A late-blooming gamer plays everyone else's formative games for the very first time.
Episodes
Thursday Jul 09, 2020
Thursday Jul 09, 2020
Today on Never Was A Gamer, we've finally played Half-Life!
Timecodes:
1.30 She likes it!
6.40 Black Mesa.
12.03 Platforming?
15.55 Weapons.
22.35 Music.
BREAK
26.30 Storytelling!
32.18 G-Man, humans, aliens, characters.
37.28 Is this a smarter AI?
41.15 Mouse & keyboard, 1st person games.
BREAK
50.35 Console training.
52.00 Opening sequence.
55.30 Best and worst chapters: Blast Pit, On A Rail, Surface Tension, Forget About Freeman.
1.08.38 Let's talk about Xen baby.
1.13.22 Xihilanth.
1.21.10 Predictions & score.
Thursday Jun 25, 2020
Thursday Jun 25, 2020
Today on Never Was A Gamer: it's Half-Life on PC!
Timecodes:
1.10 Checking in on our From Software mission.
5.45 What Michelle knows about Half-Life.
9.50 Michelle's history with 1st person shooters.
BREAK
28.05 Playing through FPS history (Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, Quake II).
BREAK
52.30 History of Half-Life.
1.14.25 Predictions.
Promo Materials:
Thursday Jun 11, 2020
Thursday Jun 11, 2020
Today on Never Was a Gamer, we've finally played Super Mario 64!
Timecodes:
0.00 Intro.
1.45 First impressions.
11.20 Opening screens and the hub world.
BREAK
27.20 Structure & stars.
BREAK
39.35 Movement in 3D.
50.35 64 vs traditional Marios.
56.30 Bowser and the bosses.
1.04.10 The Players Guide Issue.
BREAK
1.10.10 Specific worlds: highlights.
1.28.00 Specific worlds: not-highlights.
1.30.30 Hopes for an HD Remaster.
1.35.00 Predictions.
1.37.20 Final score.
Thursday May 28, 2020
Thursday May 28, 2020
Today on Never Was A Gamer: it's Super Mario 64! We've got fond memories and the wildest VHS footage Michelle has ever seen.
Timecodes:
0.00 Intro.
2.15 Did you see a speed run?
10.20 What is it about Mario games?
14.00 Coming into the N64 era.
15.20 Mario vs Donkey Kong.
20.30 ok but dk64...
24.00 What Michelle knows about Super Mario 64.
BREAK
28.50 Promo for SM64.
33.35 Launching the N64.
45.00 First glance of SM64.
51.30 Anticipating movement in 3D.
1.02.10 Print ads!
1.05.45 this absolutely batshit vhs promo video.
1.16.45 Consumers <3 products.
1.20.45 Predictions.
Promo Materials:
That wild VHS tape?? "Change the System"
Thursday May 14, 2020
Thursday May 14, 2020
Today on Never Was A Gamer, we've finally played Shadow of the Colossus!
In the course of our discussion, we also mention a game we both love called Realistic Kissing Simulator, by Jimmy Andrews and Loren Schmidt. It's free and you can play it in about 30 seconds, so please do: http://jimmylands.com/experiments/kissing/.
Timecodes:
0.49 So how do you feel?
3.00 Structure of the game.
9.50 Agro/Argo.
13.30 The camera: friend or foe?
15.35 The world.
17.50 The Plot.
24.50 Gameyness.
BREAK
27.45 What is a boss (reprise).
32.15 Ungameyness?
34.35 The boss loop.
39.58 Stamina as a mechanic
42.30 The first colossus.
47.48 Highlight #1: Hot Air Bags (#13).
53.53 Highlight #2: Bulldog Ramming Speed (#14).
58.39 Highlight #3: Grave Deer (#4).
1.04.30 What if less water.
1.05.21 Lowlight: Tamatoa (#9).
1.07.40 What have we learned about our taste in bosses?
BREAK
1.11.13 Feelings n art n shit.
1.20.40 What makes a game artful?
1.26.45 Do we need Meaning?
1.33.15 Games as whole experiences.
1.34.21 Predictions (Agro check!) and final score.
Thursday Apr 30, 2020
Thursday Apr 30, 2020
Today on Never Was A Gamer, it's Shadow of the Colossus!
