots and you want people to be comfortable with the automation on the ship and that most of the tasks that people used to do are now being done by machines, you better make them accessible to the people on the ship. And so, you know, in the backstory, they were focused tested and all these different designs and.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Throwing away, you know, and you actually probably see some of the stuff in the world where you see the old designs and find out about the focus and why people weren't relating to them. And they were, they rejected them because they're alien. So they got more adorable as time goes on. But of course now, since the hack, they're now.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Like the horse was the first one, you know, the deputy horse. So good. You're like, what are you doing? What are you talking about? And I'm like, no, just give me a little time. And then I think the moment of click for people is when they get aggroed on you and their eyes light up and like teeth come out and they get much more scared because they had it like turned into demons.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] They weren't working when they were just purely cute, but when they, but they're funny. What is their character? What is their personality? But they also have to start kind of adorably, but also be kind of scary and creepy at the same time. Dense jam, man.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So yeah, that was another thing. I'm like, what if a dentist chair could, you know, and again, it has a function on the ship. It walks around the ship and when it, when the ship was normal.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And it gives people dental care, and you know, and it knows who needs the work.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And uhm, but yeaah, then it becomes so much.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I'm sure we've all been in the dentist chair and no, and that's a relatable fear that people have.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. The wire monkey was a big, a big concept. Yeah. You know, how you raise children. You want to talk about the wire monkey? It's interesting. Do you want to?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That society, but from, you know, from cradle to grave, you're, you know, the ship is the automate, the automatons are taking care of you because.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] They won't screw it up the way we screw it up, but we, the way we screw up our kids, at least in theory.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] We won't know until it's done and to some degree, we have a fair amount of control over that because so systemic, you can tune things up or tune things down until all the content is in. It's going to be hard for me to say, but it's


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I mean, you guys played for how long? Five hours and you're barely scratching this barely barely scratching the surface as much as I think that was important to me. Like I've always valued. I remember saving up for.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Games when I was a kid, you know, and it was expensive. I couldn't tarry cars.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] The 70s was like 30 or 40 dollars, which for me back then, you know.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And I remember working hourly jobs and how much that was and every decision you made on that scale. If you bought the wrong game there, you know, that was a bad thing. So one of the frustrations I had to with our previous games is they,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] They, you know, they have limited playtime, Bioshock, Bioshock Infinite, they're linear, limited playtime. And that one solution is you just like make a giant world full of, you know, the activities that you've seen in a lot of games and that the audience has sort of seen that and they're not so satisfied with it. So.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] We really want to not do just, you know, do a big open world game or anything like that, because the story had to be present all the time and making sure, you know, and I hope in your experience, it was pretty present, you know, no matter what you were doing.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But I also want to honor that money that people are spending on this game and make sure they're not going to zip through it in a few hours. And the modular approach has helped us do that a lot too, because using this sort of pseudo procedural stuff, you can generate


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Counters and levels and things like that, that'd be much harder to do. It would take much, much, much longer.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So combination of the Lego thing, the development time.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And you know, T2's patience has allowed us to do a game. I think it's going to give a lot more playtime, but the goal is.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Rich playtime, not just playtime for playtime's sake. So it could be.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You know, it's funny, I don't, you know, it's, I think you can tell it's pretty far along at this point, and most of our work left is content tuning.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Combat pacing, you know, uhm, we still have a few more, there's one big feature, which I won't talk about yet, that is still coming in, but most of it's content at this point.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Narrative content, level content, art content, uhm.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But I, I don't, I honestly don't want to hazard it. I don't want to, I don't want to make a statement here because I'm, I'm going to be wrong.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Don't want to rule in or rule out anything just because it's, we have the situ, I've had the situation before we announced the date too early and then the conversation becomes about the date and.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] As long as I'm allowed not to do that, I'd rather not do it until I have a high degree of confidence. And for us, the high degree of confidence is, and we keep seeing improving, improving, improving test scores, you know, when that test score for the whole game is where it needs to be. That's when the game will be done. Sounds like a pretty good.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It's a very lucky approach that we have because take two, you know, look, I wish more publishers would make big bets, but I understand why it's tricky, right? You know, these games have gotten so expensive, um, that it's tricky to do that.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But cause it's much easier to do the SQL to do this and that, and there's totally tons of room for that stuff. And in AAA, it's almost doesn't happen anymore.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And so we're, we're in a fortunate position that we're able to take that kind of risk and look, we may never know. We may be complete idiots. Maybe I, you know.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Show just done, you know, another, you know, game, you know, continue to franchise, but I, I like not knowing where to go. You know, I also like that we're not sort of.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I've generally not loved doing sequels. I've done a couple of them. Well, my favorite sequel I worked on was a game I didn't do a lot. I worked on the first one, System Shock 2. That was my favorite sequel I worked on because


