NOCLIP Pocket E58 - White Knuckle Frenzy - Dragon's Lair

To slay the podcast, use the magic sword!

Welcome to NOCLIP Pocket! Today, we’re going to be talking about Dragon’s Lair and it’s sequels and spinoffs, which were all developed for arcades and use the animation of Don Bluth. The animation is really the selling point of these games, and if you can put yourself in an arcade in the 80s, you can imagine how these would stand out. The hand drawn animation recalls Bluth’s movies and makes up most of what appears on screen, with the only UI elements being a score display and the flashing yellow indicators to show players what to press. The other half of the game is a mechanic set that involves pressing one of four directions or a button to ensure Dirk is headed down the correct path. Simplicity was pretty normal in games at the time, but the incredibly punishing timing windows makes it fairly clear that in addition to the hard work put into making the animation look as good as it does, a decent amount of work was also done to make the game good at vacuuming quarters out of the pockets of children. In the modern era, this game is like a turbo version of Simon Says, but is still interesting to look at nonetheless. We’re going to be talking about visual fidelity and the art of appealing animation, the differences and similarities between the three games in this spiritual series both mechanically and in the way they tell a story with their short animations, and the abject chaos that is Dragon’s Lair 2: Time Warp.

Thank you for joining us this week! We love a weird one, and this one was pretty strange. Though the design intention was pretty easy to suss out, it was still fun to take a look at a game that is this old in comparison to what we’re usually playing. Are you old enough to have played this back in the arcade days, or have you given it a look more recently with the collection release? Did you watch this game on YouTube because playing it seemed like a really tedious effort? Let us know in the comments, or over on our Discord server! As we enter a new month, next time we’re going to be talking about Ape Escape, a classic PS1 title about apes…who have escaped. Pretty straightforward.

Episode 127 - Slaps Soft Ass - Shovel Knight

Steel thy podcast!

Welcome back! Today, we’re going to be talking about Shovel Knight, the 2D platformer developed by Yacht Club Games in the long ago age of 2014. Yes, this is an older game that has been talked to death already, but it was definitely interesting to see it now with more or less fresh eyes, particularly in today’s landscape where the game is taken as sort of a given. Shovel Knight exploded on the scene when it released because it was an indie 2D platformer that seemed to actually nail what we all remembered as being fun from those games when we played them as kids. And that is the game’s biggest strength: taking a very light touch to modernization and creating a game that truly feels like the games it’s emulating, while still being palatable to a modern audience. That doesn’t mean it’s all killer no filler, though, as some of the design still feels a little dated, or emphasizes a kind of gameplay that might not appeal to everyone, but all of that still feels part of the charm. When partnered with an absolutely stellar presentation in visuals and music, my god, the music, and taking into consideration the changes and adjustments it has undergone through its multiple releases, the game still stands as an excellently executed ode to the 90s era of platformers. We’ll be talking about how the game’s emphasis on its cast of characters brings out its charm, how the level and boss design calls back to the retro era, and we pitch a series of Shovel Knight merchandise like we’re Mel Brooks in Spaceballs.

Thank you for listening to the podcast this week. Scratch another game off the original list we made back in 2015 when this game could have been considered “on the newer side.” Was it worth the wait? Does anyone care? When did you play this game, and what do you think of the cultural hype that’s built up around it, effectively making it one of the most well known indie games of all time? Let us know in the comments, or over on Discord! Next time, we’re going to be talking about Elden Ring, which we somehow, some way, found time to finish and record an episode on in a month. Please be impressed by our lack of things to do in real life, and also please come back then to listen to the episode.

NOCLIP Pocket E57 - Group Project Vibes - The Bouncer

I don’t care if I destroy my podcast, as long as I slaughter all of you!

Welcome to the final episode of Fanbruary, which happens to be in March, but February is a short month so cut us some slack. In this episode, we’re going to be talking about The Bouncer, a weird little 3D beat ‘em up from Square and the first game they released on PS2. This game feels like a release that was feeling out what could be done on the new hardware, that Square would eventually put to use in the games that would define their presence in this console generation. And because of the success of games like Kingdom Hearts and Final Fantasy X, this game tends to slip, largely forgotten, into history. Now, I’m not here to say that this is a big tragedy, on the contrary, this is an extremely odd game with a pretty niche audience who is going to really engage with it. But if you find yourself in that audience, or if you’re looking for an experience that seems to defy explanation both in its narrative and by its very existence, this game might be worth checking out. We’re going to be talking about how buck wild the story can get at times, the impressive technical elements of the game, and how old you have to be to undergo Kung-Fu training.

