Friends Per Second

Head to https://buyraycon.com/friends to get up to 25% off everything for the ultimate holiday gift. Thanks to Raycon for sponsoring FPS! -- This week we're joined by a number of special guests. Michael Higham from IGN joins us to talk through STALKER 2. We've all played it and all have wildly different takes on it (for both technical and non-technical reasons). After that we're joined by Frederick Thylander and Drew Rechner of Ubisoft Massive, who right now are leading up efforts fix some of the core issues that plagued Star Wars Outlaws at launch. Finally, Alanah Pearce joins us to chat about PlayStation and Xbox handhelds, as well as what we've all been playing this past two weeks.  -- Timestamps 00:00 Intro 05:02 STALKER 2 43:15 Ad - Raycon 45:47 User Question 53:34 Star Wars Outlaws Interview 01:22:44 PlayStation and Xbox handhelds 01:38:58 User Question 01:47:54 What we've played 02:15:50 Show and Tell 02:31:20 Wrap up -- If you wanna check out our brand new newsletter, you can do so here: https://friendspersecond.substack.com/ -- Let's meet our hosts! - Jake Baldino (aka the Before You Buy Guy) is pretty much the most watched reviewer on YouTube across both Gameranx and his personal channel (https://www.youtube.com/c/JakeBaldino). If you're obsessed with Delorians, The Mummy and Pizza you can discuss that stuff with him directly over on Twitter: @JakeBaldino - Lucy James is a Senior Producer at Gamespot and a Creative Producer at Giant Bomb. She's actually, like, experienced and credentialed and has real life skills and stuff, while the rest of the gang would be funemployed if the YT algorithm didn't kiss them for random, inexplicable reasons.  - Skill Up used to work at McDonalds but he got fired for skimming too many chicken nuggets. He says he regrets it since he hasn't had a better job since.  -- Listen to the Friends Per Second Podcast on your favourite podcast platform: https://linktr.ee/friendspersecond Subscribe to our newsletter to stay up to date: https://friendspersecond.substack.com/ Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/TheFPSPodcast Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/friendspersecond Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Try AG1 here http://drinkag1.com/FRIENDS and get a FREE 1-year supply of Vitamin D3+K2 AND 5 free AG1 Travel Packs with your first subscription. Thanks to AG1 for sponsoring FPS! -- This week we're joined by John Linneman of Digital Foundry to discuss the PS5 Pro. It's been out for a few weeks now so we wanted to check in on how it's been doing post launch, how the library of games is performing and guess what the future holds. Plus we're lucky enough to be joined by Yevhenii Kulyk of GSC Game World, who right now is putting the finishing touches on STALKER 2. We talk through the challenging road to launch, what players should expect on day one and what the future holds for both STALKER 2 and the studio.  Timestamps: 00:00 Intro 05:15 PS5 Pro Discussion with John Linneman of Digital Foundry 45:48 AG1 (ad) 47:57 User Question 1 56:13 S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 Chat with Technical Producer Yevhenii Kulyk  01:12:20 User Question 2 01:20:55 What We've Been Playing 01:59:01 Show and Tell 02:12:09 Wrap Up -- If you wanna check out our brand new newsletter, you can do so here: https://friendspersecond.substack.com/ -- Let's meet our hosts! - Jake Baldino (aka the Before You Buy Guy) is pretty much the most watched reviewer on YouTube across both Gameranx and his personal channel (https://www.youtube.com/c/JakeBaldino). If you're obsessed with Delorians, The Mummy and Pizza you can discuss that stuff with him directly over on Twitter: @JakeBaldino - Lucy James is a Senior Producer at Gamespot and a Creative Producer at Giant Bomb. She's actually, like, experienced and credentialed and has real life skills and stuff, while the rest of the gang would be funemployed if the YT algorithm didn't kiss them for random, inexplicable reasons.  - Skill Up used to work at McDonalds but he got fired for skimming too many chicken nuggets. He says he regrets it since he hasn't had a better job since.  -- Listen to the Friends Per Second Podcast on your favourite podcast platform: https://linktr.ee/friendspersecond Subscribe to our newsletter to stay up to date: https://friendspersecond.substack.com/ Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/TheFPSPodcast Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/friendspersecond Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Visit http://buyraycon.com/friends to get at least 15% of your purchase of the all new Everyday Earbuds.  -- This week we're joined by Paul Tassi of Forbes for a deep dive, spoiler free discussion on Dragon Age: The Veilguard. Paul liked it, Skill Up didn't, Lucy's kinda in the middle and Jake hasn't played it, so we cover a lot of ground from a lot of different perspectives. We're also joined by Ryan Payton, head of the studio that just put out the truly excellent Batman Arkham Shadow. He chats with us about his career, his thoughts on the VR industry and what it was like to follow in Rocksteady's footsteps.  -- Timestamps: 00:00 Intro 03:29 Dragon Age Discussion with Paul Tassi 49:18 Raycon (ad) 52:10 User Question 58:38 Batman Arkham Shadow with Ryan Payton 01:31:16 What We've Been Playing 02:01:25 Show and Tell 02:13:16 Wrap Up -- If you wanna check out our brand new newsletter, you can do so here: https://friendspersecond.substack.com/ -- Let's meet our hosts! - Jake Baldino (aka the Before You Buy Guy) is pretty much the most watched reviewer on YouTube across both Gameranx and his personal channel (https://www.youtube.com/c/JakeBaldino). If you're obsessed with Delorians, The Mummy and Pizza you can discuss that stuff with him directly over on Twitter: @JakeBaldino - Lucy James is a Senior Producer at Gamespot and a Creative Producer at Giant Bomb. She's actually, like, experienced and credentialed and has real life skills and stuff, while the rest of the gang would be funemployed if the YT algorithm didn't kiss them for random, inexplicable reasons.  - Skill Up used to work at McDonalds but he got fired for skimming too many chicken nuggets. He says he regrets it since he hasn't had a better job since.  -- Listen to the Friends Per Second Podcast on your favourite podcast platform: https://linktr.ee/friendspersecond Subscribe to our newsletter to stay up to date: https://friendspersecond.substack.com/ Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/TheFPSPodcast Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/friendspersecond Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Try AG1 here http://drinkag1.com/FRIENDS and get a FREE 1-year supply of Vitamin D3+K2 AND 5 free AG1 Travel Packs with your first subscription. Thanks to AG1 for sponsoring FPS! -- This week we do a spoiler free deep dive into Metaphor: Fantazio, and we're lucky enough to by joined by Jess Cogswell who reviewed the game for Gamespot (scoring it a perfect 10, no less). We're also joined by the one and only Shawn Layden, former President and CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment. Shawn is in Singapore for Gamescom Asia and shares his thoughts on not only the rapidly evolving South East Asian gaming market, but also the broader gaming industry as it confronts things like rising development costs, declining console sales and the chase for the next live service white whale.  -- Timestamps: 00:00 Intro 05:29 Ralph's TGS Wrap Up 17:27 State of the Industry Chat with Shawn Layden  38:36 AG1 (ad) 41:31 User Question 51:13 Metaphor ReFantazio Chat with Jess Cogswell of Gamespot 01:31:33 What We've Been Playing 02:12:41 Show and Tell 02:28:08 Wrap Up -- If you wanna check out our brand new newsletter, you can do so here: https://friendspersecond.substack.com/ -- Let's meet our hosts! - Jake Baldino (aka the Before You Buy Guy) is pretty much the most watched reviewer on YouTube across both Gameranx and his personal channel (https://www.youtube.com/c/JakeBaldino). If you're obsessed with Delorians, The Mummy and Pizza you can discuss that stuff with him directly over on Twitter: @JakeBaldino - Lucy James is a Senior Producer at Gamespot and a Creative Producer at Giant Bomb. She's actually, like, experienced and credentialed and has real life skills and stuff, while the rest of the gang would be funemployed if the YT algorithm didn't kiss them for random, inexplicable reasons.  - Skill Up used to work at McDonalds but he got fired for skimming too many chicken nuggets. He says he regrets it since he hasn't had a better job since.  -- Listen to the Friends Per Second Podcast on your favourite podcast platform: https://linktr.ee/friendspersecond Subscribe to our newsletter to stay up to date: https://friendspersecond.substack.com/ Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/TheFPSPodcast Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/friendspersecond Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices