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205: Emulation is Theft Redux · The #Backlog Breakdown

• 0:00
  Foreign. Welcome back to another episode of the Backlog Breakdown, a video game podcast where we seek to equip and encourage the church to engage in the medium of video games wisely and responsibly. I'm one of your hosts, Josh. Regardless of what our script might say, I am not Ron Burgundy, and I don't read everything that's put directly in front of me. But with me today is my co host and brother in Christ, Nate, and also the Dread Pirate Robert.
• 1:01
  I will be the Dread Pirate Roberts. I will be the Dread Pirate Roberts.
• 1:06
  No, Wesley is not here with us today.
• 1:09
  Wesley, Right.
• 1:11
  Although in the Boy, that book has a T. Wesley.
• 1:16
  Wesley.
• 1:17
  Oh, I forgot that. Yeah, yeah. Did you read that book?
• 1:21
  I have not read the book, no.
• 1:22
  Okay.
• 1:23
  The book is excellent. I would sound more refined if I referenced the book as opposed to the movie, which I have seen many, many times. So I was attempting to puff myself.
• 1:34
  I mean, William Goldman wrote the script, too. And so the script is word for word what the book is. But there's a lot of just really, really weird and quirky background stuff in the book that can't be translated to film. But is.
• 1:49
  Is pretty entertaining.
• 1:50
  And so it's. It's. It's really. It's really funny.
• 1:57
  Nice. Well, I will keep that in mind, Paul, the techno funk boy, whom I did not introduce earlier.
• 2:05
  Yes. And this was why I stayed silent until I was introduced.
• 2:12
  Yes. So we've got three amigos here on today to discuss a topic that is not altogether uncommon.
• 2:22
  Which one of us is Steve Martin? Which one of us is Martin Short? And which one of us is Chevy Chase?
• 2:28
  I mean, so Paul and I would know this because we're from Texas. That. That's just Spanish for three friends is. Is all that is.
• 2:36
  The Three Amigos is a cult classic comedy, and I will not like you. Answer the question, Joshua. Answer the question.
• 2:43
  I was not clearly movie.
• 2:48
  Yeah. In more ways than one.
• 2:51
  I am probably Chevy Chase, the kind of dous guy.
• 2:55
  Okay. There you go. All right. We found our places within our little band, which is pretty fun, but yet. So we will be discussing emulation or rediscussing. Emulation. I don't know. It's only been, what, five years since we talked about it last?
• 3:14
  Josh, tell me, do we have a
• 3:16
  plethora of material to go through tonight?
• 3:21
  Plethora. It's. Yes. That. That The. The. The topic. That. The infamous topic of emulation is what we will be discussing today. But before we get to that, we do have some forms to observe. And so I, I, we gotta ask Paul. It's been a while since I've been.
• 3:44
  It's been.
• 3:44
  Do it, do it, Joshua.
• 3:47
  What's.
• 3:47
  What's crazy is he doing so much.
• 3:49
  You're like, you're really close to the right key as well.
• 3:53
  It's true. I think this episode is. That was, like, almost spot on, dude. Oh, man.
• 4:00
  Like, listen, when I do things repeatedly, when I pr. Basically, when I practice things, I'm actually kind of good at them.
• 4:09
  Putting the reps. Yeah. Yeah.
• 4:13
  I've only been doing the bit for, like, five years, so I don't. I don't know. I don't know. Yeah, Like, I just started working on a trump impression because, like, every once in a while, like, I. I find. I find that I can do, like. And I'm like. My thing is, like, I'm actually very particular about, like, when I do impressions at all. But, like, the other day I was talking and I did something, and I was like, oh, that is a very Trumpian cadence and tenor. Like, I. I heard that, and I was like, I might be able to do that. And so I've been working on. On a trump, and I'm not gonna. Until it hits. Until it's like. Because, like, that's the thing is a lot of people do impressions and they're bad, and it's like, it's not even close, and it's like, no, no, no, no, no, no. It's like, we're. I'm gonna. I'm gonna do, like. Because, like, I do. I do a Kermit the Frog reason. A reasonable Kermit the Frog, you know, and. But yeah, like, that's my thing is, like, if you're gonna do an impression, you do it right, and so you. You get it as close as possible. So I. I'm practicing. I'm putting in.
• 5:23
  I can respect that. And I'm. I'm waiting with eager anticipation for the day that you unveil that, because that'll be. That'll be pretty nice. You know, we used to start the podcast off with, you know, just, like, a ridiculously stupid bit. So maybe you can bring that back someday.
• 5:39
  Yeah.
• 5:40
  Talk about. Maybe you can. I mean, the beginning of our episodes. Great. Again, that would be pretty good.
• 5:45
  But you're awful, and I hate that.
• 5:50
  So, anyways, Paul, how have you been since the last episode had a hat
• 5:54
  made that says mega? Make episodes great again,
• 5:59
  and then you can be the Mega Man.
• 6:02
  Yes. I'm sorry, what's the question?
• 6:06
  Sorry. How have you been, sir?
• 6:09
  I've been all right. How are you?
• 6:10
  Yeah, I'm seething. I'm seething.
• 6:18
  You know, we all knew you were
• 6:19
  gonna ask me how I'm doing. Poorly.
• 6:22
  I do have a. I do have a bone to pick with y'.
• 6:24
  All.
• 6:24
  Okay.
• 6:25
  With both of you.
• 6:26
  Okay.
• 6:27
  So last time I was on.
• 6:29
  Okay.
• 6:29
  I. It was a fun episode. I really. I always appreciate me being on, but the. The. The thumbnail you made of me made me look fat and old, and I don't know why that would be. I. I don't know why. Why you would make me look fat and old.
• 6:50
  What? What?
• 6:54
  Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, friend.
• 7:00
  We can take that up with the complaint department.
• 7:07
  Porcho, you're gonna earn that. The HR money now, pal,
• 7:15
  about the department that makes our thumbnails. Because I wonder what it would have to say. Just be like, why. Why would you do such a thing? You. You have offended me. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Oh, does not compute.
• 7:35
  But, no, no, I've been doing well. I've been working hard on new stuff.
• 7:40
  I'm about to. I like.
• 7:41
  I'm about to do a new podcast, too, and I will send out to use very soon, but it's been working on game design. Tabletop game design. And podcast is going to be about that. And so nice. I think it's gonna be a lot of. I think it's gonna be really good. It's gonna be fun.
• 8:01
  Sounds pretty cool.
• 8:04
  You should notify me when that goes live.
• 8:07
  I will.
• 8:08
  I'll be sending you an ad so that you can put that on.
• 8:15
  That's cool. That's awesome, dude.
• 8:17
  Well, he's also. You've also got a Kickstarter that is not quite coming up. It's coming up. It's like the page is there, but the Kickstarter hasn't actually started yet.
• 8:28
  And you can click it.
• 8:29
  Yeah. So, I mean, if y' all are
• 8:30
  on, the disc goes live.
• 8:31
  Please do. And the. And the reason I'm asking people to do that is because when it hits 10 people who press the button, then I can see how many people have pressed the button. And so right now I'm just looking at it and, like, I don't know if this is 1 or 9 or 0. And, you know, and so it would make me feel better. But. But yeah, I'm. I should be done with the. The Quick Start Guide probably this weekend, and I'm going to start looking for people to review it and stuff, try to get some reviews done prior to the Kickstarter launching. But I think April 1st is going to be the day.
• 9:09
  All right.
• 9:11
  Maybe May 1st, depending on if I can get some reviews or not. But we're working. We're moving forward. It's gonna be fun.
• 9:18
  Mayday.
• 9:19
  Interesting.
• 9:20
  That'll be cool.
• 9:22
  Yeah.
• 9:22
  I'm logging into my Kickstarter for the first time. I don't.
• 9:29
  Thank you.
• 9:31
  I know. This is, like, the most compelling radio we've ever done.
• 9:39
  Have you been. Nate?
• 9:40
  I'm fine.
• 9:43
  He's calmed down.
• 9:45
  Oh, no, no. I've done the healthy thing, and I've just buried it very deeply and just push it down. Just push it down. No, I'm pretty good, man. I mean, it's kind of. I don't know. I. I just. Like, this week, like, while we're recording, like, I'm. I'm on vacation this week, and so yesterday. Yesterday was a federal holiday, and it was President's Day, and Megan and I kind of. We. We took that opportunity. She had the day off, and we took that opportunity to go out and sort of do, like, the family outing thing. So we took Byron to, like. We. Dude, we got this thing for Chuck E. Cheese, right? We, like. And we're like, hey, we can use this and get the. Ah, daggone it. Come on, Nate. Words aren't that hard. But I'm being a little like. But anyways, we got this, like, membership thing for Chuck E. Cheese, right? And it's, like, for, like, eight bucks a month, whatever. And we had intended to just go a lot more often. We actually did. But it's like, you go and you. You tell them, I have this account, and you get X amount of, like, free credits every time, and you get deals and stuff like that. So. Yeah, and it's like, I think if you go enough, it's probably super worthwhile, but, like, we've got, like, four times. Anyways, so we went to Chuck E. Cheese, and my. My son. It was, like. It was kind of funny because, like, we Sometimes, like, the house gets a little loud with, like, kids stuff, and, like, he's, like, running monster trucks over everything. And, like, he's got the TV on, and he's listening to monster truck videos, and. And. But then you go to Chuck E. Cheese, and you realize that there's an entirely different strata of, like, auditory, like, noise pollution that happens, and you're just like. Like, my little boy. Like. Like, he was. He was overwhelmed. I was overwhelmed. Megan was. Everybody was like, we're. And we're Walking around, it was like, we. We. We did that, and then we went to Chick Fil A and Target, and. Yeah, so. So we just had a little family outing, but, like, that's all. Like, we had to go 45 minutes. But yeah. And then today was just kind of a lazy day for me and the boy. But, yeah, uh, I'm trying not to be too big a bum during my vacation, because sometimes, like, you do vacation, I. I definitely want to build in, like, a day or two or three where it's like. Like, I just don't have much on the agenda. But I also, like, I need to clean my basement and.
• 12:25
  Sure.
• 12:25
  Yeah. I do have, like, some things, like, I want to do. Like, I need to get my car inspected and stuff like that. So fun. I do want to be, like, a little productive, but also, like, I just kind of, like, I've been, like, running hard in the paint for, like, the last, like, four or five months, and I just. Sure, I want to breathe a little bit. So it's. I'm. I'm trying to, like, sort of, like, not be too big of a dirt bag, but also not, like, feel like, kind of, like, thread that needle where it's like, I don't feel the need to get tons and tons of stuff done, but I have, like, a couple things. I'm like, I need to do this while I'm off. And so, yeah, it's kind of the vibe. Yeah.
• 13:11
  Nice. Nice. Cool. That's cool. That's cool. Yeah, it's. It's one of those, like, busy weeks. I feel like even asking this question of. Of how I've been in the past couple weeks. I'm like, nobody has done over the past few weeks.
• 13:23
  Nobody cares.
• 13:25
  Nobody did.
• 13:26
  No, you don't try lying to him. Don't lie to him.
• 13:29
  I don't know. I guess it's just that I feel if I do the intro, then I feel like I have to be the host of the episode and push things along. And that's what I'm attempting to do, is just barrel on through so we can have.
• 13:42
  That ever worked when I'm on?
