High on Life 2: Wise-cracking Weaponry is Back!| Official Xbox Podcast

NARRATOR: Games in this podcast range from E to M.

MALIK PRINCE: Yo, what is going on everybody? Welcome back to the official Xbox podcast. It's the only podcast coming to you from inside Xbox. We have a great one for you today. We're going to be talking about the sequel to High on Life, which if you guessed we're talking about High on Life 2, nothing gets by you. Before we get into this, we read the comments. They're like, "Oh, bring Malik and Ethan back. They're the best thing to happen to Xbox since Halo. They're bigger than Taylor Swift." Like, we get it. We get it. So, in the spirit of giving the people what they want, I'm one of your hosts, Malik Prince joined alongside Ethan Rothamel.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Hey, good to be here. I've never seen that comment once on the show, but that's all right. Also, it's so good to see you. Let me say that.

MALIK PRINCE: You too.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, I miss you so much. I have to say this live on the air because I literally haven't seen you in months at this point. And the minute I get to say hi to you, we're on the air. So, it's so good to see you. You look great.

MALIK PRINCE: You too. Look at us.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: I almost said Chicago. That San Diego sun is doing you good.

MALIK PRINCE: It's the end of summer shine, a glow up.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Does the summer actually ever end in San Diego, though?

MALIK PRINCE: That's true. That's the best part about it. That's the best part about it.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Meanwhile, we've got like two weeks left before we all turn into vampires in Seattle. So, we're trying to like milk it, milk it for all it's worth.

MALIK PRINCE: Well, what we got going on today?

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: We have a great one for you today. We're talking High on Life 2, just like Malik said. And joining us from Squanch Games, we have Mikey Spano, the Creative Director and Art Director, and Matty Studivan, the Chief Operations Officer and Executive Producer. Gentlemen, welcome to the podcast.

MIKEY SPANO: Thanks for having us. Awesome to be here.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: It's so good to have you here. When we found out we were hosting this one with you guys and getting to talk about this game, like we just felt lucky to get picked for this episode because we were fans of the first one, very much looking forward to the second.

MALIK PRINCE: Yeah. I mean, not only excited for the conversation about High on Life 2, but I mean, look, can we get a wide shot? Look at us. This wide color. This is the brightest episode of this podcast in history.

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah, I'm wearing the black shirt, but it's --

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: But it's pink.

MIKEY SPANO: Some neon pink on it.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, exactly.

MALIK PRINCE: The first question has to be like, "Where are our shirts?"

MIKEY SPANO: I know. So, true story. We brought shirts, we gave them to them, and they threw them in the trash. That's true. They threw them in the trash. They said they don't like High on Life.

MATTY STUDIVAN: No, the true story is that we're taking them off at the end of this podcast and just giving them to you.

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah, we're trying to get them nice and wet for you.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Lightly used. I'll never wash it.

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah. Anyone that knows me knows I will get this shirt very wet.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Great. Great.

MIKEY SPANO: You guys can fight over who gets it.

MALIK PRINCE: I feel like the audience knows this is a High on Life podcast for sure. It's so sick. I love this. So, let's talk about the game. You all have been on a major tear obviously revealing the game at Games Showcase, which just brought me back to a few years ago when the first game was revealed. I think I tweeted something like, "Oh, this game is going to be special because from the look, the aesthetic, the comedy, everything was perfect," and it was a smashing success. So, now, High on Life 2, you all are keeping busy with the game. Released a 42-minute demo just like a week or something ago?

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Forty-two minutes?

MALIK PRINCE: Insane. And it was the craziest demo. We'll get into it in just a bit, but how are you all keeping up? Like, how are you feeling?

MIKEY SPANO: Terrible. [ Laughter ] No, I mean, you know. So, Matty and I kind of do a lot of jobs at the studio. So, we've got all the sort of studio executive stuff that we do, but we also have the game stuff that we do, and then we're also out doing marketing and we're talking about the game. And I'm even in the engine making the game actively at the same time. So, we're just kind of working around the clock to make sure everything is lining up, we're not forgetting anything. So, as a result, after doing just Gamescom, back at home for a couple days and then right back out here for PAX.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: It's a lot.

MIKEY SPANO: I'm getting a little tired, but I love talking about the game.

MATTY STUDIVAN: I may not look like it, but I make an Excel spreadsheet if you were wondering.

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah, Matty is very type A. His hair defies his true nature.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Killer plug by the way. Shout-out Excel.