We've got some great topics in the mix, including a long conversation about why most bosses are so bad. Along the way, oh boy do we spoil a lot. Spoiler warnings for:
Journey; Brother: A Tale of Two Sons; The Walking Dead (Season 1) (Telltale); Nier: Automata; Final Fantasy 7; Final Fantasy 6; Final Fantasy 8; Bioshock; Bioshock 2; Bioshock Infinite; The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt; Pokemon Red and Blue; Wonderboy; Luigi's Mansion 3; Sonic Mania; Sonic Adventure 2; Mass Effect 1; Sekiro; Dragon Age 2.
Timecodes:
0.00 Intro.
5.16 Sad monster hunter?
8.10 Original 2005 release.
14.20 Ico (2001).
18.31 Wanda and Colossus.
BREAK
21.40 Promoting Shadow of the Colossus.
24.05 Artsy British games press.
27.00 Print ads!
30.05 But will it be art?
32.17 Editorial from Edge magazine.
37.00 But what does Dave Halverson think?
37.45 Emotional games.
40.30 Is it mostly about story?
47.20 Mechanics of feeling.
50.48 Choice and feeling.
BREAK
57.05 Boss fights!!
59.55 Why we tend to dislike them.
1.01.14 The first boss Michelle ever hated.
1.05.50 Functions of bosses.
1.16.30 What we like in a boss fight.
1.24.07 Our faves.
1.30.45 Our most hated.
1.35.42 Hopes for Shadow of the Colossus.
1.37.33 Predictions.
Ads featured in this episode:
Cover of Play magazine (2005).
Cover of Edge magazine (2005).
Thursday Apr 16, 2020
Thursday Apr 16, 2020
Today on Never Was A Gamer: it's Link's Awakening, Part 2! It's a fun one, today.
Timecodes:
0.00 Introduction.
2.15 The opening.
7.30 The Zelda formula.
18.10 Surprisingly not that hard.
20.30 The question of Tone (why is Mario here though).
26.50 Is this a Metroidvania?
BREAK
30.45 Dungeons.
38.02 A certain playful antagonism.
40.33 The Eagle's Tower.
46.25 The "difficulty" question.
48.07 Nightmare fuel (aka the Face Dungeon).
BREAK
50.51 What's old and what's new in the 2019 version?
56.45 Another embedded hint system!
1.00.20 Dimitri loves that bow.
1.02.30 The 2D/3D sections!
1.04.10 Waypoints?
BREAK
1.09.48 Let's talk about the ending.
1.14.40 And also Marin.
1.16.15 And Metal Gear Solid I guess??
1.18.50 Predictions.
1.20.45 Michelle's score.
Thursday Apr 02, 2020
Thursday Apr 02, 2020
Today on Never Was A Gamer: it's the Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening!
Timecodes:
0.00 Intro.
2.10 Michelle remembers Link to the Past (sort of).
5.50 Zeldas in general.
12.45 Dimitri's history with Zelda.
17.45 What is an adventure?
35.40 History of GameBoy and Link's Awakening (1993).
44.30 A sprawling adventure on the tiny green screen.
48.35 Down with Zelda! (Ads from '93)
56.45 Which version 'counts'? Remakes, remasters, and whatever elses.
1.18.55 Predictions.
Promo Materials:
North American rap commercial: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eeL9cJ5khHU
French Canadian commercial: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rIx5w601U7s
Japanese commercial (puppets): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L2Eo9dh3xgQ
Thursday Mar 26, 2020
Thursday Mar 26, 2020
Today on Never Was A Gamer: a little bonus episode for you! We've played Death Stranding and oh boy do we have a lot to say about it. But that will have to wait for another time, because right now we're talking about what Death Stranding taught us about Metal Gear Solid and Dimitri's hero, Kojima.
When we recorded this episode back in January, we didn't know what Covid-19 was going to become. It feels weird to post this now without acknowledging how weirdly salient Death Stranding feels in this moment, when we're all trying to stay connected in the face of catastrophe. We are both safe and healthy, and taking this virus very seriously. We hope you are, too.
We'll be back next week with our regularly scheduled full episode, Part 1 of a whole new game.
Timecodes:
0.00 Intro
5.40 #1: Kojima is 70% made of television.
17.20 #2: Kojima smuggles indie ideas into mainstream games.
22.23 #3: Evolution of stealth.
28.32 10 things we learned about Kojima.
30.44 Final score.
Thursday Mar 19, 2020
Thursday Mar 19, 2020
Today on Never Was A Gamer: Metal Gear Solid on SNES!
Timecodes: