What Shirt Says “I Like Games?” with merritt k and Lauren Shippen
If you’re at level six, you’re either at the end of the skill tree or ready to get destroyed by a wild Rattata. It can go either way, just like these complicated questions. Luckily, merritt k and Lauren Shippen can give great advice about shirt selection, how old twin-stick first person shooters are, and how to be nice to your friends.
Find Us Online
- ask questions: gamesandfeelings.com/questions
- patreon: patreon.com/gamesandfeelings
- twitter: twitter.com/gamesnfeelings
- insta: instagram.com/gamesnfeelings
Credits
- Host, Producer, & Question Keeper: Eric Silver
- Editor & Mixer: Mischa Stanton
- Music by: Jeff Brice
- Multitude: multitude.productions
About Us
Games and Feelings is an advice podcast about being human and loving all types of games: video games, tabletop games, party games, laser tag, escape rooms, game streams, and anything else that we play for fun. Join Question Keeper Eric Silver and a revolving cast of guests as they answer your questions at the intersection of fun and humanity, since, you know, you gotta play games with other people. Whether you need a game recommendation, need to sort out a dispute at the table, or decide whether an activity is good for a date, we’re your instruction manual. New episodes drop every other Friday.
Transcript
Eric: Hello gamers! And welcome to Games and Feelings, an advice show about playing games, being human and dealing with the fact that those games will involve other humans. I am your host and question keeper Eric Silver, and if Kirby sucked me up, Kirby would then have the power to smell something bad, but not enough to know what the smell is. But definitely to know that in the room, there is a bad smell. And I don't like being in the room.
merritt: [Laughs] Hi, I'm merritt k, and if Kirby ate me up - well that would be a grand little adventure, wouldn't it? But I think Kirby would get the ability to like befriend random cats on the street, get a little cat gang following him around.
Eric: I love that. I hope that that truly does happen.
Lauren: And I'm Lauren Shippen. And I don't understand what Kirby is. But based on context clues - [Eric laughs- if he ate me up, he would have the ability to tell the time without a clock within a, an error of two minutes.
merritt: Oooh, that's good. Now, can I ask do you wear a watch or anything like that?
Lauren: I used to. But I haven't in many, many years. But I've always had sort of this weird ability to just know what time it is.
merritt: So in high school, I didn't wear a watch or like an - and this is before smartphones. And I didn't have a cell phone of any kind. And I developed the ability. I was within about five or six minutes, I would say, so maybe not quite as high level. But that's a useful skill. Definitely. Kirby's a pink demon who eats things. Yeah.
Lauren: Okay. Yeah, I mean, it's handy. He absorbs the power of the person that he eats or whatever?
merritt: Pretty much! [Lauren laughs]
Eric: I couldn't decide if he wanted to go down the “Does Lauren function like an atomic clock? Or how do you not know who Kirbo, the little guy who eats people?”
Lauren: I do! I've seen the unraveled about Kirby, but I don't remember it really. And I do feel like the conclusion of that was like, we don't know what Kirby is. [Laughs]
merritt: I think that - wasn't the conclusion of that one just Brian David Gilbert walking out into the wilderness or something, like?
Lauren: It was, like walking into the ocean. Maybe?
merritt: Yeah.
Eric: [Laughs] This is incredible. This is a wonderful start. I am so happy to have both of you on the show. I listen to your shows all the time. And now we're just going to talk about games, baby.
Lauren: Yeah!
Eric: We're going to help people with their problems.
merritt: Woohoo!
Eric: The first thing we have to do before we help anyone, let's give some game recommendations in our new first segment, Game Recommendations and Feelings. Let people know about what you're playing. This can be a video game, this could be a board game, this can be a card game that you've picked up that you are now spending 1000s of dollars on, like I did in Hearthstone.
merritt: Oh no, oh no.
Lauren: Oh no!
Eric: I'm not doing it now, I'm just saying that you could talk about that if you wanted to! Or like any any type of game, what are you into, and if you want to attach a feeling that you've now experienced after playing that game.
Lauren: So I'm currently playing Horizon: Forbidden West and it is fantastic. But I actually want to recommend a game that I played earlier this year. And I want to recommend it because I was skeptical of it. And then it took over my life for quite some time, which is the Mass Effect trilogy.
Eric: Nice.
Lauren: I was skeptical to play it because I don't always love playing games from 10 years ago, just because I'm so used to playing triple A games in the past couple of years that I've gotten used to the, the game mechanics and the graphics and all that kind of stuff. And I'd started playing, I bought the, you know, Legendary Edition of the Mass Effect trilogy at the end of last year, I started playing Mass Effect one. And I was like, “Yeah, okay, this is, this is okay, I'm not so gripped by the story. And I'm not so gripped by the game mechanics,” you know, driving around this Mako on these planets is really frustrating. [Laughs] And then something kind of clicked and I finished the first game and then I started the second game. And the opening to the second game is like still one of the greatest openings of any video game I've ever experienced.
merritt: Oh my god, yeah.
Lauren: And then I got way, way, way too emotionally invested in Mass Effect, and I haven't stopped thinking about it for about six months.
Eric: That's so dangerous to have something that's that like narrative, and really does suck you in.
Lauren: Yeah.
Eric: And it's like, it's like, “Hey, we're gonna give you this book, but we're also going to smoosh the two other sequels to it directly attached to the book, so you never have to stop but you never have to put it down.”
Lauren: “But you still have to go to work. So sorry.” [Laughs]
Eric: Yes, exactly. Did I, this next, this playthrough that you did? Did the demon baby at the end? ruin your enjoyment? Or were you too busy just like happy you were living in space and romancing your friends to kind of deal with it?
Lauren: I don't know if this is like a controversial take because obviously I was not like in the fandom when the game was first released. But I loved the ending. I like - spoiler alert. I love a good tragedy. Like I thought it was earned and I like I thought - Yeah, I thought it was fantastic. I loved it.
merritt: Yeah, I never hated it as much as other people seemed to. Who did you? Did you romance someone?
Lauren: I did, I romanced Kaidan.
merritt: Kaidan!?
Lauren: Yeah.
merritt: Wow. [Eric laughs] Wow, that is rare.
Lauren: [Laughing] Is it?
merritt: Yeah, most people do not really care for Kaidan that much as far as I can tell. One of my coworkers, Kenneth Shepard, is I think one of the few people I know who is like, big pro-Kaidan shipper.
Lauren: That's so funny. Who did you romance?
merritt: Um, I think I did - It's funny. I was like, gonna say, “Oh, yeah. Wow, that series was so like, emotionally resonant for me.” And now I can't even remember the character's names. I think I went with Liara.
Lauren: Yeah.
merritt: But if I replayed it, I would probably do Garrus. But the thing is, I haven't replayed Mass Effects the first time and I probably never will. Because it's one of those games where it was just like, so emotionally intense that I'm like, “well, that that was it. That was my cannon Mass Effect experience. And I can't go back to it.”
Lauren: I totally get that. I had actually started to replay it pretty soon after, because I was like, I need to immerse myself in this world for so much longer. Like, I can't leave. And I played Female Shep the first time. And so I was like, I'm gonna, you know, like, I'll go back in and play Male Shep and sort of make different choices. And I yeah, I didn't end up sort of playing very far into it. Because that like cannon experience was so impactful. But that said, like, I, I think romancing Garrus is like, maybe the, the best choice. Liara is great. But in the first game, she's like, a little bit too, like obsessed with Shepard as like a test subject.
merritt: Yeah. [Laughs]
Lauren: And that kind of turned me off of it. But I didn't know you could romance Garrus in the second game, and so -
merritt: Yeah, I think he's like the biggest, like the breakup star.
Lauren: Yeah! And when I started to, in the second game, I realized that I was gonna be like, technically cheating, and like, I just couldn't - my heart couldn't take that.
merritt: Oh, yeah, cuz she's not there. And you're technically like, still together?
Lauren: Yeah. And so I was like, “I guess I just, I have to commit to this now,” but I did end up I - It's funny. My partner watch me play the game. And he was very, very anti-Kaidan. [Laughs] But I liked him at the end.
merritt: Kaidan’s sweet. Yeah, I don't know. I liked Mass Effect 3, because I kept him around for so long. Like you get this nice dialogue where you're like, Yeah, talking about him growing up in Vancouver or whatever, and be in buds.
Lauren: Yeah, exactly. I think there's some nice stuff there.
Eric: Is that real Vancouver? Or is it Space Vancouver?
Lauren: Real Vancouver. [Lauren and merritt laugh]
Eric: I don't know if like Mars is now Canada. [Lauren and merritt laugh] I, I feel like I never - I feel like I've come to a lot of these very large like PlayStation or PC games through like, YouTube lists and stuff that I've found like, I don't know if there's something very soothing to me about someone to tell me like “the seventh worst anime betrayal that's ever happened in games.” I love videos like that.
merritt: Yeah.
Eric: So like, I only know the very broad strokes of Mass Effect, where like, the ending is bad. You can romance people. It's in space. That's all I know. So like listening to you talk, you two talk about like who the best people are like, there are no spoilers here. This sounds like like a fanfic dream that you can just kind of play through and then there's space and guns and politics. If I remember?
merritt: There are guns. Probably the worst part of the game.
Lauren: Yeah, the shooting mechanic is really tough in the first game. It's not the best.
Eric: It's just like this whole thing is washing over me. And I'm like, I'm, even if we spoiled anything, it’s like now the feeling I'm getting is like, “I'm glad you enjoyed this.”
Lauren: I have to say I, like, it is you know, controversial ending you get to romance people, but I will advocate for playing it, because there's so much more. Like the politics are great. And the game mechanics do eventually become really fun. And you have to experience the character of Mordin Solus yourself.
merritt: Oh my god.
Lauren: Like after I played the game, I made a fan art of him my phone background for like three months. Obsessed with him. And he's like, he's like a side character. He's like, not a romance option. He's this weird little scientist alien dude. And he is genuinely one of my most favorite characters of like, all time in any media ever.
Eric: Incredible. merritt, what do, you what are you playing? And how do you feel about that?
merritt: Yeah, so I just finished the Vampire: The Masquerade - New York visual novels. So there were two of them that were put out in I want to say 2019 and 2020. It's weird because that series has kind of become like a Warhammer, in that there was nothing for a really long time. Although I did learn that there was a Vampire: The Masquerade TV series on Fox in the 90s which is extremely fun.
Lauren: Really?
Eric: What?
merritt: Called like Kindred: The Embraced. It lasted for six episodes. [Lauren laughs] And I absolutely want see it now.
Eric: Sorry. We're gonna have to change this podcast to being a rewatch podcast for that right now.
merritt: It's just about that now. Yeah. Yeah, and same thing with like Warhammer for a long time there were just like no games, and then they just started getting real silly with the license. And like the last few years obviously Bloodlines 2 is you know, kind of dead in the water. But there have been all these other ones like there is a V:TM Battle Royale that just came out a few months ago.
Eric: What? Why? [Laughs]
merritt: Yeah. It's a bunch of vampires running around a city jumping on rooftops, a sword fighting and occasionally just like grabbing some rando to have a snack. [Lauren laughs]
Eric: Same, me too.
merritt: Like the people are power ups, which is kind of funny.
Lauren: [Laughs] Oh my god.
merritt: But uh, but the visual novels are set in New York. And the first one is a little awkward because it's sort of trying to adapt the tabletop rules and make you feel like you're playing a game with mechanics, instead of just telling a story. It also has - speaking of bad endings, just atrocious endings, like it really feels like they just ran out of money. And were like, “Oh, Jesus, oh, God, we have to end this right now. I guess kill a bunch of people and fade to black.” We don't know how it's the main character. Okay. So the first one is like, was a little, you know, hit and miss. But the second one, “Shadows of New York,” they decided, okay, we're just, you play as a single character who has like defined relationships with other people. It's much less about like the mechanics and stuff and much more just about being thrown into the situation that at first seems to be like, “Oh, cool. Like, I'm not bound by like the rules of, the petty rules of humanity anymore. And then you realize, like, oh, shit, no, I'm bound by the petty rules of like devils and monsters, because they just recreated their own society that has a lot of the same problems.” For me, like both of those games, especially the latter really sort of like reminded me of the first like six months of 2020. The second game explicitly references COVID, like you start to, it starts to be a thing that happens in the background, and like it's coming up, but you're a vampire. So you're just like, not really paying attention to it.
Eric: I'm not ready for that yet. Like -
merritt: Yeah, for some people it might be -
Eric: Was it like incredibly jarring?
merritt: For me, it kind of was just like, “Wow, that feels like so long ago.” Like, obviously, you know, COVID is like, still with us. And sort of just like a part of society at this point. I still like wear masks in places, but just those first, like six months of total uncertainty, of just like, feeling like literally anything could happen, just being terrified, but also, like slightly exhilarated with some of the stuff that was going on. And also just like the whole, like, in these games, like being a vampire, and just like living in like your own little weird haven. And just like being isolated most of the time, that in itself is also like kind of evocative of those feelings. So it was a weird, like a strange narrative experience that I've never really had with a game because I don't think I've played a game that has referenced such a big historical event that happened so recently before, but I really recommend them if you're into visual novels. The first one I would recommend like with a qualification that, expect the ending to be bad. [Eric laughs] The second one, much better overall. Yeah, definitely worth playing both of them. I think they're there on like, pretty much everything. I played them on the Switch, but I think they're on Steam and probably consoles as well. Do people play visual novels on consoles? Is that a thing?
Lauren: I don’t know.
Eric: I don't know. It feels like some of them.
merritt: That seems very odd to me like sitting on your couch playing like, yeah…
Eric: Yeah, even with the Switch it’s like you're holding a Switch Lite over your head -
merritt: I kind of liked that, that the Switch Lite is like one of my favorite consoles of all time, just because it's so comfortable. And like it's so much less heavy than the original. And I never played my switch docked anyway. So I just, you know.
Eric: I, honestly I'm going to come back to that, because it's actually my recommendation is playing a Switch docked for the first time. But merritt, you have given me so much to chew on here. Not only the games and the show that again, we're just going to change the entire podcast premise. [merritt laughs] But like, I am still such a sucker of seeing New York interpreted in the various media. Like, I mean, seeing it in Spider-Man and Miles Morales is really wonderful, but seeing it rendered in, via Vampire the Masquerade. And also, I was looking this up because I hadn't heard of this when you were talking about it, the source book from the actual tabletop game of New York by Night. And now I need to read that, like I, there's so much New York stuff I need to I need to chew on.
merritt: I have the same kind of thing of like, “oh, New York. Oh, it's in video game,” that's or like seeing a place where you live like those games that were for the ps4 that were set in Seattle? Infamous, I think.
Eric: Oh, yes, yeah.
merritt: Yeah.
Eric: I was like, “The Last of Us?”
Lauren: I was gonna say, The Last of Us 2, was in Seattle.
merritt: Yeah, that's basically Seattle. But what was really weird about the first New York game which was called “Coteries of New York” is there's a part where they literally go to a street that I used to live on, like, within like a three block radius, and they're talking about the neighborhood. [Laughs] It's really weird. Like someone must have just like, either done a ton of research or lived like right by me when they were working on this.
Lauren: That's awesome.
Eric: I can only imagine like the zoom in of like going and then the, you’re in your apartment and your laying on your couch, holding Switch Lite. [Lauren and merritt laugh] And then we watch and you're playing the game, and it's just perpetual and we never stop. One last question, are they - do they ever say “whoa, I'm vampiring here?” Or “I’m masquerading here?” Does that ever - [Lauren laughs]
merritt: Uh, no, I think that would be a masquerade breach to say that.
Eric: [Laughs] Awesome, thank you. I'm truly, I'm going to dig into this so much after this. But yeah, it's funny, you said that the thing I was going to recommend is playing your Switch on the dock. I also love my Switch lite. I had a Switch for a really long time, I got it right when it came out, because I hadn't bought a new console for a very long time. And then I got to Switch Lite because of the dreaded joy con drift. And this was even before they were like Reddit threads telling you what to do. And then Nintendo saying, “we're not going to help you know, it's fine. No, you're just gonna have to deal with it and buy more Joy Cons.” So I ended up getting the Switch Lite, and it was a little bit better in terms of drift. And I put hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of hours into games like Enter The Gungeon, I probably put like 500 hours into. And then of course, like Breath of the Wild and Mario Kart 8, I played a ton on my Switch lite. And then like I was living with like a bunch of roommates. And then I moved in with my partner in 2019. And we had used the Switch as part of like a streaming setup. So it was really messed up. But then like, we hadn't streamed in a while and I'm like, “I'm just gonna move this to the real TV.” And the reason why I love the Switch so much is - merritt exactly what you said, is the Switch lite is the like apotheosis of people who played the Gameboys and then became adults and then wanted to keep playing Gameboy games. [merritt and Lauren laugh] And I was like, “Oh, I'm such an adult I playing this on the subway. Wow, video games fit into my adult life.” And now like, I feel like I've come all the way back around in like, this is my space that I live in with my partner. I'm allowed to have a video game system in the main TV. And then I'm like, “Whoa, did you know Breath of the Wild is so pretty? Like, did you know?”
Lauren: That game is so worth playing on a big TV.
Eric: And I just, I never had and I'm blown away. I bought the DLC. I didn’t because I just didn't want to do it the first time. I'm replaying all of Mario Kart 8 and getting like all the stars and all the goals and all the tracks especially with the new ones that are coming in. So like, let's change it up man, like the Nintendo Switch is a good system. Don't know if anyone heard and it works both handheld and on a dock. Who would have thought? Thank you Miyamoto really appreciate that.
merritt: Thanks, Reggie.
Eric: Thank you, Reggie. Thank you, Doug Bowser, thank you to all of you. I'm also like, I'm debating whether or not to read Reggie Fils-Aimé, the - he ran North American Nintendo for a very long time - his like business memoir. I'm debating whether or not I want to read it or not. Because like I can't figure out if it's gonna be like, interesting Nintendo stories, or just like business jargon.
merritt: Isn't it gonna be mostly about pizza? Wasn't he a pizza guy before that?
Lauren: Really?
Eric: Yeah, he worked at - Pizza Hut? What was the one with the bigfoot pizza? That was like his thing. The one that was like really long? It was a long pizza.
Lauren: I don’t know.
merritt: [Laughs] I don't remember. But yeah, he was a pizza innovator. For sure.
Lauren: Man, what a life. Pizza, Nintendo I mean, what else do you need? Really?
merritt: Just the patron saint of, of teens.
Lauren: [Laughing] Exactly.
Eric: Wait, and it turns out that he was working in Mountain Dew as well? [Lauren and merritt laugh] That's the Triforce. The Triforce of Pizza, Nintendo, and Mountain Dew. Incredible. Thank you so much for sharing your Game Recommendations and Feelings. So do you want to help some people out? You want to answer some advice questions?
Lauren: Yeah, let's do it.
Eric: Wonderful. Actually, I have, I've saved this one specifically for you, merritt, because I know that you are a big Destiny head. Is that what they call themselves? Destinyheads? [Lauren laughs]
merritt: Oh, boy. Yeah, I mean, that could be a fan of that weird YouTuber as well though, so I don't know. [Laughs]
Eric: Whatever they call them, I'm saving this for you specifically. This is from Mimi, she/her - “Do you have any advice on playing shooter games? I've been playing Destiny and the game is amazing. But a bit overwhelming sometimes. What's anyone's advice on making it less chaotic.” And also, I reserve the right to change your name to like an advice column name. So this is “First Person Just Shoot Me, Help Me.” I guess. That was close, I don't know. If you come up with better ones. Both of you are very much allowed to do that.
merritt: Now you have put the idea in my head of a game based on the 90s sitcom Just Shoot Me starring David Spade. And that, to me, is horrifying. [Lauren laughs]
Eric: I feel like it needs to be a Nintendo and NES like platformer that has so little -
merritt: Yeah, has nothing to do with the game where with a show and just your bop jumping and bopping around.
Eric: Exactly. A little sprite of David Spade jumping from one New York apartment to another? I don't know what the show is about.
merritt: Because if it's, if it's one thing you know, games let you live out your wildest fantasies. Your fantasies that maybe are so wild that you've never even had them before. Like what if you were David Spade?
Eric: So I did just have a dream where I wish I could be shooting down Chris Farley jokes for the rest of my life. [merritt and Lauren laugh]
merritt: So FPS games. Wow, man, that's tough.
Eric: Is there anything, I think the way that and I think Destiny specifically is kind of hitting on this and like where, we're a long time since Pac Man, but really, we're a long time since like GoldenEye. Were it’s just like yeah, shoot your friend. Whatever, there's just like so much going on. Yeah, in an FPS, I think, especially when you're playing Destiny, which is like, I've still been trying to figure out how to explain destiny to people. It's like both a first person shooter and an MMO. At the same time, there's like seven different currencies. I feel like there's like a lot of going on in general.
merritt: Yeah, I mean, so there's the core issue of like, playing an FPS. If you didn't grow up playing video games, then the concept of maneuvering in a fake three dimensional space on a screen is like completely deranged, until you think -
Lauren: [Laughs] Absolutely.
merritt: - like 2d games are one thing, but like, Oh, I'm maneuvering on these platforms that I'm looking at through a flat plane. Like that's hard to do. And also just FPS games with like mouse and keyboard. There's like all kinds of hotkeys and stuff going on, I would say just try it, find some friends is the main way to go. The nice thing about a game like Destiny is that it is primarily like a team based cooperative game, like there is PvP, obviously. But you don't really have to engage in it, if you don't want to, you know, if you have friends, or like you can, you know, find groups online or like a clan or something, they can really sort of lead you through it a lot more easily. Because specifically with that game, too, the new player experience, I think leaves a lot to be desired. It's one of those things where like, if you haven't been playing it for a long time, you have no idea what's going on. And in like the story, there's like a ton of different stuff to like, mess around with, there's all these different activities that you could be doing. And it can be pretty overwhelming. So I guess like, in a way, this is kind of a cop out. But I'm saying like, “hey, find someone to help you” is my solution. But like, honestly, you know, those games are the most fun with other people anyway. So I would really, really recommend like going on Reddit trying to find a clan or something. There are good ones, I'm part of a really good one, you know, that will I think make the experience a lot more enjoyable.
Eric: Hell yeah.
Lauren: Yeah, I have not played Destiny or that many MMOs. But I think just for first person shooter games in general, because I definitely have a heart. I'm one of those people that like has a hard time with them visually. I think that when you have the option, put it on the easiest mode you possibly can to just like until you get used to it. And also something that helps me with the first person stuff is mixing up the distance that I am from the screen.
Eric: Ooh, oh, that’s a good one.
Lauren: Like sometimes sitting closer or sitting further away, can that help me not be like so claustrophobic?
merritt: Yeah,
Lauren: It depends on you, depending on the graphic and depends on like, the angle of what the FPS is, like, I think just sort of messing around with the angle and the distance that you are from your screen can sometimes like break something loose.
merritt: Totally. And like playing with the field of view settings and stuff to like most games like Destiny can will let you alternate that stuff like how wide of a perspective you have around your character. And that can really change like some people just like cannot play without on a high setting or a low setting. So like messing around with that is probably a good thing to try. Also, maybe you can just like turn off some of the particle effects and stuff. Like Destiny, there's just a lot going on visually. So anything you can do to cut down on that, like visual clutter is probably going to help.
Eric: Yeah, I definitely want to say that this extends to other games, I tried to pick up Risk of Rain 2, just so that I could like play with some of my other friends who were playing FPS’s. And like, there's still so much going on for a game that's like, relatively light, lightweight, like not a triple A game or not like has five different enemies happening at the same time. Like, I think it's also hard because I remember I was playing this one game. And then like, I had just unlocked a few of the different classes. And I was playing one of the classes that wasn't as good. Like, you know, you kind of there were like 12 In all, but I just started the game. And there were only like three of them like I could have played and I'm like, “Oh yeah, I'll play the sniper, I guess” while this is happening, and they're like, “Oh, this is the baby class that isn't gonna help you once we unlock the super secret thing.” And then we got to the secret boss, and then I died immediately and I had to watch two of my friends play the secret boss on Discord.
Lauren: Aww! [Laughs]
Eric: So I'm like, I'm like, Oh, cool. I'm gonna be on Twitter while you're doing this. I hope you're having fun. Just like these games. It's exactly what you said merritt is like games don't bring you on at the same time. If there is like a multiplayer component, it's just like you have to assume everyone knows exactly what to do all at the same time. So you gotta have some friends who will help you along the way. I also remember that I was listening to a podcast that said that like the way that we understand FPS is like, the left - I'm like trying to envision a controller while I'm holding it. [Laughs] Like if the left stick goes forward and the right stick looks around like the left stick is movement on the right stick looks around. That was invented for Halo. Like that has been around only for 20 years.
Lauren: Seriously?
Eric: So like it it was invent, they - Halo invented it and they came out when Xbox came out which I find wild.
merritt: Yeah, I mean if you try to go back to play Goldeneye now like on an on 64 controller, It's kind of miserable. Like, it's not good. Yeah, no, that's definitely still fairly new.
Eric: So, yeah, so if you're not, if you're struggling, definitely you can mix it up. But everyone else is struggling and it's, it's younger than you are probably so don't worry about it. Hey, if you were playing Halo multiplayer, and you just like wanted to give yourself like a cool gamertag what would your gamertag be? Or did you have, or what was your oldest gamertag if you remember?
Lauren: Oh god Pandamonium23, but panda, like -
merritt: Hell yes.
Lauren: My Avatar was little panda. [Laughs]
Eric: That's honestly, that's perfect.
Lauren: It's still my parents still have like, an Xbox in their house. And it's still like the thing I play under when I'm home and play xbox.
merritt: Oh my god that rules.
Eric: I cannot remember mine. I think it was the same as my main screenname. I think I was still SilverGoalieOne, because my last name is Silver and I played goalie when I was eight years old. Recreational soccer.
merritt: Oh, yeah, do you think kids still do that? Like, you know, naming a gamertag or username after something that because you know, you were probably like, what? 12 or 13 when you did that. That wasn't like, you know, it's a few years before, but like, yeah, just like, “oh, yeah, no, I had a pet rabbit when I was a kid. So my username is like Chomper32. Because that was my rabbits name or something.” [Laughs]
Lauren: Yeah, my first email was my initials. And then the word ‘otter’ because I was obsessed with otter. [All laugh]
Eric: I’m going to email that later today, Lauren.
merritt: So that could have led to some really interesting misunderstandings.
Lauren: Yeah, it's - [Laughs] it came out basically as LSHotter, because my initials are LSH, which as like a nine year old it didn't occur to me that that was going to be a problem. So yeah.
Eric: So yeah, my email is ASLotter@Gmail.com. Just hit me up there. It's fine
Lauren: But no, I have to think merritt that like kids are still doing that, like things change. But I think I do think that that certain things around being like a young person sort of stay the same from generation to generation.
merritt: Totally. Embarrassing usernames and stuff. Yeah.
Lauren: Exactly.
Eric: I mean, you see it all the time when like a tweet goes viral, and it's like a 15 year old who did it, said something, whatever. It's like, “wow, PB &J. So fire.” And then everyone retweeted him as like, do 200,000 retweets, and then it's like @ASLOtter. Like it might be that it's just that now it's very public, and we watch you when you go viral. I think that's the only difference.
merritt: True.
Eric: Also I'm sorry, I said ASLotter twice. That one's on me. [All laugh]
[Segment Transition Music]
Eric: Hey, this is the snack break. I got tomato toast, with crispy toast, with mayo and just slabs of heirloom tomato. It is the only good thing about late July and August. Good tomatoes. I wait for it every year. You can have fancy snacks too when you're playing games. No one's keeping you from it. I want to point you towards our Patreon at patreon.com/gamesandfeelings. We have just as many DLC episodes, which is the extra podcast on the Patreon where I answer games advice questions from advice columns of yore, whether we're talking about Dear Prudence, whether we're talking about Dear Abby, whether we're talking about Ask a Manager or any of the other advice columns that are on slate, and of course I have my partner in life, love, and podcasting, Amanda McLoughlin, here to do it with me. If you want a whole other podcast, like Games and Feelings so that you have a weekly and it comes out every Friday on the alternate episode days, you know, so like you have one weekly podcast when you have that together, you just gotta come to the Patreon. Patreon.com/gamesandfeelings. And thank you again to our producer level patron, Polly Burridge, who doesn't care about rolling well in Dungeons and Dragons, because she likes the successes and failures as a storytelling device and you need a mix of both. Check out the other shows that are part of the Multitude collective. I think you'd like Join the Party! Join the Party is an actual play podcast with tangible worlds, genre pushing storytelling, and collaborators who make each other laugh all the time. DM Eric, that's me, and the emphatic players, Amanda, Brandon, and Julia, welcome everyone to the table from longtime tabletop RPG players to folks who've never touched a role playing game before. You have plenty of places for you to start, you can hop into the Camp-aign where we're playing Monster the Week, set in a weird and wild summer camp. Or you can marathon our D&D games. Campaign Two as a modern day comic book super powered story, or Campaign One for a high fantasy epic. Whatever adventure you choose. We invite you to hang out with us each month at the after party and episode held to discuss campaigns joke around and answer listener questions. So what are you waiting for? Pull up a chair and Join the Party! Search for Join the Party in your podcast app or go to jointhepartypod.com
We are sponsored this week by Cornbread Hemp. They are a CBD company based in Kentucky that makes USDA certified organic balms, gummies and oils. Most products are vegan friendly, including the CBD oils and gummies. And they're family owned and crowd funded. Best of all, their products are certified by independent labs with reports published on their website. If you're gonna buy CBD products, you want to go with someone who knows what they're talking about and Cornbread Hemp seems to be those folks. Go to cornbreadhemp.com and use code “gamesandfeelings” for 25% off your order. That's cornbreadhemp.com and use code “gamesandfeelings” for 25% off your order. And now, back to the games.
