The Best Games Ever Podcast: Recent Episodes
VG247
Your favourite people at VG247.com chat about the best games ever - with a twist. This is a game show where our regular panellists have to pitch their pick for the best game in a very specific category, such as "the best game where you get to eat pie", or "the best game with the worst cars". Our host Jim Trinca then has to pick his favourite, and then has to spend the rest of the week having annoyed two of his colleagues. Usually Connor. It's good, you should listen to it.
With the imminent release of Starfield, people the world over are about to fill their boots once again with Bethesda’s signature style of go anywhere, do anything game. Unless they don’t have an Xbox or a decent PC, that is. But Bethesda aren’t the only studio who have had a crack at that particular style of vast open-world RPG: indeed, they’ve inspired plenty of copycats and homages over the years, and are often namechecked by other developers when talking about open world game design.
So Bethesda aren’t the only studio who create Bethesda-style games. Who, then, aside from them, has made the best one? That’s the question we’re asking our esteemed panel on this, the latest episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast, the show where we performatively argue about this sort of thing for your entertainment. Or bemusement. Whichever. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Video games and murder are like cheese and crackers. Vic and Bob. The Edinburgh Fringe and disgruntled locals. A classic partnership, but hardly inseparable: though our chief interaction with these virtual worlds is to deal death to their residents, it doesn't have to be that way. In fact, there are thousands of video games out there where you aren't compelled to kill anyone. Or stab them. Or even lightly maim them. Farming simulators, for example, where the only thing resembling violence is the application of combine harvester to corn. Relationship simulators, where the only conflict to be found is that between heart and head. Or Assassin's Creed 3, where you tend to just kill British colonisers, which most people agree is fair game.
Our guest this week is James Batchelor, editor-in-chief of our sister publication Gamesindustry.biz, and someone who is keen to spread awareness of the fact that video gaming is a broad and eclectic art form which includes plenty of non-violent titles, over 300 of which he has documented in his book The Best Non-Violent Video Games.
So, which is the best game where nobody gets killed, according to our esteemed panel? To find out, you'll have to listen to this podcast here. Which is handy because if you're reading this you're almost definitely already doing that. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Welcome to the Best Games Ever show Episode 64: The best game you love despite itself.
Some games make it hard to love them. My beloved Assassin's Creed, for example, is often hard to recommend to people, because so many of the games get bogged down in icon janitor nonsense, obscuring the feelgood sense of motion at the heart of the gameplay, and the epic meta-narrative that's essentially an olympian love story set across time, space, death, and reality. But the tailing missions are annoying, so.
This week we're joined by someone who I consider an expert on loving things despite themselves, given that he's a committed fan of the long-defunct Dreamcast, a console that died such a definitive death that it took SEGA's entire status as a platform holder with it. And it died for a reason. The reason was that it was bobbins, and nothing on the machine was as good as the whale bit in Sonic Adventure, but by the time it came out everyone had already seen that bit on telly, so there was no actual reason to buy the console. Still, it had a good light gun, as our guest Owen O'Donnell in this video on his excellent Infinite Review youtube channel where he has set himself the task of critically appraising every idea, concept, object, and creative work in the galaxy.
We gave him a break from that burden though to come and tell us what he would pick as the best game you love despite itself, along with panel regulars Tom Orry and Sherif Saed, and your host: me. Jim Trinca. You know I'm important because I have my own theme tune. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Baldur's Gate 3 is finally upon us if you're a PC gamer, in which case, this episode is especially for you, because it's all about good games that you wouldn't dare bring up in polite company. Or impolite company.
Gaming, despite its mainstream acceptance in recent years, is still an extremely nerdy hobby, full of very niche stuff that rarely makes headlines beyond the enthusiast press. Yes, that's right, I'm sorry to break it to you, but if you're reading this that's what you are: an enthusiast. But never mind, because one thing worth being enthusiastic about is VG247's Best Games Ever Podcast, where you need not fear the prospect of social ostracisation from being too into niche video games. Or boring ones. Or, er, risque ones. Because we're nerds too. This is a safe space. There's no judgement here. Unless you're Connor, but the less said about his contribution this week the better, frankly. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
As a medium, video games are often a vast fabric of inspiration-taking, borrowed ideas, and of course shameless rip offs. Some of the biggest and best games in decades have been the result of a lot of hard work coupled with the healthy practice of nabbing what's popular during development. A tad dishonest? Maybe - but it's how some of the biggest game developers in the business got to where they are today. This week we're asking: What's the best game that's a shameless rip-off of another game? You'd see it a lot especially in the olden era of games, early MMOs, shooters, and RTS games. Even today you occasionally see a bit of idea thievery - with Genshin Impact being perhaps the most egregious case of stolen ideas. As such, there's a huge selection of games on offer this week for our brave contestants. What will they pick? There's only one way to know. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Welcome to The Best Games Ever Show episode 61: The best management sim.
Video games are a treasure trove if you like managing things. People. Buildings. Civilisations. Transport networks. Space programs (as in NASA, not as in Star Trek). Whatever organisational or logistic problem you can imagine, there's probably some kind of video game that attempts to let you solve it. And of those there must surely be a Best One.
So what, according to our esteemed panel, is the best management sim? And how on earth do we say goodbye to Tom Orry, the very heart and soul of our podcast? Probably by doing an entire episode that's tailor made for him to do his little joke with. Ah, we'll miss this. Honest. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Welcome to The Best Games Ever Show episode 60: The best game with a reptile. With Gex making his grand return, now seems like the perfect opportunity to take a look at video game reptiles. There are loads, obviously, of various levels of importance. So this episode is a real toss up! Who will win... who knows! You'll have to give it a watch or listen in order to determine how things will turn out. Reptiles can be snakes, turtles, dragons, dinosaurs... but not frogs! If you were thinking of your favourite video game frog right now, you lose. Sorry. There are millions of reptiles in games, making this one of the least restrictive podcasts of all time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Welcome to The Best Games Ever Show episode 59: The best game with the worst gimmick.
There are plenty of crap games with bad gimmicks. Tony Hawk: RIDE, for example, which was built around a terrible skateboard-shaped controller peripheral and was basically a terrible game as a result. Or Crime Boss: Rockay City, which is a painfully bottom tier heist game which boasts “Vanilla Ice is in this” as its entire USP. Then, of course, there’s the Kinect library. The entire Kinect library.
But still, look, just because something has a bad gimmick, doesn’t mean it isn’t otherwise great. Wade Barrett was weighed down with the Bad News Barrett gimmick for ages, but he was talented enough to somehow make it work. Alfred Hitchcock had a rubbish gimmick of always giving himself a cameo in his films, depriving legitimate actors of vital cameo appearances.
But what of video games? What are the otherwise superb video games that are saddled with rubbish gimmicks, and of them, which is the best? To find out what our esteemed panel thinks, you’ll have to watch or listen right here. Right here! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Welcome to The Best Games Ever Show episode 58: The best use of a mega popular license.
Licensed games are big business. The richest studios and publishers in the galaxy all have a foothold in the gaming space because, as countless CEOs and market analysts tell us every year, video games make more money than Hollywood, musical theatre, gardening programmes, the broadcasting rights for Shinty, and the GDP of Wales combined. It is for this reason that everyone working in video games lives in a castle with a moat and a bentley on the driveway.
All of the biggest media brands are represented in our humble medium. Star Wars. Star Trek. Stargate. Star Fox. America. Andy Kelly’s tweets. The list goes on. But not every licensed property is leveraged effectively for maximum engagement (that’s CEO speak for “used properly”). Some licensed games are better than others. So which one is the best, according to our esteemed panel? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Welcome to The Best Games Ever Show episode 57: The best game where you play a dead guy. Gaming is stuffed to the coffin lid with undead protagonists. Vampires. Poltergeists. Murdered detectives with unfinished business. Starship captains resurrected from death by a rogue human supremacist terrorist organisation with a trillionaire CEO. The list goes on. And indeed, on. But what’s the best game with an undead protagonist? And why on earth did nobody pick Grim Fandango? Only one of these questions is answered in this week’s Best Games Ever Show, which is a bit short this week because the recording didn’t quite work and Jim’s on paternity leave so there isn’t any time to fix it. Still, at least the situation is framed by an ironic symmetry. Y’know, births, deaths, all that sort of thing. To find out who won and what with, you’ll just have to listen to the episode. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Welcome to The Best Games Ever Show episode 56: the best globetrotting travel game. This week we welcome our first guest panellist, the ever endearing Bertie Purchese from Eurogamer! If you've ever gone to EGX you may know Bertie as the eccentric host of the Eurogamer Pub Quiz, and if you're generally interested in games writing you'll have come across his tireless work as an Associate Editor of Eurogamer, where he covers news, conjures up features, records podcasts, and looks after their Supporter Programme. He loves RPGs, which often have a fabulous globe-trotting aspect to them (though not necessarily of our globe), so we asked him to bring that expertise to today's topic. And he actually turned up! Video games are a wonderful medium for virtual travel. They don't just show you new places, they let you interact with them. Live in them. Breathe their air. Talk to the people who live there. I mean, sure, usually your chief form of interaction with a game world is violence, but that's not always the case. And, as well as inviting us to adventure in realms of fantasy, video games have gotten extraordinarily good at depicting real life places too. Contemporary locations like modern day New York, Tokyo, and London are extremely well represented as video game locations. Untethered from linear time, historical action adventure games like the Assassin's Creed series and Ghost of Tsushima allow us a glimpse into the world as it was, not just as it is now, which is a thrilling aspect of the medium for anyone with an interest in the past. But what is the best game for digital tourism? Which game truly makes you feel like a globetrotting citizen of the world, according to our esteemed panellists? Well, to find out, you’ll have to listen to this here podcast. Which you're presumably doing already otherwise you won't have seen this. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Welcome to The Best Games Ever Show episode 55: The best game with horse armour (but you can't have Oblivion)
2006 feels like a lifetime ago. I’m sure for at least some of you reading, it literally was. In which case you won’t remember the utter stink that was kicked up over the concept of – get this – paying actual real money for in-game cosmetic items, on top of the money you’d already forked out for the game itself. It seemed unthinkable, until Bethesda went and did it, releasing the infamous Horse Armour pack for Oblivion for 200 Microsoft Points, the equivalent of about £2 in real money today.
The DLC was fairly innocuous in itself. Though hardly substantial, it added a short quest to the game directing you to a particular merchant, and eight different sets of equine armour similar in style to the player character variants available in the game. Though these are generally believed to be purely cosmetic, they actually generously increased the health of any horse they were applied to, reducing the chances of losing your mount in a fight. Though marginally useful, the DLC was dirt cheap and completely ignorable. By today’s standards, it seems quaint that it would cause such a fuss.
But it was a canary in the coalmine for the gratuitous aftermarket monetisation of single-player games, and a fairly notable contributor to the fact that almost every conceivable release nowadays, 17 years later, is some kind of live service bollocks with three sets of premium currency and a battle pass. At the time, Bethesda was experimenting with a new idea, which had been made possible by the relatively new fields of digital distribution and microtransactions. Todd Howard probably didn’t mean for it to be a Sliding Doors moment in which the industry chose the path to hell.
But, in the 17 years since Oblivion’s most infamous transgression, which games with Horse Armour have stood above the rest? What is the best game with Horse Armour, premium or otherwise, aside from The Elder Scrolls IV? This a question that I put to our regular panellists on The Best Games Ever Show, and in order to find out what everyone came back with, you’ll have to watch or listen to it. Luckily, you’ve stumbled upon one of the ways of doing just that. Cor! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Welcome to VG247's Best Games Ever Podcast: Episode 33 - the best game that could have been made by an AI
Join our panel of gaming experts as they discuss and debate the greatest video games of all time. Each week, we'll tackle a new theme and share our picks for the best games in that category. This week on VG247's Best Games Ever Podcast, we have a special treat for you! In the spirit of the holiday season, our host Jim decided to take it easy and let an AI do some of the work for him. That's right, all of this week's notes, intro, and outro were written by an advanced language model trained by OpenAI. So sit back, relax, and enjoy the show as Jim continues to embrace his "holiday mode" and let the AI do the heavy lifting.
In this week's episode, we'll be discussing what existing video game we think could have been made by an AI. From innovative game design to cutting-edge graphics and gameplay, we'll explore the games that push the boundaries of what's possible in the world of gaming. And as an added bonus, this episode's intro and outro were written by an AI! So grab your controller and join us for a lively and irreverent discussion on the best games ever, brought to you in part by the hardworking (and possibly sentient) artificial intelligence at VG247!
Our picks this week (SPOILERS AHEAD): Tom - Star Wars: Dark Forces
Dark Forces is a classic first-person shooter that was released in the mid-1990s and is known for its immersive gameplay, engaging story, and innovative level design. While it is possible that an AI could have played a role in the development of this game, it is unlikely that an AI alone could have been responsible for creating a game of this complexity and scope.
Creating a first-person shooter like Dark Forces would likely require a high level of creative vision, design expertise, and technical skill, as well as a deep understanding of the conventions and tropes of the first-person shooter genre. It is possible that an AI could have been used to assist with certain tasks, such as level design or AI programming, but it is unlikely that an AI alone could have created a game like Dark Forces without significant human input and oversight.