MATTY STUDIVAN: No, seriously. Yeah. It's like the only TikTok account that I subscribe to.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: It's like Excel prompts.

MATTY STUDIVAN: Yeah.

MALIK PRINCE: We love a good Excel. You know there's competitions with Excel?

MATTY STUDIVAN: I do, yeah.

MALIK PRINCE: It's insane, but it's so cool.

MATTY STUDIVAN: You're bringing up a sore subject. I've been rejected every time.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, knocked out in the first round.

MIKEY SPANO: Wait, what the hell is Excel content?

MATTY STUDIVAN: Formulas and like who can -- they present a problem, I think.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Maybe we should pivot to that. I think we get some extra pros on the horn.

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah, let's just talk about Excel.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: No, we joke, but like my wife also working in gaming, she is like a goddess of Excel. Like what I thought could be done in this application, she can do 10 times more, and I'm always like blown away. And then, I'm like, "Am I getting excited about Excel?" You know what I mean? Like, it's the duality of being an adult. Don't be ashamed. Now, so when it launched, I think High on Life was like the biggest third-party game to hit Game Pass. It was pretty monumental.

MALIK PRINCE: It was massive, yeah.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: It was like all anybody was talking about at the office, too. And I'm curious. I mean, you kind of hit on this a little earlier. Like, I'm curious. It's only been a few years. How can you turn around a sequel so quickly? And I think you answered in the sense of like you're all kind of doing more than one job.

MIKEY SPANO: For sure, yeah. I mean, the core of the team kind of came from AAA games and then moved into this indie space, so we had a lot of just sort of production mentality built into us. And then prior to working with Squanch, I had an indie company that I did on my own, so there were a lot of shortcuts we learned there. And so, when we started here, we already had a lot of answers. And we started with three people maybe and now we're up to 87, I believe.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: In how many years then?

MIKEY SPANO: Oh gosh, it's 30, 40 years. I don't know.

MATTY STUDIVAN: Yeah, you've been there --

MIKEY SPANO: Eight-ish, nine-ish years? It's been a while.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: He's got his AARP card the other day.

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah, for real.

MALIK PRINCE: Oh, killer, killer.

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah, thank you, thank you.

MATTY STUDIVAN: It's just like part of the culture and how we've kind of built the culture. I've also kind of -- like, thinking about like a comedy game too is like comedy movies are generally like the shorter the better. And it's like we want to just like get the comedy out there. We don't want to like hang on it too long. We want to just like get the joke, get the mechanic, get it out there. And like Mikey was talking about with his small studio, like I think a lot of us bring that sort of like DIY mentality to the studio. And we talk a lot about like, "Hey, don't talk about scope on the game," but what we do talk about all the time is like, "How do we do this? Like, what are the most important things in the game and how do we spend our time and money on those? And then, all the other stuff, how do we do it like effectively and cost efficiently?" And Mikey is like the definition of like wily veteran. He's like, "Well, what if we just like change this shader over here and like move this asset?" And everybody's like, "Argh."

MIKEY SPANO: We shouldn't do it, and then I just do it myself like at the very last minute and make everybody furious at me. But I had to do it. But I do want to say really the true reason -- and this is going to sound lame, but it's true -- we have a really awesome team. Like, part of the studio's growth was we didn't really have a lot of cache initially. So, we had people who were newer to the industry, which is great because they're hungry, but then there's not a lot of experience. And once we shipped High on Life 1, we had a bunch of people come on board that actually had a lot of experience and they were ready to do something new. And so, they were all excited to work hard. We try to give people autonomy and let them kind of run their own show, and I think that that pays off a lot. And of course, being an indie studio, which it doesn't seem like we are, but we are, there's just budget limitations that make it so that it's this is the time we have to do it and that's how we're going to do it. So, we just make it happen.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: I do want to just double-click on the comedy aspect because it is like -- like one, comedy is different per person, who receives it, and I like that you brought up like the pace of comedy because it does feel like especially studio comedies typically revolve around like a 90-minute movie, like pretty quick. You want to get to the game, the game being the joke or the bit, and kind of get out of there. And I've got to imagine that's a tricky thing to navigate in development of a game because you also have to work in these comedic bits and moments in a game that someone's like playing and choosing when they walk over here, when they do this, that and the other thing.

MATTY STUDIVAN: Yeah. I feel like early on, we were saying like, "Hey, like what does comedy require a lot of?" And it's like iteration. And what is really expensive in games? Like iteration. So, like Mikey was saying, our team has done a lot of work and really like interesting and I feel like unique work to make that process as fast as possible for the writers and the artists and the designers to iterate and like see the comedy in the game as fast as possible so then it can be tuned. Like without that, it might fall flat, right?

MALIK PRINCE: Totally.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: And I imagine you've got to take a chance or like people have got to take a chance on you because it does feel like -- at least in the last like 15 years, I feel like there's a lot less studio comedies coming out from a movie perspective. So, I worried that it was the same kind of uphill battle in gaming to like sell an idea. And I mean, you nailed it in High on Life 1, and I'm so excited for the comedy that's coming in 2. Like, I think that's pretty amazing and I wonder if you had to navigate some of that same stuff like convincing people and really selling them on the humor.

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah. I mean, I think from our perspective, we tend to look at as like you mentioned a movie. You've got 90 minutes. Even in 90 minutes, not every joke is going to hit. So, for us, you look at this mountain of hours. And in those hours, you have all these different scenarios. And the amount of comedy that we have to get in there, we kind of had to early on accept that like not every single joke can hit. And even if we could make that happen, we probably don't want to because then you get kind of exhausted. And so, a big part of it is like trying to -- like, we know we can make funny stuff, we know we can make unfunny stuff, and we have to try and balance it so that if you're on a hard boss and you're dying a bunch of times, like maybe we don't do too much comedy there because if you're hearing the same jokes over and over, you start to you start to think, "Oh, this game, the comedy sucks in this game." And you don't want to leave that kind of bad taste in your mouth. So, it's it is really a tough balance. Like, it's much harder than I think people would anticipate to balance like difficulty and humor in a game. And it really comes down to our writing team. They're just really funny. And of course, the actors we hire bring so much to the lines that we really can't lose once we get the right actor in there.

MATTY STUDIVAN: Yeah, not to like toot our own horn too much because there's obviously like comedy in games everywhere, but this is like our core mission. It's like we're going to hire comedy writers, we're going to hire comedians, we're going to ask them to improvise in the studio. Everybody at the team like has to literally be like joking around and like having a good time all the time because then if they don't, it shows up in the game. It's like, "Oh, this is miserable." Like the best review we got of the first game -- and I'm already seeing comments of High on Life 2 -- is like, "Clearly, the team is having a good time making this." And I'm like, "That rules."

MIKEY SPANO: They're wrong, but that rules.

MATTY STUDIVAN: We're making a game. Yeah, Mikey hasn't had a day of fun in his life.

MIKEY SPANO: Honestly, it would be fun for anybody else. But for me, I've never experienced joy. So, I'm a bad person to ask.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: I love the idea of you like making this comedy game and everyone's laughing at like the edits and you're just --

MIKEY SPANO: Just sitting there stone-faced. I say I'm not happy. I definitely am happy. I just don't notice it. I only notice when it's sad and it's great.

MALIK PRINCE: I love that.

MATTY STUDIVAN: In the team meeting, it's just Mikey putting on like the white clown paint.

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

MATTY STUDIVAN: Sad face.

MIKEY SPANO: No, it's my ICP Juggalo paint.

MALIK PRINCE: So good. But truth be told, like give kudos to the team because like High on Life the original was like so funny. And like Ethan was saying, it's so subjective. And we watch like standup all the time, SNL, we're big fans of comedy. And so, the Mackincheese Brothers by the way in the original game, that was one of the funniest things and it's just so subtle. It was very clear like you all were riffing on that and it was just incredible. And so, I'm excited to see what players can expect when they really jump in and kind of hear those subtleties and those -- improvising?

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: No, improvisation.

MIKEY SPANO: Improvisation, yeah.

MALIK PRINCE: We got there at the end.

MATTY STUDIVAN: That is actually like a really good -- like, that reference is really good because it's an example of like the team. Like, now, we have this stupid thing in the game that's called shove tech, which is like we use it all the time. It's like, "Oh, okay, the characters can push the player around." It's so stupid to say.

MIKEY SPANO: We always joke that was like part of our new tech is shove tech.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Because you're a revolutionary.

MALIK PRINCE: I felt so bullied in the moment. I was like, "Hey, wow."

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: It was like immersive in a weird way.

MIKEY SPANO: I mean, the scene was such a mess and I think that's what made it so much funnier. It's just like the characters kind of moving around walking through each other and they're in your face.

MATTY STUDIVAN: It's like, "Stop, leave me alone."