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You know, I starting out a fresh look at it, but I've really not enjoyed.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Doing SQL soap, but it's hard to get somebody to fund one of these things. That is a new IP that has a bunch of new ideas because when you're doing new things, you.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Maybe ideas people aren't interested in.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] The way I work with them is I just keep them in the loop. I'm extremely transparent. I built up a lot of trust over the years with them. They built up a lot of trust in me.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But you know, we will, we will give them a game and my hope is it's going to be something that's, you know, it's going to make the company proud.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Yeah, yeah, like what's up? No, you know, I love making games and I'm not, it's weird because there's not a lot of developers who at my age who have been in the industry as long as I have are still doing it. Uhm, it is a tough industry and uhm,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But I love making games. I love working with people to make something. I like seeing something come from, you know, inception to, to, to finish. You know, I, I know I'm going to make more games as long as people will fund them.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But I don't know what it is yet. I do think we definitely are going to be continuing with how we, like, the system we developed to make this game. This is the tool I think I want to be building on. Because like I said, it's more like,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] We keep learning new things with this more like a guitar, you know, like then, then, then a engine that, oh, you could, you know, you could do tapping and you could.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Put an amplifier on it and you can add distortion. And we keep learning new ways to use the toolset and most of those are pretty straightforward. Like the amount of narrative content that got in the last couple of weeks just for the thing you're playing.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Rapid iteration because the engine, once you're, once you know the path of implementing something.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You can get stuff in very, very quickly and keep building out, but then we keep learning new things to do with it. Cause it is, you know, it is, it's more like an instrument than it is like a tool.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] To our enemies, I'd like to say. Enemies? That, uhm, right now, there are several, uhm, groups. We got an article that said a controversial church in Harlem may go up for public auction, alright?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, the infamous, uh, the anti-gay, anti-Obama pastor, uh, hadn't paid his bills.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, Pastor Manning is, or says his flock is being fleeced. Well, we are.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] All these, all these pink news, all these news organizations are running up and down talking about they're going to raise money to purchase our church at auction.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Ah, he's taking the piss out of you. Oh, oh my gosh. What is bad jokes?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Scotty knows. Do uhm, there's opportunity, yes!


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Sucks. I will talk to you later. Oh, it's really-


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Oh, we didn't. We just took our chances.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You think that's normal? No. Did people back then wear condoms?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Oh Jesus Christ. How'd that happen? I'm sorry. You know what?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Taught Anus with semen from all over the world.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, yeaah, I mean, god, how far back do I go? I mean, my first job in the industry was on this game of Dark Age of Camelot and Warhammer. So that's like 18, 20 years ago now. Long time, right? Uhm, and, uh,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Well yeaah. So that's the, that's the quick version there.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And it's like, I'm trying to, I mean, cause, you know, game development is complex. It's not easy and I'm trying to figure out how to kind of abbreviate this, but the beginning is kind of sitting down and talking.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, in addition to the obvious things of like, oh, this needs to get fixed or this needs to get addressed, but it's laying a lot of that groundwork. And I'm sure you all have heard the transformation, right? This is all part of the transformation. So we also have consultants in that help with this, help monitor it, uhm, so on and so forth. Does that answer your question, Jake? No?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] 5, you saw that we had some more stuff with like how the crowds work, some living city type things and of course in 2.0 you can see that grow with obviously the AI improvements, the police system, a lot of the dynamic events that happen in the world.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So it was kind of like, it wasn't, none of those updates were, were isolated, right? It was all like we had this kind of.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Those moments that kind of take you out, which then compromises you being able to fully experience the story and the characters. And so that was the kind of the spirit of, I would say, pretty much everything we did.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] On just like the stories that there are to be told and the, uhm, and just how it resonates, uhm, you know, from the, the colorful cyberpunk to the, to the noir aspects and the, and then the modernization of it all. Like there's just so much, so much fun to be had. And so yeah, it was a, it was certainly a morale boost and it was exciting for sure. No doubt about it. And then we had, we had eggs and tie-ins and whatnot. Yeah.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I would want to see in this genre, like just as a fan, like as a, you know, Blade Runner, Telsorian fan, like just as a fan. So uhm, that fueled a lot of the drive and obviously with uhm, you know, collaborating with my directors and everyone else and kind of what they wanted to see in there. And so there's just that.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Right on. So uhm, you know, there's a kind of a short list of actors if you will that we feel that is very much