Alex - Minecraft One game that may be particularly well-suited to being made by an AI is Minecraft. This iconic sandbox game is known for its open-ended gameplay and procedurally generated worlds, which allow players to build and explore to their heart's content. The game's block-based construction and simple graphics may have made it easier for an AI to design and develop, as it would not have needed to worry about creating highly realistic graphics or complex physics simulations. Additionally, the game's focus on player creativity and exploration could have allowed an AI to design a world that is rich in content and possibilities, while still being open-ended enough to allow players to create their own experiences. Overall, it is possible that an AI could have been responsible for designing and developing a game like Minecraft, although it would still require human input and oversight in order to bring the final product to fruition.
Sherif - Spore
Spore is a unique and ambitious game that allows players to control the evolution of a species from a single-celled organism all the way up to a space-faring civilization. With its complex gameplay, procedurally generated content, and focus on evolution and adaptability, it is possible that an AI could have played a role in the development of this game.
The game's procedurally generated content, in particular, could have been created by an AI using algorithms that are designed to create diverse and interesting environments and creatures. Additionally, the game's focus on evolution and adaptability could have allowed an AI to design gameplay mechanics and challenges that are based on these concepts. However, it is likely that an AI would still need human input and oversight in order to create a game like Spore, as the development of such a complex and expansive game would likely require a high level of creative vision and design expertise.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, send them our way.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask? Well, it is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (Jim Trinca and associates) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good. Listen to it.
Welcome to VG247's Best Games Ever Podcast: Episode 32 - the best game of 2023
The future is unknowable. As are the minds of our deranged panellists, who were asked to pick their nod for next year's GOTY based on the scraps of info we know about 2023's game releases and, somehow, none of them picked Starfield. It's obviously Starfield, you idiots.
Cast: Tom Orry, Alex Donaldson, Connor Makar, and Jim Trinca.
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Our picks this week (SPOILERS AHEAD): Tom - Resident Evil 4 Remake
Tom tried to cheat death and reality by crowbarring a known quantity into his Nostradamusing, but failed to consider that if a remake is close enough to the source material to be sure bet, then it barely counts as a new game. Which is obviously a load of rubbish, but this podcast is a panel game about semantic bickering, so take it or leave it. Alex - Cyberpunk 2077 Ah, Donaldson, you cheeky so-and-so.
Connor - Baldur's Gate 3 A solid pick from Connor, but ultimately all it did was open a can of worms about whether or not early access counts as a release. See? Semantics. That's all it is.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, send them our way.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask? Well, it is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (Jim Trinca and associates) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good. Listen to it.
Welcome to VG247's Best Games Ever Podcast: Episode 31 - the best game that reminds you of Christmas
Christmas is a time of togetherness, of sharing your table with family, friends, and strangers. In that spirit, we invited a number of our friends and colleagues from across the games media to contribute to this, our first ever Christmas edition of the VG247 Best Games Ever podcast. We hope you enjoy listening to it as much as we enjoyed making it, and wish you all a joyful holiday season.
Cast: Tom Orry, Alex Donaldson, James Billcliffe, and Jim Trinca.
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Our picks this week (SPOILERS AHEAD): Tom - FOOTBALL MANAGER
Tom once again ignored or upset his family. Alex - Christmas NiGHTS Into Dreams Having won far away more episodes than anyone else, Alex decided in his hubris to try and slip a magazine coverdisc past us as a "best game ever". And he didn't even pick Cannon Soccer. The brass neck on this lad, honestly.
Billcliffe - Fallout 3 Somehow the least christmassy game here, and yet, no youngster wanted anything else under their tree in 2008. Unfortunately, it was 18 rated: but Young Billcliffe had a plan.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, send them our way.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask? Well, it is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (Jim Trinca and associates) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good. Listen to it.
Welcome to VG247's Best Games Ever Podcast: Episode 30 - the best game that made you uninstall
Uninstalling crap games is one thing. But uninstalling a game that would qualify in some way as a "best ever"? That's a difficult thing to imagine, or determine. Unfortunately for our panellists, that's the game.
Cast: Tom Orry, Alex Donaldson, Connor Makar, and Jim Trinca.
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Our picks this week (SPOILERS AHEAD): Tom - TUNIC
Tom didn't like this so he uninstalled it. That's it. That's the story. Alex - Street Fighter V When Alex came out with this I had to double check that it really was Alex speaking and not Connor via some sort of elaborate Alex Donaldson Snapchat Filter.
Connor - Guilty Gear Strive Imagine getting battered by a 12yr old? Honestly, this is one of the most harrowing tales we've heard all year.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, send them our way.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask? Well, it is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (Jim Trinca and associates) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good. Listen to it.
Welcome to VG247's Best Games Ever Podcast: Episode 29 - the best game where you don't do much.
This is a topic that's very close to my heart because I love sitting doing naff all. In that spirit, I haven't borthered writing an elaborate podcast description this week. This is yer lot. Bliss. I'm going to have a mince pie later after a long and productivity-free morning. You can't sack me Tom, I'm just being thematically consistent.
Cast: Tom Orry, Alex Donaldson, Kelsey Raynor, and Jim Trinca.
Our picks this week (SPOILERS AHEAD): Tom - Vampire Survivors Tom played this for ten minutes and decided on this week's topic soon after. Coincidence, or corruption? Alex - Dive Kick When Alex came out with this I had to double check that it really was Alex speaking and not Connor via some sort of elaborate Alex Donaldson Snapchat Filter.
Kelsey - Animal Crossing: New Horizons Possibly the game most culturally associated with doing nothing, given that it arrived when half of society was closed for business and a lot of people simply had to sit around in their houses. Bad times. Still, it's all behind us now and the pandemic is definitely over. Right? Right? Oh.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, send them our way.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask? Well, it is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (Jim Trinca and associates) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good. Listen to it.
Welcome to VG247's Best Games Ever Podcast: Episode 28 - the best game to play while you wait for Starfield.
This week's topic has come about because of two things:
Firstly, we're desperate to do anything Starfield related because we are a games website and people click on articles about Starfield. But, rudely, it hasn't come out yet, so we have to get creative. I say creative. I mean, we have to go on about it on podcasts and things.
Secondly, we're scraping the barrell and letting Jim pick them now, and he won't ever shut up about Star Trek or Morrowind, so obviously he won't shut up about Bethesda's upcoming blend of those things either. It's like they're making a game for him specifically, as if he deserves it. Where's my Bethesda game about stuff I like? Why can't I have an open world RPG about pining for Project Gotham Racing and watching Lovejoy?
Cast: Tom Orry (me), Alex Donaldson, Dom Peppiatt, and Jim Trinca.
Our picks this week (SPOILERS AHEAD):
Alex - No Man's Sky
Alex chose this because it's an open world game set in space. Hahaha. Loser.
Dom - FTL
Dom has this to say about FTL, a rubbish game that should have lost: “I have never let myself gamble; I’m too compulsive, and I have an addictive personality. So I scratch that itch with other things – 1000+ lifetime hours in Binding of Isaac say hello. So if I want to placate the craving in my brain for risk/reward and harvest that lovely dopamine payoff, I use games… and what better way to prime my mind for Starfield than a space game that gives me intermittent rewards, keeps things random (but logical), and makes failure feel fair. FTL: Faster Than Light is a phenomenal, top-tier video game… that just so happens to be about space exploration and science.”
Tom (me) - Morrowind
I don't even like Morrowind. I just chose it because Jim loves it and I wanted to win the podcast for once.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, send them our way.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask? Well, it is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (Jim Trinca and associates) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good. Listen to it.
The VG247 Best Games Ever Podcast has been going for six months! Can you believe it? The show that was spawned out of a random Slack message has gone from mild strength to ever-so-slightly-less-mild strength. To celebrate this milestone I sat down with host Jim Trinca to berate him about the choices he's made so far.
Welcome to VG247's Best Games Ever Podcast: The 6-month Inquisition Special.Cast: Tom Orry and Jim Trinca.
That's it. We definitely didn't do this because we ran out of time to do a proper episode due to various illnesses and things. It was 100% always planned. Please enjoy it.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, send them our way. They honestly can't be any worse than what we come up with.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask? Well, it is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (Jim Trinca and associates) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good. Listen to it. This one isn't like that, obviously. This is like those Christmas specials that you see that round things up, only we put it out a month before Christmas.
Come back in a week for another exciting instalment of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
I've given up writing brilliant intros to these, now. If you want them to return, simply leave a bag containing £100k in unmarked bank notes on the hill at the top of the road near the church, behind the bin. Thanks. Alternatively, write a comment saying how much you miss the wonderful intros. Or leave a review for this podcast. You have exactly one week.
Welcome to VG247's Best Games Ever Podcast: Episode 26 - The best game that crashed at the worst possible time.
Cast: Tom Orry, Alex Donaldson, James Billcliffe, and Jim Trinca.
Can you guess who picked which games? MechAssault 2, Runescape, and Dead Rising.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, send them our way. I came up with this weeks, but hated it so much I picked the first game that came to mind despite knowing it wouldn't win.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask? Well, it is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (Jim Trinca and associates) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good. Listen to it.
Michael Sheen is good, isn't he?
Welcome to VG247's Best Games Ever Podcast: Episode 25 - The best game with a welsh actor in it.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, we’d love to hear them, because we're just picking countries now and running with it.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask? Well, it is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (Jim Trinca and associates) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good. Listen to it. We’ve got some details on the show’s content below, so don't skip this warning if you hate spoilers:
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The best game with a welsh actor in it
That is the topic of Episode 25 of this podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom - Planet Zoo
Look, I was very ill when we recorded this and I got absolutely zero thanks for being a hero and carrying on, just so we could deliver a good podcast - unlike the terrible one that happened when I wasn't here and Jim was left in charge.
Alex - Elden Ring
I'm Alex so I'm going to win regardless of what I pick. Anyway, I went with the big obvious choice because my mind is mostly filled with JRPG battle strategies and arcade cabs I want shipping over from Japan on a big boat. Elden Ring has loads of welsh people in it.
Connor - Total War Warhammer 2
Full disclosure, I couldn't think of a single Welsh actor for this podcast until right at the last minute. But, a quick google and peruse of the list of valid picks landed me with a pick so good I had to take it. A proper combo of a great Welsh actor and a great game. Iwan Rheon in Total War Warhammer 2.
Iwan Rheon is great. They're mostly known for their performance as Ramsey Bolton in Game of Thrones, where they play an antagonistic, people-skinning, ambitious son who literally feeds a baby to dogs to rack up those evil boy points. However, I knew them first from Misfits, a British comedy drama where a bunch of juvenile delinquents get super powers. I'm sure he'd done other stuff but that's all I knew him from, and it was plenty to warrant him as my pick.
As for Total War Warhammer 2, I mean, what a banger. It's this incredibly vast CRPG where you take control of various diverse fantastical factions and attempt to state a claim on the world through conquest, diplomacy, and big ol' magic spells. Iwan Rheon's character, Beastlord Rakarth, is a cruel Dark Elf warlord, travelling the world and amassing a growing circus of dangerous animals that he can use in battle to run over any armies he has an issue with. He's also a prick, and is essentially an unsubtle send up to Iwan's Game of Thrones role, but it fits damn well in Warhammer so no one really cared.
He's even playable in Total War Warhammer 3, and even bigger game with more races and lands to explore, but I didn't pick it since I don't think it's quite as good as 2 yet. Nonetheless, a great game, with a great Welsh actor doing a great job. In the past, I've been accused of wiggling around (or just straight up missing the point) of the podcast question. But with this one, I've surely nailed it.
Come back in a week for another exciting instalment of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
I played the Discoworld video game, remarkably, before I'd read a single Terry Pratchett book. I don't know if that speaks more to the cultural cache of video games, or to my own literary ignorance growing up, but getting to the age of 11 in the United Kingdom of the late twentieth century without having read a Terry Pratchett book is quite an astonishing un-achievement. One that I quickly remedied, of course.
This was decades ago (I am old), and you'd think that, if anything, the acceptance of video games as a valid form of artistic expression would have progressed somewhat since then. I'm not sure it has, although mercifully we do seem to have seen the back of the dreaded "are games art?" debate, if only because everyone who ever got involved in it either died or got so bored of the subject that they happily conceded that it didn't matter either way. Who cares, just shoot the demons dumbass (or, indeed, the demon's dumb ass).
But I can't help but think that Pratchett, by all accounts a deeply thoughtful, kind hearted, and forward-thinking man, would have had a more progressive attitude toward my getting into his work via a PS1 game starring Eric Idle rather than, say, by being made to read Only You Can Save Mankind as part of a syllabus. More progressive than, say, Andrzej Sapkowski's, who is on record about his view that gaming is an unserious form of entertainment that has trivialised his work.
Terry loved games. He adored The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, and at the time when I was playing the point and click adventure based on his Rincewind novels, he was enjoying Tomb Raider on the PS1, and in the process helping to forge his daughter Rhianna's deep love of the medium. She would, of course, go on to become a titan of this industry, whose extensive CV includes modernising Lara's character and origins for the acclaimed 2013 reboot, and writing an extremely rare example of genuinely funny video game fantasy in the form of the Overlord series.
