- Wow. Well, happy solstice to all of those brave souls. - Yeah. That was very good. There was a lot of really good costumes this year. I was very, very excited. A couple of Shrek's, which I really appreciate it. - Love a Shrek. - Love a new Shrek. - I saw a TikTok. (laughs) - That one really took a moment to sink in. - It takes a second to digest. (upbeat music) - Hello and welcome to .zip, a game. - Oh, fuck. (laughs) - Not a game. - It's a game. - We're playing a game right now. - Cancel, cancel me. Cancel the whole podcast, Kim's fired. Hello and welcome to .zip, a show about big games and small packages. My name is Relentlessly, Kim. - I am still Chase. - Today, we are covering yet another entry in Outlaw Summer, but this time we're leaving behind the Old West to go to a galaxy far, far away, but like a legally distinct one. We are playing a game called Notorious. - I had not really heard of this game. I'm like not a huge solo TTRPG person. I don't think we've ever like stated this explicitly in the show, but I'm usually not on those episodes and that's not because I hate TTRPGs. I just haven't played very many, but I'm here for the first time. This one, it seemed pretty dense as far as like first entries into this genre goes. - Yeah, this one is definitely more mechanically complex than the solo TTRPGs we've covered previously, which was a little bit daunting, but I actually really enjoyed how it turned out. This is a game by Jason Price, published by Always Checkers Publishing, and it is a bounty hunting game, sort of Star Wars inspired where you play a bounty hunter, you have a bounty and you are trying to find your target and take them out, whatever that means to you. - So to start out, you create your bounty hunter, including their species, their name, their personality, sort of backstory elements that you kind of fill out, and then you do all of this by rolling on a table or you can just create somebody, I guess, then you roll for what the contract is, who you've been hired to target, who hired you, the planet that they are believed to be on, which is where your adventure will take place. And then there's this gameplay loop where you're exploring, you might run into locals, get information from them or learn a little bit more about them. Some of those locals might turn into what are called assets, which can give you bonuses on some of your stats and roles later on, and yeah, just sort of explore and fill out this planet, create a little cast of characters, and eventually hopefully find your target. General impressions, Chase, what do you think? - Yeah, like I was saying, I think that it was slightly, it was kind of a lot of first. I'm like, when I show up to a board game night, I am definitely the dude who has maybe watched a YouTube video, but I'm praying for the one person who's like, I've played this before, I can teach you how to play. 'Cause I just like, I need somebody who has ingested the important parts of a game for me to really get it. Like, I think that's why I like video games is 'cause it's kind of that all the time. Somebody has just taken the most important parts and is showing you just that. Yeah, 'cause I feel like when I'm listening to the, you and AJ talk about like the games that you've played before, a lot of the times it's like, we had a deck of cards and then we just went outside and sat in the sun for a little while and drew the Jack of Hearts, which said this, that, and the other thing. And then I took a nap and ate lunch and here's the story that I had, whereas this one, yeah, it's a lot of like, okay, go to page 46 to see like what kind of character is at this part and then roll a six-sided die. Also, make sure you know you're no mad dice, a thing that we referenced on page 11. So as a first one for me getting into it, I think kind of intense at first, but once I got rolling with it, it's not that bad, especially like the game comes and I realized that this morning comes with a like online generator for some of the events that you can do. And so you really don't need to actually like get in the gully works all the time to generate these like events or locations or whatever. And like perhaps unsurprisingly, like I like DMing for D&D and stuff like that. The stuff about this game that I like the most is just the opportunities where it's like, hey, this thing vaguely happened. Fill in the details for what exactly happened there. I like that a lot and ended up being pretty long. I feel like I played this for much longer than I was expecting to. - Yeah, this came in I think close to, it would have, it was at least I think five hours for me, maybe even close to the six, which is sort of the upper limit that we target for games on .zip. - The zip threshold, yeah. - Yeah, and could have gone longer. That was one of probably my only kind of gripe with this game was that there is one particular stat that you need to be building up in order to progress in the game. And it just so happened that I was getting a combination of like unlucky roles and also like, because of how I was playing my character, I was not building that stat. And so I went, I think it was round seven for me of going through the exploration loop before I got my first lead, which the way that it works is you get two leads or three leads and your third lead is actually your target. And that's sort of how you progress in the game. And so there was a long time where I was like, not really going anywhere with my investigation. And it was like, how long does this go for? But it was really just a combination of like bad luck. And it was like how I was playing my character. And part of me liked it because it was sort of right for the character I was playing, but yeah, it ended up creating sort of a weird incentive to like play against what I had rolled, which we can talk about more in the spoilery section. - Sure. I think that this game is not as complex as it appears on the surface. Sort of once you get into that loop a few times, it becomes kind of like, okay, now I do this, now I do that very, very simple. And I agree with you the like filling in, like the complexity serves that feeling of taking the prompts that they have and filling it in in a way that feels really satisfying. - And as things went on, I found myself, as I got used to that loop, I was sort of taking liberties in terms of how one segment of the loop was going to feed into the other. For example, there was some part where my character, let's see, there was a round where I had to go through like a dark place. And so I had just had my first lead, which the leads and your target, it always starts with a showdown, which is like a big sort of cinematic scene setting thing. - Yeah. - And so in this particular showdown, there was, when I was confronting this lead, there was a like starfighter battle happening in the sky above and like raining down laser fire. Yeah, it's like, you can picture it in your mind and it's like really exciting. And so when the next thing I rolled was okay, and now you're like trekking through this dark place, I was like, okay, the way that she like gets out of there safely is to go through this dark place. And then you encounter a monster there and I happened to roll the option. You could get like, oh, you know, you encounter a bunch of little monsters or you encounter one big monster. And then there's something even bigger that that shows up to fight that thing. So I was like, oh, I rolled the second option on that. I was like, okay, like I get out of here, you know, from this scary monster thing. And then later on, you know, in the next round ended up at another location where I rolled something that was like, and you know, a monster attacks. And so I was like, okay, I'm gonna reference back to that last thing and say this monster actually has been tracking her since she left. And that's how it shows up at this place. - That's very cool. - And so yeah, it was like, as you go, these things can interconnect in very fun ways. You know, there are things where if you, you know, I mentioned earlier, there's quote-unquote assets, people who if you can successfully get some roles, you know, roll some dice with them, they can help you. There's also kind of a thing where your assets can show up later or people that you were unsuccessfully able to turn into an asset, you might be, you might stumble across them again at some point and be able to like convert them or recruit them then. So there's a lot of things where it kind of builds over time and by the end, I found that I had like a really strong sense of place on this planet and who was there and like what was important to them and that all happened sort of organically. And it was really cool. I really enjoyed that and like have now like a fondness in my heart for this planet, Ayama. - I was so glad we didn't get the same planet 'cause I think we wrote very similar characters, but glad you didn't land on UTAV like I did. - So good, yeah. No, I rolled on Ayama, which is a, you land, it's a really cool idea for a setting. It's like you land outside of a city and it's this like kind of industrial wasteland of like abandoned factories and stuff. And so I don't know if the intent was for you to like proceed on into the city, but I decided that my character didn't and she just sort of like stayed on these outskirts and this like kind of lawless in between, you know, like abandoned, not suburb, but like, I don't know, industrial area. It was a very fun concept. - That's cool. - I had a lot of fun with that. Yeah. What was UTAV like? - UTAV is snow planet. UTAV is inhospitable snow planet. It was very cool. - That's vibey. - Again, it is very vibey. It's very cool. This game definitely is wearing its influences on its sleeves. I mean, it literally says on like page two, like, hey, we like empire strikes back in the Mandalorian. - Yeah. - So it's not necessarily like a surprise for a lot of this stuff. So, you know, UTAV, Hoth kind of similar vibes. - Yeah. - To the point you were making about like being endeared to the world, it seems like the game is definitely trying to find that balance and it sounds like it was a little bit tilted in one direction for you because like by having that like threshold that you have to hit of usually notoriety. The game is just giving you these opportunities where like, it says like, hey, unless you have four notoriety here, here's the other shit that happens to you. - Right. - And so it's forcing you to be in the world for longer than just like, hey, you rolled the right dice immediately and you found your target, you know? Like that can't happen in this game. And so it's like forcing you to take a step back and be like, all right, well, what does the market look like? Or like, what does this person's house look like? Which is cool, but it's a really fine balance 'cause yeah, like once you start getting up there and you're like, okay, I would like to find the target now, it can get not tedious, but just lengthy. It gets very long. - Right. - I was definitely by the end of it like taking like, oh, that was kind of a tie. So I'm just gonna call myself the winner here. I don't even know. - Yeah, I definitely, I started doing things to increase my notoriety, just to kind of like move it along. I think if I hadn't been playing this for a podcast and sort of had a deadline on it, I think that