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And then, you know, I don't know, chicken or egg as it were, just at some point it was like, yes, this is, this is the spot for them.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] We can put them in this situation, this situation, in this situation, and you can think of all the, uhm, and we can do it, you know, some of this stuff might be, uhm,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Yeah, uhm, and again, I'm trying to figure out how to do it without spoiling, but certainly you mentioned bond and, and that was...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But uh, taking beats and there's a few other moments, hopefully experienced in the expansion where it's like, you take a beat from the fast action and sometimes it's, sometimes it's out of necessity, but other times it is out of your option to kind of really explore and dive in and get to know some of the other characters more. Yeah, I mean. That's what we like to do.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Oh, we want, we want the players to get to know a bit more about Alex. And so there's a few of those scenes that we, we weaved into the story there that these moments you can have these beats with her.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] We took like the feedback and we tried to address it in a hopefully, you know, meaningful way and I gotta just leave it for people to discover and I can't like really say more than that without swirling stuff. It's tough, but uhm,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I don't know what else to say about it. It's exciting and it's going to be fun and I feel confident in the team and us being able to do it. Will there be challenges? Yes, of course.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Like every game I've ever worked on and all my friends that are industry that worked on, there's always challenges. There's always unexpected things that happen, but that's just kind of, you kind of almost get used to it and it's just part of like,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Think about topics and themes and relationships a little bit differently. Just open your mind a bit because that's what uhm, at least to me, good story is whatever the medium and then certainly there's certain unique ways you can approach it in a game.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Or the, you know, short of virtual reality, if you will.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Stuff on the walls. My walls are barren, but the framing process is long and annoying.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Yeah, that's why it's long and annoying because I wait until I get a coupon from Michael's, which is very often, but you have to time it right.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Hello, hi. I think I wanna just mention, I wanna use my platform right now because people don't listen to the end. Uh, the next episode is gonna be delayed a little bit.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Also genre consideration, I would say branch out. If, you know, if you only like a certain type of couple of games, but they're too long, try looking around. Uh, cause, I mean, something like Dead Cells. Maybe you're not really a roguelite person or whatever it's called.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Dead Cells really lends itself to runs and, and just like, oh, let me just do one, let me just do one. And those bite-sized offerings that certain genres provide can kind of nestle into your busy life a little bit.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Yes, Seth Rosen from Ironwood Studios. Uh, he's the game director of Pacific Drive, a game that, uh, we've talked about, we really enjoy. So we wanted to pick his brain on it a little bit. So, uh, we thank him for joining us and we're gonna run that now.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So Seth, thank you for being here with us. Uh, clearly from our videos, we are big fans of the game and we definitely want to talk about that with you. Uh, the first thing though, just for some context for the folks out there, uh, we spoke a little bit before we were recording about other games you've worked on. Essentially, how did you get to this point working on Pacific Drive?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I was gonna say for me, it's always like survival game, but like the spin, like what's the spin on it? Is that gonna attract you or not?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] For me, it's not very frequently, but for me it was definitely, with Pacific Drive, it was the structure around the car. And almost the impermanence of things, like the impermanence of the world, meaning you're not wasting time building giant, dumb square houses to like put all your shit in.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But, uh, switching gears a little bit, just in terms of the car, uh, just, I gotta know, is you or anybody else on the team were inspired by a shitty car you had? And, and what car is that?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] There's nothing scarier than like, you're far away from your car and then you hear a horn honking and you're like, oh god that's my car.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So in terms of that, in terms of the arduous nature, the brutality of it sometimes, uh, was that something that kind of grew out of all these gameplay concepts over time or was that like a mission goal from the beginning to like really challenge the player?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I wanna talk about the quirks. The quirks have been incredibly challenging for me. I also haven't, uh, like, gone online and look and see guides or reddit or anything about people figuring them out. I just...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Bang my head against it constantly. So what I wanted to ask you, just on the light side.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Is what did you guys find to be one of the more challenging quirks? Uh, I don't know, like in playtests or anything, you don't have to like reveal the solution, but like what's been one of the ones that stumped people the most?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Okay, yeah, so the quark system essentially is things will just start to happen to your car. Uh, sometimes it's funny, like you shut the lid of your


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Alright, well, uh, with that Seth, I wish we had more time, but thank you so much for talking with us, and uh, hopefully we'll see you soon. Yeah, thanks so much for having me, this has been great.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Yeah, I would say to me that like to jump off of that, it's, uh, when it comes down to quantity over quality.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, to me, that is a detractor. I feel like I, I don't like playing through games where I have to sift through a lot of stuff that's just put there to justify a price tag or to keep me playing longer. And I feel like sometimes it can just get in the way of.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, good storytelling even, cause then to, to kinda kick from that.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] When games do try games as a service models or monetization or expansion things and


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Suicide Squad is like the easy first example, but there's others. I think like Diablo Immortal kinda did it, but it's like when you can see the lore and the story just stumbling over trying to explain what is essentially a business model,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That to me is a weird turn off, not just because I'm like, ew, I'm being sold, but also because it detracts from what otherwise could have been some interesting storytelling. And like that's still like what I come to the video games for most of the time.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I like games that are idle and I can just, you know, keep clicking and have fun. But I re- I really come to these things for like compelling adventures and stuff. And when it feels compromised in- in some sort of way, whether it's to jam it with stuff or to jam it with stuff for me to buy, like that- that for me usually devalues things.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, but I've also been playing Helldivers too, cause that's like an easy casual.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, pretty casually, but like I hopped, so I went hard for the first two weeks.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And then I kind of bounced off and now I just hop in casually and it's still just a lot of fun. It's kind of like a good.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Mindless one where I just want to zap some stuff while also chatting with a friend, you know, just like mowing down bugs, just really reveling in the whole, uh, you know, Starship Troopers atmosphere, which I, I don't know if I talked about that too much on this show, but the fact that they managed to keep that tone consistent