Books and games are always doing this little dance, it seems. They pilfer each other for characters, settings, themes, and concepts. Their respective industries feed each other with talent. And, most importantly of all, their intertwined relationship inspired the topic for this very podcast, which is:
The best game based on a book that nobody who played it has actually read
That is the topic of Episode 24 of this podcast.
“Look, it’s very simple”, said Jim. “Review scores aren’t a flat scale, they’re all sort of, rubbery and compartmentalised.”
“What on EARTH are you going on about now” replied Burns, already tired of this.
Jim thought for a second, looking down at his floppy Meatball Marinara, freshly purchased from Croydon’s worst Subway (which takes some doing). “Well, consider food.”
“The stuff you eat?” said Burns.
“Yeah”, Jim clarified. “So like, the best thing you can get from McDonald’s-”
“Big Tasty”, Burns interrupted.
“Yeah so -” Jim continued: “The Big Tasty with bacon,”
“No, just the Big Tasty” Burns interrupted again.
“No bacon?” inquired Jim.
“Donalds bacon is too smokey, it overpowers the beef.” said Burns, with the authority of a man who had, on several occasions, had more than one meal per day from McDonald’s: very possibly the only person to ever do so without being staff.
“OK fine”, sighed Jim, now regretting the entire conversation, and possibly the decision to take the job alongside Burns, moving to Croydon, all of it. All of it. “So the Big Tasty is a McDonald’s ten out of ten, right?”
Burns nodded reverently.
“So,” Jim continued: “if you’d gone to a good Italian restaurant and ordered the rissoto, you’d end up with something perfectly nice, but you know by the standards of Italian cuisine, it’s a solid seven. Nothing to sniff at, it’s just in a different league. A seven out of ten meal from an Italian restaurant is just better than a ten out of ten burger from Donald’s. And that’s the theory. Like how Kane and Lynch 2: Dog Days is a cracking 7 but The Last of Us is a crap 9.”
Burns considered this for what seemed like several minutes, and eventually came to a conclusion: “No. I don’t agree.”
“Wait, what? Kane and Lynch 2: Dog Days is great but its inherent seven-out-of-ten-ness is undeniable, and as for The Last of Us -” Jim protested, until Burns cut him off again.
“No, not that.” Burns clarified, reassuringly. “I don’t accept that a Big Tasty is worse than some Tory porridge you got in Carluccios. I don’t accept, frankly, that anything is better than a Big Tasty: the Ronseal of burgers.”
Anyway, welcome to VG247's The Best Games Ever Podcast: Ep.23: The best 6/10 that’s better than The Last of Us.
What is the best game where you get to eat pie?
Because it's the opening line of our theme tune, it's the first question anyone ever heard asked on our acclaimed Best Games Ever podcast: a five star rated show which some critics have described as "safe as badgers" and "short running time".
So we decided to ask it for our first ever live podcast, recorded at EGX London earlier this year, with an open mic for members of the audience to chime in with their suggestions. After several arguments about Breath of the Wild, and whether or not pizza constitutes a pie, one member of the audience stepped up and made such a perfect suggestion that they won a prize and our eternal gratitude.
We'd like to thank everyone who showed up, it was truly special to see those seats with actual people in them, and we loved how enthusiastic everyone was about taking part.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, we’d love to hear them, so please comment below or tweet them at us.
The best game where you get to eat pie, according to the panel
The best suggestions came from the audience, but this is what our staff picked, the idiots:
Tom - Breath of the Wild
Tom reckons Breath of the Wild is one of the best games of all time, and you can cook and eat pies in it. I can't actually fault him on this, but I do like mugging him off, so it didn't win.
Connor - Spider-Man 2
Connor entered this on the basis of a pizza delivery mini-game, running immediately into two semantic but fatal flaws: firstly, distributing pie isn't the same as eating it. Secondly, pizza isn't pie (don't write in).
Donaldson - Dead Rising and or Final Fantasy (various)
Of course Donaldson came out swinging with the weeb picks, and in fairness, both are brilliant pitches: Final Fantasy for it's delectable photorealistic pies that look scrumptious enough to make you lick the TV, and Dead Rising, where you not only get to eat pie but also brandish it as a weapon. On this basis, he won the for the panel.
Audience - Celeste
But the audience won with Celeste, a beautiful retrovania platformer where you spend the entire game collecting strawberries which get baked into a big pie that everyone eats at the end. An insightful and prize-worthy suggestion!
I don't believe in any god. I don't think that's a particularly unusual point of view in 2022, at least in some parts of the world, but if I did there are certainly some moments that stick with me as things I'd have potentially given a deity credit for.
I was once sat under a tree watching a game of amateur cricket. From the tree fell the largest pinecone I'd ever seen and to probably ever exist in the history of the world. The kind of pinecone that if it were to land on a head, would crush it like a hammer on a watermelon. This pinecone got so close to my head I heard it woosh past my ear. Death by pinecone avoided, but was it a god that saved me?
I walk the same route every weekday as I take my son to school. Not too long ago, on a surprisingly warm morning in September, my brisk walk was brought to a sudden halt as a heavy droplets pummeled the pavement just a few feet in front of me. Bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, they hit. I checked myself. I checked my son. No bird shit had hit us. We were safe. Was this a god?
Years ago I was brushing my teeth. This wasn't anything out of the ordinary, but what happened mid-way through was quite unbelievable. Brushing away, like I always do, I got a bit carried away. The brush zooming in and out too fast to be able to fully control, it launched out of my grasp and into the air. Where was it to land? That's right... on my head! It just sat there, perfectly balanced. The work of a god?
As I said, I don't believe in a god, but you must agree that these incredible moments really are hard to rationally explain. Anyway. Welcome to VG247's The Best Games Ever Podcast: Ep.22 - The best game about gods that isn't God of War.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, we’d love to hear them. 22 episodes in and let's just say the ideas aren't coming thick and fast. Jim is soon likely to suggest something like, "Best game a cat would look at and do a meow" and I wouldn't immediately dismiss it.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask while pondering if you could deliberately throw a toothbrush up and have it land on your head. Anyway, this podcast, which is why you're on this page, is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (me and some others on VG247) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good. Listen to it.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post or don’t want to listen but do want to know what games we picked), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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The best game about gods that isn't God of War
This is the topic of Episode twenty-two of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom - Immortals Fenyx Rising
Enough with the "oh, it's a Breath of the Wild clone" talk. Immortals Fenyx Rising is a great, fun adventure game that mixes elements of the open-world design of Breath of the Wild with God of War/action game-ish combat. It doesn't take itself too seriously, it looks great, has a load of interesting stuff to do, and deserves to be remembered more fondly than it is. It also features lots of gods.
Alex – Black & White
Right, listen. This is definitely Alex talking (Brummies!). Don't listen to anyone that tells you Black & White isn't a classic. It's a god game where the whole concept is about believing a god into existence. It's not watching some AI wander around a house and use a microwave. This absolutely deserves to win. Up the Birmingham FC!
Kelsey - The Sims 4
The Sims 4 is a god game, despite what Tom may think. You, the player, are an omnipotent being who gets to determine whether your Sims live out happily ever after, or merely become a Peeping Tom. Better yet, if someone isn't co-operating, you can also find some creative ways of making your Sims miserable, or worse, in receipt of a visit from the Grim Reaper.
Come back in a week for another episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
The PlayStation 3 was a strange thing. The console, arriving late to the party that the Xbox 360 kicked off quite brilliantly, was a big deal. Certainly, in Sony-owned countries like the UK, it seemed everyone was waiting for it. It didn't really matter that the launch line-up was a bit naff, that the console itself looked hideous, or that it was ridiculously expensive. The follow-up to perhaps the greatest console of all time, the PS2, was a huge deal.
But what exactly were people desperate to play on their new PS3? I was at the March 2006 UK launch, somewhere in London, probably in a store that no longer exists and is now a Greggs. While there we interviewed the now Stadia-failer Phil Harrison – who is essentially a giant. I'd never spoken to a man so intimidatingly large before. Phil, as big a deal as he was in his PlayStation days (lots of ducks, etc) was not my highlight of the evening. Oh no. It was the public. More specifically, the actual batshit reasons some of them were buying a new PS3 a billion pounds.
One person, a young man with a pencil-thin moustache, quite enthusiastically told me: "Sonic." This took me by great surprise, so much so that I almost laughed for the first time since BBC2 comedy show "Fist of Fun" aired in 1995. But I digress. This person was queueing for hours in order to spend £425 (plus the price of the game) to play a utterly terrible Sonic game, which everyone knew was terrible as it had been released on the Xbox 360 the previous year.
A lot of people in the queue couldn't even name a single game they were buying, simply saying something about Blu-ray and FIFA – although the first FIFA on PS3 was some six months away from releasing. No bother.
Ridge Racer 7 was right there, at launch. But no, of course no one mentioned it. However, of all the reasons I was told as to why people were buying a PS3 at launch, one took the crown as the most bizarre, nonsensical bit of accounting I'd ever heard.
"Yeah, I worked out that I can save the money I was going to spend on a laptop by just buying a PS3," a man told me. "I'll do all my work on the PS3. Just need to plug in a keyboard. Got a printer ready to go," he added. I nodded politely and walked away.
To my knowledge, no wordprocessor of any form was released for the PS3 (not unless you got Linux installed on it). I hope you installed Linux and worked your little heart off, man. I really do.
Anyway. Welcome to VG247's The Best Games Ever Podcast: Ep.21 - The best dead game you'd buy a console for if it came back.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, we’d love to hear them. To be clear, here, no one has sent in a single suggestion. I'm starting to think no one reads this. Which is rather sad.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask while pondering just how awful the PS3 launch line-up was and how the whole thing was saved by it being a blu-ray machine. Anyway, this podcast, which is why you're on this page, is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (me and some others on VG247) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good. Listen to it.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post or don’t want to listen but do want to know what games we picked), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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The best game dead game you'd buy a console for if it came back
This is the topic of Episode twenty-one of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom - Ridge Racer
Is there another game series that screams launch title more than Ridge Racer? It was not only a launch game for the original PlayStation; it was THE launch game for the original PlayStation. It proved what that console could do and sold an entire generation on the new console in a market that had been dominated by SEGA and Nintendo.
Alex – Time Crisis
I've picked Time Crisis, but I have to level with you: this pick is really all about a whole genre, which is home ports of light gun arcade shooters. These things have been around since the days of the NES and Duck Hunt, and entered a sort of heyday during the PS1 and PS2 eras, but then in the PS3 era it seemed to die out. For my money, it also died out through no fault of its own.
Light gun games were the victim of a range of circumstances. For a start, they're incompatible with modern LCD and LED flat-screen displays without a whole truck-load of cumbersome sensors - which is how Time Crisis 4 shipped on PS3. I'd also wager that the genre suffered as a result of the great Guitar Hero crash - that is, the period when, after years of plastic guitars, drums, fitness boards, skateboards, and even Wii Remote enclosures in the shape of guns to play crappy-feeling pointer-based shooters, people just got bored of buying plastic tat. All of that stuff went down the pan, and took Light Guns down with it.
But the time is now for their return. A technical solution has been created for the hardware incompatibility problem, and there are many thirty-somethings with huge light gun nostalgia. I'd buy any machine that managed to get a new Time Crisis, Point Blank, Virtua Cop, or even just remasters of the classic games. I'd pay a king's random.
Connor – Def Jam
Look, let's not mess around here. Def Jam was only really good once. However, it was damn good with Def jam: Fight for NY. It was the full package, a wild idea pulled off perfectly. Sure it's a bit dated but it's old as heck, man. That's why if they made a new one, with a new cast of modern artists, updated gameplay, and the same slick style I'd buy a whole new console quicker than you could throw Snoop Dogg out of a three story window. I'd even buy a Nintendo Console.
Makes it even worse, more so than the other good suggestions, is that every now and again some guy on the official Def Jam Twitter account will post something like "Hey, where would you like the next Def Jam game to be set, Chicago or Philly?" They've done this like 10 times now. It's gone from raising hype to rubbing it in our faces. Make a new one, please.
Come back in a week for another episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
Do you ever think about the time before mobile phones? The era of calling your the landline in your mate's house, only for their mum to answer.
"Can I talk to Jimmy, please?"
"Is that Tom? OK, I'll get Jimmy."
"... JIMMY! JIMMY! TOM IS ON THE PHONE."
"Hello."
"Hello. Do you want to come round my house?"
"... MUM! CAN I GO ROUND TOM'S HOUSE?"
"... ARE YOU HAVING TEA THERE?"
"Mum says am I having tea there?"
"... MUM, CAN JIMMY HAVE TEA HERE?"
"... YES."
"Yes."
"OK."
"OK."
"Bye."
We had such wonderful conversations on phones, before everything became texts and WhatsApp messages.
My granddad didn't even talk to his friends using a landline. He used a CB radio.
"Mike, this is Tom. Over (note: everyone in my family is called Tom!)"