• 13:43
  It hasn't ever, but usually, especially when you've been on Paul, I can just sit back and goof off, and instead, this time, I'm trying to. Trying to move things ahead. As I was saying, it just seems like it's been a blur with lots of different things going on. There's just lots of, like, projects and things that I'm a part of that have been taking up time and so, like, this week, we have something planned every night this week. So, like, Monday was. We had rehearsal for. There's like a citywide worship night that's going on at the end of the month, which actually is next Friday. And so we had our first rehearsal for that last night. Tonight we finally kicked off our small group, which is great. Tomorrow I've got rehearsal just for Sunday music on Sunday. And then Thursday we have a search committee meeting, and I'm heading up that search committee. And then Friday there's like a mom's night out for this homeschool co op that we're a part of. And my wife invited the moms over to our house for that. So I'm going to take the kids and find something to do. I'm not sure what. So there's that.
• 14:49
  May I suggest Chuck E. Cheese?
• 14:52
  I don't even know where the nearest Chuck E. Cheese is, dude. That's a good question. We have this little in joke as a family because I had said it once when we were driving past the Chuck E. Cheese and my kids thought it was really funny. And they say it all the time is, I, I saw Chuck E. Cheese and I just said Charles Eugene Cheese, that dirty rat. And so anytime they say Chuck E. Cheese, that's just what they say.
• 15:20
  Charles Eugene cheese.
• 15:22
  I'm 100 feeling that.
• 15:24
  Go for it, man. I mean, it's just, I. I do all kinds of weird, you know, funny things. I'll. I'll make up little, like, jingles of things that we're saying. And sometimes there'll be earworms and the kids will start singing along and stuff like that. Anyways, so, yeah, no, it's. It's just a full. And. And I feel like it's been that for what feels like a while, so getting lots done, but it's hard to tell, you know, in a bunch of different little bits of progress in a bunch of different areas, if that makes sense. So that's.
• 15:52
  But that's life. We watched this movie as a family. I forgot which one it was. But there's just this. It's kind of tense moment and, and the one of the girls in the movie, like, sees her father and then it kind of says in like in the kind of this Valley accent, you know, dad, like that. And I started cracking up and that made the kids crack up. Yeah. So ever since then, this has been going on for months now. Ever since then when we're watching a show or something and something's tense and something's coming, I'll Just dad and the kids will just start rolling, laughing, and I'm like, ah, you like this? This can go on forever.
• 16:30
  That's awesome. I love those family in jokes. It's so good.
• 16:33
  Yeah.
• 16:34
  Oh, man. Three dads on a podcast is pretty great.
• 16:38
  Yeah.
• 16:39
  But I love. I love those shared family experiences, but I think we have some more experiences to share. Played it, watch it, read it through. Now we're sharing XP with you. Critical hits. Good stuff to declare. That's right. XP Share, where we share experiences with different forms of media that we've had. Usually it's just over the past couple weeks, but. Hey, Paul, in your case, what are some of the highlights of some of the media that you've.
• 17:17
  I just want to say, like, I. In the last. In the last several years, I. I have put out hours and hours and hours of original music.
• 17:29
  That's right.
• 17:29
  And most of them for podcasts. And, And y' all are like, you know, hey, maybe Paul could write us up. No, no. AI slop. AI slop 100.
• 17:42
  Are you gonna write us approve of this?
• 17:48
  Like, listen.
• 17:49
  Totally good.
• 17:51
  He'd love to hear Paul throw down some Easy Core tracks. Sure, I'm down for that.
• 17:58
  Yeah. I mean, like, listen, show us what you. I have, I have no, like, I was thinking about this, actually, and it's like, I have no problems with, like, if somebody, like, was like, hey, let me. Let me make you music or whatever, or, like, even, like. Yeah, but, well, one, you're super busy, and so I didn't want to.
• 18:24
  I'm not doing it right now. Like, yeah, that's.
• 18:27
  I mean, it's like. But there is that. But it is also. It's. It's just kind of like, I think for the intents and purposes, like, it's just like, obviously, like, you want to pay somebody, you know, to do that,
• 18:42
  but you're the only one who has ever mentioned that to me.
• 18:46
  Oh, man.
• 18:47
  Listen, I believe that's not exactly true.
• 18:50
  That's not exactly true. I have been paid before, but. No, yeah, it's.
• 18:53
  It's. We should pay people for their work.
• 18:58
  But, yeah, I'm just bribing people to stay my friends. Like, look, we talked to the pre show. I, I haven't had many. I like y'.
• 19:06
  All.
• 19:07
  I, I, I'm not, I'm not opposed to bribery.
• 19:10
  Don't, Josh. Don't encourage Josh. He doesn't need encouragement.
• 19:18
  Oh, okay. So the question is what? Like, is what. What I've been into lately? I'm looking at this.
• 19:24
  Yeah, okay.
• 19:24
  All right, well, we are. We as a family are almost done with Babylon 5. This is my third time watching it
• 19:31
  as a family, too.
• 19:32
  It is. It is the best show ever. And.
• 19:36
  Wow.
• 19:36
  I. I did want to bring up that we've been trying to get Josh to start watching it forever as well. And they. They're now putting up episodes once a week on YouTube. And so people do not have excuses anymore. Get on that. It is. It is.
• 19:54
  And then I can watch it in two times speed also.
• 19:56
  Exactly.
• 19:57
  Yeah. Like a monster. It's. You know, it's 110. 10 episodes.
• 20:04
  Wow.
• 20:05
  Long.
• 20:05
  J. Michael Straczynski wrote 95 of them. And it's just because before he started, he knew exactly what was happening and for five seasons and, And. And just kept this one story, I mean, this epic, fantastic sci fi fantasy story going. And it's. It's spectacular and the characters are great. So I'm. I'm pumped that we're getting.
• 20:30
  Getting through it again.
• 20:32
  I'll probably watch it in another few years, but it's just great. The other thing, and this is weird because. All right, so I am reading. And by reading, of course, I mean listening, because reading. Who does that?
• 20:45
  Nerds.
• 20:46
  I'm. I'm listening through Harry Potter for the first time. Really?
• 20:49
  Okay.
• 20:50
  I read the first books. The first three books, when they came out. I liked the first two. I hated the third. I threw it across the room when I was done.
• 20:56
  Oh, wow.
• 20:57
  Which one's the third one?
• 20:58
  Stop.
• 20:59
  Prisoner of Azkaban. I don't know why I know that.
• 21:02
  By the way, that's my favorite movie. But it's because of the director. It's the same director who did Children of Men, which rated R, but it's the best Christian movie ever made as well. And he's. He's done some other amazing, amazing work, but I didn't particularly like the movies that much either.
• 21:21
  Okay.
• 21:21
  But I decided to give it another shot. And I got through three, and I still don't like three. I just finished four and five, and I'm working on six. And there's like this steep, steep incline of skill and interest. And in books four and five, and I'm like, this is so good and so much better than those kind of mediocre movies. It's all. I'm kind of pumped about it now, which I didn't think I'd ever be pumped about Harry Potter, but I'm really enjoying these books.
• 21:56
  Nice. Nice. I remember I read through the first one when I was young and started the Second. Did I finish the second? I don't remember, but I thought the second book was, like, a reskin of the first book. Like, there was so much in common between those two that I'm just like, why would I continue with this?
• 22:15
  Yeah. It really feels. And part of it is because it's getting a little darker, more complex, because.
• 22:21
  Right.
• 22:21
  You know, she is. She is writing for an aging audience, which I think is actually kind of brilliant.
• 22:27
  Okay.
• 22:27
  That her audience is aging along with Harry Potter. But at the same time, I feel like she took some writing classes between 3 and 4, because 4 and 4 as a movie is. Is very mediocre, but 4 as a book is so Is really interesting.
• 22:45
  Nice. Yeah.
• 22:47
  J.K. rowling is. Is really kind of interesting in the sense that, like, I actually think she's pretty proficient in a lot of ways, but she's also very much not my. My flavor. Like, it's like, I can. What's there is good. And I. I read all of them, and I. I am just. I have to be honest, though. Like, I'm just puzzled why people. Like, like, because, like, people around our age and Paul, maybe you and I are sort of at the. The upper echelon, but, like, it becomes, like, their entire identity. Sure.
• 23:20
  Huh.
• 23:22
  Well, I mean, like, don't call me Millennial. You're ex. You're ex. And I'm. I'm sort of like, I'm Elder Millennial. Xennial, whatever. Like, I'm like that weird little micro generation in between the two. But, like, I just don't understand why so many millennials. Like. Like, the books are good, but it is not like, I'm like, oh, I'm hustling. They're in, like, I don't.
• 23:46
  What.
• 23:48
  Like, it's, you know, very true. And I'm weird. I'm certainly not like that. I'm gonna hide my. My robes. Hold on. But, yeah, no, and, like, I. I think it just is. It is something about being that age and attaching to something that. That is probably a lot better than most of the slop that. That, you know, Twilight you find in the books. Yeah. Stuff like that.
• 24:20
  That you find it was around the same time.
• 24:23
  I mean, you know, look, one of those things is good. Yeah.
• 24:28
  I've gotten obsessed that, you know, in the past, and this was. This was more college, but, like, Wheel of Time and. And stuff. And I had. I had printed out, like, a whole care list of characters that was very, very long because Robert Jordan was a little bit of a freak naming characters that you'll never see again.
• 24:45
  Oh, dude. Like, there will be, like, one major arc for that character, and then they will never show up again. That arc is very, very important to the story.
• 24:55
  Yes.
• 24:56
  If you don't know what happens, like, you're. You're lost without that. But that one character just.
• 25:02
  I did that first. My first reading of Wheel of Time. I. I think I was busy, and I had this. I had this great job at the time where I just read most of the day, but I think I was busy in the particular chapter that Men shows up for the first time, and I just. I blacked out that chapter, and I came to the next book, and it was this girl, Men. And I'm like, who the heck is Men? And, like, critically important character, but she was in one chapter of the first book, and. But that's the thing with Robert Jordan. You never, never know if this person is coming back. And so you got to take note. You know, they'll be. You know, they came up to the gate guard whose name was Brutus, and he had a family, and this was all their kids names, and, like, okay, that person's not important. No. Next book. Critically important or something like that. And even you, Brutus.
• 25:54
  Sorry.
• 25:55
  But I, like, I don't know if I.
• 25:58
  Why are you giving him that, Paul? Oh, why are you giving him ammo?
• 26:03
  I do remember. I do remember going to school with a bunch of bracelets that I. That I got from DC Talk and, like, DC Talk shirts at the time. So maybe that was my Harry Potter
• 26:17
  when I was in Greece.
• 26:21
  One of those things has aged better than the other. Oh, no.
• 26:27
  I do think that Jesus Freak age better than Harry Potter. Maybe not the band.
• 26:36
  Jesus Freak is a banger of an album.
• 26:39
  That album is great. The rest of them. But I. I like them. I still like them, but, yeah, I'd give. I'd give Jesus Freak to anybody. I probably wouldn't give many of the other ones. Those people.
• 26:55
  Right, right. Yeah, that's what. That's what I meant, is the band.
• 26:59
  But Jesus Freak hadn't come out at the time. This was new thing.
• 27:02
  Oh, wow. Okay.