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Is really great because the game starts with an incredible intro sequence, like we saw in the trailer, where it's like a faux advertisement for the military. It's so...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Of that feeling and I was like, is this it? Like, and now it's just going to be a third person shooter multiplayer. It still manages to keep that tone from like what the characters say to things that play in your ship in between missions. It's just kind of always got that wacky, zany, uhm, uh, what's, what's the word? Like parody.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I like a lot of the things they do. They've been doing a lot of, I mean, they had their struggles at launch, of course, but just the way they've been approaching a lot of things that I just really like, especially considering, I mean, they're doing a good enough job where when you said live service, I was like, oh, oh yeah, I guess it is kind of a live service game, but it's just how everything is kind of handled.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I like, and I continue to play, I don't know if I'm gonna play this thing forever, cause it is, when you really boil it down, a very simple third person shooter, but,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It's, it's cool. It's cool. Like, the effects, the sound, the feedback.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, all the like weird wacky things that can happen with your friends, like, and you'll have all these like stories of like, remember when you did that and you dove off a cliff and then you hit a bomb and then you bounced off of me? Like, the game encourages like all those weird with friendly fire being on, like all that stuff just encourages and sets up you having all these stories and stuff.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You gotta just like, you know, embrace your, like, just know that in your life you can't fit everything and- No, I know, absolutely. And be happy with, like- Totally. So I live near, like, a Pokemon Go hotbed.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Like it's like a target point where people like travel to this spot to like walk around the street and play it. And I still see them to this day and I'm always like, wow, that's awesome. I will never download that app again. I don't have time, but I am so happy for people still like loving that shit. It's cool.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I thought it was, yeah, but I was like, okay, I want to see the rest of it, you know? Sure. I liked the first movie.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Let me tell you a little bit about, um, Timothy Chalamet's Paul Atreides. I think there were a couple of really cool parts where I was like, oh, this guy, this guy is badass.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But it was uphill for me, and I do feel like towards the end, without spoiling anything, uhm.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Even still, it's like the construction of the movie where it's like, even if I wasn't completely million percent sold on his performance, it was...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It was the music, the visuals, the swelling of it all. It helps push that feeling over the finish line for me. And I think that's like from beginning to end. Like there's just so much cool shit. Like this, it's, I was gonna make a they fly now joke. Cause it's like the first scene is like they fly now.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So I'm like reading the first book. I kind of read it in high school, but I like lost and I watched the David Lynch one a lot. Um, so I think it's, it's Zendaya, but also like the making the Fremen more,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Layered, a little bit more real or at least presenting that there's more depth to them. I, I really like it.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Hey everyone, now we here at Friends per Second have prepared a statement that we're gonna be reading at the top of this week's episode. Uh, it's up on my monitor, which means I'm not gonna be looking down the lens of my camera.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I'm sorry, but obviously I want to make sure that I'm reading this correctly. Don't want to get anything wrong or miss anything off accidentally. So here goes.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, if you follow us on Twitter, you might have seen our statement from earlier this week regarding Gerard's involvement with the podcast. We wanted to reiterate it here at the top of the show, just in case anyone missed it.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Now last week, the four of us, that is Jake, Ralph, Gerard, and myself, met to talk about the ongoing situation with Gerard and the Open Hand Foundation.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] During that conversation between the four of us, Gerard offered to step down from the podcast and as a team,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] We agreed that would be for the best. We want to thank Gerard for all of his contributions to the podcast to this point.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And as for our stance on this situation, it's difficult for us to talk about as Gerard was both a member of this podcast and a friend. However, we do want to say that clearly,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Gerard has made some serious mistakes in the handling of the charity funds, in the way the work of the foundation was communicated to his audience, to us, and to you.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And in the way he responded to the situation after everything has come to light.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] There are a lot of people hurt in a situation like this, but in particular, we're disappointed at the way the situation prejudices future fundraising efforts in the content creation space, making people less likely to donate to worthwhile causes for fear that their money may not reach its intended destination.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] To that end, we'd reiterate that charity work is important and we should all continue to directly support the charities that are doing good work and that raise awareness for their causes.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That's what we plan to do on Friends per Second. We're very lucky to have the platforms that we have and we want to use them to do some good where we can.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Beyond that, the three of us will be continuing the podcast next year after a little break for the holidays. We have no plans to appoint a new host, but we will definitely be leaning on, uh, friends of the show to help us out. And of course we still plan to welcome plenty of special guests each week. Thank you to everyone for all of your support.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And now we have to do another really awkward hard pivot into this week's episode.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of the Friends Per Second Podcast. It's the end of the year. I'm crawling over the finish line, boys. I don't know about you.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That is Ralph aka Skill Up. Also got Jake Baldino. Hello Jake, how are you feeling at the end of this year?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So yeah, you get the long weekend, but Christmas, I mean, I've got.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] We have, um, maybe this is a very northeast thing, but we have, you either call it CAD warmed up, that's Geordie, that's basically like cold warmed up in


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You don't look at what it looks like, you just enjoy the taste sensation. Just eat it.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Do you have, like, what do you do, what does Christmas dinner look like for you?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I uhm, I've been doing like friends Christmases and friends givings for the past few years, which is also, as much as I love and miss my family, don't get me wrong, but logistically having to go to each person's house and doing all that.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] When you take that stress away and you just rock up to a friend's house and you have like a, everyone brings their one thing that they made.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Kind of a non-gaming episode of our gaming podcast. Cause it's the end of the year. Uh, all the big stuff, I was gonna say has happened, but big stuff has happened.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, yeah, that's really sad looking at the moment because I need to go shopping. But we, um, we've got some questions that we prepared for each other. We've also got a bunch of user questions. Um, I don't know.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] There are places in San Francisco where they cook them and just put a bit of tin foil on the ground and you pick them up from there.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Okay, uhm, I get a 10 chicken McNugget meal medium.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I used to, as a kid, I used to always get supersized when I- cause I didn't have a growth spurt until I was like 15.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And then I get, sometimes McFlurry.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But a friend of mine, who remained nameless, she always orders an extra hamburger but doesn't eat it then, she puts it in her bag.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] For the next day. And that is her burger. Her bag burger.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] No, not sweet and sour, there's another one, it has honey in it. I don't think it's mustard.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] We went to, we were at Tams at the weekend to watch that basketball game I was telling you about and, uh, we ordered a bunch of pizza and they have hot honey that they just have and all put that on the pizza and it was so good.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Okay, so that was, that's my order, Ralph. What's your, your Macca's?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But over here it tastes so much, it tastes different to back home because there's just so much shit in it over here.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Oh, there was, oh, uh, a few years ago, like 10 years ago, maybe there was this big scandal where it turned out that a bunch of beef products were being sold and it was actually horse meat.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I don't think, I don't know if McDonald's was involved in that, but a lot of the supermarkets were and it became a big deal.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, have either of you ever been rushed to hospital for any reason?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, but I was rushed to the hospital once when I was a kid.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Actually, twice. Once because I was really constipated.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] To the bathroom, you weirdo. But no, the other one was, I was rushed to the hospital because I was complaining that all of my joints were hurting.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And my mum thought that I had meningitis and she was basically talking to the doctors, I think I was about five or something, and


