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Sacred Symbols, Episode 191: Forbidden Whispers (Patreon)

Published:
2022-02-25 17:00:09
Imported:
2022-02

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Content

It's been five years since Horizon: Zero Dawn launched, and finally, we have its sequel. Forbidden West has arrived on PS5 and PS4, and it's awesome. We have a lot to say about it, so we dedicate over an hour to talking about Guerrilla's new open-world action-RPG in spoiler-free terms. But of course, we can't ignore the news. Fresh Project Spartacus rumors suggest a three-tiered subscription that will include hundreds of digital games, classic access, and more. Yet, the upcoming day-and-date release of Shadow Warrior 3 on PlayStation Now seems to conflict with potential timing. What gives? After that, we get into rumors about Call of Duty's new release schedule, the unexpected success of the Uncharted film, Electronic Arts' daring move away from the FIFA brand, Street Fighter 6's underwhelming reveal, and more. Then: Listener inquiries! Were David Jaffe's recent comments truly unsavory, or just taken out of context? Why doesn't the games press care more about Japanese RPGs? Can a dying studio ever truly recover its lost reputation? Will Colin ever be able to escape the shadowy specter of Sonic the Hedgehog?

Timestamps:

0:00:00 - Intro

0:06:32 - Sacred Symbols 200 LIVE

0:15:39 - Why doesn’t Chris eat before the show?

0:23:16 - Should you tell someone their leggings are on inside out?

0:28:24 - How well have our Vitas held up?

0:32:04 - Sony has revealed more information about the PSVR2.

0:41:58 - Many Elden Ring reviewers didn’t beat the game. Is that alright?

1:03:48 - An anime is coming for NieR: Automata.

1:05:53 - Square Enix says that Guardians of the Galaxy underperformed expectations

1:11:09 - LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga has gone gold.

1:12:42 - New details have emerged about the Activision acquisition.

1:23:05 - Supermassive’s new game has been trademarked.

1:23:37 - Tencent has acquired Inflexion.

1:25:12 - What have we been playing?

2:19:43 - We may have new details about PlayStation’s Spartacus service.

2:28:27 - Shadow Warrior 3 is launching PlayStation Now.

2:35:11 - Call of Duty is rumored to skip 2023.

2:47:06 - The Uncharted movie is a commercial hit.

2:57:22 - Street Fighter 6 is on the way. 

3:05:53 - FIFA and EA are having a spat.

3:16:28 - March’s PS+ games have been revealed.

3:19:17 - Ubisoft is open to being acquired.

3:25:51 - Take-Two and LEGO are teaming up.

3:34:10 - Bioware has given an update for Dragon Age - it’s still coming.

3:43:43 - News Wrap-Up

3:46:26 - Were David Jaffe’s recent comments in poor taste?

3:58:35 - Can a studio’s reputation get so bad it can’t be redeemed?

4:07:02 - Guerilla claims there was no crunch on Forbidden West - why can’t everyone else figure it out?

4:13:45 - Why does the mainstream gaming press not pay attention to JRPGs?

4:20:11 - What are our thoughts on accessibility in games?

4:25:15 - Did Colin live in an alternate version of the 90s where Sonic wasn’t popular?


Files

Comments

Anonymous

Sweet now the weekend can begin.

Big titty drinker

Hey I love forbidden west I can’t put the game down. You guys should have Radom side quest on the spoiler cast! That dude really shows how deep horizons lore is and how much work went into it. Lore writing in video games is such an underrated part of game development. It can really enhance an experience!

Card Captor Corey

Why not bring Gio Corsi on for a Vita retrospective?

Nick La Creta

“That’s an easy question….NO! NO!”

john spatta

For the best games of ps4, I think Persona 5 Royal / Persona 5 should be one entity.

Tonys_Always_Write

I think I am with Dustin on the, it's fine as long as it's disclosed, because I think a review should represents someone's enjoyment of a game, rather than some objective truth, but that's also why I disagree with scoring in general. If we don't demand a reviewer complete all side content, I don't know why we would demand them to complete a specific questline, especially when this game is clearly more about the side content than its story. I don't it's a complicated thing, but I do appreciate Colin bringing up the topic! Waiting a week for reviews would have probably been for the best.

LastStandMedia
>>78630582

I don't think we understate the importance of lore. I literally write lore in my own games!

