It's been a while since we've had a music-focused episode, but the imminent arrival of the PlayStation mini seemed like a good opportunity to revisit the greatest (maybe?) era of game tunes. A whole bunch of developers seized on the PS1's incredible audio features to create suitably awesome soundtracks, and we spend an hour and a half this episode going through some of the best of them based on listener opinions.
Description: Shane Bettenhausen joins Jeremy Parish, Bob Mackey, and a host o...
2018-11-26 15:00:00 +0000 UTC
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Hey everyone, sorry we didn't get a bonus episode up yesterday per usual. Bob has been traveling and was prevented from returning home for several days by the California wildfires, so he wasn't able to record his piece on his intended schedule. It'll be up as soon as he's back home and able to record. Apologies for the delay!
Edit: As you may be aware, Bob was mugged on his way home and all his recording gear (and his phone, credit cards, ID, and Switch) have been stolen. Unfortunately, ...
2018-11-24 13:13:28 +0000 UTC
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Another listener request topic this week—one that was a bit of a challenge to coordinate, to be honest. This was our THIRD attempt to line up and coordinate schedules for people who could speak to the topic, and even then it didn't go entirely right—one of our guests dropped out at the last second due to family matters. But we had to press on and get it done (by request), and the result is... not too shabby, really. This is admittedly an episode where a lot of material is based on online res...
2018-11-19 12:37:08 +0000 UTC
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Hey everyone, here's an episode that prrrrrobably should have run a few months ago! Whoops! Back at BitSummit in May, I got together with Retronauts regular D. Feit (now a contributor to the site!) to talk about the at-the-time-very-recently-announced SNK 40th Anniversary Collection for Switch, given that he's a huuuuge SNK fan. (He even lives in Kansai, where SNK is based! That's fandom.) The conversation here is a little outdated now that I have a review version of the collection and have play...
2018-11-12 13:00:42 +0000 UTC
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So. Maybe you thought we were a bunch of bozos for talking about the SEGA Genesis' 30th anniversary despite not having been Genesis owners back in the day. Maybe you thought we weren't qualified to have opinions on that system and its video games. Maybe you were powerfully angry that we aligned ourselves with the other side during the console wars.
Well, here's the secret behind our crime against SEGA and humanity: I felt OK about leading our Genesis conversation because I had an ace up ...
2018-11-09 16:52:58 +0000 UTC
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Ah, Dragon Ball and Sailor Moon: The twin jewels of '90s anime. Though many series have surpassed these two in longevity and popularity, these anime titans hold sole responsibility for getting so many Americans into anime during the late 90s, when Japanese animation wasn't so commonplace in our country. And, of course, when you have two properties so huge and influential, you're gonna see a whole bunch of video game adapatations. On this episode of Retronauts, GameSpot's 2018-11-05 08:01:00 +0000 UTC
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Sega's Genesis (well, Mega Drive) turns 30 years old TODAY. And so to celebrate, a bunch of dudes who didn't own Genesis consoles at the time talk about the system! Ah, but don't worry, we asked YOU to help, and there's a great listener mail section to make up for our collective weaknesses. Plus, there's an expert-level follow-up in the works...
Description: Jeremy Parish, Benj Edwards, Chris Sims, and a host of Retronauts listeners recount the best moments and memories of SEGA's 16-bit Ge...
2018-10-29 20:51:00 +0000 UTC
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Hey, this game really SUCKS! But only because it's supposed to. This week on Retronauts, we jump back to the ancient year of 2001 to dig deep into Luigi's Mansion: the GameCube launch title that underwhelmed at the time, but really holds up today. And, thanks to a new 3DS port, it's more playable than ever before! On this episode, join Bob Mackey and Henry Gilbert as they shine their flashlights all over Luigi's first adventures in the paranormal.
2018-10-26 20:15:00 +0000 UTC
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This patron-requested episode comes to you courtesy of Jeff Vlasek, whose topic suggestion resulted in a conversation that went in some unexpected directions... interesting directions, but not the ones we really anticipated.
Description: Jeremy Parish and Bob Mackey talk to USgamer's Caty McCarthy and Polygon's Matt Leone about modern-day takes on classic series—their history, the best and worst of them, and whether or not they're even necessary.
2018-10-22 14:00:00 +0000 UTC
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This week's show is another one of those "Huh, how have we not covered this yet?" Or else a "What is wrong with Jeremy's memory that he doesn't remember covering it yet?" episode. Getting old is rough, man.
And speaking of aging gracelessly, how about Double Dragon? While this series has seen a few very good and deservedly classic entries, it's also created a lot of junk, including the little-loved Double Dragon IV from a couple of years ago. The guys from Hardcore Gaming 101...