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I remember being young, and I remember them just kind of...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Like looking at me and whatever and nothing really happening and my mum saying, no, no, no, she's really sick, she's really sick, blah, blah, blah. And then apparently my, my joints just swelled.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] In front of their eyes and they got the red dots, which is a sign of meningitis.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And they were like, uh, you know, and then they took me in for an x-ray and did all this stuff. And it just turns out that I had like this weird, I think it was a kidney or a liver infection called HSP. And then I was like, completely fine.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But it presents like meningitis, so I was like rushed into hospital, I don't know, I don't remember.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And then it was fine. Uhm, and my mum learned a valuable lesson to always advocate for herself. I don't know, I put that in there.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Right, should we take a little break, uh, for a little word from one of our sponsors? We'll be right back.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That's very circumspective for you. I make it boring.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Yeah, true, true. Clever. So one time, uhm, this was a couple years ago, I had a, had a personal trainer. This was short-lived.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, and she asked me what I did for work, and I said, I'm a senior video producer.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, I was like, oh yea, I'm a video producer, blah blah blah. Uh, I work, uh, I cover video games.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I play a lot of video games, and on my personalized meal plan, she put my occupation down as gamer.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] However, that can also lead to issues where I was in an uber with someone in, uh, this was back in the day when pre-COVID, I would do uber pool a lot or like lifts.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, with, uh, a group of other people. And I was in this...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Who works there? Jim Lenzone? I don't know who's still at CBS anymore. Paramount. Whatever the hell it's called.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Come into the living room, and my mum just goes, I've got some news. And I was like, oh shit, what? And she goes, and this is Christmas by the way, and she goes,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So I'm like, what the hell does that mean? And she went, well, we have this strange man. She didn't call him a strange man. She was very nice about it, but ultimately this man did prove to be very strange.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] We have this man living with us, uh, for the next three weeks because he works in the theatre.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And his company is doing the pantomime that is on, uh, at Newcastle Theatre. Pantomime, for those unaware, is a festive...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It's like a theater thing that you take your kids to every year. There are all these tropes and stuff. It's very camp. It's very kid friendly. His company was putting on the pantomime that year and so he was staying with us because my mom lived relatively near to the theater.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And then one day I was just in the- I was, you know, like mostly hanging out seeing my friends. I come down to the kitchen and he's there and my mom is out. He's this older gentleman.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Like, BAFTA's in a couple months. Uh, you know, we make a ton of money. I was on the, like, that was back then. I did a lot of stuff with the BBC and Sky News. I was like, I was just on Sky News talking about video games. Were you on there talking about your fucking pantomime?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That guy was- Yeah, that guy was- My mum at one point- My mum was like-


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So, that like, my family wouldn't-


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But it's really sweet. They're just like, they, I was on, uh, the radio for, I was on BBC to talk about GTA a few weeks ago.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And I just told my family about it because it was cool. And they all listen. But they give me feedback that's not gaming related. They give me, you were very eloquent.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Get and appreciate rather than understanding the intimacies and intricacies of how many units GTA V has sold.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I think when I, so I went to a school that was very, uhm, kinda strict in terms of dress code and everything.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Everything was uniformed, but then I met a bunch of friends who lived in the neighborhood that I lived in, but I didn't go to school with them. I'm still friends with them to this day.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Group chat was popping off today and I'm very sad that I won't be able to meet up with them for Christmas like we normally do. But they were definitely more of the skater kids. And I was introduced to, I listened to a lot of Slipknot, Nirvana, the Distillers. I got


