Tales from the Backlog

This is the PAX East 2024 retrospective and run-through of all of the games I played! Woooo! Games featured: Animal Well : The Art of Flight Duck Paradox Enter the Chronosphere Fallen Aces Fretless Lucid So to Speak Sorry, We're Closed Tape to Tape Throne of Bone YouTube VoD of the Nintendo DS panel I participated in! Support Tales from the Backlog on Patreon! or buy me a coffee on Ko-fi ! Join th...

Titanfall 2 , developed by Respawn Entertainment and published by EA, is one of those unfortunate games that seems to be universally beloved, but apparently didn't sell well enough for them to continue the series. Instead, Respawn is stuck in the Apex Legends and Star Wars mines for the foreseeable future, and we're left to replay this wonderful campaign (and multiplayer for some) and wonder what...

- Support Tales from the Backlog on Patreon! or buy me a coffee on Ko-fi ! Join the Tales from the Backlog Discord server! Social Media: Instagram Twitter Facebook Cover art by Jack Allen- find him at https://www.instagram.com/jackallencaricatures/ and his other pages Listen to A Top 3 Podcast on Apple , Spotify and [other podcast platforms](atop3podcast.fireside.fm)!

How do you follow up a story that ends the way that Final Fantasy X did? Well, Square decided that Final Fantasy X-2 needed to shake things up. Most sequels escalate, but that wasn't really an option here, and so the girlpower J-Pop Final Fantasy game was born. This game gets a lot of hate out there, but not for the reasons that I think deserve it. Joining me to discuss Final Fantasy X-2 is Adam f...

In this discussion, Dave is joined by Chris Coplien ( Retro Hangover podcast ), Rick Firestone ( Pixel Project Radio podcast ) and Andre ( Fine Time podcast ) to discuss the challenges and our personal approaches to evaluating retro games. In this episode, we discuss our perspectives and some specific games like Rocket Knight Adventures , Super Mario Bros. 3 , Super Monkey Ball , Kingdom Hearts ,...

How do you remake one of the most beloved games of all time? How do you fend off the masses who want to hold you to every decision made over 20 years ago? Well, in our opinion, Square Enix figured out the way with Final Fantasy VII Remake . This is a shining example of how a remake can update the graphics, completely revamp the gameplay, add voice acting, re-orchestrate the music....and still keep...

This War of Mine , by 11 Bit Studios is often labeled not only as a good game, but also as an important game, especially as countries are invaded and lives are turned upside down in the same ways, over and over again. Because of how forever relevant this game is, and with a little pushing from friend of the show Randall on our "Games in Real-World Settings" episode a few months back, I was eager t...

Boy am I glad that I disregarded all of the "Metal Gear Solid 2 is the worst one, just skip it" chatter out there. Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty , by Hideo Kojima and Konami , is a step up in almost every way from the first Metal Gear Solid game, and does a ton of interesting things in the process. Its biggest issue is that it takes a long time setting up, and then the payoff hits you with t...

If you grew up alongside South Park like I did, and you loved video games, then you were probably let down by the licensed South Park games in the early years. All of that changed with 2013's South Park: The Stick of Truth by Obsidian Entertainment and South Park Studios . It looked like an episode of the show, it sounded like an episode of the show, the story was fun, and it introduced turn-based...

From a better era of licensed games comes The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (PS2, GameCube, Xbox version). No live service nonsense, no microtransactions, just good arcadey fun reliving the best action scenes from the movie, along with tons of little goodies for fans of the movies. This was a blast, and I hope you enjoy reliving this game with us. Joining me for this episode is Chris Domin...

The day a new Yakuza / Like a Dragon game drops is like a holiday for me. Imagine my surprise and delight when I realized that we don't have to wait years for new games in the series anymore, as we got the Like a Dragon Ishin! remaster earlier in 2023, and then the connecting game, Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name to set up the upcoming Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth . Like a Drag...

Rain World , developed by Videocult , is the true definition of a cult hit. If you look on review aggregator websites, you'll see extremely mixed reviews. However, if you ask in Discord servers, subreddits, etc you'll find so many people with feverish praise. It was only a matter of time before I had to try it out for myself, and this was the winner of a Patreon poll! Shoutout to everyone who vote...

