Slime Rancher 2, Logitech G Cloud and Danny Loves Videogames

MUSIC PLAYING] LARRY HRYB: Hi, it's Larry Hryb, Xbox's Major Nelson. Welcome to the official Xbox Podcast. In the studio this week, joining us, we have Malik Prince over there on the right who's filling in for Rebecca who's out of office or whatever she-- I don't know where she is, actually. She's out of the country, who knows.

MALIK PRINCE: She's in Europe. I mean--

LARRY HRYB: Yeah, it was-- but it's--

MAN: Now I'm jealous.

MALIK PRINCE: Living her best life. Yes.

LARRY HRYB: But-- but Jeff and I are homebodies, apparently just like you, Malik. So well, thanks for stepping in.

MALIK PRINCE: Thank you for having me. I'm happy to be here. I know Jeff has always harped I watch the show. Obviously, regular watcher, viewer, has always harped on you for the intro. You got to do the YouTuber intro, subscribe, thumbs up, all the things. But I was wondering, do you all have an audience name, like how Kinda Funny has best friends? I wanted to address the audience. I feel like we need that.

LARRY HRYB: I think it's just gamers. I really just think it's gamers, right? I mean, we've been around-- been around for so long. It's just--

MAN: Not the major maniacs or something like that, Larry?

LARRY HRYB: For people that are on the show, we call them friends of the show. So maybe he's just friends of the show.

MALIK PRINCE: I love that. I love that.

LARRY HRYB: But I know you do listen each week. And it's always-- I appreciate that. But it's great to have you in here, Malik. Of course, you work on our team that works with creators and some of that other cool stuff. That's kind of a fun gig you got there.

MALIK PRINCE: Yes. Jeff's the manager. He's our fearless leader.

JEFF: You don't have to say good things.

MALIK PRINCE: Yeah. I have to, Jeff. Come on, now. No, but it's been great working with creators. I think it's a space I've always respected. I was a creator. I'm not going to tell everyone my channel. I used to review wrestling shows on YouTube back in 2009--

LARRY HRYB: Really?

MALIK PRINCE: You really were-- Yeah. That's where I started honing my on-camera personality. The videos are horrifying to go back and watch, but you need those moments to kind of get better. And so I really respect the creator space. And so it's been great working with them.

LARRY HRYB: Now, Malik, you say you'd be horrified, but maybe you know, since you have watched the show, that I have solicited friends of this show to go out and find Jeff's old weatherman videos on YouTube.

MALIK PRINCE: I keep hearing about this, and I feel like I've sent you a message, Jeff, asking if that was true. And so is-- here's my question. Is there actually footage for people to find, Jeff?

LARRY HRYB: Yeah, or are you sending us on a fool's errand?

JEFF: It exists. It's on a public YouTube channel. I will say this much. It's not tagged correctly. So like, good luck finding it. Other people have tried, and what's amazing is that people that have come back, they were like, was this you? And it was like, here's somebody that in 1998 was, like, 40 years old. And I'm like--

[LAUGHTER]

No, that wasn't me.

MALIK PRINCE: OK. Well, it's my new life's mission. So I will make sure that it happens.

JEFF: We'll show it to you.

MALIK PRINCE: But I won't--

LARRY HRYB: We'll find it. Anyway, we're going to rock into some stuff here. Since you're kind of filling in right now, Malik, we'll kind of let you go first in terms of what you're playing. I know you're playing APEX.

MALIK PRINCE: Wow. How'd you know? How'd you know?

LARRY HRYB: Well, I've been creeping on you.

MALIK PRINCE: I have two answers. And I'm sure it's going to be one that resonates with Jeff a little bit. So I will start with APEX only because they just released their new event that just came out, and it has a brand new mode that I highly recommend people try. It's called Gun Run. And if you've ever played Call of Duty, you know Gun Game is a mode where you go through and you progress through a set list of weapons, and the person to complete that-- yeah, it keeps going up, and the person to complete that first wins.

And so APEX has put their own spin on it, which I think has been great. APEX kind of in the titanfall universe, that competitive FPS kind of game. Now adding a lot of the modes from games like Titanfall and Call of Duty with their own spin. So you still have the legends. You still have the three-person squad. But what's really cool about this one is that it goes through 24 guns and essentially--

LARRY HRYB: Wow.

MALIK PRINCE: You share the list of guns with everyone. So if you get a kill, your team then leapfrogs to whatever the next gun is. So you go--

LARRY HRYB: So everybody's kind of leveled up.

MALIK PRINCE: Yeah, and so you're not necessarily set to go through each weapon in each match. It's kind of just--

LARRY HRYB: So if you carry me, I can get the benefit of the advanced weapons? OK.

MALIK PRINCE: Absolutely. And the really cool thing, as-- I think it's customary in these modes. Is the last kill has to be done with a throwing knife, which is new to APEX. And so it's a lot of fun. So I highly recommend folks give it a shot. But the other game that I've been playing is a game that just released this week on Xbox. And per just recommendation,

JEFF: Ahh.

MALIK PRINCE: So I won't--

LARRY HRYB: Gee, how did you hear that recommendation?

MALIK PRINCE: Oh, there it is. Jeff has been singing its praises. And of course, it just released on Xbox. I didn't get a chance to play it last year. But I've played about an hour of it last night. And I got to say, I love it already. I love the idea. It's beautiful playing on the 4K OLED, of course. However, now that's on Xbox Game Pass, you can, of course, play Xbox Cloud Gaming.

So I haven't tried it yet, but I'm excited to jump in on my STEAM Deck because I feel like this is a great single player, you stay focused, travel game. And so I'm really looking forward to it. And thank you for the recommendation, Jeff.

LARRY HRYB: All right, Jeff. Thank you.

JEFF: That's what I do. I started playing again last night as well. I did the thing-- every time I'm playing an arcade game, or really any game that allows you to play your way, but [INAUDIBLE] is, sort of, the masters of this. Where here's a big arena. You can climb up high, go around people.

LARRY HRYB: Here's a sandbox. Have fun.

JEFF: You can just try to barrel through people. You can sneak up behind people. And a myriad ways to do things. And so I play through-- I generally when I went-- I played on PC last year. I beat the game. I was like 98% stealth, avoiding combat wherever possible.

I always love the idea of I came through here and those people had no idea I was here. I did the objective. I stole the thing. I got whatever, and it was done. I was like, this time, I'm going through, guns blazing, I'm just going to just kick people off of ledges and who cares. Immediately, I just found-- I hit the B button and I'm, like, crawling-- beep, beep, beep.