• 27:04
  And. And Jesus. Jesus is all right. And I'd be on the playgrounds, you know, doing the third verse as Jesus is just all right to people because no one else could do it.
• 27:16
  Oh, wow.
• 27:17
  That's the one that goes. I'm down with the one that. I'm joking. I'm not gonna.
• 27:24
  Nice, nice
• 27:29
  things gonna kick me off the show. It was nice seeing y'. All.
• 27:33
  No, no, I just. I like The. I'm just following the progression of the conversation. We go from Harry Potter to Robert Jordan to. To DC Talk, and I'm like. And it's coherent. It makes sense. Like, look, this is.
• 27:50
  This is what you bring me on for. This is why. This is why people tune in for
• 27:54
  these episodes, to share experiences one to another, you know. Nate, do you have any experiences to share?
• 28:04
  Yeah, just a couple that. That I'll bring up here. I actually got to bring up my notes here. Pay no mind to.
• 28:12
  I can read it for you if you want.
• 28:14
  But. So the. The two that I'll bring up is. I've been listening to on audible the Practices of the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence. It's an older text. You know, it's. It's actually. It's like. It's kind of like one of those things where Brother Lawrence wasn't actually the author. It was just. It was these interviews conducted by somebody else. And, like.
• 28:42
  Was it his brother? No, no, that would have been.
• 28:47
  That's good.
• 28:47
  That would have been awesome.
• 28:48
  Brother Lawrence's brother.
• 28:51
  Brother of Lawrence. Brother to the Lawrence. Brother.
• 28:55
  Brother of Brother Lawrence. No, it was. Yeah, I can't remember the guy, but there was some guy who sat down and basically had a bunch of dialogues with him and then communicated those. Those, you know, wrote down those conversations, essentially.
• 29:13
  Yeah, that makes sense.
• 29:15
  It's a pretty interesting book. I would recommend it.
• 29:20
  Okay.
• 29:21
  Like, yeah, I just. I would recommend it. I think it's pretty good. It's one of those books that I didn't realize how formative, like, it's been a while since I had read it years ago and going back through it, how formative it was for just like.
• 29:33
  Like.
• 29:33
  Because, like, one of the things is, like, Brother Lawrence was just like, all of life is worship. And so, like, he would just, like, be praying all the time and then everything he did and. And it's like, you know, it's like one of those things where it's like, you know, how much of this was. You know, this is part of, like, the monastic tradition, stuff like that. But. But yeah, it's really. I think it's actually really pretty. It's pretty cool, and I would recommend it. Um, for the most part, yeah. The other thing is, I've been watching Farscape. I started up again, and Paul, we were talking about this a little bit pre show, like, Farscape is. Is so good. So great.
• 30:13
  I will. I will. Won't go on and on like we did before, but, man, Farscape's great.
• 30:19
  Yeah, I think it's one of the most interesting. Like, it's definitely, I'm only a couple episodes in and it's definitely got like that 90s, like that 90s, late 90s, early aughts television kind of vibe. And it's really, it is really jarring because the sides are letterboxed where I'm watching it on and it's like, oh, I don't, don't like this. I remember this. Don't care for it. So there's that. But yeah, like, I think like the Jim Henson studio with the, the, the, the creature work and the, the, the puppets and everything else, really, really cool stuff. And it's a really interesting sci fi world. But the reality is like, Farscape is great. It's available on Amazon Prime. It's a little dated, but it's still pretty rad.
• 31:11
  Nice. All right, Farscape. Cool. I'll have to check that out sometime after I do. What's that?
• 31:21
  I do think that that is probably the most visually gorgeous film of that sci fi era, which is an incredibly great sci fi era. I think that's been the best era of sci fi tv. But that, that show is just very pretty.
• 31:40
  And it's got a really great aesthetic too. Like, just like the design, the, the
• 31:46
  creature design, the alien design is second to none. It's, it's just top notch. Pretty cool what you expect from Jim Henson company, but yeah, that is really cool.
• 31:56
  Yeah. Nice. Well, I've got, I've got a few things to, to share, some experiences to share. I think I'm, I'm actually gonna go a little bit more serious than, than just kind of the dumb stuff that I've got here as well. Just for the sake of time. I know. Yes. Thumbs down.
• 32:16
  Boo this man.
• 32:20
  So the first thing that I'll talk about is this book that I read, which I agree, Paul, when I say read, I mean listen to is. It's called My Dear Hemlock by Tilly Dillahay. So this is a take on Screwtape letters, but particularly it is a young woman who then ages, you know, and she has kids and the kids go off. You know, they grow up and they go off as well. So the premise behind it is basically just another screw tape, but kind of set in modern day and for women, you know, and the reason I wanted to actually that is why, is because, you know, as I'm, you know, I'm associate pastor at a church and I want to understand the more sins that, that women are more inclined to because I notice that, you know, like, when I. When it's. When I have a time to preach, you know, throughout the year, is that sometimes all, you know, in my examples and calling out certain things, I often, you know, look at my own experience. But I recognize that not everyone has, you know, similar proclivities that I do and things like that. And so really, that's. That's kind of why I listened to. It was just an attempt to get into the, you know, into kind of a feminine mind and a look at these sins. And so insofar as that goes, I think it was. It was. I enjoyed that aspect of it of like, oh, yeah, you take certain things. You can make things more manipulative in the way that you, you know, talk, the way that you act. Okay, that's an interesting kind of take on these things. So there. So there's that. And that's why I listen to it. And hey, if you want. If you're interested, then. Then you can go check it out. I will say it is certainly not as well written as Screwtape letters. I would definitely say read Screwtape letters before this one. You know, there's a few things I think. She's not. The writer is not as. As eloquent as Lewis was. So sometimes she's a bit on the nose where it's like, okay, this is supposed to be one demon talking to another demon, but she kind of makes things very plain in a way that's like, more aimed towards the reader, if that makes sense. It's like, I'm not sure that these characters would be talking that way at certain points, you know, things like that. So I don't think it's done as well as what it is attempting to not rip off, but. But pay homage to. So, yeah, there's that one, My Dear Hemlock by Tilly Dillahay. The other one that I've been listening to, and I have not finished it because it is one of these kind of tomes. It's. I want it. It's like 30 to 40 hours on audiobook, but it is called Truths we confess by R.C. sproul, and it is basically his commentary on the Westminster Catechism. And so I am enjoying that quite a bit. I haven't hit any parts that I disappear. Disagree with yet. But I mean, even. Even though.
• 35:38
  If you're smart, you wouldn't disagree with any of it. But.
• 35:43
  Okay, moving on.
• 35:45
  Look, Nate. Nate, you know, the Lord is pleased to reveal his truths at a different pace for everyone.
• 35:53
  Exactly.
• 35:54
  So give him time Give him time.
• 35:56
  Yes, yes, it may. It may take until glory, but eventually we will have. Have similar theologies in every way. And hey, I mean, if, if Sproul can't convince me, then I don't know who else is going to, so. But it's, it's good to. Yeah, it's. It's good to, to dig into, even just digging into the Westminster itself, but then sprawl. And, you know, I forgot that I
• 36:21
  own that physically, like I, I have.
• 36:25
  I didn't know about that book. I'm, I'm. I'm very interested because Westminster Confession is just pretty spectacular document, as you Reform Baptist note, because you stole it word for word for most of it.
• 36:38
  And then change the polity and the
• 36:42
  sacraments, since we're talking about intellectual property.
• 36:45
  Eat the meat, spit out the bones, man. You know, don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. Take all the best stuff, you know. Right. Yes, yes, Certainly Second London shows a lot of emulation there. But anyways, that's what I have. Those are some of the media that I have been into and experiences that I wanted to share that I would recommend to different degrees as well. But we are a video game podcast, and regardless of how long we talk before we actually talk about video games, let's talk about some video games. So, Paul, what video games have you been playing?
• 37:27
  Oh, man, I got rehooked into an old. An old. Not an old. It's fairly recent, but an old obsession, of course. Talking about Marvel Snap, but no. So my Final Fantasy 14 character, I told y' all this, but he was mugged and dragged off into the woods and left for dead. What happened was my account was hacked and so somebody logged into my character, and I was shopping for houses for my freak for our free company at the time. So I was carrying 20 million gil on my character at the time. And so somebody hacked into my account, took me to a different server and took all the money. And so there's this whole process that Square Enix has for when this happens. And they could rewind your character. It works. They did it. It's kind of a pain in the butt process, and they're not very communicative about it. And it took 10 days for that to happen, but they gave me 20 million back. And so all in all, it was worth the time. But I couldn't log into Final Fantasy 14 for 10 days, so I got rehooked into Stardew Valley. That game is so good. Okay. And so I've been mostly playing that and Slowly getting back into Final Fantasy 14. And so hopefully get. Hopefully get our house upgrade here soon. For anybody listening is like, oh, he's still carrying 20 million. I have two factor authentication down on it now. You're not getting the money again.
• 39:15
  All right.
• 39:19
  Yikes. Well, I'm glad you were able to. To get it back. That's pretty cool that they at least offer something like that. So. Man, but that also. That's crazy that you're playing two games that swallow your time whole.
• 39:32
  I know. Well, in. In Stardew Valley, I. My current farm is. I got. I got the mod Stardew Valley expanded, which adds a lot of characters, a lot of. Quite a bit of content. And. And so it's. It's. It's like, you know, it's. It's. It's all the addiction of Stardew Valley, but just more to do.
• 39:55
  So that's exactly what you need. Yeah.
• 39:57
  So, yeah, two times sucks when I. When I really should be writing more, but we're getting all in. We're getting it all.
• 40:05
  There you go. Nice.
• 40:11
  I don't know anything about dumping copious amounts of time into time suck games.
• 40:21
  So, speaking of which, what have you been playing, Nate?
• 40:24
  Marvel Snap and Destiny 2. So, no, no time sinks here. No. None to be seen. I mean, I'll tell you what. It's like, I was kind of on the outs with Marvel Snap and it's. This is just like the back and forth where I was like, it's so
• 40:44
  hopeful for me when you. When you are. I'm like, yes, we're getting.
• 40:47
  It's like, please, please calm down, Nate.
• 40:50
  Back. And this is excellent.
• 40:52
  And then now what will probably actually kind of put some nails in that coffin again is that next month we are doing like a family thing where it's like no extra money on anything. And Marvel Snap was kind of like. And so, like, that's gonna take a hit. And if I'm not spending money on it, then I don't feel like I have to play it. Even if it's just like, are you a whale?
• 41:18
  Are you a whale?
• 41:20
  No, no. I buy. I buy the season pass. I buy like the. And that's like a month. And I had. Yeah. And so it's like this month, it. It'll probably. I just realized I did like the. Like, you got some of them rocks. You got some of that snap.
• 41:40
  Yeah, some of that snap. Got any more of those Galactus cards?