LastStandMedia
>>78635429

I think critics should be as complete as they can be, and I think that generally (though not always) requires one to see their way through to the end.

larry Seitz

Dustin stop being a bitch about the % hahahaha

Timothy Bryant

If you’re not waiting at noon every Friday to listen to Sacred Symbols, you’re doing it wrong

TL
>>78638132

Well, depends on the time zone. I feel you though.

Adam

I think 97 is way too high as someone who has beat every souls game including demons souls way back on ps3 as a young kid. That’s verging on best game of all time. The performance of this game is all over dropping 20fps every 15 seconds it’s really jarring especially when no offence this game looks worse than every open world game I’ve played in the last five years so how does it perform so badly and wasn’t mentioned anywhere until after all the reviews were done. I love the souls games but this is just more of the same which isn’t inherently bad but what’s interesting to me as one who loves sekiro is.. sekiro is more refined in almost every single way. The movement is incredible the combat is incredible, there is actually a coherent story and now that Elden ring is out it feels like a step backward in all those same ways and back to being a clunky ps3 game. Sure they added a few new moves but the old ones are still the same and for some reason souls games get a total pass on this and I don’t know why. It should be in the 80-90 range like all the others I think. Edit* shoutout to acg because he actually went back and changed his review with total transparency and that’s why I like him. It doesn’t need to be day and date, it just needs to be an accurate representation of the game and it feels as if certain titles get a more.. I’d say lenient approach to review scores.

Chris

I found that Horizon’s 30 FPS mode is actually awesome. It’s strange because after the PS5 launched, I thought 30 FPS was ruined for me. Somehow the implementation here is really good

Anonymous

I'm listening to your section on Horizon. Last night, I had an issue pop up where the framerate dropped so much it was unplayable. This was after installing the update Guerilla added this week. This occurred during the middle of a mission and I had to shut the game down and restarted. It seems fine now, but I hope I don't run into this again. Was definitely curious if anyone else ran into this.

Adam

Speaking on review scores importance or not importance to a game.. I feel as though horizon was short shafted. This game is a 10. I’m constantly blown away by the locations and am constantly getting so lost in errands and side missions I almost forget the main story, they are that impactful. I tell myself there’s no way this location can be beaten and then when I reach a new area, once again my jaw is dropped, really incredible stuff. I have to agree with Dustin though and say there is something seriously wrong with the performance mode, there is a bug or an oversight I’m not sure which forces me to play in resolution mode, but otherwise I cannot praise this game enough and this is coming from someone who though zero dawn was meh. Really really impressive from Guerrilla.

Drewbuntu

Colin's lack of math skills is KILLING ME

Jeremy Seal

You guys are making me nervous. I just turned 36, but I used to fly on a spy plane in the Air Force. I wont be surprised if I get recalled.

Maxx Lazos

No knowledge is useless

DeucesBruh

If you could do a Vita episode with Greg that would be awesome. I still occasionally put on Beyond 2011-2013 with the crew for nostalgia.

Anonymous

10 hours into Elden Ring and it is so far one of the best gaming experiences I've had in a long time (ps5). If it keeps up, I can see how reviewers would be left awe struck

Ealia Staroverov

There's other ways to split voting that isn't too hard. Colin: 30 Chris: 25 Dustin: 25 Audience: 20

Marc Cairney

Thanks for the podcast boys. Listening as the Mrs is in labour. Getting me through this long shift 😂😘

Kenneth Oms

Great episode. I’m glad everyone is enjoying their respective games this weekend. I’m very excited to jump into horizon once I’m done with dying light 2. Very interested to see how her character is likable or unlikable

Brandon Soto

Deathloop getting perfect 10s was the beginning of the end. Just get rid of review scores and replace it with a Like/Dislike ratio.

Wayde

Guardians of the Galaxy has sold over 4 million copies. That's a pretty substantial number. assuming the average cost of the game per unit is $45 that's a 180 million dollars worth of sales. There's no way this game cost north of a 100 million dollars to produce and advertise. I bet this game within 2 years reaches 7 million copies.

Josh Gamez

The more I think about it, the more I realize it's too bad that Bobby Kotick is such a piece of shit because otherwise he might be looked at as one of the most pivotal figures in modern gaming for how he saved Activision.