"Mike, this is Tom. Over."
"Tom, this is Mike. Over."
"Hello, Mike. Over."
"Did you watch the football? Over."
"Yes. Over."
"Ian Rush is a CT! Over."
"CT! Over"
My granddad had such wonderful conversations on his CB radio, before everything became texts and WhatsApp messages. His mind would have blown had he realised what future lay ahead for phones.
Anyway. Welcome to VG247's The Best Games Ever Podcast: Ep.20 - The best game you played on your phone.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, we’d love to hear them. If you're a Billcliffe fan (I've heard there are some), he'll be back on soon, so stop messaging me about him.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask while wondering how I remembered, verbatim, those conversations from 30 years ago. I'll level with you. Those conversations came out of my brain about five minutes ago. But they are accurate in tone, feel, and language. Anyway, this podcast, which is why you're on this page, is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (me and some others on VG247) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good. Listen to it.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post or don’t want to listen but do want to know what games we picked), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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The best game you played on your phone
This is the topic of Episode twenty of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom - New Star Soccer
Before mobile phone games became all fancy pants, New Star Soccer blazed the way with simple, but perfect touchscreen gameplay, tidy management simulation mechanics, and that hard to pin-down moreishness. It was simply brilliant, and the game I've put more hours into on a phone than any other.
Alex – Retro Bowl
Retro Bowl is an astonishingly good game, a great expression of what made the classic 8-bit arcade-era sports games great, compressed down to a mobile game that ultimately feels surprisingly deep despite its simple presentation and budget price. I'd heartily recommend it to anyone - fan of American Football or not.
But better still, honestly, is my personal connection to this game, where it was directly responsible for keeping me sane during an enormously stressful 48 hours. It's brilliant, but if keeping your head screwed on while you're trapped away from home as the world crumbles around you isn't a great demonstration of mobile gaming, I don't know what is.
Connor – Pokemon Go
I know it was the obvious pick, but Pokemon Go stood out to me as the best phone game I've ever played, and the only one that actually got me out and, well, mobile. As opposed to sitting away at home tapping away. It really was in its early days an explosive entity in the gaming space. Everyone was playing — everyone! You, me, your work mates, your boss, my boss (probably).
Everyone has their own stories of seeing crowds of people walking around, face in phones, searching for pokemon. In those early days, before Niantic figured out people were walking Looney Toons style into pits and across construction sites, there was a real wild energy about the bloody thing.
Factional rivalries were real: not online weak sauce cosmetic beef, I'm talking the real deal! You could see those suckers on the other team, you could spot them walk up and claim a spot, and you could stair them down as you took it back. Glorious, social gaming. The mobile platform at its best.
Come back in a week for another episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
It’s Barking, 1978. We’re playing an away match against the Under 9 Tigers, and I’m in goal, being the team’s only goalkeeper, and despite my repeated request for new kneepads being consistently denied. “Ain’t got the funds, lad” was the constant refrain from the manager, Keith, ever clad in his suede coat, gold chains, and cashmere polo neck: the standard uniform at the time of people who had large status in small towns.
Last minute penalties. Unprotected joints. A striker four years my senior, having been kept back several years in school on account of his behavioural issues. Why his academic progression was reflected by the local football league is and will remain a mystery, but you must accept it for the purposes of this narrative. The point is: he was three times my size, and his legs were pneumatic pistons that could boot my head clean off and barely notice.
Mercifully, he booted the ball, rather than my skull, which was saved from his kinetic anger only by virtue of not being the object on the ground in front of him. The ball soared toward the back of the net, and would have punched a hole through the stand and into the dry cleaners across the main road outside, were it not for my left knee. My unprotected left knee. Which, as it happens, did not impede the ball’s journey into the net.
We lost, naturally. The parents of my squad were furious at Keith for his reckless spendthriftery: for just 89 new pence, a brand new set of knee pads could have saved both my leg from breaking and our place in the junior league. “FIFA, you idiot, Keith!” they screamed. “FIFA doesn’t apply to amateurs, Terry!” screamed Keith back at them. “It’s a universal principle, Keith! Football in, football 'aht!” added Manky Paul, the groundsman, by way of explanation. “If yer don’t invest, you’ll never see a return!”. And he added: "You plonker!".
“Piffle” said Keith, before an angry mob kicked his head in. And from that day to this, I’ve understood a fundamental principle of life: you only get out what you put in. Whether that’s funding, enthusiasm, or taking the time to leave little five star reviews of your favourite gaming podcasts so the people involved can continue producing this wonderful content.
Welcome to VG247's The Best Games Ever Podcast: Ep.19 - The Best Game With An Acronised Name Like 'FIFA' That Isn't FIFA.“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask while wondering if the intro story is what you think it is and if it really happened. Yes and yes. I don't recommend it. Anyway, this podcast, which is why you're on this page, is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (me and some others on VG247) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good. Listen to it.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post or don’t want to listen but do want to know what games we picked), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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The Best Game With An Acronised Name Like 'FIFA' That Isn't FIFA
This is the topic of Episode nineteen of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Alex - SSX Tricky
Before we get into if we're morons for choosing games that have an acronym rather than an initialism, let's put that to one side for a moment and talk about which of these games are the best. It has to be SSX Tricky, right? Hailing from an era when it was just cooler to have an abbreviated name, SSX actually stands for Snowboard Supercross. As well as being a good game, it abbreviates 'cross' into X - which is even cooler.
It is the obvious winner based on that alone - tack on the soundtrack and a generally killer feel-good attitude, and it's tough to argue against.
James – DDR (Dance Dance Revolution)
The ultimate party game, the ultimate arcade game, DDR is as much kinetic fun whether you're playing on a giant silver stage with credits on the line or a crinkly dance mat in front of the TV.
With tons of classic pop songs and funky original numbers building out an awesome roster of tunes you just can't help but stomp along to, there's no better game for getting up, getting down, and moving all around (especially when there's booze in your body).
With myriad entries over a 20 year history, Dance Dance Revolution is one of gaming's great underrated franchises; instantly recognisable and loved by all ages, casual and hardcore gamers alike.
Sherif - F.E.A.R
Dead or Alive Xtreme 2 is a game for perverts, but I had no idea I swear. I swear to god I didn't know. I, a pure 13 year old, thought I was buying a cheap fighting game. So what if it had bikinis on the front, how was I supposed to know it was softcore porn? The lads at the GameStation let me buy it, it's their fault when you think about it.
If you like beach volleyball it's allegedly the focus of the game. You're meant to build up a friendship with a variety of women in order to improve your overall performance at seaside sports. You can also play tug of war and "butt battles" by the pool, but you can't even parry incoming ass blasts so what's the point, to be honest. You can, believe it or not, also do jet ski races. In fact, it was one of the major selling points for the game, according to revered DOA historians.
It did have a casino though, which was fun, but the game was a totally different package than what I was expecting. In hindsight I probably should have thought of a thought-provoking genre-twisting game, but the moment I saw the podcast brief Dead or Alive Xtreme 2 was the only thing that came to mind. I am sorry.
Come back in a week for another episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
Having kids is wonderful when it's not the most tiring, life-changing thing you can do to yourself - and even then you only remember the wonderful bits. When your child smiles at you for the first time and it isn't a build up of gas... wonderful. When your child says "dada" not as part of a string of completely random sounds... wonderful. When your child laughs at you for doing something only they would laugh at... wonderful.
As I said, it's not always wonderful. Waking up four times a night... not wonderful. Standing in a stress position to hold the hands of a tiny child trying to walk... not wonderful (but also wonderful). Constantly tidying things that are never actually tidy... not wonderful.
But if there's one thing that sums up having young children it's this: It's 4pm on a Saturday. Essentially the evening if you're a parent. It's a little too early for dinner, but you at least know that that's soon and then after that bed time isn't far off. The sweet release of bed time. Anyway, you see a crumb of chocolate just sat in a crevice of your shirt. Given that dinner, as established is still some minutes away, you fancy a small snack. Yum! Chocolate. But you've forgotten, just for a split-second, that you have a baby.
Welcome to VG247's The Best Games Ever Podcast: Ep.18 - The best game you thought was one genre but turned out to be another.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, we’d love to hear them. If you're a Connor fan (there must be some of you out there), make them Fighting Game related or at least adjacent, as that's pretty much all he knows about.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask while wondering if the intro story is what you think it is and if it really happened. Yes and yes. I don't recommend it. Anyway, this podcast, which is why you're on this page, is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (me and some others on VG247) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good. Listen to it.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post or don’t want to listen but do want to know what games we picked), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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The best game you thought was one genre but turned out to be another
This is the topic of Episode eighteen of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom - Bugsnax
Look. Loads of you are going to be all "that's not really a different genre, is it?" and to that I say: "poo poo." If you've not experience the horror of Bugsnax you can't comment on it. Simple. It's harrowing. The PlayStation Access video above explains it all brilliantly if you have no intention to ever play the game yourself.
Alex – Brutal Legend
It might seem like the obvious choice - and that's because it is. But honestly, who cares? Brutal Legend is absolutely the best example of a game that you think is one thing... but turns out to be another. Publisher EA is partially to blame for this, too - almost all of this game's marketing beats sold it as an action-packed hack-and-slash game set in a heavy metal world. And it is that... for a while.
But part-way through Brutal Legend, it reveals its secret Ace of Spades - it's not just an action game set in a world inspired by heavy metal album covers - it's a real-time strategy game. Soon, you're taking part in wild battles with masses of troops, fighting demons for the fate of a world populated by Ozzy, Lemmy, and other metal greats. It's brilliant - even in the hard turn into RTS turned a lot of players off.
Connor - Dead or Alive Xtreme 2
Dead or Alive Xtreme 2 is a game for perverts, but I had no idea I swear. I swear to god I didn't know. I, a pure 13 year old thought I was buying a cheap fighting game. So what if it had bikinis on the front how was I supposed to know it was softcore porn. The lads at the Game Station let me buy it, it's their fault when you think about it.
If you like beach volleyball it's allegedly the focus of the game. You're meant to build up a friendship with a variety of women in order to improve your overall performance at seaside sports. You can also play tug of war and "but battles" by the pool, but you can't even parry incoming ass blasts so what's the point to be honest. You can, believe it or not, also do jet ski races. In fact, it was one of the major selling points for the game, according to revered DOA historians.
It did have a casino though, which was fun, but the game was a totally different package than what I was expecting. In hindsight I probably should have thought of a thought-provoking genre-twisting game, but the moment I saw the podcast brief Dead or Alive Xtreme 2 was the only thing that came to mind. I am sorry"
Come back in a week for another episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
It's not common knowledge, but international mega star, Beyoncé, is a huge Assassin's Creed fan. I'm quite surprised more hasn't been made about this, given her influence, but now you know. Her 2006 stratospheric chart topper, Irreplaceable, was at one point all about Assassin's Creed - a game she played an early build of and loved so much she simply had to pen a song about it, even before it hit stores.
The song, which went on to the biggest tune of 2007 in the US, originally talked about how the star loved Assassin's Creed so much that it could never be replaced by another game. In a strange turn of events, however, Beyoncé has a phobia of flags, so was quite shocked to see so many in the game when she played it just prior to the release of Irreplaceable. This shocking twist resulted in the song hastily being rewritten to focus on a relationship, and the original song never saw the light of day.
Bizarrely, she also has an irrational dislike of first-party PlayStation exclusives.
At one point, then, Beyoncé thought Assassin's Creed was irreplaceable. But was it? Welcome to VG247's The Best Games Ever Podcast: Ep.17 - Best Assassin's Creed game that isn't an Assassin's Creed game and you can't pick Ghost Of Tsushima.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, we’d love to hear them. Just please suggest topics that I can easily write soon-to-be-award-winning short stories about. Thanks. This one was a right nightmare - thanks, Jim!
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask while wondering if the dates in the above story are accurate in any way. They are, I think, although I had to do some rewrites when discovering the song was released in 2006 and not 2007. Anyway, this podcast, which is why you're on this page, is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (me and some others on VG247) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good. Listen to it.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post or don’t want to listen but do want to know what games we picked), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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The best Assassin's Creed game that isn't an Assassin's Creed game and you can't pick Ghost Of Tsushima
This is the topic of Episode seventeen of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom - Mirror's Edge
Yes, if you just look at Mirror's Edge without my level of intellect you'll likely wonder what I'm on about. It's all about the parkour. Such a big deal was made about the free-running in the original Assassin's Creed, and rightly so, and Mirror's Edge feels like a first-person take on this. It's brilliant, and just like AC, the combat is a bit ropey.
Alex – The Saboteur
The Saboteur was one of those games that came about in what I feel was a sort of golden age of experimental open world games - of which Assassin's Creed was one. It has a lot in common with Grand Theft Auto as well, to be fair, but the similarities to Assassin's Creed are also pretty undeniable. There's stealth, clambering around buildings, and an open-ended approach that feels much like the earliest entries in the AC series.
The primary difference, of course, is that you're killing nazis. Which is a video game staple we don't get to do enough of, honestly. Toss in some really interesting and artistic visual choices, a fun protagonist, and the general originality of the project, and the result is pretty strong. It's a shame it never had any chance of getting a sequel - cruel parent EA closed down its development studio before the game even released.