GAME NUMBER 100 ON THE PODCAST! And what a unique game to talk about for #100! Killer7 , by Suda51 's Grasshopper Manufacture and Capcom , is a game unlike any other. An unholy mashup of rail shooter, adventure game, crime fantasy and political drama, you'll never play another game quite like this. Joining me for this episode is Andre from Fine Time podcast, which you can check out HERE or on your...

2023 has been absolutely packed with great games, and now is the time to reflect on the new games I played over the past year. Despite missing a lot of popular releases like Alan Wake 2, Super Mario Wonder, Star Wars: Jedi Survivor, Armored Core VI, Lies of P and many more, I still played so many good games that it was tough to make a top 10! But alas, this is the podcaster's curse, so I present t...

This is an important one for me. Final Fantasy X has been one of my favorite games ever since I played it for the first time almost 20 years ago. Square really made a complete game here- story setup, characters, combat, music...total package. Joining me to discuss it are Ryan Batie and Chris Taylor from JRPG games club podcast Lightning Strikes Thrice . You can find them and all of the other thing...

Blasphemous 2 , by The Game Kitchen , is a straight putt as far as sequels go, but that turned out to be a great thing. The Game Kitchen seemingly took lots of feedback into account, smoothed out some rough edges and greatly improved the metroidvania design of Blasphemous 2. The result is one of my favorite games of the year, and one that I was happy to invite longtime friend and frequent podcast...

After playing The Messenger, I could not wait for what Sabotage Studio would make next, so I looked them up, found the Sea of Stars kickstarter page and backed it while the credits for The Messenger were still rolling. To say I was excited would be an understatement. In reality....Sea of Stars is a disappointment. Not a bad game, but not a great game either. I'm joined in this episode by two many...

From Assassin's Creed to Spider-Man, Yakuza, Persona and Grand Theft Auto, video games can take us on a sort of virtual tourism journey. But hiding in the background, there are tons of other** games set in real-world locations outside of The United States, Western Europe and Japan* . **Randall Quiggle * and Ozzy Garcia join me to shine a light on some games that might teach you a little bit about...

This one is a spicy meatball. Few game series inspire the amount of praise, vitriol and everything in between as Final Fantasy does, and the latest entry, Final Fantasy XVI is no different. A series famous for continuous reinvention reinvents itself once again as a dark fantasy action game, and I knew I had to get a couple of great guests on the show to talk about it. This week I'm joined by Eric...

To my knowledge, this is the only podcast ever recorded at over 1000 km/h. F-Zero X , by Nintendo EAD for the Nintendo 64 features hyperspeed racing, buttery smooth gameplay and an absolutely incredible shredding speed metal soundtrack. Joining me on this high-speed podcast is Dave Pietrangelo of Remember 64 , Back in My Day , Creature Cast and Console Creatures . You can find everything Dave is d...

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (KOTOR for those in the know) was, for many of us longtime fans, the Star Wars game that we had always dreamed of- a game that let you explore famous planets from the movies, become a jedi, befriend wookiees and play through an acclaimed story. But that was 20 years ago, and Star Wars games have come a long way. How well did KOTOR hold up along the years? Its...

Tales from the Backlog is 2 years old! To celebrate, I am doing the yearly mailbag episode! I answer your questions about my favorite episodes of the show, how I choose the games for the show, podcasting and much more! Support Tales from the Backlog on Patreon! or buy me a coffee on Ko-fi ! Join the Tales from the Backlog Discord server! Social Media: Instagram Twitter Facebook Cover art by Jack A...

Signalis , by rose-engine is a game that seems to inspire everybody who plays it to jump at every chance to talk about it (or record nearly 3 hour podcasts about it, in our case). From its undeniable aesthetics calling back to the 32-bit era of Resident Evil and Silent Hill to its dreamlike story about android replikas in a cosmic horror/space sci-fi setting, Signalis leaves an impact. Luckily for...

Put another tally in the "Dave is covering a game on the podcast that he swore he'd never play" list- life came at me fast, I suppose. Dead Space (2023) , Motive Studio and EA 's remake of the original Dead Space from 2008 is an incredible visual upgrade on already great gameplay, though it does wear out its welcome as it seems to run out of novel gameplay ideas well before the story has wrapped u...

Iron Lung , developed and published by David Szymanski in 2022, was a game I was sure I would never play. Frequently topping "Scariest Games Ever" lists around the internet, mixing thalassophobia, claustrophobia, rustophobia and more, I always figured I would just hear about it from afar. But as a convert to horror games, I liked the idea of giving this one a go. After all, a $6, 1 hour game is a...