[Segment Transition Music]
Eric: All right, do we want to go to another question?
merritt: Let's do it.
Eric: All right. I think I'm gonna expand this one out a little bit. But I think this question is really interesting, and is going to be very helpful for the various things we have here. This is from “Partyless Adventurer” - see I don't even have to make up a name. “Hey, goblins and gremlins -” Thank you. Thank you for saving me from having to - [merritt and Lauren laugh] “I am a socially awkward Aardvark who has difficulty finding individuals to play tabletop RPGs and RPG board games with. The friends I have are not interested in playing long form games. So I must adventure into the unknown to find new adventuring buddies. Here's my question: How does one indicate to others that they want to play tabletop RPGs? Wear a t shirt with a d20? Sing a song about an adventure? In general what suggestions might you have about getting a group together to tackle a game that would take more than two hours?” Yours in gaming, Partyless Adventurer.” I feel like there are two questions here. One is how do you suss out if people want to play a game?
merritt: How do you find the geeks and gamers in the room? Yeah.
Lauren: Yeah.
Eric: That's right. I think the two questions aren't How do you find the nerds? But how do you public - The question I want to start with is, how do you publicly tell people you like games without - because the entire gamer personality trait has been taken by people who, I don't know if I want to play games with necessarily. Because it's like “my wife lets me play games and in exchange I make salary,” like that's the shirt I'm buying in Walmart now I'm wearing and those are those people? Like how do you tell people you like games in, in publicly is a question I want to know.
Lauren: Yeah, I mean, Eric, I think like, the point about the common perception of, of the gamer is true. And also kind of complicates this question in an interesting way, in the sense that like, there is not going to be a universal experience at all around this particular thing. I find that, sort of in the spaces that I occupy and in the, in the way that I present myself that like, when I start to talk about video games, it's more of like a curiosity to people or a surprise to people because I don't necessarily like read as like your classic gamer. And so it's a little bit easier, in some respects, for me to sort of like come out as somebody who loves video games, [Eric laughs] because it's not coming with like all of this baggage of what else that might say about me. And that might be different for somebody else, right? Somebody who maybe outwardly presents as like a more stereotypical gamer, then there might be more tension around that conversation, because of like, what you might think people will assume about you. [Laughing] I feel like I'm just like adding a problem to this person's plate. But like, I just I wanted to acknowledge that, like, you know, this is it's gonna be different depending on like, the way that you present and the spaces you're occupying. But this is something I experience a lot and like, trying to discover if the person I'm talking to is like, also a fandom person, just like in general, and sort of like my understanding of like, like, “Is this somebody that I can like, tell that I read fanfiction?” You know, like that kind of level of fandom person.
Eric: Right.
Lauren: And I think, you know, sometimes it's really just about like, waiting for the other person to start talking about something that they're passionate about. And then like, ask them questions about that thing that they're passionate about, whether it's sports, or books or TV shows or whatever. And then like, you know, when you have an opening, if someone's like, “Oh, my God, and I loved that there was this huge twist in this TV show. I was watching” you can be like, “Oh my God, I know exactly what you're feeling.” You know what you're feeling I was playing this game the other day, and there was this huge, and then finding those like little inroads of like, shared passion, and then maybe the person will be like, Oh, my God, yes, I played that game. That was such a good twist. Or they'll be like, Oh, I haven't played a lot of video games. Like, tell me more about that or haven't played a lot of TTRPG. It's like, tell me more about that.
merritt: So I will say I haven't played a lot of tabletop games in a while. Although I am starting a Vampire: The Masquerade game.
Lauren: Yeaaa!
merritt: And yes, after having played those visual novels, and I'm hoping and honestly expecting that it will go better than my really disastrous attempts to play it when I was in middle school. Because as it turns out, that isn't really the kind of game for people whose brands aren't really done cooking yet. If you offer to DM I feel like a lot of people will jump on board. Like if that's something you're willing to do. It's one thing If you're like, oh, I want to find a group to play, I want to play in a game with someone that can be tough, but like, even just putting yourself out there and being like, I will run this experience for you, people will be like, Oh, okay, and you know, if your existing friends like, aren't into this stuff at all, that's one thing. And you know, you shouldn't try to push something on people that they don't want to do. But you could always also just try starting with like, smaller, like single shot games, like something like Fiasco. And there's also a million others of these now that I don't know about.
Eric: Yeah,
merritt: Like, can be really fun and a great way to start stuff without the pressure of like, “you are signing up for a potentially endless campaign every week for the next X years.” If it's just like, we're gonna get together for two hours, order some food or bring some food over. And we're going to like play this fun little collaborative storytelling game, I think the pressure can be a lot lower. And people might be like, “Oh, that's really interesting.” And then you can sort of whip out the world books or like the, you know, the expansions and stuff and be like, “Oh, really, perhaps you would like to tell an epic tale of gallantry and goblins and things of that nature?”
Eric: Look at my secret books I've been hiding from you.
merritt: You just press a button and like, the fireplace flips around and it's just - yeah. [Lauren laughs] Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I guess I haven't been out there. Like, it's weird. In a way it feels kind of like dating, right, of like trying to find like a gaming group. Because there are sites for it now. And you can go on Reddit and try to meet that way. You can go to your local game shop. I guess a lot of those have been hit pretty hard over the last few years. But they're opening back up. And I'm sure there's some kind of hanky that signals that you want to DM, that's a thing still.
Eric: [Laughs] Yeah, there you put a bandana with Matt Mercer's face in your back pocket, and see what happens. [All laugh]
Lauren: Yeah, I feel like an entry point for a lot of people into just the concept of TTRPG is is Betrayal on, on the - Betrayal on the House on the Hill, or whatever the board game is called
Eric: The spooky board game with the mind, with the mansion. And there's a hill, and -
Lauren: You know, like - yeah, I think a lot of people who like enjoy the concept of board games, but are sort of wary of TTRPGs as a concept, because it feels like - I was one of these people until many years ago -
merritt: Oh, yeah.
Lauren: Like I was really intimidated by the idea of TTRPGs. And by the idea of like, especially D&D, or something that's like being created wholecloth by somebody, and by me as part of that. So I think starting with something like Betrayal, or - Well, I mean, I, this is a longer campaign. But Time Stories is like one of the greatest sort of legacy games that I've played. And this sort of, you can start with a single time story, and I think, introduce people to the concept of it. And then also, to piggyback off of the local game shop, also your local board game cafe. A lot of cities have them now. And a lot of them have groups specifically for this kind of thing.