James - Sly 2: Band of Thieves
If you think about it, Sly 2: Band of Thieves (Sucker Punch Productions' best game imo) is basically an Assassin's Creed game, but with a racoon.
Sly is the hereditary heir to the Cooper gang, an clandestine organisation of gentleman thieves who have been fighting against the evil Klaww gang for generations, and the similarities don't stop there. Between the three playable characters, Sly, the stealthy parkour master, Bentley, the ingenious gadget specialist, and giant pink hippo Murray, the brawn to the others' brains, you have all of the main pillars of Assassin's Creed's gameplay too. What's more, on your globe-trotting adventure around real-world cities like Paris and Prague, you're breaking up criminal organisations who're abusing the semi-mythical Clockwerk parts to further their nefarious aims - just like the Pieces of Eden in Assassin's Creed.
Come back in a week for another episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
Games who ape films
Who like films to be games
Who make films like they're games
Who make games like they're films
Always should be something you really love
You couldn't go anywhere in 1994 without Blur's classic, Games and Films, wriggling through the airwaves and into your ears. No other song captured the mood of the era better. Video games were rising, but wanted to get the credibility of films, while films were looking at the growing success of games and wondering if they should be keeping an eye on them. Games with bits of movies in them were the result. A lot of them were naff, but we still enjoyed them.
The school playgrounds at the time became battlegrounds. The "filmers" of the time insisted that films are art and shouldn't be disrespected by these new "computer games," which to be fair was a common view of children up and down the country, likely the world, who had deep admiration for classic movies like Baby's Day Out and Problem Child. A fringe group, though, calling themselves "gamers," stood up for their exciting new hobby. Games didn't have to be art. They could be anything they wanted to be.
Sadly, this rhetoric was paper-thin, with the "gamers" acting like complete pillocks over games that attempted to welcome newcomers. This clique didn't want these uneducated casuals coming in and having fun. Oh no. The gatekeepers had been self-elected, forever dirtying the term "gamers" with their insistence on all games requiring guns or things that weren't guns but acted just like guns.
It was an age I'll never forget.
Welcome to VG247's The Best Games Ever Podcast: Ep.16 - Best game that uses that FMV that was all the rage in the '90s.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, we’d love to hear them. If we don't come up with some new ideas soon we'll have to start just talking about current events, which no one wants to listen to.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask while wondering if you were one of those video game gatekeepers back in the 90s - you might have been. It's OK. Kids are mostly awful. Hopefully you grew into a more reasonable person. Anyway, this podcast, which is why you're on this page, is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (me and some others on VG247) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good. Listen to it.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post or don’t want to listen but do want to know what games we picked), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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The best game that uses that FMV that was all the rage in the '90s
This is the topic of Episode sixteen of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom – Realms of the Haunting
I'm not interested in FMV games so bad they're good, or just FMV games that are just a few clicks now and again. Realms of the Haunting combines very impressive video sequences (for the time) with a super ambitious FPS-point-and-click-adventure set-up that was truly ahead of what most studios were doing in the mid '90s. A superb game.
Alex – Contradiction: Spot the Liar
As you'll hear me argue in this episode, Contradiction: Spot the Liar is a classic. Yes, it's a bit crap, a bit rough, and has cinematography and acting that would be happily at home in an extremely low-rent daytime TV soap opera - but that's sort of the point. It's a charming labour of love, with both utterly diabolical and delightfully wonderful acting performances that deliver a fairly fun and fanciful interactive murder mystery.
It's no Her Story, like, but it's a great example of what I think is one of the best elements of FMV games: when they're slightly cheap, slightly crap, but brimming with Hollywood ambitions. Don't just take my word for it, either - in user reviews, it's the third-highest rated game in the FMV category on Steam - even above Her Story. It isn't as good as that game, to be clear - but that's not the point. It's just wonderfully mad. I love it.
Kelsey - Immortality
Immortality is Sam Barlow's latest FMV game, and it's one that sets itself apart from the genre when it comes to production quality and execution. As you attempt to get to the bottom of whatever could've happened to actor, Marissa Marcel, there are countless secrets to uncover.
It's a game that has you questioning everything, all the time. In fact, it's somewhat exhausting, but this is an FMV game where the player is more involved than ever before, and every emotion you experience feels intended by design.
Come back in a week for another episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
I’ll come clean. I’m writing this well in advance of publication as I’m going on holiday. I usually spend literal minutes coming up with a brilliant way to segue into the topic of the week’s podcast. It is often very brilliant and hilarious.
The relationship between me and the podcast article is complicated. It’s not easy. It requires work for it to be the best it can be. You can’t just turn up and hope to have a great podcast article without trying your hardest.
Sometimes I even hold a little ceremony before I write the article, just to show how serious I am about writing it. It’s a big deal, so I have to make sure I’ve thought it through properly. But I’m not doing that today, because of the holiday reason I mentioned above – a holiday I’m taking after writing the article, which is in no way related to the topic of the podcast.
Welcome to the VG247 Best Games Ever Podcast, Episode 15: Best game with a wedding in it.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, we’d love to hear them. If we don't come up with some new ideas soon we'll have to create some kind of device for Jim’s cat to use that converts cat thoughts into concepts humans can understand.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask while wondering what that intro was all about. Marriage, weddings, OK?! Get it now? It wasn’t labored at all. Anyway, this podcast, which is why you're on this page, is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (me and some others on VG247) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good. Listen to it.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post or don’t want to listen but do want to know what games we picked), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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The Best game with a wedding in it
This is the topic of Episode fifteen of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom – Super Mario Odyssey
I think this is the best wedding scene in a video game, not only because of the journey to it on the Moon, but also the action sequences that follow and Peach's decision at the end of it all. Absolutely brilliant, and anyone who, for example, chooses a farming game over this is simply wrong.
Alex – Final Fantasy IX
This is Alex, resident JRPG fan/nerd. This definitely isn't Tom pretending to be Alex. Final Fantasy rules! All JRPGs are wonderful, but Final Fantasy IX is even more wonderful thanks to its wedding sequence. Turn-based weddings are the best!
Kelsey - Stardew Valley
Stardew Valley is the stylised farming simulator that combines all of the best bits from games like Harvest Moon, Rune Factory, and more. In this sim, though, harvesting your crops and working tirelessly in the mines isn't all that there is to do. There's also 12 marriage candidates to choose from, get to know, and live happily ever after alongside until you divorce them so that you can marry another. You don't simply have to be a farmer, but you can be a serial wedder too.
Come back in a week for another episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
In my final year of Primary School the whole of Year 6 worked together to create a time capsule. This was nothing new, I’m sure. No doubt that school field is now almost impossible to navigate with stepping on precious artifacts of a bygone era. But, the point is, we were attempting to put together a package that one day would be looked at by future children (probably with hover boots, and hover cars, and hover food, and hover dogs), so they could appreciate the wonderful world we lived in.
My memory is a little hazy about the exact specifics of the items included, but there was definitely a Troll with bright orange hair. There was a piece of a sponge football (useful!), some braided string, a packet of pickled onion Space Raiders crisps (Best Before Date well before the capsule was due to be uncovered), and one of those bike reflectors that you got in packets of Frosties cereal. All absolutely perfect examples of early ‘90s childhood, I think you’ll agree.
Unfortunately, there wasn’t room for everyone in Year 6 to donate an item, but because I was undoubtedly the most popular, smartest child in the school at that time I was given the opportunity to put forth an item.
I was well into football by that stage, but given that someone else had already put in the quite frankly absurd and idiotic “bit of a used football” I had to think outside the box. I had the idea. Childhood was essentially pretty simple back then. Playing outside, rolling up newspapers to hit people with, and collecting football stickers.
The thing was, though, that I didn’t fancy giving up any of my precious swapsies collection. I did have a massive dislike of Manchester United, though, buoyed by my classmates being the worst glory supporters of all time.
So, I waved goodbye to my 1993 Merlin's Premier League #56 Lee Sharpe sticker. I hope one day a child will see your face and discover how you went on to throw a BBQ for your fans, hosted at your own house.
So, with that wholesome tale of a world worth preserving, welcome to the VG247 Best Games Ever Podcast, Episode 14: Best game you’d fire into space to prove the Earth isn’t worth saving. That segue was so severe I’m sorry if it caused you whiplash.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, we’d love to hear them. If we don't come up with some new ideas soon we'll have to create some kind of random topic generator - not a bad idea actually.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask while wondering which football sticker you'd be willing to entomb in a time capsule. Or L.O.L. Surprise sticker, whatever the stickers you chose to collect. Anyway, this podcast, which is why you're on this page (not to run over impossible choices in your mind), is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (me and some others on VG247) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good. Listen to it.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post or don’t want to listen but do want to know what games we picked), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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The Best game you’d fire into space to prove the Earth isn’t worth saving
This is the topic of Episode fourteen of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom – Most Roblox games
Roblox is full of mindless games that are designed to encourage in-game spending to reach an arbitrary goal. Most have little gameplay other than repeatedly pressing a button, such as Strongman Simulator. It's tedious in the extreme and an example of why we don't deserve video games.
Alex – Gal Gun
I'm not even embedding a video for this one. Just listen to us talk about it on the podcast and you'll understand why. If you Google it, maybe don't do it on a work computer.
Connor - Detroit: Become Human
Detroit: Become Human is a game that makes me very, very sad. I don't understand how Quantic Dreams keeps getting away with it. Every time they release a game, you get a visually impressive product with a few golden nuggets, just washed down with the most obnoxious writing and narrative direction in the world. But they keep coming back! Somehow dragging big names like Clancy Brown (voice of Mr Krabs) for amazing performances in so-so games.
It's the perfect example of missed potential, of numerous second chances given to people who in my opinion shouldn't have them. If you shot this into space and aliens got their hands on it, they'd probably feel super disappointed at it all and drift away towards exploding suns, a comet, or a million other things more interesting.
Come back in a week for another episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
My daughter has a favourite toy. It's a Squishmallow called Serene. Serene is a round-ish turquoise squirrel. If you're not into soft toys, you may not know how popular Squishmallows are, but to give you an idea... the last time I was in the local toy shop, every one of the four people in the queue to pay had hold of a Squishmallow.
But the popularity of Squishmallows isn’t the point of this little story.
Serene goes everywhere with my daughter and is her best friend - as much as a wannabe toddler can have a best friend. Given how Serene can sometimes be thrown from the buggy with the complete lack of foresight and comprehension of possible events that only a baby has, and the extreme love she has for her, we thought it best to buy a second Serene. "Let's buy a clone of Serene, a new one, just in case," I said to my wife while browsing the toy store and walking past the sizable Squishmallow display.
And so it was. This new, untarnished, blemish-free squirrel sits wrapped in a plastic bag on top of the wardrobe in my bedroom. The hope, of course, is that clone Serene, imposter Serene, will never be needed. But if the worst was to happen and OG Serene went to wink "stay with Grandma for a while" wink or wink "went to keep Mummy company at work" wink, this currently lifeless squishy toy would be subbed in. She'd look the same ("Serene has had a bath, how lovely!"), but we'd know. Forever, we'd know what we’d done.
I'd miss Serene, but I'd never say anything. Occasionally I'd lay awake at night thinking about her, wondering what life she's leading, "living with Grandma." Maybe I'd glance over at a pile of toys, Serene 2.0 staring at me, eyes lifeless but piercing. “Noooooo!” I’d attempt to cry out, but it would be too late. She'd attempt to suck the soul from my body. I'd resist, but she'd be too strong. I'd become trapped inside the lovable squirrel’s impossibly soft body. New Serene, inhabiting my body, would glance at me now and again with a look of victory. She'd won. Then one night she’d walk downstairs into the dimly lit living room, calmly and without saying a word placing original Serene down next to me.
"You never should have called me a fucking clone," she'd whisper. I can't say a word.
Welcome to the VG247 Best Games Ever Podcast, Episode 13: Best game that was called a clone of another game.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, we’d love to hear them. If we don't come up with some new ideas soon we'll have to go down the road of topics like, "Best game that James Billcliffe thought was wonderful but every other sentient being on the planet accepted was terrible" (not at all related to this week's podcast!).
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask while trying to imagine life inside a soft toy. You can't imagine it. It's a concept ripped straight out of what would be the best episode of The Twilight Zone ever made, such is the quality of the idea. Anyway, this podcast, which is why you're on this page (not to read my pitches for horror fiction), is essentially a 30-minute panel show where people (me and some others on VG247) decide on the best game in a specific category. That's it. It's good.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post or don’t want to listen but do want to know what games we picked), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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The Best Game that was once called a clone of another game
This is the topic of Episode thirteen of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom – Axiom Verge
Honestly, this game is so good I'm not sure why the others bothered to argue against it. Axiom Verge is an absolutely brilliant Metroid clone that mixes pin-sharp gameplay with a superb sense of adventure and discovery. Please, please, please give it a look if you've yet to. It's on all current platforms, so there's really no excuse. There's a sequel, too, although I'm yet to be sucked in by it in the same way.
