Press B 234: Game of the Year: 1993

It's not Super Mario or Jurassic park. Best game of 1993 today on.

It's Unforgivable.

Don't unforgive over the intro.

Unforgivable was Metallica, wasn't it?

No, it's Unforgiven. It's also Unforgiven 2 and Unforgiven 3.

Which is because you're unforgiving. 3.

3 starts out so pretty and then turns into trash.

Well, who stars in it? Not Clay Eastwood.

Oh, Unforgiven.

Three Metallica songs.

There's three of them.

I'm sorry, I wasn't listening.

He doesn't listen to hip hop. It's fine.

I think. I think. I think. I think it's. I think it's been. I think it's been long enough that Unforgiven has one of my favorite lines in it, and it's where I think it's Christian Slater kills a guy, like, shooting him like 16 times or something. And Clint Eastwood says, you sure killed the fuck out of that guy.

It's a good line. It's a strong line.

Yeah.

Remember, like. And subscribe, please. Anyway, beautiful segue.

We'll get monetized one day. Until I say, you sure killed the fuck out of that guy.

All right, Fantastic.

Use that in the trailer. All right.

So I am your host today, Werewolf. And I'm joined by Sinistar Sick Jake and Chard Monk today. How you guys doing?

Swell.

It's Friday.

I'll leave it for the comments.

And today we are doing a game of a year. So this. This. This week, we're doing 1993. And of course, it's. It may not be 99, 1993, where we're from when it was released, but it originally released in 1993 according to Moby Games.

Thank you, Moby Games.

Yeah, Moby Games rule the games every time we do this.

If you have a problem with our dates and years, go yell at Moby Games because that's where we're getting our source material right now. Okay.

All righty. Who wants to go first? Who wants to provide what their submission is for best of 1993?

Runner up. Right, we start with runner up.

Runner up first.

Yeah, yeah, sure.

I can go. I can start. So just to clarify, just to make sure, because I've had issues with this in previous versions of this episode. It's 1993. The E backwards.

It's not Legend of Zelda. It's not legend.

Not 84. We agreed we're not doing 84. You guys didn't want to do that yet? It's 93.

Correct.

This is 9386. Right.

Just want to make sure. 9386. Okay. So when I looked at the list for research for this episode, because that's the thing I do first off, what a really packed year for games. There's a lot here and I couldn't be more surprised to see how much SEGA was on this list. It is packed with SEGA games. This has got to be one of the best years for the Sega Genesis. Not only just Sega Genesis, but RPGs especially. There are so many fantastic JRPGs on the Genesis. One thing that people kind of criticize the Genesis for being is a machine that doesn't have that many role playing games, but it had a handful and a lot of them came out in 1993. So it's pretty awesome. Packed list. My runner up is Mega Man X for the Super Nintendo. And I'm bringing that up because GP is not here this week. He hasn't been here for a while. But I think we all know how much GP loves Mega Man X. And if I didn't suggest GP's Mega Man X, I fear he's going to like, riot. So we can't have that. So we're picking Mega Man X as my runner up. I haven't played it really, so I'm going to pass to you guys. Let me know.

I'm going to say that when GP did it for my birthday, I think last year, it was fantastic.

Yes, that's fine. No, I could totally. I can now fit in another game that you stole from me. Thanks, Jake. No, this is going to be a running joke. I see that now. No, that's fine. That's totally fine.

It's a GP pick. It's fine. It's for gp. It's for gp.

Is it GP Pick? That's funny because. I don't know, I think I mentioned I was going to pick Mega Man X because I used to speed run it for and because here I was going to, you know, say. But that's fine. No, I could squeeze. There's. There's.

I guess I wasn't listening. I'm sorry. Shocker.

Are you serious? Jake.

Jake, I want to point out that when you told us what you were picking, it was not this.

I think he listens a little bit, but just enough. It's like.

It's like my tone fall off the stepladder.

My tone of voice doesn't carry in Canada except for certain facts. That's. It like it doesn't matter where it's coming from. It's almost like when you talk to your dog and you say sit and you're like, why did you do this? And all the dog hears murmur, murmur, murmur. This. That's kind of what I feel like our conversations are between Jake and I. So that's. That's fine. It's okay. I'm going to save us a sub, so don't worry. Fucking guy.

I will say I have played a little bit of Mega Man X and it controls fantastically. The graphics of sprite works are amazing, soundtrack is awesome and stellar. I kind of never really got into the franchise. I was always more of a classic Mega man fan. But I can't help but respect the controls in this game are pretty solid. I guess my only negative is I sucked at the boss fights because it kind of forces you as a mega buster. So I wasn't. I was kind of pitching to you guys. I know this game is liked by a lot of people, not just gp. Is there anything else about this game that is like a standout?

This game takes Mega man to a whole nother level of gameplay. It is fantastically done. It is beautifully done. It's got a great story that goes with it. And you're introducing the Mavericks, which Mavericks are really cool. They're the animal based mechoids. Mechanoids. As opposed to Cheney. Yes, Dick Cheney. That's exactly. What are you talking. See, again, not listening. Anyways, I used to speed run this game quite a bit way back in the day. I also watched a lot of people speed run this game because it's a great freaking game. Jake's right. The controls are super smooth. The. The animation is great and the soundtrack rocks. It rocks. Yeah, it's absolute banger of a soundtrack. I've actually had myself humming. Oh, what's the Eagles theme song? Bed Storm Eagles theme song in bed I'll be like, what is that song from? Oh, it's from Storm Eagle. Because I've been playing that game far too long that those songs get stuck in my head on repeat. But no, Mega Man X is, was. Was a great improvement on the original since we did get like Mega Man 8. I think fell in the Super Nintendo. I don't know if it ever came to the States or not. It was a seven and. And it just kind of fell flat. I didn't think that Mega man was very good. So Mega Man X is kind of like the pinnacle of Super Nintendo Mega Man's in my opinion. That's my opinion that doesn't. You have to agree on that.

