590: We catch up with some old friends

Larry Hryb: Hi, it's Larry Hryb, Xbox Live's Major Nelson. Thank you for downloading the show. It's great to be back, we're all in the studio. Here we are, saying hello to ... hello, E.
Eric Neustadter: Hello.
Larry Hryb: Nice to see you again, as always.
Eric Neustadter: Nice to see you.
Larry Hryb: Sitting, of course, next to you, is Laura. Hello, Laura.
Laura Massey: Hello.
Larry Hryb: And then bringing up the rear, as always-
Stephen Toulous: As always. If I'm not running ahead I'm bringing up the rear.
Larry Hryb: Exactly. Nice to see you guys. It's been quite a week of gaming, hasn't it?
Stephen Toulous: It has.
Larry Hryb: I don't know what ... we usually jump right in with what we're playing, so I figure we'll go in, and gentleman, it would be all right if Laura goes first?
Stephen Toulous: Absolutely.
Eric Neustadter: I know where she's gonna start from. Something I want to talk about.
Laura Massey: Yes!
Larry Hryb: What are you playing now?
Laura Massey: I am obsessed with Mini Metro.
Larry Hryb: Still?
Laura Massey: Yes!
Larry Hryb: This was like ... we talked about this a couple weeks ago.
Laura Massey: We did, and I still can't put it down.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Eric Neustadter: You're welcome.
Laura Massey: Thanks, E.
Larry Hryb: Just to make sure, 'cause I don't know we talked about this. It went from E mentioning it on Twitter, and I was like, "Oh, that's interesting," over Christmas. I picked it up and couldn't put it down, and then the next show when we came in, I said, "Laura, you gotta play this." And she's like, "What is this?" And she downloaded it during the show-
Laura Massey: During the show and started playing it.
Larry Hryb: Have you played it?
Stephen Toulous: I have not. I've seen you guys obsessed with it but I have not played.
Larry Hryb: You should give it a try.
Eric Neustadter: Oh, it's amazing.
Laura Massey: It is so smooth, and just super addicting.
Larry Hryb: Yeah, it's all of those things.
Laura Massey: Oh my goodness. I just realized I told you this earlier. I just realized there are multiple levels on it.
Eric Neustadter: New York?
Laura Massey: I've been playing New York for weeks.
Eric Neustadter: Oh, really?
Larry Hryb: Was it New York that's the opener or is it ... it's London.
Laura Massey: Well, yes. London.
Larry Hryb: London is the first level.
Laura Massey: The London Metro for weeks.
Eric Neustadter: And they have very different problems to solve-
Laura Massey: They do.
Eric Neustadter: And you have to worry about bridges-
Laura Massey: And tunnels and all kinds of things. I didn't realize there's more to the game so I am super excited right now.
Larry Hryb: Wait a minute there's more?
Eric Neustadter: There's a lot!
Stephen Toulous: Yay!
Larry Hryb: Yeah! Good for you.
Laura Massey: It's super fun.
Larry Hryb: Are you playing any more, as always, Diablo?
Laura Massey: I have been playing that. I think we talked a little bit about it in the last show, where there was Diablo One recreated in Diablo Three.
Eric Neustadter: How is that? I haven't tried it.
Laura Massey: It's good.
Larry Hryb: Okay.
Eric Neustadter: It looked good.
Laura Massey: It brings back the memories.
Stephen Toulous: Yeah, right?
Larry Hryb: Does it?
Laura Massey: Yeah, because they recreated the entire thing.
Larry Hryb: Oh.
Laura Massey: They have a filter over the screen to make it look like it's old graphics, they rebuilt-
Stephen Toulous: I still remember the-
Larry Hryb: I have ...
Stephen Toulous: My first encounter with the Butcher. Right?
Laura Massey: Yes!
Stephen Toulous: That's the first time, when you're like "Oh my goodness!"
Larry Hryb: What did I get myself into.
Stephen Toulous: It's terrifying!
Laura Massey: Because it's really fun to see the progression of Diablo. From Diablo one, to two and three it's-
Larry Hryb: Now you've played them all?
Laura Massey: Yes. Because in Diablo one, your just in a dungeon and all of a sudden this huge red scary monster comes running after you, and kills you almost in the first hit.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Laura Massey: And, of course, it's very different in two and three as they learned.
Larry Hryb: Yeah.
Stephen Toulous: It was a different time I think. That was like the same X-Com time period where they held no qualms with just killing you.
Larry Hryb: Well that's when, we've talked about this frequently on the show, that's back in the day when games were hard.
Stephen Toulous: Yeah.
Larry Hryb: Remember when there was no, there was no ... You couldn't go to the internet. Laura this is, dating ourselves a little bit, and you're excused, but you couldn't go to the internet. You had to either go down to the game computer store and hang out, right? And ask the guys, or the girls, or look at a magazine, so you just didn't have this instant access to everything. There was just no-
Eric Neustadter: It was just ... Sorry I was just having this conversation with a friend yesterday. We were talking about old Infocom games, and how you used to get stuck for two or three weeks on a puzzle.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Eric Neustadter: And you would take the puzzle to school, and talk about it with your friends, and-
Larry Hryb: Get the graph paper out.
Eric Neustadter: And try to find a solution. And there was nobody you could ask. You couldn't go-
Larry Hryb: Well you could just ask your immediate ... You could only work locally.
Eric Neustadter: Right.
Stephen Toulous: There was a great tweet the other day. I think it was David Willis who tweeted it, and he said, you know, "Back before the internet you used to have to run down to the library, and break the glass, and sneak in, in order to find out who Alf's brother was."
Larry Hryb: Right. Right.
Stephen Toulous: And now we can just click it.
Larry Hryb: In seconds. In seconds.
Stephen Toulous: In seconds.
Laura Massey: Yeah.
Larry Hryb: The Internet's at your fingertips.
Laura Massey: That's pretty funny.
Larry Hryb: So you're playing Diablo.
Laura Massey: Yeah. I was going to say that I do remember playing Diablo II on the dial up modem. I think that's probably the first multiplayer game-
Stephen Toulous: Mom! Don't pick up the phone!
Laura Massey: Yes.
Larry Hryb: Okay!
Eric Neustadter: You didn't have a dedicated line for that?
Larry Hryb: No!
Laura Massey: We did. Eventually.
Larry Hryb: You did!?!
Laura Massey: After yelling at all the family for disconnecting everything.
Larry Hryb: No. No. No.
Laura Massey: It was the upstairs line.
Larry Hryb: No.
Eric Neustadter: I had three lines.
Laura Massey: What?
Larry Hryb: These are-
Eric Neustadter: There was my parents line, there was my line for my modem, then there was the third line for the BBS I was running.
Larry Hryb: So that's what I've got to ask you a question, because, um ... And Laura I don't know if you had this, but I know that at least E and Stepto, you guys, we kind of shared the same upbringing we we're on bulletin boards.
Stephen Toulous: Yeah.
Larry Hryb: Did you have a name?
Stephen Toulous: I don't want to say my name because it got ... It got co-opted by a certain movie franchise.
Larry Hryb: I see, so you can't really use that?
Stephen Toulous: I was Morpheus for the longest time.
Larry Hryb: Oh? Before the fran-
Stephen Toulous: Like, in the mid '80s.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Stephen Toulous: From Neil Gaiman's the Sandman.
Larry Hryb: Because I can always, I can always ... How about you E? Did you have one?
Eric Neustadter: (Deep sigh)
Larry Hryb: Okay, you don't have to say it. Because I-
Stephen Toulous: Was it Buttercup? Because the look on his face is like "I really don't want to say this."
Eric Neustadter: I'm trying to remember.
Larry Hryb: Because I know that whenever I meet somebody that's of our age, and we talk about that, that's always my first question. There's always that smile, the stop and the smile. Because they haven't been asked to repeat that phrase in probably 20 or 30 years.
Laura Massey: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Stephen Toulous: And maybe they wish they'd chosen better.
Larry Hryb: Right. Right.
Eric Neustadter: I remember them being different. Because my Fidonet name was not the same as the name on my BBS.
Stephen Toulous: That's true. My Fidonet name was different too.
Eric Neustadter: Right. And my first ... I have no recollection of what my first internet email address was.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Eric Neustadter: It was a UOregon.edu address.
Laura Massey: Oh, I do.
Stephen Toulous: I do.
Eric Neustadter: But it was ... It had six, seven, eight bangs in it. And I have no idea what was at the end.
Larry Hryb: Bang bang bang.
Stephen Toulous: Mine was a series of numbers, because everything was done through a VAC system at the local community college, and it was a series of numbers that are just meaningless now.
Larry Hryb: Do you still have it?
Stephen Toulous: What a great question. I don't know. Back then-
Laura Massey: You haven't checked it!
Stephen Toulous: Back then we didn't have the same password rules we have today, so I bet I can guarantee [crosstalk 00:06:08]
Larry Hryb: Anyway. I just like to, and I haven't asked you that question, so I remember ... Remember we had him on the show before Jeff? From NASA?
Laura Massey: Right.
Stephen Toulous: Yeah Jeff Norris.
Larry Hryb: Right Jeff Norris. I remember I was someplace with Jeff, and we were sitting next to each other, and we were talking, and I said "So what was yours?" And he broke out in the biggest smile, and he told me. I'm not going to repeat because that's-
Stephen Toulous: He still uses it or he doesn't want to-
Larry Hryb: He's probably still using that. But it was just ... It's always something you can always ... It's kind of like a secret handshake now-a-days right?
Stephen Toulous: Yeah it is.
Larry Hryb: Anyway, I'm sorry Laura. We got completely distracted.
Laura Massey: Oh it's totally fine.
Larry Hryb: As we often do.
Laura Massey: So I'm playing Diablo.
Larry Hryb: You're playing Diablo.
Laura Massey: Yep. I also, weirdly, jumped back into World of Warcraft.
Stephen Toulous: What?
Eric Neustadter: What?
Laura Massey: Yes.
Stephen Toulous: What?
Laura Massey: Just to play it, and give it a try over the weekend. It was like hey, we haven't done this in a while. Let's try that.
Stephen Toulous: You haven't done crack in a while.
Eric Neustadter: Yeah. Was there a head wound involved, or?
Laura Massey: No, no head wounds.
Stephen Toulous: I seem to remember this pretty good. But I wonder why I gave it up?
Larry Hryb: Wow. What made you do that? I must ask.
Laura Massey: I don't know. Just wanted to give it a try again.
Larry Hryb: Okay.
Laura Massey: See what was new. See what was different. They, of course, continually update that game as well as Diablo.
Stephen Toulous: That's true.
Larry Hryb: Yes, they do.
Laura Massey: And it has been twelve years.
Eric Neustadter: It's not the same game it used to be.
Stephen Toulous: No game can, I think right? In that environment. Like, if you really put a platform down, and you may not think to yourself "Oh it may not be around in 12 years," but once it is you're like "well what do we do now?
Larry Hryb: Right.
Stephen Toulous: We have to change it.
Eric Neustadter: It's amazing how much Blizzard has evolved WoW.
Laura Massey: Oh yes. 12 years of all kinds of improvements. And it was pretty fun. I'm only level 10. Probably won't keep up with it. But-
Larry Hryb: Okay.
Laura Massey: It's better now than when I tried it a couple years ago.
Larry Hryb: Yes.
Laura Massey: That was the last time I tried it.
Larry Hryb: What ... Was there something that drove you back to it, if I may?
Laura Massey: No. It was just a [crosstalk 00:07:46]-
Larry Hryb: Just a lot of time that you had available?
Laura Massey: Ha ha.
Stephen Toulous: You knew you were going to get mocked for this one, right?
Laura Massey: I did.
Larry Hryb: No no no, that's the ... I was like okay, that' interesting.
Laura Massey: I was debating whether or not I should bring it up.
Larry Hryb: No, it's okay. It's okay.
Laura Massey: Okay.
Larry Hryb: Anything else?
Laura Massey: Maybe we should move on from me now.
Larry Hryb: Yeah. We'll go ... Stepto what about you? What are you playing?
Stephen Toulous: I'm playing three games. One just briefly is, I went back to Skyrim on the Xbox-S, and turn on the mods.
Larry Hryb: Oh so which one are you playing? So when you turn mods on-
Stephen Toulous: I have nine.
Larry Hryb: Okay.
Stephen Toulous: So I have a weather one. I have a texture one. I have a bug fix one.
Larry Hryb: Can you send me the list, and I'll include it in the show notes?
Stephen Toulous: Yeah, absolutely. Basically they're the top ... They're essentially the top nine most stable and work best together. And what I love about the mod menu, is you can immediately see what's the most popular and read the star ratings and stuff.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Laura Massey: Right.
Stephen Toulous: So it's like the first nine. There's realistic villagers, where they move in patterns that are a little bit more randomized, and their conversations as they're walking around are a little bit more realistic.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Stephen Toulous: A lot less arrow to the knee. And it's gorgeous in 4k.
Larry Hryb: Sure it is.
Stephen Toulous: I mean it's not native 4k. It's just up scaled. But it's ... Oh my god it's absolutely stunning.
Larry Hryb: Do you have an HDR television?
Stephen Toulous: I don't. THat's my next big thing is to get an HDR television. I have a 4k TV and it's a big 65 inch too, and it's great. So Skyrim's great, the mods are great. They're super easy to install.
Larry Hryb: Yeah.
Stephen Toulous: Two things. They turn off achievements. Know that going in.
Larry Hryb: Yeah, of course.
Stephen Toulous: I'm fine with that because I put 120 hours into Skyrim almost.
Larry Hryb: But to be clear, you can just pull up another save that doesn't have them enabled, and you're back in-
Stephen Toulous: Yes. It won't pollute all you're saves. Yeah. The second thing is watch your load order of your mods. Thankfully most mods have a text file that says "Don't load this before you load this or it will undo"-
Larry Hryb: Stepto's tips: there's a load order.
Stephen Toulous: So those two are-[crosstalk 00:09:35]
Larry Hryb: Much like life.
Eric Neustadter: Do I have to go into config sys, and auto exec, and -
Stephen Toulous: No, not that bad. It's not bad. But it did feel a little like that though. It did feel a little like that.
Eric Neustadter: I don't think I want to do that.
Stephen Toulous: The second thing I've been playing, speaking of Blizzard, I finally, you're going to laugh because it's been so popular, but I finally got into Overwatch.
Laura Massey: All right.
Larry Hryb: Now, I saw you playing the other day. I was going to invite you, but to be honest with you, you were only a level five.
Eric Neustadter: Oh.
Stephen Toulous: Let me tell you this story. Let me tell you, because it's funny. I started playing, and I was playing against ai. And I got to where I like a couple of heroes and I felt confident.
Larry Hryb: Which ones?
Stephen Toulous: Bastion mostly.
Larry Hryb: He's a little OP.
Stephen Toulous: But I sometimes.
Larry Hryb: He's a good starter, he's a good starter.
Stephen Toulous: OP is what's needed for me.
Larry Hryb: Okay, fair point. And what else?
Stephen Toulous: So I started rolling with him, and then I dabbled in Mercy, and a couple of the other ones.
Laura Massey: Mercy's really fun.
Larry Hryb: Yeah.
Eric Neustadter: D.VA
Stephen Toulous: What I ended up doing was rolling with Bastion, because it fit sort of my ... Plant and tank out sort of thing.
Larry Hryb: Sure.
Stephen Toulous: On certain maps. Of course on other maps you can't make it work unless you have the support people with you. So then me and a couple friends got together and started playing the AI. And we were good. Let me tell you something. We were good. We were so good.
Larry Hryb: Oh. Really?
Eric Neustadter: You rolled that AI.
Stephen Toulous: That we decided we were going to play humans. And let me tell you, let me tell you, I'm pretty proud of us. I'm pretty proud. We got wrecked.
Larry Hryb: Yes, you did.
Laura Massey: Oh no!
Stephen Toulous: We got wrecked!
Larry Hryb: How many people were there?
Stephen Toulous: Well, so we had full teams on both sides, but in our squad was three. It was me, Josh, and Usenia, and we ended up ... We weren't doing terribly. It was just you could see we were just so patterned.
Larry Hryb: Yeah. Yeah.
Stephen Toulous: And they would adjust to everything. It was beautiful. The reason I'm proud of is we actually had a great time.
Larry Hryb: Well that the most important thing!
Stephen Toulous: Really watching these people beat us, and seeing clearly how they were doing it. We just couldn't adapt fast enough. They were obviously all communicating. Because they were instant pivots. So I'm having a huge amount of fun with that. I will get better at it. I still like Bastion. I still basically like to plant a turret and just hose everything down.
Larry Hryb: Yeah.
Stephen Toulous: That's why it's fun.
Larry Hryb: While he's making all his R2-D2 like sounds.
Stephen Toulous: Exactly, and all the emotes. Which I didn't think I would get into those either, but I-
Larry Hryb: Oh yeah!
Laura Massey: Oh wow.
Larry Hryb: We'll talk about that in the what I'm playing section for me.
Eric Neustadter: Have you run up against a really good Genji yet?
Stephen Toulous: Oh yes. Absolutely.
Eric Neustadter: And you're sitting there planted, and he's in you back.
Larry Hryb: And then he's in your front. And then he's in your back. And then he's in your front.
Stephen Toulous: And then the last game is-
Larry Hryb: Yes.
Stephen Toulous: Civ Six.
Larry Hryb: Oh boy.
Stephen Toulous: Which is more beautiful than it has any reason to be. Every Civ game has been a little cartoonish, with touches of realism that were just perfect. This time they went all out. I was sitting there at one point on the map and I caught myself just ... I was staring at the water. I was watching the sunrise over the water on one of the maps. I must have wasted 60 seconds watching the sun reflect off the water.
Larry Hryb: That's okay.
Stephen Toulous: And I'm just going "This is a beautiful game. Oh I need to get these soldiers moved."
Larry Hryb: Right.
Stephen Toulous: So I've been playing that a lot as well. I'm not yet in the "just one more turn" phase because I've been too busy with other stuff.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Stephen Toulous: But I'm going to get there. Very quickly. That and I'm dabbling in X-Com 2. But not very much. So I won't talk about that one just yet. But it's beautiful as well.
Larry Hryb: All right.
Stephen Toulous: That's it.
Larry Hryb: E. What are you playing? You just got back from a trip?
Eric Neustadter: Yes.
Larry Hryb: Do you want to talk about that now or do you want to talk about it later?
Eric Neustadter: Talk about it later. So, I can echo Mini Metro. Both on iOS, I've got on my iPhone and my iPad, as well as on PC.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Eric Neustadter: We were talking about this just before we started recording, it's actually in my opinion better on PC.
Laura Massey: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Eric Neustadter: And if you haven't tried it there, and you really like Mini Metro, you should. As you get up into levels and you've got more and more lines running around, you wind up having to get into really dense areas and drag thing around.
Laura Massey: Yes.
Eric Neustadter: And it's kind of hard to grab-
Larry Hryb: More precise.
Eric Neustadter: Yes.
Larry Hryb: Precise dragging, for lack of a better term.
Eric Neustadter: Excuse me, I'm coughing because I'm just getting over a cold.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Eric Neustadter: On PC, with a mouse, you can get in there very precisely and grab this train, or this line, and move it exactly where you want. The extra level of precision is really nice.
Larry Hryb: Either way it's a fun game.
Eric Neustadter: Yeah, it's really [crosstalk 00:13:49]-
Larry Hryb: I mean, because I started playing it on my iPad, played it on computer, and then Laura's just been playing on her phone.
Laura Massey: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Larry Hryb: So she hasn't really had that bit-
Laura Massey: Yup.
Larry Hryb: Either way it's addicting.
Eric Neustadter: Have you notice from phone to iPad it's easier on the iPad because the screen's bigger.
Larry Hryb: Yeah of course.
Laura Massey: I can imagine.
Stephen Toulous: I don't need another game.
Larry Hryb: Yeah.
Stephen Toulous: I have like four I haven't even played!
Eric Neustadter: It was on sale for 99 cents.
Larry Hryb: That's what I paid for it. That's when I picked it up.
Eric Neustadter: The great thing is, it's simple. It's an easy one for if I have a couple of minutes as I'm waiting for my plane.
Larry Hryb: The music is kind of like, it's procedural and it's relaxing.
Stephen Toulous: Ah so it's like the Minecraft music.
Larry Hryb: It's, yeah.
Stephen Toulous: I love the Minecraft music.
Eric Neustadter: That or like, some disaster-piece stuff. Yeah it's really nice.
Larry Hryb: Fun.
Stephen Toulous: Great. Now I've got to get it.
Larry Hryb: So you're playing that.
Stephen Toulous: Ride the ferry.
Eric Neustadter: Yes. Oh yeah, it's a perfect ferry game. I'm playing Civ Six, because Civ.
Larry Hryb: Because Civ.
Eric Neustadter: I had switched to where I was just playing five, I'm not just playing six.
Larry Hryb: Yes.
