8-4 Play

PRAISE THE SUN! Dark Souls has been consuming most of our lives, but we do manage to eventually break away from talking about it to discuss other recent happenings, including Square Enix's surprise retooling of Final Fantasy XIV, Sega's XBLA remake of Guardian Heroes, and Capcom's limited edition Monster Hunter 3DS. Plus: hands-on impressions of Robot Invader's Wind-Up Knight, ears-on impressions...

With Mark out of town on business and Tokyo Game Show now behind us, life at 8-4 Towers has been pretty quiet lately. But that's no excuse not to record a podcast! ...OK, actually, it kind of is, but we went ahead and recorded one anyway! Tune in to hear us talk about Dark Souls, Zelda: Four Swords 25th Anniversary Edition, the Diablo III beta, porntips from Thailand (not what you think!), "Lucky...

Shane Bettenhausen! Ryan Payton! Billy Berghammer! We've got special guests up the wazoo here at 8-4 Towers to celebrate 8-4 Play's first anniversary (yay!) and to help us break down the 2011 Tokyo Game Show. Tune in for hands- (and/or eyes-) on impressions of all the big games, including the PlayStation Vita launch lineup, Binary Domain, Phantasy Star Online 2, Anarchy Reigns, Soul Calibur 5, the...

Freshly-unemployed Internet sensation Shane Bettenhausen joins us as we kick off TGS week with a blow-by-blow breakdown of the big two pre-show press conferences - Nintendo's Frankenstick-free Monster Hunter megathon and Sony's 94% gameplay-free Vita launch bonanza. Tune in for an hour-long preview of what's to come, and then check back Friday for our monster Tokyo Game Show/8-4 Play 1-year-Annive...

And the megatons fall like rain: Dragon Quest X revealed as a massively-multiplayer online game for Wii and Wii U. :BWAAAH: Monster Hunter coming to the 3DS -- and with "monstrous" right-stick add-on, no less. :BWAAAH: Who better to join us in the fallout shelter than a man in the news himself, Kojima Productions vet Ryan Payton, who left Microsoft to go indie and to talk with us about 3DS vs. Vit...

You could just listen to the 8-4 crew talk 3DS rumors, PS3 and Vita announcements, MHP3rdHD, DOTA2 and Street Fighter IV as eSports, games that will hit and miss the upcoming Tokyo Game Show, and the Valve / EA / Activision shit-talkin' express and then just call it a day. Perfectly acceptable. But if you want the real, secret, best ending to the podcast, bust out some healing herb and stick aroun...

In which our heroes discuss: Armored Core V and Dark Souls pushed back, Xenoblade Chronicles moved up, PlayStation Vita coming right on time (sorta), 3DS sales rising (used), 3DS sales falling (new), 3DS sales rising again (post-price drop), addiction to EVO streams, ham withdrawal, what's good about Peter Moore, what's bad about Skyrim, who and what will and won't be at the upcoming Tokyo Game Sh...

Yes, we eventually talk about Rhythm Heaven for the Wii, Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet, Groove Coaster, From Dust, Phantasy Star Online 2, Irem's apparent demise, Mega Man Legends 3's definite demise and so on, but mostly this episode is all about Nintendo ' s embattled 3DS handheld and just about every aspect of the news surrounding its upcoming price drop, complete with color commentary from di...

Played Shadows of the Damned? You should! Why? 1) Read the reviews, it's a great game! 2) We here at 8-4 worked on it! 3) Oh yeah, so did some other guys, Suda 51 and Shinji Mikami. 4) You will enjoy this podcast a helluvalot more, since we discuss the soundtrack with legendary game musician Akira Yamaoka and talk shop about creating the script. When you tire of our self-congratulatory nonsense, t...

Frankly, it's too damn hot in Tokyo to spend much energy writing up a fancy description of our latest episode, so let's just cut the crap, OK? We talk about Operation Rainfall's attempt to bring Wii JRPGs to the West, Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D, Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D save file-gate, Journey (the game and the band), Wii U, famed game director Yasumi Matsuno moving to developer Level-5, y...

Child of Eden is finally out, and who better to discuss it with than Q Entertainment's own James "Milkman" Mielke? Fresh from LA, the former EGM editor-in-chief and 1up.com superstar joins us as we talk about Tetsuya Mizuguchi's latest opus, the big three's E3 press conferences, hands-on impressions of Wii U and PS Vita, and more. Hosted by internet celebrity and 8-4 superfriend David "CheapyD" Ab...

E3 is almost here! Join us for one last round of rumor-mongering and baseless speculation on what'll go down at next week's big event. Former 8-4 intern and Resident Evil superfan Alex "cvxfreak" Aniel joins us to talk about Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D, Kojima Productions' pre-E3 announcements, the merits (or lack thereof?) of calling your handheld "Vita," and our very own E3 predictions.

