The Weekly Stuff #341 – Xbox Games Showcase, Halo Infinite, and Ghost of Tsushima Review

It’s time for another episode of The Weekly Stuff Podcast with Jonathan Lack & Sean Chapman, a weekly audio show that explores the worlds of film, television, and video games. You can subscribe for free in iTunes by following this link. 

Our latest and possibly final entry in “Not-E3 2020” came this week with Microsoft’s Xbox Games Showcase, where they unveiled Halo: Infinite and detailed many other games coming to the Series X and Game Pass. It was certainly a compelling pitch for the latter, but did it do anything to pitch us on the fancy new console itself? We go in depth recapping the entire show, before settling in for a longer review discussion of Ghost of Tsushima, the excellent PS4 swan song that we can’t stop playing. Neither of us have finished it yet, so no major spoilers here, but we go deeper with the gameplay systems, characters, and presentation that make this such a unique and memorable open-world game. 

Enjoy!

Time Chart:

Intro: 0:00:00 – 0:01:42

Stuff: 0:01:42 – 0:32:17

News and Xbox Games Showcase: 0:32:17 - 1:56:37

Ghost of Tsushima: 1:56:37 – 3:06:43

Stream The Weekly Stuff Podcast Episode #341

Download 'The Weekly Stuff' Episode #341 as an MP3

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The Weekly Stuff with Jonathan Lack & Sean Chapman is a weekly audio podcast, and if you subscribe in iTunes, episodes will be delivered automatically and for free as soon as they are released. If you visit www.jonathanlack.com, we also have streaming and downloadable versions of new and archival episodes for your listening pleasure.

The Weekly Stuff Podcast #340 – The Final Fantasy VII Episode

It’s time for another episode of The Weekly Stuff Podcast with Jonathan Lack & Sean Chapman, a weekly audio show that explores the worlds of film, television, and video games. You can subscribe for free in iTunes by following this link. 

After giving some quick first impressions of Sucker Punch’s outstanding Ghost of Tsushima for PS4, this episode is fully dedicated to one long-awaited topic: Final Fantasy VII. This year’s PS4 remake, yes, but also the PS1 original, and the PSP spin-off Crisis Core, and the depressingly abysmal movie Advent Children. We talk about it all, having both finally journeyed through the complete Final Fantasy VII experience for the first time this year, diving deep into why the original remains such a unique and powerful pillar of narrative gaming despite plenty of dated elements, and why the Remake just didn’t do it for us despite its good character work and production values. If you’ve been waiting to hear us talk about Final Fantasy VII in any or all of its forms, this is the episode for you. 

Enjoy!

Time Chart:

Intro: 0:00:00 – 0:02:29 

Ghost of Tsushima Impressions: 0:02:29 – 0:22:18 

Final Fantasy VII: 0:22:18 – 3:25:24

Stream The Weekly Stuff Podcast Episode #340

Download 'The Weekly Stuff' Episode #340 as an MP3

Subscribe to our YouTube Channel!

Subscribe for free to 'The Weekly Stuff' in iTunes!

Follow Jonathan Lack on Twitter!

Follow Sean Chapman on Twitter!

The Weekly Stuff with Jonathan Lack & Sean Chapman is a weekly audio podcast, and if you subscribe in iTunes, episodes will be delivered automatically and for free as soon as they are released. If you visit www.jonathanlack.com, we also have streaming and downloadable versions of new and archival episodes for your listening pleasure.

Weekly Suit Gundam #22 – Gundam 0080: War in the Pocket Review & Discussion

It’s time for Weekly Suit Gundam, a show exploring the world of Mobile Suit Gundam from The Weekly Stuff Podcast with Jonathan Lack & Sean Chapman. You can subscribe for free in iTunes by following this link. 

Before continuing on to 21^st-century Gundam, we’re doubling back for deep dives with the OVA series we’ve mentioned in passing but never reviewed in depth, starting with Mobile Suit Gundam 0080: War in the Pocket. Released in six installments in 1989, War in the Pocket marked the first time creator Yoshiyuki Tomino wasn’t involved in a Gundam production, and is widely regarded as one of the franchise’s finest hours, expanding and deepening the series’ themes and perspective by focusing in on the small-scale story of a boy growing up amidst the backdrop of the One-Year War. It is one of the greatest and most powerful anti-war stories ever told, on similar footing as Isao Takahata’s 1988 Grave of the Fireflies, and began a rich tradition of Gundam taking some of its best artistic leaps on home video. 

Enjoy, and come back next time for our next OVA review with Gundam 0083: Stardust Memory!  

Subscribe to our YouTube Channel!

Subscribe for free to 'The Weekly Stuff' in iTunes!

Follow Jonathan Lack on Twitter!

Follow Sean Chapman on Twitter!