Thank you for joining us this week! This is our last episode that was explicitly listener suggested, but stick around, particularly if you made suggestions, because some of them will worm their way into our schedule one way or another. Did you play the Bouncer when it came out, or is this a totally new experience for you? Did you go through the game a hundred times to unlock all the playable characters and their moves? What bouncer rank are you? Let us know over in Discord or in the comments below. Next time, we’re going to be talking about Shovel Knight, another game we have had on our list for some time, but now seemed like the best time to pull it out. Something about a grand fantasy quest just feels right post February 25th for some reason…oh well.

Episode 126 - Coulda, Shoulda, Keycards - Prey

We spent years trying to put the podcast into you, we never tried to put you into the podcast.

Welcome back! We’ve had a pretty good time so far on Fanbruary, the month where our listeners select the games we play, and we’re going to continue that good time with Prey, the 2017 Arcane immersive sim game. Prey is a first person shooter, but with a heavy focus on systems and a wide array of things the player can do, either by default or by spending some resources to unlock abilities. This is fairly standard for the immersive sim genre, but as the games that meet that criteria are pretty few and far between, it’s safe to say this is among the most accessible of them. The game is pretty not confusing, and the threats and objectives are always clear, so even a player with little to no experience in specializing toward a playstyle can jump in and get a handle on it. I mention this because it describes both of us prior to playing this game, and once we jumped in, we ended up taking two entirely different paths and found the game about as balanced and fluid despite our vastly different playstyles. This is the strength of Prey’s design: the game gives you tools and lets you decide how best to use them, and no matter your choice, you’ll find yourself uniquely capable of taking on its challenges without needing to bend your playstyle around them. We’re going to be talking about tried and true vs novel mechanic sets, world design across the whole title with special emphasis on the brilliant intro, and we talk about how the fat cats over at Big Arrow got their hands into our games again.

Thank you for joining us again this week! This is the last full episode of “Fanbruary” (and, would ya look at the time, maybe the last episode in February at all), but we have one more listener-suggested pocket title to get to next week. We’re extremely pleased with how these turned out as far as quality and variety, so we’re going to count this as a successful theme and will probably revisit it next year. If you want to get in on it, let us know in the comments, or come join our Discord server where you can talk about this and all the other games, as well as make regular suggestions whenever you want. What did you think of Prey? Did you play it at launch, or is it one you came back to? Did you become hopelessly addicted to Neuromods like I did? Did you accidentally play the 2006 game because they share the same name? Let’s hope not. Next time, we’re going to be diving into Elden March, which is to say, we’re talking about Shovel Knight, a game that has very little to do with Elden Ring. But I hope it’s exciting nonetheless.

NOCLIP Pocket E56 - Gorgon Conclusions - Killing Zone

Sensational 3-D Podcast!

Hooooo boy, welcome back to the podcast. This week, as part of Fanbruary, we’re talking about Killing Zone, a PS1 fighting game starring some conspicuously public domain monsters. You might ask, is this game good? That’s a really fair question. No, it’s not great, for sure, but what it does provide is nostalgia (and at least one pretty cool idea, but I’ll get to that later). Sure, maybe your favorite games are actually good, but I bet all of you have at least one game that gives you that warm fuzzy feeling from remembering days in your childhood playing a game you got as a gift, from a bargain bin, or that you rented. This is that kind of a game: not one we’d recommend going back to if you haven’t played it, we’ve done that for you, but one that reminds you of the Glovers or Rascals of the world. As a bonus, the game also includes a CPU training mode called “Auto Mode” that is actually a cool idea, even if it fails in execution, so you’ll get a little regular game design talk out of this episode as well. See, we’ve kind of got a bit of everything in this one. We’re going to talk about fighting game mechanics and balance since I suppose we have to at least try, aesthetics and audio design done in a way only the PS1 era could have accomplished, and we attempt to decipher the one spoken line of dialogue and extrapolate that into a backstory for the game’s announcer.

