Speaker 1: Welcome to Tech Stuff, a production from iHeartRadio. Hey there,
Speaker 1: and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland.
Speaker 1: I'm an executive producer with iHeart Podcasts and how the
Speaker 1: Tech are you? Yes? Our cavalcade of special guests continues today.
Speaker 1: My dear friend and next door neighbor back when we
Speaker 1: were working at Pont City Market, Annie and her co
Speaker 1: host Samantha from Stuff Mom Never Told You are here.
Speaker 1: Welcome to the show.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for having us. This is very exciting.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I love that we finally get to work together.
Speaker 3: It's been years since we've been in the same network,
Speaker 3: and now I get to officially work with you. Amazing.
Speaker 3: I'm so excited.
Speaker 1: I'm excited too. Like I've seen Samantha, we've met in
Speaker 1: person a couple of times, but we have never had
Speaker 1: a chance to work on a show together. Will I
Speaker 1: was listening to stuff Mom Never Told You recently with
Speaker 1: I think it was Joey who was on talking about
Speaker 1: dating in New York, and it made me laugh so
Speaker 1: hard because Joey's younger than my marriage is. I'm in
Speaker 1: my twenty eighth year of being married and so listening
Speaker 1: to like the trials and tribulations of dating in the
Speaker 1: modern age. I was sitting there thinking about back before
Speaker 1: I was married and what dating was like. And the
Speaker 1: funny thing is I met my partner online, but it
Speaker 1: was in a telnet chat room, which anyone out there
Speaker 1: who knows what a tellnet chat room is welcome to
Speaker 1: being old.
Speaker 2: That's amazing.
Speaker 3: I really kind of want that story now.
Speaker 1: Oh well, tell you why you have me on your show,
Speaker 1: and I'll tell you all about it, Okay, because here's
Speaker 1: the thing, I got no tech stuffs left to talk
Speaker 1: about this kind of stuff. I'm out on January tenth.
Speaker 1: January tenth, I am gone. And just so, just so
Speaker 1: y'all know, I mean, I don't think you even are
Speaker 1: aware of who the new hosts are, but certainly my
Speaker 1: listeners aren't because I haven't told them yet. That's going
Speaker 1: to be a New year reveal, So it does. Have
Speaker 1: you not done the email? Oh no, you're starting off
Speaker 1: with a Chad GBT savior or demon demon? No you
Speaker 1: know it already. Uh No, Today you brought forth a
Speaker 1: topic that I was so excited by because, as it
Speaker 1: you discovered once our notes started to fill out, it
Speaker 1: turns out I'm a big fan of this particular genre
Speaker 1: of video games. You wanted to talk about cozy games?
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, indeed, And I think this is gonna be
Speaker 2: really fun because I think we're all coming at this
Speaker 2: from different experiences, so we're really excited to talk about it.
Speaker 2: One of the reasons we wanted to talk about it
Speaker 2: is one because Samantha's had like an amazing cozy journey.
Speaker 2: But to as you kind of alluded to with chat GPT,
Speaker 2: we were trying to think of a tech topic that
Speaker 2: wasn't going to be very depressing, and it was a
Speaker 2: little difficult because right now is a high stress time
Speaker 2: a lot of us maybe are looking for some relief,
Speaker 2: especially as the year comes to a quotes, So we
Speaker 2: thought cozy gaming, that's that's a good topic.
Speaker 1: Much better than let's talk about Elon Musk. So I appreciate.
Speaker 3: It, right. I mean, we definitely went in to talk
Speaker 3: about we could talk about deep fakes, Oh no, that's
Speaker 3: really sad. We could talk about you know, all those
Speaker 3: other AI ventures. But coming back to cozy games, which
Speaker 3: is something that I have found joy in in the
Speaker 3: last few years and really have had Annie and even
Speaker 3: our super producer Christina navigate me through this world because
Speaker 3: gaming is not something that I would typically would say
Speaker 3: is something that I do up until recently, and the
Speaker 3: cozy gaming world really has made it so much more welcoming,
Speaker 3: I think, especially for people for us and loss people
Speaker 3: who are jumping into gaming.
Speaker 1: World absolutely and even old fogies like me like I
Speaker 1: reach a certain point where my hand eye coordination isn't
Speaker 1: what it used to be. I don't have the twitch
Speaker 1: skills of the young ands out there. I was raised
Speaker 1: on games like the pac Man's you know, and the
Speaker 1: Gala is not so much the call of duties. And
Speaker 1: also I never really like competition. I always preferred collaborative
Speaker 1: and cooperative games. Even with board games, I much prefer
Speaker 1: that style. So cozy games speaks to me because I
Speaker 1: like an environment that fosters joy and wants all the
Speaker 1: participants to experience that joy, not joy that one person
Speaker 1: feels at the expense of everybody else. Not that there's
Speaker 1: anything necessarily wrong with that kind of gaming, it just
Speaker 1: doesn't appeal.
Speaker 2: To me right, And I know all the gamers in
Speaker 2: my life enjoy cozy games, whereas people who like cozy
Speaker 2: games the same isn't true about non cozy games, so
Speaker 2: I feel like they're very welcoming to people, and I
Speaker 2: guess that brings us to the question, just to start off,
Speaker 2: what is cozy gaming. I know you've talked about it before,
Speaker 2: but we like to have a good solid definition here,
Speaker 2: and people disagree. People like to disagree about what exactly
Speaker 2: it is. But they're often described as something that's somewhat
Speaker 2: mindless but still involved. They usually don't have violence or
Speaker 2: competition in the same way non cozy games have them.
Speaker 2: Players can't really lose or feel guilty about letting someone
Speaker 2: down like in a multiplayer game. They usually have soothing
Speaker 2: in pretty graphics and music, fairly simple task and controls.
Speaker 2: They're inclusive and safe for all. They're low stress and
Speaker 2: sort of a vibe, sort of a feeling, and after
Speaker 2: you play them, you generally feel calm and happy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's some overlap with the genre of casual games,
Speaker 1: but I feel like the term casual games is almost
Speaker 1: like a kind of like it's like shade right, people
Speaker 1: quote unquote real gamers will dismiss something that falls into
Speaker 1: casual games. And certainly there are bad casual games out there.
Speaker 1: There are bad games in every genre. It would be
Speaker 1: disingenuous to say every game that falls into the cozy
Speaker 1: or casual bucket is great, but the same is true
Speaker 1: for any other genre as well. And I think the
Speaker 1: quote unquote true gamers, well, there's a lot of air
Speaker 1: quotes I'm doing, which is weird for an audio podcast,
Speaker 1: but I think that they would paint all of them
Speaker 1: with the same brush, and I think that's unfortunate, it's reductive,
Speaker 1: it's not surprising for at least certain segments of the
Speaker 1: gaming culture. We'll get into more of that later as well,
Speaker 1: but yeah, I think there's certainly a real place for this,
Speaker 1: particularly in a world where people are trying to find
Speaker 1: ways to reduce anxiety, to be able to take their
Speaker 1: mind off things that might be troubling them while not
Speaker 1: engaging in an activity that is just inherently harmful to themselves.
Speaker 3: And I think it's interesting because when we have these
Speaker 3: conversations about gaming in general, the biggest money maker out
Speaker 3: there and people really want to discredit it, is mobile gaming.
Speaker 3: And that was one of the big conversations we had
Speaker 3: when we talked about cozy gaming and what they want
Speaker 3: to qualify as true gaming. And again, you kind of
Speaker 3: talked about this with the real gamers quote unquote, but
Speaker 3: the level of competition that's there. But when you look
Speaker 3: at what is making a dent in capitalism, which you
Speaker 3: know that counts for more for anything else, right, it
Speaker 3: is mobile gaming. It is the number one money maker
Speaker 3: for that gaming industry. So it's interesting when we have
Speaker 3: this conversation and the amount of women and marginalized people
Speaker 3: who actually have access to something that is easily there
Speaker 3: and really great to take your mind off things. Is
Speaker 3: playing five minutes of what used to be snake y'all
Speaker 3: remember that game? Oh yeah, you know, like those types
Speaker 3: of games that have come back a little bit, and
Speaker 3: it helped with dementia and help with like everyday warplay.
Speaker 3: It's actually a really great way to go. But people
Speaker 3: want to dismiss it so quickly because they don't want
Speaker 3: to say this is true gaming.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and yet these are the games that often can
Speaker 1: go viral across all demographics. Like I wouldn't necessarily say
Speaker 1: that wordle falls into the category of cozy game, but
Speaker 1: certainly a casual game. And I don't know if you
Speaker 1: guys remember this, and I apologize for guys. I don't
Speaker 1: know if you folks have remembered this, but about four
Speaker 1: years ago, there was this little bug that was going
Speaker 1: around and like a lot of us were like stuck
Speaker 1: at home, and then it seemed like this game called
Speaker 1: Wordle brought everybody together in a way. And back then
Speaker 1: before it was x X was this thing called Twitter,
Speaker 1: which wasn't terrible. I mean it was bad, but it
Speaker 1: wasn't as bad. And I just remember, like so many
Speaker 1: of my friends would their Twitter status would just be
Speaker 1: their Wordle score for the day, Like for the first
Speaker 1: like three weeks, I was like, I don't know what
Speaker 1: the hell these boxes mean.
Speaker 3: I had that moment a lot, and I will say,
Speaker 3: you know what, for those out there, this was a
Speaker 3: pickup line. One dude, you's a chill group of us
Speaker 3: talking about Wordle. So it opens up so much when
Speaker 3: you talk about these mobile games.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it's a great unifier.