• 41:47
  But I think next month I will be like, and. And I kind of like, last month I was like, ah, I think I'm kind of done. But, like, this month, it's like, we've just agreed as a family that we're not spending money on anything that isn't absolutely essential. And so, like, that means, like, the season pass is going to go, and that's probably going to be like, my out. Like that. That'll be the point. Because it's like, I buy the season pass because I'm like, oh, like, I get my money's worth out of this, and then I'm just like. And then what happens is, like, you know, you're like, oh, I've got money in this and now I need to keep playing. And so we've, like I said, we've pre. Committed as a family to just, like, say no to all that. So. And destiny. Destiny is kind of like, I jump in, I play with my friend Hoss, and we. We kill aliens with. Well, I have a lightsaber. It's not a lightsaber. Technically, it's a praxic blade, but it's a freaking lightsaber, and it rules. It is everything a lightsaber should be, which is an awesome power of, you know, an awesome weapon to smoke, to smite thy enemies with. But other than that, not a ton. I mean, I'm still kind of like, I haven't really. I really do want to sort of just, like, knuckle down and Link's awakening. Like, I'm pretty much like, I could probably within like, two or three hours be done with that game if I would just, like, knuckle down on it. But it's kind of like, I also. Basically, I'm at a point where it's like, I just need to pull up a YouTube video for the temple. I'm on to, like, walk me through the temple, because, like, it's.
• 43:27
  But I gotta start that.
• 43:30
  Yeah.
• 43:30
  I don't know when we're doing it, but I gotta start.
• 43:32
  Yeah. I mean, there's so. But. And that is a patron game. You know, actually, it was your pick, Paul. Yep.
• 43:38
  That's why I gotta play. I. I have not played this game before, so.
• 43:42
  Yeah, I will be interested to see what you think of it, because I think in some ways it's like. And I'm playing the. The. The redone version that's got, like, the little claymation doll looking on the switch. It runs awesome on the switch too, by the way.
• 43:58
  Nice.
• 43:59
  So give me your opinion, because Josh gave me his opinion earlier, so I have not played it. Should I be playing the. The game? Boy version or the. Or get the. Get the.
• 44:09
  I didn't have any major problems with performance on the Switch version. I've. I've never beat the Game Boy version. I did play it, like, a fair amount. I don't know, dude. Like, I don't know that there's any significant content changes. So it's like, what. Which aesthetic do you like better? Do you like the pixel art? Or do you. I mean, if you have nso, if you have the Nintendo Switch online, I think it's in that library.
• 44:43
  It is, yes.
• 44:44
  So I would just say, like, you're already paying for that. I'd play that. And it. Then if you're like, oh, hey, like, I like this, but I like. Maybe, like, an upgraded version. I'm a sucker.
• 44:53
  Liked an upgraded version, honestly.
• 44:55
  Yeah, I was gonna say. So I. I think just all things considered, you. You probably should just play the Game Boy version.
• 45:03
  Okay, so I'll check that out. I don't know. Have y' all seen that meme of shoot? The. The character from watchmen? Is it Dr. Manhattan?
• 45:15
  The blue dude? Yeah, that's.
• 45:16
  Yeah, the blue dude. But. But it's from. It's from the comic, and he's on. And he's on Mars, and it's like, you know, and it's this year, and this is happening. It's this year, and it's just that the meme is, you know, like, these separate years and the same things happening. We need a backlog breakdown of, you know, it's the year 2023, and Nate is playing Destiny 2 and Marvel.
• 45:41
  Snap. That's good.
• 45:45
  That's fair. That's fair. Harsh, but fair. Sort of. Just moving on. I'm also playing BioShock Infinite.
• 45:53
  Started that up.
• 45:54
  That one's kind of like. I don't play that on the big screen when Byron's home.
• 46:00
  Right?
• 46:00
  So it's kind of like.
• 46:03
  It is gory.
• 46:05
  It's. It's a little gratuitous. Dude, it's super sick. I have this mod that when I punch people with the melee weapon, there's a 70 chance to set them on fire. And I'm like, so not only do we get, like, the blood and the grunts from that, sometimes they catch on fire, and there's screams associated with that too, which I'm like, listen. I'm like, yes.
• 46:31
  I was surprised when I played through it last year, how gory the game was, because, like, BioShock the original has its moments, and it has a creepier atmosphere overall. This one just has, like, an unsettlingly like bright atmosphere. And so the gore, I was just like, like, whoa, dude. It is.
• 46:53
  That game is super jarring in a lot of ways because it is very bright. It is like. Yeah, like rapture from the first one is like dark, it's dank, it's wet, it's. It just got. It's like spooky vibes and it's like. And BioShock Infinite. It's like, it's lots of sunlight, lots of like really like ambient light, like lots of great colors and. Yeah. And then the, the good old ultra violence.
• 47:24
  Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 47:26
  But, but yeah, we're, you know, the plan is to do an episode on that, but Josh. So I haven't picked up anything. Haven't beaten anything. I was kind of looking ahead though, and you just finished something, so maybe we should do an episode on that shortly.
• 47:42
  Okay. Okay. And that is actually probably something we should have tackled even beforehand. So. So, you know, I. I last. I did a bite sized episode and I was thinking about doing some sort of a review for the game because I have a lot of mixed feelings about the game. But I'm glad you say that because maybe we could do kind of an extended thing because I think there's an
• 48:07
  episode in there like.
• 48:09
  Okay. Okay, good to know then. I won't delve too deeply into it, but I did finish Sea of Stars. I think one of my main issues with my time with the game is that I expected this game. I remember when it came out that it was an indie darling. It was a. It was touted as a must play. I was looking back on some stuff. The Completionist gave it his game of the year and I remember that sentiment in general. Just that this was like absolutely fantastic and you need to play it and that it takes a lot from Chrono Trigger. And so going into the game I expected a lot and it did not deliver what I expected.
• 48:55
  Sounds awesome. I'm picking this up.
• 48:59
  It does a lot of things well. The pixel art is fantastic. Even if I'm not the biggest fan of the art style itself. The art style is a bit more generic and I wished it. It was. It would not. I wish they would have like really gone hard into a particular style, but it has kind of an indie double A kind of feeling to it in terms of style. But the pixel art is. Is great. The world feels alive, even if it's not communicated as well as. I mean, the world itself, like it feels alive, but just the story and introducing you into the world and what's going on. I did, I felt was pretty stilted the way that you really only get backstory in areas if you pick up certain items and then talk to someone whenever you. Basically at save points, you can choose to show this artifact to someone, to a historian, and they will tell you the story of their peoples and things like that. Which I wasn't doing because now if I get to a save point, I don't want to just pause the game and read for five minutes. Like, I want to get back into the game. So anyways, that's. That's a bit more of a nitpick. The. The combat I did enjoy, it got a little stale for a little while, and then I found the challenge ramped back up towards the end of the game. My favorite boss fight was towards the end, not the final boss fight, but there was this kind of two on three battle that you had that had me kind of on the edge of my seat and I really enjoyed that. Anyways, yeah, if we're gonna do a full episode, I probably shouldn't act like I'm doing a full episode on it, except to say that I do think the game is good, but I think the game had a lot more unrealized potential than I expected it to have. So, like, if I were. If I were to rate it out of five, I'd give it a three because I enjoyed it, but it just wasn't what I wanted it to be. And I. I feel like there are a number of areas where it could have been improved and it could have been better, but it didn't really.
• 51:15
  And. And again, we'll talk more about this, like in, in an upcoming episode, but I kind of. Did you do like, the completionist ending?
• 51:25
  No, I did not. Nope. And that, that was one of the things that kind of sealed my feelings for the game is that I finished it, I got the regular ending, and then, you know, you. You restart whatever, and it's like, hey, there's this free dlc. And I took a look at it and it's like eight to 10 hours. And I was like, I have no interest in putting another eight to 10 hours.
• 51:49
  Yeah.
• 51:50
  And that's when I was like, okay, yeah, this game is like, it's. It's good, it's okay, it's good. But it's not more than that for me.
• 51:59
  So I didn't feel it was like, necessary for.
• 52:04
  It's not, it's not. I'm sorry, I just meant the question was posed, do you want more of this game? And I Said no. And that's when it hit me, like, okay, yeah, that's actually how I feel about the game.
• 52:17
  What I will say is that if you get the true ending, it does, I think, foreign. It's like one of those things where I was like. I was a little more up on it after getting the true ending. But, like, there is kind of like this whole thing where it's like, if I kind of have to do, like this, like, song and dance almost to a certain. Like, that's not. That's not awesome. Like, you know, it's like, it's. It's kind of. There's. And so
• 52:50
  I did have part of it spoiled. Like, the big thing that happens in the. In the true ending. I don't know how it happens, and I don't know. But anyways, there are some things in the story. I mean. Oh, goodness. I don't want to give anything away. Yeah, let's just area of the game that's, like, filled with ghosts and reanimated dead. And so I'm kind of like, kind of flies in the face of some of the things that happen in this game. But we won't talk about it, so.
• 53:19
  Yeah, we will.
• 53:21
  Anyways, anyway, so.
• 53:22
  Yeah, so I did an episode on that.
• 53:24
  Exactly.
• 53:25
  Yeah.
• 53:26
  Are you interested in playing through it, Paul? Because we can have you on for that episode. Anyways, Sea of Stars, I did finish it. I put in, you know, 25ish or whatever hours it was. So I do get a negative one for finishing Sea of Stars. After playing through that game, I was taking a look at my list of games that I wanted to beat for the year and went to kind of the other extreme of, like, in terms of length and in terms of type of game. And I went with a game that I had played with a buddy of mine. We would play it on our breaks at work when I worked for a church back in Texas. And he actually picked up the Super Nintendo Kart. And we would play donkey Kong Country 2 Diddy's Conquest, which takes on a whole new. A whole different meaning in 2026. But what can I say? Anyways, we got maybe halfway through the game. We never finished it, but I remember because it was my Super Nintendo that I had brought up to the church because we had an old CRT there that we just couldn't bear to get rid of. And so we would have it on this cart and he went to a used game store and picked up Donkey Kong country, too. We would play it. Got about halfway through, but then he Was like, you know what? You can just keep this game. I think this was around the time he got laid off or something like that. And he was like, you can just keep the game. Because I don't have a Super Nintendo. Like, I just got it so that we could play it. And I've never ended up finishing the game. So I have the save file in the basement of about halfway through. So I want to play through it. And I put in some time into it. I think I'm like five or so four or five different areas, sections done with the game. But the game has tons of different collectibles and I've not been focusing on that. And I am really enjoying it. I understand why this one is held in high esteem amongst the Donkey Kong country games. I get it. It takes what one. What the first game does and kind of goes crazy with some of the stuff and goes in, not necessarily in new directions, maybe a few added things, but it really kind of digs into some of the concepts from the first game and. And ramps up the challenge, it feels like too, because I'm very familiar with the first game and. And I like the challenge in the game. It's. It's a good. I just find that. That I respond to that pretty well in a game of this kind. So I have not finished the game. I imagine I will finish it by the time we record next because it's a short game and I'm not going for full completion. So in addition to that, I've also been playing theater, Rhythm, Bar Line. I'm probably like three quarters of the way through all the different games because there's like 16. I was going to say 16 different Final Fantasy games. And I did not mean to. To make that, to reference that. But no, there's actually probably more like 20 different titles ranging from like 5 tracks to like 30 tracks with Final Fantasy 14. So anyways, making my way through that, enjoying that quite a bit. I might have that finished up. I don't know. We'll see if we have that finished up by the next episode. But anyways, those are the games that I'm playing for now. And so I get an extra negative one to my Beatdown score, which brings me to a total of -4 for the year so far. And that's. That's where I'm sitting.
• 57:02
  Cool.
• 57:02
  Yeah, cool, Cool.
• 57:03
  Cool.