Eric Neustadter: It is ... I mean, they've changed a lot of things. A couple of which I'm still getting used to. The biggest one being builders working differently now. Instead of, you get a worker and they're just forever there doing things to your territory, you build a builder, and then they get three actions. And there are things you can do to let them have more actions, but I think of it so differently now, because you can't just keep cranking them out. Because they're going to do their thing and go poof.
Stephen Toulous: Yeah. That's what stuck me as the odd part of the game. I think they introduced that in Civ Rev, or Civ Four, where you just auto ... Maybe Civ Three? Where you just click and say "Go do whatever needs to be done to this piece of land that is optimized for what I'm doing around that."
Eric Neustadter: Right.
Stephen Toulous: You could just let 20 of them go, and the next thing you know turn 100 you've got irrigation. You've got roads. You've got railroads. You've got everything you need. And this really struck me as ... I think it's a good change. It forced me to pay a lot more attention to my management of my civilization.
Eric Neustadter: Yes. And like, workers don't build roads anymore. Traders build roads.
Larry Hryb: Yeah, see you guys have always been into Civ and I've just, I appreciate it, it just never rang my bell some reason. I don't know why. Right? Laura? What about you?
Laura Massey: Yeah, I think I've only played Civ Rev.
Stephen Toulous: Civ Rev is the perfect distillation of all the things people like about Civ, and then the main games, I think added all the minutiae that you could really dive into. Civ Rev was actually, and Civ Rev Two, brilliant versions of Civilization. They were essentially Civilization Two, and they were really, really well done. But yeah it's a unique taste in a lot of ways. A lot like X-Com can be sometimes.
Larry Hryb: Yeah.
Eric Neustadter: X-Com, to me, requires a lot more thought.
Stephen Toulous: Yeah.
Eric Neustadter: Like, when I was laying on the couch yesterday, took the day off work just home sick with the dog, and I was like "What am I going to do to pass the time? I can't sleep", got my laptop on the couch and started looking for things to play, and tried a bunch of things, eventually went to Civ because after 20 years of Civ I can play Civ without thinking.
Stephen Toulous: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Eric Neustadter: I can't play X-Com Two without thinking.
Stephen Toulous: Yeah. They changed some things about it too. Which I like, but it's still that very, like every moment ... One moment you're at macro-level, and then you zoom into the actual mission.
Eric Neustadter: And die.
Stephen Toulous: And every choice you make, every single choice you make, could go horribly wrong or horribly right. And when it goes medium, that's the tense part. When it goes somewhere in between that you're like "Oh man I really needed that to go right, I'm glad it didn't go wrong, but now I'm super tense".
Larry Hryb: So, all right. You're playing Civ. What else you got?
Eric Neustadter: And pretty much everything else I'm playing is VR.
Larry Hryb: Oh that's right you've been doing a lot of VR lately.
Eric Neustadter: Yeah. So I-
Stephen Toulous: Do you have the Sony? Have you played the Battlefront Rogue One thing?
Eric Neustadter: I do have the PS VR, I have not tried that.
Stephen Toulous: I want that so bad.
Laura Massey: When did that come out?
Eric Neustadter: The thing I want to do-
Stephen Toulous: It's out.
Laura Massey: Really?
Stephen Toulous: Yeah if you have a PS4 or a PS4 pro and VR kit, I think it's free, don't quote me on that.
Larry Hryb: We're not the experts on the PlayStation.
Stephen Toulous: There's a Rogue One mission that is 100% x-wing simulator.
Laura Massey: What?
Stephen Toulous: Go look at the YouTube video. It is everything you could want in an x-wing simulator.
Laura Massey: Oh gosh.
Stephen Toulous: It's a mission that takes place after Rogue One?
Larry Hryb: We'll talk about it a little more later.
Stephen Toulous: Somewhere in the plot.
Eric Neustadter: So I mostly, while I do have a PS VR, I mostly play on PC.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Eric Neustadter: Although I am looking forward to RE 7 in VR on the PS VR, but I bought, or I built, a new gaming PC, and I bought an HTC Vive. And wow. The thing that has really hit me, I had tried seated VR before, like cockpit style stuff, and I was always like "Oh that's pretty cool", you know, it's ... I don't completely get the excitement but this is fun. It's a neat gimmick. Playing FPSs at room scale, where you've got lots of room to move-
Larry Hryb: That's the key. You've got to have that room. You've got to have a lot of room.
Eric Neustadter: Yeah, so I've got-
Larry Hryb: You turned the ... Upstairs in your house right?
Eric Neustadter: Yeah. So my son's old bedroom is now my VR room. I've got about a two and half meter but two and a half meter play space. So lots of room to duck, and dodge, and do all that kind of stuff. And that, to me, really makes it feel like you're in a different environment.
Larry Hryb: Why don't we have any animated GIFs of you running around with your headset on? I've got to talk to your dog.
Eric Neustadter: There's probably some ... There were people over at Christmas who were filming, and they probably were taking video honestly. But there are some fantastic games.
Larry Hryb: Yeah. There's a lot of real new experiences.
Eric Neustadter: Yeah. My personal 2016 game of the year was Space Pirate Trainer, which is a $15 game. It requires $2,000 pc and an $800 headset, but the game is only $15.
Larry Hryb: Yeah the price to ... The barrier to entry, and the space, is a little bit steep. But once you get that in order.
Eric Neustadter: Yeah. It's too expensive, and most people don't have the space. It's not reasonable for the average person to do this, but if you're lucky enough to be able to?
Larry Hryb: Yeah.
Eric Neustadter: It's amazing. So Space Pirate Trainer is that game I ... When someone comes over this is what I say "Hey you have to try this to experience it."
Larry Hryb: Have you been over to play Space Pirate Trainer?
Laura Massey: No.
Larry Hryb: I haven't been.
Stephen Toulous: I have not either.
Larry Hryb: Who are these people you're inviting over?
Stephen Toulous: In fairness though, I'm across a large body of water.
Larry Hryb: Yeah. You're far away.
Eric Neustadter: You ... I invited you over to play, and you bailed for something.
Larry Hryb: When was this? I don't remember this.
Eric Neustadter: I don't remember.
Larry Hryb: All right.
Eric Neustadter: Anyways. So think back to Star Wars.
Larry Hryb: Which one?
Stephen Toulous: Think back? To Star Wars?
Eric Neustadter: There's only one Star Wars.
Laura Massey: I'm always thinking about Star Wars.
Eric Neustadter: So, the scene where Luke is going through light saber training, and there's the droid.
Larry Hryb: On the Millennium Falcon when they're playing chess in the background.
Eric Neustadter: Right. So it's a little like that. So what happens-
Larry Hryb: With the blast shield down? I just want to make sure I understand. I want to set the scene.
Stephen Toulous: That's the visor part, you can't see anything.
Eric Neustadter: Now that I've established the base of it. So you are a space pirate in training. So you put the VR headset on, you're handed the two vive controllers.
Larry Hryb: Yes.
Eric Neustadter: And those are your pistols.
Larry Hryb: Yes.
Eric Neustadter: And you're standing with your back to your ship.
Larry Hryb: Yes.
Eric Neustadter: So it's a a 180 degree game.
Larry Hryb: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Eric Neustadter: And you are looking over a platform that drops off, and you have big open space in front of you.
Larry Hryb: Where did the pirate part come in?
Stephen Toulous: Yeah?
Eric Neustadter: Uh, there's a spaceship behind you. You're a space pirate in training.
Larry Hryb: Do I look down, do I have pirate boots on?
Eric Neustadter: No.
Larry Hryb: Do ... Do I-
Eric Neustadter: You're obsessing over the wrong thing.
Larry Hryb: Do I look to my left, do I have a space parrot?
Eric Neustadter: Yes.
Larry Hryb: Okay.
Eric Neustadter: Now, let it go. I knew if I didn't say yes you'd keep asking so.
Larry Hryb: Space pirate.
Eric Neustadter: Um, so-
Larry Hryb: Argh.
Eric Neustadter: Wave one. One droid come floating up-
Larry Hryb: Okay.
Eric Neustadter: This round droid, it's slow, it's dumb. It takes a long time to figure out where it you are to shoot.
Larry Hryb: What do you shoot it with?
Eric Neustadter: You've got your two guns.
Larry Hryb: So they're guns, they're not light sabers, or laser swords?
Eric Neustadter: They're not light sabers or laser swords. However, you can reach them behind your back like you were drawing an arrow from the quiver-
Larry Hryb: Yes?
Eric Neustadter: And pull the trigger and it converts into a shield. So you can have shield and pistol. Plus there are also ... Well there's a default laser pistol shot. You have five other shots you can choose from.
Larry Hryb: Okay.
Eric Neustadter: So there's something kind of like a shotgun blast. There's grenades. There's a couple different options. But you shoot this one droid. Okay, wave over. You got 100 points or whatever.
Larry Hryb: Wave over.
Eric Neustadter: Wave two. This time it's three droids, and they're slightly smarter and faster than the last one. And this continues, and it's more and more, and they're getting smarter and smarter, and there's more kinds of droids. When they shoot at you, there's a very distinctive sound, and it goes into what is basically bullet time from the Matrix. And you can ... Everything slows down so you've got room to either get your shield up, or dodge.
Larry Hryb: Yes.
Eric Neustadter: And this is room-scale VR so you can really dodge. So you can take two steps to the right, or you can duck under it.
Larry Hryb: How long are you playing this?
Stephen Toulous: I can see myself just throwing myself across the room.
Larry Hryb: Is this one that you get wear-ed out pretty quickly, or? Tell me about that.
Eric Neustadter: I'll play for an hour at a time. Each individual game is usually five to ten minutes.
Larry Hryb: Okay.
Eric Neustadter: It's just so much fun. And it is the perfect distillation of what ... Like if you had asked ten year old me, in the '80s, you know, "Hey some day in the future,"-
Larry Hryb: The guy who was trying to figure out Zork?
Eric Neustadter: Yes. You know, "What would you want to be able to play?" This is exactly what I would have designed.
Larry Hryb: Okay.
Eric Neustadter: So it's great. I'm playing a ton of other VR games too, I've been ... As they come out and people are like "Oh this is good!" I'm just kind of buying them to try them. Arizona Sunshine is pretty new, and it's kind of a standard Walking Dead zombie adventure. You're walking around. Raw Data is really, really good.
Stephen Toulous: Raw Data is good.
Eric Neustadter: Yeah. Raw Data is a multiplayer, room scale shooter. So Justiciar and I have been playing online together, and it's really cool to be able to ... It's a kind of a wave based kind of horde mode style game, but you can see each other. And it's VR so you see their in game avatar. And you're defending yourself, and you look around and go "Hey! Behind you!" And it's really behind them-
Laura Massey: Oh cool.
Eric Neustadter: And they can turn around, and see it, and that kind of stuff is really, really neat. So I've been looking for all the co-op VR stuff I can find.
Larry Hryb: I'll play co-op.
Eric Neustadter: Well you have to get a PC-
Larry Hryb: I have one.
Eric Neustadter: And a Vive.
Larry Hryb: I have one.
Eric Neustadter: What?
Larry Hryb: I've had one. I've had one for about, I don't know, six or eight months.
Eric Neustadter: This is news.
Stephen Toulous: You guys should talk to each other more often.
Eric Neustadter: I guess.
Larry Hryb: Well let's talk about what I'm playing, and then we'll talk about that. I'm sorry, do you have anything else?
Eric Neustadter: No that's it.
Larry Hryb: So I know that, you know, I'm going to offer this up because you guys dropped the ball.
Laura Massey: What?
Larry Hryb: Well I'm just letting you know. We're talking about the-
Eric Neustadter: He didn't mean you, he said you guys.
Larry Hryb: Yeah, you guys. Because we were talking about, you know, your Fidonet handles, and the obvious question was what was mine. And the listeners are probably saying "Why didn't you ask him?".
Stephen Toulous: Not interested.
Larry Hryb: Oh, okay.
Stephen Toulous: Not super-
Eric Neustadter: Honestly, didn't care.
Stephen Toulous: Yeah.
Larry Hryb: Fine. So if you listen to this podcast, and you want to know, hit me up on twitter, and I will tell you.
Eric Neustadter: Laura might want to know.
Larry Hryb: No, I don't think she does.
Laura Massey: I'm curious now.
Stephen Toulous: Laura might want to know.
Laura Massey: I'm curious.
Larry Hryb: Would you like to know?
Laura Massey: I would like to know.
Larry Hryb: RiffRaff.
Laura Massey: Really?
Larry Hryb: Do you know what movie it was from?
Laura Massey: No.
Larry Hryb: Rocky Horror Picture Show.
Stephen Toulous: Yep.
Larry Hryb: You know?
Stephen Toulous: I immediately knew which RiffRaff it was.
Laura Massey: I've seen it but I don't know, I don't recall.
Larry Hryb: It's okay.
Eric Neustadter: Oh, you have seen it.
Laura Massey: I finally saw it.
Larry Hryb: Okay. Anyway, so that was a random thing. So, what am I playing? I am playing Overwatch. The update is out this week. It's the Lunar New Year with the Rooster, you've got a great skin with Bastion with a Rooster up here.
Stephen Toulous: Oh, cool.
Larry Hryb: It's amazing.
Eric Neustadter: Is it a space pirate?
Larry Hryb: There aren't-
Laura Massey: A space parrot?
Larry Hryb: A space parrot. Could be. That's the new game, space parrot. I'm playing Resident Evil 7, Biohazard, of course. That's a play anywhere game between Xbox One and PC.
Eric Neustadter: Oh, that's right!
Larry Hryb: So that's very cool.
Eric Neustadter: How is it?
Larry Hryb: It's great. I mean, I'm not a big Resident Evil guy, because it's just a little too slow for my style.
Eric Neustadter: Yeah.
Larry Hryb: But, the other reason is, is I'm actually involved with playing the Halo Wars 2 Blitz Beta.
Laura Massey: Oh yeah that's right, that came out!
Larry Hryb: So that came out. And then I finished up, over the weekend I finished up the Witcher 3 story.
Laura Massey: You finally finished it.
Larry Hryb: Finally. After however many-
Eric Neustadter: How many hours? Did you look?
Larry Hryb: I think I'm over four days.
Eric Neustadter: Oh.
Larry Hryb: And I just ... The problem was I started, when did I start playing? Like three weeks ago? Maybe a month ago?
Laura Massey: Yeah, maybe about a month a go.
Eric Neustadter: Started over from scratch?
Larry Hryb: No no no. I just picked it up again.
Eric Neustadter: Oh okay.
Larry Hryb: I had gotten to one of the areas, and I felt like I was kind of ... It turns out I was only in act two of three, and then I started playing it and I just ... I mean, that game is just so unbelievable with the side quests, and the -
Laura Massey: Yes. Larry gets distracted.
Larry Hryb: I get dis- ... Well the problem is, especially in those ... Have either of you played it?
Stephen Toulous: No.
Larry Hryb: Okay. Have you played it E?
Eric Neustadter: Just barely.
Larry Hryb: Okay. The side quests ... You're like "I'm going to do this side quest in like 15 minutes", two hours later.
Eric Neustadter: Right.
Larry Hryb: It just=
Stephen Toulous: Just like Skyrim.
Larry Hryb: Every side quest is a rabbit hole that does not end.
Eric Neustadter: Right.
Larry Hryb: So, anyways I'm playing that. And then of course like I said Overwatch, we've got to play some Overwatch Stepto. Once you get-
Stephen Toulous: Yeah.
Larry Hryb: Because I think I'm-
Stephen Toulous: I think I'm up to 11 now.
Larry Hryb: Okay. I think I'm about 82.
Stephen Toulous: Oh god. Well, okay.
Laura Massey: [crosstalk 00:27:25]
Eric Neustadter: It's probably been a month of two since I've played.
Larry Hryb: When did we play around Thanksgiving? Remember we played once?
Eric Neustadter: Thanksgiving, Christmas, something like that.
Larry Hryb: Yeah we played. We had a good time. We had the full crowd in, so we need to do that.
Stephen Toulous: I found that, against these people that we were playing against, certain people who knew they were too low to really be effective were really bullet sponges. We would just serve as bullet sponges.
Larry Hryb: Well the key is, that we play, and we haven't really talked about this, is if we're playing like me and Trite, Lith and I will play, he's DPS and I'm just healing him.
Stephen Toulous: Yeah.
Larry Hryb: And with Mercy it's just-
Stephen Toulous: That's pretty much what Mercy is.
Larry Hryb: It's the OP combo.
Stephen Toulous: Yeah.
Larry Hryb: It's ridiculous.
Eric Neustadter: D.VA's ultimate is so much fun. Sometimes when you get ... I have yet to get a penta, but I've gotten a number of quad kills with it.
Larry Hryb: Yeah, I think I've gotten four.
Eric Neustadter: Oh. It feels so ... Especially if you can like, launch it up and over a wall. So, they hear it, but they can't see it coming, so they don't know where to run to-
Larry Hryb: Boom.
Eric Neustadter: And all of a sudden it drops in and explodes.
Larry Hryb: Boom. Overwatch. So that's what I'm playing. All right. So, now we need to stop for a minute and tell you what's going on.
Eric Neustadter: What?
Laura Massey: What's going on?
Larry Hryb: So, if you haven't figured it out dear listeners, Stepto and E are back. For this one night only.
Laura Massey: The reunion show. Yeah.
Larry Hryb: Special show. Yeah. I'm sure you started listening to the show and said "Wait a minute, what is going on here?" So=
Stephen Toulous: Did I download the wrong one?
Eric Neustadter: Is this the wrong podcast?
Larry Hryb: Yeah is this 2008?
Stephen Toulous: Why are they talking about Overwatch?
Larry Hryb: What's going on? But, no it's ... I told Stepto, I said "Stepto I want to have you on the show again." And E, we had to have you on the show because last time, you know, we haven't had you on the show since you left the company.
Eric Neustadter: Right.
Larry Hryb: And know you're, where are you now? You're over at ...
Eric Neustadter: The Pokemon Company International.
Larry Hryb: The Pokemon ... So you're responsible for all those kids walking around with their phones stuffed in their faces?
Eric Neustadter: Only partially.
Larry Hryb: So what do you do over there?
Eric Neustadter: I'm the VP of technology.
Larry Hryb: So you're responsible for all the people walking around with their phones stuffed in their faces?
Stephen Toulous: Pretty much.
Eric Neustadter: That's a partnership between us and Niantic.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Eric Neustadter: The tech's Niantic. So.
Larry Hryb: So you're keeping their servers on. So when it doesn't work they can ... Oh wait a minute! When it doesn't work they can tweet you!
Eric Neustadter: It's their servers. Those are not my servers.
Larry Hryb: So, anyways. And that's in Seattle here? You didn't move.
Eric Neustadter: Bellview actually.
Larry Hryb: Bellview. Which is right next to where we're located.
Eric Neustadter: Yes. Very excited.
Larry Hryb: So I was trying to get ... I said I wanted to get you back on the show when you, you know, after you got that cool job, and then I said well let's get Stepto on. Step what are you working on? Let's talk about what you're working on.
Stephen Toulous: I'm a senior security consultant and Leviathan Security Group.
Larry Hryb: What does that mean.
Stephen Toulous: Also here in Seattle, what what we do is-
Larry Hryb: By the way, I've got to tell, I'm sorry to cut you off, but when you were saying that, in my mind I'm seeing Stepto in a suit and tie. Aren't you?
Stephen Toulous: No.
Larry Hryb: He's got this big title.
Stephen Toulous: Okay, I-
Larry Hryb: No and you're not!
Laura Massey: I thought Leviathan [inaudible 00:29:48].
Stephen Toulous: Yeah, no. No ties.
Larry Hryb: I'm sorry, Vandelay industries? Leviathan, okay.
Stephen Toulous: No it's actually fantastic. It's a wonderful opportunity. What we do basically, is we solve hard problems. When people have a security issue, or a security design, and it could be a game company, it could be an online service, it could be a social network, it could be something of that nature, and they need someone to come in and provide outside expertise on "Hey, what are the things we should worry about," or "What are the things we're not seeing," or "What are the technical things that we need to poke around, and make sure that in our rush to grow we haven't overlooked something". That's what Leviathan does, amongst many other things. And it's just a lot of fun. It's a great opportunity to get to work with a lot of different companies, that do completely different things.
Larry Hryb: So, you work a little bit in gaming and also out of gaming, is that right?
Stephen Toulous: Yeah. Exactly. I'm ... Each consultant has several clients that we work directly with. Some have few that they focus all their time with. Some have a lot that they provide advisory roles at.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Stephen Toulous: But, it's wonderful. It's a really fun opportunity, and I'm super excited to be there.
Eric Neustadter: He's secretly working at Weyland-Yutani.
Larry Hryb: That's what it sounds like.
Stephen Toulous: Oh you can't just, you can't just say that.
Larry Hryb: Now him wearing that shirt makes sense!
Eric Neustadter: Yep.
Larry Hryb: Now it all makes sense!
Eric Neustadter: Good lord.
Larry Hryb: Well yeah, that's kind of why you tuned in and you're trying to figure out why are these people on the show? And Laura's ... So we're recording this in the evening, because you guys have other jobs.
Stephen Toulous: We have day jobs.
Larry Hryb: Right?
Stephen Toulous: You can't just goof off.
Eric Neustadter: Are there numeral [inaudible 00:31:15] who don't know who we are?
Stephen Toulous: Well, man, there might be yeah.
Eric Neustadter: It's been awhile.
Stephen Toulous: Who's this Stepto guy?
Larry Hryb: I've got to tell you this funny story. There's this new guy who works in our market department that I was just telling Laura about.
Laura Massey: Yeah.
Larry Hryb: Who apparently knows Laura, went to school with Laura.
Eric Neustadter: Oh.
Laura Massey: Supposedly.
Larry Hryb: I've got to dig up his name.
Stephen Toulous: Wait, supposedly?
Eric Neustadter: Well UT is a big school.
Laura Massey: He wouldn't, he didn't remember his name.
Larry Hryb: I don't remember his name, because I just met him once. So I was talking, I saw him earlier today because I was talking, because I wasn't saying that ... I mean obviously I haven't talked on the internet until now that the show's up that you guys are coming in. I said "Hey do you know who I'm going to have on the show tonight? I've got Stepto."
And he's like "Oh my god, I've been listening to the show since it was just you and E. And then Stepto joined, and then Laura joined!" So he knew all of .. He was a big fanboy it was great.
Stephen Toulous: Ah.
Larry Hryb: But it's great to have you guys back, just for a little bit. And you're always welcome to come back on the show, and that's why I figured we'd do a special show this week. I did a show earlier this week, when we released the latest system update, I don't know if you guys saw the news around that, what we did?
Stephen Toulous: Yes.
Eric Neustadter: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Larry Hryb: We had a huge system ... Well it wasn't everybody, it was just going to preview audience, er, I think they call it insiders now. So it's-
Eric Neustadter: Yeah.
Larry Hryb: They made the change one button the guide, and some other cool stuff. I don't know if you guys have had a chance to look at that.
Eric Neustadter: I have not. But one of my consoles is insiders.
Larry Hryb: Oh good.
Stephen Toulous: When I got rid of my other, my regular Xbox ones, and went to Xbox one S, I forgot to rejoin. I need to rejoin.
Larry Hryb: Well if you need that I think we know who can get that stuff. I think that we know the people. Yeah, so I did the show earlier this week, and Jeff of course, Jeff who's not here, you've met Jeff haven't you Stepto?
Stephen Toulous: Of course I have.
Larry Hryb: Right, and of course-
Stephen Toulous: There were a couple of shows, I think, where he was in just before I left.
Larry Hryb: Right, so he um-
Eric Neustadter: I've seen Jeff more recently than I've seen you.
Larry Hryb: Yeah. That's a true story. So he's actually over in London right now doing some work. I think he went to Rare to play Sea of Thieves.
Laura Massey: Oh my goodness.
Stephen Toulous: Ah.
Laura Massey: So jealous.
Larry Hryb: Yeah, so I realized he was out of town. You guys are available. That's why I wanted to get, this is the whole reason ... This is exactly what's going on.
Stephen Toulous: It's funny, I wonder how we would be if we did this every week again, because there are so ... One thing I'm noticing when I open the guide and I go to the store-
Larry Hryb: Yes.
Stephen Toulous: There's just so much.
Larry Hryb: There's a ridiculous-
Stephen Toulous: And that's just on the Xbox.
Laura Massey: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Stephen Toulous: Doesn't even count the peripheral stuff. All the indie games that are out there, all of the top releases, all of the smaller releases, that are what we used to call the little arcade games.
Larry Hryb: Arcade games, yeah.
Stephen Toulous: Are now full blown 12 hour games.
Eric Neustadter: You live more gamer score.
Laura Massey: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Stephen Toulous: And, I mean, they're beautiful, and they've got huge production value. And, god, when you just mention Seven Seas, I'm like oh that's another thing I'm probably not going to have time to play.
Larry Hryb: Yeah. To you point there's a lot rolling out, and since you guys have moved on to incredible positions working in security, and Pokemon, I'll just Pokemon ... Do you have a Pokemon in your office? Do you have any of that stuff in your office?
Eric Neustadter: I have a lot of them.
Stephen Toulous: When do I get just the guys who has, like when he plays Munchkin, he has like, all the props.
Larry Hryb: Right. You and I have been trying to ... Because Bellview is just like 15 minutes away from the Microsoft campus, I've been trying to come over for dinner, or lunch, and we just haven't figure it out.
Eric Neustadter: We almost went to lunch a couple of weeks ago.
Larry Hryb: And then something happened.
Eric Neustadter: Yeah. Come do a tour. There's a lot of Pokemon in my office.
Larry Hryb: I think I know some people over there too.
Eric Neustadter: You know at least a couple of people working there. Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Larry Hryb: Yeah. I think I do know a couple of people.
Eric Neustadter: I might have hired a couple of people who used to work here.
Larry Hryb: And you actually just got back from one of my favorite places: Tokyo!
Eric Neustadter: Yes.
Larry Hryb: Now do you understand why? Because you've never been.
Eric Neustadter: This was my second trip.
Larry Hryb: Oh this was you're second trip.
Eric Neustadter: My first one was in Nov- October or November.
Larry Hryb: Okay, but you haven't been since we went, that ... Talk about it on the show, now you understand why I love it.
Eric Neustadter: Yeah, I had a great time. And then this trip I got to make a stop over on the way back. I went direct Seattle to Narita going over, but came back via Seoul. And we stopped off for about 20 hours in Seoul. Met the President of Pokemon Korea.
Larry Hryb: Oh.
Eric Neustadter: He took us out Korean barbecue.
Larry Hryb: So you did business. Oh, I saw you're tweet on that.
Stephen Toulous: Oh.
Larry Hryb: When in Korea.
Eric Neustadter: Korean barbecue, in Korea, oh ...
Larry Hryb: Enough said. That's like I'll only do Karaoke, I'll only do that in Japan.
Eric Neustadter: You shouldn't even do it there.
Larry Hryb: Oh I disagree! I can hold my own!
Eric Neustadter: I'm sure you do.
Larry Hryb: Baby baby baby sleep on it. Paradise by the Dashboard Lights is my song!
Stephen Toulous: I don't know, in that shirt I kind of picture more of a Bobby Darren, Beyond the Sea type of thing.
Larry Hryb: Beyond the sea, once more.
Eric Neustadter: So Tokyo was great.
Larry Hryb: I love Tokyo.
Eric Neustadter: Seoul was great.
Larry Hryb: I've never been to Seoul.
Eric Neustadter: Amazingly in Seoul, so, my girlfriend had asked me to bring back some Korean beauty stuff, because she, like a lot of women I know, orders that stuff online, because-
Larry Hryb: What's so different?
Eric Neustadter: It has like, all kinds of weird, stuff in it.
Larry Hryb: Like what? Glitter?
Eric Neustadter: No. But like snail bee extract, and-
Larry Hryb: What does it do?
Eric Neustadter: I don't know.
Stephen Toulous: Snail bee extract?
Eric Neustadter: Seriously there are all kinds of-
Larry Hryb: Do you know about this?
Stephen Toulous: Do they squish them and then put them into ...
Eric Neustadter: I don't know.
Laura Massey: Bees?
Larry Hryb: This asian cosmetic black market? What's going on here?
Eric Neustadter: This is a big, like-
Larry Hryb: I know it is.
Eric Neustadter: A ton of female friends of mine are really into the stuff. And they get face masks, and creams, and all kinds of things.
Laura Massey: I don't know.
Eric Neustadter: So, I had been asked to bring some stuff back. What I discovered when I got over there is in Korea, Pokemon has a licensing deal with one of the high end makeup companies.
Laura Massey: Oh really?
Eric Neustadter: And like, Pikachu face masks, and Squirtle hand cream, and Bulbasaur this and that. And so I came back with a giant bag of Pokemon beauty product.
Stephen Toulous: Pokemon beauty product.
Larry Hryb: Wait a minute, wait a minute. I must ask. Did you walk down the men's aisle?
Stephen Toulous: Yes?
Eric Neustadter: I don't think there was a men's aisle.
Larry Hryb: Oh come on! There was!
Eric Neustadter: I don't think so.
Stephen Toulous: Pikachu, the new scent.
Laura Massey: Yes! I was thinking cologne!
Eric Neustadter: That's disturbing. We do have some new animation that should, no. He only says one thing. He says "Pika."
Larry Hryb: I know.
Eric Neustadter: Unless it's in Detective Pikachu, where he does speak.
Stephen Toulous: I opened a can of worms with that one.
Eric Neustadter: You really did.
Larry Hryb: So you are now the expert when it comes to licensed makeup.
Eric Neustadter: Only for Pokemon in Korea. I am still learning many things about Pokemon. I do not know all +900 Pokemon. I'm still learning many of the evolutions. I did just learn how to properly sex a Pikachu the other day.
Larry Hryb: I'm sorry, what?
Eric Neustadter: It turns out there are male and female Pikachus. Which I did not know.
Larry Hryb: So how to identify, or are they participating in the act of? What does that mean?
Eric Neustadter: How to identify. They don't-
Stephen Toulous: That's a whole other-
Eric Neustadter: There's no participating in the act of.
Stephen Toulous: That's another aisle in the Pokemon shop.
Eric Neustadter: We are an E for Everyone [crosstalk 00:37:53]
Larry Hryb: More so in Japan!
Eric Neustadter: So, when Pikachu breed there is an egg, and you take the egg to the ... I'm blanking on the name. The nest center? Or something like that, where it hatches. But to tell a male from a female Pikachu, look at their tail. A male Pikachu's tale ends in a lightning bolt. A female Pikachu's tail ends in a heart.
Larry Hryb: All right.
Laura Massey: I had no idea. The more you know.
Larry Hryb: Okay, that-
Eric Neustadter: I've learned things.
Stephen Toulous: You are now the Richard Attenborough of Pokemon.
Eric Neustadter: Yes.
Stephen Toulous: Er, David. David Attenborough? Which one, who's the ... I can't remember.
Larry Hryb: Here's an extraordinary moment.
Stephen Toulous: Richard Attenborough's the director. David Attenborough's the [crosstalk 00:38:28]
Larry Hryb: So you are having a good time over there, are you?
Eric Neustadter: I'm loving it over there. Yes.
Larry Hryb: Good so, now do you guys get to work together?
Eric Neustadter: No.
Larry Hryb: Like do you do security on Pokemon, Stepto?
Stephen Toulous: Nope. And if I did, I mean, our client list is confidential.
Larry Hryb: Yeah, you, of course, couldn't talk about it. So, maybe he is, maybe he isn't. I don't know.
Stephen Toulous: Who know? It's secretive.
Larry Hryb: Although I did notice there was some, um, Korean cosmetics peaking out of your bag when you walked in so. That may be something entirely different, I don't know.
Stephen Toulous: No, because I would have tweeted about the barbecue for sure.
Larry Hryb: That's right.
Eric Neustadter: The barbecue was-
Stephen Toulous: But I do work just a couple of blocks away from Jack's.
Laura Massey: Oh, you do?
Larry Hryb: The barbecue place, that's right.
Stephen Toulous: I work in Seattle so that's right by Jack's and that is a dangerous place to work, because you will eat Jack's all the time.
Eric Neustadter: Yes. Let me tell you, when we were in Tokyo every night was a dinner that was planned with us and our hosts at our parent company, and some of the food was unbelievable.
Larry Hryb: Oh yeah.
Laura Massey: Nice.
Eric Neustadter: Everything from, I mean, we've done simple stuff like ramen and katsu, and Japanese curry, but like some of the fancy shabu-shabu, and other things, like, we did shabu-shabu with beef and spider crab. That was amazing.
Stephen Toulous: Oh that was what you took that picture of. Someone was like "What is that?" I'm like that's crab! Looks amazing!
Eric Neustadter: Just unbelievable. And I ate a few things that I wasn't sure I wanted to.
Larry Hryb: Were they still moving?
Eric Neustadter: No.
Larry Hryb: By the way that is a legitimate question when you're in Japan.
Eric Neustadter: No, it is. It is. I did weird out my hosts a couple of times when I wouldn't eat octopus. They were like "Why not? Octopus is wonderful." And I would explain that I don't like to eat anything that's intelligent enough to use tools. That just feels weird. Octopus are very smart, and they're like "What are you talking about?" And I would have to-
Stephen Toulous: You ruined octopus for them.
Larry Hryb: So did you pull up YouTube and show the octopus getting out of aquariums?
Eric Neustadter: That's exactly what I did. Yes.
Stephen Toulous: And ruined octopus for them.
Eric Neustadter: The one getting out of the mason jar by unscrewing the lid, and I'm ... And see octopus-
Larry Hryb: And 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.
Eric Neustadter: Are really smart, right. And tat the end of it, I think I just convinced them I was weird. But I didn't eat the octopus. I ate just about everything else. I had fugu. I ate a deep fried fish that had the head on it with the eyeballs still there and-
Laura Massey: Ooh.
Eric Neustadter: Everything.
Laura Massey: That sounds interesting.
Larry Hryb: Well good for you.
Eric Neustadter: Yeah, yeah.
Larry Hryb: Well welcome back.
Eric Neustadter: Thank you.
Larry Hryb: You weren't here Laura because I think you stepped out for a moment when we were getting ready to record, Stepto and you weren't in here yet.
Laura Massey: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Larry Hryb: My first question to you was "Was I right about the Japanese toilet seats?
Eric Neustadter: And, they're very nice except when they're turned up too high. When they're very warm-
Laura Massey: Oh no. [crosstalk 00:41:03]
Stephen Toulous: Did you burn your bottom?
Larry Hryb: To quote the great Yosemite Sam, that will burn your biscuits.
Eric Neustadter: Yeah. Mm-hmm (affirmative)- They are quite fancy
Larry Hryb: They are quite fancy.
Eric Neustadter: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Stephen Toulous: You'd think there'd be a safety, like there'd be a level you'd never wanted it above.
Eric Neustadter: Yeah. The weird part, at least the part I thought was weird, was when I checked into the room for the first time, and I walked in there and it's got a proximity sensor? And it opens when you walk near it.
Larry Hryb: That's what mine does.
Eric Neustadter: And I was not expecting that.
Larry Hryb: It's like "Hey let's go? You busy? Let's go! We going to do this?"
Eric Neustadter: No time like now!
Larry Hryb: And what's funny is mine does that, because it springs to life, and then when you don't do anything it kind of (groans) the top goes ... Kind of like "well okay, I'll close the top."
Eric Neustadter: Yes. It's got the little remote there with all the different buttons.
Stephen Toulous: There's a remote. Like that to me is the funniest thing. Everything you need is within your arms reach. Why would you need a remote.
Eric Neustadter: There's a control panel on the wall next to you.
Larry Hryb: Have I tweeted photos of mine?
Stephen Toulous: You have.
Eric Neustadter: It's like an l-carved control panel.
Larry Hryb: That's delightful.
Stephen Toulous: Delightful.
Larry Hryb: It is delightful. There's certain things in life that you must enjoy, and a Japanese toilet seat is one of them.
Stephen Toulous: I just wasn't expecting that there were overheating risks.
Eric Neustadter: Neither was I honestly. I was not prepared.
Stephen Toulous: That yelp must have been funny.
Larry Hryb: Woo. How? You know you can turn down the heat on those right?
Eric Neustadter: Yeah, but you don't know that until you sit down, and then you discover it's too hot.
Laura Massey: The damage is done.
Larry Hryb: Wow. So what happened? Well doctor you won't believe-
Stephen Toulous: Lick the tip of the finger it's like (hissing noise).
Larry Hryb: Ah. Oh. Ow.
Stephen Toulous: Can water bounce on it?
Eric Neustadter: The one in Korea was fine.
Larry Hryb: Did you go to, when you were in Japan, did you go to any of the Japanese spas?
Eric Neustadter: No. I was working.
Larry Hryb: Oh boy. That was one of my most extraordinary experiences I've ever had. It was.
Eric Neustadter: Really?
Larry Hryb: Yeah, because you walk in, it was spa, where was it. It was out near the MeSay Center, anyway, it was a spa and you walk in and it was the old kind, the old school, so it's all male. And you take a shower, and you get into the tub, and you sit in this really hot tub with a washcloth on your head.
Laura Massey: A cold one? To cool you down?
Larry Hryb: No that's what you walk around with if you want to be discreet.
Eric Neustadter: That's how they identify you?
Larry Hryb: Yeah. And then you use it when you get in the shower, so that's really all you have, is you just have what you came into this world with, and a wash cloth. To go through the entire experience. And it was unbelievable, because the hot water, and the whole, I just ... There's something to just unplugging and going in and just taking care of yourself.
Laura Massey: I'll say.
Eric Neustadter: The closest I got to that was "hey I have two hours in between meetings, I haven't had ramen yet, where can I get ramen?
Stephen Toulous: Oh yeah. I hear that's ...
Larry Hryb: Oh, yeah.
Eric Neustadter: The ramen is, oh.
Larry Hryb: Did you go into any of the arcades?
Eric Neustadter: There weren't any good ones near where I was.
Larry Hryb: Oh, in Roppongi that's right. There's none.
Eric Neustadter: Next trip I'm going to go longer and go spend a day in Akihabara shopping.
Larry Hryb: Yeah!
Laura Massey: Oh fun.
Larry Hryb: You know who you've got to talk to, is Albert. Because Albert knows all the good places.
Eric Neustadter: Albert, and Chis Coler, and yeah.
Larry Hryb: Yeah. All those guys.
Eric Neustadter: A coworker of mine did go and pick me up something while he was over there.
Larry Hryb: So good.
Eric Neustadter: But I haven't made it yet. So, third trip I'll get to it.
Larry Hryb: All right. A little Xbox news while we're cooking along here. First of all I want to thank you guys again for coming in.
Stephen Toulous: You're welcome.
Eric Neustadter: Thanks for the invite.
Larry Hryb: Always so fun to have you guys in.
Laura Massey: Yeah, it's really fun.
Larry Hryb: And staying late. Games with Gold are out. We've got Lovers in a Dangerous Space Time-
Laura Massey: Fantastic game.
Larry Hryb: Is for Xbox One, and that will be free until ... For the rest of the month. And then, now you've got Project Cars available until March, 15th. And then on Xbox 360, and Xbox One through backward compatibility, You had Monkey Island, now you have Star Wars The Force Unleashed.
Eric Neustadter: Oh.
Laura Massey: Very good.
Eric Neustadter: Okay. That's, is Force Unleashed the one where you can bring down the destroyer?
Stephen Toulous: It had that in the video, I don't remember if that was in the game or not.
Eric Neustadter: I think it was. I seem to remember doing that.
Larry Hryb: All right. By the way, you know, I feel like we should do it now.
Eric Neustadter: Okay.
Larry Hryb: Can we talk about Rogue One? Spoiler cast?
Eric Neustadter: Yes.
Laura Massey: Oh my gosh yes!
Stephen Toulous: I feel like it's about to leave the theaters.
Larry Hryb: It feels like we should, but I know Jeff wants to be a part of it, but he's no here, so let's go. Okay. Hold on a minute. I just want to put a marker here so I know where to put, so if people haven't seen the thing they can stop.
Eric Neustadter: Spoiler warning.
Larry Hryb: All right, so if you're listening now, this is a warning. If you haven't seen Rogue One, we are going to talk a lot about it. So there is going to be spoilers and stuff for the next, probably two or three minutes. So, you have been warned.
Eric Neustadter: Two or three minutes?
Stephen Toulous: We should just all talk at once. Like just pick, like five spoilers and just say them.
Larry Hryb: All right, so, a word-
Eric Neustadter: It's amazing.
Larry Hryb: Yeah.
Eric Neustadter: Okay. I just had to put that out there.
Larry Hryb: How many times have you seen it E?
Eric Neustadter: Three?
Larry Hryb: Laura you've seen it once?
Laura Massey: Once.
Larry Hryb: Well, it's funny, you had tickets to six different shows at one point.
Laura Massey: I did.
Larry Hryb: I remember, you were texting me when they went on sale. You bought them here, you bough them there, and bought the here-
Laura Massey: Because I had to see them, you know, on opening weekend at least, or the first day.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Laura Massey: And I wanted to make sure I had back ups. Because I have a preferred theater.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Eric Neustadter: Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
Laura Massey: So I bought multiple.
Larry Hryb: And then, because I saw it a few days before it opened-
Laura Massey: You saw it multiple times.
Larry Hryb: I saw it before it opened, and then a couple times after it opened. So three. How many times have you seen it?
Stephen Toulous: Three.
Larry Hryb: Three.
Stephen Toulous: And I saw it at my little theater in Kingston.
Larry Hryb: So let's be clear, you live in a different part ... You live in this interesting ... Can we talk about where you live?
Eric Neustadter: It's another world.
Stephen Toulous: It's funny because I live, I live seven miles as the crow flies, from downtown Seattle. But it's across the water.
Larry Hryb: It's across Puget Sound.