Speaker 2: It does. And that's kind of going back to what
Speaker 2: you've said about preferring those kind of cooperative, collaborative games.
Speaker 2: A lot of these are really fun because when the
Speaker 2: pandemic happened, we were looking for both stress relief but
Speaker 2: also some companionship, some way to connect to other people,
Speaker 2: and these games were great for that. Yeah, you go
Speaker 2: on Twitter and see someone's wordle score and you're like, oh, Like,
Speaker 2: it was just a really fun way when we couldn't
Speaker 2: hang out in person necessarily and share these experiences. And
Speaker 2: I think that is a big part of cozy games
Speaker 2: as well. I am kind of shy, so I usually
Speaker 2: played cozy games by myself, but it is a big
Speaker 2: part for some people that you can connect with other
Speaker 2: people online in this way.
Speaker 1: Well, And even though I'm an extrovert, I am like you.
Speaker 1: I often for most of my cozy gaming I'm playing
Speaker 1: the single player version of that. I mean, I love collaboration,
Speaker 1: but there's so few games out there that I connect
Speaker 1: with that are also collaborative and I feel like I'm
Speaker 1: welcomed into that community. Sometimes you get into a game
Speaker 1: pretty late, and it's like if you're the first new
Speaker 1: friend in an established group of friends that have been
Speaker 1: established for like ten years, and they're all joking and
Speaker 1: using references that the rest of the group knows and
Speaker 1: you do not, and you're like, well, this is a mistake.
Speaker 1: I should probably go somewhere else. And that's kind of
Speaker 1: how I feel for some of these online communities, and
Speaker 1: it's no shade on them either. They're having fun with
Speaker 1: their established communities. It's just sometimes it can be hard
Speaker 1: to make an inroad. But the games themselves, the things
Speaker 1: that make a cozy game cozy, that welcoming sense of joy,
Speaker 1: that's something that I certainly could use more of in
Speaker 1: my life, and I love that we have. I have
Speaker 1: lots of different examples that we'll talk about, and you know,
Speaker 1: not that much crossover, although there is one game on
Speaker 1: Annie's list that I have to a billion percent back up.
Speaker 1: But it's also the game that you can't talk about
Speaker 1: because to really enjoy it, you need to go in
Speaker 1: knowing nothing about it. Gone Home is the game. Oh yes,
Speaker 1: so good, but you can't. Don't don't look anything up,
Speaker 1: don't read about it, just play it because I cried
Speaker 1: at that game. That one made me cry. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I want to. I want to chat about some of
Speaker 1: the examples we have here, Like you you have some
Speaker 1: of the popular examples with Animal Crossing. I mean that
Speaker 1: one went crazy popular in the pandemic. It came out
Speaker 1: just as the pandemic was creating lockdown, and like it
Speaker 1: was like it became a pop culture moment in circles
Speaker 1: that I follow at any rate.
Speaker 2: Oh yes, oh yes, it came out at like the
Speaker 2: right time. And I think this is actually a great
Speaker 2: segue into talking about how we all got into cozy games,
Speaker 2: because I remember when that came out. Animal Crossing New
Speaker 2: Horizons is one of the big examples people give for
Speaker 2: cozy games. The other one is Starty Valley. But I
Speaker 2: kind of going back to your original point, I didn't
Speaker 2: start playing Animal Crossing until two years later, and it
Speaker 2: was because Samantha was like, you got to try these
Speaker 2: cozy games.
Speaker 3: So I was trying to use her for fruit.
Speaker 1: Oh of course, yeah. I mean those turnips aren't going
Speaker 1: to grow themselves, right.
Speaker 2: Samantha was using me, But she's been my real like
Speaker 2: open door into this world. So I thought we could
Speaker 2: all talk about how our experiences and how we got
Speaker 2: into it, starting with you, Samantha.
Speaker 3: Yes, I have to put a big caveat on the
Speaker 3: games that I play. I am not really good with
Speaker 3: my hand eye coordination, as you were talking about, it's
Speaker 3: not great. I am that one person that when we
Speaker 3: play Mario Kart that I continuously fall off the track
Speaker 3: like that is my ra And you're gonna know about
Speaker 3: it because I'm like I'm off, I fell again, I'm
Speaker 3: off again, and I'm always last place. So for me,
Speaker 3: trying to just stay on track is my thing, and
Speaker 3: that's that's kind of the theme through everything. So with
Speaker 3: animal Crossing, even though is I love the fishing part,
Speaker 3: I love the collecting and swimming. I just did it recently.
Speaker 3: The new thing right now with the Christmas being around,
Speaker 3: which we just had an episode about holiday themed animal crossing,
Speaker 3: you can build a snowman. I was like, oh wow, okay,
Speaker 3: I want to do this. I have dropped every every
Speaker 3: snowball off the edge of something or crashed it into
Speaker 3: a house, and I'm very upset about this.
Speaker 2: I want you to know.
Speaker 3: But like I'd love the trying to find the peoples
Speaker 3: to come to my island. It does feel like I'm
Speaker 3: starting a bit of a cult, and then also just
Speaker 3: keeping a campground, like like that's my whole experience is
Speaker 3: to collect all the fish, collect all the fossils, which
Speaker 3: I've done y'all, but I haven't gotten all the art pieces.
Speaker 2: I have.
Speaker 3: Any made sure to brag to me about that island.
Speaker 3: It's kind of sad because it still again looks like
Speaker 3: a campground. But I'm like that's what I want. I
Speaker 3: want to be a retreat into the campground, not.
Speaker 1: Like not like, hey, let's turn this into a bustling metropolis.
Speaker 1: Is it Animal Crossing where the snowman will criticize you
Speaker 1: if you don't get the balls just right? Yes? No, yeah?
Speaker 3: Yes?
Speaker 2: Is it trying to give me like, oh, it'll be
Speaker 2: like you tried your best?
Speaker 1: Yeah, the judgment so like if the head is too
Speaker 1: small or too large in relation to the body, and
Speaker 1: the Snowman's like, what are you even doing?
Speaker 2: See?
Speaker 3: Yeah, now now I'm even more upset. And I even't
Speaker 3: even done it. I haven't even I can't even get
Speaker 3: it together to make one.
Speaker 1: So I haven't played Animal Crossing. One are the YouTube
Speaker 1: video channels I watch outside Xbox did a whole thing
Speaker 1: about it. When I saw that, it made me laugh
Speaker 1: so hard. They're talking about how you know certain games
Speaker 1: that that neg you when you when you when you
Speaker 1: when you mess up a basic thing in the game.
Speaker 1: But like, legitimately this is challenging to dude, get it,
Speaker 1: just because it's hard to judge in the game when
Speaker 1: you're at that level. But overall, Animal Crossing certainly checks
Speaker 1: all those cozy boxes so you got into that. That
Speaker 1: was kind of your your journey into cozy gaming.
Speaker 3: One of the things that happened is my partner is
Speaker 3: a gamer and loves to play games, and he's been
Speaker 3: trying to get me into gaming in general. So Overcooked
Speaker 3: was his beginning with me. Huge mistake. Again, I'm not
Speaker 3: competitive yelling at me about cooking something just right, yea
Speaker 3: all over the place. We did not fight, I will
Speaker 3: give you that. So our relationship is strong. I've determined that.
Speaker 3: But he then like I said, let's try Animal Crossing.
Speaker 3: I think you'll like this, and it did the trying
Speaker 3: to find the again, like finding the biggest fish that's
Speaker 3: worth the most amount of money. Let's do this getting
Speaker 3: the singer to come onto our island. I love it.
Speaker 3: I don't know if you know, Like you said, you
Speaker 3: haven't played this, Jonathan.
Speaker 1: I haven't, but I've I listened to a lot of
Speaker 1: shows of people who have played it, so I feel
Speaker 1: kind of like I've semi experienced elements of the game
Speaker 1: just through osmosis.
Speaker 3: I think you should try it. I would be interested
Speaker 3: to see what kind of village island you create. Like
Speaker 3: I have a good friend who's made his entire island goth,
Speaker 3: but like chic Goth, I don't understand how that happened.
Speaker 3: He has displays everywhere and Annie, well, Annie, you need
Speaker 3: to talk about your island obviously, Okay.
Speaker 2: So basically what happened was Samantha went.
Speaker 1: Any story that starts with basically what happened.
Speaker 2: Basically, Samantha went from like, I'm not a gamer to
Speaker 2: hear all these games you need to play, and she
Speaker 2: was like, we're going to do an episode. It's research based,
Speaker 2: so you need to go play these cozy games. And
Speaker 2: she gave me all these recommendations. One of them was
Speaker 2: Animal Crossing. And the funny thing about me is that
Speaker 2: I'm a completionist. I want those achievements. So I knew
Speaker 2: That's why I didn't start playing Animal Crossing, because I
Speaker 2: knew it never ends really, so I was like, I'm
Speaker 2: just going to be trapped in some hellscape where I'm
Speaker 2: checking the mail, like I don't want this, but she
Speaker 2: convinced me to do it, and I of course made
Speaker 2: mine very Star Wars semed. It's got a Star song,
Speaker 2: it's got a Star Wars flag. Everybody says Star Wars slogans.
Speaker 2: But because I'm such a completionist. I completed that damn
Speaker 2: museum and I quit.
Speaker 1: I'm done this and no further.
Speaker 2: Yeah. But it's just really funny because I know I'd
Speaker 2: like have the exact opposite experience with cozy games, where
Speaker 2: I'm like, no, I'll play my like horror game a
Speaker 2: million times and it's great, But a cozy game, I'm
Speaker 2: so stressed because I where's the end?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I hear you. Yeah, there's certain ones where you
Speaker 1: can theoretically reach the end of the content, but even
Speaker 1: those occasionally will get massive updates and it'll you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's like the Mafia. Just when you thought you
Speaker 1: were out that you get pulled right back in. And
Speaker 1: So I have a whole bunch of games that are
Speaker 1: listed on this section, but I'm just going to talk
Speaker 1: about one and maybe mention the others when we chat
Speaker 1: about some of our favorites. But Starduck Valley is the
Speaker 1: game they got me into cozy games. Now. Stardu Valley
Speaker 1: has some elements to it that also include, like if
Speaker 1: you're going into the minds, there's combat and stuff, but
Speaker 1: that's not the prime focus of the game. That's one element.
Speaker 1: Most of it is about setting up a farm and
Speaker 1: creating relationships with all the villagers that live in the
Speaker 1: little town, and maybe even finding yourself a match. There
Speaker 1: are certain members of the town who are romancible. You can,
Speaker 1: if you're a jerk, get into a committed relationship and
Speaker 1: then ruin it by flirting with somebody else. It's it's
Speaker 1: such fun. Concerned Ape is the name of the guy
Speaker 1: or the handle of the guy who created it. He's
Speaker 1: got another game that's that's been in development for years
Speaker 1: now that I am highly anticipated, called Haunted Chocolate. Cannot
Speaker 1: wait to see that. It sounds like it's going to
Speaker 1: have a lot of sort of shared DNA the Stardoo
Speaker 1: Valley but yeah, Stardio Valley. I literally have more than
Speaker 1: one hundred hours of game time in that game because
Speaker 1: I would start over and try different things, like well,
Speaker 1: what if I start a relationship with this village or
Speaker 1: instead of that one? What happens? Can I fix him?
Speaker 1: The answer to that last question is no. Just like
Speaker 1: in real life, like I had never done any video
Speaker 1: game modding. I've been playing games since I was a kid,
Speaker 1: and I'm fifty. So when I say when I was
Speaker 1: a kid, I was playing games like River Raid, which
Speaker 1: by the way, developed by a woman, Carol Shaw, phenomenal
Speaker 1: game that was on the Atari twenty six hundred. But
Speaker 1: I've been playing games since I was a kid. It
Speaker 1: was the cozy games I started playing really with Starduo Valley.
Speaker 1: I got to the point where I was modding it,
Speaker 1: which added new villagers and new areas to explore, and
Speaker 1: just recently this past year, Concerned Ape released a huge
Speaker 1: update to the game to make it one point six.
Speaker 1: So even in a game like that where at first
Speaker 1: it feels like there's a beginning, middle, and end, and
Speaker 1: then you can continue past the end, but the story's
Speaker 1: pretty much over, it's never a guarantee because some of
Speaker 1: those cozy developers just figure out, hey, I want to
Speaker 1: add a little more to that world I created, and
Speaker 1: next thing you know, you're right back in it. And
Speaker 1: it's crazy too, because of course, the sale in the
Speaker 1: case of Stardu Valley has already been made. It's not
Speaker 1: one of those games where it's like a subscription based
Speaker 1: thing where you've you know, you're paying every month to
Speaker 1: play this game. You purchased it already. Concerned Ape has
Speaker 1: no obligation to keep developing this title, and yet he
Speaker 1: continues to do it, So U a true hero, I would,
Speaker 1: I would say, but yeah, that was the game that
Speaker 1: pulled me into it, and since then there are countless
Speaker 1: games I would argue fall into the cozy category that
Speaker 1: I have, I have explored and I can't wait to
Speaker 1: talk more about coziness. But my producer is holding up
Speaker 1: a knife and pointing it at me, so I think
Speaker 1: we need to take a quick ad break or else
Speaker 1: things are going to get an awful lot less cozy.
Speaker 1: All right, we're back, and my producer has given me
Speaker 1: the friends symbol of smashing two wrists together, so I
Speaker 1: think we all know what that means. It means it's
Speaker 1: time to get back to talking about cozy games.
Speaker 3: Never part of gold, Yes, but yeah no, I was
Speaker 3: wondering because Stardoo Valley, Animal Crossing and I have another game,
Speaker 3: Cozy Grove are all real time games I have. Like
Speaker 3: my partner loves Started Valley again. Our executive producer, Christina
Speaker 3: loves Stardoo Valley. If you let them go, do they
Speaker 3: like start like all their food rots? Does that all
Speaker 3: that happen? Does all the crops and all that they've
Speaker 3: worked so hard? Do they go away?
Speaker 1: Crops will stay ready for harvesting until you harvest them
Speaker 1: or if the season changes. So each season is twenty
Speaker 1: eight days long, and so once once spring turns to summer,
Speaker 1: for example, any spring crops you had that were either
Speaker 1: still in the growing phase or were unharvested, because you know,
Speaker 1: some crops take longer to grow than others if you
Speaker 1: don't plant it out properly. I mean there are people
Speaker 1: who make spreadsheets with this stuff. I never got that
Speaker 1: tactical with it. Let's say you plant something that takes
Speaker 1: you know, eight days to grow, but you did it
Speaker 1: on three days before the end of the season. Well,
Speaker 1: then once the first day of summer starts, all of
Speaker 1: those crops are now dead and you have to clear
Speaker 1: them with a scythe and then start over with summer
Speaker 1: crops because spring crops won't survive into summer. With a
Speaker 1: few exceptions, there's some crops that do span two different seasons,
Speaker 1: So if you plant them early in season one, they'll
Speaker 1: go all the way through season two, and some of
Speaker 1: them will continually generate vegetables or fruit, depending upon what
Speaker 1: the crop is. So like corn, corn keeps producing, but
Speaker 1: if it's something like a melon, once you harvest it,
Speaker 1: that's gone, you have to plant something new in its place,
Speaker 1: or just say that's it. So the nice thing is
Speaker 1: about this game is that you can be obsessive and
Speaker 1: use spreadsheets and everything to plan everything out. There's nothing
Speaker 1: wrong with that. That's a legitimate form of gaming. Or
Speaker 1: you can be like me where you're like, whoopsie, Daisy
Speaker 1: shouldn't have planted that. Then could have held on to
Speaker 1: it till the next year. But whatever, it's summertime. Let's
Speaker 1: plant some other stuff. And that's what I love about
Speaker 1: the game is that there's not a right way to
Speaker 1: play it. I mean, you can men max, but I'm
Speaker 1: just not that type of player. I've never been a
Speaker 1: men maxer, so I don't sweat it and it helps
Speaker 1: me a lot.
Speaker 3: Okay, you know, I think when we talk about games
Speaker 3: now start a value. Yeah, they had the seasons, it's
Speaker 3: not like real time of seasons. Yeah, but games like
Speaker 3: Animal Crossing. Specifically with Animal Crossing, it gives you a
Speaker 3: new venture because you can visit each other's islands. I
Speaker 3: still love the Elijah Wood story about Animal Crossing. That
Speaker 3: really pushed it to an element of like, oh, there's
Speaker 3: a celebrity let's go, let's see if we can get
Speaker 3: him to come to our island type of conversation. But
Speaker 3: it really opens up where during that pandemic era where
Speaker 3: we were all quarantined or trying to people were able
Speaker 3: to actually still have fun, Like you don't have to
Speaker 3: be right next to each other. I have visited Annie's island.
Speaker 3: I haven't visited recently. I need to see the finished product.
Speaker 3: You can do dream states where you go and visit
Speaker 3: people's island without interacting with people, but it's actually people's islands.
Speaker 3: Like this level of gaming is such a different, unique perspective.
Speaker 3: It could be dangerous if you too get a different way,
Speaker 3: but wind in appropriately. It's so fun because I have
Speaker 3: brought people back into Animal crossing, just like Annie after
Speaker 3: the fact, because I am real slow in catching up
Speaker 3: with the times and like what the fads are and
Speaker 3: I get to interact with them and they get to
Speaker 3: show off their island, even not right next to each other.
Speaker 3: Like it's a fantastic way that this level of community
Speaker 3: is able to attach to a game like this, And
Speaker 3: I think that's a big part of what makes these
Speaker 3: appealing is that safety, that safety that it kind of
Speaker 3: brings as well as that soft, warm feeling that we
Speaker 3: talk about when it comes to obviously cozy. So this
Speaker 3: is such a great opening for so many people who
Speaker 3: just want to occupy some time once again without having
Speaker 3: to remember how awful things can be or agree well.
Speaker 1: And it gives you a chance to see into other
Speaker 1: people's approach to creativity, which I love. I think of
Speaker 1: it equivalent to there's a concept within tech about open source, right,
Speaker 1: this idea of you are creating something and you're leaving
Speaker 1: it open for other people to be able to see
Speaker 1: how you're doing it. They can actually contribute to the development.
Speaker 1: In some cases, they are free to take what you
Speaker 1: did and build upon that, maybe in a brand new way.