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah. And I think early on too, like whenever I'm like drawing something, I'll just write a name and I think I wrote Mackincheese Brothers. But then when we started doing it, I wanted to make sure that the last name actually was Mackincheese Brothers, all one word. And so, the characters also reiterate that when you're playing that their last name is Mackincheese Brothers. And for some reason, that's so funny to me. Like, we have a couple more jokes like that in this game, too. And it's really the ones that we don't spend a lot of time thinking about are the ones that hit the hardest, which is fine. I think that's cool. I'm glad people love that stuff. And it's always like, "Damn," like we put so much into this other thing.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, you never know what people are going to gravitate towards.

MIKEY SPANO: Exactly.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, that's part of it.

MALIK PRINCE: Yeah. So, let's take a quick shift to art because, Mikey, I know like art as we even look at this incredible key art that's just like full of color, it's so important for this game. What are some of the differences that players will notice from the original to now the sequel?

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah. So, I think with this game, what I wanted to do -- and it was my goal with the first game, too, and we were using Unreal Engine 4, which is amazing, and using Unreal Engine 5, we're getting the fidelity up higher. My goal for the franchise was always for it not to be cartoony and for it to feel like a real movie from the '80s or '90s that has practical effects. So, the lighting and the shaders and everything, I want them to feel real. So, it's like, yeah, it's a crazy sci-fi shape and a weird thing, but it's actually made of concrete and the concrete looks real and the lighting looks real and all that. So, in this game, we've stepped up the fidelity on the art side significantly. And we also have some areas in the game that are a lot like cleaner, a lot whiter and cleaner and kind of in the more Syd Mead sci-fi style. I wanted to do something -- like you can kind of see it here in the key art. There's a lot of colors in this key art, but the actual game, this city is much more muted than this and it feels a lot more realistic. You could probably see that in the videos and stuff. But it was something I really wanted to try. Like, can we still make our weird wacky style work in something that feels more grounded and realistic?

MALIK PRINCE: Yeah, you see that in the initial scene of that 42-minute demo that I keep talking about a little bit, but you still have these like super saturated moments. Like, I think it was Murder Con was in the demo. That was so cool. There's so many good parts of that demo. If you haven't seen it, go to the Squanch Games YouTube channel. It is such an incredible piece of content and really gives a great like view of the comedy, of the art, of the story, what players are going to -- the journey they're going to be on. And so, check it out.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, I think people probably got their first glimpse of some of the art you're describing in the demo as well that featured Con Con at Gamescom. It's like my first year in years not going. YEAH. So, I miss it. I loved it. I always love going.

MIKEY SPANO: It's incredible.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: It is crazy.

MIKEY SPANO: Very smelly. Hygiene can be a bit of an issue sometimes.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: They used to put it on the cards. They used to say like, "Make sure to shower before you go." Like I remember that.

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah, I remember. And they would have like a bunch of little mini Old Spice deodorants that you took like out of -- you know those little like soda things that you get at like a party? Every year at like back when E3 was happening, they always had those little Old Spice things right in the front of the of the entryway.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: I kind of miss that. I kind of miss that.

MIKEY SPANO: Highly necessary.

MATTY STUDIVAN: I feel like the first day we got there, it was so smelly. I was like, "Nobody look at me."

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah. I look like I'm the smelliest, but I'm not.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: I mean, they always used to have Gamescom in the German summer. So, sometimes, it is so hot and it's just like we are gamers, we're roasting.

MATTY STUDIVAN: Not turning the A/C on.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: No, no. It smells exactly like that. But I would argue more immersive for your demo experience.

MIKEY SPANO: For sure. Yeah. I mean, we had like six people playing and then we had two to four devs in there just like kind of helping them along in a room that's like the size of this table. So, yeah, we were stinky in there.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: I do think it is funny like smell aside, it is funny to have a demo about a convention at a convention because it is a bit of an immersive experience. I'm curious like was that a tongue-in-cheek choice? Did that just happen?

MIKEY SPANO: I mean, I can say it was a choice. Would that be a lie? Honestly, I didn't even realize it till a journalist asked about it at Gamescom and I was, "Oh, man, yeah, I guess we did do that on purpose."

MATTY STUDIVAN: The idea for that level's been like 2 years, 2 and 1/2 years now I feel like it's been around?

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah, it was just a stupid idea that came out of a writer's room and it just stuck. I don't know how it stuck and it turned out pretty cool, I think.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah, that's really funny. I'm bummed I missed it.