And that's just who I am. And I'm going to end up playing the game through probably almost exactly the same. There are some new updates that I'm really interested to try out where there are certain trinkets. So trinkets can be things that either up level or give you different abilities, and they can be subbed out every time, really every time you leave an area and go to another area, or they can be added to weapons depending on what type of trinket it is.

But they're doing something where it combines two together, which basically will allow you to have that many more different factors into the way that you play. The example they gave was, like, you could put one that increases your speed with another trinket that allows you to damage people by running into them, and it was something like a bulldozer or a freight train, like combo one. So it will encourage-- instead of like min maxing just for, OK, here's the things that are going to keep me alive, or these are the things I'm comfortable with.

You'll have just that many more slots effectively to experiment a little bit. And that's what I want to do this time. I'm going to try to make myself jump into a room full of people and just see if I can cause havoc because that's just not my way.

LARRY HRYB: Deathloop. Now available on Xbox Game Pass. In fact, we're talking about Game Pass a little bit and what we're playing-- got something going on here.

MALIK PRINCE: It's the gloves.

JEFF: Whoa!

LARRY HRYB: [INAUDIBLE] you can kind see what I'm playing here. Oh, what is that? Do you want me to go full screen, Jeff? So I can show the--

JEFF: I do, Larry.

LARRY HRYB: And you've got the details on this device. This is a great new Logitech device that was announced a couple of days ago earlier this week, and I am playing, as you can see, deathloop on, a little Halo Infinite, grounded the Game Preview. And then the game that you turned me on to last week, Wrath of the Witch-- of the White Witch

JEFF: [INAUDIBLE].

LARRY HRYB: Yeah, so there it is.

JEFF: There it is there on the right. So that is the Logitech GCloud handheld. Of course, we want people to be able to play their games wherever they are. You can play it on iOS. You can play it on Android. You can play on your Xbox. You can play on a PC.

LARRY HRYB: You can play it on a STEAM Deck if you do the right things.

JEFF: Exactly. So now here's a device. And how does it feel? This is what-- I'm dying to try this out, guys.

LARRY HRYB: The immediate thing that people look at when they see this is, oh, it looks a STEAM Deck or a Switch, and it feels really good. I have not had a chance-- actually, I did hold a STEAM Deck, an early version of it, but those are heavy. This device is not that heavy, but it just has a nice feel to it.

I've been really great with it. I've been traveling with it. You know, I went to Atlanta a couple of weeks ago. I had this in my carry-on. I've been taking it with me where I go.

And it is-- it's just great to have access to all of your X Cloud Library right here, and it's fun. So Phil tweeted out-- I mean, Jeff, I don't know if you or Malik have talked to Phil about this, but Phil, when I had a meeting with Phil a few weeks ago, it was like, this never leaves my side. And it's true. It doesn't. He pulls it out. And I can understand it now because this thing is just so fun.

JEFF: So that device is not just for Xbox Cloud Gaming. So the way it will work, if you get one, and you first boot it up against called the Logitech GCloud. You will see the Xbox Cloud Gaming shortcut pinned to the home screen. So that's where you can go. But you can.

We're also working with Logitech to enable Remote Play so that you'll be able to directly connect to your console and to be able to play games that might not be part of the Cloud Gaming or just go through your full Xbox library. So why not both? There you go.

LARRY HRYB: You can see they all have-- it's got X Cloud on here. It's got GeForce. It's got STEAM link. Those are all the things I see on this one. I don't know what else can be loaded on, but we're talking about X Cloud. And it's been--

MALIK PRINCE: We're living in the future. I feel like, growing up-- yeah, I grew up with the GameBoy, GameBoy SP and the idea of getting console quality gameplay on a handheld was just foreign to me. And so now that we're in the world with the STEAM Deck and now with the G Cloud where you can just literally play Death Loop, a fully fledged console experience in your hand is just amazing. So I'm excited.

I like that you think that I have conversations with Phil as well. So that made me happy, but that's beside the point.

LARRY HRYB: But anyway-- so yeah, Jeff, thanks for-- and we'll put a link to-- that was the information that was announced this week. I think they're doing preorder soon and then it'll be available next month October. So that's a fun little piece. We kind of stumbled into the what we're playing section because I couldn't talk about what we're playing without showing what I was playing.

So that's why I wanted to bring this up here. Jeff, what have you been playing this week? I know you've been playing Death Loop, and let's talk about the JR PG section of the show.

JEFF: That's correct. I did finish Soul Hackers 2, which I've been playing. Ended up playing for 40 hours. I didn't know it was going to be as long as that, but I really enjoyed that game. A have more adult-themed Persona type game made by Atlas as well. I wanted to make sure I got that done before Persona 5 comes to Xbox next month.

But knowing that Deathloop was coming on Tuesday. I finished Sunday. I had a day in the middle. And I ended up saying I'm going to play something lightweight, something where I'm not going to get overly invested. And that ended up being you suck at parking, which if you live in Seattle, that's everybody. But worse than most places, you know. If you're from the East Coast, which this whole group is, man, people in Seattle suck at parking. But now, it's in game form. And basically, the way this goes, it's sort of a top-down, isometric-ish view.

You're controlling a little, tiny jalopy.

LARRY HRYB: Is it on XCloud?

JEFF: It should be on XCloud. It's part of Game Pass. And the way it works, it reminds me of the controls of RC Pro-am, which you may remember as a rare classic from the NES. You can also play it in Rare Replay, which I very much enjoyed doing.

And you control this little car, and you just have to park it as quickly as possible through increasingly complicated--

LARRY HRYB: Like a smart car?

JEFF: Basically, yes. You have X amount of time, and you have these increasingly complicated tracks. And you have multiple spots on the track. And you basically just need to get the car into the spot and park. But because of the way the controls are, left on your left stick is left from the perspective of the car.

But sometimes the car's going to the right. Sometimes the car is going up or down. So you just have to put your mind into it, again, very much like RC Pro-Am, back in the day. And it is harder than it sounds.

LARRY HRYB: It sounds pretty hard to me.

JEFF: Yes. So to get it gold, you have to do it without dying. Your cars are constantly--

LARRY HRYB: You're dying when you're parking your car?

JEFF: You're constantly flying off of the track, or you're hitting electrified fences, or anything. It is the norm to do it. So it has very much like a Trials HD feel to it, where it's like, can you pass it? Yes. Can you do it perfect? Well, that's where you're going to keep wanting to go back.

I can shave some time off. To give you an example, playing this week, it's only been out for a little over a week. On early levels, I finished it. I was like, oh, that was pretty good. And then it shows the online scoreboard. I'm at 117,000th place. A lot of people are playing this game.

It is a really great game to just-- when you're trying to figure out what you want to play--

LARRY HRYB: Oh, it's there.

JEFF: Yeah, there you go. Sometimes you just jump in, and it's like, OK, I'm going to run a couple of these levels.