Alex – Mortal Kombat
For my money, Mortal Kombat is the original video game clone. Everybody described this game as a Street Fighter clone back in the day, even though its core developers maintain to this day that it was primarily inspired by an even older fighting game, with Street Fighter holding little influence over the spine-ripping game that turned arcades upside down in the nineties. One thing was undeniable, however: Midway only greenlit MK due to the success of Street Fighter. The two are inexorably linked, forever.
Whatever the truth of inspiration was didn't matter to the press or the public anyway. MK was Street Fighter's brasher, louder, attention-grabbing cousin. Arguably, MK was resolutely American just as Street Fighter was unabashedly Japanese. The two engaged in a war that was as potent and as divisive as Mario vs Sonic. Street Fighter launched the fighting game genre as we know it today, and MK solidified its potential for mass-market success. But even so... people continued to call MK a Street Fighter clone. It's a moniker that will follow it forever - deserved or not.
James – Untold Legends: Brotherhood of the Blade
When it comes to Diablo clones it's hard to go wrong. All you need is some made-up fantasy words, tons of loot and more spiders and rats than you could fit in the world's largest, spookiest terrarium. The loop of picking up green things, then blue things, then purple things, then orange things as the loot rarity goes up is so insatiably moreish that you're good for at least 80 hours of gameplay regardless of the wrapping.
A premium example of this comes in the form of 2005 PSP launch title, Untold Legends: Brotherhood of the Blade - a rock solid Diablo clone with the added bonus of being on an awesome portable console with retro-futuristic discs that still spin inside their plastic cases as you eject them - still hot - from inside the handheld.
Come back in a week for another episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
We can't help it when something rubs us the wrong way.
Disclaimer: For legal reasons some of the names of the people involved in this story have been altered.
”Steve,” exclaimed the supply teacher, Miss Personality Vacuum.
”Yes, Miss,” replied Steve.
”Frank.”
”Here, Miss,” replied Frank.
”George.”
”Yes, Miss,” replied George.
”Stacey.”
”Yes, Miss, here” replied Stacey.
”Dickhead,” continued Miss Personality Vacuum.
There was silence, only broken by the slight sound of heads turning and necks rubbing against shirt collars.
”Dickhead,” Miss Personality Vacuum stated once more, this time accompanied by a vague look out across the classroom.
Still only skin on cotton could be heard, but the turned heads might as well have been drawing an arrow pointing straight at Dickhead.
”Dickhead, if that is you, please can you reply,” asked Miss Personality Vacuum quite politely.
”My name isn’t Dickhead,” said Dickhead with all the petulance of talking baby Jack Russell.
”I’m sorry,” said Miss V. “What is your name?”
”Dick,” sneered Dickhead.
”OK, thank you,” said Miss V, letting the tone go unpunished to just get through the register.
”Kate,” enquired Miss V.
”Aren’t you going to call my name?” interrupted Dickhead.
”OK, yes,” said Miss V now a little flustered and clearly slightly annoyed but trying not to show it. “Dick.”
Silence.
Miss V stared at Dickhead with the kind of stare that would either turn you to stone or burn a hole straight through you.
”My name is Dickhead,” said Dickhead.
I fucking hated Dickhead. And with that, Welcome to the VG247 Best Games Ever Podcast, Episode 12: Best game you hated for a very specific reason.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, we’d love to hear them. I don't want to say we’re scraping the barrel, but well... someone suggested “Best game with a duck” the other day and for a moment I thought it was the best idea of all time.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask while trying to work out what Dickhead’s real name was. Three syllables and could be shortened to two. That’s the only clue you’re getting. I expect he's gone on to star in a 30-minute panel show where people decide on the best game in a specific category, just like this podcast – although unlike this podcast, that show is likely mean spirited, clueless, and not as smart as it thinks it is.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post or don’t want to listen but do want to know what games we picked), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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The Best Game that you hated for a very specific reason
This is the topic of Episode twelve of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom – Final Fantasy 7 (original release)
Yes, I have picked one of the most loved games of all time, but no, I haven’t gone for the reason that the game’s marketing sold people a game that wasn’t as it seemed. Essentially, I got stuck on disc one, OK? Maybe I was bored and really couldn’t be bothered to figure out what I was meant to be doing, but in my mind the Saucer area was so bad that I just gave up.
Alex – From Russia With Love
Sean Connery providing his voice and likeness to a new Bond game! What could go wrong? Well, it seems the performance could. As much as Sean is loved in the classic James Bond movies, his acting in the PS2-era video game is borderline terrible. Such a shame.
James – Persona 4
Persona 4 is a fantastic game where you find out that rural life can be more exciting than you ever imagined, as you solve the enigmatic case of an otherworldly killer and make the kind of friendships that last a lifetime. The only trouble is you can throw all of that away in the space of a single conversation, along with potentially hours-upon-hours of progress and invested time. Nowhere inside of the game does it tell you any of this, but you should've worked at the corner shop more, idiot.
Let us know what game you’d pick and if you think James writes jokes in advance so he can read off a script? If you like the podcast, please subscribe and leave a review saying how wonderful it is, and tell all your friends. Do a tweet about it, post on Facebook, or be one of those people that walk around town with a boombox and rig it to play the latest episode at an obscene volume.
Come back in a week for another episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
Teenage independence brought with it the chance to shape our own gaming futures.
Goodbye England's rose
May you ever grow in our hearts
You were the grace that placed itself
Where lives were torn apart
You called out to our country
And you whispered to those in pain
Now you belong to heaven
And the stars spell out your name
As the news of Diana’s death forced itself into the homes of everyone in Great Britain, royalist tears flooding the carpets and dampening the underside of sofas, some people had other things on their minds.
It takes a lot to get a teenager out of bed on a Sunday morning, and if there’s no money involved it takes even more.
”Princess Diana has died,” Mum put out there as I stumbled down the stairs, bleary eyed having stayed up too late playing Dungeon Keeper.
”Is snooker practice cancelled then?” I asked, not really reading the room.
”I don’t know,” said Mum. “No one has said anything. Diana has died.”
A bowl of Crunchy Nut later and a car tooted its horn outside.
Diana was dead. But snooker practice was on. As a teenager, I was as hyped for snooker as modern kids are for Fortnite Nerf guns and YouTube videos of someone blowing up a million pounds.
Welcome to VG247 Best Games Ever Podcast, Episode 11: Best game that you were ridiculously hyped for as a teen.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, we’d love to hear them. I promise to not claim them as my own works of genius – I'll give you credit way down the page, like those people that get viral tweets only to tell you who made the image two tweets under the main one a week later.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask while thinking about where you were on Sunday, August 31, 1997. Wouldn’t it be funny if you were watching a 30-minute panel show where people decided on the best game in a specific category? As that’s just what this podcast is!
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post or don’t want to listen but do want to know what games we picked), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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The Best Game that you were ridiculously hyped for as a teen
This is the topic of Episode eleven of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom – Formula 1 (1996)
F1 was just a thing that was seemingly always there when I was a kid. Broadcast on the BBC in the UK, every weekend we’d sit and watch it while eating a Sunday lunch. As such, the first game on the PlayStation was a huge deal that I was super hyped for. Turns out I wasn’t very good at it, but it looked incredible back in the day.
Alex – Dead Rising
The Xbox 360 had some real killer games early on in its life, and Dead Rising is right up there with the best of them. A brand-new zombie game Capcom, the masters of the zombie genre, and one where you had seemingly endless ways to kill the undead monstrosities. Few games of the era managed this level of hype, and the game itself didn’t disappoint.
Kelsey – Resident Evil 7
After Resident Evil 6 something had to change, and Capcom (second appearance in this week’s pod) duly delivered the goods. Resident Evil 7 is a masterstroke in game design, player progression, and horror. With the weight of the franchise on its shoulders, Resi 7 thrust the series into the upper echelons of modern AAA releases, and ushered in a new era of quality Resident Evil releases.
Let us know what game you’d pick and if you think young people should be banned from showing how young they are? If you like the podcast, please subscribe and leave a review saying how wonderful it is, and tell all your friends. Do a tweet about it, post on Facebook, put a podcast banner on your drive so it looks like we’ve sponsored it (we won’t do that).
Come back in a week for another episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
We all love things we shouldn't love. Video games are no different.
”I can’t believe you!” she screamed, having caught him in the act.
She’d left work to surprise him. A lovely little act of kindness on what would have otherwise been a completely ordinary day. Just another feature-less weekday blended in with all the rest – the palatable home-made protein smoothie of life.
A posh afternoon tea from the local fancy-for-the-area cafe that sits on the park. Sandwiches with pickle that isn’t Branston’s. Cheese that isn’t 40% lighter cheddar. Scones with a hint of cinnamon. Homemade tray bakes the likes of which you usually only see on the TV that are the size of an eight-year-old's hand. How lovely. At least that was the intention.
”I didn’t...” he stumbled. “I...” he added completely without point or reason.
”Get out,” she yelled, barely able to look at them together, the coffee table a mess of where they’d been.
”But...” he blurted out. “I was weak while picking up some bits from CO-OP. I’m sorry.
”I don’t know why I did it. I’m sorry. I really am,” the chided man muttered, repentantly as he walked out the door.
The woman sat down. She wasn’t going to let this ruin her lunch. She pushed the empty Rustlers microwave burger wrappers into the bin and started eating her sandwiches.
Welcome to VG247 Best Games Ever Podcast, Episode 10: Best game that is really bad.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, we’d love to hear them. We've got a vault full of existing ideas, but about 98% of them are terrible, 1% are unrecordable, and the rest are just about passable in a pinch.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask while pondering a Rustlers for lunch. To get straight to the point and to quote myself from last week: “It’s a 30-minute panel show where we decide the best game in a specific category.” More importantly, please don’t eat a Rustlers. You could pick almost any other item of food and come out the other side in a better place.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post or don’t want to listen but do want to know what games we picked), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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The Best Game that is really bad
This is the topic of Episode ten of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom – Operation Wolf
A much-loved video game of the 90s, porting from arcades to pretty much every console and system that was around at the time, Operation Wolf on the Master System is the perfect game that’s good but also bad. You see, it was rock hard, and had to be played with a light gun to experience it at its best. Most people, me included, used a control pad. Sad times.
Alex – Deadly Premonition
So bad it’s good. Has any game ever perfectly summed up this saying more than Deadly Premonition. It somehow manages to combine a lot of fairly terrible things into a game that has a sizable, dedicated fan following. The fact that the sequel (seen above) so badly misses the mark is another testament to how all the planets must have aligned perfectly for this gem to come into the world.
Sherif - EDF
Earth Defense Force (EDF) is a long-running series where you essentially have to shoot waves of giant ants (and other giant things). That’s it. And it’s amazing. Give it a look and you might not get what’s so great about it, but trust when we say that this is one of the most fun you can have with a video game. It’s technically a mess (every version) and feels quite bizarre compared to the standards set and adhered to in most video games, but that is part of its charm.
Let us know what game you’d pick and if you think all old games are bad, actually? If you like the podcast, please subscribe and leave a review saying how wonderful it is, and tell all your friends. Do a tweet about it, post on Facebook, hire one of those planes to fly a banner promoting it over a big sporting event.
Come back in a week for another episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
When this topic was decided, we overestimated our ability to ignore the obvious crude options.
This was the moment. Time to be a hero, to go down as a legend, forever remembered in the history books as the person who took the team into the final.
He stepped up to the penalty spot, placed the ball and shuffled back. The goalkeeper looked nervous, but then so was the penalty taker. It was a cold afternoon, but inside this arena (a field), things had reached boiling point.
Thoughts flashed through his mind: why is a defender taking this penalty? Why is one of the strikers crying on the sidelines? Who’s dad is that shouting and hollering about how “he’s going to go to your right”? What happens if he misses?
Using the aggro dad’s words against him, he struck the ball to the keeper’s right, and it worked. The goalie dived the wrong way, the ball sailing clearly into the net... until a leg popped up, seemingly stretched out beyond all boundaries of human contortion. A foot... a toe even, impossibly bulging out of a football boot, nudging the ball onto the post.
The boy had missed.
Time accelerated in a blur, so in an instant the Under 11s Cubs football team was out of the tournament. Steve was still crying on the sidelines, more now, perhaps knowing he’d bottled it as the team’s main attacker.
The defender collapsed to his knees. Heartbreak, the same felt by so many of his sporting idols. Glory wasn’t to be. Game over.
In that moment the boy vowed that, should it ever come to pass in his future, he’d never take part in a 30-minute (or thereabouts) podcast about balls in sports video games, so welcome to the VG247 Best Games Ever Podcast, Episode 9: Best game with balls that isn’t a sports game.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. You can listen to them in any order you like as there’s no rhyme or reason to the topics. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, we’d love to hear them. I won’t lie. Coming up with new topics each week is harder than I imagined, and I could do with a break. Otherwise, we’ll be doing shows like Best game with a character that wears trousers.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask, still a bit confused about the genre-defying opening to this podcast article. I’ve tended to say something like “It’s a 30-minute panel show where we decide the best game in a specific category,” but given that some of these episodes now touch 40 minutes that’s a blatant lie, although still a goal – sometimes we just get a bit carried away. I’m sorry, OK? It’s easy to point fingers and say things should have been different. Don’t be one of those people. “The boy” knows he should have kept the ball lower. Leave it be.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post or don’t want to listen but do want to know what games we picked), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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The Best Game with balls that isn’t a sports game
This is the topic of Episode nine of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom – Red Dead Redemption 2
Great game? Check! Perhaps one of the greatest of all time, even. Features balls? Yep. Rockstar modelled those horses accurately. Not a sports game? Check! This one is a full-on western. Surely even Jim can’t snatch this victory away from me?