Eric: Absolutely. Oh, man, we said so many things. I want to like touch on all these things at the same time, what you two said about dating, and about like, figuring out your interests and then going from there is like, find people you like and then keep seeing if they like games, is, doing the other way is like, “Oh, you like games, I'm in a committed relationship with you now. And then all of a sudden you realize they're a bad person.” Like that's the hard part. And I feel like very similar to dating is like, I want to be dating someone, I want to be in a relationship. And then I realize that you're a bad person. And then you have to break up with them which is the awkward part. So I feel like it is a lot of poking and prodding. And what you said about the handkerchief is very funny merritt, and I think we're getting closer to this where you're saying, Lauren is like, but how do you tell someone you like games easily? Like if the suggestions that Partyless Adventurer said here,bout like wearing a shirt that had a d20 on it. I'd be like, I don't know if I want to be your friend and I professionally run a Dungeon and Dragon podcast, you know what I mean? Is like, I don't know if this is coming on too strong. Or I mean something else if your apparel is this, like it's - Lauren, if you saw someone wearing a shirt that said ‘Destiel Is True And Canon’ would you be like, oh, I want to talk to this person immediately. [All laugh]
Lauren: I mean, I would be intrigued for sure.
merritt: Probably also just like keep an eye on the exit.
Lauren: Yeah, I mean, you never, you never quite know.
Eric: Exactly.
Lauren: But I will, I will make an argument for enamel pins or patches. Thos like little like I have you know, a jean jacket that I switch out a bunch of enamel pens on it. And like, I've got one that's the main character from Oxenfree, right? And it's like, she just looks like a cool girl with blue hair. But if you know, then like, there we go. Now we're talking about Oxenfree now we're talking about video games.
Eric: That's true. I did see someone with a strawberry from Celeste. And I was like, Oh, yes, like Yes, there it is. That oh, that's really good with a patch or a sticker on your water bottle or like on your, on your laptop.
Lauren: Phone case.
Eric: Yes, that's, that's very good
Lauren: Phone background, make Mordin Solus your phone background, like me. [All laugh]
Eric: A hundred percent. Yeah, um, I also want to say that I think that friendly neighborhood board game stores much like dating, I think you can sniff them out a little sooner than you did before, where like, all of a sudden, you're like, “Uh Oh, I'm in a white supremacist D&D game. And it's been five sessions.” Like that. I feel like you'd be able to figure that out much sooner now. And I feel like there are a lot more open armed, more inclusive games where you'd be able to figure that out, you can find the people so much easier. And it's not just like, “I need you. I need someone to play games with me.”
Lauren: Mmhmm.
merritt: Yeah. Because at the end of the day, like, you know, you want to be having a good time, like, it's, it's less, like, you might think, Oh, I just really want to be playing a tabletop game right now. But like, if that means you're doing it with people who you don't get along with or you don't like, then that's probably worse than not doing it at all. So it's like the relationship that thing again, right? It's like you want to be doing something with someone or people you like, not, not just for the sake of it. So you know, it might take time, there are enough people out there, especially in the post sort of Critical Role and Adventure Zone world that we find ourselves in. There are enough people who listen to podcasts who are like, I wish I could go on a fantastical journey. And as a DM, or game master or storyteller or whatever. You will be in high demand.
Lauren: Yeah, I mean, we played a game, just a one shot back in December with two friends of ours who had never played TTRPG in their life, but they're huge Critical Role fans. And so they were curious about it. And like, you know, we haven't been able to sort of get a regular game together. But it is something that we're all now interested in doing more of, because that was their avenue in, right, like that - They enjoyed watching other people play it, and then they were curious. And so my partner ran a game for them, and they had a good time. And you know, sometimes yyeah, your existing friends do have a good time with doing other things might actually be sort of sleeper agents for, for game players.
Eric: Yeah. 100%, I want to double down on the two things that both of you said, one, if you want to DM it, then you can be the DM or the GM, then you're the person who puts it together and they need you. And - [Laughs] I, Yeah, and then you get people to be excited about the thing. And I think what we said first of all merritt. It's very funny of how you set a post-Critical Role and TAZ world. It's like in Fallout, this is like after the atomic bomb went off. [Lauren and merritt laugh] Yeah, but then you can like cut them off at the pass and show them what actual games are like. Because I think the next step is always like, “wow, that Mercer isn't my GM. But I'm also not the player. We have our own dynamic. We have our own thing here.” And then it's like, you got to take that next step forward into playing the game. And what a wonderful introduction. Now you have another tabletop RPG fan. Yeah, those are like the two steps, right? It's like you consume the content. And then you play it and you have a deeper understanding of the entire thing. And then you're set. And then you have to do it every single Friday for the rest of your life. [Lauren laughs] I want to do one more quick question before we get to our Query from the Internet. This is a quick one. This is from Cheyenne, or ‘Hops Me Out Playing Games:’ “Hey, everyone, do you have any suggestions for games that can be played at a brewery? Or I'm gonna say anything outside where your friends are hanging out? And maybe there's a drink or they're maybe card or dice or board?”
Lauren: It's so funny. There's a brewery down the street that I'll go and write at sometimes. And there is a, there's a couple who shows up every single Friday evening with a new board game under their arm and I'm like, trying to think about what games they bring. I think I've seen them play Betrayal before with some friends.
Eric: Really?
Lauren: Yeah.
Eric: That feels like so so fiddly while you also have like, mugs on your table.
Lauren: I think, I think they're like the other people who play games a lot. Right? Like that's not a good, that's not sort of a good beginner one to play at a brewery.
Eric: For sure.
merritt: I was gonna say Jungle Speed, but that's probably a bad game to play at a table with drinks.
Eric: Oh my god Jungle Speed,. I have not thought about that for 20 years since I was at summer camp. [Lauren laughs]
merritt: Yeah, yeah. Good game, but you know, not not for that kind of stuff.
Eric: Jungle Speed is perfect because of the big the whole thing about Jungle Speed, is the big knobby thing in the middle that you all need to grab and then people push each other over, maybe this was just at camp so -
merritt: It can get brutal. [Eric laughs] I think any game like Okay, so we're talking about a brewery you know, setting where people are like having some drinks and sitting down and stuff. I think anything with like bluffing or with like a social component is gonna be fun. So something like, like a Sheriff of Nottingham maybe -
Eric: I was just thinking that.
merritt: Yeah, where there's like not a lot of components that are gonna get like knocked around. And a lot of it is just sort of like having fun and like, you know, lying to your friends basically. I think that that's like a really good fit.
Eric: 100%. I was gonna say Sheriff of Nottingham especially because the person that you lie to switches.
merritt: Right, yeah.
Eric: All the entire time. So like if you're you can't play Coup or something where you like you need a everyone needs to be focused at the same time and like trying to lie to each other. I like the idea that it's like the responsibility of whomst to you lie is kind of diffused so that people aren't concentrating while they're drinking or they're going to get food or pick up their, their hot dog that they got at the food cart next to the brewery. I'm going to pivot this a little bit and say like, I specifically go to bars that have card games there. So it's also worthwhile to like look for Barcades and bars that have really good like pinball machines in there. I just went to a bar recently that had like six old school pinball machines there, it is now my new favorite bar and I love going there all the time.
merritt: They got Addams Family?
Eric: Yeah. Oh, the didn't have the Addams Family one, but I do love that one. That's at the Barcade.
merritt: Are you in New York?
Eric: Yeah, yeah.
merritt: Okay. I think I probably know what bar you’re talking about. [Laughs]
Eric: It’s at Milo's Yard in -
merritt: Yeah, yeah,
Eric: Yes, that place is awesome. It's incredible. And I played the Centipede there, and I got on a high score. And I was like, when was the last time I played Centipede, when I also got like a tequila soda. It was awesome.