Thank you for joining us this week! While we don’t necessarily recommend seeking this one out, we do recommend listening because I think there is value in looking at things that don’t quite meet their goals. We talk a bit about the difference between games that seem like they had aspirations, obvious cash grabs, and those that are harder to figure out, and I think it’s actually a pretty useful discussion to have when talking about “bad” games. Plus if you don’t listen we won’t get that sweet content cash. Do you have a pet favorite weird game from a bygone era that you enjoyed as a child? Let us know down in the comments, or come talk about it over on Discord! We sourced every one of the games we’re playing this month from our suggestions channel over there, so do join if you would like to be a similarly bad influence to us in the future. Next time, we’re going to be checking out Square’s The Bouncer, a game that has mostly been forgotten to time, so do keep an eye out for that!

Episode 125 - Strawberry Laser - Everspace

You’re a podcast? Then why didn’t you attack on sight?

Welcome back! This month is Fanbruary, which means that we are playing games suggested to us by our audience, and the very first we’ve chosen to cover is Everspace. This is a space combat game with a rougelite framework, seeing you making runs through six different “Sectors” to explore and collect resources and starting from the beginning each time you die. The “lite” part of the genre title comes in the form of credits, the game’s metacurrency which you can spend to upgrade either yourself or your ship, making subsequent runs a little bit easier. And I really can’t stress “a little bit” enough. This is a difficult game, particularly if you don’t have a lot of experience with this type of combat, but it is helped immensely by the shocking amount of fine control you have over your movement, making the actual experience of playing pretty smooth and the fights feel more strategic. Once the game has its hooks in you, it actually is a really compelling experience and it had us engaging with its narrative mysteries as well as its mechanical ones once we got the hang of it. We’re going to be talking about the many layers of systems in the game and how it might be better off explaining more of them a little earlier, the surprisingly solid presentation in the form of audio and visuals all the way up through writing and voice acting, and all the good, flavorful lasers.

This is the first episode to come out for “Fanbruary” but we’re pretty deep into the games already and I gotta say I haven’t been this excited about doing some episodes in a while. We were both kind of expecting to get left in the dust by this game and were pleasantly surprised at how captivating we ended up finding it. Have you played this game? Are you a space games kind of person or someone constantly searching for that new roguelike that’s going to grab you? In either case, this is one to at least give a shot to. Let us know on our Discord or down in the comments if it worked as well for you as it did for us. Next time, we’re going to be talking about Arkane’s Prey, a reboot in the loosest sense of the term that puts the Dishonored developer’s immersive sim trademark back on the genre in which it started, the sci-fi FPS, so check it out then.

NOCLIP Pocket E55 - The Birdboss Challenge - Momodora: Reverie Under the Moonlight

This sacred podcast is one of the few untouched spots.

Welcome back to NOCLIP pocket! Today, we’re going to be talking about Momodora: Reverie Under the Moonlight, which is the fourth game in the Momodora series, but the first one to really take off. This is a Metroidvania game, but one that is surprisingly compact. It’s fairly rare in the genre to have a game this short, and it brings with it some disadvantages but also some surprising advantages. The smaller map makes backtracking and exploration a lot more clear, and encourages the player to explore more thoroughly, and makes your destination more clear due to it being more fresh in your memory without the need of more obvious signposting. The game falls within the Souls-like subgenre, a boon to its coming to prominence at the time of its release, but even so, feels very at home as a Metroidvania and less like copy-paste of Souls mechanics common in the era. The combat system, while simple, feels very satisfying when you’re engaging with it at face value, though there are ways to exploit it. It’s a mixed bag, but one that feels worth your time, as long as you don’t mind a pretty silly looking boob boss. We’re going to be talking about using new abilities to reach areas in a map small enough for you to remember where you should be using them, the balancing of the combat system and difficulty, and a lot more than could have ever been thought necessary about the Swamp Witch.

Thank you for joining us this week! We knew little about this game prior to playing it, but it seemed like a decent go-along with Metroid: Dread, and I’m personally pretty satisfied with the experience. As a short indie Metroidvania, it can sometimes highlight the things that really are cool about the genre even though it doesn’t really strike out in too many new directions itself. What did you think about it? Did it hit the right notes of the Soulslike formula for you, or would you have preferred something longer or more complex? Let us know over in the Discord or in the comments! And while you’re there, in the Discord, doing whatever, keep an eye out on the announcements channel, because we’re going to be announcing all the games we chose for Fanbruary, our audience choice theme month, very soon. So check us out then!

Episode 124 - Imagine Skin - Metroid Dread

You have been stripped of most abilities. You might call it podcast amnesia.

Welcome back to the podcast! Today, we’re going to be talking about Metroid Dread, the 5th mainline 2D Metroid game, which is admittedly a lot of qualifiers. Dread picks up following the events of Fusion, a game that was nearly 19 years old at Dread’s release, and carries over its story elements as well as some of the design that made Fusion feel different from the games that preceded it. For example, Dread feels like a more linear experience than previous Metroid games, with less of an emphasis on exploration, but it does so much more with its design, guiding players with a much more invisible hand than Fusion was able to do, and making navigation feel much less daunting than in classic Metroidvanias. Instead, Dread shifts its difficulty more into combat, which is more fluid than its ever been, leaning partially on the newer hardware it’s been released on, but also because you are given a host of new abilities both for movement and combat, chief amongst them being the counter, a mechanic developed in the remake of Metroid II on the 3DS, and put to use again here to great effect. This counter mechanic, as well as the speed and fluidity of the combat, shifts the focus of gameplay from careful exploration and resource management into a more run and gun experience, with the exploration being relegated to uncovering upgrades and hidden paths. While some may lament the loss of a more traditional Metroid experience, it does still provide a mix that keeps the feeling of exploring an unknown planet while smoothing out the frustrating experiences and focusing more on player execution. We’re going to be talking about abstraction in level design and how this can better immerse the player in the game, combat difficulty and boss fights, and we discuss how Samus has over time become a cocktail of genetics.

Thank you for joining us again this week! Metroid, being one of the genre naming franchises of “Metroidvania” style games, has largely existed on its classic catalogue, with many years between releases and spinoff games and remakes holding down its presence in the gaming landscape, so to get a new game with comparatively little time between announcement and release was a pretty exciting thing for fans, most notably, me. How do you think Dread handled the franchise’s tropes and design sensibilities? Was it what you were looking for, or do you still pine for another game like Super Metroid? Let us know down in the comments or over on our Discord server where we talk about the games. Next time, we’ll be playing… something. We’re opening up the suggestions to the listeners for next month, so check back in to find out what we were recommended, or drop a suggestion of your own in the comment section!

NOCLIP Pocket E54 - Humble Bumble - Wandersong

I hope I was able to prove I’m more handy than the average podcast.

Welcome back! Our first game of 2022 is going to be Wandersong, the indie adventure game that refused to just be an indie adventure game. In this game, you play a Bard who is clued in to the forthcoming apocalypse and sets out on an adventure to save the world. Carried by an immutable (literally and figuratively) enthusiasm, the Bard overcomes obstacles using a combination of song and some light platforming mechanics. Tonally, this game is delightful, with the bard meeting all comers with a positive attitude and a desire to make peace over all else. It’s a great way to express the game’s philosophy in a way that manages to be heartfelt and funny while feeling appropriately storybook even if it’s a bit on the nose. Mechanically, it’s more of a mixed bag. If you want to see a developer really try everything, this could be the perfect game for you, and you certainly will never get tired of any one thing. However, you can see a bit of a lack of polish across the game’s many unique mechanics and challenges, although you’ll never engage with one of them for more than a few minutes at a time. Put together, this is a game worth giving a shot to if you’re looking for something colorful that isn’t afraid to experiment. We’re going to be talking about focusing your game on a musician and what that means both in presentation and in mechanics, how a simple narrative can work well when you’re priority is getting across an emotion, and we determine whether this game’s McGuffin is better or worse than the Triforce.

Thank you for listening to the podcast this week (and this year)! We should be back to releasing more regularly from here on out, but it was nice to have a bit of extra time on this game for the sake of our other responsibilities over the holidays. Let us know what you think of this game in the comments or over on our Discord. Were the rapidly shifting mechanics and simple story a bit too hard for you to take seriously, or did they come off as amusing, entertaining or just a novel experiment? Next time, we’re going to be talking about Momodora: Reverie Under the Moonlight to coincide with our main episode on Metroid: Dread, so get your Metroidvania brain in gear because we’re going to be lookin’ at maps for the rest of the month.

