812. 1Upsmanship: Celestial Hard Drive 2024
Added 2025-01-03 14:00:11 +0000 UTC
As is tradition, every year we give the hosts the option to adjust and prune the Celestial Hard Drive for alien consumption. Which beloved games will be off the short list? Find out by clicking on the the triangle above this description and sitting motionless for about an hour.
Michael Swaim: https://bsky.app/profile/michaelswaim.bsky.social
Adam Ganser: https://twitter.com/therealganz
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Comments
I'll comment on the next one as well but going through the catalog and seeing what Adam is into... dude you gotta play Tribes 2. It is a excellent 1st person shooter and it brings in the grappling hook and frictionless skies. And Jump jets!
Aaron Berney
2025-07-09 18:01:19 +0000 UTCOw.... Damn... Hellblade absolutely blew me away and I've been saving the second one, already bought it, for when I have a solid 2 weeks free. I'll make my own mind up anyway but just shit son! The thought just never even crossed my mind that it could possibly be a letdown! O.O
CalamariWangcaster
2025-05-26 06:15:11 +0000 UTCI remember being so blown away that when yall played disco elysium there was a glitch that made you not get the dream sequence, only because to me that was the actual emotional climax of the game. In fact I was save scumming in that scene more than any other moment in the entire game, crying, trying to change the outcome of a dream. Completely unique experience in a game for me. Not that this episode really has anything to do with disco elysium lol
E l i j a h
2025-01-13 05:09:40 +0000 UTCMike, you've mentioned Marathon in the past, right? I think that's worth a play but I'm biased. Among its contemporary games, I felt like it had a really good story.
JB
2025-01-07 00:10:32 +0000 UTCIf you're interested, they had a sequel recently that was very good. I would highly recommend
Nick Fontaine
2025-01-06 18:58:31 +0000 UTCI’ve been surprised a few times now that your summaries of the key early FPS games always skip Quake - the lists tend to go straight from Doom to Half-Life or Goldeneye. It may not need covering in its own episode - the style really just rehashes Doom and the grim visual palette can be wearying. But the evolution from a 3D environment populated by slowly shuffling 2D sprite-based demons into a world full of actual jumping-and-snorting 3D models was profound for the genre at the time, along with the physical advances around water and explosions (god bless rocket-jumping). It also cemented mouse-looking as the go-to control system. Like Doom before it and Unreal and Half-Life after it, Quake also had the shiny new graphics engine that every PC FPS over the next few years would borrow or emulate, not to mention a slew of good amateur Quake mods to add everything from grappling hooks to a soccer mode. Plus a Nine Inch Nails soundtrack before the world realised that soundtracks are Trent Reznor’s forte. But also, hooray for Norco!
James McLeod
2025-01-06 18:41:08 +0000 UTCMichael's plea to save Hellblade by trading Ori made this one of the most special episodes of any podcast. This is the emotional core I feel are what people want to hear about your love of these games. I know you both want to come off as connoisseurs of video games and make sure this hard drive has truly great games on it but I reject the notion that you need to include Diablo II solely on its legacy when both of you seem to dislike the game. I am here to see what cames have meaning to you, I am not here for the most objective true best game list because thats not really interesting. I would rather the hard drive be full of games you truly care about that affected you than just games that moved their respective genres forward. If it does that and you like it sure, thats a great reason to promote it but me personally as a fan I want "Hellblade" more than "Diablo II" and as a big fan of Diablo I am not offended if you didn't put it up there. If you don't like a game, that's valid. Be proud of what you like and don't be held back, this is your drive. Thanks for making awesome content, can't wait for more.
Jason Laske
2025-01-06 18:25:07 +0000 UTCI believe I played one those a couple years ago. I liked it a lot.
