Ep. 375 - Like a Destiny, with Ed Zitron

Ep. 375 - Like a Destiny, with Ed Zitron

Journalist, podcaster, and PR person Ed Zitron joins the panel for the reveal of the Video Game History Museum Library, how to tell when a PR person is lying, and a precise rundown of how fucked video games are. Hosted by Alex Jaffe, with Frank Cifaldi, Brandon Sheffield, and Ed Zitron. Edited by Esper Quinn, original music by Kurt Feldman.

SHOW NOTES:

Credit Report (05:01)

1: Aaron Stewart-Ahn asks, have you ever gotten in serious trouble playing a multiplayer game? (05:12)

2: Frank, tell us about the newly online Video Game History Museum Library (11:01)

3: Who do you think has the best PR team in video games? (19:52)

4: How fucked are video games? (27:31)

5: LeFish asks, rank from best to worst: 1080 Snowboarding, Excitebike, F-Zero, Mario Kart, and Wave Race. (34:13)

6: What is exactly as satisfying in real life as it is to do in a video game? (37:49)

7: What is the Queens of the Stone Age of Video Games? (40:45)

LIGHTNING ROUND: 21 Questions (43:41)

Recommendations and Outro (55:11):

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Biggest grin on my face seeing this week’s guest, Ed’s a treasure!!

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Awesome guest.

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Haven’t listened to it yet but pretty hyped to hear Ed on the panel. He has some excellent writing and panels on his AI skepticism.

He’s also a fun follow if boisterous business analysis is your jam which… obviously is mine.

Hi Ed! You were one of my first follows on Mastodon!

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OK. Big Boy Barry.

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Ed Zitron: What about Big Boy Barry, you ever run into Big Boy Barry?
Brandon Sheffield : No, who’s that?
Ed Zitron: It’s a guy called Big Boy Barry

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Picked an odd morning to wear my new QOTSA hoodie for the first time. On topic, however - Ed was great. Keep him on speed dial.

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Immediately putting the Video Game History Museum Library to good use:

image

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Excitebike is fairly extensive franchise compared to some other Nintendo franchises. There’s

Excitebike
Vs Excitebike
Excitebike bunbun Mario Battle(the Satellaview one you didn’t want to count)
Excitebike 64
Excite Truck
Excite Bot and
Excitbike World Rally (this was a late Wii era Wiiware game)

Even being conservative that’s at least four games that count

Ah and for Waverace apart from 64 and Blue Storm(GameCube version) there is the original Gameboy version.

And who could forget the sequel to F-Zero, F-1 Racing?

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Ed’s disdain for Nintendo PR combined with wanting marketing departments to actually play the games they’re marketing was an interesting dichotomy, because Nintendo’s PR department is one of the ones known for a fact that they extensively play the games. According to Kit Ellis and Krysta Yang who used to work there up til 2022 anyway, they describe an office where people who were working PR were playing the things as much as possible and their main antagonist on what they could or couldn’t say was the extremely cautious legal department.

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oh I’ve gotta listen to this one bc while frustratingly opaque (for reasons that aren’t their fault i assume) nintendo PR is some of the best i’ve worked with.

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nintendoland souvenir: a personalized subpoena

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  1. F-Zero GX is the best game from any of those franchises.

  2. F-Zero GX is actually the most Sega Nintendo racing game, because it was developed by Amusement Vision.

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Paradoxically I think Waverace 64 still feels more like a Sega game than F-Zero GX (or AX). Though Waverace Blue Storm does not.

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GX sure doesn’t feel like a Nintendo game though.

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Yeah, there’s been some debate about this - while F-Zero GX is technically the most sega nintendo racing game, Waverace 64 feels more like Sega IMO.

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I think it’s the announcer voice - and the real world brand cross promotion

Haven’t seen the episode, but I jotted off a quick chart before class that is undoubtedly wrong but illustrates my gut feeling that Nintendo has made a greater percentage of Sega-like racers than Sega has made Nintendo-like racers.

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