The NOCLIP Awards 2021 - Non Falafel Content for Eating

We’re rolling out the green carpet, and not just to play executive golf.

The NOCLIP Awards are our most important annual tradition, and we’re back again this year with a new crop of categories alongside our old favorites. Find out what game did jumping the worst, which game focused the most on its mechanics and least on anything else, and join us as we figure out which host knows the other the best in our own version of the Newlyweds Game. All this and many (or at least some) more will be debated and judged for the enjoyment of your perfunctory NOCLIP Awards house parties I expect all of you to be hosting.

Thanks for listening, and I hope you were on the correct side more than not. Do you think we picked correctly here? Was anyone monstrously robbed of their amazing submissions? Did you have a totally different pick for a category, or could you come up with your own list based on the games you personally have played this year? Let us know over on Discord or in the comments below. We’ll be back next time with NOCLIP Pocket focusing on Wondersong and after that a full episode on Metroid: Dread, so we hope you’ll join us in kicking off the new year.

Episode 123 - 3,000 Emails - Life is Strange: True Colors

Bah! What a thankless life! Being a podcaster in the age of monsters!

Welcome back to the podcast! Today, we’re going to be talking about Life is Strange: True Colors, because we just can’t quit this series apparently. The third game follows the gameplay precedents the series has adhered to thus far, being an adventure game in the “Telltale style” (a term that seems more and more dated since the studio was closed and then reanimated), that focuses on dialog trees and choice-matters narrative branches as opposed to puzzles. It even maintains a lot of the aesthetic and tone set up in the previous games, though notably the plot is now a lot more grounded barring Alex’s power to read and occasionally feel other’s emotions. And that power is probably the closest the series has come to smoothly integrating new mechanics into its overall structure, given how important emotions are to, you know, interfacing with other human beings. If you don’t know the series, everything revolves around its characters and plot, so we’d recommend playing the game first if you’re interested before listening to the episode and I won’t get into anything more spoiler-y here. We’re going to be talking about character building and how the game chooses to focus its emotional energy this time around, the setting of the game and how it succeeds in setting the groundwork for the game’s tone, but may stifle other aspects, and we spoil the true lore of the game which mixes an eldritch death cult and Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

Thanks for joining us today! If you’ve been listening for a while, you may have caught our episode on Life is Strange 2, which I would say we had…some issues with. Coming off a series low (in our opinion), we wondered if this third game could recapture what made the first game actually good. And it mostly does! We’d love to hear about your views on the trajectory of the franchise and whether you agree with our assessment on this (or any other LiS game). Let us know in the comments, or over on our Discord! Next time, we’re going from a game you can mostly play with one hand to a game that feels like you might need three to competently manage in Metroid Dread, so check us out then.

NOCLIP Pocket E53 - Medicinal Straw - Toem

A new podcast has been added to your HikeLady,

Welcome back to the podcast! Today, we’re going to be talking about Toem, a photo-taking adventure game from developer Something We Made, and a game that is, well, frankly, sort of squarely in our wheelhouse. In Toem, you are tasked with going from place to place and fulfilling requests, which you do by using your camera and some limited environmental interaction to solve puzzles and obtain items. The camera is definitely the most noteworthy mechanical part of this game, switching from the game’s isometric perspective into a first person one and allowing you to freely move around and take pictures at whatever angle you choose. This is used to good effect, putting things in locations you can barely see without the on-the-ground viewpoint given to you by the camera. It makes the puzzles feel engaging and occasionally challenging, yet the lenient completion requirements allow you to moderate exactly how chill of an experience you want from it. Combine that with the game’s grayscale art style and varied characters, and you have a short, laid back game that scratches that itch for a do nothing night at home that you can play in a single sitting. We’re going to be talking about the unique way this game approaches puzzles, what it does to encourage completing the game at your own pace, and we try to turn the podcast into a news show for some dumb reason.

Thank you for joining us again this week! Toem was, to us, a pretty decent follow up to Ocarina of Time, just because it is so short and laid back. There is functionally no pressure in this game and it makes for a really calm experience to sit down and play. Did you find the slow but dense style of this game to work for you, or were you searching for something a little deeper? How did you feel about the presentation, whether it be the simplistic visuals or the acoustic indie soundtrack? Let us know in the comments, or over on our Discord, and maybe drop a suggestion for what we should play next. Next time, we’re playing a game that no one requested, in the form of Wandersong, which, debatably, is a pretty similar game to to all the indie adventure games we play, but with a more musical bent. It’s certainly a lot more colorful than Toem, so at least that sets it apart. We hope you’ll come back for it next time.