Lauren: I would, I would also say like, simple and classic is great. Like, just bring a deck of cards. And I think something that can be really fun when you have a couple of people, like I'll say like four or five people, ask your friends like what card games they have played, like growing up with their family. Like my family, we grew up playing this game called ‘Oh, Hell,’ which is like a sort of more chaotic and less complicated version of Bridge. [merrit and Eric laugh] And like, that's a game I love introducing to people because it's it's like perfect with four people. It's like a game that usually nobody's ever heard of. So it's like fun to you know, introduce it to other people. It lasts for 10 rounds, but like can be really, really fast. And it's not something that you need, like, to have so much focus in, so I think just asking your friends like what card games they play can sometimes be like a fun way to also get to know your friends together.
merritt: Have either of you played Euchre?
Eric: Yes.
Lauren: I have played it!
Eric: I also played Euchre at summer camp a lot. Yeah,
merritt: Had a big Euchre moment in high school. Like somehow just all my friends got obsessed with Euchre in high school. [Lauren laughs] And like, we were just playing it constantly.
Eric: That is so funny. Imagining you at like recess, trying to figure out where like, the good Jack is, is very funny to me. [merritt and Lauren laugh]
Lauren: Also, if you have the patience to learn Bridge, Bridge can be incredibly rewarding. If you have a good Bridge group.
merritt: One of my life goals is to learn bridge, like before I turn 60s so that I can just hang out with like a like, you know, a bunch of much older people just playing Bridge.
Lauren: Bridge is fun.
merritt: That sounds like so much fun.
Lauren: It's really fun. It's just, it's such a commitment. Like you have to have your, your Bridge partner and you have to like - It's like sort of needlessly complicated at times. But it's fun.
Eric: This is perfect. And I thank you so much for the advice that you've given to these real people who have sent in questions. And thank you to everybody who sent them in. I'm sorry that I garbled your name so much. I'll be funnier in the next episode, I promise. But now we are at our final segment. This is ‘Queries from the Internet's’ - where I find something on the internet that we can also give advice to if it's a little more unhinged, because it's not a real person. It's kind of the general mall of the internet that we got to figure out. This particular section is called “Oh, that is good advice.” I - one of my favorite Twitter accounts is called Video Game Advisor. Have you two heard of this?
merritt: I have seen it on occasion. Yeah.
Eric: It's kind of looks like one of those like respectful meme accounts that like comes in my timeline. That's not like terrible, ridiculous. Basically, people take screenshots of good advice and send it into this Twitter account, as they say on their Twitter bio, “sage advice from the world's most trusted source: video games.” [merritt laughs] So I have a few of my favorite screenshots that I found over the last few months. And I wanted to share with two of you. And I would love to like try to reverse engineer a situation where this advice would be good. And you'd be like, “Oh, that did help. Or I do remember that game.” See, merritt, and I'm gonna, I'm making up a game and I'm gonna making you do it. I have the tables fully turned
merritt: Wow, the tables have changed. [Lauren laughs]
Eric: This first one is from Pokemon Yellow. You have a little Pikachu behind you. And you talk to a random man. And he says: “you should be nice to your friends.”
merritt: I mean, that's just good advice. Like, that's just -
Lauren: Yeah, you should be nice to your friends. I like to think I'm usually nice to my friends and don't need the reminder. But I'm sure there have been times in which I could have used it, especially when I was younger.
Eric: That's fine. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have told two people who are such good friends to get this advice.
Lauren: [Laughs] No, I think it's very easy to remember to be nice to your friends when they're like standing in front of you. But I think that one of the things of the, you know, that we've been dealing with for the past couple of years is a lot of our friendships moving to like more digital and more sporadic contact. And so I think it's important to remember to like, be nice to your friends on a more active basis. I'm personally incredibly introverted and kind of forget to socialize sometimes. So I have a recurring task in my Asana, on my To Do app, that's just “text a friend” -
merritt: Oh my god, yes.
Lauren: To literally just remind myself to be like, reach out to somebody today, just say hi, just to kind of keep that friendship alive. So actually, I have taken this advice and put it into my own - [Eric laughs]
merritt: Oh my god, a kindred spirit, someone who over-organizes everything too. I use OmniFocus. But I have literally the same task like once a week, like text or email someone you haven't talked to you once in a while.
Eric: I like how both of you were like, I'm always nice to my friends. And then you're like, I both have this advice weekly delivered to me.
Lauren: The problem is we've already taken this advice! [Laughs]
merritt: Like I offload all of my brain into my organizer. So I don't think about this stuff.
Lauren: Same! Same.
merritt: But I would, I would like to put a twist on this and say that you should treat yourself like a friend, too.
Lauren: Yes.
merritt: And you should be nice to yourself. You know, that's a lot harder than being nice to your friends sometimes. But I think it's, it's really important. And just think like, if you're like the kind of person who beats yourself up a lot. Would you hang around with someone who did that all the time to you? Because if not, then you know, maybe you should try to address that.
Eric: Yeah, go talk to that NPC in the, Celadon City and figure it out.
merritt: Be nice to your friends. Also, giant monsters exist. [Eric and Lauren laugh] And you can catch them in this little ball here.
Lauren: And be nice to them too!
merritt: Although it doesn't really matter if you're not because they can't legally they can't do anything about it. [Lauren laughs]
Eric: That thing following you. It's a Pikachu. It's fine. He's your best friend now. All right, this one is from Curse Mountain which came out on Wii in 2009: “Be careful not to alert nearby ghosts by jogging.”
merritt: By jogging!
Lauren: Interesting. I mean, this is, this is great advice if you if your running route goes past a graveyard.
Eric: Perfect.
merritt: That’s true. I have never heard of Cursed Mountain before.
Lauren: I haven’t either.
merritt: A Wii game?
Eric: I haven’ either, that's all I have. Apparently you hold Z to jog.
merritt: Yeah, I'm looking at it now. Okay, now I'm going to have to play this. Because it sounds really really silly. I mean, that's pretty good advice. Unless you are hunting for ghosts. In which case jogging might be the best way to - do ghosts hate jogging, or do they just hear the noise that you make when you're running?
Lauren: Hmm.
Eric: From what I understand from this? It seems like the ladder you're trying to evade the ghosts and your pants are so swishy.
merritt: Mmm, your pants keep swishing like that Seinfeld episode. Yeah.
Lauren: That's very relatable.
Eric: All right, here's another spooky one. This is from “Casper Scare School: Classroom Capers,” which came out on Nintendo DS in 2010. “Just pick up anything interesting that's dropped on the floor.”
Lauren: Okay. Hmm.
merritt: Oh, no yeah. So yesterday, I was walking down the street, and there was a playing card on the ground. That was the Joker playing card. Like, just the Joker, not like, just a joker not the Joker. But I was like, You know what, I'm just gonna pick that up and put it in my bag. I don't know why I'll probably throw it out in a month from now. But who knows? It could be useful. And I think treating your life like you live in an adventure game and you have to pick literally everything up or like you're in Skyrim. And you're just picking up wheels of cheese constantly. Yeah, I don't see any way that that could end poorly.
Lauren: Yeah!
Eric: I do appreciate the point and click adventure nature of your suggestion that's like, “Oh, I'm gonna need this later to open up the lock that has the lion inside, who’s going to give me the part that changes my car into a spaceship.”