I, I very much agree with you. Seven actually came out after X, which is wild because it's nowhere near as good.

It's not.

Yeah, seven sucks like seven.

I, I six came out the same year as Mega Man X.

That's right.

Really? Yep.

Yes, that's right. And I, whenever, when they Make a Man X originally came out, we all thought it was 10 because of the X. So we're like, yeah, where the other side.

And I'm like, it's not 10, it's X. Yeah, call him X in the game.

Yeah, It's Mega Man 10. He's. He's 10. He's 10 in the game. No, Mega Man. Mega Man X is a great. And it's the start of a really strong X franchise for at least the first three games. And then everything beyond that's kind of like. But no big, big Bang. Man X fan so much. In fact, I almost made that my runner up. But you know, I'm glad GP never would have asked. Yeah, I'm sure you wouldn't.

For free, Maze.

What a week. Jesus. Anyways.

Well, Char, do you want to go next before somebody steals another one?

Hate it here. Yeah, I'll go ahead and save a sub too. This was not my original pick, but I, I did. I have been gushing about it and it deserves to be on this list whether it's a favorite or not. I have very, I have very long, great memories of reminiscing about playing this particular game on my PC. Bringing it home. My dad spending literally hours to try and get it to work on my Pissario. My, my compact pissario all in one windows 3.1 piece of shit drive. And somehow he made it work almost every single time. But I am, I'm going with Doom because you can literally play that on anything. You can play Doom on anything. You could play it on a pregnancy test. You could play it on your phone. You can play it on the brand new Nintendo Alarm Clock.

By the way, it plays on our new bidet.

It plays on the bidet. It plays on the bidet, plays in your mind. It's fucking Doom. It's Doom. It's Doom. How could you not have a Doom game in a Top best games of 93? Doom. Doom has done so much for first person shooters and just in itself and its name and its own programming, it's a great game. So Doom is hanging out. And I'll be Doom Guy. I'll be Doom Guy this episode. I'm cool with that, Doom needed to have a shout out. So thank you for not stealing Doom from me. If I stole that from you, I apologize.

I would never steal your picks in my plan. Slander.

Probably a bard's tale. Doom blards tail. Doom plays on Bards Tale. So I mean, it's everywhere on everything.

You want to talk about soundtracks? Doom soundtrack is also iconic. That's like one of these PC soundtracks. And for how early of PC gaming it was, that's a pretty epic soundtrack.

Absolutely.

I mean, get your bingo cards.

It made Quake, it made Half Life. It made so many of these other shooters that followed it. I mean, we had a whole episode between. The argument between. Which would be possibly better would be doom or Wolfenstein 3D.

Right.

We had this whole thing and Doom just carries a lot of weight. We did. Yeah, that's what I said. We had an episode about that. Murmur, Murmur episode. Murmur, Murmur. Did we murmur, Murmur.

Canadian ears. What can I say? They're picking up French half the time. I can't help it.

Do I need to learn French? Is that what the problem is?

We play Doom in Quebec, but it's par.

Wow.

Parley vu from vul.

There you go.

You've already passed grade four French. Good job.

Have I? I better not be saying that at grade four French because my ass is going to jail. But anyways, yes.

No, Doom is a fantastic pick. I mean, it added on to Wolfenstein in the fact that it had traversal up and down. I mean, once again, I mean. Yeah, it's just. It's just fantastic all around.

I love how you say the feature it has is looking up and looking down.

No, no, no. I mean, honest traversal. Honestly, traversal.

It has tunnels too.

Have you tried tunnels?

That'd be true.

It has tunnels. Yeah. Okay.

I think it's hilarious because while it has planes, it technically doesn't.

Well, for shooting. It doesn't.

Trains and Automobiles.

Yeah, for shooting, it does.

Not visually it does. But for shooting. No.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay, but.

Right, so you can't look up and down in Doom. That was later on, I think. Right?

Yeah, that was Quake Nukem or whatever. That was Quake.

Okay, yeah. All right.

But. But it does have traversal of levels. Like there were platforms that would lift you up and, you know, take you down and. And all of that stuff. So, yeah, fantastic.

Yeah.

Well.

Well, Doom would not be my pick. I do recognize that that is probably one of just the Games of 1993. So that's a good pick.

Thank you.

All right, I'll go Ahead and throw my runner up again. This is another one that is not necessarily one of my favorites, but it's another one that I recognize just how important it is to gaming Star Fox.

Jeff is going to stay subscribed.

We're saving the subs.

But I mean, I remember the magazines were going nuts about Star Fox when it came out. The kids I knew were going nuts about Star Fox. I like the music.

Yeah, Star Fox is great. That's a great.

No, Star Fox is awesome.

I mean, I've. I've beaten Star Fox. I've beaten Star Fox 64. I've beaten Star Fox 0. It's not my favorite. I've also beaten Star Fox Adventures, not my favorite franchise, but I have appreciation for it.

But have you beaten Star Fox Traversal or Star Fox Sparkling?

I just want to point out zero. Star Fox is a fantastic game because it does have tunnels.

Does have tunnels.

Mode 7 tunnels. Right? Or not. It's not Mode 7. It's super effective. Right. Actually, you know, what was it? You know what the last game to use the FX chip was European release. It's. It's a winter gold. It's like an Olympic sports game and it uses the FX chip. And it actually looks legit, like a hidden gem. Well, maybe it's hidden over here. Maybe in Europe is all the rage. But. Sorry, tangent. I want to talk about that game.

Can you do barrel rolls?

Yes.

In the bobsled, maybe. If you do it wrong, I bet you we could maybe try out some.

Dude in the back screaming at you named Slippy. Keep your helmet on.

Yeah. I will say I was absolutely terrible at Star Fox on Super Nintendo as a kid. I'm still not that great at it, but I think when I beat it on Super Nintendo, I needed save states.

But I had this thing with Star Fox with like when I was growing up. I like. I like destructible environments. Right. Most of you guys already know that. So when Starbucks like had the ability to lose like your ship's wing, I was like freaking out over it because that had been like something so new to me. Like, oh my God. And you like limping half your. Half your planes, like all cattywampus as you're still trying to fly. I was like, what? I just lost my wig. What's going on? Like you. Nothing. You didn't have any of that in the past. So because it was all polygon, it allowed for more, you know, separation on stuff. So I thought that was cool aspect.

It gets a T. Rex wing. It's like A little guy.

Yeah.

A little stump. Yeah.

Grab my strong wing, Chad.

I mean, you. You cannot deny that Star Fox was a big step. Step up from stuff like afterburner and Space Harrier. So.

Hell yeah.

Sure.

Because it wasn't like.

I mean, it's not a rail.

It didn't feel like it was on a rail.

What's that like? I understand people loved afterburner, but Star Fox, infinitely better than afterburner. I may not like either one of those back in the day, but we couldn't have Star Fox 64 without Star Fox on SNES. And it's that one franchise, Nintendo. I always. I'm always weird why they don't actually give it another game entry. I don't know why they keep doing the reboot thing. I kind of want them to go back and give it a. Give it its version of Metroid Dread. I want them to go back to it, and they haven't done that in forever.

I don't think they're gonna do a reboot. I think they'll just do Star Fox collection and it'll be all three of the original game all rebooted.

So I was. I was gonna say I feel like. I feel like Dissent is honestly kind of a little bit of a spiritual successor.

I could say that if it's a Descent. But descent is full 360 motion, right?

It is. It is. That's why I say spiritual. Spiritual success.

That's fair. I think it's fair. There's a lot of tunnels in the sense.

I love that game because it's. It's all tunnels.

It's all tunnels. That's about tunnels.

Jake. This is the. Jake shakes his head the entire episode. Episode.

Well, yeah. He's not over here fucking pilfering people's picks. Try saying that.

I was doing this for gp. This is the GP pick. I was sacrificing my pick for our good friend gp. So I don't know why you're so salty, but I didn't know it was your pick. I didn't pick for gp.

You know what?

This is an MP earlier this week. And he said it, but before we recorded.

You know what's funny? It was all the time in my line of work. This is the remembrance of. This is like. Jake is my supervisor, and I'm like, maybe his top assembler, let's just say. And I built something and I showed him how to do it, and now he's coming in front of the entire team to show everybody how to do it, because he figured it out. That's how it feels like.

You made this?

I made this.

Yeah. Want to see what?

It's pretty cool.

I'm celebrating our friend. Not that chart had anything to do with it. At the beginning of this week. No, these. I'm doing it for our friend. Even though Chard might have mentioned it in an MP and he's being called out by the three other hosts on this goddamn show.

But why are you complaining? You got to do your. You got to do Doom. You're saying you had all these games you want to talk about? Fine. Pick an extra one.

No, I'm good. I'm happy. I'm happy.

You're welcome.

All right, so my runner up.

You know what else isn't on rails? This fucking episode. That's. Yeah, because it's off it. Way off.

Yeah. So my. My runner up is Sam and Max. Hit the road.

Okay.

LucasArts game. Absolutely fantastic. The. The creator that. That LucasArts hired and brought in wrote it as a comic book, and then it basically was turned into a point and click adventure. It's. It's clever, it's. It's unruly, it's vulgar. It's. It's all these things. It's about a dog and a rabbit that are a detective agency. Sam and Max. And Sam is the dog, and Sam is kind of this like, almost, you know, like film noir style. Like, he talks. He talks like, you know, we're gonna. Hey, little buddy. Kind of those things. And then Max, the rabbit is the guy that likes to turn people inside out. And in fact, at one point, he does turn someone inside out.

Jesus Christ.

Yeah, just. I mean, some of the one liners, like, you go into a restaurant and Sam walks up to the. To the, you know, the manager or the, you know, person at the counter, and he says, my little buddy needs to use the facilities. And Max says, facilities be damned. I need a bathroom. And, you know, I mean, that kind of stuff. But it's one of those where it's both clever and absurd. Like, some of the puzzles are just absurd. You don't understand why you're doing them until the. You know, until you're done with them. Like, there's a ride that you have to get on that shakes everything out of your pocket so that you can go get something else out of the lost and found. Because you have to go collect your things out of the lost and found, right? I mean, it's that kind of thing. There are mini games in this that you can unlock, and once you've unlocked them, you can do them anytime. Including one that's, I think it's called like car surfing or something like that where you have to like jump over street signs, like the big billboard style street signs as you're driving. It's. It's just front to back. It's a great game. Honestly, I think it's held up. Telltale did a series after it. You know, it's a Sam and Mac series, but in my opinion, Hit the Road is kind of the best of the best bunch. But yeah, one of the LucasArts classics we've talked about. Other LucasArts like the dig or Loom.

The Sam and Max games are games I've wanted to play for a long time and just never have. And I have some of them on Steam.

Yeah, those might be the tail. Tail.

This is definitely something that I would enjoy watching someone play. But I mean 93 was, was pretty heavy in the point and click era. I mean it was like I felt like being a Genesis kid, you know, in the Super Nintendo was, was still getting a lot of good stuff on there. But it felt like PC was really making a strong argument during this time frame with the point and click adventures and looms and, and the other stuff that came out around that time. So it was. We were eating good. We were eating really good at this time.

Well, and I had a hard time when I was picking this list saying do I pick Dave the Tentacle or do I pick Sam and Max Hit? I mean both are absolutely fantastic. I did have to go with Simon Max because I, I liked that game just, you know, a millimeter more than. Than Day of the Tentacle.