Alex – Conker's Bad Fur Day
When this topic was chosen for the podcast, I obviously decided to interpret balls as testicles, because I am a fully-grown, 33-year-old adult. When I think of bollocks in games, my first thought went right to N64 classic Conker's Bad Fur Day, which is utterly packed with balls. My primary argument is for the Bourgeois Big Bollocked Boiler, a memorable boss that's a giant furnace that happens to have "balls of brass, polished to the nth degree". And what do you do? Well, you get between the boiler's legs and smash its balls with a house brick. This is just one example of the glorious use of balls in Conker, too; there's more in the podcast. A feast for the ears!
Connor - Lethal League
Lethal League is a brilliant fighting game where instead of smacking each other in the faces directly, players must land blows on their opponent via a baseball placed in the centre of the screen. The more the ball is hit, the faster it goes, leading to high intensity matches where spacing is crucial. It's got brilliant music, enticing visuals, a cast of characters each with their own special moves and super attacks. It is also not a sports game! Just because a baseball is present, doesn't make it a sport! If you kick a football through a school window, are you playing football? No way.
Let us know what game you’d pick and if you think Tom was right, again? If you like the podcast, please subscribe and leave a review saying how wonderful it is, and tell all your friends. Do a tweet about it, post on Facebook, write an obituary for Eurogamer’s podcast(s) for the local paper, and ask people to listen to this instead.
Come back in a week for another episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
Look, we know this is pushing the term "most," but just go with it.
It was February, 1996. A coke-filled, overweight 13-year-old me was reading about CES in issue 148 of CVG and salivating over the ultra-positive review of Sonic 3. CVG gave out some high scores, but a 94 was pretty exciting for a SEGA boy like me. What a life I’d have as a games journalist, I thought to myself. Not high on drugs, just full of the hope only a child can possess. I would make this dream a reality and live like a king, never having to buy a video game again.
And then, screaming out of the tinny speaker in my Philips radio alarm clock, came a song that was, unknown to me at the time, foretelling my future. Ironic, by Alanis Morissette.
A traffic jam when you're already late
A "No Smoking" sign on your cigarette break
It's like ten thousand spoons when all you need is a knife
It’s being a games journo yeah, and then turning on them in a radio show
And isn't it ironic, don't you think?
A little too ironic, and yeah I really do think
18 years later, and here we are. The prophecy has been fulfilled in the quest for hits. It’s the VG247 Best Games Ever Podcast, episode 8: Best game that journos love but most people think is a bit naff.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. You can listen to them in any order you like as there’s no rhyme or reason to the topics. If you’ve got suggestions for topics, we’d love to hear them – but please keep in mind that I’ll have to write some award-winning-worthy fiction for each one.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask, hoping it’s not going to trigger another ill-conceived nostalgic segway. Well, imagine you are watching a TV panel show from the early 200s. One of the good ones. But the TV is broken so there’s only audio, and all the famous panelists were off ill so they had to bring some randos down from the audience. The TV network also started to care about video games, so dedicated a whole show to it, rather than just having one person reference Mario as if he’s to be talked about with the same disdain as Fred West. It’s also only about 30 minutes long, so if you don’t like it you’ll be over it in no time at all.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post or don’t want to listen but do want to know what games we picked), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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The Best Game that journos love but most people think is a bit naff
This is the topic of Episode eight of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom – Yakuza 6 (or just any Yakuza game)
Right, listen before you start having a go. I am here to get people talking, to be the contrarian jester of the group. So I picked a game from a franchise that I full-well know people love, but Yakuza is a game series that journos adore, yet I don’t really get. OK? It’s on me, but I’m projecting onto others.
Alex – Quantum Break
Hello, I’m Alex, definitely not Tom writing words for me as I’m not working today. I apologise for choosing excellent 8/10 sci-fi action banger, Quantum Break, as my game for this week. I have come to understand, since this podcast was recorded, that Quantum Break is a wonderful game that most people love. It’s destined to go down in history as one of the greats of the genre.
Sherif - Deathloop
Everyone in games media has been raving about Deathloop since it came out. When I finally sat down to play it towards the end of last year, I realised that I just don’t see what everyone is enamoured by! Deathloop has always been pitched, and advertised, as a time loop game. This is what I went in expecting. I was left in disbelief yet again when I started playing and found that it’s not a god damn time loop game!
Let us know what game you’d pick and if you think the treatment of Tom is now getting out of hand? If you like the podcast, please subscribe and leave a review saying how wonderful it is, and tell all your friends. Do a tweet about it, post on Facebook, call into local radio shows and say nothing but the podcast page URL.
Come back in a week for another episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
It's hard being a kid. There are so many games but rarely do you have the cash to get them all.
It was 4:45 pm on Tuesday. The moon was visible in the blue sky, motionless and distant but looming large. Like an egg in the ocean, that you happened to be viewing through some binoculars you accidentally had the wrong way round. This, I thought, was the world manifesting my brain’s turmoil. My noggin had stopped working and the spectre of the impending deadline was high in my mind. What is a person to do when tasked with a near-impossible question? Was I forever doomed to see the world through reverse-binocular vision? I just had to think of a game I wanted as a child but didn’t get. Find out if I answered this question in the VG247 The Best Games Ever Podcast, episode 7.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask, hoping I’m not about to start talking about eggs or binoculars again. Well, imagine your standard video game podcast, but you’re listening to it through a kaleidoscope for the ears, and all the bits that make the funny shapes are hilarious TV panel shows. It’s also only about 30 minutes long, so if you don’t like it you’ll be over it in no time at all.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post or don’t want to listen but do want to know what games we picked), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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The Best Game you wanted as a child but never got
This is the topic of Episode seven of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom – FIFA Internation Soccer on 3DO
What could be better a better choice than a game only released on a system that was doomed to fail and was far too expensive? FIFA on the 3DO was a visual spectacle that was hard to believe back in ‘94. Seeing the FIFA we knew but with a 3D camera was astonishing, and a lot of people were desperate to get their hands on this back in the day.
Alex – Chrono Trigger (SNES)
In the 90s, Chrono Trigger was probably the perfect game. It was made by some of the best and brightest artists and creators in Japan – Hironobu Sakaguchi, creator of Square's Final Fantasy series; Yuji Horii, creator of Enix's Dragon Quest series; and Akira Toriyama, character designer of Dragon Quest and author of the Dragon Ball manga series. Seeing that art – so full of life, so full of character, so intriguing –on the boxart for the game, your mind would race: what on Earth could this game, with its mages, beasts, spiky-haired protagonists and, err, frogs, be about? I never got to find out, until much later as it wasn’t released in Europe.
Kelsey – Silent Hills
Silent Hills, and the Playable Teaser (P.T.), are an enigma. They set up a mass of horror fans for some real disappointment when we found that the full game would never see the light of day, and the Playable Teaser for many is still unavailable. There's no better choice than the Silent Hill game that nobody could get their hands on, and never will.
Let us know what game you’d pick and if you think Jim should be replaced as the host due to his strained relationship with Tom that is causing him to make irrational choices? If you like the podcast, please subscribe and leave a review saying how wonderful it is, and tell all your friends. Do a tweet about it, post on Facebook, print out copies of the podcast URL and leave them on empty train seats.
Come back in a week for another episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
Video games can be ridiculous, but which ones would the average Joe think you'd completely made up?
Someone please save me from writing something here every week. Is there a not an AI capable of doing this, albeit without my amazing sense of humour? We’ve got games that let you explore procedurally generated worlds! Someone procedurally generate some words for me! On that happy note, the VG247 The Best Games Ever Podcast returns, with episode 6. This week I was concerned that we’d be unable to put ourselves in the shoes of the average plebeian, what with us being superstar games journo types, but my fear was unwarranted. That’s right, it’s time for the Best game someone not in the know would think you’d made up.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask. I’m not sure I want to tell you. Why don’t you take a chance on it and find out for yourself? Each episode of the Best Games Ever Podcast is only about 30 minutes, so what have you got to lose? It’s bound to be better than an episode of Eastenders (that’s a terrible London-set soap opera for our US readers).
Hopefully you can find room in your podcast-listening schedule for it. Wouldn’t it be great to be there at the start of something great? To be able to tell your friends and family that you were there when Jim, Tom, and co were unknowns and not the millionaires they become? Also, you’ll hopefully have some fun for half an hour.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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Best game someone not in the know would think you’d made up
This is the topic of Episode six of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom – Mount Your Friends
A real classic of the Xbox Live Arcade era, back on the Xbox 360 days. This multiplayer party game asked you to master a tricky individual limb control scheme to climb up your friends and reach a higher point than they did. It’s a nailed-on all-timer, this, but did it win this very particular category?
Alex – Katamari Damacy
When you think of quirky video games, Katamari Damacy is likely right near the top of your brain. This joyful game is essentially built around one simple idea: roll up objects to make a huge ball. That's it really. And it’s brilliant. It helps that the game has one of the best soundtracks ever and that you can now play a version of it on pretty much every platform available.
Connor – Dong Dong Never Die
Right, Connor isn’t here to explain this to me, so just watch the video above. It’s a fighting game that is unlike anything you’ve ever seen before. Enough said.
Let us know what game you’d pick and if you think Jim must be stopped at all costs. If you like the podcast, please subscribe and leave a review saying how wonderful it is, and tell all your friends. Do a tweet about it, post on Facebook, print out copies of the podcast URL and leave them on park benches.
Come back in a week for another episode of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast.
Sometimes we seek out games. Other times they seek out us. It's another brilliant VG247 podcast.
Hello again I won’t lie. As I attempt to write some general blurb about this podcast for the fifth time and not make it the dullest thing imaginable, I’m struggling. But hey, ho, the VG247 The Best Games Ever Podcast returns, with episode 5. This week I worried we’d end up talking about how Steve from over the road lent a copy of Advance Wars on the GBA, but instead we soon became a blip on the radar of the local constabulary. That’s right, it’s time for the Best game you got for an odd reason. Not the best title, I admit, but stick with it.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask, presumably because you read the words I’d written and not because you really wanted to ask. It's really quite simple, so listen up and please don’t ask again: Each week three of us must present our choice for the best game ever that fits the title of the show (this week it must be a game that we reckon is great but came into our possession through odd means). Then our host/judge, Jim Trinca, will use his complete lack of objectivity to declare a winner and annoy at least one of us – most likely me.
Each episode of the Best Games Ever Podcast skirts around the 30-minute mark. We’ve got a small number of things to talk about, and we don’t go on random tangents about the latest video game news (unless it’s somehow relevant to the games and stories being discussed). We feel 30 minutes is the perfect length. If we were doing this live and asked you to pay for a ticket, of course we’d make it longer, but we’d likely take the easy option and deviously put multiple Best Games into one show. Smart.
Hopefully you can find room in your podcast-listening schedule for 30 minutes. If not, just cut one of the dull ones. Do you really need 12 shows about decluttering, or that one about talking to the artists that paint all the knock-off art onto funfair rides? Fair enough, that one sounds great. But you can get rid of one of the others.
If this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. They’re not topical in the least, so go wild.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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Best game you got for an odd reason – Crimestoppers Edition
This is the topic of Episode five of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom – Sam and Max Hit the Road (1993)
The Point and Clink adventure game was all the rage back in the early ‘90s. LucasArts was at the very top of its craft, knocking out classic after classic, and this wacky adventure featuring the “Freelance Police” duo was another slam dunk. As not only one of the best games of its genre, but also with a strong case for being one of the best games ever made, surely this piece of video game history has got the competition sewn up?
Alex – Perfect Dark (2000)
It’s hard to believe Perfect Dark released in 2000. By that time the Dreamcast was on its way to failure (sad eyes), and the PS2 was just around the corner. Nintendo was still happy to release Rare’s classic sci-fi FPS on the N64, though, even with its own follow-up console, the GameCube due the following year. As the successor to the much-loved GoldenEye, Perfect Dark had a lot to live up to, and for the most part developer Rare absolutely smashed it.
James – Metal Gear Solid 2 (2001)
Who can forget that first look at Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty? It was a big moment for the PS2 and pretty much cemented Kojima as the top-tier creator he is known as today. The game itself held quite a few surprises, of course, some that didn’t go down well with fans, but generally MGS2 is held in very high esteem as one of the greatest games of all time.
Let us know what game you’d pick and if you agree that Jim has completely gone off the rails. If you like the podcast, please follow/subscribe and leave a review saying how wonderful it is, and tell all your friends. Do a tweet about it, post on Facebook, leave the podcast page open on the laptop screen in your local tech store.