Episode 122 - Narrow Guillotine Alley - The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time

Would you like to hear what I said again?

Welcome back! I don’t know how much I really need to say about Ocarina of Time, it’s one of the few axioms of video games that you can just assume people know about and understand. This game accomplished a lot for the industry at the time, making a lasting impact on both games, in the form of how design changed after it came out, and players who would use it as a point of comparison for action adventure games for years to come. But we’re playing it now, in 2021, and want to examine it using our modern lens. What design decisions hold up, and what felt like a limitation of the time or the hardware it was originally released on? How has its impact affected other games in its series and otherwise? How annoying, comparatively, are the different NPCs who talk to you against your will? We try to answer these questions as well as discuss our experiences more in our usual way and hopefully that ends up being an entertaining take on this game that has been talked absolutely to death over the last twenty years. We’re going to be talking about dungeon design and how the 3DS update brought out the best in some of them, the presentation of the game in terms of its world and atmosphere and the effect that had to enrapture players at the time, and the many Unix systems that we should know.

Thank you for joining us this week. This game almost feels like a right of passage for content creation, and it’s probably about time we finally talk about it. It certainly has a legacy that is lasting, and coming at it with fresh-ish eyes won’t really change that, but it’s interesting to see what parts of it still work because it really shines a light on the parts of the game that have been emulated by developers over the years. Is this a nostalgic classic for you, or did you get on the boat late? Have you, however impossible it might seem to people, not ever played this? Let us know in the comments, or over on Discord. Next time, we’re going from an all time classic to a newer title in a beloved (by us) franchise with Life is Strange: True Colors, so come back for that if you thought it was weird for us to not be talking about a game mostly about walking around and talking to people.

NOCLIP Pocket E52 - Free the Jesus Trapped Inside - The Procession to Calvary

All hail Podcast John!

Welcome back to NOCLIP Pocket! Today, we’re talking about The Procession to Calvary, a point and click adventure game with an art style composed entirely of renaissance era paintings. If that hasn’t already sold you on the idea, then I don’t really know what your deal is. Comparisons to Monty Python are pretty common in the discourse surrounding this game, and it’s pretty clear why that is, given the art style and the game’s emphasis on humor. To some extent, the game is much more focused on being a comedy than it is a point and click game, and that absolutely works for it. The barebones mechanic set also allows for more of your verbs to be used in these jokes as well, with the ability to punch pretty much anyone and applaud the in-game musicians performing the music you’ll hear throughout the game. Overall, it’s a interesting and pretty strange little title that’s worth trying out if only to see something visually new and outlandish. We’re going to be talking about what made jokes land or not for us, whether or not the puzzles in this game constitute “moon logic", and, somehow, some way, for some reason, Chalk Zone.

Thank you for joining us again this week! If you played this one, did the old-ish adventure game mechanics make you feel nostalgic while playing this game, or were they a hurdle to get over? Was this funny to you? Let us know in the comments, or pop over to our Discord to talk about it with us. Starting, well, technically last episode, we’re going to be slowing down releases a bit due to some scheduling concerns, so sorry about that. If this game was up your alley, though, maybe try out some of the other weird games we’ve covered over the years in the meantime. No time like the present, right? Next time, we’re going to be talking about Toem, a recent release which is less on the irreverent humor side and more on the cute photography side of games we talk about on Pocket, so we hope you’ll come back for that.

Episode 121 - Psytation Needed - Psychonauts 2

Name for me this podcast so roughly bearing me o’er the sea!

Welcome back to NOCLIP in the not so spooky month of November! Today, we’re going to be talking about Psychonauts 2, the long-awaited sequel from Double Fine. Psychonauts 2 is an action platformer game in much the same way as its predecessor, but with a more ambitious scope that comes from having so many years in between titles. As it picks up briskly from where Rhombus of Ruin ended (which, itself, picks up immediately after the events of the first game), you might be surprised at the depth of the game’s themes. The tone is very much the same, with an emphasis on humor that plays into the game’s outlandish premise, but it spends the time to much more critically examine its characters. The game focuses on the real impact its characters have on each other and their surroundings all the while honing the platforming elements, elevating it from a cult favorite to a pretty genuinely well made game on all fronts. The movement is smooth and your abilities feel more integrated in combat, making everything from level progression to the greatly expanded side content feel natural, exciting and fun. We’re going to be talking about how the levels in this game feel more fleshed out, though maybe less punchy, than in the first, the psy powers and how they’ve been changed and updated, and about Nick Johnsmith’s juicy middle.