MALIK PRINCE: Yeah, I've never been, so I can only --

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Oh, you didn't go this yeah. For some reason, I thought you were there.

MATTY STUDIVAN: It was actually how we convinced Microsoft to get us in their booth. We were like, "Listen, we made a demo just for you. It's about a convention. And like, you have to let us show it at this convention."

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: It's a little meta. It's a little artsy, but you're going to like it. You'll like it.

MIKEY SPANO: We've been planning this for years.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah.

MALIK PRINCE: So, let's shift gears to talk a little bit about the hub system in the game and what players can expect when they jump in because we're really excited to hear about it.

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah, I can answer that. Matty can probably jump in too because he makes sure it all actually happens.

MATTY STUDIVAN: I try.

MIKEY SPANO: But yeah. So, our Design Director, Eric Meyer, him and I early on decided we wanted to do something that had Metroidvania elements to it, but we also wanted to support telling really tight stories. So, this time around, we tried to keep all of the Metroidvania elements in the hubs. And so, we have three decent-sized hubs in there, and each one of those hubs has a lot of little side things you can do, NPCs you can find, tons of collectibles, tons of unlockable things. And obviously with the skateboard, there's a lot of cool stuff related to the skateboard that you can do in the hubs. In terms of how it kind of all flows together, you've got sort of your home base that you're kind of always returning to. And in there, you're talking to your crew and meeting and talking about what you're going to do next. And then, you'll be dropped down into the hub. And then from there, you're navigating to like a target that you're following. And once you get to a certain point, it's triggering a more linear experience where we can tell the story in a tighter way. We still always have choices that you're making and branching paths and stuff like that. But in terms of like finishing a level and then coming back with new power-ups, we try to keep all that in the hub so that we can tell a complete story without needing players to come back and hear the same things over and over again.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: That's smart. That's really fascinating.

MATTY STUDIVAN: Yeah, it's a big step up, I think, for us from the first game. If you play it and you know in Blimp City, it's like really cool spot, but pretty small like geographically or like space-wise. And so, having three of them and also like needing the space with the skateboard because you're just traversing a lot more distance. And also, if you played the first game and you remember like the warp crystals and bringing in the like weird sort of non-sequiturs, we wanted to like have that just like appear in the hub and have them like be actually a part of this world. And one of the ways we were able to do that, which is like we do a decent amount of game jams at the studio because like the entire team is so creative. And so, we had like eight teams or nine teams for a week and I think like seven of the game jams are in the hubs in this game.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Oh, wow.

MIKEY SPANO: And if we had like infinite time, we would have taken all of them. And the other thing about that at the studio is anything that we do, we don't really ever say something's cut. We just say we're going to just move it to the next thing. So, we'll have a lot of cool ideas. And like Matty was saying, the team's so creative. Usually, they always just have an idea that's like, "Yes, let's put it in the game." So, if we can't get it in for time for one game, we'll move it to another game.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Save it for the third one.

MIKEY SPANO: Exactly. The third one that's definitely happening.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: That's true.

MATTY STUDIVAN: There's like a lot of action. So, I think the side content is like -- I'm a big -- like as a player, I'm like, "Let's go into every nook and cranny of this game." And just the opportunity to just hide so much stupid stuff everywhere that way, I mean, we have the movies in the first game and obviously we're going to have movies in the second one. So, it's like we have like this guy Evan is working on all the side content and he's like, "I'm like working with our team building an entire movie theater and you're just like going in and watching all these movies." And it's like -- I don't know -- just we're spending a lot more resources and time on it because I think this is like my favorite stuff in a game. It really makes the world feel like you're somewhere, lived in.

MIKEY SPANO: Totally, yeah. And it's nice too as like an older gamer, I want like a way to start something and finish it. So, with the missions, we try to keep them at a certain length so that if you're like, "I'm going to go take down this bounty," you actually can finish it in a night and then get back to putting your kids to bed or whatever it is that you have to do. And then for the gamers that want a more free form experience, they know they can just hang out in the hub for a while and do whatever they want and take on missions whenever they want. So, we try to balance like the two gamer types.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Smart.

MALIK PRINCE: Yeah, truth be told, that's how I play games. Like I do play it in chunks where it's like I want to know like there's a definitive part of this where I can come back the next day and like kind of just pick up. And so, I love to hear that's in your design philosophy.

MIKEY SPANO: For sure.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah. The older I get, the more I appreciate it.

