Watch Out For Fireballs!

Kole and Gary finally tackle the FPS that set the standard, not only for the genre, but for cinematic and narrative games to this day. To hear the whole thing, join us at patreon.com/duckfeedtv

Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones is the first entry in this long-running series that we've covered. It's a tactical RPG set in a medieval world, and this particular game has a lot of oddball features that would eventually become mainstays in the series. However, does it all stand up?

Special thanks to Geri Khan for producing this one! Kole and Gary take a rare trip to the Genesis to discuss one of the best games the run'n'gun genre has to offer. Loads of charm and creativity make this one of the best games on the system. Listen in!

It's time for this month's Dispatch episode, where we answer your questions and prompts, talk about our special topic (Glitches in games), and hear your responses to Way of the Samurai, Final Fantasy V, and Wolfenstein: The New Order.

Hey! It's our preview episode on 2014's Wolfenstein Reboot/Sequel/Whatever, The New Order. This is just the preview episode. To hear the entire thing, join us at patreon.com/duckfeedtv

Bartz, Lenna, and Faris have decided to tag along with Galuf to defeat Exdeath once and for all, a decision that takes them to a whole new world. There, they meet Exdeath's coterie of dipshits in his meat castle. We pick up with World 2 to talk about the remainder of Final Fantasy V, which swings from high systemic highs to low grindy lows.

Kole and Gary tackle the Final Fantasy with some of the most complex mechanics and most anonymous characters and places in the series. This episode covers generalities and world one.

Peter Bemis joins us to talk about Way of the Samurai, a strange and forward-looking game from the early days of the PS2 era. As a wayward ronin in the Meiji Era, you stumble across a town that's in the middle of a power struggle. Two families are working against each other, unmindful of the bigger threat headed their way. This action/fighting game features multiple paths and endings, and it's meant to be played over and over again. Hear us work out the story and the structure, and talk about how it all comes together.

This is an extra spicy episode of the WOFF Dispatch, as we cover tons of our questions and prompts before settling in to talk about gaming addiction and the tricks developers and publishers use to foster it. Then we read your responses to A Hat in Time, Psychonauts, and Mirror's Edge.

Gary and Kole discuss the generalities of Mirror's Edge in this premium episode preview. Join us on Patreon for the whole shebang!

No game makes you WANT to like it as much as Psychonauts. Raz is a great character, the counselors at his psychic summer camp are top notch, and the aesthetic is excellent. The problems begin with the play, since the game only shows a passing interest in being an enjoyable 3D platformer. So Doublefine's premiere effort is endlessly charming, but also a pretty big disappointment. Listen in to hear us be even more conflicted.

We begin our 3D Platformer Month with a modern loveletter to 90s platformers like Banjo Kazooie and Super Mario 64. Hat Kid runs afoul of the Mafia, and she must collect her hourglasses (which are spaceship fuel) from a planet full of colorful jerks. The game runs high on charm, but it also runs right into our fundamental problems with this genre. So we try to put on our "3D Platformer Appreciator" hats and see what's good here and what falls short.

This is a big dispatch episode, where we spend a good deal of time on your questions before talking about why games shouldn't try to be movies. We then turn our attention to your responses to June's games.

We round out puzzle month with the ultimate "puzzle" game, so elemental that you can't imagine it not existing. Alexy Pajitnov and a crew of colleagues in the USSR birthed the game, and it followed a long and complicated trail to becoming a worldwide phenomenon. This episode relates that story, talks about how Tetris has changed over the years, and looks at some recent excellent Tetris games.

The early 90s were a very strange time for PC games, almost solely because of the introduction of the CD-ROM drive. This new techology revealed two paths for the industry, both of which would be pretty short-lived: The Myst path of baroque, isolated puzzle voids, and the 7th Guest path of FMV movies with puzzles slightly attached. The stories of Henry Stauf's infernal mansion are almost too out there to be believed, and we definitely don't recommend that you play these games to completion, but we invite you to hear all about both the 7th Guest and its sequel, the 11th Hour, here on the show.

Get ready for a day of Duckfeed. On August 31, 2019, we will gather at the Clinton Street Theater in Portland Oregon for live performances of many Duckfeed shows, and a few local podcast friends. Listen to the announcement for more. More details are forthcoming, including ticket details.

We begin Puzzle Month with one of the best indie releases of 2018. While it's nominally a turn based strategy game, Into the Breach provides near-perfect information, making it more of a series of chess puzzles than a traditional X-Com-alike. And the story of the game's development confirms that this was the designer's intention.

We read your responses to May's games, and we talk about how AAA games get romance wrong.

Hitman 2016 is a tremendous game. It's shockingly generous in scope, rewarding curiosity and ingenuity. Agent 47 heads to exotic locales to kill exotically, and we're here for it. This episode is a preview of the full premium episode. To hear the entire thing, join us on Patreon! (https://www.patreon.com/posts/watch-out-for-26886888)

Batman: Arkham City is an object lesson in how sequels can go very right. It's additive in every way that matterns leaving the core play of Arkham Asylum intact while adding an open world and lots and lots of villains. The Jokester is back and sicker than ever, and Hugo Strange has made deft use of eminent domain to create a prison city. What could go wrong? Huge thanks to Doug Lief, who guests on this episode, for his support, and for picking this great game!