Ealia Staroverov

Regarding Grubb and Spartacus. PS+ is already $10 if you only buy one month. Otherwise a retail 1 year is $60, so half the monthly cost.

Jackie Rheu

Woahh four hours… hell yess

Mitchell Lundsberg

A vita retrospective/round table would be a great episode. Proud citizen of vita island as the owner of 2 vita’s myself. It truly was a special system. 12 hours into horizon and the deeper it gets the more alive it feels. I can’t wait to play more this weekend.

Angel DeJesus

Ugh. Why do so many people think they will get rid of a yearly subscription at a discount with essential? Ps+ already has a monthly option for $10, then you get it for half the cost if you pay for a year in advance.

Zack E

Playing Horizon on a launch day PS4. Perfectly fine and extremely great looking. Both Zero Dawn and Forbidden West are just outstanding games.

Tick Dickler

Thinking about it, the Elden Ring reviews issue comes again back to having a points system. If gaming outlets just gave a Roger Ebert style four stars, that would be totally fine if they hadn't played it all imo. When Roger Ebert reviews, he wasn’t looking for the next scientifically quantifiable Citizen Kane, but whether or not he enjoyed it and would recommend it, the literal one objective pursued by people called REVIEWERS. The Industry has a long way to mature when their review system is designed for that weird 7th grader who thinks making a list of the top ten most venomous shakes is a science fair project.

Phil Walker

Regarding Elden Ring. Clearly the reviewers think the game is better than just the raw sum of its parts. Im assuming from your slightly barbed "97" comments, you question it deserving such a score. A lot of 'all time' games that really don't run all that well. Ocarina, Halo, The Last of Us and GTA 4+5 to give a fair spread of 95+ games. Should these games not have received their overwhelming praise either? Do you think you should have given The Last of Us a 10 given that it never runs at a locked 30fps? Or do you think if it were released under today's more performance scrutinizing eye, it would get more criticism? As always, love the podcast x

TL

Listening right now at work and I do agree with Chris, while I love Horizon 2, the Matthew McConaughey rip off character (Travis the Hacker) is very annoying and immersion breaking.

Gunnerzaurus

Hey guys, I got to push back a bit in regards to the crunch question. One of the main responses was "Sony has the money to not crunch, indie /smaller publishers and devs do not" The crunch argument in regards to LSM has always been in the context of large publishers. I probably should have been more specific, but I don't think it's ever been brought up in regards to a smaller team. Secondly, I get what you guys are saying about "there will always be people who want to willingly crunch", sure I concede that, but is there even a discussion to be had here when every time a studio says "hey guys, we had no mandatory crunch!" (Which had happened a few times in recent years) the go to LSM answer is "Yes you did, because art CAN NOT be made without crunch". Can we not just take these claims, often made by the employees themselves at face value and concede yes, Horizon can be made without crunch so long as you have a talented team and skilled producer keeping everyone on task during their 8 hour days? Either way, I believe it's the way the industry is heading (for the better of the developers personal lives and their families) and we'll only keep seeing it. Much love guys, respect your opinions either way and appreciate the work put into LSM.

RK128

Great episode like usual, but I wanted to comment on your Elden Ring comments. I too question the high praise of that and other recent games. Maybe my standards changed as of late but games releasing with bugs, poor visuals or unstable frame rates are a hard pill to swallow when they get 9’s and 10’s. As another comment mentioned, Last of Us on PS3 infamously had frame rate issues despite the high critical reception and Elden Ring getting 97 is nuts when you have to contend with input issues. You know, a game that demands perfection of the player. Then again, stuff like Zelda OoT got 10’s back in the day and it ran at 20fps. So maybe we are expecting more now? I don’t know but recent games launching with bugs and frame rate issues makes playing the latest releases not that desirable day one anymore.

NotSkyWalker

As someone just coming off of HZD (I got my platinum <24 hours before HFW release)... HFW is a HUGE improvement on its predecessor. It lived up to the "Assassin's Creed II" or "Mass Effect 2" sequel expectations I had for it (in terms of the jump in quality / my personal enjoyment). I agree the first act dragged, but it has improved at a rapid pace since departing the initial hub you spend quite a bit of time in... PS app says I am at 70% completion at the moment.