LARRY HRYB: You suck at parking.

JEFF: It's almost a bit of a warm-up. Sometimes you can find yourself getting really into it. There is a Battle Pass for customizing your car because it's just a box, effectively, when you first start. There's all kinds of stuff. I highly recommend you try it out. It's a perfect game for Game Pass, probably a perfect game for Cloud.

You can just jump onto it, jump off of it.

LARRY HRYB: You suck at parking.

JEFF: Try to suck a little less.

MALIK PRINCE: Rated E for everyone.

LARRY HRYB: I'm going to have to ask. I don't the answer. I know, Malik, you have a driver's license, right?

MALIK PRINCE: Yes. I do.

LARRY HRYB: Yes, Jeff and I know. We have a friend of ours that works at the office that does not have a driver's license. So I wonder how he's going to do with this.

MALIK PRINCE: I feel like I agree with Jeff a little bit, in that folks in Seattle aren't the greatest parkers because I feel like I've actively gotten worse since I've-- almost like it's infectious, in a way. Because now, I try and parallel park. And I'm just going to go and not go to this establishment because I can't get into this spot.

So I feel like I'm just gaining all the bad Seattle habits and lack of ability to do these things. But yeah, it's a fascinating game, Jeff. It does sound pretty hard to me. So the fact that it's hard to get--

JEFF: Check it out. It doesn't start hard. Well, it's hard to be awesome. It is not necessarily hard to pass a level. So it's one of those things where, for people that really just have to get perfect, 3 stars across the board-- and those people exist. I live with some of those people-- then they could spend a lot of time with it.

But sometimes you just want to jam through. I would say it's total, I would call it, lean-back gaming, where you're just like, yeah, yeah, yeah. And when you're done, you just come back later. So there's many, many levels, and it's on Game Pass. Try it out. You Suck At Parking

LARRY HRYB: I'll have to check that out. And as you said, it's on Game Pass, which is kind of cool. By the way, Jeff, I just texted you the name of that person. I didn't want to out them on the show, so I just figured I'd check--

JEFF: Really?

LARRY HRYB: Yeah, exactly. He just doesn't have a driver's license.

JEFF: Well, you know what?

LARRY HRYB: Who knew?

JEFF: Who knew?

LARRY HRYB: They're watching this right now.

JEFF: That's the world we live in. You don't need it.

LARRY HRYB: Yeah, they may be watching right now, but enough. So check that out. That's on Game Pass, and it's also on XCloud if you want to do that. And that's the great thing, also, is you can check out these games if you have a console, Xbox One or Xbox Series X or S, you can just stream it right to the console to take the parking for a test drive before you install it.

JEFF: There you go.

MALIK PRINCE: I like it. I like it.

JEFF: It is a small download, anyway. But if you want to save, I think it's only like 6 gigs. But you know what? You'll know pretty quickly if you're going to be into it.

LARRY HRYB: Jeff, before we get into the interviews, which are going to come up in a second, we got a little bit of news to go over. So I don't know if you could cue us up with some news.

JEFF: Oh, my God, a little bit. We got some great news, this week. First off--

LARRY HRYB: By the way, you need a controller for that game.

JEFF: You do. I think my battery's low. Well, you know what? Let's talk about that. There's a new system update, the Xbox September update. One of the headline features is, oh, wow, this is just a normal, Elite Series Two Controller. Or is it?

[GASPING]

Whoa!

LARRY HRYB: Yours comes through a little bit better than mine. Let me try to shut my studio lights off, so you can kind of see it.

MALIK PRINCE: Look at that!

JEFF: And there's green, and there's back to white.

LARRY HRYB: There you go. That's a little bit better. You did blue, like I did blue!

JEFF: I did. It stands out. So there's an ability, if you have an Elite Series Two, it could be the new, core white one, or it could be one that you've had for a couple of years. The LED within the Xbox button has the ability to shine over 60 million different combinations of colors.

So we open that up to you.

LARRY HRYB: Yeah, so what's interesting here is I remember when we shipped the Elite Series Two, I remember-- Jeff, remember I was talking to engineering, and I came to you? And I said, hey, they can make them different colors! And you're like, really?

JEFF: I do remember that. Slightly taking credit for this, by the way, Malik.

LARRY HRYB: No, I'm not. I'm just merely saying that the ability to do RGB on the LED has been in there since day one. We just recently uncorked it. So it's been sleeping inside your controller.

JEFF: Yeah. So if you go to the Xbox Accessories App, you go to configure, and then you go into the different profiles, that's what this is. In fact, you can set a different color for each profile. So you see I'm switching colors there. I should've picked more divergent colors. But you can do that.

And you can use sliders. You can pick predetermined ones. It has hex code support. So if you want to get the exact, right color for something, you're able to do that.

LARRY HRYB: What's the hex code of that shirt you're wearing, Jeff? I don't know what that is.

JEFF: I don't know. I'll let you know. I'll let you know. But with 60 million colors--

LARRY HRYB: I like it.

JEFF: Thank you. Thank you.

LARRY HRYB: I'm not saying I didn't like it. I just was like, I've not seen you in that color before.

JEFF: Well, it's like Deathloop has that '70s-ish vibe or '60s vibe.

LARRY HRYB: They're kind of muted, autumnal colors.

JEFF: There you go. I had a pumpkin spice latte this week, first one of the year. And I wanted to wear it.

LARRY HRYB: Last one, too?

JEFF: I wanted to wear it. Oh, you've got one now?

MALIK PRINCE: Well, pumpkin cream cold brew, but close enough.

JEFF: Those are really good.

MALIK PRINCE: Amazing. Amazing.

JEFF: Yeah, if you want to mix up your-- if it's still warm where you're at, which if you're in 85% of America, then yeah, it's still pretty hot, pumpkin cream cold brew. Way to go.

MALIK PRINCE: So good.

JEFF: You can switch over to the PSL, once it cools down. So what else is in this update? It has a full library revamp. So when you go to My Games and Apps, and you want to look at all the different ways that you can sort your games, you can look at one view now that incorporates everything from the games that you own to games, if you have Xbox Game Pass, that are unlocked with that, EA Play, Xbox Live Gold, the Games with Gold, Apps, everything.

There's all different ways to sort it, just giving you more options there. You can select storage locations. Like let's say you want your apps to be on an external drive. Or if you have backward compatible games, they don't need to necessarily be on the SSD. You can have that on an external USB drive.

You could have it so those things go there, automatically. You could have it so your modern Xbox S and X optimized games are on the internal storage. Or if you have one of our expansion cards, you can just-- it's your choice. So put it where you want to.