Speaker 1: And I feel like elements of that philosophy are inherent
Speaker 1: in some of these cozy games as well, where it
Speaker 1: is this openness. And one of the best things about
Speaker 1: open source, in my opinion, is that it allows for
Speaker 1: people who otherwise never would have been able to participate
Speaker 1: in that particular project to take part in it, and
Speaker 1: the project benefits from their participation. Because if you have
Speaker 1: a closed project, you might have some really smart people
Speaker 1: working on that they're really really smart, but you're limited
Speaker 1: to the people who are in the room. When it's open,
Speaker 1: it's practically unlimited. I mean, as long as someone has access,
Speaker 1: they can contribute. And it doesn't matter how big that room,
Speaker 1: that closed room was, you're still going to find the
Speaker 1: best ideas in that open environment. Same sort of thing
Speaker 1: with this approach to cozy games, where you're gonna see
Speaker 1: stuff that Whenever I see any of these videos of
Speaker 1: people who have meticulously crafted their islands and animal crossing,
Speaker 1: I just sit there and think, like, how many hours
Speaker 1: does that represent? I mean, it's phenomenal. You've done an
Speaker 1: amazing job. I don't think of it as a waste
Speaker 1: of time. I think of it as an incredible expression
Speaker 1: that you know, you took these tools that were meant
Speaker 1: to be a game and you turned it into art.
Speaker 1: That's kind of phenomenal, and you're sharing it for free
Speaker 1: with people, or maybe not for free, maybe they got
Speaker 1: to bring a turn up or two, but they still
Speaker 1: get to go see it.
Speaker 2: Yes, And I think there is absolutely a reason why
Speaker 2: they're so popular and why they are so popular right now.
Speaker 2: And the pandemic was a big one, and during the
Speaker 2: pandemic they really took off because we were looking for
Speaker 2: this way to connect to find stress relief, and that
Speaker 2: has translated to so many new games, and so many
Speaker 2: of them that are so interesting and new, which we'll
Speaker 2: talk about, but also a lot of money, like an
Speaker 2: estimated three hundred and twenty billion dollars by twenty twenty six,
Speaker 2: and a lot more gamers three point two billion gamers
Speaker 2: worldwide by the end of twenty twenty three. That's a
Speaker 2: lot of people. And with that, coinciding with the rise
Speaker 2: of cozy games, we've seen the rise of women and
Speaker 2: non binary people and trans people who are developers. I
Speaker 2: haven't found anything that's a direct link, but it's pretty
Speaker 2: telling that we're seeing a lot more of these games,
Speaker 2: and then we're seeing a lot more women and non
Speaker 2: binary people and trans people in the development space. Because
Speaker 2: we also have talked to some developers on our show
Speaker 2: who are saying, you know, it's easier to get in
Speaker 2: in the cozy gaming space as an indie developer doesn't
Speaker 2: have a big studio backing her. And so I think
Speaker 2: when we're talking about that, when we're talking about people
Speaker 2: in the gaming world, this creativity of seeing what someone
Speaker 2: does on their island, but also the creativity of having
Speaker 2: more developers in the space and seeing what comes of that.
Speaker 2: I've just really really enjoyed. I love seeing a game
Speaker 2: that doesn't have the traditional like this is victory model.
Speaker 2: I love seeing the different ways people are redefining games.
Speaker 2: It's just so fun because games are such a great
Speaker 2: storytelling medium, or just even a pretty space where it
Speaker 2: feels nice and safe and you can connect with people
Speaker 2: that way. There's just so much vast fertile ground for
Speaker 2: new types of games, So I have really loved that
Speaker 2: coming out of this.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think there has been a real convergence, both
Speaker 1: with the rise of the popularity of cozy games and
Speaker 1: the welcome trend of more women, non binary, and trans
Speaker 1: game developers getting traction in a space that traditionally has
Speaker 1: favored men. I mentioned River Raid being made by Carol Shaw,
Speaker 1: and of course that's not the only example of an
Speaker 1: early game developed by a woman. Women have been involved
Speaker 1: in game development since games have been a thing, right,
Speaker 1: whether you're talking about video games or just games in general,
Speaker 1: but more often than not, their stories were kind of ignored,
Speaker 1: are just simply not not addressed. While you would hear
Speaker 1: about you know, Nolan Bushnell or something you know, you
Speaker 1: hear about all the men, especially the business leaders responsible
Speaker 1: for establishing game studios and that sort of thing. And
Speaker 1: I like the fact that that women and non binary
Speaker 1: and trans game developers are having a moment, you know, like,
Speaker 1: and I'm hoping it's just the beginning of a moment
Speaker 1: that lasts from here on out, so that we're not
Speaker 1: telling the same heterogeneous story over and over and over again.
Speaker 1: And it's also nice to be able to talk about
Speaker 1: something that isn't a terrible story, like toxic work culture
Speaker 1: at a company like Ubisoft or Activision Blizzard, like anyone
Speaker 1: who's done any research into gaming, Ultimately, you're going to
Speaker 1: come across those stories. The nice thing is it doesn't
Speaker 1: have to be like that. It's not like that everywhere,
Speaker 1: and there are stories of people who are in a
Speaker 1: safe space to be creative and to develop games and
Speaker 1: to create things that speak to a very wide audience.
Speaker 1: And you know, I'm living proof, Like I'm a straight
Speaker 1: white man who loves cozy games. It's not like these
Speaker 1: games aren't meant for you so you can't play them.
Speaker 1: They're so welcoming that even a demo like me gets
Speaker 1: to go and play with everybody's toys and I love it.
Speaker 3: Yes.
Speaker 2: And you know, when we first started talking about cozy
Speaker 2: games on Spinty, Samantha did all this research to see
Speaker 2: like what's up here, and there was a lot of
Speaker 2: like our women, Is it more women playing cozy games?
Speaker 2: And there was some research that suggested that, but it
Speaker 2: was mostly like pretty small percentage wise. I think it
Speaker 2: was just because the narrative has so long been this
Speaker 2: is what a game is, but women, wait a minute,
Speaker 2: they're playing this, and they're playing mobile games, and that
Speaker 2: goes into what we've been kind of alluding to, of
Speaker 2: that discussion of what's a real game and what's a
Speaker 2: real gamer. And in my opinion, like I read somebody
Speaker 2: wrote it like that's like saying somebody who reads a
Speaker 2: children's book and a different book, Like they're all books.
Speaker 2: At the end of the day, they're all books. Like
Speaker 2: why are we casting one is not a real game
Speaker 2: or it's lesser, And oftentimes it's because it's seen as
Speaker 2: something more feminine. There's like a lot of gender essentialism
Speaker 2: of like, oh, it's more like social and empathetic, that's
Speaker 2: more for women, But plenty of women like violent games too.
Speaker 2: I'm somebody who likes all kinds of games. I don't
Speaker 2: know why. Well, like I do because on the show
Speaker 2: we do, but we always have to gender things in
Speaker 2: this way. It's unnecess yeah, unnecessary.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, no, like anecdotally, like some of the creators,
Speaker 1: like the content creators that I follow, who are you know,
Speaker 1: they're not developers, but they're players in the space. A
Speaker 1: lot of the women that I follow, you know, they're
Speaker 1: playing incredibly competitive you know, triple A title, violent games,
Speaker 1: you know. And I find all the pigeonholing and stereotyping
Speaker 1: to be really frustrating. It also does not help that
Speaker 1: there are video game developers out there who are trying
Speaker 1: to capitalize on a female audience, and so they're making
Speaker 1: a game they think women will like, which is the
Speaker 1: equivalent in the tech space of hey, let's make this
Speaker 1: thing pink and then women will buy it. It is
Speaker 1: the most insulting, reductive thing you can imagine. And those
Speaker 1: are some of the games I would say are bad games.
Speaker 1: They're not. Maybe the gameplay is fine, but the presentation
Speaker 1: is so pandering and and insulting that I can't stand it.
Speaker 1: It's insincere, is what it really comes down to. And
Speaker 1: I don't want that game.
Speaker 3: Right, And even though cozy gaming is not new, like
Speaker 3: the term is fairly new obviously. And then the understanding
Speaker 3: and kind of the I guess industry in itself with
Speaker 3: people trying to jump on board again like big corporations
Speaker 3: like you were talking about, and I found it like
Speaker 3: really reassuring that we see more and more independent companies
Speaker 3: coming out because of games like this. I know you're
Speaker 3: gonna mention one of the games that you love that
Speaker 3: I haven't played yet. I'm gonna it's unpacking. And the
Speaker 3: way that it had developed was through a female, a
Speaker 3: women creator, Rin Bryer, and she worked with an independent
Speaker 3: company in Australia to make this happen. We see when
Speaker 3: things like this. It won so many awards, it has baftis,
Speaker 3: it has all these awards to it because it is
Speaker 3: one of the biggest games out there, but it couldn't
Speaker 3: have happened without it actually being developed with an independent
Speaker 3: gaming company. And I think that's really important to talk
Speaker 3: about that we are seeing more opportunities, Thank goodness, because
Speaker 3: of this. We had a creator on named Renee Gittens
Speaker 3: and loved her. She was fantastic and she is a
Speaker 3: director of Stumbling Cat Studios, which is an independent company,
Speaker 3: and she talked about the struggles of releasing her own game,
Speaker 3: which by the way, is Potions, and it's a really
Speaker 3: cool if you like Stardu.
Speaker 1: Valley, that Potions was fantastic.
Speaker 3: Did you play it?
Speaker 1: Okay?
Speaker 2: So good?
Speaker 3: And she did such an amazing job in creating this
Speaker 3: that the marketing part was kind of shaky and she
Speaker 3: really had to push forward through outlets like TikTok in
Speaker 3: order to have it out there. And I think she's
Speaker 3: things fairly successful now, thank goodness. But like it's independent
Speaker 3: companies like this that really help create a better platform
Speaker 3: and a better results in gaming through their companies.