Thank you for listening! By the nature of us doing the podcast only in recent years, it feels like it hasn’t been that long since we played the original Psychonauts, but as big fans of the original, we couldn’t let this one go without comment. How do you feel about this game and the changes it made? Was it satisfyingly different to you? Not different enough? Did you also wonder why the other intern kids got pretty roughly sidelined for most of the game? Let us know in the comments, or over on our Discord where you can talk about the game and suggest new games for us to play! Next time, we’re going to be talking about The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, which I’m going to say like it’s no big deal, but am actually nervous to have something interesting to say about it after like 25 years and a million think pieces. So I hope you’ll join us in our existential dread then!

NOCLIP Pocket E51 - One Noodle - Carrion

Podcast 60% breached.

Happy Halloween! For our final game this October, we’re going to become the monster and take on Carrion, a Metroidvania where you play as a big tentacle monster. On its own, that is kind of a lackluster description for the game, but what makes the game successful at its goals is a bit difficult to describe in a short way. What the game really excels at is making the monster you play as feel just right, in a way that the premise doesn’t quite get across. You’ll stalk enemies from just out of sight and attack in a quick and lethal way. Your movement is extremely free, being able to move straight up vertical shafts as if gravity doesn’t exist by propelling yourself up the walls, but also encumbered enough by your sheer mass that getting to some places takes just long enough to create tension. You are extremely powerful, but very fragile. The game may not be particularly scary, exactly, but it does succeed in putting you in the headspace of a monster, which if that isn’t in the Halloween spirit, I don’t know what is. We’re going to be talking about how the level design keeps you moving forward while still keeping the ability-unlock progression system of a Metroidvania, how wrapping your head around the controls and your movement options actually forces you to play the game like the monster should, and we talk about the butchery equipment that was sold to us as kids.

Thank you for listening to NOCLIP this week, and for another year of October horror games! We’re pretty happy with the variety we managed this year and will keep an eye out for more of the strange and interesting projects as we plan for next year’s crop. How about you, though? What horror games, if any, did you play to get into the spirit this year? Did we manage to introduce you to something new or at least have you try something you haven’t yet? Let us know in the comments, or over on our Discord! As we move into November, we want to go in an entirely different direction, and are going to be talking about The Procession to Calvary, so we hope you’ll join us for that!

Episode 120 - Dude With Knife - Outlast

When people get scared, they’re as likely to turn to podcasts as anything else.

Welcome back to the podcast! Today, we’re talking about Outlast, which is one of the classics of the modern horror game community. This is a first person horror adventure game that gives you no way of defending yourself against the things that are coming to kill you (a “haunted house game” in our parlance), but despite coming out when this type of game was decidedly in vogue, it sets itself apart in two big ways. First, it is shockingly fast paced for a game in the genre, with a lot of your time spent running and following a fairly clear path, and less of it spent investigating and exploring the way something like Amnesia would play. And the second, pretty clearly, is its aesthetic. The washed out green atmosphere is a staple of the game’s marketing which carries over into its DLC and sequel as well, but also emphasizes the found-footage style they were going for here. Using your camera as a flashlight and as a way to get collectibles in a kind of token way is the gimmick that the game rides on and it does succeed in generating an identity of its own. We’re going to be talking about how the game holds up after several years and multiple refinements of its genre, the effectiveness of patrolling enemies, and we explore the assumptions created by the “gamer brain.”

Thank you for joining us for the last episode of Halloween! On the main podcast, anyway, we still have one more horror title to talk about on Pocket next week, so be sure to check in for that to really round out the month. Did you play Outlast when it came out, or had it recommended while talking about horror titles? Do you think it holds up? Let us know in the comments or over on our Discord! Thank you for listening and I hope your October has been pleasantly spooky, or unpleasantly, or whatever you wanted it to be. As we’re leaving October, next time we’re going to be talking about Psychonauts 2, the newest entry in the list of game sequels that released extremely far apart from their predecessors, so we hope you’ll be back for that.