And then party, there's some party chat noise suppression, which was available on Xbox Series X and S, is now available on Xbox One, as well, and then also on Windows 10 and 11 PCs. And we should probably talk a little bit about that because there was also a really big update.

The Windows 11 2022 update also hit this week. It's update season. It's not just PSL season. It's update season.

LARRY HRYB: At least around here, it is.

JEFF: Yes. There's a lot of updates that incorporate lots of things. Check out the Windows Blog if you want to see everything. But from a gaming perspective, there's help.

LARRY HRYB: By the way, I'm working on getting Panos on a future podcast.

JEFF: Oh, that'd be great. That's awesome.

LARRY HRYB: Because we had him on last year, because he's one of the heads of Windows. And he's great to have on. He's a big gamer, too. So we want to get him on. So stay tuned.

JEFF: That's awesome. So there's a controller bar. It's basically an updated view of the Xbox Game Bar that lets you switch games and move through things more simply. Because when you're using your controller on your PC, sometimes you don't want to have to necessarily put down, go to the mouse, go back and forth for some of the things you might want to access very quickly.

You're able to just jump back and forth by hitting the Windows button and sliding over to it. There's graphics improvements. I won't get into all of that. But basically, some people like to run their games windowed because they have multiple things going on, instead of full screen. More options, more performance enhancements for that, including auto HDR.

And there's new gaming features for Edge. We have all of this summed up for you on Xbox Wire. News.Xbox.com.

LARRY HRYB: Latest update.

JEFF: This is the Windows 11 2022 update. It's available today. You'll see it near the top of the blog. I'll go ahead and make that go towards the top of the blog. And you should check all of that out. You could just get the new Windows by just going into updates through your menu there.

What else?

LARRY HRYB: What else? But wait, there's more.

JEFF: We talked about Deathloop coming to Game Pass, but that is not all. So coming to Xbox Game Pass, of course, Deathloop is available today. So is Hard Space Ship Breaker. This game was available, I want to say, on Steam Early Access. And a lot of people were talking about. It's now available through Cloud, Xbox Series X and S, and PC Game Pass.

So anywhere you play, you'll be able to play Hard Space Ship Breaker. We also have, actually available now, a game called Spider Heck, which is a couch co-op brawler. Beacon Pines is available. It's a cute, creepy, storybook adventure. Slime Rancher 2.

I know we have a conversation that will be happening soon. Slime Rancher 1 was incredibly popular on Xbox platforms.

LARRY HRYB: I was bringing this up for you.

JEFF: Yeah, thank you. It's in Game Preview, so you get to work. And I'm sure during the conversation, you'll be able to find out how to share feedback back with the developers of Slime Rancher. You see Moon Scars, as well. Grounded, we've been talking about this for some time.

The full release of that is September 27th. Malik, you've been working very closely with Obsidian. So that's when the story comes to Grounded, and the game will be fully complete. It's added so much. If you hadn't played since it came out, two years ago, you would be shocked at how much new content is available there now.

LARRY HRYB: We talked about that because that was the last time we were in public. Because I did the interview. We did Pax East, and I had some of the folks from Grounded on the podcast. And that weekend is when the world was changing with-- one of the many weekends-- the pandemic.

JEFF: Yeah, because it was summer of 2020 when the game first released into Xbox Early Access.

LARRY HRYB: So we talked about it earlier that year.

JEFF: Yeah, that makes sense. And then so much has happened in the last two years. Within Grounded, we can leave the rest of that elsewhere. So that will be next week. Looking forward to actually now going back through, seeing everything that's changed, getting achievements now, playing through the story. Let's co-op this, gentlemen. Can we do that?

Then two other games to mention, three actually, Let's Build A Zoo. I don't know if it's related to We Bought A Zoo, the movie. I'm assuming not, but Let's Build A Zoo, that's next week. Valheim, very popular game on Steam. It's in Game Preview for PC. You can play. It's a Norse-themed survival game, where you can play with up to 10 players.

And then this one, Larry, maybe you play with your daughter, Paw Patrol Grand Prix will be available on day one with Game Pass. We know that these are very popular with parents who have Game Pass. At night, play Deathloop. When your kids are awake, play Paw Patrol Grand Prix.

MALIK PRINCE: Game for everyone. Game for everyone. Love it.

JEFF: Yes.

LARRY HRYB: Big week.

JEFF: Yeah, big week. And we're also continuing to support and honor Hispanic Heritage Month. So if you tune into Twitch.tv/Xbox, as you would have seen all week, we've had guest creators on the show or on our channel, usually morning shift, Pacific time, early afternoon if you're on the East Coast.

And that will continue next week, as well. So we ask you to welcome our guest creators, and they'll be playing all kinds of new stuff or whatever they're super into. And it's been fun. It's always fun to welcome new folks to the community. And please, treat them right.

LARRY HRYB: And more importantly, give them the Xbox channel and the spotlight to let them have access to an audience they normally wouldn't and grow their own audiences. We're all about that. And I'm sitting here with two people that work with creators all the time. So that's what you guys do.

MALIK PRINCE: Yeah, it's been really great going into the chat while they're playing and just the amount of love that is in the chat. And also the joy that's on their faces when they see people jumping in and discovering them for the first time, and going back to their channel to follow them.

It's one of the most fulfilling parts. Because I think in the industry, obviously, there's a ton of underrepresented communities. So it's just really great to be able to use the platform that we have to spotlight them. And they're so grateful for it. But at the same time, so are we. So it's just been a really great part of what the team has been doing.

LARRY HRYB: Well-said, Malik. Well-said. Anyway, Jeff, anything else you got there? Otherwise, I think we should roll one of these interviews. I want to learn about Slime Ranch. And then a good friend of the show, Danny Pena's going to join us and talk about his kids book.

So Malik, we're going to go to you, and you can bring us into those interviews.

MALIK PRINCE: Let's do it with my beautiful vacuum in the back. Yes, recently-released, as we talked about, Slime Rancher 2, one of the most colorful games I've ever seen, just released into Xbox Game Pass. Here to talk about it is co-founder and CEO, Nick Popovich.

LARRY HRYB: All right, slime gang, you've got to be very excited because Slime Rancher 2 is now available on Xbox Game Pass. And joining me today to tell us about it is Nick Popovich, who's the co-founder and CEO of Monome Park. Nick, great to see you.

NICK POPOVICH: Thank you very much for having me, Larry. It's great to be here.

LARRY HRYB: It's quite exciting. Slime Rancher came out. And I remember back in the day, everybody was playing it. Millions of people played it. And now, you're back with number two. Tell us about, first of all, shipping the first one and then the road to shipping Slime Rancher 2, if you would.