Speaker 1: I love hearing that a lot. Like that's good, such
Speaker 1: a nice contrast to some of the stories you hear
Speaker 1: from the big established companies, where like there are women
Speaker 1: who say, oh, my time at like Activision Blizzard was
Speaker 1: actually great. I got to work on some fantastic things,
Speaker 1: but there was also this incredibly toxic culture that I
Speaker 1: also had to deal with. And of course there are
Speaker 1: women who said the toxic culture defined their entire experience
Speaker 1: of working at these companies. So hearing about these chances
Speaker 1: for people who don't identify as straight men. Having a
Speaker 1: chance to be able to build in this space is
Speaker 1: really encouraging to me, because I mean, there are entire
Speaker 1: experiences I never would have had if it hadn't been
Speaker 1: for someone taking a chance on a person who doesn't
Speaker 1: fall into what is considered the mold of video game
Speaker 1: designer or you know, video game director or whatever it
Speaker 1: may be. And that's a real shame because you know,
Speaker 1: we would be without some really kick ass games if
Speaker 1: that were the case.
Speaker 3: You said you do potions. How far along are you
Speaker 3: at the beginning.
Speaker 1: Smell, I'm still very early on, still very early on,
Speaker 1: so but I want to I'll give a shout out now,
Speaker 1: but I'll probably shout her out again later. There's a
Speaker 1: content creator who goes by the handle gab Smolders. Gab Smolders.
Speaker 1: I found out about gab Smolders because I'm an old guy.
Speaker 1: I was extremely late to the game of discovering this
Speaker 1: one content creator and not irishman. Top of them. Martintolia
Speaker 1: is how he started off all his videos. His name's
Speaker 1: Jack Septic Guy. That's his handle, Jack Septic Guy. He's big, big,
Speaker 1: big news like huge content creator. I came late to
Speaker 1: the game. Found out his partner is gab Smolders and
Speaker 1: he had her on for a streamer too, and I
Speaker 1: was like, Oh, this person's really cool. And then they
Speaker 1: mentioned that she had her own YouTube video channel, so
Speaker 1: I went and subscribed to that, and so she started
Speaker 1: playing Potions and I was like, yes, so I just haven't.
Speaker 1: I have so little time and so much of it
Speaker 1: is dedicated to Stardu Valley in Disney Dreamlight Valley that
Speaker 1: I have only played a little bit of it.
Speaker 2: Okay, well, okay, this is a good segue into a
Speaker 2: couple of things for me.
Speaker 1: Well, I know, Annie, you have to say something because
Speaker 1: you started and then Tari found another knife. We took
Speaker 1: the first one away from her. This one's bigger, So
Speaker 1: I think we're gonna take another quick break to think
Speaker 1: our sponsors. Tari's staring daggers at me, but the actual
Speaker 1: literal dagger is no longer in her hand, so I
Speaker 1: think it's safe for us to start the episode.
Speaker 2: Oh good story. Well, okay, yes, I do have a
Speaker 2: couple of things I wanted to bring up because after
Speaker 2: all of this was coming out, maybe more women are
Speaker 2: playing games. What does that mean? People were trying.
Speaker 1: To women, they're a thing. Did you know?
Speaker 2: Did you know we could have been making money off
Speaker 2: of this whole demographic. Oh my gosh. It's so frustrating because,
Speaker 2: like you said, women have been creating gays what they've
Speaker 2: been playing games forever, but there was a whole like
Speaker 2: gendered marketing thing that happened in the eighties. And yep, anyway,
Speaker 2: there was a lot of what's going on here. Obviously,
Speaker 2: one of the things that came up was casual games
Speaker 2: and cozy games are easier to pick up, they're more accessible,
Speaker 2: and women we've talked about recently on a recent episode,
Speaker 2: they have less leisure time, So it's quite possible that
Speaker 2: that is one of the reasons is like I can
Speaker 2: just pick this up whenever I have time. I don't
Speaker 2: have to go through the tutorial of how all of
Speaker 2: this works, Like it's pretty simple. In between all the
Speaker 2: other things you've got going on. Social media for the
Speaker 2: first time was actually marketing games towards women. In some
Speaker 2: cases very problematically so as you were mentioning, but it
Speaker 2: is one of the first times where these games were
Speaker 2: being marketed towards women, and things like content creators and
Speaker 2: social media also helped but I think we do have
Speaker 2: to emphasize as well that it has been when you're
Speaker 2: talking about things like Activision, Blizzard, when you're talking about
Speaker 2: online harassment, it's been a space that has often been
Speaker 2: very hostile. And even if somebody didn't outright experience the hostility,
Speaker 2: just the reputation of it was enough to be like, oh,
Speaker 2: I don't want to I'm not welcome in that world.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So this episode overall is all about joy and
Speaker 1: acceptance and accessibility and celebrating connectivity and all this sort
Speaker 1: of thing, but we have to address a very awful,
Speaker 1: terrible elephant in the room. So yeah, I wish I
Speaker 1: could say that the gaming industry and the audience for
Speaker 1: games in general all came to embrace and celebrate the
Speaker 1: fact that there was a more diverse group of gamers
Speaker 1: out there then typically gets represented. But no, that's not
Speaker 1: the way it unfolded. There were trash people who mostly
Speaker 1: gathered on eight chan. If you don't know what eight
Speaker 1: chan is and you've heard of four chan, eight chan
Speaker 1: is four chan but worse, and they got together and
Speaker 1: created a coordinated smear campaign that was targeting women in games,
Speaker 1: whether they were women creators like developers or they were
Speaker 1: in the gaming media industry where they were reporting on games.
Speaker 1: And this ended up getting the name from the actor
Speaker 1: Adam Baldwin. You might remember him from Firefly, a show
Speaker 1: that I used to like to watch. And gamer Gate
Speaker 1: became a thing in twenty fourteen, and on its surface,
Speaker 1: the perpetuators of gamer Gate set it was all about
Speaker 1: addressing and unfair and biased practices in media, in games media.
Speaker 1: In reality, what it was was a harassment campaign that
Speaker 1: specifically singled out women and non binary people in the
Speaker 1: space and tried to run them out of it. And
Speaker 1: this extended beyond just online harassment to things like swatting,
Speaker 1: where they were sending swat teams to people's homes or
Speaker 1: sending disturbing male or sharing ad you know, doxing people online.
Speaker 1: And it was a perfect catalog of all the worst
Speaker 1: behaviors that you would hear about on the internet, all
Speaker 1: directed at women for having the temerity to be both
Speaker 1: women and people who like to play games. And it
Speaker 1: was the worst and it lasted for like two years
Speaker 1: until it kind of died down when enough people said
Speaker 1: that they were no longer buying the cover story of
Speaker 1: this is about games journalism because it's so clearly was
Speaker 1: not so much so that even Wikipedia, if you go
Speaker 1: to Wikipedia and look up Gamergate, it actually has i
Speaker 1: think in brackets it says an online harassment campaign. So
Speaker 1: it's Gamergate online harassment campaign, like that's what they It's not,
Speaker 1: you know, championing ethics in game journalism the way that
Speaker 1: they were claiming. So that was super ugly and for
Speaker 1: someone like me, as naive and idiotic as I am
Speaker 1: being not having that experience like I have not had
Speaker 1: the experience of being confronted with this kind of stuff
Speaker 1: in my day to day life, seeing it so bare
Speaker 1: like an undeniable out there was a real wake up
Speaker 1: call that was long overdue for me, honestly, because it
Speaker 1: was undeniable what was happening, and that the fact that
Speaker 1: it was happening in the open, it was one of
Speaker 1: those things that I thought was really disturbing. This would
Speaker 1: eventually dovetail into the Me Too movement and you would
Speaker 1: start to see more and more people come out and
Speaker 1: support women and the stories they had to tell, not
Speaker 1: just in gaming obviously, but in all venues, and in
Speaker 1: some ways I think ultimately it's a good thing, but
Speaker 1: it was such a truly brutal time online and in
Speaker 1: the gaming industry and general.
Speaker 3: Trying not to be the negative Nancy, and we were
Speaker 3: trying to do very positive. I wish we could say
Speaker 3: that was the end and everything has changed for the
Speaker 3: better and everybody accepts everyone into this world. But since then,
Speaker 3: we've had incidents in Twitch where deep fakes are made
Speaker 3: of female creators. We've seen people attacking trans creators like
Speaker 3: nobody's business people, attacking influencers who say they like a
Speaker 3: certain game like I definitely love Following, like you were
Speaker 3: talking about different YouTubers and TikTokers who talk about cozy
Speaker 3: gaming specifically like that's now part of my world, and
Speaker 3: them having to do every like every six months, a
Speaker 3: video saying please stop harassing me, please stop telling me
Speaker 3: I'm not a gamer, please, like having to do something
Speaker 3: that seems so needless and so honestly like, good for them,
Speaker 3: I hope they're making making money off of that video,
Speaker 3: but the fact that they have to take their time
Speaker 3: and do another video to call out the haters, essentially,
Speaker 3: because it seems like it's a constant basis every time
Speaker 3: I've ever seen and again it maybe because Twitter has
Speaker 3: changed so vastly in the last few years, but even
Speaker 3: before it did change hands. I remember looking at one
Speaker 3: specific group, a nonprofit feminist frequency. Yes, their whole thing
Speaker 3: is to try to educate as well as advocate for
Speaker 3: women and non binding people in the community, in the
Speaker 3: gaming community. Every time they would post something, I swear
Speaker 3: about seventy percent of the comments to them were literal
Speaker 3: dick picks. Yeah, and that was after the fact. So
Speaker 3: there's so much And again though back to there's so
Speaker 3: many people that are like you, Jonathan, who were like,
Speaker 3: what is going on? Why would you do this? This
Speaker 3: is silly? Why can't everybody be a part of this?
Speaker 3: This seems unnecessary. So there's definitely people who are have
Speaker 3: become more and more supporters, but there's still that negativity
Speaker 3: that still have people and a lot of marginalized people
Speaker 3: questioning should I even try?
Speaker 1: Yeah, it suggests to me that there's some deep things
Speaker 1: that go well beyond the gaming sphere that are contributors
Speaker 1: to this kind of behavior. I mean obviously, because like
Speaker 1: I think anyone could say that, well, if you don't
Speaker 1: like those kinds of games, and you don't consider them games,
Speaker 1: why don't you just follow the people who like the
Speaker 1: kinds of games you like, And then you know other
Speaker 1: people can enjoy this thing and it doesn't like the
Speaker 1: fact that it exists doesn't mean you're required to enjoy
Speaker 1: it or engage with it. Go and do the things
Speaker 1: you like to do. So why do you have to
Speaker 1: Why do you feel the need to engage in a
Speaker 1: negative way with this world that doesn't speak to you?
Speaker 1: Just go do the thing that does speak to you.
Speaker 1: And I think the answer to that question is, Oh,
Speaker 1: I see, there's a deeper level of like misogyny and
Speaker 1: transphobia and tribalism that's at play, that is driving these behaviors,
Speaker 1: and this is just an easy way for that to manifest,
Speaker 1: and in some ways has been treated as an acceptable
Speaker 1: way for it to manifest, because again, gaming, for so
Speaker 1: long was perceived to be the domain of young male
Speaker 1: leisurely activity. And maybe that's a whole lot of armchair
Speaker 1: psychology and none of it is supportable. It's entirely possible,
Speaker 1: But from my own observations, it's the implication I feel
Speaker 1: pressed upon me when I see these kinds of things unfold.
Speaker 2: Yes, And if this were a different episode of Jonathan,
Speaker 2: I would unpack so much of that, like the history
Speaker 2: of dudes feeling maligned because they were nerds, and now
Speaker 2: nerd is cool, and they don't the gatekeeping.
Speaker 1: They don't want anybody in the pedestals.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yes, and the reason like it's a real game
Speaker 2: and not a real game skill level, and you could
Speaker 2: never obtain this skill, which yes I can. But anyway,
Speaker 2: one of the things that really upsets me about all
Speaker 2: of this a lot of things, but one of the
Speaker 2: things that really upsets me is that games are fun
Speaker 2: and they are a good stress reliever. As we were
Speaker 2: talking about, there's been scientific studies into all of the
Speaker 2: things that they can help with. We've had listeners right
Speaker 2: in that say it helps them with things like PTSD.
Speaker 2: It can like it can relieve your your stress, your anxiety,
Speaker 2: it can lift your mood, it can foster connection. It's
Speaker 2: being used in all kinds of treatments for things, and
Speaker 2: so obviously that's there's a lot going on there. There's
Speaker 2: been a long standing narrative about games and mental health.
Speaker 2: But it's really unfortunate to have like a whole demographic
Speaker 2: where it is either they're missing out on it entirely
Speaker 2: because they don't feel welcome or it's a stressor because
Speaker 2: they're gonna get harassed if they play Yeah yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, No, that that's sucks. If any of my listeners
Speaker 1: out there ever find yourself tempted to like criticize someone
Speaker 1: for the things that they like, if those things aren't
Speaker 1: hurting anyone, just think twice about it. As I often
Speaker 1: stress this show, the underlying philosophy is a combination of
Speaker 1: critical thinking and compassion. That compassion piece is important. I
Speaker 1: say over and over again. If you are compassionate but
Speaker 1: you lack critical thinking, you're a dip. And if you
Speaker 1: are a critical thinker but you lack compassion, you're a jerk.
Speaker 1: Don't be a dip or a jerk. Combine the two together,
Speaker 1: and then you can be you know, or at least
Speaker 1: try to be a good person. It's a good step.
Speaker 1: It's a good start, a foundation. Really. But yeah, I
Speaker 1: completely agree with everything you said, Annie. I mean, like
Speaker 1: my listeners know this, but this might be news to you,
Speaker 1: and I apologize. But earlier this year, I had a
Speaker 1: a massive medical emergency and nearly died and spent quite
Speaker 1: some time in the intensive care unit of a local
Speaker 1: hospital here in the Atlanta area, where everyone was super nice,
Speaker 1: and a part of that medical emergency was due to stress.
Speaker 1: My blood pressure had reached level of two sixteen over
Speaker 1: one point thirty, which is in stroke territory if you're curious.
Speaker 1: And so I had to do many, many, many things
Speaker 1: to try and find ways to change my lifestyle to
Speaker 1: improve my stress levels. And I did lots of stuff,
Speaker 1: like I reduced my workload, I started to eat better,
Speaker 1: and then the holidays happened, but anyway, I was eating
Speaker 1: better for most of the year. And these games, these
Speaker 1: cozy games, were one of the ways I would manage
Speaker 1: my anxiety and my stress. When I would feel them
Speaker 1: coming on and I had a little extra time, I
Speaker 1: would play these games. I would let me focus on
Speaker 1: something that was not stressful. There were no real like
Speaker 1: there's like steaks, but they're all very low level stakes.
Speaker 1: You know, will Emily agree to go to the movies
Speaker 1: with me in Stardue Valley or I'm not gonna have
Speaker 1: to go back to Sandy and boy she's a pill, Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, and so like low stakes. So I but
Speaker 1: I found them like I again, this is anecdotal, but
Speaker 1: I found them very therapeutic. And to me, when you
Speaker 1: have an experience like that that that you feel directly
Speaker 1: benefits like your life and is potentially keeping you alive
Speaker 1: or at least helping to you know, when you when
Speaker 1: we tell these stories about people who feel turned away
Speaker 1: from the hobby or they're criticized for liking a certain
Speaker 1: type of game because it's not a different type of game,
Speaker 1: it really is upsetting because I'm like, y'all, these games
Speaker 1: kept me from going insane and having blood pressure to
Speaker 1: the point where I had to go back into the hospital.
Speaker 1: I think this is something that is worth experiencing, or
Speaker 1: if you don't want to experience it, just let other
Speaker 1: people enjoy what they're enjoying.
Speaker 3: I'm really glad you're okay.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, well, okay is a really broad term.
Speaker 3: We're gonna say, yes, okay, are you are you feeling better?
Speaker 1: My blood pressure is lower, Okay, the surgery I had
Speaker 1: to have earlier this year went well.
Speaker 3: So glad to hear it. We're glad that you're okay,
Speaker 3: We're glad you're back with us, and yes, let's to
Speaker 3: there to the workload. Yeah, good on you. I know
Speaker 3: that's something hard for you. I might not know you well,
Speaker 3: but I know that you do work a lot, so
Speaker 3: good on you for falling back. But here's the other
Speaker 3: thing to this too. Not not only is it, yes,
Speaker 3: all the stress relief because I'm with you, because I
Speaker 3: need that as well. I found out I've got a
Speaker 3: perfect game for that has an ending, but it's beautiful.
Speaker 3: It's very stress relieving. But one of the things this
Speaker 3: is a money making industry, and not just for developers,
Speaker 3: not just for companies. But we talked about influencers. It
Speaker 3: opened the door for so many people to be able
Speaker 3: to be a part of this industry which seemed geared
Speaker 3: towards men. So even in Twitch, twitch streams and Twitch creators,
Speaker 3: people have been making bank and you rarely see women
Speaker 3: in there, but when you do, it's pretty cool to
Speaker 3: me to see so many being able to play any games.
Speaker 3: It's not just cozy games. It's all these games. But
Speaker 3: even more so, like we were talking about with TikTok,
Speaker 3: we're talking about with YouTube like being able to make
Speaker 3: money off of content. That's something that wasn't previously done before.
Speaker 3: So we have creators like we've talked about. You talked
Speaker 3: about gab Smolders and which I want to hear morebout
Speaker 3: her because I'm go'n have to follow her. But Cozy
Speaker 3: Kay is one of the ones that really got me
Speaker 3: into finding these different games. And she makes this aesthetic
Speaker 3: like the whole thing is the aesthetics of it all.
Speaker 3: She loves the game, don't don't play, she loves the game.
Speaker 3: But like with her aesthetics, she's being able to make
Speaker 3: a living through this content and she does an amazing,
Speaker 3: amazing job. She's gotten sponsorships through these games. She's gotten
Speaker 3: sponsorships from blanket companies and candle companies because again, it
Speaker 3: goes along with that cozy vibe. And this opens up
Speaker 3: so much more for marginalized people to be able to
Speaker 3: be a part of an industry they thought they could
Speaker 3: never be a part of previously because yeah, maybe their
Speaker 3: thing is not playing I'm sorry any but last of us,
Speaker 3: because they don't want their heart to be torn out
Speaker 3: of their chest every few days, I'm sorry, relaxing like
Speaker 3: you see so much more like. And then we have
Speaker 3: people like Milady Confetti, who is another creator that she's
Speaker 3: on a podcast, her podcast, Nerdy Magical Girl Podcast, where
Speaker 3: she gets to talk about her love of cozy games
Speaker 3: and gaming in general and just all things nerdy, But
Speaker 3: this really opened up a door for her to be
Speaker 3: a con creator that she couldn't have been previously or
Speaker 3: may not have had the opportunity previously. So this is
Speaker 3: such a moneymaker for not only again the creators are
Speaker 3: the developers, but so many more people out there. And
Speaker 3: I think that's amazing. Yeah, because we need more content
Speaker 3: like this.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I like. I love the creators who would
Speaker 1: engage in the cozy and also the silly like. I
Speaker 1: like creators who are who don't have that ego or
Speaker 1: being and they're not being silly like in a prankish
Speaker 1: way where they're constantly pranking each other. I don't like
Speaker 1: the pranks like this one. So many pranks are clearly
Speaker 1: prearranged and not actually pranks. They're just performative and y'all
Speaker 1: that's just not cool. But two like, they're usually mean spirited,
Speaker 1: and I'm not big on that either. My friend Shay
Speaker 1: would say, well, it's because you're a cancer. You just
Speaker 1: want everyone to be friendly all the time, Like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I do want I don't believe in astrology, but I
Speaker 1: do want people to be friendly all the time. Gosh
Speaker 1: darn it, But so I to cancer. But but yeah,
Speaker 1: Like I like the people who they They love the cozy,
Speaker 1: they love being silly, they love laughing. Like that's the
Speaker 1: vibe I yearn for when I'm going on to watch content.
Speaker 1: So like gab Smolders, who I did mention earlier, she
Speaker 1: does a lot of different games, like not just cozy games,
Speaker 1: she also really really and any you dig this, she
Speaker 1: loves creepy, spooky, supernatural horror type games, so those are
Speaker 1: like the two categories she typically does. And you never
Speaker 1: know if it's gonna be a cozy game or if
Speaker 1: it's gonna be a this thing's going to eat your
Speaker 1: face off your face game. Typically not an action oriented game.
Speaker 1: It's usually more like like Japanese horrorse aesthetic going on.
Speaker 1: She does a lot of games from Itchyo.
Speaker 3: But.
Speaker 1: I love it whenever it's cozy, because she she herself
Speaker 1: will make herself cozy. She has a cat named BIB
Speaker 1: and BB is a big, old, fluffy tabby cat who
Speaker 1: who very frequently will interrupt her videos and BB just
Speaker 1: becomes part of the video and like BB has BB's
Speaker 1: own fan club. But yeah, potions is how I learned
Speaker 1: potions from gab Smolders. I've watched your play Stardo Valley.
Speaker 1: I've watched your play lots of these cozy games, including
Speaker 1: the ones that have sort of a creepy element to them.
Speaker 1: So that's why Annie, I think you definitely need to
Speaker 1: check her out. She's originally from the Netherlands, now living
Speaker 1: in England, and her accent is also adorable. It's not
Speaker 1: super strong, but it's one of the many things that
Speaker 1: I actually find very comforting when I'm watching these. It's
Speaker 1: almost to the point of being ASMR without being ASMR, Like,
Speaker 1: it's not intentionally you could argue unintentional ASMR unless she's
Speaker 1: playing one of the really super wacky games where it's
Speaker 1: just way too much laughing for it to be relaxing.
Speaker 1: It's just very fun. But yeah, highly recommend gab Smolders.
Speaker 1: Her content is great. If you go to her channel,
Speaker 1: say I sent you. She doesn't know who I am,
Speaker 1: it'll just be fun.
Speaker 2: Who was this?
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly? Who's Jonathan from text? Who's this guy?
Speaker 2: Well? I mean that's such a useful There are so
Speaker 2: many video games. It's so useful to have someone who
Speaker 2: you trust to recommend or not recommend in case maybe, so,
Speaker 2: I do think that's really valuable I found a lot
Speaker 2: of horror games through people where they're like, oh, have
Speaker 2: you seen this someone else playing it? And kind of
Speaker 2: to the getting with the cat and the blanket, A
Speaker 2: lot of people say, like for them, the cozy game
Speaker 2: is that is like you get in your blanket, you
Speaker 2: get your pet, or you get the warm drink. And
Speaker 2: that's why a lot of cozy games are on portable
Speaker 2: things like Switch.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So I do think that's important part of this
Speaker 2: conversation as well, the rise of portable gaming system. I
Speaker 2: also read some people describe it as being meditative and
Speaker 2: that's why they kind of feel that health benefit when
Speaker 2: they play. But I do think unfortunately gaming, and it
Speaker 2: specifically cozy gaming, is often dismissed as like there's no
Speaker 2: value in this or in fact it's doing you harm.
Speaker 2: But beyond the high stress times we live in, and
Speaker 2: there have been studies that show these do help. They
Speaker 2: are also when we're talking about why it matters, it
Speaker 2: matters that we're looking at different ways games can look
Speaker 2: based on who's creating them. It matters when we're talking
Speaker 2: about like how we define the structure or what is winning.
Speaker 2: When we're talking about inclusivity and storytelling, our creativity to
Speaker 2: give us these better stories, these more varied stories, and
Speaker 2: just women, having more women and marginalized people in gaming
Speaker 2: and redefining what a gamer is. So we can hopefully
Speaker 2: one move on from that conversation and we can move
Speaker 2: on to like improving in a different way. I'm tired
Speaker 2: of being stuck on this one part. Yeah, let's let's
Speaker 2: talk about like why these cozy games are so valuable
Speaker 2: and why people love them, and let's stop dismissing them
Speaker 2: as useless.
Speaker 1: Yeah, or not real games. Yeah, yeah, I think. I
Speaker 1: think if everyone were to play Gone Home Sincerely, Like literally,
Speaker 1: you sit down, you play Gone Home Sincerely, and you
Speaker 1: can't talk about that game because it ruins the game.
Speaker 1: But you get to the end of Gone Home, and
Speaker 1: the by the end of Gone Home, the game has
Speaker 1: turned out to be not what you thought it was
Speaker 1: when you started, Like, I think it's safe to say
Speaker 1: that it is different. And if you are not moved
Speaker 1: by the end of that, just you know, like maybe
Speaker 1: maybe keep your opinions to yourself, because for the rest
Speaker 1: of us, it would be really nice if we could
Speaker 1: all just celebrate something that like tells such a beautiful
Speaker 1: story that unfolds in such an amazing way and has
Speaker 1: a killer soundtrack that you know, we can all celebrate
Speaker 1: in something and maybe for someone like me have a
Speaker 1: chance to see the world from a perspective entirely different
Speaker 1: from my day to day experience. And that, to me
Speaker 1: is one of those really valuable elements of this is
Speaker 1: that one people who have largely been underrepresented or not
Speaker 1: even represented at all within video games get to have
Speaker 1: an experience that reflects their reality. That I think is
Speaker 1: invaluable by itself. The added benefit is that people like me,
Speaker 1: who have been catered to for my entire life get
Speaker 1: to have an experience outside of what I normally get
Speaker 1: to live, and it just it opens up your eyes
Speaker 1: and it's a beautiful thing.
Speaker 2: Yes, the power of storytelling in games because it's you
Speaker 2: playing like there's a part of you in it. I
Speaker 2: think that is so if you genuinely allow yourself to
Speaker 2: be moved, if a game good, you will be moved. Yeah,
Speaker 2: And I think that is incredibly, incredibly powerful, And honestly,
Speaker 2: I'm kind it's kind of tragic because the people who
Speaker 2: are dismissing cozy games could really use them.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah a lot.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I do think it's funny that you
Speaker 4: said the Last of Us is instinmant that you said
Speaker 4: the Last of Us is Annie's cozy game.
Speaker 1: It's so not a cozy game in any way, shape
Speaker 1: or for it. We'll say however, Episode three, I think
Speaker 1: of the Last of Us TV show is perhaps the
Speaker 1: best television I've ever seen in my entire life. So
Speaker 1: if you haven't seen the HBO adaptation of the first
Speaker 1: Last of Us game, you need to see that because
Speaker 1: it's probably the most beautiful love story.
Speaker 2: Yes, tears, so many tears.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, I cried for days. I cried my face,
Speaker 1: I cried. I cried describing the episode to my partner,
Speaker 1: who did But my partner never played the game, had
Speaker 1: no interest in the show, and I was like, I
Speaker 1: have to tell you because I have to talk about this.
Speaker 2: I've got to share it with so much.
Speaker 1: Like I love Nick Offerman so much more, and I
Speaker 1: already loved him as much as I thought I could. Hey, there,
Speaker 1: this is Jonathan from the future. Hey y'all know how
Speaker 1: this works. This means that we kept on talking and
Speaker 1: the show kept getting longer. So Annie and Samantha, who
Speaker 1: are still on the call, with me. Now have to
Speaker 1: listen to me throw to more sponsors, so we'll be
Speaker 1: right back. Let's sort of move out toward the end here.
Speaker 1: We've been chatting for quite a long time, and there's
Speaker 1: so much more we could say. Obviously, this is a
Speaker 1: very important topic. It sounds silly to say cozy games
Speaker 1: is an important topic, but it absolutely is for all
Speaker 1: the different reasons that we've listed, from the benefits to
Speaker 1: the increased representation to the entrance of people with new
Speaker 1: perspectives in the world of video game development, which ultimately
Speaker 1: benefits everybody. Even if you don't play the game, it
Speaker 1: benefits you. Just chill out, you're gonna get the benefits.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about some recommendations that we each have. We've
Speaker 1: mentioned some of them already, but Samantha, let's let's hear
Speaker 1: your recommendations for some cozy games.