this would be a fun game to kind of like, you know, let it, let it breathe. Like play it, you know, every night or a few nights and kind of just like let yourself move through the story at whatever pace you're gonna move through because I think that that would be extremely rewarding in terms of, yeah, just like the fun, it's like sort of like world building and character development that you get to do. That to me would be the ideal way to play it. It's like over the course of a few nights just sitting down for a couple of hours doing a few rounds of exploration. - Yeah, and also like it builds in this epilogue mechanic where once you're done with it, you can continue on in like another game. It's just like, hey, next time you start, if you want to keep playing the same person, you just start with a certain of notoriety, favor and motivation, which is cool. Like that's cool that it kind of loops back into itself. - Yeah, I think it's also cool that like, it is possible for your nomad, which is what they call the bounty hunters here, it's possible for them to fail. - Yes, yeah. - And even you, under some circumstances, you can choose for them to die as part of that failure. But through that epilogue mechanic, there are still ways to like pass the story on without giving too much away, which I think is really, really fascinating. And so there was a part of me that was surprised that this was only for one player because I could see a really fun kind of reworking of this with a group where you have, you know, just have like a long-term campaign with other people. I think that would be extremely fun. I don't quite know how I would jailbreak it to do that. But like, I feel like this way of storytelling and world building over time could be extremely fun in a group if there is a way to do that. - Yeah, you don't have to squint very hard to see how this would be a game that multiple people could play, which is cool, that's nice. - Yeah, I'm dying to hear what your character got up to and who they are and all this shit. - Yeah, same. So I think it's time to move on to spoilers if you are at all into like Star Wars or just the idea of a cool sci-fi bounty hunter, you know, scum and villainy type stuff. This is a really fun way to get more into that. So that's notorious. You can find links in the show notes, I'm sure. - Thank you, AJ. - Yeah, thank you, AJ, for handling all of that. And we will see you in the spoiler section. - Be right back. - Pew Pew. (laughing) Tell me about your Nomad, Chase. - Yeah, oh man, okay, so let's see. I got, I rolled the assassin character. - Ooh. - Who I liked playing quite a bit. They are, so essentially you get like different, like loadouts, fridge character. You can do different origins, scars and triggers as well. So I rolled a person called Soul Starlander. She is a human, her personality is calm and her scars that she lost three fingers. Her origin is that she used to work for, or helped order 66, which again, you know, the Star Wars connection. - Whoa. - That's so cool. - I was very excited about this. - Yeah. - So essentially like in this world, there was another sort of like purge that the old empire did to the new uprising at some point. And Soul had like, not unwillingly, but was just like young and was like, I gotta get paid, so I'm gonna do this. But she was also wrapped up in a relationship with somebody from the new uprising. And her trigger is that she missed the shot is the thing on her character sheet. But I rolled that as like, it was an intentional missed shot that like, she was supposed to at some point kill her, you know, relationship lover and decided I'm not going to do this, which obviously got her very much like kicked out of the good graces of the old empire. But it also, you know, despite her wanting to not take the shot, that person did end up passing. So like, you know, she's not with this person still. - Got it. - So I think calmness comes from like, she is a like well-trained, maybe like, you know, a little bit older at this point, but isn't somebody who's like going in guns blazing, like kind of just like, I'm gonna take, you know, these jobs 'cause I need to make money, but like, I'm not this old empire hot shot that I was at some point. And I just truly do not care for the conflict between these two factions. - Got it. - There was a lot of opportunities on Uthav to like have the, so the planets are split up by controlling and challenging faction. On Uthav, the controlling is the new uprising and the challenging is the old empire. - Okay. - And for like a lot of opportunities, her soul was like, I can't get involved with these dipshits. Like, they're just gonna keep fighting each other forever. And like, she's like, there's a couple times where she was like, there's plenty of good people in the new uprising, but there's a lot of like, zealotry among them too. So like, I don't like, I don't like the old empire either because they got my person killed, but also fuck these guys. - Yeah. - This sucks, so that's soul. She has a laser rifle and a concealed blade, which is very cool. - Sick. - Yeah. - That's really cool. - I really like it. - She had a nomad named Amursa. - Oh, cool. - She is a Charen, which is a bear-like species. - Yes, my target was a Charen. - Oh, wow. My people, how dare. I have to imagine that this is like, they're equivalent of like a bookie sort of thing. - I think so, yeah. - So that's sort of how I imagined her. So she is, her profile was the scoundrel. Your stylish exterior and cocky personality to make mercurial talent for scraping your way out of precarious situations. She was like, okay, cool. I'm kind of like a Han Solo vibe. But then the personality that I rolled was solemn, sincere and thoughtful. And I was like, this is not like wholly incompatible, but it is weird. And so the way that I sort of interpreted it is that like she is extremely confident in like a calm and assured kind of way where she's kind of always like calculating and planning, like very good at like planning her attacks, but then also like switching it up if things go awry, like constantly sort of like reformulating her plan. - Yeah. - Her scar is that she was injured in a tense duel and ended up with an eye patch origin. She was a former star fighter pilot and gloriously expelled from the old empire's vast navy. - Cool. - Yeah. And her trigger was, she was exiled by her people for a heinous crime she did not commit. And I, there was also something, I forget if this was under personality, your profile, but they asked, what past misdeed are you trying to atone for? And so I took all of that and combined it and decided that she was a starfighter pilot. She was like sort of on shore leave in her home planet when she found out about like a bounty for a dangerous and elusive target and decided to like try her hand at it. And basically ended up, you know, getting in a firefight with this person and getting an innocent person killed in the process. - Yeah. - Which led to her being arrested, expelled from the navy and exiled from her home planet. Sort of like combining all of those. - Yeah, that's great. - That's the backstory things I had rolled. And so since then she's like entered the bounty hunting life after she like got out of prison, but like sticks to this code of like, I plan things out, I make sure like, I know what I'm doing and I'm not going to like put innocent people at risk as part of, you know, anything that I do. - It's very cool. - Yeah. I was very excited about how I like managed to like put all of that stuff together. But then that did lead to the problem of, I was like, this is somebody who is very like, like deliberate, not really hot headed. And so like she's not going to kill in it or not innocent people, but like she's not going to, when you have a combat situation, when you succeed in most circumstances, you are given the option to kill or to spare. Killing will increase your notoriety. - Yes. - But I was like, I think in most cases, she would spare people. - Yeah. - Mistake. (laughing) Big mistake. Because between that and the roles I was getting, I was just not building notoriety for the vast majority of the game. - Oh my gosh. - And therefore did not progress for a very long time. - Yeah. - Until I realized that was the only way to progress. - You had mentioned something about this in the discord and I like pulled up that message this morning 'cause I was like, I don't want to like totally blow it here. And I was like, oh, okay. So like maybe cut a few people loose during your playtime. So a soul was a little bit looser with like, hey, somebody attacked me. Sorry, you're going to get the concealed blade and we're going to be done with it. - The concealed blade. - Yeah. - Oh, my loadout was a trusty laser pistol or two, a stun baton and her outfit is a wide brimmed hat, thigh holster and duster coat. So like, yeah, very sick look, including with the eyepatch. Like very, very outlaw summer. I was thrilled with that. - My soul had like, I have failed to mention it, but she has a hooded cowl and mysterious insignia and padded armor. So like, definitely the old sun-kissed drifter look, you know. - That's sick. - Yeah. - So yeah, I landed on Iama. That's about I-Y-A-M-A, maybe it's Iama. Described as a mega urban planet where you sort of land in the ruins of an old factory on the outskirts of a major city. And they describe this as sparse wasteland, a sea of junk menacing depths underground tunnels. So I do think that it was meant to be like, you stay outside of the city. And so yeah, that's what I did. The controlling empire or the controlling faction here is the old empire. The challenging faction is Red Moon, which is like a crime syndicate. And the minor faction is the New Uprising, which is basically the rebellion. - Yeah. - My client was the New Uprising. They had a bounty against a murian, which is a rat-like person named Kira Pyeong, who is aloof sarcastic and rude. - Wow, cool. - Yeah, who's your target? - I had Bindi. - Bindi. - Bindi. - Bindi Sue, the daughter of Steve Irwin. - Yes, sorry, we're trying to find her in Uthav. Bindi is a chair and she's very sincere. And the sort of plot device is that she has taken a treasured item that the, I think, I didn't write it down, but most of my writing would suggest that she was originally a prisoner of the old empire. - Ooh, okay. - Escaped with something. The game was definitely like, don't figure it out yet. - Oh, interesting, okay. - Which was cool. And yeah, it was fun. I like discovering what was going on there. - Were you hired by the old empire? - Yes, we're, no, sorry. We were hired by the New Uprising. - Got it. - And so sort of in my playthrough, I think what was happening is that, and initially I knew this of like, it seems like Bindi is trying to be caught by either side to be used for some political purpose on either direction. - That's fun. - That obviously the old empire isn't a fan of her because like she stole something that they had. And my thought was like, the old empire is trying to catch her and say like, look, we're so strong here that we can, you know, do whatever we want. And we like catch prisoners and like, you know, dole out justice. And I think that the new uprising was also like, this is a strong token for the old empire. So we need to get her back too. But it wasn't necessarily out