NICK POPOVICH: Sure. So with the first one, we hoped a bunch of people would play it. A few more did than we were expecting. So it was just a few of us that shipped the original. We wanted to do something really different. I think we succeeded in doing that.

And any time you do something like that, you're not sure how people are going to receive it. And it turns out, everyone really enjoyed it. And we nurtured that game for years. Because one of the things that we found out was people stuck around an awful long time playing the game.

I think one of the things that we discovered that we weren't expecting is the world was just a place people wanted to be in, like to relax. It was a kind of a zen experience for a lot of people, which was really surprising. So ran that for years.

The world got very big, and new consoles came out. Our team grew. So it was out for a while, and we just wanted to try new stuff. We had a bunch of new, talented artists and engineers, and there was things in the backlog of the original Slime Rancher that we knew we would never get around to doing.

So this is a fresh start for us. It's a whole new world. We get to continue the adventure, a total reimagining of the setting. The first one was a dusty, Old-West vibe. And this time, we're going for a prismatic island, like a magical island, and it's lush and beautiful. There's water everywhere.

So it's just very different than the first time.

LARRY HRYB: The original Slime Rancher launched in 2017. This is pre-pandemic, pre-current generation of Xbox. So it seems so long ago. And now, you essentially have developed this game through the pandemic, right?

NICK POPOVICH: Yeah.

LARRY HRYB: And now, you're shipping it on a new platform. You talked about some of the features, but it feels like there was another layer of challenge here with all that was going on in the world, right?

NICK POPOVICH: Yeah, certainly. And we're extremely fortunate that games weren't as affected as the rest of the world, in terms of what we really had to worry about. We were able to work remote and everything. But obviously, it was hard for everyone. And I don't know.

For me, at least, and I'm sure for several people on the team, this was kind of a happy place that you could retreat to. The worst possible thing, of course, came at probably the best time for us, where development had hit its stride with Slime Rancher 2. So we could just keep our heads down and focus on building out this.

Like I was saying before, it's almost like an island getaway. It was an escape. I remember developing what is, ostensibly, extremely happy parts of this experience when the pandemic was going on. And northern California was having the wildfires and everything.

We're making it so at noon, it was dark outside. And there was just a hellish, orange fire in the sky, like glow. And you're just sitting there going, make the jiggle a little bit more. And make the smile bigger.

LARRY HRYB: Make it happier.

NICK POPOVICH: Exactly, you're just reacting to what's around you. So I think it probably helped inform the theme and the palette that we established for the game. We just pushed to make it as much of, literally, a breath of fresh air as possible for us. So it's a great point.

LARRY HRYB: We talked about it's available on Game Pass. And in 2017, Game Pass really wasn't a thing, per se. But now that you're part of Game Pass, there's going to be millions more playing it. But let's take a look at your launch trailer, here. Really, it's great to see. And this gives you some of the lushness that you just talked about, right?

It looks beautiful, and it's a place you want to go and slime.

NICK POPOVICH: Yeah, for sure. Every part of this world is colorful, like in a hyper color kind of way. Like the grass that you saw earlier is constantly shifting in color in real time. Anything that looks like, oh, it might be white rock, or something like you see here, it's actually lavender hues, and violets, and stuff running between it.

Everything has more color to it than you think. I'm a very big fan of fabrics and materials that, like on a couch, it looks like it's red. And then you get close to it, and you see it's got gold weaved into it, and purples, and things like that. And that's basically everything in this game.

Even the shadows, along the edge of the shadows, it pulls in other colors, as if they're made of watercolor. But it's really something. I don't think anything else looks like it, especially not a first person game.

LARRY HRYB: Slime Rancher 2, it's-- again, I can't believe it. Well, I can believe, actually. There were 10 million fans of the original one, worldwide.

NICK POPOVICH: 15 million, actually.

LARRY HRYB: OK, apparently, I have dated information.

[LAUGHTER]

NICK POPOVICH: Yeah. Well, it snuck up on us, too. It just kind of keeps going. And we just hit another sales milestone a couple of weeks ago. And we're like, when did this happen? We just kind of stopped counting after a while.

LARRY HRYB: Nick, what do you think the attraction is? Why do people want to play around with slime? It's fun, right? But what do you think the attraction is to get these 15 million plus folks into your universe?

NICK POPOVICH: Well, I think it controls like a lot of games people are familiar with. At the end of the day, you've played a first-person shooter, but the rules of it are completely different. And you get to do every single aspect of this game at your own pace. You can turn parts of the game off that caused too much friction for you. Or if you're a young kid, you don't want to experience things that way.

So I like to think of Slime Rancher as almost like a warm bath, if you want it to be. You can speed run it. You can do all the things that make it more difficult. But I think the world itself, especially this one-- I play it every night. And it's just a fun, relaxing place to be at the end of my day, just for a little bit.

And I think that's what everyone's getting out of it.

LARRY HRYB: We saw a little bit there. We saw some new zones, the conservatories, the rainbow fields, starlight train. There's a whole bunch of other areas, and it just looks beautiful. It looks like you've got an upgraded graphics engine. Certainly, it's on this generation.

So that's got to provide it's got to be even just a little bit more slimier, right?

NICK POPOVICH: Yes. One of my favorite enhancements that we have is the slimes jiggle in real time. They actually react to other slimes touching them. And you get enough smart people in the room, like we did, you got to focus on the important things in life, right? So that's one of the things that we made sure we do.

LARRY HRYB: We need more jiggle!

NICK POPOVICH: Yeah, exactly, like make it realistic.

LARRY HRYB: Did you have people in the conference room or on the calls, holding a bowl of jell-o, going maybe it needs to do something like this?

NICK POPOVICH: There's been plenty of GIFs of that, like that Japanese pudding and jell-o. And that's a constant source of inspiration, for sure.

LARRY HRYB: Also, one of the things we noticed in the first one, or at least in this one, the crafting system is introduced earlier on in the game, right? So people can get into that a little bit earlier, and you can upgrade your vacuum, or you can craft upgrades for your back?

NICK POPOVICH: Yeah. So that's a direct reaction to-- it sounds like I won't shut up about it now-- the 15 million players. There's an awful lot of people that have played the game that are familiar with it. So we, for the second one, took it a step up and said, we've got a lot of people who are familiar with how this works.

They're going to want to get to what was a really interesting aspect of the first one, straight away. So it's there, but we don't force it. Just like everything else in the game, you could ignore it and experience similar to, basically, the way the first one began, if you wanted to.

Or you could dig right into crafting, and upgrading, and slime science, as it's known.

LARRY HRYB: We saw a little bit of the world, and it's much more expansive and lush, right now. You talked about that. But there's also different paths, and there's things blocking your paths to get into other areas. That's a new mechanic, right?