MIKEY SPANO: Like for me, I like short games but I know that there are players that they'll spend a lot of money on the game and you got to give them content. Like, I want people to be happy that play the game. So, we have to try to find ways to keep parts of the game digestible enough so that the people are still getting their money's worth and then the people who maybe don't care as much about 100 hours of content still get to have fun with the game.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Totally. Well, it is such an immersive experience and like when you think about the writing, the depth of what you have -- and this is true across many games -- like there is a level of like if it's not open world, if it's more linear, like we do get to dive deeper into writing, we do get to make those zones a little bit more detailed. Like, there is a trade-off, and it's usually a positive one.

MIKEY SPANO: So, this time around, it definitely let our writers flex and like really tell a story with arcs where we can kind of predict when they're going to land and everything.

MATTY STUDIVAN: I don't know, though. I mean, I looked at the word count on this game and I'm like, "Unless you're Alec Robbins and you write like 500,000 words for this game."

MIKEY SPANO: Oh, yeah, we have Alec, our Narrative Director, who is a writing machine. And like, everything he writes is hilarious.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Oh, that's awesome.

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah. And he has a great little team under him of people and a lot of people that come from like TV. So, they're not really coming from the game space. They're coming from the TV space.

MATTY STUDIVAN: You also have to consider like the guns are your companions. And so, like you need to write lines for like the situational and in-character for so many different scenarios. It's a lot.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: It is. And that's a good comment to make because I do want to kind of transition back to some of that. Like obviously, like the guns, often hilarious, very eclectic firearms that you have in your games. I think everyone's excited to see what's next there. And as we talked about before, like you guys have such great alum in the voice acting like writers from SNL like JB SMOOVE and Tim Robinson, Maria Bamford and so on. Like, so many famous people in these games. I guess I'm curious like should we expect some new faces, some old faces?

MIKEY SPANO: Oh, yeah, 100%. I mean, I was amazed in the first game who we were able to get. And actually, we were joking that we have two Academy Award winners in the first game, which is hilarious. Like, I mean, we had Susan Sarandon in there for a little cameo. And then, we had Gabourey in there for Mux in the DLC. I just love her. She's so funny.

MATTY STUDIVAN: She's amazing.

MIKEY SPANO: And we've got her coming back for Jan who's one of the dual pistols, the husband and wife that are going through a divorce. That story line, Alec just crushed it. It's so funny. And then, we have Ken Marino playing Travis who's the --

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: I love Ken Marino. He is the best.

MIKEY SPANO: Ken is ridiculous. You get him in the booth and he's so pro. He just nails it. Every single line just perfect. He gets it. It's crazy.

MATTY STUDIVAN: I'm like been -- I'm going to say it every time we get to talk about it, but I've been a The State fan since I was like 15 years old. And I'm like, "Oh my god." Like in the game, Thomas Lennon.

MIKEY SPANO: We have Kids in the Hall people in the game, which is so awesome, like just the stuff that we all grew up with. We're like, "Wouldn't it be cool if we could do this?" And I don't know how we do it, but like Matty is a bulldog. He'll chase stuff down. And now, we work with -- And like once we had success with the first game, actors will like tell their friends about it and someone will be like, "Oh, you were in this? How was the experience?" And so, then we can get bigger gets each time.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah. Playing through the first game, it's just like every new weapon and NPC, it's like, "Oh, I know that voice." Like, you feel that in some games every once in a while. But my god, in High on Life, it's like every moment it's like I recognize somebody.

MALIK PRINCE: And like, I want to talk a little bit about how you go about designing the actual guns and matching them with personalities. Like when I think about like Knifey, it's very obvious like you really have to get in close to someone, so you want this like aggressive kind of like bloodthirsty character. So, how do you all go about designing the guns and putting personalities to them? Because that's one of my favorite parts about the game as well.