2018-10-15 12:51:26 +0000 UTC
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Last month, I joined Bob and Henry (Gilbert) to discuss the history of the G.I. Joe cartoon; this week's bonus episode is a follow-up to that, with a dive into all the classic/not-so-classic games based on G.I. Joe... uh, and quite a bit of discussion of the comic book. Which is to be expected when a comics expert sits in on the show, I suppose. I highly recommend checking out the "There's No Place Like Springfield" episode of What a Cartoon before listening to this episode, but it does stand al...
2018-10-12 12:43:25 +0000 UTC
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The latest chapter in our Final Fantasy deep-dive series is here, and it... isn't Final Fantasy. Instead, we're going in-depth on Final Fantasy's step-sibling, Chrono Trigger. Kat Bailey and Chris Kohler join us to travel back and forth through time—yeah, it's another one of those "high concept" episodes. And a heck of a conversation, in my opinion.
Please enjoy, and thank you as always for supporting Retronauts!
2018-10-08 14:24:10 +0000 UTC
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Hi! Welcome to October! Here's a podcast I recorded in May. [comical music sting]
Yeah, so I've been holding onto this one for a while, but now the story can be told. I had the good fortune to lock down Q-Games boss Dylan Cuthbert for an hour and a half back at BitSummit (thanks to company composer and social media guy and all-around pinch-hitter Mark Lentz!) and we spoke about the journey Dylan took from being a kid wanting to make games to being a kid working in the heart of Nintendo headqua...
2018-10-01 11:31:19 +0000 UTC
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When Mario debuted in 1981's Donkey Kong, he entered a gaming landscape devoid of voice acting, so Nintendo never stopped to think, "Hey, what's this little guy supposed to sound like?" Over the years, though, as Mario entered the world of cartoons, live-action TV shows, and movies, someone had to sit down and decide on the voice of this formerly voiceless character. And decide they did! On this episode of Retronauts, join Bob Mackey and Henry Gilbert as they explore the many voices of Mario, an...
2018-09-28 07:00:01 +0000 UTC
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We at Retronauts regret to inform you once again that something is very old. (Hey, we're just doing our job.) That's right: The PlayStation 2 turns 18 this month, and to celebrate its passage into adulthood we've put together two whole hours of podcasting fun about Sony's market-dominating beast of a console. Just how important was DVD support? And will any console ever outsell the PS2? On this podcast, Bob Mackey, Jeremy Parish, Henry Gilbert, and Matthew Jay rev up their Emotion Engines attemp...
2018-09-24 07:00:01 +0000 UTC
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As promised in last week's not-Micro episode, here were have another journey into the arcade catalog of a coin-op legend. This time it's Namco, and unfortunately the hits are a little thinner on the ground than they were in our previous Namco episode. There are some classics, no question, but also lots of instances where everyone involved seemed a little lost at sea, trying to match the success of Pac-Man, Galaga, and Xevious. You don't create Hopping Mappy if...
2018-09-17 12:11:08 +0000 UTC
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Well, it was inevitable. Bob and I have decided to drop the "Micro" naming scheme for our biweekly Friday podcasts. Now they're just... Retronauts. This episode was the camel-back-breaking straw, since it ended up clocking in at 75 minutes, which is frankly long enough to justify being called plain ol' Retronauts.
So, Retronauts is now a... man, what would you call this schedule? Weekly except when it's not? Weekly and semi-weekly on a once-in-a-fortnight rotating schedule? Basically, you're g...
2018-09-13 12:30:11 +0000 UTC
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The next chapter of the show's steady march through the history of role-playing games has arrived. No creator interview this time, though; Yuji Horii's a little tough to get locked down for a podcast, as you might imagine. But we do our best here, by finding some experts.
For the first segment, Bob and I made the trek out to Nagoya, Japan to talk to retrogaming bar Critical*Hit proprietor Alex Fraioli about the original Dragon Quest. For the second segment, Nadia Oxford Skypes i...
2018-09-10 12:11:15 +0000 UTC
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With this episode, we've now explored 20 years of SEGA arcade greats. (And some not-so-greats... but mostly greats.) This final chapter of our SEGA saga takes us up to the year 2000 and a whole lot of games you probably know better from Dreamcast. Ben Elgin and Benj Edwards join for this rootin' tootin' hootenanny of coin-op nuttiness. This is prime SEGA, with all the over-the-top voices and music that entails.
By my count, this is also the 300th crowd-funded episode of Retronauts! That could ...
2018-09-03 12:55:52 +0000 UTC
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Normally listener mail shows up in segments accompanying the relevant topic or else many months after the fact, but this time we're doing something a little different. This mailbag segment concerns topics in several episodes that haven't gone live yet, which means it's a look at things to come in the world of Retronauts. Get a glimpse of the future (of the past) with the help of USgamer's Nadia Oxford...