Speaker 3: So kind of going on the storytelling ones. I've got
Speaker 3: two and this one, Snuffkins, is probably one of the
Speaker 3: most cozy. Like you sit and just look at the
Speaker 3: scenery types. The drawings are beautiful, the music is relaxing,
Speaker 3: the characters are cute, and there's a whole little story.
Speaker 3: It is, like I think it only takes like a
Speaker 3: few hours to finish up, because it is very like
Speaker 3: from beginning to end. But it's such a great tell
Speaker 3: you should take a chance. I actually said Annie a
Speaker 3: picture of myself getting real cozy doing this and sent
Speaker 3: her pictures of clips of the game because I was like,
Speaker 3: you have to see this game. She hasn't yet, but
Speaker 3: it's such a such a fun game. And then Coffee Talk,
Speaker 3: which has a one and two. It's really interesting, kind
Speaker 3: of goes into like eighties nineties graphics, but it tells
Speaker 3: a whole story and you've got to make coffee throughout.
Speaker 3: So I think those two are like two great storytelling games.
Speaker 3: And then Cozy Grove, if you like a haunted Bear
Speaker 3: Island is exactly what you think. I love it. I
Speaker 3: love it so much and it does. It is also
Speaker 3: in real time, so it changes with the seasons with
Speaker 3: you and the day and the night. There's Donut County,
Speaker 3: so if you like mayhem and chaos and raccoons.
Speaker 2: Go for it.
Speaker 3: I love funny.
Speaker 2: I love funny.
Speaker 3: There's little puzzles throughout you have to solve in order
Speaker 3: to make things happen, whether catch on fire or put
Speaker 3: into a hole. You just go with that, and then
Speaker 3: Lemon Cake if you like to make and bake things.
Speaker 3: I think it's a really cute graphics and it teaches
Speaker 3: you different recipes about So those are my recommendations for today.
Speaker 1: I like how it could change tomorrow.
Speaker 2: I can't good it could mine. I'm gonna disclaim I
Speaker 2: love horror so much. These are definitely not for everyone,
Speaker 2: and some would argue they don't count. Also, we didn't
Speaker 2: go into this, but there's an argument about your comfort
Speaker 2: game and your cozy game. So last most two would
Speaker 2: be my comfort game, not my cozy game. But so
Speaker 2: mine are Oxen Free, which is just really pretty kind
Speaker 2: of text based game. It's got a cool story. It's
Speaker 2: very stranger Things Gone Home, which yes we've talked about.
Speaker 2: I won't go into it. It's really good. And then
Speaker 2: I also liked Coffee Talk, which Samantha had me play,
Speaker 2: and it's just really fun. It's got like vampires and
Speaker 2: wear wolves and you're making coffee.
Speaker 1: I love it. Holy cow, I've never heard of that before.
Speaker 1: I'll have to look that one up. As for myself, well,
Speaker 1: one I want to mention is a game called Pentiment.
Speaker 1: I don't know if either of you have ever seen this.
Speaker 1: It's a game where you're playing a artist in medieval
Speaker 1: Europe and you are illuminating manuscripts, and all of the
Speaker 1: dialogue is in word bubbles, and every character has their
Speaker 1: own handwriting style, so like if you're talking to a monk,
Speaker 1: it's super fancy type setting, and if you're talking to
Speaker 1: a commoner, it's like more like chicken scratch. But then
Speaker 1: murder happens, and you're essentially there to help try and
Speaker 1: solve murders. Here's the thing about Pentiment. You're never told
Speaker 1: what actually happened. You have to determine what you think happened,
Speaker 1: and you come to your conclusion and you you present
Speaker 1: your argument. But even at the end of the game,
Speaker 1: you're never told if you were right or wrong. So
Speaker 1: that's kind of a fascinating element that I had not
Speaker 1: anticipated from such a game. Other suggestions, I mean, Stardo
Speaker 1: Valley is always going to be a suggestion, but we've
Speaker 1: talked about that, you know, ad nauseum, I would say
Speaker 1: Disney Dreamlight Valley. If you're a total Disney nut. It's
Speaker 1: very heavily branded to Disney, So if you're not into it,
Speaker 1: it is not your thing, but it's very cozy, and
Speaker 1: for the lovecrafty and horror fans out there, you should
Speaker 1: play Dredge, a creepy deep sea fishing game, but it's
Speaker 1: it's kind of cozy. You're like running a boat and
Speaker 1: fishing in different areas, and it's not like Super It
Speaker 1: doesn't have like a lot of twitchy elements to it,
Speaker 1: and the story is really entertaining, but it does have
Speaker 1: a lovecrafty and kind of weird horror energy going on in.
Speaker 3: That nice I'll have to look at that.
Speaker 1: It's fun. There's another game called Dave the Diver, where
Speaker 1: by day you are diving to capture fish and by
Speaker 1: night you run a sushi restaurant. And the funny thing
Speaker 1: is Dave the Diver actually has a crossover with Dredge,
Speaker 1: and they also did a crossover with Godzilla. Oh really, of.
Speaker 3: Course they did. That sounds that sounds it's just Japanese
Speaker 3: because that's Japanese.
Speaker 1: Really, yeah, it's a Korean game, and it is. It
Speaker 1: is wild. It is uh, it's the The local translation
Speaker 1: is pretty good for Dave the Diver, but there are
Speaker 1: little bits where you're like, oh, this was not this
Speaker 1: was not Maid in America. It is is a fantastic game, though,
Speaker 1: Dave the Diver and Dredge together, if you can play
Speaker 1: the two of them, I would recommend playing Dredge first
Speaker 1: and then Dave the Diver. They're great companion games. Well,
Speaker 1: Annie and Samantha, this has been a great conversation. You know,
Speaker 1: we talked about some heavy stuff, but we talked about
Speaker 1: a lot of fun and joyful stuff too, And I
Speaker 1: think that is the perfect kind of tech Stuff episode
Speaker 1: right where it's it's not all grim and dour and dystopian,
Speaker 1: but at the same time, we take the effort to
Speaker 1: explore the maybe you know, the the more unseemly sides
Speaker 1: of a of a topic, because only by addressing it
Speaker 1: can we ever hope to make things better. That's at
Speaker 1: least my own opinion. I realize that I may be
Speaker 1: an eternal optimist.
Speaker 2: Well that's a good way to be. Thank you so
Speaker 2: much for having us. It's has been a delight.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a great way to kind of run down
Speaker 1: my run on tech stuff because I didn't reach out
Speaker 1: enough to my fellow stuff podcasters. It can get so
Speaker 1: easy for us to get into our own like routines
Speaker 1: and the grind and just trying to create episode after episode.
Speaker 1: I don't know how it is for y'all, but for me,
Speaker 1: there would be moments like I would wake up in
Speaker 1: the morning and I would just start the dread of
Speaker 1: what am I going to find to talk about this
Speaker 1: week would start to descend upon me, and that was
Speaker 1: enough to prevent me from even just reaching out. I
Speaker 1: now wish one of my biggest regrets is I didn't
Speaker 1: reach out more to do collaborative episodes with my fellow
Speaker 1: stuff podcasters, in particular, because I know we worked together
Speaker 1: so well, Because I mean, Annie and I had to
Speaker 1: She sat at my left hand side, and poor Lauren,
Speaker 1: who sat across from us, had to endure just an
Speaker 1: endless supply of puns. True.
Speaker 2: True, we owe her a lot.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, apologies. Yeah pizza maybe I don't know, but
Speaker 1: not on a delivery app service. We talked about that
Speaker 1: and boy those no okay, but yeah, I thank you
Speaker 1: so much for coming on. It was it was a
Speaker 1: real pleasure.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for having us. I'm glad we
Speaker 2: got to do this. Before you hang up your tech
Speaker 2: stuff coach chat.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know what, I got so little merch after
Speaker 1: running it for sixteen and a half years, you'd think
Speaker 1: i'd have at least a hoodie, but I've got a
Speaker 1: T shirt where most of the lettering has peeled off. Well,
Speaker 1: if if my listeners out there haven't heard by now,
Speaker 1: you need to go and check out stuff. Mom never
Speaker 1: told you. The episodes are phenomenal. You tackle pretty much
Speaker 1: any topic you can think of. Uh. The dating episode,
Speaker 1: as I mentioned, it was so informative and interesting to
Speaker 1: hear because again being out of the dating game for
Speaker 1: more than thirty years now hearing how things have changed culturally, technologically, socially.
Speaker 1: For one thing, I felt like I understood people better
Speaker 1: because I'm rapidly descending into grouchy old man who yells
Speaker 1: at Cloud's territory.
Speaker 3: I've been there.
Speaker 1: For some of us. It's life goals, honestly, Like you know,
Speaker 1: you could be the person who's just like ah outside
Speaker 1: on the front lawn and everyone's like, oh, that's Jonathan.
Speaker 1: It's it's actually very freeing. For one thing, my social
Speaker 1: calendar is wide open now. That's nice. Yeah, I like it.
Speaker 1: Like it's like, hey, no obligations, I could do whatever
Speaker 1: I want. Let's play some cozy games, y'all. And thus
Speaker 1: my STARDUW Valley Hours played just grows and grows. For
Speaker 1: all of my listeners out there, I hope you enjoyed
Speaker 1: this episode. Go check out stuff Mom never told you,
Speaker 1: and I will talk to you again really soon, but
Speaker 1: only a couple more times. Tech Stuff is an iHeartRadio production.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.