of the goodness of their hearts. You know, it was just like, well, we can't have them winning. So like, what, you know, what are we going to do here? - That's fun. - Yeah, I liked hunting for Bindi. - Sounds like a title of it. - It sounds like a 90s rom-com. - Yeah. - The road to Bindi. - The road to Bindi. - Oh, and just to say this now, I realized this may be 20 minutes ago, but when you were talking about the mechanics of this game, something you said was your third lead turns into your target or whatever, like that it turns into them. I misinterpreted that quite a bit. - Oh. - Okay. - I thought that by the time you got to your third lead, if it wasn't your target directly, like if some other prompt hadn't said, "Hey, you find your target," that that person is now your target. Like regardless of if it's Bindi or not, so. - Interesting, okay. - It's a different thing, but I spun it narratively of, you know, to, I'll explain it when I get there. - That sounds fun, yeah. - I did not find Bindi. The road to Bindi was Bindi at the end of it. - That's so symbolic and meaningful, I feel. - Isn't it? - Yeah. I forgot to mention the reason for immersive bounty was that the target killed the leader of a cell of rebels. So yeah, that's sort of why I'm after I was hired by the uprising to like take this person out because they were killing members of the uprising. I will say this game does, they do like a twist. So I feel like your misinterpretation is still very much, I feel in the spirit of what the game likes to do with those final showdown. So I think that's kind of cool. We probably don't need to go through every beat of each of our stories because I think that would be a very long show, but I don't know if you wanna like hit some of the highlights of the road to Bindi. - Yes, no, I will. I also wrote just like a couple paragraphs as an intro that I think might be fun to read. I didn't do the whole thing, but just like the section where she's landing on UTAV. So I'll read you what I got for that. Startup, initializing and logging in. Soul Star Lander Thalog, day 14, month Libra, year 2847. Begin. These old ships were really not built for these conditions. Almost every sensor is screaming at me that we are likely to be crashing soon. Guila's words come flashing back. It's fine, girl, keep your head on straight. I whisper the same thing to my ship as if that'll help. Planet UTAV is a hell of a place, and I mean that fairly literally. It's just horrible here. A totally frozen ball of ice circling around a backwater star system that no one in their right mind would willingly visit. Of course, it makes for a great place to hide out and lose some heat. It also makes for a pretty challenging landing when you're flying a ship that was meant to fight in the skies of a desert planet. The rising and falling alarms in my cockpit finally give way when the ship softly touches down. I never had a doubt that it would be fine, but my ears thank me for finally relieving them of the piercing metal shout. My hand dust off the frosty coordinate indicator. Yep, just where I wanted to be. The middle of nowhere. UTAV only has a few space ports with any actual people living there, and so when someone lands there, the word of their arrival spreads fast. I don't need that kind of attention right now. The chair and target, apparently named Bindi, is likely very aware of the bounty that's been put on their head. And I would really prefer to knock into a chase with something that resembles a bear. (upbeat music) - Which is where this stops. And then I just started doing bulleted lists here, so. - I love that. Yeah, I did the same. I thought about writing things out as I started, 'cause it's like, it does really lend itself to that. - Yes, yeah. - But I was just like, that's gonna take me so long. If I do that, but yeah, that was rad. - Thank you. - Thank you for sharing that. - Very fun. Mine actually wasn't horribly long. I wonder how different our runs were, 'cause I was like, well, if I read these, it's not too bad. Most of them lead into each other, so I'll read you a handful here and just kind of get the vibe if it's like going long or whatever. But the first thing that happened was she saw a burning building in the distance and was like, well, this is a good as place as any to start. And she discovered that there was an old empire outpost and the fire was seemingly started by the new uprising, again, just more evidence that the fighting is alive and well here and they just cannot stop. At this point, she's a little bit older, so it's like, are we ever gonna fucking figure this out? It kind of makes remarks about that there's always this kind of cycle of young brash people who are willing to fight for something that they believe in, but also have no context for the larger fight and maybe shouldn't be doing this in the first place. I've been playing a lot of Metal Gear Solid, and so I think it's a lot of that coming in here. - Yeah. - She also saw the tracks where the old empire soldiers ran off to and she's like, I may still have some sway with them. They also don't know that I'm contracted by the new uprising, so maybe I can go get some information out of them. And so she goes to this enclave run by the old empire, not super easy to get in, but using one of her old, what was it, trinkets or whatever, something that she was equipped with. She's like, hey, no, I'm old empire. - Yeah, she still has some of the memorabilia from working there there. - Nice. - And they're like, all right, fine. She talks to an innkeeper who spilled some of the beans about Bindi. Apparently both, this is the part where she figures out both sides want to find her, but Bindi doesn't give a shit about new uprising her old empire. That's not why she is running. She just simply wants to continue living. Soul took some time to rest, and she was poking around this base trying to figure out if there was anything else she could find. She also discovered that there's some fuzziness with which these two factions are divided, that she'd found this like crate of old empire supplies that were like being transported in something labeled as the new uprising supplies. And so she's like, either someone is profiting from both sides of the war here, or the lines between these factions are like blurrier than they used to be. She goes back out into the wilderness and encounters a scrap crawler. She pops around their cabin looking for supplies, and there's another nomad here. And there is potentially this moment where they both kind of like are looking at each other. Like, are we about to fight? And about the other person nods and then leaves. She's like, the mood in here is bizarre. Like this is very strange, but eventually does get knocked out by somebody else, not the nomad, but just somebody in the crawler here. And then wakes up being dragged behind this snow beast that is the person who knocked her out and then, you know, riding this snow beast. This was my first fight. And I didn't have any of my equipment because you're like bound. And so-- - Yeah, I got this one too. - Yes, yeah. So Sol was like, they weren't smart enough to take off my like boots. And so, you know, I can use a little bit of my equipment to boost up on the back of this thing. Fought the person. And then this is also where I was like, like, hit me and knocked me out. Why don't we just huck him off the beast here? - Yeah. (laughs) - And so yeah, beat him up through him overboard. And she's like, if, you know, the wounds that I just inflicted didn't get them, like the cold will. So sorry, pal. She rode this beast for a little while and was like kind of just letting it go wherever it wanted to go. So like, maybe it'll take me back to wherever it was like, you know, rented from or something. Sure enough, there's this small outpost on the horizon that the beast seemed to be drawn to. And it is a trade alliance outpost. The trade alliance is the minor faction here. - Oh, okay. - And Sol mostly sees them as like, kind of enlightened centrists of like, we don't take sides in the war. And she like has a problem with that. - We just chop it from both of them. - Yes, yeah. She like, she also tries to kind of not play on one side of this, but is like also has complaints about these people because yeah, they're kind of just standing in the middle and not really doing anything. But someone here has encountered Bindi and they don't really seem to be aware of the conflict around her and kind of spill the beans about her as well. They say that the treasured item is not a thing but a person and that Bindi has stolen a person away from the, I guess, I don't know, the treasure, but like the brig, essentially, she broke out and then also took someone with her. - Interesting. - The new uprising had said that she traveled alone but had withheld that information. And so Sol's like, why? Like why lied to me about that? As Sol is leaving this outpost, this is my first encounter with an asset. She finds someone who has been beaten up and dumped outside of this trade alliance outpost named Kwam Maru. And it's like this kid who's been trying to fight both sides of the war at different times in their life. Like they keep bouncing between like, okay, well, I'm gonna fight for the new empire. No, just kidding, they suck. I'm gonna fight for the new uprising or whatever. And they're like very self-assured, but Sol is like, you're gonna get yourself killed, dude. Like you need to not do this anymore 'cause clearly you've been beaten up and like dropped here. Someone didn't care if you survived or not. And so I recruited Kwam Maru to come hang out with me. And like, she's like, I should at least show them some skills for like how to survive in this world. I will tell you what their deal is in a second here. - Okay. - We went to an old empire spaceport. So like kind of a larger area 'cause at this point I was like, we gotta find something. Like we're not finding Bindi very quickly here. But when I show up there a panicked Latok, which is like a insect creature, comes up in pleads for help getting off the planet. And I conceptually thought like, Sol is trying to impart some lessons onto Kwam Maru at this point. Like, I don't wanna just like turn this person away 'cause that's gonna look bad. Like I kind of want them to figure out like, you know, Kwam Maru is from this place. She's also a shapeshifter person. And so like, she's like, I don't know. Like I think that, well essentially Sol is trying to figure out like how do I impart that this person should take care of their people and their planet rather than like fighting on either weird side of this war that doesn't benefit them? And so she's like, all right, you know, told the Latok, like you can just come back to my ship 'cause they're trying to get off planet. Like I'll, you know, you can come with me once we leave this place, which took a point away from my favor. So like it does come at a mechanical cost, but it's like, well, I don't wanna like tell them to go away. - Right. - However, immediately after that three soldiers from the old empire show up trying to like, you know, figure out what's going on 'cause these two weirdos just showed up and, you know, started talking to somebody begging for help. The deal with Kwam Maru is that she will fire at whatever hostile shows up after like immediately, whoever the