The Crate and Crowbar

Alex, Chris and Marsh endure the first episode of Mythic Quest: Raven’s Banquet, but only barely, punch towers with mechadongs in Besiege, beat bad bots in resuscitated coop shooter Generation Zero and get bandy-legged in The Suicide of Rachael Foster. “It’s a real Bront.” We sat stony-faced through videogame-dev-set sitcom Mythic Quest: Raven’s Banquet but [...]

Alex and Marsh grudgingly drag themselves from the swamp to chat about spry roguelike platformer ScourgeBringer, palpate the unctuous parts of The Good Time Garden and feel ways about things in plangent poke-a-story Florence. Gentle nature-walk / insect stridulation simulator, Hunt: Showdown now has a PvE onboarding tutorial for new players. That’s nice! Red Dead [...]

Alex, Chris and Marsh bear witness to the spherical design crimes of Battlefront II, sweat bricks in formidable hell-Tetris game, Schwerkraftprojektionsgerät, and return to their happy place, the cursed murder-swamp of Hunt: Showdown. No one needs to own this many maglites. GeForce Now game streaming thing is out… now! But what is it and why [...]

Tom S, Chris and Marsh seek the Creature in the Well, guiltily juggle men in Dynasty Warriors 8, revisit the roots of the RTS in Warcraft 3: Reforged, crave decapitation in Mordau and assess the early access jank of Warhammer Underworlds: Online. “Stay off the tracks.” What’s that emerging from the frigid tundra of January? [...]

Alex and Marsh take a jaunty journey into the depths of Hades and wander the Streets of Rogue. The RNs are very much G’d, gorillas freed and the roguelikes liked, to varying degrees. Also: patch note heresies and our favourite offal. The Half-Lifes… Half-Lives?… They’re freeeee! Some of the Half-Life: Alyx team answered questions on [...]

Tom, Chris and Marsh gather to reopen Black Mesa’s final chapters, vie to become the ultimate Tom in Slay The Spire, hoover up all the flavour text in Pillars of Eternity: Deadfire and ride the rhythm of Sayonara Wild Hearts. Let’s put this at the top: this year’s C&C Community GOTY is now online! Go [...]

It’s the end of the year! Pip, Marsh, Alex, Chris and a hologram of Tom Francis gather on a big sofa to discuss their favourite games of the year. Featuring Sekiro, Baba is You, Red Dead Redemption 2, Disco Elysium, Outer Wilds and more! This’ll be our last podcast of the year – we’ll be [...]

Alex and Chris discuss Resident Evil 3 and Twin Peaks VR before setting a course straight for the heart of men-in-helmets-land: Phoenix Point, Halo: Reach, and a little Destiny 2: Season of Dawn. Also featuring: the true pillars of any hero’s journey, the retroactive bigtown crisis, the vital importance of denying yourself the dream gnome, [...]

Tom, Marsh and two-thirds of a bottle of whiskey consider the fate of Valley of the Gods, indulge in Russo-phobic whack-a-mole in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and ponder space, loss and buttons in Still There. Campo Santo’s Valley of the Gods is now officially on hold as its creators move onto other projects at [...]

Alex, Chris and Marsh take on the Pied Poper in A Plague Tale: Innocence, pootle across the Sea of Thieves, burp their way through Sigma Theory: Global Cold War and leave a faint but distinctly colonic whiff of Dota in their wake. BUY BUY BUY And people did – specifically they went and bought all [...]

Tom, Chris, Alex and Marsh rejoice in the return of Half-Life, coo at the UI of Unity of Command II, marvel at the muddle of Death Stranding and spark up our Good Hot Swords in Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order. This episode is brought to you in association with The People’s Lidl Rum David Bowie [...]

Alex, Chris and Marsh provide only the most deletable content as they marvel at the obscene indulgence of Death Stranding, tumble through infinity in Manifold Garden and test the limits of dark ecstasy in Lust From Beyond: Prologue. Don’t open with the genital shoggoth. Brian David Gilbert has made a Hideo Kojima name generator. That’s [...]

Marsh is joined by artist John Roberts to sleuth through Jenny LeClue: Detectivu, unpick the mysteries of Tangle Tower and expose deceptions in Telling Lies. Also: class war and Photoshop brushes. Fallout 1st is undergoing a proletariat revolution. EA’s stuff is back on Steam now. Cool? The Steam Library has been revamped. Hm. Detectiving and [...]

Marsh, Alex, Chris, both Toms and (occasionally Pip) assemble for the dawn of the podcast’s third century. Featuring Outer Worlds, more Disco Elysium, Radio Commander, Teamfight Tactics and more. Plus: the rise of Norman Buffus, British Public Transport Elysium, an extremely long conversation about pants, books, the cursed Beeb, and some vital Tom Francis news. [...]

Chris and Marsh get the comms horn for Fortnite’s spectacular server shutdown, eat the wave of FOMO in Destiny 2 and unleash their inner twat upon Disco Elysium. Also: house rules for goblins. Fortnite Chapter 2 is a marketing coup and some sort of game, too, I guess. A good thread on the aforementioned. Chris [...]

Toms Francis and Senior join Marsh to discuss dismissive dad death in Indivisible and lobby for gun-lobbing in both Borderlands 3 and John Wick Hex. Also: why PCs are awful and no one should build them. Please, don’t say “fampany”. Blizzard’s incredible, punitive reaction to a pro-player speaking out about Hong Kong. UsTwo Games got [...]

Tom F, Alex and Marsh discuss the voxely promise of Teardown and existential terror of Microsoft Flight Simulator, return to Destiny redux, play some holes in What the Golf? and get nailed by every pixel in Noita. Put that in your leviathan and smoke it. Admire the restrained scope and exquisite smashiness of Teardown by [...]

Tom F and Chris break into the pod chamber to discuss the latest wave of gaming subscription programmes, the pipe edge situations of Overland, and some game about a goose you probably haven’t heard of. You’ve always got some redundant beans. The subs models in question are Apple Arcade, Xbox Game Pass, Humble Monthly and [...]

Chris, Tom S and Marsh discuss The Hunt: Showdown, Nocked! True Tales of Robin Hood and Astral Chain. Plus things that tinkle and jangle, things that waggle to make friars happy and things that should be renamed, remade and covered with moons. It’s a busy weekend for game releases: honk at a farmer in Untitled [...]

Chris, Tom F, Alex and… Marsh (!) discuss Wilmot’s Warehouse, Guild Wars 2, Slay The Spire’s new class and Control. Plus: what’s that wizard’s problem anyway, the tricky issue of endings, David Cage’s Hamlet, and so on. One is a box in Wilmot’s Warehouse. Here’s the excellent trailer, featuring Pip! Six birthdays all at once [...]

Tom F and Alex are joined by special guest Mike Cook: AI researcher, indie dev, and friend of the podcast. We get into AI judging games, combining games, designing games, and failing to understand what’s so good about walls. Also discussed: long Cebs in The International, dialogue style in A Short Hike, gossip in Fire [...]

Chris, Tom F and Alex discuss Dicey Dungeons, Jupiter Hell, Exanima and Fire Emblem. Plus: arguably the worst way of categorising games we’ve ever come up with, and that’s saying something. I’m sorry, but for physics reasons I need you to cradle me and lower me to the earth. We’ve all been playing Dicey Dungeons, [...]

Chris, Pip and Tom F briefly return to autobattlers before discussing A Short Hike, Stones of Solace, Islanders, and the faults of a variety of algorithms. All this, just so that an otter can say well done. Pip’s lives in Teamfight Tactics now. …with breaks for Stones of Solace. Tom has taken A Short Hike [...]

Chris and both Toms wander in late to discuss assorted retro shooters, Nowhere Prophet, Fire Emblem, naughty semaphore, and additional tepid takes. I’m a murder president on the go, and I need my fix. Tom S’s been playing a big pile of all-caps retro shooters, including AMID EVIL, DUSK, Ion Fury. Tom F has been [...]

Tom F, Chris and Alex use videogames’ full name as they discuss Kingdom Come, Bloodstained, Griftlands, Mechanicus, The Witcher 3 and more. Chris has been pondering Kingdom Come: Deliverance and Warhammer 40,000: Mechanicus. Alex has been developing an art collection in Assassin’s Creed: It’s A Real Journey and Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night. Tom’s been [...]