Inscryption

by none other than Devolver Digital, who we have done a number of episodes on already.

We've covered so far Inscription, Cult of the Lamb, Enter the Gungeon, Loop Hero, recently Ball X Pit, but Devolver also just has an incredibly growing...

Monster Closet of other rogue games, including a Stay Tuned and a half of Downwell, which I guess because we played Velgress for UFO 50, we kind of have a good sense of what that is already.

But other games like Stick It to the Stick Man, very recently released, I think either today or yesterday, Shroom and Gloom.

That's not a game that I think would, would be defined as what, uh, someone with a narrow scope of what a game is w- would look like, you know? Something like, uh...

And I think even, like, something like this, uh, like s- uh, you know, The Stanley Parable, or Inscryption is a good one too, that, uh, it's like a card game.

Mm-hmm.

Um, I, I think that, like, there could be like a whole world of these games that exist out there that I have no understanding of or awareness of because of how, like, indie games are kind of facilitated and how, like, uh, I don't necessarily think, like, the best of the best is rising to the top.

I played a few hours of Slay the Spy.

I played through Inscryption.

But, like, you'll notice that all the games I like are just digital board games.

Mm-hmm.

I was really expecting it to come out this year, but it's coming out in 2027 on April the 27th.

It is, of course, the latest game from Daniel Mullins, creator of Inscription, and it is a sequel to a lesser-known game of his that came out before Inscription, which really hit the mainstream.

You know, I think Daniel Mullins had a good reputation, a growing reputation, but Inscription really just blew the doors off for him.

It was a huge hit.

It was another IGF winner.

Go for it.

So Pony Island 2 Panda Circus is developed by Daniel Mullins who created Inscription and if you haven't played Inscription go and play Inscription.

It's absolute lunacy it starts off as a card battler in a haunted cabin but you can actually get up from your seat and look around but there are so many puzzles to solve in the room when you unlock that it then moves on to like a 2d top down game map and And it's a whole meta commentary on the world of game development.

And this thing looks like it's that but next level.

It looks absolutely mental.

If you know anything about his games, his games are always, always on point and always a bit crazy.

And if you haven't, go play Inscription because it's brilliant.

And I think it's actually on the PlayStation Plus catalog now.

Uh, one I'm ve- very, very, very excited for, one of my most anticipated games.

Pony Island 2: Panda Circus is the newest game from, uh, the creator of Inscryption, which is one of my favorite games of all time.

Love that game so very much.

I still have not played Pony Island 1 'cause I've, again, been waiting, uh, for the release date on this bad boy-

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah, I, I'm, I again continue to be extremely intrigued by this game and the way that Inscryption was so many things in one, and I don't even wanna say what all those things are as to not spoil it.

It's definitely one of those games I'd love to experience again for the first time just in terms of the way it blew my mind, right? Uh, to go back to Sam Green c- Sam Green's question there.

Sorry.

From the creator of Inscryption.

Uh, you popped off for it.

Looked really cool.

I'll tell you that right now.

Oh.

This is one of those ones where, like, Inscryption was a game where if you haven't played Inscryption, you've probably played or seen plenty of games that have taken-

Inspired by it

I think it's cool because you're going to get people who wouldn't necessarily play one half of that to try something they would maybe not have tried otherwise.

Um, and that's how I got into card-based games, because I tried Inscryption and I never liked card-based- ... combat of any kind.

But I tried that, and because of the other elements of, like, puzzle and mystery and horror that went along with that, it, like, made...

It, it clicked in my brain and I was like, "Oh, wait, no, actually, I do kind of like this." [laughs]