• 57:04
  So if you guys. If you've been listening to the show for any amount of time, you know that these numbers that Josh and I throw out just aren't. I mean, they're they're nonsense, but there is actually a little bit of meaning there. Yeah, yeah, I see you shaking your head, Paul. You don't like it. There's lots of things you don't like. We don't care. This is also true. Yes, no. But we run a meta that goes year long, you know, a yearly meta that essentially it's there to sort of encourage people to beat the games that they already own and sort of mitigates that help increase, like introduce a little bit of friction in sort of acquisition. So you beat stuff you already own, your score goes down, you want a negative score, you get rid of the pile of shame, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. If you're interested in that. We have rules over in the Discord. We still haven't finalized the 2026 rules. John reached out to us. We do need to get that done because there have been questions asked, but we'll do that soon.
• 58:02
  Ish.
• 58:03
  Sooner rather than later. But yeah, if you're interested, we can get you a copy of those rules. They're in our Discord. They're in the 2020. They're tagged in the. The different beatdown channels. Yeah, all that. We'll get it to you if you want. All that being said, other things that you might be interested in. Like so many other podcasts, we. We do have a Patreon. You can look at it as a tip jar. You can look at a way to partner with us. Our patrons get early and uncut access to each and every episode. They get a lot more sort of influence in a lot of ways in shaping the content that we do. Like we did this year. We did nominations and voting. They can offer up topics. They can join us on podcasts on episodes. You know, so actually you will. You will hear from Paul at least one at a time this year. At least one. You know, perhaps more because as we mentioned before, he. He nominated Legend of Zelda, Link's Awakening, and that got that. Got through the voting. And so we're going to be doing that. He'll probably hop on that. That actually will probably be you.
• 59:12
  You and West.
• 59:13
  That'll be. And get Wes.
• 59:15
  Yeah.
• 59:15
  To keep up the. The tradition.
• 59:17
  The. The.
• 59:18
  Okay.
• 59:18
  The Legend
• 59:22
  and now four. Yeah, yeah.
• 59:25
  So, yeah. But they also get a little more access to us through an exclusive channel in the Patreon and. Or well, through the Patreon, but also an exclusive channel in the Discord server. So there's also the Bro Hang, which is a topical podcast that Josh and I do where it's not really topical. I mean, it's topical to whatever.
• 59:48
  There are topics.
• 59:49
  There are topics, but it doesn't have quite the agenda. We talk, we do talk about things sometimes entirely too long, and we say things that we probably shouldn't. But hey, what's new? What else is like, you know, surprise? But all that being said, if you're interested, the link will be in the. What's the link Tree.
• 1:00:17
  That's right in the show notes linktree.com/the backlog breakdown.
• 1:00:21
  Yeah, sure, sure. Jeepers, this is going to be awesome because I'm already like, just falling apart.
• 1:00:28
  Sick.
• 1:00:29
  Sick. We haven't even hit the main topic and I'm just like, I'm a, a jabbering mess. But lastly, but surely not leastly, we alongside actually Paul here are part of the Playwell Network. So it's Paul, it's Wesley Ray, the hench, and dad himself. It's Nicholas Porch, AKA Porcho, the Wonder from Down Under. And the most recent addition is Mark Erickson with quickplay. All these guys have podcasts and create content that explore the ideas of engaging with recreation in meaningful and restorative and wise ways. And so we love these guys. We love their content and we think you should check it out. And so here's a word, and it's probably going to be from Paul. So.
• 1:01:17
  LRT and Gates is a podcast about my upcoming heroic fantasy, tabletop, role playing and novel project. As we have the Kickstarter this spring and work begins for the full game and novel that goes with it, I'm going to be podcasting my thoughts about game design, about adventure, about storytelling and the ideas that are going into the game and the ideas that inspired me to write in it in the first place. We'll also have some real gameplay and stories from the world of Elartia. Elartian Gates is available wherever you get podcasts.
• 1:01:55
  And we're back you.
• 1:02:00
  It's fun. It was fun. It was fun. It was a fun little.
• 1:02:03
  No.
• 1:02:03
  You know, I was trying to do your thing, but I was not pulling it off very well. I was trying to. To emulate the best of us, but it just came off as a poor emulation of what previously existed. So today. Oh yeah, that's right. Today we're talking about emulation, aren't we? That's pretty cool. I hate that's pretty cool.
• 1:02:26
  He's the bane of my existence.
• 1:02:29
  So way back when. Well, this was even brought up in our episode 200 the Jamboree. I don't know what you want to call it where there's even a lost episode where we talked about emulation. So early on in the annals of the podcast, we've had similar conversations. And you could say this is a bit of a redux of the. The emulation strikes back or something along those lines, whatever you want to call it. But have our views, have our understandings, have, have, have we changed throughout this podcast? Has this podcast changed us? Have we changed? What do we think about emulation? I think that's where we're going. I don't know. I just know that we're talking emulation. So thanks for being here, Paul. And let's talk emulation.
• 1:03:18
  Yeah, and. Well, and just to like, I remember we did that episode and then we did an episode on emulation. And then Paul was like, he kind of did like in, in not, not the jerky way, but in like, kind
• 1:03:34
  of a. Oh, that's relief.
• 1:03:36
  No, but you kind of, you pulled like the, the. Well, actually, there's a little bit more here. And so some of what we're going to talk about is like, I think there are some general principles for emulation that we. And, and how we can use it as gamers that we can talk about. I also think, though, that. And, and this is kind of what you brought up, too, when we talked about it with you years ago. At this point in time, Paul, was that IP law, especially in the States, is kind of dubious at best. And the way that a lot of these corporations sort of leverage copyright laws and things like that is pretty heinous. Mickey Mouse, we're looking at you. But also, I would say, like, to a certain extent, like, you know, sometimes there are things I think would be better off not in the public domain. Winnie the Pooh horror movies. I'm looking at you like, there are things that should not exist. And because some people will be like, hey, can I ruin a thing? Then I'm going to ruin that thing. But we'll get there when we get there. But I think. I don't know that. I think it would just be helpful to sort of re. Like revisit some of the, the basic tenets of emulation that I'll talk about. Like, what I kind of hold to, like, my position. And then we can sort of use it as a springboard to get into maybe areas of just like, whatever. And as with so many things, like, listen here, we're not trying to bind anyone's conscience with this stuff because mileage may vary. You may not hold these convictions or these positions, but what I will tell, like what I can do is I can share my convictions, how I came to those positions, and then we can talk about the rest of those things. So primarily, and I'll start us off with this, I think that primarily emulation is fine as long as you own the media. I think that's actually pretty clear cut. I think legally that's covered for the most part. You know, you may get a little wonky, especially now that it's more. Less you owning the software and it's more about you licensing the right to use that software. But I think as a general rule, if you are emulating software for a console or a computer that you already own, you're in the clear. I think where it gets a lot murkier is when it comes to games preservation stuff. And I think where it's absolutely just forbidden is if you're just using it to steal games, which like is you have no intent to pay for that software. You just want to play it. And that's like. And I think that's primarily like most explicitly, like, you know, there was that guy within the last year, he was a streamer and he would basically his whole thing is like, I will tell you how to steal Nintendo, like emulate Nintendo games so that you don't have to pay them. And like Nintendo went after him like, they were like, yeah, good luck with that pal. Hit him for, you know. You know, it's like, listen, of all the companies like poke with sticks like that, Nintendo is probably your worst bet. But like, I think that's a pretty clear, clear cut. And, and I would say like, the general principle I have with this is that I think, you know, some people are like, well, it's not available in my own language, etc. Etc. Etc. And okay, like Josh, like Josh and I did an episode on Mother three that's a game that you can't buy in the States. You know, like you can buy translated ROM copies and it's actually, it's. I think we even talked about it when we did the Mother three Earthbound three episode. Is that that's like the one game Nintendo will not go after people for apparently like every other game because that, that fan translation just, they just kind of leave it alone. I don't, I. Yeah, it's. It's weird. Like, you know, but it's not that weird actually when you think about all the reasons why. But in order to do our episode, Josh, like, we basically, you and I bought digital copies or digital codes for copies on the Japanese Wii U system. Or whatever. So like that's, that was like our sort of like where we were like, hey, we feel like we've sort of fulfilled our legal obligation to utilize the software. So. And what I would say is like, I think as a general rule, my kind of. And again, this is pretty broadly speaking, but that I tend to look at like, if you cannot obtain it legally and you do not, and you do not obtain it illegal legally, then you probably, like, it's a general provision, a general grace that maybe you ought not to play it. And especially in light of the fact that like we are, you know, in some ways the backlog breakdown. Like there's, let's be honest, a lot of us have like, like hundreds of games that we could be playing probably anyways. So it's like, sure, why go out of your way to potentially like. And especially the way that ROMs and everything work now. Like, they're just a lot of times like they're back doors for, you know, they're Trojans for viruses and malware and all that stuff. All that being said, I would say as general principles, this is kind of what I hold to. Now what I will say is I think, I think there might be some exceptions, but like, those are the general principles that I hold to.
• 1:09:32
  Yeah, discuss. Well, if I could cut in for just a second before discussing that is we haven't really defined emulation. I think for this point in the conversation we can just define it as playing games outside of their original format and their original console. So you can get into the tech, because I think we will eventually get into the technicalities of ROMs being the games themselves and then emulating consoles, which. That's another rabbit hole because you can't pull the BIOS files from a console legally. You have to do that separately. So, but for the sake of conversation, I think we can say the emulation is just playing it in a different, not in its original intended way, but emulating what a console would do with software.
• 1:10:32
  And that's even sort of an interesting case because, like the legality of emulation has been sort of up for grabs, I think. And the reality is nobody's tested the case in law, nobody's tested these things for the most part. So in theory, the way that it works is, yes, you, you mentioned like, you can't, you can't just copy the bios, but if you can, you can take those data packets and find ways to make them run on other software or other hardware. Like, so basically, if you build an engine that will emulate the same effects as the, the native hardware's BIOS basic input output system. You know, for people who don't know what that means. But like the, like if you can emulate again emulate that bios, you can't just rip it out of the, the system. You can't just copy it. It has to be engineered to do that. Like yeah, in theory that's not really contestable. And as long. And the other part of that rule is that as long as you, the where it gets sticky is with roms which, the read only memory packets for those games. So the actual packets for the, like the code for those games, as long as you aren't in theory you can create a ROM of your game
• 1:12:10
  to
• 1:12:12
  play that on other hardware. It's where you're sort of trading ROMs or downloading ROMs and stuff like that. Where that's. Those areas get very, very gray very, very quickly. Like in theory you could, if you own a game and then download a ROM for it so that you can play it on your PC, you're technically kind of outside of the understanding of law. But again none of this has been tested in court.
• 1:12:46
  Like I, and I, I think that, I think that's a big deal because I'll tell you, Nintendo disagrees with you. Yes, they, they think that you, you, you would need to buy it again for whatever new, new thing that you, that you're doing. And, and since now look like none of us are lawyers, please don't.
• 1:13:09
  I, you know, this is not legal counsel.
• 1:13:12
  The companies are not generally going after people for that use because I mean first of all how are they going to know? But it, yeah it's the, it's the sharing and stuff that they, they really, they really go after. Now I'm going to say this. Just because they are not doing it right now does not mean that they're not going to do it. I live through the MP3 fiasco, right? Currently, currently record companies are not going after people for downloading MP3s for their personal use. That doesn't mean that they didn't before because they did. And they took hundreds of thousands of dollars from people for that, for that when Napster was first coming out. And so that, that's, that's.