Anonymous

Didn't Kotick make $150m last year? $15m seems like a tiny golden parachute on his scale

David D

Appreciated your kind (ish?) words on Sonic at the end, especially as a European - Sonic, the tv shows etc and Sega were massive for my childhood and even now I’ve always been a fan, great to see the resurgence of the series in pop culture recently - STAND UP SONIC FANS!

Captain Bon Clay

For horizon forbidden west I’m playing on a ps5 and multiple times I’ve had frame rates drop to 15-20 fps making the game look like a slideshow, the only thing that fixes it is restarting the game Also once I hit about 70 hours in the game started blacking out my screen for a second to load new areas! There’s been no fix I’ve found for this

Hose A Contra Razz

1/3 should be fair as founder and owner you have the final word. This kinda reminds me of KF, most hire were Tim’s friends, I believe gave him more power over you in the way the company was ran. That’s just an observation I might be wrong.

Anonymous

3:56:28 is gonna be a legendary lockmort soundbite

Samuel Ashley

I believe Mario sports games do so well because of the complete abandonment of arcade sports games from everyone else in the industry. I grew up in the ps2 era where high quality arcade sports games were coming out constantly. I dream of a day where we can go back to NFL Street, MLB Slugfest, and so many more. I know we are in the cte era of football and the anti doping era of baseball, but the kid in me dreams of how cool those would be with true online capabilities. Anyways, I’m not necessarily excited for Lego sports games, but maybe if they sell well It will open companies’ eyes to the potential of arcade sports games again.

NinjaDC

Hmm. I guess I can understand JRPGs commanding a smaller share of the (game media) market. Gaming has grown a lot from the 90s. As for Horizon. I'm loving a lot of the improvements, particularly to character animation in dialogue sequences. That said, the game has some really, really weird difficulty spikes. The first robo-mammoth I encountered in the campaign frustrated me more than any boss I've dealt with in the Soulsborne series. Unlike Soulsborne games, it didn't feel tough but fair, just straight up cheap with myself finally cheesing the thing to death over thirty minutes. That wasn't fun.

Peabody

Chris gets onto how the original Spider-Man films are so good, and…man…they are so bad.

Robert Graham

I’m 100% leaving horizon in resolution mode. That graininess is super weird I agree with Dustin. I find it’s an oddly great feeling 30 after I play for an hour or so without switching.

Anonymous

First thing I noticed was Aloys hair. It’s like she’s on a film set with a fan constantly blowing on her

NeO JD

“All roads run through Colin.” Need to get that in your entry way. 😂

Raymond Stuart

I absolutely agree with Dustin on the Performance mode feeling a little “off” and I am now sadly spoiled, I can’t deal with 30fps. Really fun, though. The side quests are quality. The dialogue sections are solid with great facial animations. Colin, I feel like some of your negativity around acquisitions is rubbing off on your overall thoughts on Xbox. Sony fanboys will love you for it, of course. Xbox was killed in the last generation but all their recent steps have been about addressing their weaknesses as fast as they can. Forza and Halo were really solid entries last year. Deathloop, one of last years best games, was created by a studio now part of the Xbox family. They have a stable of studios that will produce some really good games this generation. And when both Xbox and Sony both produce great games, gamers win!

Anonymous

What's the name of that old catalog Twitter account. Kinda interested in checking it out.

Clint

I'm glad we got a Cash Cab reference

Andrew Gambill

I know there was criticisms of you guys not talking about games you’re playing enough. I agreed but it was a minor issue I had. I really think today’s discussion of horizon really nailed the balance. Sometimes I’ve thought spoilercasts didn’t go deep enough. I loved hearing all of this discussion now while I’m still early in the game myself and can’t wait to get a deep spoiler cast when the game is finished. I know not every game is probably going to require this level of discussion and attention but this was awesome. Sacred Symbols continues to be the cream of the crop.

LastStandMedia
>>78716520

I would argue JRPGs were largely always outside of the mainstream, so all genres would grow relativistically.

LastStandMedia
>>78778444

I will reserve judgment until something comes out of Xbox that they didn't purchase while in-development.

Rich Price

Hey guys, I’m late with this but FIFA have moved to World Cup to December 2022. Also, speaking of unsavoury countries hosting sporting events, they gave the last World Cup to …….. Russia.

Jonathan Perez

Who is the fellow that Chris talks about at the end? The one responsible for keeping sonic in pop culture.