Adam Ganser
2025-01-05 02:50:12 +0000 UTCHave you guys tried the Golden Idol series? Hearing you mention Obra Dinn reminded me of it, and I think Mike would like it if he hasn't tried it
Nick Fontaine
2025-01-04 00:58:28 +0000 UTCJust delightful. I don't have a PC but I did buy a steam deck just to dip a toe in some of the weirder offers Mike so consistently uncovers and my playstation having ass was missing.
drunkencoyote
2025-01-03 19:36:13 +0000 UTCMetal Gear Solid will always hold a special place in my heart. It was the first game where I truly got into the story. I love the music. I enjoyed the bittersweetness of defeating each boss. I've even recently gotten the mcfarlane snake toy cause I want to have something other than the game to memorialize my joy for it. MGS 5 is fun to play but I still need to finish it. All this to say, it's really weird that all that's left of that episode is the youtube version of it. It oddly isn't even on iheart with the other old episodes. I need to replay Metal Gear Solid...
Oliver Allen
2025-01-03 19:10:00 +0000 UTCI have alot of cherished couch co op memories with this game and the series in general!
drunkencoyote
2025-01-03 18:53:34 +0000 UTCYou guys are nailing it. This is the series that convinced me to subscribe. I've been listening since day 1. Always a bright spot when I see it go up. I really appreciate that it's a balance between popular opinion/ and your own takes. The push/pull between those is a tension that creates really good conversation. The project is worth while. Thank you for continuing to make it while life happens.
Maladapted
2025-01-03 18:48:24 +0000 UTCHappy new year guys! Thank you Ganz for bringing back Borderlands 2. As someone who once considered them self a fanboy, I really think that BL2 is the pinnacle of the series. BL1 was a great start but feels kinda empty in comparison. BL2 was just more of everything they did right in the first. It was one of the best multi-player experiences of the time with drop in/out level scaling and the characters dynamically different play styles really complimented each other. Raid bosses, rare loot, solid dlc's. After 2 there was a steep decline. Pre-sequel was enjoyable but felt disconnected. BL3 was borderline trash, absurdly meta and ham fisted. Wonderlands was fun but it was a departure, and I think they were desperately trying to recreate the emotional journey that was perfectly captured with tiny Tina's keep dlc. There was a mod program for BL2 called gibbed that allowed you to create the ultimate gear load out and i got a ton of mileage in the OP levels. I think they will ultimately fumble BL4 and it will put the series out of its misery.
Joylesstiger
2025-01-03 17:30:02 +0000 UTCI don’t know what you’re talking about.
Adam Ganser
2025-01-03 16:01:55 +0000 UTCI completely get this and I appreciate the way you expressed it. I’d say there’s a tension between those things and we’re constantly negotiating it. Thanks for listening.
Adam Ganser
2025-01-03 16:01:14 +0000 UTCMike brought this up himself, so I'm just repeating that point, but there's a bit of whiplash between the criteria in whether it's about your taste or not. It kinda feels like it defeats the purpose of the podcast, like you said, is it just gonna be a list of the 100 most popular games? It might just be my autistic brain needing consistency, but it feels like you keep changing the criteria based on the argument you're currently having - which is human and normal and fine, it just kinda stresses me out 😅
Tue HL
2025-01-03 15:34:05 +0000 UTCi am politely asking the two white men who know that GTAV was written by white people to please replace that problematic shit show with either San Andreas or GTA3, which i believe are both more pivotal games regardless of how shitty 5 is. those games were also written by white people but that pill is much easier to swallow when it’s not from a time that we all OBVIOUSLY knew better
Aldo M.
2025-01-03 15:26:40 +0000 UTCIt's frustrating when you delete a game because you think another game you may never cover would be a better selection. Instead, you should wait until both games are present in one of these episodes *or* introduce a mechanic where you can keep, delete, or replace, where replacing is you keep a game only if both players decide to delete an existing game on the hard drive.
JT Moen
2025-01-03 14:24:47 +0000 UTCHuzzah! Been waiting for this one, but Guylight has been filling my ears in the meantime
Alexander Ault
2025-01-03 14:14:38 +0000 UTC
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