Lauren: I mean, you never know what's gonna, what somebody is going to drop as they're walking in front of you. I think the craziest stranger encountered to this end that I ever had was I was - when I was still in LA, I was walking back to my apartment from the sandwich shop that I was working at at the time, just like, I just finished a shift I was exhausted, you know, still my uniform. And there was this older man walking maybe like half a block ahead of me and some paper fluttered out of his pocket as he was like putting something back into his pocket. And so I like sort of, you know, race up to pick up the paper and catch him and give it back to him in case it was important. It was two $100 bills! [Eric laughs]And I catch up to him like, “here you dropped $200.” And then he gave me one of the bills!
merritt: Wow. Imagine living the kind of life where you could just accidentally drop $200.
Lauren: And like, you know, I was, this was, I was making you know, like $12 An hour or whatever and trying to pay rent in LA on that. And so like get like being given this like $100 bill off a random stranger simply because he was like, I think surprised that I caught up to him at all rather than just like taking the $200 which you know, I did have the thought of that I was gonna do, I'm gonna do the right thing. It was like genuinely the best part of my year that year. [Laughs]
Eric: And that man? Albert Einstein, incredible. [merrit and Lauren laugh] All right, we got one last one here. This is from “Rampage: World Tour” the arcade machine from 1997: “Gary,” so this is to Gary, “Puking is painful. Watch what you eat.”
Lauren: I mean, that is very good advice.
Eric: Gary, yeah. I think Gary just needs the advice. I don't know, I think that he turned into - here's what I think happened. Gary turned into a big dinosaur. And now he's starting to eat everything because he thinks it's fine. But really, you got to watch whether you eat anybody or big dinosaur. Or let's say, you're 31 now, and you can't eat the way that you did in your 20s. And now various things that were, You were totally fine with, such as dairy or spicy foods, will hurt you later, or you eat it and then it pains you two hours from now - this isn't me. This is a hypothetical person.
Lauren: Yeah yeah yeah.
Eric: That might be, you just gotta watch what you eat because it will hurt you later.
Lauren: So this is great advice to take with you to like an amusement park or state fair, because we've all been in that situation where we're like, it's fine. I can eat this entire funnel cake and then like, chug down this entire Slurpee. No, don't! You'll be - especially if you're in your 20s or 30s. You will be regretting that later. Be careful with the funnel cakes.
Eric: Yeah, Gary.
merritt: Gary, get it together.
Eric: I wish that there was a lot more like conversation around - instead of like, “watch what you eat. Wow has a lot of calories, a minute on the lips is a lifetime on the hips.” Hey, watch what you eat. If you eat five tacos at barbecue now you're gonna be unhappy two hours from now, someone should have told me!
Lauren: Exactly. Learn from your mistakes.
Eric: Exactly.
merritt: I refuse to learn from my mistakes because like several times, I would order a burrito from this place that had, it was the best burrito I've ever had in my life. It had roast potatoes in it.
Eric: Oh, yeah.
merritt: Oh my god. incredible, amazing, starch on starch on starch.
Eric: Which is also like is a prized rare item in New York City. All the people that are like, yeah, potatoes go in burritos. We don't get that in New York City, we have the worst Mexican food.
Lauren: Oh really? That's all over the West Coast.
merritt: It's not a huge thing here. And, you know, I every time I ordered I would wake up at three in the morning and just be just nauseous and I won't get into details. But you know, quite ill. And I didn't - I didn't put two and two together until like, the third or fourth time and even then I was just kind of like, “yeah, it is really good, though.”
Lauren: I mean, that's part of it, too, is knowing the, the times in which you're gonna, you're gonna take the later pain because of things are delicious and accepting that as part of your journey.
merritt: Absolutely.
Eric: Yeah. Gary, figure it out. Come on.
Lauren: Eat those buildings!
merritt: That can't be good for your tummy that concrete and rebar.
Lauren: Yeah, absolutely hard to digest.
Eric: I'm still haunted. Every time that I get barbecue now I'm still haunted from the time that I went to Austin for my brother's bachelor party. And we had flown in early in the morning. And we had landed like around noon. And then we immediately went to like the best barbecue place in Austin, which is like in a - was kinda like in a parking lot. The smoker was like attached to a food truck thing. And then like we had to wait, it was a super long lines, we had to wait like another hour and a half, two hours, and there was a free keg next to it. So the only thing we could drink is like cheap keg of beer. So it's like three o'clock, we get these massive plates of meat, I eat so much of it. And then like for the next two days, I was just totally messed up inside. And I still can't eat barbecue because I wanted to eat it so bad. And I was so hungry. And like if I just figured it out now I wouldn't have an aversion to the most beautiful food delicacies of smoked meat. Now, every time I just think about that, and I'm like, I'm gonna push through because I spent $20 on this piece of brisket.
Lauren: I'm so sorry. That is that is tragic.
Eric: So Gary, Get it together. Jesus.
Lauren: Get it together, Gary.
Eric: Jesus. All right, Gary. Gary's off the hook. We're, we are finished now. Thank you so much to both of you for being here. Well, hey, what do you do on the internet? Where can people find you?
Lauren: You can find me at Lauren Shippen anywhere on the internet, Twitter, Instagram. And LaurenShippen.com is my website. And so yeah, go to those places to find my podcasts.
merritt: I'm sure I'm like not the first person to do this. So I apologize in advance. But when I saw your name the first - and I've never even actually seen the show. But the first thing I could think of was Lauren Shippuden, like Naruto.
Lauren: Oh my gosh, no! You're, you are the first person to bring that up.
merritt: Oh, well, then it’s just an even worse joke than if everyone had done it already. Um-
Lauren: No, I love that! [Laughs]
merritt: Again, I know nothing about Naruto.
Lauren: I don't either, but you know, given people's feelings about Naruto, I take that as a compliment.
merritt: So I work at a website called Fabyte, you can find us at fanbyte.com. We do all kinds of podcasts. I host one called Channel F, and we might actually have a special guest on there next week. And yeah, you can follow Fanbyte on Twitter @Fanbytemedia. And I am on Twitter at merrittk.
Eric: I don't know when this is coming out. So it's me. I'm gonna be on Fanbyte!
merritt: Eric is the special guest. I don't know when it's happening.
Eric: I was like, Oh man, you're getting Reggie Fils-Aimé to come on to talk about pizza, I hope it’s me.
merritt: Reggie, I’m going to ask him the hard hitting questions about that pizza. Yep.
Eric: And if Mountain Dew is the third thing in the Triforce. 100%. I also love Channel F, it was one of the inspirations for Games and Feelings. So keep doing what you're doing, and if you're not listening to Channel F, go do so.
merritt: You know what just go to the site and click around on stuff just to make sure that it works.
Eric: Everyone go to Fanbyte and make sure it still works. You can find me on Twitter at el_silvero. E, L, underscore, Silvero. My name if I was a Lucha Libre wrestler, and you can find the show on Twitter @gamesnfeelings. It's ‘n,’ like Linens n’ Things, because Twitter made us do that. The best place to submit questions is to go to our website gamesandfeelings.com/questions, and you can support the show at patreon.com/gamesandfeelings and see the links right down there in the episode description. Thank you again so much to merritt and Lauren, thank you for taking the time to answer the advice questions and to do my silly video game advice. It's nice to be good to your friends. I don't know if you knew.
Lauren: Thanks for having us on!
merritt: Yeah. Thanks!
Eric: And remember, the instruction manual doesn't have anything about feelings.
[End Music]