Stephen Toulous: So I have to take a 30 minute ferry to come over, and I live out in a completely rural area. I have got a couple acres of land, and-
Larry Hryb: Internet.
Stephen Toulous: Internet. And the dogs love it, it's great. But the the little town of Kingston is not very large. And so it's movie theater is a converted fire house.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Laura Massey: Oh.
Stephen Toulous: And the guy who had did this-
Larry Hryb: I absolutely love this story.
Stephen Toulous: This is absolutely fantastic. This is a great way to see a movie. So he did redid it with a digital screen, sound system, and it's only got like 100 seats.
Laura Massey: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Stephen Toulous: I believe it's called Firehouse Theater in Kingston. It's literally sometimes worth going over just to experience it, because here's what they do: the first movie I saw there, was the Martian.
Larry Hryb: Okay.
Stephen Toulous: I thought I'll test this place out. I've already read the book. I can always go see the movie somewhere else if I don't have a good experience. I sit in there, not a bad seat in the house. There's even a little balcony.
Laura Massey: Oh fun.
Stephen Toulous: Where there's like five seats up in a little balcony if you want. The previews are running, and then all of a sudden the previews stop, and the owner of the theater comes out. And he says ...
Larry Hryb: What does he say?
Stephen Toulous: "Tonight you're going to be seeing the Martian. It's based off of a book" based by [inaudible 00:47:13] and it's got, er ... Was it [inaudible 00:47:14]? No it was the other guy ...
Laura Massey: Weir. Andy Weir.
Stephen Toulous: Sorry I got the wrong author. But he came out and did an explanation.
Larry Hryb: He sets it up?
Stephen Toulous: He sets it up.
Larry Hryb: What?
Stephen Toulous: He says it's really great, the special effects are fantastic. I saw it last night, I'm really excited about it. I hope you enjoy it-
Larry Hryb: Does he do it for every screening?
Stephen Toulous: On the other screen, he even tells you what's on the other screen, because there's two screens. He says on the other screen we're playing, at that time it was Pan, and here's the cool part: He was like "It's good. It's not super great. I really wasn't super impressed with it,"
Larry Hryb: So he's editorializing?
Stephen Toulous: No. He's "just to let parents know it can get a little dark in certain places, and stuff like that. We'll keep that for another week. We've got some art house films coming in two weeks, and I hope you enjoy it."
Larry Hryb: Wow. This is your new favorite place.
Stephen Toulous: And then he leaves and the movie comes on, and it's just perfect. The sound was great, everything was great. But the real kicker is that when I bought my ticket, I was standing and I ordered popcorn, so I bought my ticket, I ordered popcorn, it's taking forever. And I'm just kind of wandering around, looking at the posters and wondering why it's taking forever. They put real butter on the popcorn! They melt-
Eric Neustadter: No.
Stephen Toulous: Real butter for you and put however much you want on the popcorn!
Larry Hryb: Not that yellow butter flavoring.
Stephen Toulous: Not oil. They take a stick of butter-
Larry Hryb: Oh wow!
Laura Massey: Oh my gosh!
Stephen Toulous: And then they're like ... They cook it over a little thing, and they're like "How much do you want on your popcorn?"
Eric Neustadter: And they layer it, right? They put some [crosstalk 00:48:21]
Stephen Toulous: Oh yeah, oh absolutely.
Laura Massey: Oh.
Larry Hryb: Aw.
Eric Neustadter: Oh wow.
Stephen Toulous: Sold. Small town living.
Larry Hryb: Yeah there's something to be s-
Stephen Toulous: But that's where I saw Rogue One and it was a great experience, and I thought it was amazing. I think one of the things I like most about it is the sound track, I was really scared about, turned out to be fantastic.
Larry Hryb: So I want to point something out. Laura you and I see each other each week.
Laura Massey: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Larry Hryb: E, you and I text once in a while. I talk to Stepto about two or three times a week.
Stephen Toulous: Yeah.
Larry Hryb: Like I'll call him and I'll, because we talk a lot, we talk politics, we talk movies.
Stephen Toulous: Yeah. We usually-
Eric Neustadter: What's a call?
Laura Massey: A phone call.
Larry Hryb: He's much more interesting on the phone than you are. You just don't like, you don't like to talk on the phone!
Laura Massey: Neither do I.
Eric Neustadter: Nine times out of ten I can't. I'm multitasking.
Larry Hryb: Yeah that's very true Laura you are not a phone person.
Laura Massey: I'm not a phone person.
Stephen Toulous: No? I'm ...
Larry Hryb: But Stepto and I have, so anyways, we've talked a lot about "Hey, we should talk about"-
Stephen Toulous: A lot about Rogue One.
Larry Hryb: Rogue One. So that's kind of one of the reasons I wanted to bring it up.
Stephen Toulous: It's well shot.
Larry Hryb: Yeah.
Laura Massey: It is.
Stephen Toulous: The cinematography is excellent.
Larry Hryb: Fantastic.
Stephen Toulous: I loved little touches like no Jedi, no real force usage. There's implied force usage.
Larry Hryb: Yeah.
Laura Massey: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Stephen Toulous: The acting is fantastic. And the writing was great. I want to see the dark version. I want to see the version that Disney went back and said too dark. Way too dark.
Larry Hryb: Well, you saw the clip of Chewbacca slicing what's his name's ...
Stephen Toulous: Yeah.
Larry Hryb: Though that was actually Force Awakes, that's right.
Stephen Toulous: But Disney is definitely keeping a very tight control on over when things go a little too-
Laura Massey: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Larry Hryb: Off the reservation.
Eric Neustadter: Yes.
Stephen Toulous: Mature, I guess, for the fantasy-
Larry Hryb: Non theme parky.
Stephen Toulous: Non theme parky. Yeah.
Larry Hryb: For lack of a better term.
Stephen Toulous: Yeah and I think Star Wars, going back and watching, I just showed Rogue One to someone who'd never seen a Star Wars film.
Laura Massey: Really?
Eric Neustadter: Where did you find this person?
Stephen Toulous: There are lots of them actually.
Eric Neustadter: Really?
Stephen Toulous: I was surprised too. But I took her to see it, and then we immediately marathoner the original trilogy right after that.
Eric Neustadter: Okay.
Stephen Toulous: And she was like "Yeah! That's the way to do it!" Because A New Hope starts 20 minutes-
Laura Massey: Pretty much immediately-
Stephen Toulous: After Rogue One.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Stephen Toulous: And it's like, an immediate continuation. And then the spots in between Empire and Return of the Jedi, feel more weighty. Because you feel like more time has passed.
Larry Hryb: Okay.
Stephen Toulous: Yeah. So it was a fascinating experience. I love Rogue One. I love it, love it, love it.
Larry Hryb: Yeah. I remember when I saw it I called you, because I saw it right before you did!
Stephen Toulous: Yeah you saw it right before I did.
Larry Hryb: And we were like, I didn't want to talk about it because I didn't want to spoil it, and of course Laura you and I talked about it, and of course E we hadn't talked at all because you don't like to talk on the phone.
Eric Neustadter: Right.
Larry Hryb: But we-
Eric Neustadter: Wonderful device. I use it for texting all the time.
Larry Hryb: That texting thing you have in your pocket?
Eric Neustadter: Uh-huh (affirmative)-
Larry Hryb: You know-
Eric Neustadter: It's also a Mini Metro device.
Larry Hryb: Aka Mini Metro device. Well done. But yeah, Laura, you enjoyed the film-
Laura Massey: I did.
Larry Hryb: I mean we just loved everything about it. We like the ... Just everything about the film, it just felt right. You know? And you know Gary, one of the screen writers right?
Stephen Toulous: Yeah. He did the story, and I think a portion of the screen play.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Stephen Toulous: And, it's funny, he and I had talked about this two years ago?
Larry Hryb: So right before production.
Stephen Toulous: Yeah, and one of his statements was, kind of, he didn't want to give anything away, but he said, you know, what's always kind of ... There are two things that kind of bothered him about A New Hop going into it, was the crawl says "The Rebels have won their first battle."
Larry Hryb: Yeah.
Stephen Toulous: What was that battle? It's never mentioned. And then the second piece that bothered him a little bit was when Vader says they'll be no one to stop us this time.
Larry Hryb: Yeah.
Stephen Toulous: He's like "There's got to be something there to that!" And I think that's where the kernel of it started, which I find fascinating.
Larry Hryb: Well I actually, I remember when I came out of it, and you and I talked about this: digital Tarkin.
Stephen Toulous: Oh digital Tarkin! We did we had a great discussion about this!
Larry Hryb: And I just, I had a ... What did you think of digital Tarkin Laura?
Laura Massey: I was not a fan. I felt like they did as good a job as they could've, but I'm not a fan of CG characters, like I'm just not a fan seeing Leia-
Larry Hryb: It was the uncanny valley. It was too much. E what did you think?
Eric Neustadter: I agree with generally not being a fan of CG characters, but to me it mattered that Tarkin was in there. He needed to be.
Larry Hryb: Yeah, I mean, once you realize what it was, and I mean, some shots ... It wasn't as bad as, you know, unfortunately, the Princess Leia shot at the end, which a lot of people didn't like.
Stephen Toulous: I don't know how that slipped, like I don't know how they didn't ... Maybe they just couldn't fix it.
Larry Hryb: Yeah. But anyway, that's the one part that was ... It just ... Because maybe because I play so many video games, you guys, we're used to digital characters? And it was just, something about this is wrong.
Eric Neustadter: I think, my brain just intentionally doesn't notice it. If I really look for it it's like oh yeah, I can see what everyone is talking about. But as I'm enjoying the movie, none of it registers. I'm just enjoying it, going with the flow.
Larry Hryb: Yeah. I guess, knowing the fact that Peter Cushing's dead that's like, I was like, wait ... I actually when he came on screen I went (gasps) I actually gasped.
Stephen Toulous: Yeah. Well, because you and I had this great discussion, and you had this great point about ... They did a fantastic job until they kept doing it.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Laura Massey: Yeah. It lingered too long.
Stephen Toulous: Less would have been more.
Larry Hryb: Right. Had they done the long shots, or a reflection in the mirror, or ... But there was all these close ups of the face-
Stephen Toulous: Close up arguments.
Larry Hryb: That it gave me all the chance to look up and down his face a million times going "This is not right."
Stephen Toulous: Yeah.
Larry Hryb: So that was where it kind of unwound for me.
Eric Neustadter: Okay.
Larry Hryb: So that's all. Anyway, Laura do you have anything to add?
Laura Massey: Yeah. So I thought this one was really good. I very much enjoyed it. I did notice it was a bit darker, and they took a different tact towards the Rebel Alliance.