Description: Nadia Oxford dials in to Bob and Jeremy to swap listener mail su...
2018-08-31 11:53:43 +0000 UTC
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Ha, ha... get it? Right.
Well, anyway, change of routine here—Bob's off on vacation this week, and I have a massive backlog of episodes that need to be posted (no, seriously, I have almost 20 recorded and in the wings). So I'm stepping in this month to catch up while he winds down. Don't worry, though, you'll still get your monthly dose of Bob despite his absence from the production board; this episode and Friday's Micro both feature him prominently expressing opinions about matters on which...
2018-08-27 12:03:06 +0000 UTC
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Hey everyone, following on the recent Tron episode, we have a question for you. We've produced a few episodes this year that have focused on non-game properties that inspired video games, and these have had a heavier emphasis on the original works (which were mostly very interesting classic movies) than on the related games (which... typically were not all that great). There has been some listener dissent about these, though, so we'd like to take the temperature here.
How do
2018-08-25 00:16:06 +0000 UTC
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Hello, friendos — here's a Retronauts podcast about (gasp) a brand-new game. But it has an old soul. And it kind of works as an epilogue to our Metroidvania history series of episodes, too.
I've been following Chasm since back in the days when 1UP.com existed, if you can believe that. By complete luck I happened to be taking a trip to the area where creator James Petruzzi lives, just a week or two after the game's release. Given how brilliantly Chasm channels the spirit of ...
2018-08-20 13:07:39 +0000 UTC
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Another month, another Micro that is, in fact, way too long to be a Micro.
This time, we look at another movie and its tie-in games. The line's a lot blurrier here, though, because the movie in question is Disney's Tron, which is basically a video game in movie form. There's really a lot of ground to cover with this particular film, and we probably don't hit it all... but it was fun to record (and hopefully listen to), and that's what counts. Probably.
2018-08-17 11:55:54 +0000 UTC
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This week's episode is the companion to the Ultima podcast from a couple of months ago. We begin with a studio segment featuring Jason Wilson and Rowan Kaiser setting some context and perspective on the topic in question, then shift over to a noisy Game Developers Conference press room for a one-on-one with the game's designer. In this case, the game in question is The Bard's Tale, and the designer is Michael Cranford.
I realize the show has been a bit heavy on vintage CRPG d...
2018-08-13 11:56:01 +0000 UTC
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As you'll notice right away, this week's episode was originally intended to be a Micro feature. But, inevitably, despite my assuming we'd be lucky to squeeze half an hour of conversation out of the topic, we went on for a full hour. And that was when I decided, heck, let's just make it full episode with the mailbag backup feature I've been wanting to run as a Micro for a few months now.
I guess what I'm saying is that two Micros per month aren't enough. We gotta get to that next Patreon fundin...
2018-08-06 12:57:12 +0000 UTC
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In 1994, Sega released the Pico: a cute little purple-and-teal suitcase that ran on Genesis hardware and promised to enhance young minds rather than rot them. While it was a neat little piece of tech at the time, America didn't take as kindly to the Pico as Japan did--though Sega's little "learning computer" managed to touch a few tiny lives before it disappeared with only 20 releases to its name. On this episode of Retronauts Micro, join Bob Mackey, Henry Gilbert, and Pico enthusiast 2018-08-03 07:00:01 +0000 UTC
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Back in 2007, Irrational Games wowed the world with BioShock, an FPS experience that bridged the gap between PC and console games with its role as the "thinking man's shooter." With 2013's Infinite closing the book on the series—and Irrational Games as a whole—and still no new Ken Levine game to speak of, there's never been a better time to revisit the recent past and a game that really kicked the HD generation into high gear. On this episode, join Bob Mackey, Jeremy Parish, and Gary Butterf...
2018-07-30 19:59:12 +0000 UTC
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Here's one that's been on my "dream podcasts" list for ages — a full-length interview with Robert Woodhead, formerly of Sir-Tech, and one of the two visionaries behind the Wizardry series... which is to say, one of the most influential role-playing designers of all time. This was recorded back in March and I've been holding onto it until after the USgamer feature on Wizardry went live, but it's been tough to keep this under wraps. It's an interesting conversation with a video...
2018-07-24 15:11:30 +0000 UTC
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Well, this one turned out a little messy. A lot messy, actually. I think we've done a good job with our occasional excursions into films and other media tangential to classic games so far (e.g. Labyrinth, Star Wars, etc.), keeping the conversation pretty focused on the big picture and leading up to the games themselves... so maybe you'll forgive the way this one flies wildly off-track from the very start. Oops!
It also doesn't help that Raiders didn't ...
2018-07-20 15:42:39 +0000 UTC
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