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah. I mean, I'm constantly doodling. Matty will tell you every meeting I'm just constantly doodling. So, when we're starting up the project, by the time we're even talking about starting it up, I'll have two sheets of just different gun ideas. And we usually just start there. And then, we look at them and we say, "I like this design. It'll work like this." We start tweaking it. And then, we start to think, "Okay, well, what if the character did this? And what if the character was like this?" And so, it always just comes from some little sketch. And then, as the guns develop, we add some pieces to them that then go back into the original design. And then, I'll usually make the gun in 3D so that we know it works. And then, I'll paint on top of it and pass it to a much better artist to actually get it in the game. And there's a lot of iteration on the designs of the guns, and it's always risky. It's the same with comedy of like the guns are characters that all animate. They have to lip sync and look around and do all this stuff. So, if you're making a change, it can have a huge impact. So, we have to try and like really get it right as fast as possible. And that can be tough on the design team to like, "Well, what if the gun did this instead?" It's like, "Well, we've got to redo the gun if that's what it's going to do." So, we're always kind of -- there's always give and take there.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: It's interesting because in most like shooters, you have to balance the weapons to make them like fit and make them kind of equal on some playing field. But then in this element, like you're also balancing like characters and like, "Well, the fans are going to love this guy or this person."

MATTY STUDIVAN: You want them to like inform one another a little bit. So, I mean, I don't participate in the casting process, but I'm usually like in the Slack thread with Mikey and Alec and like our producer Ash and it's just like them going back and forth on like, "What about this guy? What about this person? What about this person?" And finally, Ash and I are like, "Well, we've got to ask someone. So, who do you guys want?" And it's like any other process, top three, and we talk to the person see how interested they are. Understanding if a person can go in and is going to improvise or even wants to is a big thing. We work with a great studio called Brightskull now. Like Mikey was talking, I did a lot of that stuff on my own in the first game and was like, "Okay, well, that was horrible and I was bad at it, so let's talk to a real professional." And they've been like an enormous help in contacting us with people and really selling the project and the studio and what we're trying to do, and I think that's why our cast in this game is even better than the first one.

MALIK PRINCE: Yeah, that's what I was going to say. I feel like it has to be such a vote of confidence that like you built something that so many people want to be a part of, and that's just got to be one of the best feelings in the world. I've never built anything that anyone was proud of.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: We had a show -- hold on. We had a show for years. We had a show for years.

MALIK PRINCE: Yeah, but I didn't build it.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: All right.

MATTY STUDIVAN: Never been happy. Never been proud.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: We'll talk about that in therapy.

MIKEY SPANO: If it didn't exist, would it have been as good? Probably not. So, you did good. Give yourself some credit.

MALIK PRINCE: I don't need my actual therapist. You already know.

MATTY STUDIVAN: I thought I was going to cry.

MALIK PRINCE: I do want to ask you because I've been seeing a fan question that's been popping up. You don't have to answer it, of course. Like, we don't want to spoil anything. The game is coming out next year, so there's plenty of time. But a common question that I see everywhere about this game, people saying basically it's not a High on Life game without Kenny. What are your thoughts on that statement in general? I'm just going to throw it out there.

MIKEY SPANO: I totally agree that it's not High on Life without Kenny. Each game tells a different story. So, this story doesn't have Kenny at the center of it, but Kenny still very much exists in the High on Life universe. Hopefully, we'll keep making games because we have a big arc for the series that we want to tell that Kenny's a part of. So, Kenny is still there for the fans. Kenny is one of my favorite guns too, so he's still going to be around for as long as we're making games. And we do know for sure that we want to keep Kenny around.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Great to hear. I'm worried because we're quickly running out of time here. I know this has been so fun.

MALIK PRINCE: Wait, isn't this taped?

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah.

MIKEY SPANO: They're going to have to pull us out with that cane.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: We have meetings. That's our real issue. But this game coming out next year. We've asked a lot. We've talked a lot about this game, but what is something from each of you that you're most excited players get to experience?

MIKEY SPANO: You go first because I want to hear what you say.

MATTY STUDIVAN: Well, I said this in Slack the other day and I like really mean it and I don't know why this resonates with me, but like we have this RV in the game and like we've talked a little bit about the game. You're the outlaw and everything. So, there's like a conversation that like I think it was like Mikey and Eric and a bunch of people were having about like, "Okay, well, if you're going to like go on these missions, like the RV can't just go into the hubs because like there are going to be like cops all over you or whatever." And so, I don't remember whose idea it was, but like, "Okay, we'll make these like different like the cleaners sign and like all these stupid signs that like disguise the RV as you come." It's like so dumb. I was just like all of the pitches for like what the art could be on the side, I was like, "It's so dumb and I love it so much."

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: That's awesome. That's awesome.

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah, that was something I wanted to do because I loved Sunset Overdrive, and there's a bit of that DNA in the game too. Our design director worked on Sunset Overdrive, so he brings some of that flavor over. And actually, our tech director, I know he worked at Insomniac. I'm not 100% sure if he worked on Sunset, but he was close.