NOCLIP Pocket E50 - An Edgelord Production - Sally Face

Once they started calling me that, I figured if I owned the podcast, they couldn’t use it against me.

Welcome back to NOCLIP Pocket! It’s the middle of October which means we are right in the middle of horror season, and so today we’re talking about Sally Face. Sally Face is a horror adventure game made by a single person that mashes together so many elements of horror that you might find it surprising that the game actually manages to be surprisingly sentimental. While the game begins with a combination of real world horror and a couple of ghosts, it quickly spirals out of control and adds more and more elements, potentially as a consequence of its episodic release structure, or maybe a desire to fit all the developers ideas into the game, but whether you find this disarming or charming is going to come down to personal preference. It’s a game that has a certain edge to it from its lo-fi production and subject matter, but in the end, if you stick with it, you will become strangely endeared to the characters. We’re going to talk about how tone and atmosphere fit around overall aesthetics, having a mix of different mechanics thrown in for variety and how well it was pulled off, and we discuss this games meets meets meets between Nickelodeon cartoons, video games and collectible cards from the 80s.

Thank you for joining us again this week! This game comes from a recommendation from an IRL friend (thanks, btw, if you’re reading this), and we were pretty surprised by how positive we came off on it. Which is a spoiler for the episode, I guess. If you played along, let us know how you felt about it down in the comments or over on Discord! I would imagine for people less entrenched in adventure games this may feel a little mechanics-light, but it hits a sweet spot I think for most audiences with a tolerance for the kind of game this is. We’re going to be wrapping up Halloween on another pocket episode, so be sure to join us while you’re carving your jack-o’-lanterns or eating candy corn or whatever you do for the season as we discuss Carrion next time!

Episode 119 - Orange Flavored Apple - The Medium

Remember, you can’t save every podcast.

Welcome to our first episode for this year’s Halloween! We’re going to be talking about The Medium, a horror adventure game with the hook that you are able to control your character in two different versions of the game world simultaneously; both the real world and the spirit world are accessible due to your status as a “medium.” What this translates to mechanically is that you move around the two versions of the world and need to solve various puzzles in order to get around. It has a little bit more depth than that, with sections having you in only one world or the other, or swapping between the two, but it does mostly consist of traversal obstacles and simple lock-and-key style puzzles. It tends to get by on its visuals, which are genuinely interesting, using color grading and surreal landscapes to really separate the two versions of the game’s world. We’re going to be talking about variety versus depth of mechanics, the importance of considering the non-literal interpretation of your narrative, and we try to figure out how to blink your ears.

Thank you for joining us again this week, and this year for another spooky Halloween. This developer, Bloober Team, sort of gained their popularity with “Layers of Fear” and has been steadily growing in budget in their later releases. We haven’t exactly kept up with them, so it was a bit surprising to see a game with more of a mechanical focus than the games we were aware of previously. How did this game sit with you? Let us know in the comments or over on our Discord. And stay tuned, as we still have another game (and a couple more Pocket episodes) on horror games this month, and next time we’re talking about Outlast, one of the classic horror titles with a deliberate found footage aesthetic.

Six Years of NOCLIP - Balloon Clown May

Unbelievably, we’ve now been doing this podcast for the length of a US Senator’s term, and that’s weird in at least several ways. We hope we’ve pleased our constituency during that time, though, especially since the other candidates in the upcoming race are likely much more popular than us and we do intend to try skating by on the high incumbency rates of elected officials. This metaphor kinda stopped working immediately.

For today’s anniversary celebration though, we’re giving you another selection of outtakes, bloopers and our sound test ramblings culled from this year’s episodes covering topics from how thoroughly we theme our episodes to reality tv dating shows and slogans for fictional companies. We hope you enjoy, and if you don’t, well, I can’t exactly blame you. We want to thank our friends for joining us on several episodes this year, the listeners for showing interest in what we do and validating this particular questionable use of our time, and whoever is out there creating the market for the unique and exceptionally weird games we like to play on Pocket sometimes. More horror titles are coming up for the rest of this month, so keep an eye out for that, and we’ll be back to provide an awful listening experience again next year. See ya then!