Understandable.

Yeah. Compared to Sierra, lucasarts had more of a like a charm or whimsy to their graphic style that I definitely appreciate. Definitely different. A different kind of point and click adventure. And I haven't played too many of them, but I always want to try Sam Max. I did play Day of the Tentacle and I like that one. But Sam Max, the character designs are really, really fun. Like when you mentioned I'm like, isn't that more new? And then you explain, yeah, Telltale did a series on it, so that's probably what I'm remembering.

Yeah. But definitely try out Hit the Road, which was the original. Yeah, yeah.

That was on Steam too.

Those are strong.

Thanks.

I don't need to look at any other games on Steam, guys. Come on.

Yeah, backlog. What Backlog?

Yeah, I made the mistake of showing my wife in the new Indiana Jones game, so.

Looks good actually.

Yeah, go, go look at the go look at the minimum requirements. It's. It's. It's stalwart.

We'll be just fine here. Just fine.

Yeah, I don't think my computer can run it. I've not even looked, but I'm guessing my computer can't run it.

I think it requires rtx.

Then I definitely can't run it.

Jake and I are fine.

I can't. Good. But I can't.

But you know what, though? Game Pass goes on. Microsoft's been doing the Game Pass deals for a while now. So if you get that or get Game Pass ultimate on PC, that lets you do the cloud streaming and just pay the 15 bucks per month to play through it to play that game for what the reviews are showing how good it is. 15 bucks to play that in the highest quality on cloud streaming. It's totally worth it.

It's not a terrible idea. Anyways, we're completely, again, not on Rails.

Yeah, that's not even a tangent anymore, though.

Although. Although LucasArts for it. Well, LucasArts did have some fantastic Indiana Jones adventures in that era.

Wasn't there a Point Jones adventure back Fate of Atlantis? Yeah.

Yeah, I think there was even like something action adventure. Don't play that one.

Right, Wolfenstein. Jake, let's go.

Do you want to tell us Chard's other pick?

Please?

Let me tell you about the picks that I researched this week. See the second Genesis. Now, wait, so many bangers this year.

Hold on.

This year, before you go out of.

Tennessee, you guys get mad at me because I picked three. You know why I picked three? Because I know one of you, Jake, is going to steal one. So before you guys are like, maybe we should just do two. No, I will always have a third in my pocket so I can keep this goddamn show, though. It's going off the rails somewhat on a rail on not both, but at.

Least one out of all four of us charged in that tunnel going straight ahead. Let me tell you, people criticize it for not being in the system for JRPGs, but they're wrong. In 93, there was a bunch of JRPGs for the Sega Genesis, and they're all freaking bangers. My game of the year for 1993 is Link's Awakening for the Game Boy. Let me tell you how many batteries I burned through for the Game Boy to play Link's Awakening. So many that my mother got pissed at me and refused to buy batteries for, I think a solid month because I was running through them. I played Link's Awakening on the old school Game Boy green and spinach screen. Can't see for shit. I didn't have a magnifying glass or a light. I played it the old school way on the couch in front of the tv. Link's Awakening.

Uphill, both ways.

Oh, so a Super Game Boy.

I always wanted one of those. No, Link's Awakening I've said. I mean, I've lost count of many times I've said. Link's Awakening is one of my favorite Zelda games. I flip back and forth between this and Links Link to the Past in terms of being my favorite. But Link's Awakening I adore. It's fantastic. They somehow took everything I loved about Links Link to the Past and put it on a small freaking 4 bit screen with the shittiest of colors. But it works. And the soundtrack is so good. I've said before as well, Game Boy has better sound than has any right to for such a small device. And Link's Awakening has banger soundtracks from the theme of the Wind Fish to just everything, every dungeon theme, the combat, everything is about. That game is so fantastic. I like, I even like the Switch port later on down the road, even if it is running with like a shitty frame rate. But I always kind of have that nostalgia to go back and play Link's Awakening. And I know there's a DX version and it's color. I don't care about that version. I always like playing the original. Something about the old school color palette just hits me the right way. I love that game from the platforming elements, the items, characters. There's Goombas and Kirby for no reason. You want tangents. Kirby. And a Zelda game is a freaking tangent by Nintendo staff. So that game is fantastic. So that's my game.

And the chain chomps.

Yeah, yeah. Which is a dog.

Yeah, you got to take one for a walk, right?

Yes, you do.

Yeah, That's a good pick.

Link's Awakening is amazing. It's a great game.

Yeah, it is. I love that game. I played it on a Game Boy Pocket mostly. I think I might have played it a little bit on a Super Game Boy because I had one. But I think I mostly played it on a Game Boy Pocket because that was my first Game Boy.

I had the original Game Boy and I had Link's Awakening as well. So I played the hell out of that one as much as I humanly could. Yeah, it's weird what great tunes came out of that Game Boy. I mean, Tetris soundtrack is incredible. Like hands down one of the best Most iconic musics out there is Tetris. So you take your epicness of Link's Awakening and put that into tunage. I would love to hear, like, a remastered, orchestrated version of songs from Link's Awakening that's not on the switch, personally. Like an Uematsu OC remix.

Yeah, probably got you covered.

Yeah, they probably do. I know where I'm going after the podcast, but.

Yeah, concerts, Nintendo concerts. There was a Zelda concert, I think in Tokyo a couple years ago. If they ever go on tour of North America, I want to get tickets because Zelda music overall I like quite a bit. Even the games I don't care for in the franchise, I still dig the music. I can't not love the soundtrack. So, yeah, it's a great franchise for music.

Good pick.

Yep.

And it wasn't mine, so that's good.

See, I listen sometimes.

It was mine.

It's all for GP. It's a GP pick.

Leaks awakening on the PC.

100%. 100%.

I almost picked it because earlier this week Jake was saying that he was talking about Genesis games. So I was like, oh, okay, cool. I'm free to pick a Game Boy game.