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Really into wearing very unflattering baggy clothes.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I really wonder if these are somewhere, or if they got thrown away, or if there's a picture of them, but there was a pair of black, wide-legged jeans.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I would, I would wear these big black baggy jeans. I also had, you know, big regular denim ones and I would do short sleeved band t-shirts over long sleeve t-shirts wearing converse. I would just, I think this is around the time probably Avril Lavigne was coming around. Yeah, I was gonna say.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But I used to straighten it, and it was...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I mean, it's not a good luck and it's no wonder I remained very single in high school.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So that was my phase. I got, I got like really into music. I got really into Beck.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Cause he has, and has, an album for basically every mood and every genre I guess, so.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I was insufferable back then. I was playing video games this whole time too, but I don't think I was as-


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] public about it or like I wasn't, it wasn't until kind of a little bit later where I found places like Gamespot and IGN and kind of got more involved into the gaming.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Oh, so you always got to play then, you didn't have to play on the Mad Catz controller.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, I had a kind of related question based on phases.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Where, I don't know, I'm just kind of interested in what you guys were like at school. Like what did you, what, what did you study? What was, what were your friend groups like? I'm just, this was in school.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Or uni as well, I feel like uni is also very special.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Yeah, because I was in school with the same people from 11 to 18 and then I went to uni and a bunch of people


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Went to the same uni as me, I was in the same halls as a guy from my year who we became really good friends. And then my best friend from school, two of my best friends from school, three of them.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, you met, you met one of them, you met Katie, uh, in LA, who was randomly in LA at the same time as the Game Awards. Um, like we were all just in the same uni, so we spent, you know, like 10 plus years, and I'm still friends with, uh,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] People that I went to school with, like when I was back in the UK I stayed with my friend Hannah. Uhm, school for me was...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But then we were kept separate from the boys.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, so you were mixed in year 6 when you were about 10 and then you were separate from year 7 to...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] 11, so 16, and then you were mixed again, uh, seve- age 17 and 18.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So it's kind of weird because you have all these really close friendships with the girls and then the boys get added into the mix.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Cause I, I went to a school that would ask you to leave if you didn't get certain results. And so it was very much.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But I missed, I missed like, I think that's why now I have such a close group of friends and I like to surround myself with friends because I think that helped a lot when I was younger and also it's great just to surround yourself with good people.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But no, I'm in school. Also, I lived a five minute walk away, so my house was like, very often the hangout house, which was very fun. Cause I would be like...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So they, they still tour, I get adverts all the time that they're around 7 minutes ago. Yes! Oh my god, I would love that!


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, so I can't, I can't put it on a timeline properly.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, but it was definitely a Sega Genesis. I was just Googling to make sure cause over back home we call it the Mega Drive. We do too.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And so I remember a friend of mine having Mortal Kombat.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] My friend Robin had Mortal Kombat, I remember seeing that and I was going, what the hell is this? But another friend of mine, I remember going around and playing Sonic for the first time, no idea which one, and I just remember being so bad at it, I was like


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] My granddad's next door neighbor had a PS1 and I remember playing Crash Bandicoot.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I also remember playing Crash Bandicoot with my godmother's kids, and then...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] He was obsessed with worms. My dad loves playing worms. He plays- That's awesome. Yeah, he loves worms. Very cool.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And then you would play like, uh, Doom and Quake and...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Oh, X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter. So I have all these scattered memories of early video game experiences, but I can't tell you on the timeline which one would come first. But I definitely remember the Mega Drive stuff.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Alright, Ralph, I know you've got more questions for the two of us. I've got another question, uh, but we're going to go to a quick break, uh, with a word from our sponsors before we go to that.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And then it just immediately started issuing takedowns and because it uses things like GDPR back in Europe and there's an American kind of equivalent to get your information taken down, it just gets the job done. And so I have, I logged in today to see how much it had done and out of the 150 plus, there were already like 70 resolved, others were pending.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It also suppresses, like puts you on like this list so you're not like, suppresses the amount of reach these places can, when what they can do with your information if they have it. So it's like, it's really cool. And I get, I get a ton of junk mail and it's just kind of like.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It's also scary, like I'm on the internet. I don't want people knowing where I live or how to contact me. And so it's just nice peace of mind.


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[Assistant] Yeah, I have, I'm so bad at making sure that I eat properly because I work so much and AG1 is like the one thing I do in the morning that kind of makes me feel like I've given myself a good start to my day. So I'm also, my New Year's resolution is to keep doing it.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Are you saying, when you say hottest, do you mean aesthetically? Vibe? Beady?