• 1:14:05
  Thanks Metallica.
• 1:14:07
  Right. And by the way, by the way, and this is one of the things that, that annoys me about this subject. The artist got none of that money. None of it. $0. It went to the record companies. And this is part of the messiness of, of IP in general. And all. So yeah, I want to add to that. It's like, because this has not been tested in a courtroom, even having a copy of a game that you have purchased is not an area that, it's an area that we think is okay right now and it may not be tomorrow.
• 1:14:52
  Well, and depending on the language in the eula, that end user licensing agreement, I mean, some of these companies could already be putting language in there where I'm saying, like, you cannot do this. And so by emulating it, you're in violation of the licensing agreement and therefore, like have forfeited your rights to that material technically. And again, it's like, this is why, you know, those EULAs are, are big and you know.
• 1:15:22
  Right.
• 1:15:22
  They take 20 minutes to scroll through, just, just scrolling through them, let alone reading them. But yeah,
• 1:15:31
  yeah. So, you know, and, and the actual, the actual law on this is not, is, is not something that, I'll be straight with you, I just don't care that much about, I care in that I don't want to go to prison.
• 1:15:50
  Yeah.
• 1:15:51
  You know, I don't want to be fined for thousands or dozens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of dollars.
• 1:15:58
  Right.
• 1:15:58
  I also care about that. I care about that part.
• 1:16:01
  Right. I, I, you know, I, I, by the way, I mean, the first time we did, we did this episode, I was, I was doing retro super show. And you know, back then I got an Everdrive for my nes and it was, it was specifically because it's like, hey, look, I'm reviewing games that I can't get anymore.
• 1:16:23
  Little Samson, we're looking at you, Little Samson.
• 1:16:26
  Like, and I've told you, I think I mentioned in that episode, Little Samson is a freaking great game, like top tier nes. And I was surprised at how good it is. But you know, it's not something you can get, it's not something you can get anywhere. And it's really sad except through emulation. And so like, during all this, I'm probably going to use different words than y' all are, and I think we're going to end up in the, in the same place on things.
• 1:17:01
  Okay.
• 1:17:02
  Okay.
• 1:17:02
  Yeah.
• 1:17:03
  You know, so back, back then I was using emulation for that, you know, for that purpose. I'm not, I'm not running that show anymore. And so I'm not doing that anymore.
• 1:17:15
  Okay.
• 1:17:16
  You know, I, I, I did because Josh said on a different, on a different system, I did emulate a, a, a Windows 3.1 game on my computer. So I don't know if that's a Different system, but. Well, that was Sim Tower, by the way. I did, I did purchase it when it first came out. That game is awesome.
• 1:17:42
  I'd say that's emulation, because that's not native hardware or that's not the native bios. So it's like.
• 1:17:48
  That's true. That's true. Yeah.
• 1:17:49
  You're having to create an artificial system.
• 1:17:52
  Exactly.
• 1:17:53
  And dude. And here's the thing. Whether or not people think about it or know about it, emulation is actually pretty common in the industry. And I'm not. But it's like the Nintendo online service, like all those, all those, the Super Nintendo games, the Nintendo games, the GBA games, those are all emulated. One of the big things sort of in the Sony camp is like, at some point in time there are rumblings and rumors that we're going to get, like, native PS3 emulation so that we'll be able to bring those games from the PS3 era into the current gen without having to remake them, you know, because that cell architecture on the PS3 was something. Yeah, not just, you know, take note. Developers. Hardware developers. When you make a system that is completely outside the pale of everybody's computing and programming experiences, it does not bode well for you as a general future.
• 1:18:59
  Yeah, yeah.
• 1:19:02
  But, yeah, I mean, and I think, like, the thing is, like, for me, even recently, it's a, I've, I've kind of become, you know, I, I, I don't listen to them all the time, but, like, I really like State of the Ark in that podcast. And they played terranigma, you know, probably about a year ago at this point in time, and I was like, I was really tempted to go back to, like, it's like I played that because, like, listen, I think, like, Paul, you and I are of an age where, like, the Internet became a thing. Emulators on PCs and, dude, it's like you could download the entire SNES library, you know, and so I played terranigma on a PC years ago and I was like, oh, you know what? I really enjoyed that game. It's been a long time since I played it. This would kind of be like a cool one to go through and play with them. And I ultimately decided to not do that for two reasons. Again, the aforementioned, the aforementioned malware, you know, because, like, ROMs are usually, like I said, they're usually plagued with like, some sort of Trojan bugs or nasties, you know, but so it was that. But it was also like, yeah, I needed one more game on my pile. Like, I needed A hole in my head. And ultimately I it that position where it's just like I did like where it's kind of like listen, I could probably buy a cart if I want, like if I could hunt one down and buy one. But it's like, like is it worth the hassle? It was kind of like. And I just, I was ultimately like no, no, it's not worth it. Like no. And granted, Terran Dygma is a really interesting case because like that's, that's a situation where it's like probably comparable to Little Samson. The, the publishing rights are just like, that's a complete mystery. Like nobody knows who holds the rights for this, this thing anymore. And so there is no outside of pre existing copies. There's no real way for us to get access to this thing outside of it. And so that does beg a question like do we have a right to. And it's like, well the games is art and games preservation and all this stuff. And there's like a lot of like different kind of things leaning into this. But you know that, that those are some of the issues that kind of make this a little grayer and maybe not as cut and dry as we'd like to think.
• 1:21:26
  Sometimes I'll make it even grayer. And this is why, and this is why I'm not going to use the same, the exact same words. Even though we're gonna, we're gonna land pretty much at the same spot. The concept of intellectual property itself is a fairly new concept. And it's because of recording and it's because of the printing press and audio recording and being able to create video games that's brought this about. But there really wasn't a concept in the ancient world or the medieval a world or the renaissance of, you know, oh, I, I wrote a song and now Bob over there has got to pay me money to play the song. That just didn't happen. It's it. Somebody wrote a song somewhere and now everybody in the world is playing it and the poetry people are, are reciting it, you know, in, in public gatherings. The, the idea that, that you owned that, you know, because you were the first one to sing, wasn't it, it wasn't a thing. And so more became a thing, you know, when there's, when there's printing and stuff. But even then it's like o might run, run a bunch and some printer down the street might go, hey, this is pretty cool. We're going to run some too. There's, there's, there's Whole sec. There's whole sections in Don Quixote where Cervantes is complaining and making fun of other people, stealing his characters and writing stories about him. But those other stories are being published too, and there's not anything you could do about it. It's just that he doesn't own those characters. There's not, there's not that concept yet.
• 1:23:43
  Okay.
• 1:23:44
  And that was, that wasn't that long ago. And so like I'm, you know, I actually went to the Westminster Larger Catechism, if y' all don't know.
• 1:23:58
  Okay.
• 1:23:59
  The, the Larger Catechism has this incredible section on the Ten Commandments and it's extremely extensive and it basically goes through every, every sin of omission and commission that you can commit,
• 1:24:20
  period.
• 1:24:21
  And I went through the, I mean, I went through the thing on, on theft and it's just like, is there, you know, did they find anything in here that would, could really, that could really apply to intellectual property? And there's not. I mean, it's just in general theft. And so we as modern people, we have, we have this issue before us that because, because the creative world has gotten more complex with printing, with recording, with programming, with film and wide scale on a reproduction. Right, and reproduction. What, what slots into what? And that's, that's a hard question. And, and because I can't point to a verse and say, you know, okay, emulation is definitely a sin because of this verse, I'm going to slot it more into wisdom because I'm just not prepared to say that this is a sin. Now on the wisdom front, most of the time it's not wise. Look, you're skirting current American laws and whether they're right or wrong, you know, look, people's, people's lives were ruined in that, in the Napster thing. Just ruined. Do not risk that. It's mostly not going to be wise because we can very easily get this stuff. I mean, I mean, the thing that destroyed Napster was the 99 cent iTunes download. That's what destroyed it, you know?
• 1:26:18
  Yeah, all the legislation in the world did nothing. But when itunes came out and was like, oh, hey, you can buy that song for a dollar, people were like, and we won't sue you into oblivion. And it was like, oh, here's a dollar.
• 1:26:32
  When we have steam and gog now and there's, there's a thousand things that we can get extremely easily and we all have a thousand things that, you know, sitting on our hard drive right now. You know, there just the, the, the wisdom aspect of that just doesn't seem, doesn't seem wise. Like what, like we have, we have an abundance of, of games just right at our fingertips. Stuff you can get like classic stuff that you can get on gog for like 50 cents. Incredible games. It's like what there doesn't seem to be, Be a lot of wisdom there. The things now, now that I think that we can definitely slot into, into sin category is it would be like passing off any intellectual property as your own that it was not sure or actually physically stealing the thing, you know, where, you know, somebody, somebody produced this CD or this game and I went and swiped it at Walmart. That is clear cut. Clear cut, yeah. And then it's a sliding scale and I'm in. I don't like sliding scales when it comes to theology, you know, and, and, and so like I have a line that I've picked on that scale that, that wavers because of circumstance. Like I said, if I were to still doing the Retro Zoo super show, I'd be emulating a lot more. A lot more. Now I'm not really at all, you know, the, the, the sliding scale of. Oh, if I own it, I, you know, I'm, I'm cool with emulating then if that sort of thing is, is where I think that sliding scale comes in. And like you said earlier, I'm not gonna, I'm not here to bind anybody's conscience about where, where to put, put that line. Sure. But at the end of the day, yeah, if you're, if, if you're downloading Lil Samson because I said it was amazing, check it out. I deleted then.
• 1:29:02
  But
• 1:29:04
  you know, if, if, if, if this is how you're getting most of your games, it's just like, I, I don't necessarily think that's probably the best use of your time and resources that God's given you.
• 1:29:15
  Well, and I think like the, the other side of it though, and the, the wrinkle, the thing that does make it sort of even just one of the things that makes it, I think a little muddier, a little messier is like when we were talking about Napster and all those lawsuits, none of that money went to the artists who make all went to the record companies who hold the publishing rights. Right?
• 1:29:38
  Yeah.
• 1:29:39
  And see, this is where this is again where it gets kind of like weird and iffy because like the way that it works is okay. Like we'll just, we'll use Nintendo because like, why not? We'll just pick on Nintendo because I like doing that anyways. Nintendo employs a bunch of people to engage in these creative endeavors and make a game. So these people make the game and they're the ones who actually make it. And in a way they have ownership of that. But part of their contract is that they turn the overship, the ownership of that product over to Nintendo to do with what they will. And then Nintendo publishes, it retains rights and et cetera. And some of that money is used to pay these people's salaries. Right, right. And so like there is sort of a bit of a fair give and take compensation but again, rights holders like and, and I think you need to respect those. Right. Like it's like Nintendo has put the money in to developing Tears of the Kingdom. Right. So they recoup those, those, the, the rewards of that. But like again, and, and I think most people, like most people at Nintendo are paid pretty well. Like they stay there for a reason. Yeah, they're, they're taken care of. It's, it's like one of those companies that's supposed to be like one of the best companies in the world to work for kind of thing. So that's like, that's kind of a virtuous cycle and that's like really kind of like the best case scenario. Like it would be a lot cooler if the, the actual creatives involved had some sort of like perpetual stakes. So almost like royalty checks or something like where it's like, hey, every time a game, this, this like so many copies of a game sell, you get X cut. And maybe they do that. I, I doubt it. But you know, whatever the, the however that all works though, that's an agreement that seems to work, you know, for the most part. But like there are companies that are less scrupulous and don't take care of their people as well, you know, and, and I guess it's just like it. But it is one of those things. It's like these are companies and even there it's like we, we have things that like things used to go into like copyright. Correct me if I'm wrong, Paul, but is it 70 years?