No, you're not.

I had to double check with him.

I. I had a hard time picking two games because I really do want to pick certain. Certain Genesis games. Like, I. I was talking in Blue sky about Pirates Gold. I love that game for a lot of reasons, but I can't. I can't sit here and seriously tell you it's Game of the Year or even a mon mention. As much as I love Pirate's Gold and how that's like the definitive version, it doesn't hang with everything else we've talked about this episode, but there's a lot of good Genesis Games in 93. Like a lot.

You were going Shining Force too.

That's.

That's where my head was.

Fantasy.

Yeah, that was another one where an almost.

Wow.

I'd love to pick Fast Star 4, but. Yeah, I want to save something for GP. Next time he comes on the podcast.

We'll do an. We'll do a 1993 Redux.

Yeah.

Well, on that note, I'll go ahead and I guess I picked mine. My next. My game of the year for 1993 is absolutely, hands down one. A game that is played on consoles. That's super great. I'm actually pitching Fantasy Star 4 because Fantasy Star 4 is great. It's an amazing game. Fantasy Star 4 is. Is the strongest out of the the series, in my opinion. I Thought the. The first three were kind of piecing it together and had some good bits all to it. But it felt like four had everything you needed and just smashed it all into a really good game. It's got great tunes, great characters, great battle system. I love the combination spell system where you can have two players cast one spell and it turns into one major thing. The sprite work on it was really cool. I really like the. The portraits of. Of the different characters, the. The cyborg orgs and the different robots that you play. And it's fantasy in the future, so, you know, guns and swords, like it's. It's the whole nine. You get to fly to different planets. You're taking on weird deities. You're. You're fighting all evil. The void fight the big fight at the end. The. The sprite work for that is absolutely gorgeous artwork. I am absolutely floored by all the work that they did on that. I am proud to say that I do have the badge for fantasy star 4 when we. When we streamed it some months ago. So we're talking years now, but great game, great game. The dog. The dog soundtrack for that town is one of the greatest songs in the entire thing. I. I love fantasy star 4 and I have to give it. This was a game that I have said on numerous occasions. I was trying to find something that would fill my Final Fantasy void because I couldn't have it on the Sega Genesis. And Fantasy Star was the game that I picked to fill that void. And I bought it many, many years ago and then returned it because at the time, when I bought it in 93, it was 90 bucks, 80 to $90. Because RPGs back in the day, they're stupid, stupid price. So that bad boy got reshelved and I had to wait years, years later to cook it back up and try it and play it again. So A Fantasy Star was incredible. I wore the magnet out on that cartridge from Bel Air because I rented it from that place so freaking much.

Yeah, you're not wrong about the price. I remember when I bought it, it was probably around $101. Something. Something stupid up here. When I was a kid, I bought it. I had to. Bought. No, I was going to say online. I bought it from a catalog. So mail order nice, because none of the stores carried it. I guess in my area, the Genesis didn't get the same level of attention as SNES and Nintendo, so I had to order it through a catalog to get it. And one of my favorite games on the system, hands down, I mean we're just talking banger soundtracks. That is some of the best music on the Genesis. And I think I like it better than some of the music on this nest even. I think the Phantasy 4 soundtrack is iconic. I love. I played that one first out of the entire franchise. But if you have. If you played the entire series, from the very first one on the master system and worked your way through to the fourth one, the story kind of loops together in a way that I appreciate. Three is kind of a side story, but it still kind of ties in. But I really dig that whole. That whole loop of the story, if you're into it. But if you've never played the other ones and you've only played four, you're still good. It tells you all the main plot points. And it's still a standalone story. Holds up. But yeah, the graphics are so good. I'm with you on the battle system. It's very tight and fast. I really like it. I did eventually go back and play two and later three. They're okay. But when we're comparing RPGs on various systems, ain't nobody mentioning Fanstar 3. Nobody like that. That game was so empty, and there's parts of it I like, but it's such a dead game compared to 4 and then 2. I just found bullshit hard for no reason. So, like four. Four is like a perfect game on the Genesis, you know, the rest of the franchise, I could take or leave it if as long as I have four.

It's really colorful, too.

Great game.

There's a lot of color in. In Fantasy Star four. It's really bright. It's nice.

Yeah. It's a franchise I got to play through at some point. I absolutely loved Phantasy Star Online and that I went into that knowing I was going to enjoy it because I enjoyed what I had played of the Fantasy Star games, but I never owned any of them as a kid. So when I got to play that on Dreamcast, I was like, this is awesome. And I went all in on it. Like, I have. I probably spent hundreds and hundreds of hours playing that. It's stupid.

I can. I couldn't strongly recommend a game, an RPG on the Sega Genesis as much as Fantasy Star 4. Easily. Easily.

Yeah.

And I played through one, so I need to go back and play through that as a franchise. Just like, barrel through the four of them in a row.

Don't get hung up on two. Two can be a killer.

Use a guide. Well, there's parts of two where you just need a guide.

Yeah, I'm pretty sure I have all four of them on the Xbox Genesis collection.

Nice.

Or I also have the Genesis mini, which I think has 2, 3, and 4. And then I think 2, 3, and 4 are also I have on Steam. So I've got them all over the place. I just need to play them.

One of those package compilations actually includes a map with the second game, I believe as an add on to it. I think it was the. It might be the Steam one. Or the Xbox One has a map. And that would be invaluable because I had to look up maps online when I was playing through two. Like, there was one dungeon where you had to go outside the walls to get where you're going. Spoilers. But it was very annoying to figure that out. It took me an hour.

Well, now you know, like.

Yeah, now I know. Now I know.

So I do remember when I would see Fantasy store Fantasy Star 4 on the shelves at the store. I'd be like, I'm so interested in getting it, but not at that price point.

Oh, man.

Pretty sure there were numerous times I'd go into the store to buy a game.

I had never been more.

I'd have the money to buy it, but I'd be like, but I don't want to spend all my money.

Yeah.

So one time I think I walked out with Illusion of Gaia instead of fantasy star 4. Another time, there was something I might have been secretive evermore.

Yeah.

Losing a guy I think was a 93 game too. As a matter of fact, it was.

Unless.

Yeah, okay.

That and Secret Amana, Jake's favorite mana game of all time.

No. Nobody. No, don't. Don't tell lies. Don't. Don't spread that vicious rumor. Final Fantasy Avenger is the best Secret Amanda game.

Stop stealing my. Stealing my games and I'll stop spreading the lies.

Hey, you just told GP's pick by. By taking Fanstar 4. That was being saved for GP. I put that aside for him. And you just joined it out to put it here on the podcast this week.

Call me an A hole.

All right. So. So, Wolf, what's your. What's your game of the year?

Well, charges did to me what I did to him. I'm picking Secret Amana.

Oh, shit.

So it worked out.

That's called a segue.

Yeah. So I absolutely love the shit out of Secret Amana. That is still probably one of my favorite games I've ever played. I remember as a kid we would play three player Secret of Mana all the time on Super Nintendo because one of us had a multitap. So we'd be like, all right, let's play some secret of Mana 3 player. And it would be such a good time and such a frustrating time because there was always somebody getting stuck on the corner somewhere and the other two had to come back and allow him out. But.

Yep.

Nice.

It was a lot of fun.

I love Secret Amanda. That's a great game.

Yeah. The entire soundtrack is amazing. The sprite art in that game is beautiful. It's. It's so good. The story is epic as hell if not a little odd at points.

Beginning. The beginning is they treat you. You're the. This raised village and you touch a sword and they exile you because you touch something.

Like exile. Get.

I was exiled for touching something too.

Wow.

Wow.

I hope that was not your high school nickname.

It wasn't. I. I never went to high school.

No. The truth. So set you free. No. Secret of man is a great game. This is another one that I. I went on a rope and badged as well. I. I really do enjoy this game. This game's a lot of fun. All the Jake gives. It isn't warranted. It's. It plays great. It. It has great controls. I love the way it handles. I like the charge system with the attacks. I love the different weapons that you find and you can level up and make them beer and cooler looking and do more. The spell system was. I like the little spin wheel. I like when you pause and you pull up the. The wheel and it has all those. The cool selections you can do. At first I thought it was going to be tedious, but it turned out to be pretty streamlined pretty well. Like once you get used to kind of how it works.

Yeah.

Sprite work. I love the. The location that has the four seasons in it when that you would run around. And when I used to do D D. My. My world that I created as a dungeon master had that four seasons in it that I stole from. From Secret because I thought that was a really interesting design. And the dragon's cool as hell. The dragon get to fly around.

Yeah.

So you know, there's always a square game. You always get some kind of flying creature or flying ship of some sort. And I was wondering what they'd give you. And they gave you a goddamn dragon. So. And he's cool. He looks like a little dog. So he's cute.

And they even put in that little cutscene every time you summon him.

Yeah.

So you see him come flying out from in front of the sun and he Swoops down and picks you up. That was so cool. At the time.

It was definitely Mode 7 at its finest.

A weird thing is, I believe that that map, the world map for that, was actually a globe. And so it was really easy to get yourself screwed up and lost.

It's a few temples. I think it spent hours trying to figure out where the hell they were. And I'd fly. You'd fly past it. I'm like, well, how did I get down to this area? I've literally been trying to find this little island in the middle. Where the hell am I?

Yeah. I'd be like, all right, just that way. And I start going. Completely miss it somehow. And it's like I went straight. So it was not a rectangular map the way they usually are, at least when traversing it. For some reason. Still never figured out what the deal with that was, but that's hilarious.

I'm glad you brought.

That's the thing with modern games, right? We have quest logs. When you're playing RPGs these days, it tells you what you need to do and where to go, especially if you're not playing a game straight. If you're only playing an hour or two here and there. Otherwise, it's just really easy to get lost. In the classic RPGs, you had none of that hand holding. Right. If you put it down for a week, you don't remember where you're going, you're kind of fucked.

Yeah.

So Secret man is fine. I don't hate it. It's just the combat. I don't like the normal attack system, like the having to charge up to do any kind of damage. That part kind of bothered me. Although the magic system is really dope. I really like the magic system. The summons. That stuff's really cool. The. The artwork is stunning. The graphics are great. So I don't hate it. I just. I just don't like the combat. It's not one I think I can go through and play again. There it is.

There it is.

Bingo.

For those that are listening to the podcast, we just had the Secret of Mana strategy guide thrown up.

The Bradley Guide, right there.

That is. Yeah, the Brady games, I think.

Brady Games.

Brady. Not Bradley Brady. Gosh, it's been a week.

Or is this Prima? Where does it say?

Oh, it could be Prima on the spine.

I always thought of Prima.

I said prima, too.

It's prima.

Okay.

So, yeah, it's premium. The weird thing about this strategy guide is it's all written as if it's telling the story of the game. So it's not like, just go here and do this. It's like they went here and did this. It's kind of wild.

Immersion.

The hint book that you could have bought for Bard's Tale was written from a prior adventurer's tale.

Okay, that's cool.

Yeah, that's cool. All right. Send a star.

Okay, bring.

Bring up the rear. What do you got?

Well, I was. I told Jake a game I was going to pick, and. And I realized I. If I didn't change it, it was going to do a huge disservice to a game that needs to be on the 1993 list. 94. 93.

93. Don't worry, I already put Doom.

No, no, no, no, no, no. I. I have to pick this one because if I don't. Oh, sorry. No, we're on 94 or 93.

93. Dork.

Okay. All right. All right.

Jake is 93.

Sorry, I'm going with my. I'm going with my same pick. We'll go to 94 and I'll bring this one up. But my pick is actually SIM CD 2000.

No.

Yeah. Which in the SimCity franchise is the Goat. I mean, they've tried to duplicate it and they just haven't. So, I mean, it took SimCity, which was. You had blocks that placed. This is a commercial zone, this is a residential zone. To being able to kind of design and build those to the size that you wanted. It added on top of electricity, it added sewer, it added water, it added all of that. It had multiple layers. So you had terraforming. It was an epic game. So if you haven't played the SimCity games, it's building a city, managing a city.

Yeah.

I think some of the features we take for granted in modern city building games probably originated because of SimCity 2000. Right. Like, you're right. It's definitely up there. I did not play that one, but I. You gotta respect what it led to for other city builders. And I guess SimCity 4 was. Wasn't bad. But then city people didn't like. But like. But yeah. Sim City 2000 is always the one that people say was like, definitely the peak of the franchise.

Yeah.

We did a whole episode about these guys. Right. Like we did Utah incessantly about SimCity 2000, I believe.

Yeah. And so we don't need to rehash a whole bunch of it. But the soundtrack is absolutely fantastic as well. I mean, the maxis soundtracks from the SimCity games are epically like. You hear them and you're like, that's a SimCity game, right. What's funny is when was it Six Feet under, the intro song to Six Feet Under, I think, like the HBO series. I'm like, was that written by the same guy that did the SimCity games?

Oh, really?

Yeah. Oh, yeah. It sounds very much like a SimCity. Like.

Yeah.

So, yeah, I don't know if it was, but it sounds very much like that. So. Yeah, anyway.

Yeah, that's right. Yep.

Are you listening?

I would agree with that.

Yeah. Yeah. When I first heard that, I was like, man, that has to be the same guy that. Did I. If I remember right, it actually might have been Stuart Copeland that did this. This intro to. From the Police. The drummer from the Police. But not. Not SimCity, but Six Feet Under. Sorry, that's a total tangent. We're on target.

Yeah. Well, according to Google's AI Answer, which could be completely baseless, it's Thomas Newman. I don't know if I dig further, I could find out, but Thomas Newman.

Is the less famous brother of Randy Newman.

It's a jungle out there.

Have y'all. Have y'all seen. Have y'all seen the Family Guy? That makes.

Takes a long look at Randy.

Anyway, so, yeah, as far as I'm concerned, in the SimCity franchise, it is the goat. I mean, yes, SimCity 4 wasn't bad. SimCity 3000 wasn't bad either. But for, you know, for. For all the picks, Sim City 2000 kind of really defined where that game went.

Nice. That's a good call. Actually, after that episode, I went and got, I think, one of the SimCity games.

So.

Because you guys hyped it up so damn much.

So nice. And if you want to play a modern take, pick up City Skylines. The first one, not the second one.

Yeah, I hope that second one gets patched over the next couple years, because I. I really like that first City Skylines, and there's a lot there. I was kind of disappointed. They kind of rushed that second one out.

Yeah. All right, is it time to throw out all of our honorable mentions? Because this game or this year was so epic.

Oh, man, there's so many.

There were a lot. Yeah.

Yeah.

So we're getting third real quick.

No, I'm. I. I was. I was being.

You can do it. Any talk about them? I can toss them out. Yeah. Honestly, like Shining Force 2. How can you not like Shining Force 2? That's the other big RPG for the Sega Genesis. So much better than the first game. Story is great. Count, like, dozens of characters Combat is very fun, very snappy.

Peter, Master of Orion. Master of Orion. One of the original adventure Space Forex games.

I mean, Jesus. But it felt like this, this, this time of year. I mean, you guys probably didn't give a about it, but Mutant Football League was one of my favorite sports growing up and I'm the Sega Genesis and I used to play the hell out of Mutant Football League. That was an ultra violent take on standard football where there would be landmines in the middle of the field and your players would literally die and explode. And you could tackle, but you would also like rip people in half while you attack. It's like Wizard's Chess from Harry Potter or like absolutely totally overly aggressive and exaggerated. I loved it.

Or like the Warhammer Football light game. I can't remember what. Yeah, Blood Bowl. Yeah, it's like Blood bowl which I have actually played the tabletop version. I have played that in person.

Oh wow.

Nice.

I was going to mention, oddly, Super Mario All Stars came out in 93.

Which gave us lost levels. Right. It was the first experience.

Right. So it gave a lot of kids who didn't have a Nintendo those three games from the Nintendo on the Super Nintendo. And then also brought over one more game that nobody in the west had played before. So everybody was like, oh my gosh.

Super Mario Brothers 2, aka Lost Levels, aka Japanese Super Mario Brothers 2.

I mean, fan of Presby to cancel fan favorite. Cool spot came out. Those of you who remember that episode Sonic cd, the less known, still pretty decent Sonic game that came out.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, no, this was a banger year.

Toejam and Earl Hunnic and Funkatron Mega Man 4. I know it's terrible, but I'm just.

Saying there's one franchise we don't talk very much about. Actually, I don't know if we've talked about it at all. On Presby is the strike series on the genesis. And that was 93 is when urban Strike came out.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You're flying your helicopter around Washington D.C. taking down terrorists and you can blow up monuments and shit and get yelled at. But the controls of the helicopter was always great in those games. Strafe and all that. I love those games quite a bit. I rented a few back in the day and yeah, Urban Strike was one of the best ones.

I loved Urban Strike Missed. Missed. Came out in 93.

Missed.

Yeah.

We didn't have a missed.

Ducktale Epic Pinball Lemmings to the tribes.

Yeah. Super Street Fighter 2, Super Star wars, the Empire Strikes Back just banger year.

You have SNES Genesis at their peak, right? And then you also have the last year of the. Of Nintendo was there as well. And then Game Boy was getting full swing of things, right? You had all these great consoles all at once releasing fantastic games.

So yeah, Boss was running strong.

I would be remiss if I did not mention TECMO super bowl for gp.

There you go.

GP pick that is. Honestly, he probably would have picked Tecmo super bowl and Mega Man X would probably be his two picks, I guarantee you.

Indiana Lufia and the Fortress of Doom.

That one. Yeah, that one. Huh.

Wolf's laughing because he knows what the fuck.

Yeah.

Cannon fodder.

Great game, great games. There's some really good that's out there. 93 was a. Was definitely a good year. And I believe I was 11 years old at the time, so I was in my peak gaming childhood thing.

That was the year I found Final Fantasy 4.

Ah, it's a good time.

Depending on the time of year, I was either a junior or a senior in high school. If I'd gone to high school.

We're gonna keep that alive.

Gotta build that lore somehow how we do this.

It's a really big box that Cinnastar lives in there.

Exactly. Well, gentlemen, this has been a lot.

Of fun, as it always is. Even when you get your stolen from you in the middle of your goddamn episode.

Or gp. It's for gp. I don't know why I'm getting this hate. It was for him. It was his picks. We all know it was his picks. Don't you listen to MPs chart? Jesus. I don't speak weeks ago.

I don't speak French.

It's okay. Neither do I.

All right, well, bring us home, baby.

Yeah. Well, that has been this episode. We have shared our games. If you've enjoyed what you've heard, please check us out@press betocancel.com or press be.org you can find the links to our discord or social media presence is there. We are also part of the Super Pod Network. You can check them out at.

Was it superpod.com superpod network.com superpod network.com.

Okay.

Yeah.

I can't recall this week. I was horribly unprepared for this. I apologize.

Well, I think we were all mildly horribly unprepared for this week. So.

It's been a week.

Can you tell?

Yes.

Yeah.

This would be one of my. It's a friend.

Yeah. Do it again.

Tell your friends.

Douglas.

Yeah, Tell your friends.

Call out Names at random.

I'm looking at you, Jerry.

Jonathan. It's on you this week.

Look, look. Spartacus.

Courtney.

Perfect.

All right, all right. Thank you for listening.

Do a barrel roll.

No.

In a bobsled.

I hated it when I went up there.

I liked it.

I don't like the glass floor. I fucking hate it.

Oh, cool. The glass floor.

No, sorry, YouTube.

Oh, yeah.

We are now streaming now.

Okay.

And it wasn't me this time. Batting a thousand.

Makes you feel better. Wolf, I've lived in Toronto and near Toronto my entire life, and I have not once gone up the scene. Tower. It is the biggest thing in the damn skyline. I refuse to go up it because I hate heights. And it also has a glass floor, so you're not alone there.

But at least it doesn't have a glass ceiling. Much like this podcast.

That's right.

See, I didn't expect the glass floor. And so when I got there, they actually updated that.

That's fairly recent.

So, yeah, nobody expects the glass glass floor.

The Spanish Inquisition floor.

Yes.

Yeah, I freaking. I burned myself like that. So burn myself. This week I am ready to.

Wolf, did we ever figure out who's hosting?

Well, I. Jake just kind of decided it was me.

Don't blame me.

Well, because he was away and so I just sort of got the blanket thrown at me. It's fine.

You know, normally it's the guy that's not there that gets voluntold.

I was trying to lose that Canadian dictator reputation from last year, that's all.

No, sounds like you're getting it right.

Yeah, I forgot about that. It's back, baby.

Wait, what about Go. What about. What about dictators? That's gross.

Wow. And I'm the supervisor.

What are you doing to my potatoes?

Wow.

Potato.

Are we live on Twitch?

I don't know.

Live on everything. I have it up for a team. I may be slacking, but I don't know.

Where have you been, Chris? I don't know.

Get out of my head.

Take on me. The reason water polo failed is because all the horses drowned.

Oh, boy. Damn, it's tied.

Just getting all these jokes out before we do the intro. That's. That's the way we do these.

Intro. Old intro. When I'm dead.

You know, I'm gonna call my playthrough of dead space this weekend. Felice Navi. Dead space.

Yeah, that's pretty good.

Nothing says. Nothing Sundays Christmas like necromorphs.

You gotta do a thumbnail with the dead space guy with the Christmas hat on. That's what you probably will.

I got some pretty killer thumbnails. One of my videos has 133 views already.

Wow.

It helps.

I know.

It's crazy.

I know. People here are like, yeah, good luck with your 133 new views, nerd.

Is that what somebody commented? Really?

No, I have no comment yet because.

No, I was gonna say we get no comments on our channel, which, for those watching, please leave a comment, like, and subscribe.

Yeah, that's you. We're talking to you.

Yeah, me, I like and subscribe every day, Doug.

Every time we're talking.

Every time I subscribe, I unsubscribe.

We're talking.

I thought we were talking to Jared.

Douglas and Jared. They're brothers.

Okay.

My one kiddo was it last month. She told me, it's like, I help your podcast. I subscribe, like, oh, that's great. Yeah, I unsubscribe and subscribe every couple weeks. Thanks.

That's why our numbers keep changing.

Just giving daddy a stroke. When we go down one subscriber, what do we do? What did I say? And back up a week later. That's my kid. Nice.

That's hilarious.

By the way, welcome to. Welcome to Press B After Dark, where we just bullshit for an hour.

Look, I got a second webcam I can put underneath my desk like we were talking about. Make it that Patreon only cam feed under the desk. I can just do that.

I've. I've got one too. We could all just go full foot cam and get kicked off of YouTube.

I like what sins Rich just said.

I. It's. It's not. But I'm sure you are putting my kids through college in views and stress with visage, so thank you. Mammy's putting my kids through college.

That's right.

All right, whenever you're ready, Wolf.

All right.