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[Assistant] Yea, I can see the appeal. Yea, definitely. But again, it's similar vibes with, uh, Geralt where it's like, he could look up to you. You know? He would care for you. Yea, that's true. That's true. That's true. That's sometimes that's all you want. Yea. Jake, you look very confused.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Well, those are questions that we wrote for each other in this team bonding exercise for this Chilled Out episode. We obviously have some user questions. Uh, remember it was contact at friends-per-second.com. Uh, Jake, do you want to scroll down to read the one I highlighted at the very bottom?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, Howlin' at the Moon t-shirt today, but the Okami soundtrack is beautiful. Um, I have it on the vinyl from a few years ago and I, there's a one song on there, Shinshu Plains or Shinshu Field, that's so gorgeous and it has this real kick to it and halfway through and it just makes me feel very energized. I love.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I've been fortunate enough to see some video game music live, sadly not a Tommy Tallarico special, but I've seen-


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I've seen the eldest girls, uh, in concert in London and I've seen...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, Yoko Shimomura and uh, Ueda.


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[Assistant] Do Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts and Chrono Trigger before. And so seeing those in, performed by a live orchestra is always amazing.


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[Assistant] Uhm, so I would say yea, Final Fantasy VII, I loved what they did with the remake, but also XII, I mean XII I have the soft spot for anyway, but XII's music is just like yea.


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[Assistant] Uhm, I love- I- I do this thing where I do chores to The Sims music.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It helps so much! I saw it on tiktok or something and I started doing it. I was doing it today. I was like tidying up and I was like, oh yeah, I feel like I'm really getting stuff done.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] 1 and 2 are incredible, don't get me wrong, but Red Dead 1, that soundtrack, I just became obsessed with.


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[Assistant] Bill Elm and Woody Jackson, and even the covers that they had on, not covers, the uh, artists that they had to get in on Red Dead 2, so.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Josh Homme, for example, doing Cruel World and Willie Nelson and, um,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Oh, there was one where I was, I used to love the Life is Strange soundtrack the first game.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And there was one more that I wanted to talk about that it's completely left my brain.


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[Assistant] Uhm, no, I need, I listen to a lot of podcasts to help me sleep, even though, so...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Ellis James and John Robbins I've listened to since like 2017. And it's, I will get 10 minutes in and I'm out.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I probably don't like, I'm chronically fatigued. I do not need help going to sleep, but it's part of my routine. It's like this comfort thing. And so I can't listen to gaming podcasts to sleep.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Alright, thank you for your question. Uhm, Jake, uh, we got another one. Ralph, do you want to read it as the one I highlighted at the top?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I, uh, I used to crochet a lot actually and do cross stitch. Yeah, so I could crochet you a robocop hat.


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[Assistant] It's, it's kind of time consuming in a different way. I like doing it because I, it's, it's counting and it's a repetitive motion. It kind of helps your brain switch off. And so I would put a show on and just be like, yeah, yeah. Um, I haven't done it in a while. Uh, I have a lot of jigsaw puzzles, which I like doing.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, is this thing a relaxing thing? You get the satisfaction of completing at the end. I really like cleaning and clearing stuff out.


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[Assistant] My apartment right now does not reflect that because it's an absolute state in here, but I'm genuinely over the break. I have, I saw this on TikTok again. I've said that like three times this episode. Don't, don't judge me. My attention span is short. It's ruined.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I saw this girl and she put every drawer and cupboard on a spinny wheel.


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[Assistant] Uh, gradually just kind of clear all my stuff out, get rid of stuff that I don't need anymore. Kind of take stock of what I do have. I do like reading.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I have a really bad attention span, so I have to, you see this pink chair? That is the chair that I read on. And that's, that's my reading light and I've got a little foot rest and the whole thing. Um, I'm currently reading House of Leaves. Cause.


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[Assistant] Ultimately I'm spending a- I spend a lot of time with my friends, uh, right now. I've been traveling a lot so I'm kinda- I'm kinda glad for a little bit of a downtime.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But over the break there's, I've got a little list of stuff.


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[Assistant] Pile of shame, I guess for us is kind of like, I guess everything.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That you haven't ever touched, right? Because you have to talk about it so much. So.