• 1:32:04
  I, I don't remember anymore. Yeah, because they increased it. I think it's, yeah, I think it's somewhere 70 or 90, 90, somewhere around there now.
• 1:32:11
  So like, and what that's supposed to do is that in that time the, the things copyrighted, the, the person who invented it or came up with it is allowed to receive primary benefits of that. Right. And that's, I, I think that's fair. But like after you get outside of that window, like the, it's sort of like these things get gobbled up by institutions. I mean, and again, we, we brought up Mickey Mouse, but like, that's a historic example of like the copyright on Mickey Mouse, like was renewed and extended several times and eventually the one that they kind of let go was the Steamboat Willie stuff. Right? That, that, that, that proto Mickey.
• 1:32:53
  It looks like Disney's finally run out of rope on all their copyrights, thankfully. But yeah, so now, now they're going to start falling off. But yeah, yeah, yeah, right now Steamboat. But Willie is the one for Mickey. And it, and it like, it is
• 1:33:12
  kind of like, it is kind of like gross because sometimes like again, people will take something that's cherished and iconic like that, like Winnie the Pooh and they'll make something obscene because why not like make ugly things like, you know, because the world needs more ugliness, I guess. You know, and it's like, listen, I'm not. But so there is like a sort of thing where you almost want some of this stuff to be protected in perpetuity, but at the same time, you know, it's like you have like the Tolkien estate, right? And it's like, you know, it's, that's
• 1:33:51
  the one, that's the one I was gonna bring up because it's like, oh, it's protected, but it's. I would much rather have Winnie the Pooh horror film than Rings of Power. You know, it's protected, but protected by Amazon, like, you know, Amazon.
• 1:34:10
  Well, it's protected by, yeah, it's protected by whoever can secure the most funding to get the license.
• 1:34:20
  And it becomes, becomes a, you know, I have the right to make this movie because I have money.
• 1:34:27
  Sure.
• 1:34:27
  And that, that's what it turned into. But I'll give, I'll give you, I'll give you a video game example of this. And, and you know, it's like, look, Mickey and Rings and Lord of the Rings. Those were a long time ago in the 80s and 90s, particularly in the 90s, the biggest software company in the world was Sierra Online. They don't exist anymore, anymore. But they, they made some of my favorite games back then. And one of their biggest series was King's Quest. This is a very famous series of games made by Roberta Williams, who was one of the owners of Sierra Online. And she just, and it was, it was kind of her ideas that started the company. You know, Ken and Roberta Williams were eventually, you know, ask to leave. They left Sierra Online as the company got new ownership. That company was sold. That company was sold. I think Activision owns King's Quest now. I think. Who knows?
• 1:35:37
  I can actually, you know, we can continue to talk, but we can. I. Because there was that remake thing that was done a few years ago, and I can tell that's true.
• 1:35:51
  Yeah, yeah.
• 1:35:54
  Who currently owns it right
• 1:35:59
  now?
• 1:36:00
  Publisher. Publisher. Activision has the publishing rights, so.
• 1:36:04
  Yeah. Okay, so Roberta Williams gets none of that. You know, she's. She's gone. The, you know, the. The programmers, the company that made these or, you know, that made that game is gone and defunct. Activision now owns it because they have money. They're. They're not doing anything with any of. It's kind of frustrating because there's a lot of really good properties that. That they own from Sierra Online. They're not doing anything with any of them. But I. I believe, you know, the old games are. Are probably available on Goggerstein, but. But now that money, now that money's going to somebody who had nothing to do with anything. Right. You know, they're going to Activision again. Doesn't mean it's wise to just download it because of that. You know, if I wanted to get a King's Quest game out, I'd get it off Gog or Steam, But King's
• 1:37:04
  Quest 4, 5 and 6 are currently on Gog.
• 1:37:10
  Okay. Those are the best ones anyway. So if y', all, you know, if y' all want to check those out, those. They're probably for cheap, too.
• 1:37:17
  10 bucks?
• 1:37:17
  I would think so for all three of them.
• 1:37:20
  Yeah. So, you know, those were fantastic games. But again, like, this is. This is. We're now. We're now paying somebody for these games that had nothing to do with the games except that they bought a company that bought a company that bought a company.
• 1:37:42
  So. And just, you know, to correct myself here, I was like, King's Quest 1, 2 and 3 are available. King's Quest 4, 5 and 6 are available. King's Quest 7 and 8 are available. And then the thing called Order of the Thorn, the King's Challenge, which.
• 1:37:57
  I don't even know that one.
• 1:37:59
  Yeah, I don't know that that's actually related to
• 1:38:04
  it.
• 1:38:04
  Kind of looks like it might be. No, I don't think that that was just on Gog, but yeah.
• 1:38:11
  Oh, gotcha. Okay.
• 1:38:12
  Each one of those bundles is like 10 bucks a piece anyways.
• 1:38:16
  But yeah, so nice. Once again, like, you. You don't need to. You don't need to emulate games. You can get three fantastic games for. For $10 and they'll frustrate you.
• 1:38:25
  Well, and, but going to. With annoyance, GOG obtained some sort of licensing agreement with whoever the rights holder is to make money. But again, none of that is going back to Roberta like the, the, the individual responsible for making the game or like whose vision it was. And I like. And that's where it gets like weird and sticky and a little slimy, you know.
• 1:38:55
  Right.
• 1:38:55
  Like.
• 1:38:55
  Well, okay, but let me, let me put the other side to that though, is that. Yeah, I agree. It is odd that something that one person ostensibly created money would no longer go to her. I get that. But at the same time I would think you would want to have the creator have the ability to sell their product to someone else. Exactly. To sell those.
• 1:39:24
  I mean she probably sold her rights.
• 1:39:26
  Yeah.
• 1:39:27
  Oh yeah, yeah. Ken and Roberta did fine. Okay.
• 1:39:31
  Yeah.
• 1:39:31
  They sold a multi million dollar company. Now look, all the employees got canned and not long afterwards. Now, now that wasn't there. Like look, I'm, I'm a fan of Roberta Williams. That wasn't their fault. They left the company in decent shape and, and the cut. The next company ran into the ground. But you know, she, you know, she was the brains behind those games. But the there, you know, there were programmers that worked there and at the time that was the place to work. Kind of like Nintendo, right? The place that no one left. If y' all ever see. Oh, is it a metal Jesus Rocks on YouTube. Have you run across him?
• 1:40:11
  Yes.
• 1:40:11
  Yeah, Yeah. I haven't watched any of his stuff in a long time, but yeah, okay.
• 1:40:15
  He got his start, you know, on the, in the phone banks in Sierra.
• 1:40:19
  That's right.
• 1:40:20
  He did work and he, and he worked there for a long time because they treated people really, really well and, and, and all that.
• 1:40:29
  Dude. Just as a bit of a side note and I was thinking about it because I remember the story about like Sierra Online and everything in Jason Schreier's one of his latest books. It's called Play Nice. It's actually the story of Blizzard. Blizzard at one point in time, before it was acquired by Activision, was actually a subsidiary. Like, like they were at. So they, they had some connection to Sierra Online. And actually the, the acquisition of Blizzard was like brought in through but like Play Nice is really just kind of. It's mostly about. A good chunk of that book is about Blizzard, the company. Yeah, it's, it's. I remember, you know, say what you will about Shrier's politics and some of his positions, but I do remember enjoying that book quite a Bit. But yeah, you can see like even in listening to that, it's like, I remember listening to that and like it's his daisy chain. Because it goes from this company, then to this company, then to this company and then this company. And it's like these things change hands quickly.
• 1:41:43
  Yeah, sure. One connection between the two companies is that when Diablo came out, the original Diablo, it had one expansion called Hellfire that was not done by Blizzard, that was done by Sierra completely.
• 1:41:59
  You could play the Monk. Yeah, I played it.
• 1:42:03
  It's quirky because it's like a completely different company did the expansion for that game.
• 1:42:08
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so getting back to kind of what we're talking about of even rights holders, again, I agree that it is odd that the original creators wouldn't have any, any say or any monetary gain for someone purchasing their work if it's changed hands. But I would even say, as much as it pains me to admit it, as much as I agree with you, Paul, I hate the Rings of Power. I still think that, that it makes sense to me that Tolkien gave his works to the Tolkien estate, who then entered into an agreement with a company who said, we will pay you money to make official these official shows based on these works. Like, I, I don't think there's anything wrong with it, as much of a bastardization as the Rings of Power is. But I think the principle of having these intellectual properties safeguarded from outside forces and, and the people who own it being able to make decisions about it, I don't think there's anything necessarily wrong with that as much as much of a distaste.
• 1:43:28
  Well, sometimes bad things, bad things happen, like people, people make bad decisions sometimes.
• 1:43:35
  Right.
• 1:43:36
  Tolkien had the best son in the world, but his grandkids, right? Not as much. But so like, this is, you know, in this is, this is the difficulty with this subject and, and me saying all of this is not me saying that I have the answer here, because I don't. Sure, Tolkien is a great example because when, when the Hobbit was first done, an American publishing companies just said, hey, this looks fantastic. We're going to run this. And in some quirk of copyright law back then was 100% legal. 100% legal. And they did it with Lord of the Rings 2. And that's why there's a Lord of the Rings too.
• 1:44:27
  I'm kidding. Sorry, sorry.
• 1:44:29
  In my copy, which I think Valentine did, of my copy, Lord of the Rings even, because when I bought it in the 90s, it said on there, you know, something about, you know, you know, Tolkien's own publisher, you know, the, the fakes had long since gone, but they wanted to point out, it's like, no, no, no, J.R. tolkien's getting money for this. You know, don't, don't pay attention to whoever it was that was also publishing it. Marvel Comics did the same thing to them. They, they did a comic book of the Hobbit, which is great. It's great.
• 1:45:11
  Okay.
• 1:45:13
  They went to, they went to Tolkien and they said, they told him, it was like, look, because of U.S. copyright law, we can do this without you
• 1:45:24
  with her partnering with us or not without you.
• 1:45:26
  We're gonna do it. So let's make a deal in that way we can be partners on it and talking did. And that's why, you know, and we have. And so. Okay, that's wrong. Like, I don't, that I don't like and I don't, I also don't like and I also don't like that his grandkids are messing up the story. I think that is better than the previous error and I don't know how to fix that. I'm working on this big world and I mentioned earlier that it's going to be a tabletop role playing game. It's also going to be novels. It's also going to, to be music. Ah. Now look, my stuff doesn't go much of anywhere. You know, 10 people listen to my music. Thank you. All 10 of you. I love you. You know, but like if this hits the big time, you know, it could be that my grandkids are screw ups and you know, want to do all sorts of horrible things to my world. And I, you know, that, that, that under U.S. copyright law is going to be their right to do it. Does that make it morally right? I don't, I don't know. And this is why, like, this is why, like I'm, when it comes to ip, I'm so hesitant to call anything particularly a sin.