MATTY STUDIVAN: I'm sure everybody there worked on it.

MIKEY SPANO: Yeah, they probably worked at it in some in some capacity. But yeah, I loved every time you would get dropped off, it was kind of a different animation with the van where they would like dump you out or do a different thing.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: That was so cool.

MIKEY SPANO: And so, when we were play testing, I was like, "Well, don't the cops know what the RV looks like? Aren't they going to just see it and know?" So, we had this stupid thing where obviously anybody would be like, "That's the same RV," but we figure we'll just throw a paint job on and it's like shoe delivery or whatever the hell.

MATTY STUDIVAN: The conversations that are like my favorite at the studio where it's like, "Oh crap, like that's a good point." And like, "Okay, well, let's do something like even dumber."

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: It's so fun to get to be in a writers room for one. And two, I've got to say it just sounds like you guys are cultivating an incredible place to work creatively.

MATTY STUDIVAN: That's the goal.

MIKEY SPANO: For sure. It's definitely a challenging place to work because we're all really passionate. What do people always say? The island of misfit toys. So, it's a lot of people with a lot of experience that know what they're doing and have a very specific way they want to do things and it's awesome. But for people coming up into the industry, it can be intimidating to work with people that are so passionate about what they're doing. And I think that's what leads to us having such a unique game is people willing to say like, "We're just going to push forward on this idea. It's dumb, but I know it's going to be fun. We're going to push forward." We're lucky enough that our team trusts each other to do that kind of stuff.

MALIK PRINCE: It's so good that you all again are fostering that environment, and I cannot wait. Again, going back to it, I was so shocked when you all revealed that High on Life 2 is a thing, first of all, so soon after the first one, but that it's coming very soon. So, it'll be out next year. So, all of you check it out when it releases. Matty, Mikey, thank you so much.

MIKEY SPANO: Of course. Thanks for having us. Yeah, February 13th. Friday the 13th, Friday the 13th.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Thank you guys so much for joining us. Any final parting words to the fans or Malik and I?

MIKEY SPANO: Man, I always like to just thank the team. I know I keep saying it, but making games is hard, making comedy games is harder. And the team that we have just really puts everything into this game. And I always want to make sure they know how appreciative I am, and I know the rest of the directors and stuff also feel that way. We're very fortunate.

MATTY STUDIVAN: Like, it's not us cultivating the culture and the team. It's the team building a place that they want to work.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: I love that. Well, we were super appreciative of that, and shout-out to your whole team. Truly, like really excited for the game to come out, so excited. Like, all I can say, this has been such a fun episode awesome.

MIKEY SPANO: It's awesome. Like, I don't want to be like overly confident about it, but it's so stupid. It's the dumbest thing you've ever seen. I promise you, it's the dumbest thing.

MALIK PRINCE: I've got to say, speaking of that in a good way, the demo -- again, I keep mentioning it -- was so cool. The little Easter eggs. I've never seen -- if you haven't seen, again, go watch it. I've never seen a boss battle that ended with you fighting in the actual menu screen of the game. I was like these guys are building something insane and I loved every bit of it.

MIKEY SPANO: And that's one of the more normal parts of the game. I would say this demo is early in the game. And in the normal act of the game, by act three it's just so off the rails and insane. I think people are going to be really surprised.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: It's so exciting.

MALIK PRINCE: I get to play it tomorrow, so I'm pumped. Ethan's not because he is a liar. He said he was coming to an event that he's not actually coming to.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: I'm busy. I'm busy. I'll try.

MALIK PRINCE: But I want to say great being back in the saddle with you, my friend.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Good seeing you, man. Paper covers rock.

MIKEY SPANO: Oh god.

MATTY STUDIVAN: Wow, this is getting intimate.

MIKEY SPANO: That made my stomach turn.

MATTY STUDIVAN: Do a slow zoom on that, please.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: I'm tasting your Chapstick.

MALIK PRINCE: Oh, it was good?

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

MALIK PRINCE: That's an inside joke.

MIKEY SPANO: Good for you guys.

MALIK PRINCE: Go home, go home.

ETHAN ROTHAMEL: No, it's going to be fine. Mikey, Matty, thank you guys so much for joining us today. Microsoft XL is out now. This game will be out in February, High on Life 2. We did it, dude.

MALIK PRINCE: We did it. Thanks for watching the official Xbox podcast. Be sure to hit the like, subscribe, whatever button let's you know when we put out new episode. And until next time, we'll see you. Bye.