NICK POPOVICH: Yeah, the whole world is more vertical than it was before. Because it's on new hardware, we're able to make the world a lot bigger than it was before. So we're still in Game Preview, and we're going to be constantly expanding that, and adding to the world.

But the world that we have now is definitely more intricate than the first one. There's a lot more reasons to revisit parts of it, learn shortcuts, that sort of thing. And then at the edge of the world, and for what we have released so far, there is a large obstruction that will open up the next part of the world, further down the line, as we develop Slime Rancher 2.

LARRY HRYB: Well, I'm looking forward to it. I know that with everyone that's coming out of the pandemic, dealing with everyday life-- you talk about fires, and earthquakes, and everything else that's going on in the world-- it's going to be great to retreat to your little, rainbow world of Slime Rancer 2.

It's available on Game Pass, right now. It came out earlier. Depending on when you're listening to this, it came out a few days ago or last week. And what are some tips you want to have people think about when they get into this? Do they need to play the first Slime Rancher, or can they go in cold?

NICK POPOVICH: No, you don't need to play the first Slime Rancher. If you did, you'll definitely appreciate a few moments more because the characters that you met in the first game are brought back into the second one. And you should appreciate interacting with them a little bit more.

As far as tips go, I would say just take it slow. Do things at your own pace. There is nothing in the game that is going to be telling you need to do this right now, right now. There's no objectives that are time sensitive. So any choice that you make, anything that you want to pursue, any slime you want to wrangle and just focus on, you'll be rewarded for doing that.

So I would say wherever the wind blows you, and whatever looks like the most curious corner that you want to investigate, pursue that. And there is no harm in doing that.

LARRY HRYB: All right, Nick, appreciate it. And there's no reason not to try it out, you Game Pass members. Get on this right now. So Nick Popovich, you're the CEO of the team behind Slime Rancher, and celebrating 15 million members, and Slime Rancher 2!

So congratulations on the launch, and thanks for all the slime.

NICK POPOVICH: Yeah, thank you so much. Thanks for having me. I hope everyone enjoys it.

LARRY HRYB: Danny Pena, I'm so excited to have you on the show, known as Godfrey. First of all, welcome, Danny. Good to see you.

DANNY PENA: Good. Thanks, Larry, for having me on. Actually, the last time I was on, you're probably not going to remember this. But this was 2007.

LARRY HRYB: Oh, no.

DANNY PENA: This was E3 Santa Monica. It was a brief thing. I had to give you feedback about the press conference for Call of Duty, Modern Warfare, the first one that came out.

LARRY HRYB: That's going way-- then I'm sadly way overdue because you've had me on your show a couple of times. And it's great to have you on again. And I apologize for being so tardy, many, many, years later.

DANNY PENA: It's all good.

LARRY HRYB: But here we are, 15 years later. But it's good to see you, man. You are one of the few podcasts. We're going to talk. You're an author, co-author now. But you're one of the few podcasts that predates my podcast. You've been on for how long?

DANNY PENA: Wow, now, it's been over 17 years, just with Gamertag Radio. But with Internet Radio, I've been doing it since '01. So it's 21 years, now.

LARRY HRYB: It's crazy, isn't it?

DANNY PENA: Time flies, man. Time flies.

LARRY HRYB: And I had the opportunity to know you and work with you since, probably, 2004-ish or so, so right after you got started. And you've been bouncing around. You're certainly still hosting the podcast. You've had quite-- tell us a little bit about your journey, because you've been all around the games industry.

DANNY PENA: Yeah. Well, for me, I've always been a fan of games, since I was a kid. My grandmother actually bought me my first Atari 2600, back in the days. But then I became a fan of Nintendo. And then fast forward, I went to an event in New York City, in 2001, called Xbox Unleashed.

This was the first time getting hands-on of the original console. And I wasn't sure about the console at all. I was like, oh, let's see. I was curious. I was all about Nintendo at that time. And then I got to play it, and I fell in love with the console, man. I was like, this is amazing. Oh, my God. What?

So then the team over at-- the original team, Jay Adder and everybody else back then. And then I went to the launch because Xbox invited me, Times Square Toys R US. And from there, I got to meet Bill Gates. I got to play Future Frenzy with him at that time, too.

And after that, I was just so inspired with the console, the team, and I created Gamertag Radio in 2005. And originally, back then-- and you probably remember this Larry-- I used to record interviews through the Halo 2 lobby.

LARRY HRYB: That's right. I remember that.

DANNY PENA: There was no Skype. That's how I used to do my interviews, back then, man.

LARRY HRYB: Yeah, you do what you can do, but you've gone a long way. You've been bouncing around the industry and working in different parts of it now. But I want to talk to you. You wrote a book, or you co-authored a book. And that's really exciting. We've got the front of it, right here. Danny Loves Video Games.

Tell us about this because this is a fascinating project.

DANNY PENA: Yeah, for me, one of the things that my cousin-- his name is Mr. Luna. Him and his wife, Annie, they created a company called Two Quality People. And they've been creating books now for a couple of years. And they came up to me and asked me, hey, Danny, I would like to write a book about you. Because you have a really interesting story and a very inspiring--

So the main reason why I want to do this is because when I was a kid, I didn't have no mentor or anything like that. And I always wanted to be part of the gaming industry. And I had to learn everything on my own. Now that I've been part of the industry, I want to just inspire the young kids that would like to become a content creator, developer, or anything that has to do with gaming.

So that's the main reason. So in there, you'll find out more about me growing up, getting my first video game console, and also talk about how I created Gamertag Radio with my little brother, and so on. So the main thing is I just want to inspire the kids.

And also for the parents, my father, back then, didn't really get it at that time. Now, he's a huge supporter. But back then, he was like, Danny, you're wasting your time. This is not good. This doesn't pay the bills. And I had to prove to him that it is possible to build a business.

Actually, when I was a little kid, I was living in Dominican Republic. And I was in my early teens. And I had a lot of Super Nintendos and Sega Genesis. And I came up to my mom. And I told her if it's possible for me to rent an office, and have a bunch of TVs and my consoles there. And I would charge my friends to play with my consoles.

LARRY HRYB: Look at you.

DANNY PENA: I'd charge them 15 minutes, 30 minutes, or an hour. And they were like, all right, Danny. She loved the idea. We did it, and people were requesting to play, at that time, Donkey Kong Country, all the cool games, Mortal Combat, and everything. And that's how I started, back then, just experimenting.

And look at me now, man, 21 years later.

LARRY HRYB: So you're a podcaster, author, and entrepreneur in so many ways. I never knew that about you. That's a fascinating story. It's interesting how you talk about that. I grew up in New England, which is not a center for game development or video games, back when we were growing up.