The Weekly Stuff with Jonathan Lack & Sean Chapman is a weekly audio podcast, and if you subscribe in iTunes, episodes will be delivered automatically and for free as soon as they are released. If you visit www.jonathanlack.com, we also have streaming and downloadable versions of new and archival episodes for your listening pleasure.

The Weekly Stuff Podcast #339 – Ubisoft Forward 2020 and Gundam War in the Pocket Review

It’s time for another episode of The Weekly Stuff Podcast with Jonathan Lack & Sean Chapman, a weekly audio show that explores the worlds of film, television, and video games. You can subscribe for free in iTunes by following this link. 

Not-E3 2020 continued this weekend with Ubisoft Forward, where the company showed off Watch Dogs Legion, Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, and announced (well, sort of, after many leaks) Far Cry 6. And it came under a cloud of terrible press for the French-Canadian gaming behemoth, as months’ worth of sexual harassment and toxic work environment allegations have resulted in one of the most dramatic corporate shake-ups in the history of video games. We talk about all of that and more before our latest Weekly Suit Gundam topic, reviewing Mobile Suit Gundam 0080: War in the Pocket. Released in six installments in 1989, War in the Pocket marked the first time creator Yoshiyuki Tomino wasn’t involved in a Gundam production, and is widely regarded as one of the franchise’s finest hours, expanding and deepening the series’ themes and perspective by focusing in on the small-scale story of a boy growing up amidst the backdrop of the One-Year War. It is one of the greatest and most powerful anti-war stories ever told, on similar footing as Isao Takahata’s 1988 Grave of the Fireflies, and began a rich tradition of Gundam taking some of its best artistic leaps on home video.

Enjoy!

Time Chart:

Intro: 0:00:00 – 0:02:30 

Stuff: 0:02:30 – 0:30:36

Ubisoft News: 0:30:36 – 1:33:27

Gundam 0080 – War in the Pocket: 1:33:27 – 3:26:20 

Stream The Weekly Stuff Podcast Episode #339

Download 'The Weekly Stuff' Episode #339 as an MP3

Subscribe to our YouTube Channel!

Subscribe for free to 'The Weekly Stuff' in iTunes!

Follow Jonathan Lack on Twitter!

Follow Sean Chapman on Twitter!

The Weekly Stuff with Jonathan Lack & Sean Chapman is a weekly audio podcast, and if you subscribe in iTunes, episodes will be delivered automatically and for free as soon as they are released. If you visit www.jonathanlack.com, we also have streaming and downloadable versions of new and archival episodes for your listening pleasure.

The Weekly Stuff Podcast #338 – Final Fantasy VII, Video Game Pricing, and TV’s Reckoning with Blackface

It’s time for another episode of The Weekly Stuff Podcast with Jonathan Lack & Sean Chapman, a weekly audio show that explores the worlds of film, television, and video games. You can subscribe for free in iTunes by following this link. 

This week’s episode is a real humdinger of tonal and topical shifts. We start with some Final Fantasy VII chat – Sean having just played Crisis Core, the PSP spin-off, and Jonathan having just finished this year’s Remake – Jonathan reviews Minecraft Dungeons, and we discuss how weirdly prescient Steven Spielberg’s Jaws feels in a moment of profound government incompetence. For the news, we discuss reports that video games might be moving to a $70 price point for the new generation, and the weird state of video game pricing over the last generation. And then we jump into some really heavy topics, first discussing J.K. Rowling’s abhorrent, hateful screeds against transgender people, and then talking about the sexual assault allegations that have rocked the fighting game community. Finally, we look at how American TV has been responding to the Black Lives Matter movement, both in finally realizing white people probably shouldn’t voice black characters in animation, and in how they’re treating recent material, from shows like 30 Rock or Mad Men, that used blackface. This is a complex issue that demands a fuller understanding of historical context, and we try to give some of that while also discussing the many ways these producers and companies could go further to educating and making amends instead of just scrubbing the internet of problematic material. 

Enjoy!

Time Chart:

Intro: 0:00:00 – 0:05:00

Final Fantasy VII Stuff: 0:05:00 – 0:49:22

Other Stuff: 0:49:22 – 1:04:12

News: 1:04:12 – 2:07:45

TV, Voice Actors, and Blackface: 2:07:45 – 3:07:24 

Stream The Weekly Stuff Podcast Episode #338

Download 'The Weekly Stuff' Episode #338 as an MP3

Subscribe to our YouTube Channel!

Subscribe for free to 'The Weekly Stuff' in iTunes!

Follow Jonathan Lack on Twitter!

Follow Sean Chapman on Twitter!

The Weekly Stuff with Jonathan Lack & Sean Chapman is a weekly audio podcast, and if you subscribe in iTunes, episodes will be delivered automatically and for free as soon as they are released. If you visit www.jonathanlack.com, we also have streaming and downloadable versions of new and archival episodes for your listening pleasure.