Come back in a week for The Best Game someone now in the know would think you’d made up.
#podcast
#videogames
#funny
Hello again listeners. It’s hard to believe it’s been a whole week since I rewrote the last one of these, but the calendar does not lie. The VG247 The Best Games Ever Podcast returns, with episode 4. This week we’re talking about the most British of things: pubs. And by “talking” I mean, arguing about the best game with a pub. Are the games good, and what makes for a good pub? That and more will be conveyed to you by the medium of talking people in this podcast.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask, presumably because you’ve not read one of these pages before, as if you had you’d know already. Anyway, if you still need to be told, here’s the lowdown: Each week three of us must present our choice for the best game ever that fits the title of the show (this week it must be a game that we reckon is actually very good, has a pub in it – or a bar/drinking establishment of some sort). Then our host/judge, Jim Trinca, will use his biased views to declare a winner and leave two of us with the hump.
Each episode of the Best Games Ever Podcast will be about 30 minutes long. Enough that you can eat a whole Share Size bag of chocs without having to pace yourself too much, but not so long that you then have to reach for the Doritos. Hopefully you can find room in your podcast-listening schedule for 30 minutes. If not, just cut one of the boring ones. Do you really need 15 true crime shows, one about the lives of dog walkers, and the rantings of one man who only dines at all-you-can-eat restaurants? Fair enough, I’d listen to that final one.
Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. They’re not topical in the least, so go wild.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher before heading to social media to make a wonderfully considered post), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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Best game with a pub
This is the topic of Episode four of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom – Prey 2006
Prey, the 2006 game not the entirely different an altogether more po-faced Arkane reboot, is very much of its time – all big guns, mega violence, and ghastly human/machine hybrids, but It was a really fun shooter that had a superb portal mechanic – way before the likes of Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart did something similar (and better). It also had a brilliant pub, complete with bar fight and Fear the Reaper playing on the jukebox. It’s a proper classic of the era.
Alex – The Secret of Monkey Island
When I think of pubs in games, most of the games that immediately come to mind do so because their pubs are awful caricature, or entirely unrealistic. While I've never actually been to a real-life pirate bar, I have to imagine that the Scumm Bar wouldn't elicit that reaction even if I had - it just feels like a real, legitimate location that absolutely fits within its world. Mainly, it's all about the atmosphere - with a limited color palette, a single screen and a music track, it sells itself as a believable location. It has that in common with much of the game from where it hails, the excellent The Secret of Monkey Island. I could listen the bar's jaunty music all day.
Connor – Everybody's Gone to the Rapture
The first game that came to mind when I had to think of a game with a pub was Everyone's Gone to the Rapture, a cool little walkabout game that won plenty of awards back when it first came out back in 2015. Not only is it pretty interesting narratively, as well as genuinely quite lovely to look at, it's got multiple British country pubs that you can go inside and take a look at! We're talking tiled roofs, white outside paint job, wooden interior, and proper tap handles built into the bar. You've even got the sketchy bottles of red and gin out of reach. For me, it perfectly captures the actual look and feel of British pubs better than any other game!
Let us know what game you’d pick and if you agree that Jim must be stopped. If you like the podcast, please subscribe and leave a review saying how wonderful it is, and tell all your friends. Do a tweet about it if you fancy, or a post on Facebook – we'll take whatever exposure we can get.
Come back in a week for another Best Game Ever..
This one is going to cause some arguments. What defines a mini-game?
The VG247 The Best Games Ever Podcast returns once more, with episode 3. This week we’re arguing (quite a lot, actually) over the best game with a mini-game better than the main game. This brought up some good choices, but also posed the eternal question: what defines a mini-game? Have a listen to see if you agree.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask, with the child-like glee usually reserved for when you find some money down the back of the sofa or see that someone at work has brought doughnuts into the office. Here's the lowdown: Each week three of us must present our choice for the best game ever that fits the title of the show (this week it must be a game that we reckon is actually very good, but isn’t as good as a mini-game you can play in it). Then our host/judge, Jim Trinca, will use his limited wisdom to declare a winner and leave two of us with the hump.
Each episode of the Best Games Ever Podcast will be about 30 minutes long. Enough that you can zone out while also browsing Twitter on your phone for 5 minutes and not miss the whole thing, but not so long that you a week’s worth of commutes to get through it. Hopefully, you can find room in your podcast-listening schedule for 30 minutes. If not, just cut Eurogamer’s - we won’t tell them. If you’ve cut Eurogamer’s already, I’m sure one of the identikit US shows can be disposed of.
That is it.. Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to the previous episodes. They’re not topical in the least, so go wild.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (if you want to get a refresher being heading to the comments to make a wonderful, considered post), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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Best game with a mini-game better than the main game
This is the topic of Episode three of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom – Burnout 2: Point of Impact
This brilliant arcade racing game from 2002 set up Criterion as a true racing studio powerhouse. Not only is the core racing a big step up from the original, but it also has Crash mode. Tom (that’s me) insists this is a mini-game as it’s not the core part of the experience. Crash mode became a real fan favourite, and ended up being radically built upon in the third game, and even got its own full standalone game. It’s definitely a mini-game. No one can say otherwise.
Alex – Shenmue
In many ways, Shenmue is Mini Game: The Game, where its slew of mini games and side activities are the glue that sticks the world together. Some might argue that makes it a bit of a cheap pick here, but I disagree, especially since there's one stand-out: Ryo's iconic stint as a forklift driver. The forklift driving mini game inexplicably features races around the boxy tracks formed by the Yokosuka docks, and is explained in-universe as a way of letting drivers blow off some steam between shifts. But, honestly, who expected a racing experience from some of the minds behind Daytona USA and Sega Rally to be buried in the middle of an adventure RPG? Perhaps that's why it's so memorable...
Kelsey – New Super Mario Bros. Wii
Renowned for being some fresh Mario fun, while remaining faithful to the franchise, New Super Mario Bros. boasts 26 mini games that offer a dozen more hours of fun than the base game does. Platforming between worlds was entertaining, but these mini-games appear to be the true host of fond memories for so many; 6-year-old Kelsey spent years comparing high scores with friends and still tries to beat them on her DS now. Most importantly, long after you tire of the base game, Luigi is always up for some poker, even 16 years on.
Let us know what game you’d pick and if you agree with Tom that Crash mode is a mini-game. If you like the podcast, please subscribe and leave a review saying how wonderful it is, and tell all your friends. Do a tweet about it if you fancy.
Come back in a week for another Best Game Ever. Next up we fight over the best game with a pub.
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#funny
Can you think of a great game that everyone seemed to ignore? We came up with three.
The VG247 The Best Games Ever Podcast is back with episode 2, following the tradition of going after episode 1. This week we’re fighting over the best game that nobody cares about. Hmm, tricky one, that. Have a listen to see if you agree with our choices and which game was victorious.
“What is VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast?” you ask, with the child-like glee usually reserved for when you see a new limited edition flavour Coke or a Transformer cameo in a new Chip ‘n Dale film. Here's the format: Each week three of us must present our choice for the best game ever that meets certain criteria (this week it must be a game that we believe is great but nobody cares about). Then our host/judge, Jim Trinca, will decide who has made the best case and declare a winner, most likely annoying two of us in the process.
We’re aiming to make each episode about 30 minutes long. Enough to feel like you've invested some time into something more than an audio sneeze, but not so long that you need a whole box of Kleenex to make it through. Hopefully that means you can squeeze the show into whatever busy podcast schedule you already have going on in your life. If not, just cut Eurogamer’s - we won’t tell them.
That is it. Check out VG247's The Best Games Ever Podcast on Apple Podcasts and subscribe. Or listen on Spotify. It's even on YouTube if that's your thing. Please do let us know what you think of the show – and if this is your first time listening, do go back to listen to Episode 1. We’ve got some details on the show’s content below (mostly for SEO if I’m being honest, but you might want a bit of info on the games we picked), so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll past this warning.
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Best game nobody cares about This is the topic of Episode two of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom – Quantum Break The Xbox was in a pretty bad way back in 2016. The console was clearly underpowered compared to the PS4, the system had put a focus on Kinect and TV (?!), and Sony had a better line-up of exclusives. So It’s no surprise that people generally didn’t care about part video game part TV show Quantum Break. Which is a shame, as Tom reckons you should have. It’s from Remedy (Max Payne, Control, Alan Wake) and is awesome, both in terms of visual splendor and action-oriented gameplay. The TV stuff, wasn’t even that bad – it has Lance Reddick in it, so it must be good when he’s on the screen.
Dom – Pokemon Conquest Have you ever heard of Pokemon Conquest? Nah, we didn’t think so. And fair enough, really; it was a spinoff crossover game with the Nobunaga’s Ambition tactical-RPG series. Obviously a great fit for Pokemon, right? You play as a warlord in Feudal Japan, and using Pokemon in grid-based strategy battles, you slowly take over the empire. Not only do you have moves as well as your Pokemon, you can also evolve, too, for some reason. Dom reckons that despite barely anyone playing it (it was a DS game that launched after the 3DS, in the same year as Black 2/White 2, d’oh), it’s the best Pokemon game out there. And it’s particularly relevant now, with Arceus being out in the wild.
Alex – Disaster: Day of Crisis A weird and wonderful mix of Metal Gear, Time Crisis, disaster movies, and post-9/11 rah-rah chest-thumping action, Disaster: Day of Crisis is a bit of a mess. But it's also a modern masterpiece. Developed by Xenoblade studio Monolith Soft, Disaster is emblematic of a golden age of the Wii - warts and all - of a period before Nintendo saw the sheer amount of dosh to be made from casual 'waggle' games, when it was still green-lighting more traditional games and asking developers to find a way to work motion controls in. Thus enters Day of Crisis, a game with light gun shooting, driving segments where you turn the controller on its side, tense bomb defusal mini-games, and motion-controlled CPR on endangered victims. It's by no means polished perfection, but it's the B-movie video game at its best - and somehow, one of Alex’s favourite games of its generation.
Let us know what game you’d pick and which of the three you think should win in the comments below (It’s Quantum Break, right?). If you like the podcast, please subscribe and leave a review saying how wonderful it is, and tell all your friends, who can then tell all their friends who are hopefully big players on social media. #podcast #videogame #funny
For quite some time we’ve wanted to produce a podcast on VG247, but for assorted reasons nothing ever got off the ground. That has now changed. VG247's The Best Games Ever Podcast is here.
“What is this new podcast?” you ask, with the child-like glee usually reserved for when you spot a new type of M&M or an ice cream version of a favourite childhood sweet. Well, it’s quite simple, really. Each week three of us must present our choice for the best game ever that meets certain criteria. Then our host/judge, Jim Trinca, will decide who has made the best case and declare a winner.
We’ll never do something so simple as “Best horror game,” or “Best PS2 game.” That’s just not what this show is about. We’re trying to do something a little different, on the off-chance it’s more fun than just a bunch of us sat around talking. Each week we’ll have something specific to talk about, and that’s it. There might be the odd hilarious segue, but the aim is to be more panel show-like.
We’re also trying to deliver a show that’s about 30 minutes long. Enough to feel like you’ve been a part of something, but not so long that you need a week’s worth of commutes/park walks to get through one episode. Hopefully, that’s something you can get onboard with.
That is it.
We’ve got some details on the show’s content below, so if you want to avoid spoilers, don’t scroll beyond this warning.
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Best game with a named horse
This is the topic of Episode one of VG247’s Best Games Ever Podcast. Here’s a rundown of who picked what.
Tom – Shadow of the Colossus
This one is pretty obvious, and no doubt a favourite amongst readers/listeners. Shadow of the Colossus is a brilliant game that is considered by many to be a true classic. And it has a named horse in the shape of Agro. Team Ico’s game is so good it’s been remade/remastered twice, so has appeared on PS2, PS3, and PS4. Do you agree with Tom?
Dorrani – Elden Ring
Dorrani went for something more recent, with Elden Ring. Released earlier in 2022, Elden Ring is already considered a classic of the open-world genre, offering intense and challenging battles along with a world that is a joy to discover. The horse in Elden Ring is named Torrent, and has among other talents a rather incredible double-jump. What do you think? Is Elden Ring better than Shadow of the Colossus or is it too early to say?
Alex – Final Furlong
Out of nowhere, Alex produced this gem of an arcade game. Final Furlong sums up what arcade games can offer that consoles and PC’s can’t: huge peripherals. In this case, it’s a massive plastic horse you must ride on. Alex insists that this is the best game with a named horse, but does one of many named racehorses really count? His favorite is called Miracle Thunder.
Let us know what game you’d pick and which of the three you think should win in the comments below. If you like the podcast, please subscribe and leave a review, and tell all your friends, who can then tell all their friends.
#podcast
#videogames
#funny
VG247's The Best Games Ever Podcast
First Episode will launch Friday, May 27, 2 PM BST.
Here's our brilliant intro jingle to set the tone.
Alex went hands-on with Elden ring for 6 hours with unrestricted access and found out all sorts of new details, locations, and interesting gameplay features. He is joined by Dorrani and Sherif today to discuss it all.
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