And you and I are not quite the same age, but we kind of came through the same era. It was very different. Nowadays, you can open up a web browser, and start a camera, and start streaming. Anybody can stream, for the most part. And you feel like you're part of the industry.

Whereas when you and I were growing up, we didn't have that. You talked about doing interviews in the Halo lobby. The universe wasn't so connected and small. And it feels like you can just get right to those people, and reach out, and touch them. Whereas when you and I, we had to find our way into the industry, right?

DANNY PENA: Yeah, I learned on my own. I have to give thanks to you guys. When I started my early days, you guys were the first one to hit me up and gave me that access to not only meet the team that worked on any of the projects, but also getting hands-on, and just those cool opportunities.

I want to do that, especially now. There's a lot of talented Latinos in the US and in Latin America, and they feel left out. They don't know what to do, how to do it. And I'm trying my best to see how can I get more gaming companies to have a leg up to give them access, maybe also have a free workshop for them to learn about game development, stuff like that.

So I've been trying that now for a couple of years, now.

LARRY HRYB: Yeah, it's funny because I just remembered that this month is Xbox's Hispanic Heritage Month, which is another thing. And you kind of touched on that a little bit. But Xbox has always been about the community.

And I remember the early days, like you were just talking about, where you were in 2005, when you came out, when we launched the Xbox 360. You used to come out to those old offices. Remember Millennium at the end of the highway and all that?

DANNY PENA: Yes, I remember that. Very old school. I remember that. [LAUGHTER] Yeah, I was there for, I think it was, Lost Planet. There was a Lord of the Rings game. Yeah, it was a couple of times. That was pretty cool.

LARRY HRYB: You'd come out. It was always great when we heard that Godfrey was on campus, that you were here. And it really felt like you were part of the team in the early days. Because if you remember, nowadays, you talk to Phil Spencer and the team. It's just so large, and we're such a huge part of Microsoft.

But back in the day, we were a bunch of random folks at the end of the highway, next to a gravel pit, weren't we?

DANNY PENA: Yeah. But believe it or not, you guys have always been passionate about everything you guys do over there. And still to this day, I actually I went to the event that you guys had at E3. Not E3, it was during Summer Game Fest. I went there with Paris and my wife, Rihanna.

And it felt different, but in a good way. I felt like you guys were more open, willing to take more risk, and it was great seeing the community there, at the event. It felt kind of like back then, you guys would do C3.

LARRY HRYB: Remember those? That's right.

DANNY PENA: Yeah. I was there, too. I still have those passes, believe it or not.

LARRY HRYB: That was my idea when we did this community celebration events.

DANNY PENA: Oh, that was your idea?

LARRY HRYB: Yeah.

DANNY PENA: That was awesome.

LARRY HRYB: We used to, for those of you who don't remember, back before content creators were-- you certainly were one of the originals. But before it was a big thing, we would close down after hours at E3, in Los Angeles, and we'd have a community event because we had this beautiful booth.

And I was like, let's just use the booth at night. And certainly, it was more expensive. Because I don't know if you remember, it was always warm in there because I had to pay like $100,000 for the air conditioner. Because we had to cool the whole place. It was crazy. But it was just so much fun to have folks there to get hands-on experience with the games and to meet each other.

And I was able to meet you and, of course, Paris, and so many other folks in the industry that have gone on to work in different parts, whether it's media or game development. So it's been a fun ride, hasn't it? It's not over yet.

DANNY PENA: Yeah, it's not over yet. But I just love that, man. And I'm glad that you guys are still doing Fanfest. I think that's very important for companies to do that in the industry, overall. So keep it up, man. I love that.

LARRY HRYB: I want to get back to the book because we're kind of on a little bit of a book tour. It's funny. You know who else wrote a book that I recently had on the show? It was Reggie, another friend of yours.

DANNY PENA: Reggie, yes. Yes. Actually, I got to say thanks to Reggie. You know it took me like 10 years to get him on the show?

LARRY HRYB: Really?

DANNY PENA: 10 years.

LARRY HRYB: Why? Was it after he left Nintendo?

DANNY PENA: Yeah, after he left Nintendo, he was more open to doing things. But yeah, it took me 10 years. And then because of the Phil Spencer interview for our 1,000th episode, Reggie contacted me. And he's like, hey, let's do the interview. It took us another year because of scheduling.

But then after that, he invited me to speak, to be part of a keynote with him, Fireside Chat for Gamesbeat, a couple of months back.

LARRY HRYB: I remember that.

DANNY PENA: Actually, a couple of days after I got married, I had to do that, right away. But it was cool, man. So I'm glad that he gave me that opportunity, man.

LARRY HRYB: Yeah, and he's another one who's kind of had quite an interesting-- and we can go back and listen to your interview or my interview with him. He's just a great person. And that's the one thing about this industry is, certainly, Nintendo and Xbox on some fronts were competing.

But at the end of the day, I think Phil has done a great job. Phil Spencer's done a great job talking about when everybody plays, we all win. And that's so true. I have people attack me on Twitter, the PlayStation fans, or whatever. Look, let's just play some games. I'm not going to hate you for liking what you like. Let's just play games.

That's all that matters. Right, Danny?

DANNY PENA: Yeah, definitely. I have everything. I have every console, all the games. I'm a huge fan. And here's the thing, too. I love that you guys are also investing a lot on XCloud and stuff like that. The reason why I'm very excited for that is there's going to be people that can't afford to buy a gaming console or a PC, but they have an Android device. They have an iOS device, right?

And they could also be part of our community and play the same games that I've been playing, too. So I'm happy to see that Xbox is doing so many different things that it's going to help to grow the community overall, just the industry overall. So yeah, like you said, man, when everybody plays, we all win.

LARRY HRYB: I want to get back to showing the book cover again here. Your book is now available on Amazon and pretty much where all the better books are sold. Is that accurate?

DANNY PENA: Yeah, so you can find it at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Walmart, online for now. But we also have a Spanish version, too, because there's a lot of gamers in the Caribbean and Latin America. So I want to try to get them, too, man.

LARRY HRYB: And you did the audiobook, right?

DANNY PENA: No audiobook just yet. Right now, we're just focusing on the book, but I definitely want to do an audio book. Yeah, I think I got to do that.

LARRY HRYB: Just like me, somebody who's been in audio for so long, it feels like you kind of have to do that, right? Should we have Paris read it?

DANNY PENA: Hey, Paris has a great voice.

LARRY HRYB: I know, exactly.

DANNY PENA: He'll be perfect. Larry, you should also write a book, man. I think you have a lot of cool, behind-the-scenes stories about your career, too, man. And also, as a podcaster, I would love to learn more about you, like how was the process of changing the industry?

Because at that time, nobody was doing that, what you were doing now.

LARRY HRYB: Right. I know. Well, first of all, it's funny, Danny. I've actually been writing a mental outline of what my book would look like for way in the future. I have no desire to retire right now. Because the problem when you work in this industry, you just have so much fun. Every day we come to work, I get to talk to great people and work with great people like you.

It's just fun, and you don't want it to end. You just want to keep going. It just keeps going. And when you find a job like you have, or I have, or people that work in the games industry, you kind of want to do it forever, right, because it's fun.

DANNY PENA: Yeah, man. I still feel like the same kid when I started back then. I used to mess around with my dad's equipment because he used to be a DJ, back then. So I would grab his tape recorder, press record, and at night, I would listen to the cassettes. And I will picture my own scene of whatever it is that I'm recording in the background, man.

So I started like that and everything. And I just love podcasts. I just don't see myself stopping anytime soon, man.

LARRY HRYB: Yeah, and there's no reason to. You and I are going to be in the old folks' home, still doing a show.

DANNY PENA: Yeah, I'm still having fun with this. The day that I'm not having fun, probably you're going to feel the same way, that's the day I'll stop.

LARRY HRYB: Yeah, that's the day you're going to hang up your headphones, right? You're just like, I don't want to do this anymore.

DANNY PENA: No more talking to Paris and Pete. I'm done.

[LAUGHTER]

LARRY HRYB: Well, hopefully, I know you got many more shows before you-- but more importantly, Danny Loves Video Games is available right now on all these great places. Danny is a co-author. It's phenomenal to be able to talk to you, and I've just so enjoyed your success. And I know that you've got a lot of stuff ahead of you.

And I'm really looking forward to seeing what you're going to do in some of the other great things you have planned. So I want to thank you Danny. And let's tell people how they follow you on the socials. It just popped up here. But for those listening, how do we find you?

DANNY PENA: Yeah, find me on any social media outlet, right there, just look up Godfrey. I'm there. Especially Twitter, I'm very active there. But if you want, subscribe to our podcast, Gamertag Radio. We're in every podcast platform out there. Just look it up, and subscribe, and follow us, man. We release two episodes a week.

LARRY HRYB: There you go. That's unbelievable, Danny. I appreciate it. Keep up the great work, and we will have you on again in another less than 15 years, I promise.

DANNY PENA: Yes, let's make it happen.

MALIK PRINCE: All right. What a great interview, Larry, with Nick Popovich. Slime Rancher, I didn't get to play the first Slime Rancher, but I'm excited to try out Slime Rancher 2, of course, coming to Xbox Game Pass, as we talked about. Just a great opportunity to try a brand new game for me, and a game that people have loved-- the sequel to a game that people have loved.

So that's awesome.

LARRY HRYB: Yeah, well said.

JEFF: Big fan of that vacuum, by the way.

MALIK PRINCE: I had a note to move it before we started recording. And then I remembered it was back there. And I was like, oh, should I get up when it's on a single shot of Jeff or Larry, and move it?

LARRY HRYB: Too late.

MALIK PRINCE: And I was like, no, that's too risky. They'll come back to me. So now, it'll be forever part of the show.

LARRY HRYB: The vacuum is now a co-host on the show.

JEFF: Number one for that vacuum in this house, killing spiders.

LARRY HRYB: What's that? Oh.

JEFF: Yes, that's the number one. If you live in the Pacific Northwest, spiders get in the house. They're high up.

MALIK PRINCE: I let spiders live in my-- I don't kill them.

JEFF: I'm fine with them outside. Yeah.

MALIK PRINCE: That's fair.

LARRY HRYB: Anyway.

JEFF: These walls are here for a reason.

LARRY HRYB: Spiders, spiders. Also thanks to Danny Pena, who we talked about has authored kids books. So it's always good to have Danny. I've known him for almost 20 years now. It's kind of crazy how we've known each other for 20 years. And whoo, next generation of gamers is coming along.

That's why we wrote a kids book.

MALIK PRINCE: Dare I say juggernaut in the industry, as far as creators go. I love the fact that venturing out into a new space and writing a children's book. It's just something that I think should be done more, especially as it, again, pertains to representation. So awesome. Love it.

JEFF: Larry, you should write a book.

LARRY HRYB: That's what Danny said during the interview, and I've actually got a mental outline of one. So maybe it'll be a pop-up book.

[LAUGHTER]

JEFF: Maybe it'll be a radio. It'll have a built-in transmitter or something. You're a radio guy.

[WHISTLING]

LARRY HRYB: And it'll be a combination of radio and ice machine.

[LAUGHTER]

I like ice.

JEFF: You're first ever book, you're turning the publishing industry on its ear.

LARRY HRYB: This is true innovation. Anyway, we're rolling towards the end of the show here. I don't know if you guys have anything else to add, but we're going to check my notes here. I think we covered everything. Jeff, thank you for covering the news. Malik, it's always good to have you on.

Maybe I'll have you on next week. We're working on-- Rebecca's going to be out for extended time. So we're getting a bunch of folks to come in. You're always welcome to come back in.

MALIK PRINCE: Thank you, I'm excited.

LARRY HRYB: Yeah, it's great to see you. And I'm looking forward. Thank you for the Apex tips, by the way. That was good stuff.

MALIK PRINCE: Of course. Give it a shot. Two weeks of gun run, by the way. So you only have two weeks to play it. I highly recommend you try it. So yeah.

LARRY HRYB: I'll work on finishing Deathloop. Jeff, thank you for joining us this week, as always.

JEFF: Of course.

LARRY HRYB: And thank you, by the way, again for that tip on the JRPG because I'm enjoying the studio gibbly.

JEFF: I just can't believe it.

LARRY HRYB: I was texting. I mean, you see me playing it.

JEFF: No, it's great. It's an awesome game. I really, really loved it. So I'm glad to see it only took the greatest animator that--

LARRY HRYB: Of ever.

JEFF: --the industry has ever turned out to get you to play a JRPG, but you know what? We're here.

LARRY HRYB: We're here. Anyway, all right, gang. We'll see everybody next week. Make sure you hit us up on social. If you want to find us, you can see us. If you're watching us, you can see all our socials right there, @JeffRubenstein, @MalikPrince. I'll put them up again for you. Any final words, Jeffrey?

JEFF: Oh, no. Because if I say final words, that means that's it. That's it for me.

LARRY HRYB: All right. Then I won't do that to you anyway, Malik. All right, we'll see everybody next week. Make sure you like, subscribe, and do all that stuff that everybody else tells you to do at the top of the video. We're going to tell you to do it now. So we'll see you next week, everybody.

JEFF: To the three people still listening, thank you.

LARRY HRYB: We'll see you next week. Bye-bye, everybody.