next person is. She just starts taking pot shots. And so. - That's so funny. - She's like, you know, I haven't been this close to like this much power or these much, this like group of people who are like, you know, not good for us. So it takes off a pot shot, immediately misses and the soldiers just come over and beat her up. - Oh geez. - And at that point. - Recurring event in Kwam Maru's life. - Yes, but soul is like, I don't think we, like I can't watch this kid just get thrown in jail 'cause like if you beat up one of the like old empire guards or cops, like that's kind of a life sentence for a lot of these people and she's like, let's just deal with this and get out of here. And so this was kind of a fun moment because it was the first time I got to use the concealed blade which part of its like attributes is that it has a plus three to whatever your attack is, which is pretty high, but it also has minus one to their defense. And so the way that defense works is that like, if you beat them in one of these like contested roles, then they'll take one damage point to their defense. So if they have two defense, you have to essentially beat them three times for it to work. But with the concealed blade, if they have one defense, no, they don't, you just have to beat them once. - That's really cool. - It's very fun. And so the way that I like contextualize this was that soul is like, the concealed blade makes it really easy to make it look like you're not actually moving with lethal intent, that you can kind of just like move with some grace and just slip by some people and just kind of cut them along your way. She's like, it, you can catch a few people off guard before they notice what's going on. And she's like, the first two went down very easily and the third one was, you know, trying to resist, but you know, not that big of a deal. Again, this is a group of people, but their like stats weren't very good. And so she just cuts them all down. And she's like, Quammer is a good kid. We just need to like get her out of this headstrong era of her life. And so we're both like, we gotta get the fuck out of here. Like this is not a good place. I need to find a place for Quammer to heal up because she got beat up kind of badly. However, on the way out of there, we encounter a hoverbike gang that's caught wind of this nomad who's been offering members of the old empire and their leader apparently is like, I have to challenge the strongest person. Like we're gonna fight. So I'm not really seeing a smart way out of this. It's like, okay, I don't really have time for this, but we should just do this and be done. And so she's like, I'm just gonna fight him, make a statement and we'll be done with it. The gang leader's pretty tough. Like his stat blocks were pretty good. And so Sol was like, it's close. Like the leader isn't faking his strength, but she's like fine. I will actually move with murderous intent and yeah, ends up winning this fight. Says nothing and leaves. And we are almost at the end here. - Wow. - Yeah, no, it didn't take very long. I was again, I was kinda killing people left and right and so the notoriety climbed up pretty quick. We made Quammer and Sol make it back to a base that is seemingly controlled by the new uprising. Like I was mentioning before, plenty of good people, but plenty of zealots too. In fact, the first person we encounter is a hostile guard who has something to prove. She's like, I would love to not make enemies out of my client. So I decided to just mention the stories of a nomad nixing old empire and hover by hostels. And so this person backs down. That was the first time I realized, I should just threaten people. Why am I just killing everyone? It turns out this person thought they were the target of my hunt and they were kind of freaked out about this, but they let it slip that there is some kind of monster loose in this base and they're all a little on edge. And so Sol decides like, why don't I just fight this monster instead? They do that. Monster also had a really good stat blocks. I almost lost at this point, but Faudet killed it and was like, all right, great. This puts Sol in contact with this dude named Chetto Rebei. (sighs) - I know that guy. (laughs) - Also new Chetto. - I did. - Okay, this is where, conceptually, this should have been Bindi. If I was following the letter of the law of these rules, but here's what happened. And I'll explain kind of how I interpret this. Chetto Rebei is this kind of larger dude. He works at this junkyard and he's like half information broker, half, like tough guy. He believes that he is famous for his courage and valor, but he is actually in fact famous for his ruthlessness. He wears this like cape with scraps of clothing from every person that he has fought and killed. - Oh shit. - And so he's got this kind of like tattered long cape that he drags around with him that's old and sort of beat up but has these like disparate little bits of clothing from everybody that he's like torn off once they've been beaten. But he keeps people in line by like serving as this information broker. You know, he has kind of playing both sides and he has been feeding both the new uprising and the old empire information about Bindi's location. He has been tracking her because Bindi came to him seeking help, like I need to escape and like get off planet or at least like lay around in the dark for a little while. So like these people stop looking for me and he said fine but also has been like tracking her and feeding out information to get paid. So he's like, hey, you know, she was seen here a couple of days ago which is why she has not been able to evade the law very well. So what he also reveals is that this person that Bindi had broken out was one of the few remaining family members of hers that this is essentially like a younger cousin of her chair and group. And she's like, this is bullshit. I need to break them out and like get out of here. And so she essentially is just like the thing that she stole is one of the younger members of the chair and family, which is why the old empire is pissed off at her and wants to make an example out of her and why the new uprising also wants to use her as like a token. Like, look at how good she did fucking up the old empire and whatever. And soul is smart enough to know that like neither of those things will be good for Bindi. So I fought Cheddar Rebe, also a very brutal fight but was able to use the laser rifle, which has, I think it's like a good first role. You get like plus four to a role. And so she was able to put him down but decided to spare him saying that I will let you live if you stop feeding information to these factions about her location, just like let her go essentially. - Wow. - And also just decided like I'm also going to commandeer this tracking device that he's been using to track her and maybe keep an eye on her for a little bit. And so that was sort of the end of this for me. And so rather than like encountering Bindi directly and resolving it with some kind of fight, my interpretation was just like at some point soul has decided I do not want to actually track this person down that like by doing that, I am leading more people to her. And so I am going to just try and cut her loose and let her escape with what she wants, which is, you know, safety in her family. And in the sort of epilogue, this also kind of made sense because I got a score of between seven and nine, which noted you've infuriated the fashion that the target was lined with and they place a substantial bounty on your head. You were not the target of an infamous rival Nomad, who I was going to say was the person I encountered in the scrap crawler. - Nice. - And so if I were to play again, the next part, I would start with a notoriety, one favor and two motivation. And essentially at this point, it would be the misadventures of Quamaru soul and this weird insect guy that is now on my ship, hopefully with some, you know, connection to being able to track Bindi at some point and ensure that she's okay. - I love that. I love that you ended up with like a little Mass Effect squad by the end. - Yeah, no, I'm just recruiting everybody I can. - That's awesome, what fun. - Yeah, I had a great time. - So Immersa's adventure began with, she landed on Ayama in the ruins of an old factory. No sign of her target at first, but immediately she encounters a hostile from the minor faction, which is the uprising, which is the same faction that hired her. So I was like, okay, how do I sort this out? And so basically I decided like, okay, the place that she lands is a place that the uprising told her like, okay, you can land here and it's like an uprising base and you can start there. And this is like sort of true of like the rebellion in Star Wars for like much of the time that it was active, like it's sort of fractured. And so my assumption is like, the way that I interpreted it was like Immersa lands and like has sort of like a verbal like passcode that she can use. So they know that like, she's not actually hostile, but they're like not, they're not gonna help her. Basically it's like, I was able to try to threaten them or speak with them. And so I tried to speak with them and I failed the role. And so they were like, fine, you can land here. And like we won't mess with you, but like we're not going to give you any information or help you and as part of that role. - She forgot the password. (laughing) - But I forgot or I lost, I missed the role. And so as part of that, I guess we never like really explained how roles work, but basically you roll two D sixes, two six sided die and add kind of whatever stats you have and whatever stats the other person may have. And whoever's, if your dice roll with your stats is higher than the other characters dice roll, you like, it's a successful thing. It's either a successful attack or you've successfully spoken to them and convinced them to help you, whatever. So I failed this one. And so this guy is like, fine, go on your merry way, but on the way out, he steals something from your ship. And so I decided that he stole the fuel cell from her speeder, meaning that she was going to have to proceed on foot. This will come back later. - That's cool. (laughing) - So after that, I end up at like an outpost run by the challenging faction, which here is Red Moon, the crime syndicate. So a MRSA like has a drink there, speaks to one guy who, again, I failed another role. He did not help or give any useful information, but then kind of the next round, I encounter, I got like a thing that says you're offered shelter for the night in the home of a harmless looking local, try to speak to them. And so I played this as, okay, she meets another person at the bar. This is a like crystalline, they're called pollucids. They're like one of the main species on this planet. So I ran into them a lot. This one is named Aura Day. And they sort of chat and flirt and like, Aura invites MRSA back to her place. - Wow. - Yeah. (laughing) And so there's like a role where you can either, like if you fail, they, you have a disagreement and they become hostile, or if you succeed, like you, like, bond with them a little bit and you can recruit them. And luckily I succeeded. So we find out that Aura's sibling is imprisoned by the empire and like, you know, she doesn't know what's going on with them. And so a MRSA opens up and is like, I was also in prison and so they have a nice night together. I successfully recruited her. And the role, when you recruit someone, you roll and see like what, you know, benefit they give you, she turned out to be a scrap vendor and can provide, what is it? Let me find the wording of this. 'Cause it was so funny, scrap vendor, a beast herder, you spend some time with them acquiring a pack beast or personal transport, which gives you like extra defense in a future fight. And I was like, it's so funny that I did that thing about someone stealing the fuel cell for the speeder. 'Cause now it's like, okay, Aura gives her the fuel cell that she needs. And so now she's like speeding around on her speeder. - That's so cool. - Yeah, it was like a fun, there were so many opportunities like that for like these things to interconnect and like create a really fun cohesive story. - Yeah. - So let's see, I'm gonna just like hit the highlights 'cause there were some here where it was like, you go to a market and talk to someone. Like it wasn't that interesting. So she like continues on, finds another settlement, finds another bar and runs into another Nomad. And so when you run into another Nomad, you like roll their stat block as if they were like a player character. So this is a polluted, another one of those crystalline people named Malachi Das and you have like beef or you can roll. You had this and you've just sort of rolled that like, they just like are like, hey buddy and like move on. I rolled that they have beef and they fight. (laughing) So they're like, oh, you know, what happened? You get to decide what that was. So I decided Amursa once fed him false intel about a dangerous target that she knew would smoke the target out and right into her waiting arms. Given how dangerous the target was, she thought Malachi would understand and offered to split the bounty with him when all was said and done. But Malachi has held a grudge ever since. But he sees her, he immediately attacks. (laughing) So they get in a fight, luckily she succeeds. And this is one of those examples where I was like, she's not gonna like kill this guy. She spares him, just like shoots the gun out of his hand and is like, look, like if you wanna start a fight, like get the fuck out of here. Like there's a bunch of innocent people here who are just trying to enjoy a drink. So that was a fun little event, but like that was back wet before I realized that like not increasing notoriety will cause you to not progress in the game. But what that did do, if you spare someone instead of, if you kill them, you get an increase here in notoriety. If you spare them, you increase your favor, which can be used in like speaking roles and other things. So at least there was that. Yeah, I kept rolling, nothing eventful happens. (laughing) It was sort of a skip through there. Here's where I meet Cheddar Rebe. - What's his deal in your work? - In mine, I saved him from being attacked by beasts, but then I failed to recruit him. So that was sort of a wash. - A bust, yeah. - Yeah. (laughing) But this is a point where I was like, it's rough. I like kept little notes for myself as I went of just like my reactions and feelings as I went. And I wrote your woof. It's rough how bad my luck has been. (laughing) But like, what I did appreciate was, even though I wasn't like progressing the story, I was still like filling out the world with these characters. And you know, like as part of this, I decided like the outskirts of the city are sort of populated with people who before the empire came in, like they were employed in these factories and like participating in this industry. And I sort of imagined like maybe this was like, you know, consumer products, like things for people. And then when the empire came in, they were like, we like all this industry, but like we wanna create like bombs and weapons and stuff. So we're gonna open some other factories. This is all gonna fall into decay. And like there's gonna be this big income, you know, like wealth gap here now. And so there's like tons of people here who like lost their factory jobs and are now just trying to like get by like scrapping around and stuff. So that's sort of like what I imagined Cheddar Robay's experience to be here. He used to work in one of the factories out here. When the empire moved in and shut them down, he started working as a scrapper to get by. - So he also kind of works in a junkyard. - Yeah. - Wow. - I will also, I also rolled the junkyard thing. So we will be back in junkyards. This whole place is one big junkyard, really. - It's definitely giving like shades of a Omega from As Effect. - Yeah. - Especially the, what is the faction called the like crime syndicate? - Well, there's a few in Omega. There's like all the like-- - No, I mean, I mean in this game. - Oh, in this game? - Red moon. - It very much is like the, what is it the blue suns or whatever? - Yeah, blue suns is one of the Omega. - Yeah, very feel, it feels very blue suns coated. - Yeah. - Or a blood pack or eclipse or whatever. - Yeah, it's a lot like that. It's like the, I sort of imagine like the empires here in the city and then like out here, it's like kind of lawless and like red moon is kind of like, you know, the gang that like exploits everyone. But there's like, you know, uprising sort of like cells out here sort of festering. - Yeah. - And a lot of stuff here that's just like did not move the story along or like was not particularly interesting. - Yeah. - Okay, so then there's a part where I ran into an unaffiliated mercenary or rebellious civilian being intimidated by a hostile soldier or guard. So I like stepped in, fought them. This turned into another like recruitable asset, which I was successful in doing. And his name was Salar Noon. And I rolled for him the exact same thing. I rolled for Ora Day. So I was like, okay, he's another scrapper who gives me another fuel cell for my speeder, I guess. - I get a cool fuel cell, we kiss maybe. And then he's my final. - Yeah, I didn't kiss him. Yeah, just, just Ora Day. And then finally I got a lead. - Hell yeah. - So my first lead was this. - Oh my God, this was your first one. - My first lead. - Yeah, it did take you a long time. - It took me a long time. I did six rounds of exploration before I, on the seventh round, got my first lead. - Can I get this dice looked at? - I know, it was wild. And as I was going through all of that, like there are random events you can roll that will increase your notoriety. And I just wasn't rolling those. And so it was like, I was going nowhere. So I just had to start killing people, which I did. That was just how I got here. So this was my junk yard. Checked out in a junk yard, said to be run by an associate of Kirip Young, my target. That associate is Mina Vi, a calm and assured Pelusid who runs this junk yard as a front for a black market trading post on behalf of Red Moon. She's gotten herself into a bit of gambling debt and is desperate for money. And it turns out like she, I rolled something that was like she sold something to, or I forget if it's like just helped the target in some way. So I decided she sold her the sniper rifle that she used to kill the uprising leader, which is like, why am I'm after this target? - That's cool. - But then I rolled that this lead acted to prevent something much worse. So I decided Pyeong came to her asking for a bomb, which would have killed not only the uprising leader, but also their entire cell. And Vi pretended that she didn't have any and sold her the sniper rifle instead. But she attacks. We fight. I decided to spare her just because it was like, she did like prevent a greater tragedy. So Immersa spares her just then a star fighter battle breaks out in the sky above, between the Empire Navy and an uprising squadron. Junk yard has bombarded with debris and stray laser fire as Immersa makes her escape. So this is where I like went underground. In order to escape unscathed, Immersa goes underground to the tunnels beneath the outskirts of the city. Once used to transport goods between factories, they are now home to criminal factions, smuggling illicit goods and local wildlife. So I get attacked by a big monster. And as I am in the process of killing that monster and even bigger monster comes and like finishes it off. So Immersa escapes, she emerges from the tunnels and finds a traveling scrap crawler. (laughing) Another same prompt. So the person who runs it is a loud human named Hailey Luang. She says that she's like loyal to Red Moon because they buy a lot of her scrap. She's like not really like into that, but like she kind of feels like she has to. And then this is where I rolled the thing where you wake up being dragged behind someone riding a vehicle or beast. So I just, I also, it sounds like we both got the same two different prompts and both put them together the same way. - Back to back, yeah. - Yeah, which is, I run into a scrap crawler and then I wake up being dragged by something so they knocked me out. So yeah, Immersa was knocked out by Hailey Luang because she's heard the rumors about Immersa. I should have mentioned earlier, like the first notoriety point that I got was I rolled something random where it's like someone from the challenging faction now knows you're here and they've like taken note of you. So I tied this back to that and said, okay, she's, Red Moon is now sort of like, why is this bounty hunter poking around? Like someone bring her in so we can like figure out what's going on. So Hailey Luang is like trying to do that. - Yeah. - And so escape from her and then the next thing that I rolled was you're in a spaceport run by the challenging faction. So I was like, great, she like brought me all the way to this Red Moon spaceport and now I got to escape. So Immersa kills a hostile guard and then I rolled a monster is loose and the locals are struggling to contain it. - Hey. - So I was like, perfect. This monster that I escaped from has been tracking Immersa ever since including like tracking the crawler. Now it's here and Immersa's like, great, this is my opportunity to like get the fuck out of dodge. - Yeah, that's cool. - And so yeah, so she like uses that as a distraction to escape. The next thing I rolled was you've heard that a reclusive mystic mentor or tribal shaman lives nearby. They don't receive many unexpected visitors. So then you roll to see like if they will help you and you can maybe recruit them or if you like you have 50/50 chance of them either helping you or not, I rolled for not which is they open their door but take one look at your scar and refuse to let you in. What word did they keep repeating as they ushered you away? And so I wasn't sure what the one word would be. I think I originally was like, oh, it's just something to do with like the fact that she's lost an eye. Like, you know, eye or something. But then I rolled the next thing which was my next lead. And so I was like, maybe he says something that like just gives her an idea that leads her to her next lead. - Yeah. - And so I decided that the word that he said is scythe. - Cool. - And then the next lead that I rolled was a, you know, a rival nomad. So I was like, okay, she remembers the name of Jed the scythe cabe who is a nomad that she once knew like