BlueBlue

Ide have to disagree with Colin’s take on 97 to a game that doesn’t run well. Breath of the wild got 100s and that game runs like poop on TV switch. But if anything I do agree with how these types of games show the industry how dumb numbered reviews and hitting embargo’s can be.

Klutch

I can't speak to PC, but the performance for Elden Ring is great on PS5 and highly exaggerated that it "doesn't run well". I am not on Twitter to read the discourse or digital foundry but the experience I am having is incredibly different than what I expected based on the conversation about bugginess and performance in this pod fwiw. I think it earned its 10/10 scores, personally. I am blown away by the open world and I can see this ruining other open worlds for me forever like botw did for other people.

Anonymous
>>78844326

I have to agree with you here, but I do understand where he’s coming from. I think a point of clarification here may be necessary as well - I wouldn’t fault the reviewer necessarily for not finishing a game of this scale due to time constraints, but more so the review outlet itself (unless of course the reviewer is independent). All this to say, I would rate both Elden Ring and Forbidden West VERY highly based on my experience (about 20 hours in each game), though there is definitely some jank going on in both cases. In my mind, the fact that I’m willing to overlook the jank and still can’t get enough of these titles speaks highly to the core gameplay loops and overall packages they offer.

Owen

I do find it interesting that Jaffes question for example doesn’t bother people but in that SS+ episode that article title about Sifu was considered inflammatory. But this is the internet and you never know who’s gonna get bothered by what which is why social media sucks.

Kid-Organic

Dustin’s synopsis on Aloy’s character progression with the new entry is spot on. Spot on, mate!

Giovanni D'Amico

Great episode and agree with other comments - wonderful to have an hour+ of thoughts on a huge first-party release in the main show. I know you'll do a spoiler cast, and I can't wait for that, but glad you shared as much as you did here. It's great to hear your impressions 10-20 hours in while I'm knee-deep in that amount of playtime as well - so that we're all playing through together. Thank you for being so receptive to feedback. :D

Cornelius

If you got Greg to come for a show on the vita I'd flip out

Jack

I'm about 25 hours into Elden Ring on PS5 and I haven't encountered any issues at all. It's a stellar open world and shaping up to be FromSoftware's finest work.

Iqan Adil

2 things worth raising I think, not sure if someone else in the comments brought them up or not. First, re Spartacus, if ps classic games are running directly (not through streaming) on PS4 and PS5, isn't it a bad look that this is not being offered for free like it is on xbox? Second, re Call of Duty, the report on the delay in release implies that warzone 2 will be released that year. On multiple occasions it was reported that warzone is cannibalizing the playbase of annual cod releases, so it could also be the case that releasing warzone and another call of duty in the same year will negatively affect the paid Cod release. I think this is another big factor in the decision to skip a year for cod. Love the show, sending my regards all the way from Baghdad, Iraq.

Peter Pham

...97... 🤣 Anytime you guys talk about shitty reviews, Colin should just say 97 lol

Giovanni D'Amico

Glad you guys could be diplomatic about the vote split and was happy to hear the result. Colin, we all know that you are THE authority on all things PlayStation, and maybe you feel like you wanted that extra % because the final list will be representative of your brand and your company - which is true - but not allowing each host to have an equal say would really be treating Chris and Dustin like guests/second-class citizens. Better to split the vote into four quarters (or, hell, leave the audience out of it, but I get why you want to include them). Thanks for another great episode and all of the Horizon talk.

Paul Andrew

So, I did play Horizon Forbidden West on base ps4. The visual glitches people are referring to are probably what I'm seeing, which is a lot of pop in. I think the game struggles without an SSD. That said, the glitches I had, which were somewhat common, barely effected my enjoyment

Carlos Moreno

Lol wild, in the same breath putting the quality of Elden Ring next to Battlefield.

Wayne Moss

Just a heads up if you go to see Uncharted this weekend there is a after movie clip & a after credit clip ( 1 before the credits roll & 1 after the credits roll)

Kevin Cooper

Shout out to everyone who wears their AMY trophies like a badge of honor. (LOL)

Ladder Ape

I got stuck in the first 10 mins of Horizon when a prompt would not work but since then nothing game breaking for the next 3 hours.

Greg Hommel

I’ll tell you what, I can’t help but think ahead about what Killzone will be like with the lessons learned from Horizon. To Dustin and Chris, just play at 30FPS and quit pretending it makes you sick.