Episode 373: Gary Barlow’s Space Crusade

Marsh, Tom S and Chris look back over the week of E3 announcements, from Giancarlo Esposito’s opinion of dictators, to the reveal of Peter Quiff in Guardians Of The Galaxy, to the onslaught of Left 4 Deadlikes. Also discussed: several dozen other E3 reveals, plus Tom’s new computer ennui, and Chris’s fondness for Chivalry 2.

• Giancarlo Esposito was interviewed by Geoff Keighley during this year’s E3, with chat about, uh, dictators and astrology.
• Weezer also played during the show, but maybe they shouldn’t have.
• Then the founders of Deviation Games arrived to announce what good friends they were. Their company website is quite something.
• Fall Guys is getting a bean with a boob window, but maybe it shouldn’t have.
• The gang blast through some Summer Game Fest announcements, so let’s do the same: Death Stranding: Director’s Cut is coming, as if the original wasn’t self-indulgent enough; an Evil Dead game exists; there’s a spate of Left4likes coming, including The Anacrusis, Back 4 Blood and Redfall; Planet Of Lana was a Limbolike among many; and Geoff got to gift Elden Ring to the stream chat.
• Bethesda showed more of Starfield than a logo, but no actual game.
• Stalker 2: Heart Of Chernobyl is entering into the crowded Stalker genre.
• Contraband is a an open world co-op game from the makers of Just Cause.
• Sea Of Thieves is getting a Pirates Of The Caribbean tie-in ten years too late.
• Battlefield 2042 is a big war and we like it.
• 12 Minutes is a time loop game about Willem Dafoe telling you off. Marsh compares it to Masq; Tom S confuses it with Facade.
• Psychonauts 2 yep, yes.
• Somerville is a new Limbolike coming from the co-founder of Limbo creator Playdead.
• Halo Infinite’s multiplayer is free and that is good.
• The rat game is back in A Plague Tale: Requiem.
• The slime game is back in Slime Rancher 2.
• Atomic Heart continues to wow with its character design.
• Replaced has pixel art with luxurious lighting and a camera seemingly inspired by martial arts films.
• Forza Horizon 5 looked amazing and was Tom’s game of E3.
• Rainbow Six Extraction uses the tools an destruction of R6: Siege for a co-op monster slayer.
• Avatar has finally achieved its inevitable form as an open world Ubisoft game in Avatar: Frontiers Of Pandora.
• The Square Enix conference began with Marvel’s Guardians Of The Galaxy. Marsh is right, I did hate it.
• Babylon’s Fall did not stick in the memory.
• Life Is Strange: True Colours gives you a new psychic power: empathy.
• Stranger Of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin inspired more conversation than any other game of E3. A kind of victory.
• Chris has been waving swords about in Chivalry 2, which launched this past week.

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Our intro music is by The Mandibles from their track Clambake. Many of the band members now tour as Count Bobo And The Bullion.