early on when she was first getting started in bounty hunting. So she goes and tracks him down thinking he might, you know, be able to help her. She finds him boarding his starship. The showdown was like, he's boarding his starship and it's, you know, nighttime and you're lit only by the moon or whatever. So she confronts or goes to Jed and is like, "Hey, do you want to help me?" And he's like, actually, no, I fucking don't because I'm looking for Kira Pyeong too. - Oh. - Because the uprising leader that she killed is my partner. I want revenge. I know you, immersive. You are like too soft. A lot of the time you spare people a lot. And so I like, I want to kill her and so I don't want you involved. And so they fight, I defeat him and I do spare him. - Got you, yeah. - Yeah, it's like her thing now. But luckily the next thing I roll is to find my target. So Jed, having been defeated, reveals that he was boarding his ship because he received a tip that Pyeong knows there's about to be an uprising attack on an empire base. She's planning to leave the planet when the fighting breaks out to avoid detection. Now that would be a pretty risky thing to do, wouldn't you think so? Put a pin in that. It'll come back later. So he knows where Pyeong's ship is and was about to go confront her. And so a Marissa like speeds off to confront Pyeong. I also got, when I rolled the showdown for the target, it was another, she's just about to leave. And I also got, there's just about, there's like a star fighter battle. So I was like, all right, I rolled both of these before, but like I will just combine them now. And so she's like just about to board her ship just as that battle breaks out. And so it turns out Pyeong is a member of the Mystic Order, which is the, it's the Jedi. - Yeah, it's the Jedi. - Well, it can be the Jedi or the Sith. They're like, you can choose whether they're dark-sided or light-sided, I guess. And so you speak to them. She reveals, I rolled your client lied to you about your target's actions, what part of your client's accusations are a complete lie or wild exaggeration. And so I interpreted it slightly differently, but 'cause I was like, why would this person be like killing members of the uprising, whatever. So Pyeong reveals that the uprising leader was secretly a member of the Mystic Order who had been corrupted by the dark side. In order to sow greater chaos and despair, they worked their way up in the uprising in order to sabotage the uprising's efforts and feed intel to the empire. So the Mystic Order is trying to purge dark-sided double operatives from the uprising, but they can't work directly with them since they don't know who can be trusted. So that's why the uprising's like, oh my God, she attacked us. And it's like we're, she's actually trying to help the uprising, but like, you know. But so they attack. So now I'm fighting a Jedi and I lost this fight. - Oh, wow. - Yeah, so I lost this fight. So I'll read what I wrote out about like how this fight went down because it was actually really dramatic where like she immediately knocked out all of my defenses and then it looked like I was coming back but I lost the last role. So it made for a very dramatic scene. Amersa is dumbfounded by Pyeong's revelation, but before she has time to consider Pyeong's words, Pyeong is drawing her glowing blade. A weapon Amersa has never seen before. Amersa, the meticulous planner, was never prepared to face a foe such as this. Each lunge forward with her baton is deftly countered. To get within striking range would be certain ruin. Pyeong's fighting style is unlike anything Amersa has ever experienced. Her stun baton feels blunt and clumsy in the face of a blade's grace and precision. But Amersa is nothing if not a keen observer and a quick learner. Pyeong, for all of her ferociousness, abides by a code. She fights fair. Amersa does not. She soon realizes that if she's going to escape this alive, she'll need to fight dirty and so she does. She fakes a stumble and just as Pyeong thinks she's won, Amersa takes advantage of Pyeong's confidence and throws a fistful of dirt in her eyes. With Pyeong blinded, she manages to get in a couple of good blows. She thinks she may have turned the fight around, but Pyeong is of the order and is able to tap into the energy of the universe. And so after the initial surprise quickly wears off, she manages to knock Amersa off her feet once again. Pyeong looms over Amersa, prepared to deal the final blow, and suddenly a group of empire soldiers appears. Pyeong flees to her ship and escapes. The soldier showing up is like one of the things that can happen when you lose a fight. I was kind of hoping that Amersa would get got 'cause I thought that would be dramatic, but you know, the dice chews with the dice chews. - That's true. - And so Pyeong, because she basically uses the force, is able to escape in the middle of this like giant fight. - Yeah. - And so that leads to the epilogue. My score at the end was your actions have caused harm to the population of this planet, either directly or inadvertently. You've become the trigger in someone else's story now. What is their defining memory of your time here? And so I decided... Rumors of a bounty hunter poking around in the industrial wasteland of the Yama, fulfilling a contract on behalf of the uprising, have spread to the ears of the empire operatives in the city. The empire resolves to eradicate the uprising presence outside the city. What this means in reality is that the scrapers and other locals trying to get by out here are facing more empire harassment than ever. Or a day decides she can no longer sit by and support the uprising passively. Instead, she decides to join the fight. When she thinks back on a mercy's role in disturbing the careful balance of power and Yama, Ora can't help but feel angry. But a small part of her is secretly grateful that a mercy's actions finally spurred her to action. - Good. - Yeah. - Pretty good. - Yeah, I liked bringing it back to Ora Day, who I like immediately was enamored with. - Yes, yeah. - When I created her. So yeah, I lost, which was kind of, listen, if you're gonna lose to a Jedi. But yeah, it was a really cool twist in the story that made, even though it was like a tough fight that I lost, it made it feel very satisfying anyway. I yeah, it was a really fun conclusion. I had a lot of fun with this one. - Yeah, that's cool. - I feel like because mine was a little bit shorter, there weren't quite as many character twists and turns as there were in yours. I'm sure that there would have been had I kept playing, but I do like how character driven most of your story felt. - Yeah. - I'm sure you're giving me the highlights, but still some of mine were like, "I don't know, we go here." And then like, that's really it, rather than like, here are these big shifts happening. - Yeah, there were actually a lot in the middle before the first lead where it was like, "I go here, I talk to this local." And then I go here and this guy doesn't want to help me. It was just like a lot of that for a little while, which yeah, I think that those, that kind of like in between of like, not really going much of anywhere is maybe the weakest part of the game. But again, I like that even if that, even if you're not moving the story forward, you're still like, I just love the world building this game. And the way that every time you encounter a character, you can roll their personality and their species and give them a name or whatever. And it's like just enough information that it helps you turn like this sort of like mechanical wrote thing into like a scene in your mind. And you can sort of imagine like, what is the vibe of this person and what is this interaction like? And so I feel like you can really feel the kind of movie influence and inspiration in this game. Everything feels like a scene, you know, perhaps like most notably in those showdowns where like they just like set the scene. So it's like a cool set piece. But even beyond that, I think that there's every scene sort of feels like they give you just enough information to like imagine that and it's pretty cool. - Yeah, that is cool. I like that. Do we want to talk about big takeaways? - Yeah. - I think like largely I am interested in like story generation as something, just something that like I find very interesting to like use and study and like experience because I think that I have or I used to have a misconception that like when people were writing or creating things that it just sort of like sprang out of their mind, you know? And I was always very worried about like originality and I don't know novel ideas as far as like creative writing goes or just like, you know, kind of any creative endeavor. I used to play music a lot and was always worried like, God, do I sound too much like this other band or something like that? Like how do I sound like my own thing? And like definitely that's part of growing as an artist of like figuring out what your specific thing is. But I think with games like this and you know, this one specifically, it's cool to not have to do quite as much of that work that I find that the places where I can be creative is not the gigantic concept writing, right? Of like the showdown location was not the thing that I would have found the most joy in writing. It was like, how does this connect together and what is the like narrative that I am trying to say here, right? I think if I was gonna like actually write out more of this story and what would, what happened in it, I was feeling the pull towards like this person who feels like they don't have any buy-in to the conflict that's currently swirling around them. But that like, you know, Sol was a person who really cared about this partner that she had lost and you know, discovering the same sort of like desire and passion to live in Bindi and you know, the passion that extended to her family was something that she was like, oh, this is actually what I care about and I need to like follow that rather than just kind of like drifting from contract to contract, right? You know, it's, it's, I think any story I write in 2024 is gonna be a little anti-capitalist, you know? That's what that's in there. Yeah. But like that, that being the thing that is pulling me along and like, how do I make sure that that is in every beat of, you know, writing these stories and trying to communicate that tone and that narrative and everything that's happening is fun because I think that that's like the cool part about storytelling. It's not literally the words on the page. It's just like, how does this all culminate in the atmosphere and the tone and the thing that I'm trying to pull together? Yeah. And I like that. I used to use, I can't remember the name of it. I think it's like the story engine or something. There's like a series of cards that I bought as a way to help like build characters for D&D. And it's like, you know, you just rotate them and pull them and sort of draw it out. And they connect up to one another of like this kind of person and then you draw it and they say, but they are haunted by and then you draw another card. This thing that happened on a X-YZ planet, which is really cool because again, it's, it just gets me started enough that my brain is able to kind of like kick into gear and be like, oh, I like three of these things, but I have to change this last one because that's what's going to match up. Or like, you know, ooh, this is a challenging set of characteristics that I never would have thought on my own. How do I square this within this person? Like, that stuff is cool because I think, I certainly have a tendency in, you know, D&D writing or really any sort of creative endeavor to not rest on my laurels, but do the thing that's comfortable. And I like when something is like, what if you tried something very different than that? What if, you know, the constraint was writing a character that you're not super familiar with? And so this game specifically was a really fun exercise in that of how do you make all these things fit together? And then what is the actual story that is popping off the page at you? 'Cause that's definitely the lens that I'm coming at these solo RPGs from. It's like, how do I build this into a narrative rather than like, I'm just playing a game, which it can be both, it can be either. It offers you both, but I like the idea of, you know, writing a story or adding this as a character in a D&D campaign or, you know, some other form of fiction, which is cool. I like, I definitely don't consider myself like a writer, per se, but I definitely like making stories. And this is kind of an avenue for that, which I really appreciated. So yeah, that's what I'm gonna be thinking about after I finish this game. - Nice, yeah, this is not my big takeaway, but like, I'm sorry for the Ringo barks in the background. - It's out last summer, if you know. - Yeah, it's out last summer. And he's got, get along little doggy. I like these games, these solo TTRPGs, which so often become like storytelling vehicles, I feel like it's given me an appreciation of like the iterative nature of good storytelling where like, you know, there's always like, what's inspiration versus copying and like, like, I feel like these games are getting these ideas and these prompts and using them to like, as a springboard to create a story that like resonates with you. Like that to me is like such a good example of like how storytelling, like you need other influences and you need that inspiration and don't necessarily need it, but like, it makes things better. And so, you know, this idea that like, oh, well, that's not original or like, you know, like, oh, so derivative, it's like, who gives a shit? - Yeah, if the story's good, I don't care. - Right, right. And like, I don't know. I think that like when you play a game like this and see the ways that like someone else's work can then inspire you and like that feeling that you get when you're like, oh, and then this can connect with this that way, like it's a really great fun feeling that I feel like it's so important for like building that muscle of like creativity that I don't know, I think it's really valuable. Now my big takeaway, which is about something completely different. (laughs) - Art lasers fucking cool. - It's not unlike that 'cause it is kind of about Star Wars. So like, I think that a lot of, not everyone, because clearly this stuff has appeal, but like, I think a lot of people who at least describe to the same sort of like philosophies that I do about what's going on in Star Wars right now, it's like, there's a desire and I have a desire for like new stories in this universe. There's such a, there is a tendency right now in this franchise to just, you know, the appeal of so many of the new shows and films is like referencing back to the old stuff. - Yeah, yeah. - And like, hahah, isn't it? You know, it's the classic like Glup shit-o meme. (laughs) - It gets me every time they couldn't have picked a better fucking name for this dude. - And it's so Star Wars, but also so funny. But yeah, it's the idea that like, you know, if you look at something like the Obi-Wan show, which like, I am not a big fan of that show, I know that some people really loved it, but like, the basic premise of that show, I think is not a spoiler is like, Obi-Wan goes on an adventure with Baby Leia. - Yes, yeah. - And like, it's just like, okay, I guess if you want to shoehorn that into the old thing, but like, it's just not that interesting to me to keep telling stories about the same people and the same conflicts and like, you know, there are some ways that I think you could turn that stuff over and look at it from different angles that would be interesting, but that is not what the is being done in the Disney Star Wars era. Like, this part is actually a spoiler for Obi-Wan unless you don't want me to say it for whatever reason. - No, go ahead. - Okay. We get an encounter between him and Darth Vader, who is Anakin Skywalker, his former Padawan. And like, it's deeply unsatisfying, I think. And there are ways where like, you really could have explored that in an interesting and nuanced way, but I think the people who make this stuff are so tied to the conceptions we already have of these characters and these situations that like, they are not willing to challenge it. And so like, this all comes back to, for me in, and I think a lot of other people, the idea that like, could we just tell some fresh stories in what is already like a fascinating universe that we don't need to keep going back to the same well for it to be interesting. Andor was a great example of that. - Yeah, it's like, okay, this is a character that we saw, but like his life and background wasn't really fleshed out. So now we're gonna flesh that out against the backdrop of like, how this rebellion was built. And that's really fascinating. I'm also watching Rebels right now, which kind of does a similar thing. And so like, for anyone who feels that way, I think that this game is a great way to scratch that itch where if you're just interested in other stories in the Star Wars universe that don't necessarily have to be about the Jedi versus the Sith or the rebellion versus the Empire, but can be about like ordinary people living in the margins of that. And obviously with a particular bounty hunter bent for all of the like Boba Fett sickos out there. But like, I think that this is a great way to scratch that itch if that is something that appeals to you. And at the same time, even if you're not a Star Wars head, like you can absolutely play this game and have a great time with it if just like the idea of a sci-fi bounty hunting adventure interests you. But yeah, like the nomads are sort of like explicitly in their code of conduct neutral in these fights. And so it creates a lot of opportunity for like storytelling within the Star Wars universe or illegally distinct but similar universe where you can explore that. And so I think that that was very fun for me. And I do think that it's, I would play this game again. I think like probably, I think I would maybe leave behind immersive story. Maybe I would continue with Ora Day or somebody else. But like, I think that the like slow build of it would be very fun. Because now knowing that that is how this can be paced, I think I would enjoy like just sort of like, let me go to this planet, see what's up, like play around in the space. So yeah, that's my, that's my big takeaway. Scholars, lasers are cool. Laser cool. Stores is sometimes cool. Mm-hmm. My relationship with Star Wars is a little bit interesting, not interesting, but like I think I am agnostic against that Star Wars sometimes of like, I loved it when I was younger. I was mixed on the prequels when they came out. I was like, you know, young enough to watch them in theaters and was like, this is sick, but why don't I feel cool walking out of here? You know, like I like all the lightsaber stuff and like pod racing is sick, but like I don't feel the same way that I did. And so like, you know, I was interested in the kind of reboots and anything, you know, not bad. Had some, had some ups and some downs. I liked last year. I was pretty sick. But I suspect that I feel about Star Wars that like the way that a lot of people feel about video games. And also the opposite is true that like, I feel a deep desire for video games to be a better art form. And so whenever I'm like bummed out about the newest Call of Duty, I'm like, this could be so much better than what it is. And like try to highlight games that I think are doing that. Whereas with Star Wars, I'm usually like, oh, it's a bad Obi-Wan show. I just, fine, I just won't watch it. Like, I just kind of bail on it pretty quickly, which is like probably not the activity that somebody who's like a huge fan of that stuff is. But I think I am more okay with it, not okay, but I am accepting of it being bad a lot of the time. And just like, I don't know, Dune was pretty good. Like that feels like a good enough sci-fi story for me to watch that and enjoy it. But I agree with you that like, in the way that every movie is this balance between an artistic endeavor and a product, I think that like Star Wars currently feels pretty heavy on the product side, you know? - Yeah. - Yeah, I have a weird background with Star Wars for someone who is as into it now as I am because I was not really into it as a kid. I like saw the movies, but I was like, okay, cool. Just like moved on with my life. And then as an adult was like pretty actively uninterested in it, until I don't know if I was prompted to become interested in it again. I think part of what happened was like, I was kind of a Disney adult for a while, maybe still a little bit and like, it was all over the parks and stuff. And so I was like, okay, I'm gonna give this another shot. And like, enjoyed it. I think this was like around the time, around the like last Jedi, like, you know, Rise of Skywalker era. So I think Rise of Skywalker was the first sequel trilogy movie that I saw in theaters. And I was like, oh, that was terrible. But in the meantime, I have gotten much more into Star Wars by virtue of listening to a more civilized age podcast, which it's kind of amazing to me that I haven't brought it up until now in this episode. But like, they started by watching the Clone Wars and have sort of been working their way through this like ancillary media associated with, you know, the major franchise. And like, that is where the most interesting shit happens. Like, I just finished season two of Rebels last night 'cause that's what they're currently watching. - Yeah. - And like, Andor is my favorite Star Wars thing. Rebels is now my second favorite Star Wars thing. There's some good shit going on in there. But like, all that stuff in the margins is so much more interesting than the mainline films. And so like, I don't know. I think it's all really fascinating. And I love the way that a more civilized age like breaks it down. But yeah, I find myself like, I haven't watched Soka. I like did not finish the Mandalorian. Like there's so much stuff here. I'm like, this is not like Mandalorian was fun when it was like, you know, kind of just like a serial like, yeah, fun Western. And then it, you know, got like Star Wars fight. - Got a blue sky walkery on it. - Yeah. - Yeah, but I agree with you. It's very much in the realm of like, we are making a product now. It's a fucking, I don't understand how Andor got made and is what it is. It's like such a fascinating outlier and so, so good. But I'm hoping that like, that is hope for other cool, interesting things in this franchise. And I don't know. I haven't watched Shackleite yet. I'm probably going to hold off until they cover it on AMCA. But, but yeah, I don't know. This turned into Star Wars talk, but. - It had to. I think there was no way it wasn't gonna turn into Star Wars. - But yeah, it's, I don't know. I think that this is a really fun way to kind of look at this, this franchise from a new lens and one in which you get to feel like an active participant. Also, Apropos of nothing go watch the Jenny Slate video about the Star Wars Hotel if you haven't. 