Jeff Bakalar

What was, what was, totally off topic, totally unrelated to anything we were talking about, what was the last JRPG you reviewed?

Um, God, I don't think I've ever reviewed a JRPG.

Christ, that's a, that's a nice beat to have.

Uh-huh.

And Prophet literally fucking said that, which is like, oh, they want a reason to stop spending money on investment or investing into AI other than we've run out of money, 'cause that would be really bad for their stock price.

Microsoft deeply invested in that.

When that day comes, do they turn around back to gaming being like, "What were we thinking? Oh my God, let's just shut ourself as, uh, uh, shut ourselves of as much of this as possible"? And for Blizzard to be a- again, in a strengthful, a strong position where they can point to their story of how they've delivered will be important in that moment.

So I think this is planning for fighting battles internally, but also potential, uh, a, a potential collapse of Microsoft's interest in gaming, which feels like could come at any moment.

They have people order them.

The mo- Like, Jeff Bakalar kind of talked about this in the videos, like, the majority of pinball players these days, there's some in bars.

It's everyone has them in their home.

Not everyone, but you know if-

We've got another episode of Never Been a Better Podcast in place of our normal podcast this week while we're on break.

Never Been a Better Podcast features a rotating crew of Austin Walker, Jeff Bakalar, Dan Riekert, and Abby Russell, as they join me and Alex each month over on the Patreon side of things.

This episode originally aired in May of 2023, and features the full house.

That's right, Abby, Dan, Austin, and Bakalar all join us, so let's celebrate this special and rare occurrence.

This is the mec- this is the ceiling height.

Let's start, let's go around the horn here.

Jeff Bakalar's here.

Hey.

Um, two things I wanted to shout out.

One, I think this may have been some of the happiest I've seen Geoff Bakalar.

[laughs]

Oh.

Yeah, that's, that's why we're making fun of you for sitting down.

[laughs]

I think that's, I think that's why Bakalar's killing me during this play through, because it's like we are all just doing some, probably some pretty bad ideas and stuff, and Bakalar is always, I'd say the voice of reason, but he's the one that just kinda shows up and is like, "Yeah, you really think that's gonna work?" [laughs]

Yeah, but it's not a voice reason.

They got me up kind of early to take the kids to school, and there was a train on the way, uh, that was blocking the street, and I had to go completely around town, 'cause it blocks off every road in the entire town, and that ruined my day.

And then I had to come home and deal with Mike Minotti streaming a video game with Jeff Bakalar, and, uh, it's completely thrown me off my tracks here.

But, uh, I don't know.

I'll get back on the rails here with, with Lexi.

Uh, be sure to become a member and support us and get access to all of that.

As far as this show-

Is only Bakalar allowed to do the meow?

Uh, wait, I'm sorry.

Yeah, we're gonna get through this together, man.

Speaking about getting through this together, I wouldn't have it any other way without him, Jeff Bakalar.

Hey, Jan. What's up? How you doing? You look great.

I'm tired too.

So go to giantbomb.com/join.

Gets you ad-free versions of our shows, gets you premium exclusive shows like...

Well, Jeff Grubb, we h- just started a new series, a premium series of, a premium season of The Blight Club starring Jeff Bakalar.

Meow.

... like, you know the whole, like, oh-

Ask Jeff Bakalar

...

I'll buy you a new pint of milk when your milk is out.

Speaking about hero, we have my hero.

Cha- champion of the darkness and, uh, the devil inside all of our hearts, Jeff Bakalar.

What's up, Jan? How are you? How you doing? I didn't take you for a big Foo Fighters guy.

Oh.

That dropped yesterday.

We had the whole crew in on that bad boy.

Folks, if you wanna see, uh, you know, Jeff Bakalar here don some tight clothing, uh, that may make you feel some type of way, Cat Jerkman right there.

Meow.

Virtuoso, one of the, like, worst games Mike's ever played, uh, in like, like a painful way.

But we're not gonna do it deliberately, and I think we're gonna make some efforts to pull it back a little bit and have some f- It, it really hurts, 'cause, uh, we're doing like a special one right now where, where, uh, Jerf, uh, uh, Jeff Bakalar is playing, uh, Catwoman for the GameCube.

And it's a riot.

It's a bad game, but it's a riot and we could be playing that instead.

This and orange candy.

I know.

I wanna quote my friend Jeff Bakalar, "I wish I had your problems."

Yeah.