With E3 approaching quick, the 8-4 crew are buried in all manner of pre-expo prep work -- they've hardly had time to think about any other of them vidja games, much less play them. But when has that ever stopped them from talking about them?! Tune in for thoughts -- and maybe a feeling or two -- about PSN's revival (outside of Japan), Namco's new Soul Calibur game and Tekken movie, Modern Warfare'...

Bin Laden is dead. The galaxy is at peace. What better way to celebrate than with 8-4 Play and a ton more talk about Nintendo's Wii successor and Sony's ongoing PSN woes? To help brief us on the latest intel, we called in former US Navy Seals Shane "Bill Rizer" Bettenhausen and Evan "Lance Bean" Shamoon, who also share thoughts on Portal 2, the new Sony tablets, El Shaddai, and Sonic's legitimacy...

What's this? An episode of 8-4 Play where the crew actually talks about what they do all day: game translatin'? Believe it, spoony bard! Localization legend Richard Honeywood, he of such Square Enix favorites as Xenogears, Chrono Cross, and Dragon Quest VIII, joins us to talk shop, 64DD development, and being best buds (well, buds) with Nintendo prez Satoru Iwata. And speaking of Nintendo -- did s...

In this very special episode of 8-4 Play, we recap our live-to-tape hosting of the Grasstream2 Japanese tsunami relief charity event, put on by the good people at famed developer Grasshopper Manufacture. You will (hopefully) laugh, you will (probably) cry, and in the end, you might just learn something -- about Pandora's Tower, Hip Tanaka, Yakuza of the End, and how you (yes, you!) can help Japan...

A lot has happened in the four weeks since our last episode. The Game Developer's Conference came and went, Charlie Sheen jumped the tiger-shark (-blood...or whatever), Winter gave way to Spring, and the largest earthquake in Japan's recorded history rocked our tiny island home. But the show must go on, as they say, and so the 8-4 five are back in action with personal quake stories, first-month 3D...

The Nintendo 3DS is out in Japan, and the 8-4 crew is back from launch morning chaos with a pile of brand new 3DS gear and a bevy of special guests ready to give hands-on impressions, including Brad Douglas of Sony (shock!) and Che Chou of Microsoft (awe!). Tune in for first thoughts on the hardware, the games, the 3D camera, the AR cards, and much, much more.

Pop quiz: What do Cave Story, Catherine, Dead Space, Dead Island, Hard Corps, Dark Souls, Butt-head, Tactics Ogre, Super Bowl Monday, Ys, the 1979 Iranian revolution, Dragon Quest, Haruki "Peppy" Epperson, Billy Mitchell, and Voltron have in common? Give up? ...Nothing! Except that they're all topics discussed during this super random episode of 8-4 Play. Enjoy!

PSP2...NGP...whatever you want to call it, Sony's new handheld has the gaming world in a tizzy, and we've got just the thing to satisfy your next-generation portable cravings: two hours of hardcore, hands-on impressions fresh from Sony's PlayStation Meeting 2011 in Tokyo. Matt Leone of 1UP, Phil Kollar from Game Informer, and podcast phenom Shane "El Shaddai" Bettenhausen join the 8-4 crew for a h...

Live in Tokyo, do you? And you attended Nintendo's recent 3DS event? ...So you know everything there is to know about the upcoming glasses-free 3D handheld? Fine then, don't listen to this podcast. The rest of us will tune in to hear the 8-4 crew's full report on Nintendo World 2011, including first-hand impressions of playable games like Kid Icarus, Pilotwings, Resident Evil, etc. and thoughts on...

After an extended holiday break filled with snow, sake, and SASUKE! (look it up), the 8-4-some is back and they got some 'splainin' to do! (:LAUGHTER:) Good thing former EGM and Turn 10 hipster Che "China Warrior" Chou joins in to talk iPhone game shame, his personal wall of give a s*** -- basically ANYTHING but his current workplace (Microsoft's 343 Industries) and their shadowy Halo project. Com...

Let's make this perfectly clear: Like Kinect, sauerkraut, and inverted controls, this special holiday episode of 8-4 Play is not for everyone. How can you know? Take our simple quiz: 1. Do you enjoy Monster Hunter? 2. Are you curious about Monster Hunter? 3. Would you like to hear almost two hours of talk about one of Japan's biggest gaming franchises in the last decade? If you answered "yes" to a...

In Tokyo, the holiday season brings a mix of imported Western traditions and uniquely Japanese flavors (Google "Japan KFC Christmas" if you don't know what we mean), so that's exactly what this T-day episode of 8-4 Play delivers. A rundown on the best Black Friday gaming deals one minute, a detailed explanation of table-flipping arcade title Cho-Chabudai Gaeshi the next. Hardcore Final Fantasy IV:...

The 8-4 crew's too busy working on next year's games to have much time for this year's offerings, so they called in intern Alex "cvxfreak" Aniel to help discuss everything they wish they were playing (but mostly aren't). Tune in for baseless, uninformed talk about Donkey Kong Country Returns, Kinect, Monster Hunter Portable 3rd, Vanquish, 25th Anniversary Super Mario Bros., and (as required by law...