'Cause that's also really good. - Such a joy. - Really great. - It's so much fun. - But yeah, if you want to feel like, if you really want to feel like, I'm in my own Star Wars story, I think this game is a better example of that than the Star Wars Galactic Star Cruiser was. - Yeah, it's a lot of most things are a better Star Wars story than the Galactic Cruiser. - Yeah, it sounded pretty bad. - Yeah, such a bummer. I was like, I took a couple of classes in college about larping specifically, like. - Oh yeah. - You know, not necessarily the hurtling lightning bolt balls at each other in the forest larping, but just like, what is a kind of D&D, kind of tabletop, kind of real life thing look like? Like what games can you play there? - Yeah. - And they had announced the like Star Wars hotel like a couple of years after that. And I was like, this has the potential to be the fucking coolest thing of all time, right? - Yeah. - Because in that class, I just kept thinking, like, could you just go so big with this and make it so much fun, you know? 'Cause like any of those, a common game trip, there's the kind of like murder mystery party thing of like, somebody knows what's going on, something happens an hour in where somebody gets killed or like, you know, you've got a deck of cards that you're playing with the rest of the people in the group. And you know, you do XYZ thing to accomplish your specific goal or whatever. And stuff can be so much fun. And I was just like, if they get people who are into this and like, you know, are paid to be good at being, you know, a rebel spy or whatever, like, this could just be the shit that people want. 'Cause I think that like, under a lot of the Star Wars movies and just like, stories and everything, like there's definitely a desire from people to be like, man, I wanna go to fucking Tatooine. Like, I wanna go hang out. And so I think like, being able to execute on that, it's just like, such a cool idea. But then yeah, the execution seemed like-- - It was so bad. - It was very bad. - Yeah. - Again, I think it is a productification of a lot of the things that people like, right there, are enough people in the boardroom saying, like, hey, this is too expensive, we need, and we need to open it. And we need to charge people 10 grand to come stay here or whatever, but it's just, it's never gonna work. - Yeah. - And so I think that the places that I find good Star Wars stuff, and just the places that I find good media in general, are the places where there is less risk if something fails, you know? Like, I feel like a lot of the big risk situations that companies are looking at right now, they're taking the quote unquote safest option. It's probably not the safest option, but it's the one that they feel is like, I don't know, this will probably get people in seats, you know? - Yeah, well, let's just do this kind of walker stuff. What's clear is like, they tried to do this, but like without really putting in the resources to make it like amazing, you know? They like, it feels like they cut corners in a lot of ways from the Jenny Slade video. And if you're interested in hearing more about the Star Cruiser experience, AMCA also went sort of shortly before it was shut down, and that was previously patron-only content, but I think they just like, with the Jenny Slade video being so popular, they decided to like release publicly their experience of the Star Cruiser as well. So that's really a very good listen. A lot of similar experiences there in terms of like, Natalie Walker like just didn't get to do any, like was not invited to do any events, like her story just like completely fell off for whatever reason. But yeah, I like that, I completely agree that that is a thing that seems so cool in theory, and they just totally whiffed it. - Yeah. - And it's like, I don't know, the idea of like larping in the space is like fascinating and the fact that like that dream is basically dead now because they tried this thing and like didn't, did not made it just prohibitively expensive and also like not good. - Yes, yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's just a bummer that that sort of means that like that's never probably going to happen again. But like there, you can see the promise in it, especially like if you listen to the AMCA sort of discussion of it, they encountered people who because they were there at like the tail end of like when this thing was ending, like they encountered people there who like had been there before and had like were actually in character. Like it seems like the people who, you know, wanted to do that stuff, it sounds like in Jenny's time, like there were not a lot of people doing that. When AMCA went, it seems like there were a fair number of people who like had created characters and like really got into it. And that aspect of it sounds like it was incredible. Like they, it seems like they're the best part of the experience was like being at the bar with a guy who was like larping as a former pod racer. Like, you know, shit, like that is really cool. And I don't know, that's the kind of experience that I think would be so fucking sick. And now, you know, when is that ever going to emerge again? Probably not in this franchise, so. Yeah, I was going to say probably not a Star Wars thing. I'd be willing to bet that there will be some larping thing that takes off in our lifetime in a way that like, maybe not to the extent that D&D did, but like it reminds me of kind of a similar arc in the way that like for a long time tabletop gaming was like kind of a niche thing that people did. And was sort of viewed as like too nerdy to enjoy. And like larping is very much that for a lot of the time. You hear people every now and then being like, oh, I went to a murder mystery party and they're like, that's fucking weird. But it's incredibly cool. And I think it'll just take something to spark that to the point where like, you know, enough young people who are not stigmatized about that stuff will be like, oh, that actually sounds sick. Like we need to go to my local version of this. And that happens like there are places that do that, but I sort of suspect that there will be something that, you know, whether or not it's a real play podcast about it or something or a YouTube video or something. But like, I bet eventually it will hit a little bit bigger 'cause clearly the desire is there. Like people wanted to go to this. It just also happened to be like $10,000 to go if you wanted to go, you know? - Yeah, no, I think that you're right that something like that could easily take off. Like I'm a big fan of the Renaissance fair here in LA. Me and my friends go every year. And like the number of people there who dress up and are very into it, like there is absolutely a significant group of people, I think an R-H bracket who would be down for that kind of shit. And yeah, I do, if and when that happens, fucking sign me up 'cause I think that it's so fun to get to do stuff like that. I think as I've gotten older, like very, I think play is important for throughout your life regardless of your age. And I think that that is not something that I saw modeled from adults in my life when I was young. And so I, you know, I hope that folks our age continue to embrace that because everyone deserves to have fun. - Just like let your hair down, y'all, you know? - Yeah. - Go speak in a silly accent and go to the Renfaire or something. - Release your fear of being judged and put on a silly outfit. - I think that there, like the couple generations older than us, the idea was like, well, when you turn 30 like misery is the thing that you're supposed to feel most of the time rather than like, you can have fun sometimes like, no, no, no, no, that's not miserable. I'm supposed to be miserable. - Right? - Whereas like, yeah, you can put on a cool costume and go larp or whatever and it's not that big of a deal. - Yeah. - As a stand in for making a good "Star Wars" movie. - Right, because they're not doing that anymore. - They're not, they don't seem interested in that anymore. - We're done with that. You gotta make your own fun. - Yeah. - I played this game and it was cool. - It was really cool. Highly recommend. Thank you for listening to this ram that we recorded at the end of this episode. - Yeah. That's how it went. - Get into it one this time. - That's how a "Chim" episode goes, I guess. - Listen, don't get me started about "Star Wars" and also capitalism. - Yeah, it's so closely tied in weird ways. They're like so right next to each other. - Yeah, okay, should we wrap up now? - Yeah, I think so. - All right, trying to remember this stuff that AJ says around this time. Thank you for listening to the show. Thank you to all of our friends who made cool stuff for the show. Thank you, Jake, for the music. Also known as Emma Ranthen, links in the show notes. Thank you to AJ's beautiful partner, Tara, who made the very cool art that you see for .zip. Links are also in the show notes for her. Thank you, Chase, for making our very cool website. Do you wanna tell people where to go to see that beauty? - It's of course at dotzip.online. If you wanna go check it out. - Beautiful. - Feels good. - Feels good to say, feels good to look at. It looks like a Facebook page. - Nay, a Myspace page. - Myspace, yes, excuse me. No, we're friends with Tom, not Suck. We're a part of the worst garbage podcast network. Go to TWG.online. - I think so. - To look at all the other great shows there, including Chase's wonderful video game pod-timism, my wonderful frog of the week, which AJ also works on. There's also, into the eighth era, if you want more video game content, there's pause and pause if you're into warrior cats. There's, can't let it go if you're into-- - Audio PowerPoint parties. - Audio PowerPoint party, which is like the perfect description. - Very good, yeah. To clarify, it is the worstgarbage.online rather than TWG.online. - Thank you for fixing me. (laughing) And yeah, you can find links to our socials in the show notes if you want to, but the best way to get in touch is to join the Discord, where we talk about the games that we're playing, and there's also a lot of shit posting in our channel. - It's a good time. - Which is very fun. Also a big conversation about Ursula Le Guin recently. - Yeah. - Fun times. - Fun times. I think that's everything, right? - I think that's it. I don't have anything else. - Sick, I don't either. We will be back next week. Thank you, Chase, for making a Chimp episode, which means it was very fun. - Thank you, Kim, for making a Chimp episode. (laughing) - And we will see you all next week. Goodbye. - Pew, pew, pew, bye. - Pew, pew, pew, bye. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - PwG, the worst part of it, the all mine. (upbeat music) (dramatic music)