Larry Hryb: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Laura Massey: Where, they're not all good.
Stephen Toulous: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Larry Hryb: Yeah.
Eric Neustadter: Yes.
Laura Massey: And I don't know how I felt about that. I was like "What?!?!"
Larry Hryb: Yeah, you hadn't thought about that before.
Laura Massey: What were they doing?
Eric Neustadter: It added a nice level of richness and reality to the universe.
Laura Massey: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Eric Neustadter: It's not, you know, '70s comic book black and white. There are shades of gray, not everyone on the good side is going to be good. Not everyone on the bad side is going to be bad. You just ... It felt more real because of that, to me.
Stephen Toulous: But, to Laura's point I think, something that I just considered right now, is that maybe this was really their only opportunity to really do that. And so here, they knew from the original trilogy the Rebel Alliance had been set up in a certain way. So maybe with Rogue One, it was their only chance to show the Rebel Alliance going "Ooh, we don't want to be the Empire", and maybe that's why they pivot a little bit more in the next three films.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Stephen Toulous: Granted it's sort of retconning, but I think, yeah, that really surprised me.
Laura Massey: It surprised me, pretty much-
Stephen Toulous: I don't think it's a good or bad thing but it's definitely noticeable. It's stark.
Laura Massey: Yeah, because in, I didn't think the guy in the beginning that kills the guy that's supposed to be his friend-
Stephen Toulous: Oh god, yes.
Laura Massey: Would be the hero! I mean, I was like (gasps) what? It's a very different take on a Star Wars universe. I thought that was an interesting and refreshing way to do it, but it was a bit darker.
Larry Hryb: Yeah, and I love Mads Mikkelsen. I've been a fan of him since Casino Royale. Right? I mean who couldn't be? I was like, wait a minute, he's always the bad guy. Well he wasn't really a bad guy this time, but he was? Right? They kind of gave him that excuse to be evil, but not be evil. If that makes any sense. Right? Because he was trying to do the right thing.
Stephen Toulous: Mm-hmm (affirmative)-
Larry Hryb: So it was, uh, (deep sigh) ...
Laura Massey: The other thing I took away from it is, oh, it's a tragedy. The movie is the definition of a tragedy. Everybody dies, at the end.
Stephen Toulous: It occurred to me, when I took the person who hadn't seen any of the Star Wars films, it occurred to me right at the end, a few seconds before all the things happened-
Larry Hryb: Right.
Stephen Toulous: That oh, yeah, she's not going to know ... I know of course-
Laura Massey: Yeah, you're not going to see her anymore. Yeah.
Stephen Toulous: All these people have to die. They have to. Because none of them show up anywhere else.
Larry Hryb: Right. Yeah the other, the only other problem I had with it was, and you and I have talked about this, was the end of the film. Where the=
Laura Massey: Vader.
Larry Hryb: Right. Well first of all, Vader was complete-
Stephen Toulous: Beast mode was pretty cool.
Larry Hryb: He was unbelievable. That was another ... My jaw was on the ground. But the fact that he clearly knows the plans are on this ship. So this, you and I talked about this, right? And that was, I don't want to say a plot hole, but that was, that area sagged. In terms of logic.
Stephen Toulous: Did you watch, after Rogue One, did you go back and watch Star Wars?
Laura Massey: No I didn't. But I watched your tweets.
Stephen Toulous: So one of the things I thought was interesting was, going back and immediately watching A New Hope a couple days later, was like, all of a sudden all of Vader's stuff sounds very sarcastic.
Larry Hryb: Right!
Stephen Toulous: And it kind of works. Because he knows like "I know you're not a diplomatic ship!" And before it was like, you thought it was a suspicion, but now you know he knows. And he just kills that guy-
Larry Hryb: Right, exactly. Yeah. Exactly.
Stephen Toulous: And throws him to the ground. And I took it like, that ... When I got a chance to watch A New Hope, I did agree, at the end, that that was weird.
Larry Hryb: Yeah.
Stephen Toulous: That was an odd choice. They didn't have to put-
Larry Hryb: Can you talk to Gary about that please?
Stephen Toulous: Sure.
Larry Hryb: Okay. So, anyway. Anyways. It was a lot of fun there, and of course we have another Star Wars film coming up this year. I don't know how I feel about these yearly things.
Stephen Toulous: The Last Jedi.
Eric Neustadter: More importantly, for Stepto, we have the sequel to Prometheus coming up.
Larry Hryb: Did you know that I went, I don't know, I know Laura did because we talked about it on the show, I don't know if you guys know this. I went to New York. To do the movie ... The junket for the Assassin's Creed movie.
Stephen Toulous: Oh right.
Eric Neustadter: Yes.
Stephen Toulous: I did know that.
Eric Neustadter: I missed a screening of that by a couple of hours. I was really kind of ticked.
Larry Hryb: And it was great to talk to, you know, the stars. I mean, I don't want to tell the story again because the listeners have heard it, but just about the run-in, well ... I don't want to say run-in ... What would I say that I had with some of the cast members, who are very nice, and Jeremy Irons was just a delight.
Laura Massey: Yes.
Larry Hryb: He complemented me on my voice.
Laura Massey: Yeah, he paid you the biggest complement.
Larry Hryb: And I was like-
Stephen Toulous: Jeremy Irons complementing you on your voice.
Larry Hryb: Yeah it was an oh my god moment. But it was, anyway, it was just a lot of fun to talk about Prometheus with Michael Fassbender, with Michael.
Stephen Toulous: Oh it's Michael to you?
Larry Hryb: Yeah, he didn't want to talk too much about it because he was there to promote the other movie, and I respect-
Stephen Toulous: He's mister Fassbender to me.
Larry Hryb: He was very nice. We had a great conversation.
Stephen Toulous: Oh no, I imagine. He's always seemed very approachable.
Larry Hryb: Yeah.
Stephen Toulous: And to be honest he's one of the best parts of the film.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Stephen Toulous: My problems with it are mostly story.
Larry Hryb: Right.
Stephen Toulous: It's not really the ... The movie is gorgeous.
Eric Neustadter: He plays a big role in Alien Covenant. Apparently. So. I'm very excited for that.
Stephen Toulous: It wouldn't surprise me.
Larry Hryb: Anyway. That's the end of the movie section, actually hold on a minute. Any way, so that's kind of the end of the spoiler part. Jeff is going to be upset that he couldn't, that he couldn't uh ...
Stephen Toulous: Yeah I'd like to hear what he ...
Larry Hryb: So, so-
Stephen Toulous: Hear it in the next show with him. I'd like to hear what he thought.
Larry Hryb: So the bad news is, um, we're out of time. Because I know, Stepto-
Stephen Toulous: It flies so fast.
Larry Hryb: You have to go somewhere. E you've got to get home to your dog. Laura's got a life that she has to get onto, and as do I. But, um-
Eric Neustadter: Wait, why do you and Laura get to have lives.
Larry Hryb: Well I'm just saying is you have previous engagements. We've got stuff that we ... We have life. We have life.
Stephen Toulous: Mine is I'm going to get to play with a friend's chinchilla.
Laura Massey: Cool
Stephen Toulous: When you have the opportunity to play with a chinchilla you should take it.
Larry Hryb: They're really soft.
Stephen Toulous: I hear.
Larry Hryb: They're very soft.
Stephen Toulous: And then of course I have to get across the water to get back to the dogs. So they don't sit at home all day.
Larry Hryb: Why don't you just give them some money to send them to the movies. This guy sounds like he'll watch them.
Eric Neustadter: Yeah. Movie, plus doggie daycare.
Stephen Toulous: Right?
Eric Neustadter: Yeah.
Larry Hryb: Anyway, so I want to thank you guys for coming in. I know it was, especially for you Stepto it was a schlep. I'll have you on again, can you come on again and we'll do it for even longer?
Stephen Toulous: Any time for even longer, sure.
Eric Neustadter: Absolutely.
Larry Hryb: You know, we've talked about doing this ... I've got this device that I talked about off the air that I did a Facebook live stream with that went horrifically wrong.
Laura Massey: Oh no.
Eric Neustadter: It looks like an Amazon Echo with an eyeball.
Stephen Toulous: Yeah, it does.
Larry Hryb: It's the Mivo, but maybe we can do a Facebook live stream-
Stephen Toulous: Yeah that'd be fun.
Larry Hryb: Google hangouts, we used to do those all the time. But I want to have you guys back on again, I really appreciate you guys coming in.
Eric Neustadter: We need to play some co=op. Let's go do some horde mode or something.
Larry Hryb: We can do Overwatch! I'll show you guys how to ... E and I play that, and Stepto ... Laura!
Laura Massey: I still have some leveling up to do, as well.
Stephen Toulous: Probably not as bad as me. I was ... I'm pretty low.
Larry Hryb: You know what Laura? You can be the healer.
Laura Massey: [inaudible 00:59:54]
Eric Neustadter: Healers in Overwatch are pretty cool, I mained Mercy for awhile.
Larry Hryb: They are cool. They are legit. You haven't seen ... You've seen some of my play of the games right?
Laura Massey: Oh yeah.
Larry Hryb: Yeah, so I mean their ... Anyway, so, we should do that, but I want to, seriously Stepto I want to thank you for coming over the water. E for joining us. And I want to congratulate you guys on these awesome gigs that you have.
Eric Neustadter: Thank you.
Larry Hryb: How do they find you on twitter Stepto?
Stephen Toulous: Stepto. S-T-E-P-T-O.
Larry Hryb: And then Laura they find you?
Laura Massey: @LauraLollipop.
Larry Hryb: Yeah I'll put a link in the show notes. Of course E I can find @TheVowel.
Eric Neustadter: That's correct.
Larry Hryb: In fact, it's pretty sweet, we were talking about you a couple of weeks ago.
Laura Massey: We were.
Larry Hryb: About, remember when he was resisting on twitter?
Eric Neustadter: Oh yeah.
Larry Hryb: He thought it was the stupidest thing ever.
Stephen Toulous: Oh, yeah yeah yeah. 2008.
Eric Neustadter: That was ten years ago.
Larry Hryb: He would come in and like flip the table. He's like "it's the stupidest thing ever". So anyway, that's how you find him.
Eric Neustadter: I still think it is, but you can find me there.
Larry Hryb: Anyway, so we'll talk to you guys next time, and hit these guys up on twitter. Thanks for listening, and we'll be back next week with Name the Game, Laura?
Laura Massey: That's right.
Larry Hryb: Jeff will be back next week, and we'll have some other cool stuff, and we'll talk to you guys next time. Goodbye everybody.
Stephen Toulous: Bye-bye everyone.
Eric Neustadter: Bye.
Laura Massey: Bye.