• 1:46:57
  Okay.
• 1:46:58
  Outright. I don't think it's wise, you know, I don't think it should have been done. It's certainly legal, 100% legal. I, but I also don't like it.
• 1:47:12
  Sure.
• 1:47:13
  You know, I would next communicate one of Tolkien's grandkids over it, you know, because, because I don't think I can prove that.
• 1:47:22
  Yeah.
• 1:47:24
  And that, that's where, that's where all of this gets messy. Because what we're talking about, what we're talking about really is not a physical product. I didn't make this thing. I made the idea. And the idea might be printed on a thing. It might be, you know, it might be programmed into a thing. It might be recorded into a thing, but it's an idea.
• 1:47:52
  And
• 1:47:54
  that gets. That gets really wonky when we're trying to figure out a really good way to protect an idea. And like, and like, again, I don't have good answers to this. I have kind of gut feelings when I see, you know, when I see Starfleet Academy, you know, on, on Paramount, and it makes me upset and I like. And I don't think that's right. I might excommunicate those people if they
• 1:48:26
  were in my church. But
• 1:48:30
  look what they've done to my
• 1:48:31
  boy, you know, but my boy.
• 1:48:36
  It gets. It gets very muddy very, very quickly. And I think it's because. I think it's because we're. We're really trying to apply something very, very, very new.
• 1:48:51
  Yeah.
• 1:48:52
  Into. Into, you know, biblical instruction that is perfect, you know, but also written in the context of. Of 2000 years ago and trying to apply it. And I don't think. I just don't think there's an extremely clear path on that yet that we've nailed down. Yeah, yeah. And that's a failing in us. That's not a failing of God. That, that's because we haven't had enough time. We haven't had. I don't know that we've had any, you know, theologians really working on this one. You know, it's just. It. What, what the answer is, and this is a real answer, what the answer is we'll just follow the law. It's like, okay, well, the law is murky, too, or I just play it safe. But we're, we're not, We. We haven't really spent the time on it. I don't necessarily think we need to right now. We got other problems to deal with. But sure, at some point, like, I, I think. I think theologians need to sit down and, and wrestle with this one. Just ip in general.
• 1:49:56
  It. Well, and it is interesting, too, because there's There, there. There's ip, There's. There's trying to put protections for an idea like you've talked about, which you can communicate ideas and then reproduce ideas, you know, very easily because, like you said, it's not a thing. When we're looking at video games, then it seems like, oh, well, no, it does. It feels more like stealing at first because you are copying actual code. Right. And making another copy of that. But then it is just code. But then it is just zeros. And ones. And actually, you're not damaging the original, so you're not stealing the original. You're making an exact copy and taking that.
• 1:50:55
  See, even there, though, man. Because it's not. It's not physical. Like, I would say, like, again, like, it's those. You didn't come up with those zeros and ones. It would be like, to me, it's like, I'm not sure that, like. And again, like, it is kind of like an issue of the law. Like, yeah, it's. It's theologically murky. It's. I don't think, like that. That example is legally murky. And I. I think in some ways it's like, the reality is, like, if I drew a picture and then, you know, and you really liked my picture and you just took. Took that, like, and made an exact copy of it, you know, there we would. We would say that something feels weird or wrong about that. Right. Like, even though.
• 1:51:53
  Well, in the sense of if you drew a picture for yourself.
• 1:51:57
  Yeah.
• 1:51:57
  And I said, hey, I really like that picture. Can I have it? And you said, no, this is mine. This is for me.
• 1:52:04
  And.
• 1:52:05
  And so then I took it, I put it in a photo. Excuse me, a photocopier, made a copy of it, gave you the original back, and then had my own copy. Like, okay.
• 1:52:17
  But then, like, I. I would say, like, I would say, like, actually, yeah, you don't have a right to that because it is mine.
• 1:52:23
  I mean, that's true.
• 1:52:24
  I don't have a right to it. Yeah, you don't have a right to it. And by you doing that, I do think that is, like, sort of like. And again, it's like, it's murky. Like, I'm. I'm hesitant to call that outright theft, but that is not right. There is something not right about that. Again, you know where it is, like, I think, like, so much of, like, property laws is about who has rights to what, you know, and the original inciting incident for this years ago was like, the thing that got you and I talking about it was. I was part of a degenerate reform group that will not be named, that was devoted to anime.
• 1:53:10
  And okay, there's.
• 1:53:14
  There's only a few.
• 1:53:15
  There's only a few of them dedicated to anime.
• 1:53:19
  There's only a few of them. I don't know if I, like, listen, I don't know if this is a thing anymore, but there was a debate going on in that. That group at that point in time about pirating episodes of an anime, and I kind of just said like, hey, like, you know, and I thought about it for a little bit and I was like, well you haven't purchased any of the DVDs or whatever. Like, you know, it's like you can't really purchase them and you're just saying, well I want to watch this anyways. When it's just like ah, that just felt. It's like you don't have a right to that material. And I think that, that, that sometimes it's like sometimes, you know, there is, the, the wisdom is like there is. Yes, I think primarily Paul, like I would 100 line up with you. I think this is primarily a wisdom issue, but also I think part of it is like sometimes we just need like we don't have rights to whatever we want. And I think that like that, that there's something there that needs to be explored and solidified there. And I think that's where it's sticky. We all inherently know that none of us have inherent rights aside from the things that have been God given to us. Constitutionally, we know that according to the Constitution in the United States we have the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Right. Those are constitutionally guaranteed rights. We know that scripturally we have the right to defend our own property. We have a right to defend our families. We have the right to worship in peace. You know, like we have, there are lots of God given rights through scripture as well. And we, and again it is kind of, it is different because like they're like the, the lines are a little muddier, it's not as clear cut. But I do think like for me there is this thing where it's like. And we've even talked about it, it just doesn't feel right sometimes. Like, and I think that that is an indicator that there's something there for us to reflect on. Again, I'm not super concrete, so it's like yeah, so your, your example, Josh, and would be like, hey, yeah, I'm just going to copy all the zeros and ones. It's not really damaging the product or anything. But it's like you don't, you haven't like you don't inherently possess a right to that stuff, that content. And I think that's, that's the primary thrust where it's like that, that would be my like pushback against that.
• 1:56:09
  So, so the other kind of nuances though that my, that my example did not get into is that these video games were created as consumer goods. So they weren't in my example you drew the picture for yourself in. But in reality, video games were made to be distributed and sold for a profit. But in certain cases, if they're no longer being sold, then is it. Yeah. Is it right or wrong to then make a copy? And I would question. Okay, depending on how you answer that. So. So for a game that has no way currently of being of ever being sold because the license holders don't care or because no one knows who holds the license for this particular game any anymore, if you were to say, well, no, I still think it's wrong for you to make a copy, would you give that same answer after the cop, after the IP runs out in 70 years, would that change?
• 1:57:22
  I think, I think at that point in time. Because it's not. Because then you get into like. So we have the whole category of public domain. Like these things are available to anybody. They are free. You can distribute them for free.
• 1:57:40
  Okay.
• 1:57:40
  And that, that's different. Like, because we do have a legal, we have a legal category. And that's what I'm saying is like. And you need like in as much as that, like, it's not commanding you to sin. I do think you have an obligation to obey the laws of the land. Like.
• 1:57:57
  Yeah, right, right, I understand that. But is it. Yeah, right. Is it, Is it actually breaking a law if no one is being harmed because the good is no longer being created and you can digitally just make a copy and that. That's where I think it kind of breaks down and it gets sticky. Right, right. And there are. We've both kind of wavered back and forth between like morality and the law. And sometimes those things are in tandem and when they, like when the law is clear. Yes. We all three agree you should follow the law when the law is clear. I think, I think we've said that
• 1:58:40
  even if the law is immoral, like is. Is something where, if it's evil, don't obey that law.
• 1:58:48
  Right, right. But it's like in these cases, like,
• 1:58:52
  if it's like one of these things where it's like it's not really moral, but it's not really like immoral either. It's, it's. Yeah, like, just, just do what they tell you to. Like, it's easier that way.
• 1:59:05
  And we can all agree on that. But when, when we're getting into these more gray areas where the law hasn't been, you know, clearly defined, then we kind of go back and forth between moral, I don't know, even emotional because we talked about, you know, how things feel. But I do think, oh, well, then if you totally take the law out of it and that changes your answer, well, then are we leaning too much on that in order to derive our morality of these acts? And you know, and I'm not saying that I have an answer either. I have my own opinion, which. You guys haven't asked me my opinion yet, so I haven't shared it. But anyways, I'm sorry, hold on, Paul, you were gonna say something.
• 1:59:51
  Let me finish writing.
• 1:59:53
  No one cares, Josh.
• 1:59:55
  Clearly you don't, because it's been an hour and no one's asked me.
• 2:00:00
  I just assumed you were an adult. And since you are one of the hosts of this podcast, I. I just assumed you would make your position known at some point.
• 2:00:10
  Okay, cool.
• 2:00:11
  Your name in chat. Is the backlog beat down, like.
• 2:00:18
  Yeah, I, I know, I know. I'm, I'm, I'm largely kidding around. What were you going to say, Paul?
• 2:00:25
  I, you know, I think. I think in general, like, our,
• 2:00:32
  Our
• 2:00:32
  morality on this topic has been more informed by an FBI warning that at the front of movies, dude, 100%.
• 2:00:44
  100 cabinets.
• 2:00:45
  Yeah, like, no, thank you. I do not want the feds looking at me any closer than the already are.
• 2:00:51
  Well, that's why I don't do drugs.
• 2:00:56
  But I'm also like, like, you know, the danger of these things being murky. A lot of people don't remember this because, you know, y' all are too young. Nate probably isn't, but, you know, back during the Napster thing, you know, there was a law that for CDs, and this is. This is part of the weird IP thing, not for movies, but for music. It was 100% legal to make a copy and give it to a friend, which is wild. Those mixtapes that we used to make, 100% legal. You could make a copy of a movie now. We did. Growing up. We did that anyways. You know, we had two VCRs going,
• 2:01:41
  but yeah, oh yeah, VHS. That would make it easy.
• 2:01:44
  But there was different rules for movies. And so a lot of the Napster. The Napster defenses were like, wait a minute, it's legal to make a copy and give it to somebody. Which is. I'm not a lawyer. Is a pretty decent defense. And that. And the record companies, like, you know, we. We reject that. We want, want, you know, we want your money or we're going to destroy your life. And that the law was subsequently changed for that. But this is the difficulty when we, when we have, when we have murky laws and we're playing anywhere in this, in this category. And I was. I'll go into preservation later. Josh, I'm really interested in hearing your opinion on this.
• 2:02:40
  Yeah, it's simply because, because, you know, we've done this episode a few times. I, I believe I even had kind of a bite sized episode somewhat recently on my, my thoughts on emulation.
• 2:02:50
  Yeah. Not too long ago. Probably within the last year or so.
• 2:02:53
  Yeah. Yeah. But I do. But my thoughts on emulation have evolved a little bit. I'm still in the general, the general area that we've, that we've talked about up to this point. But I do find in myself that I am becoming more lax towards emulation than I used to in the past. And I think there's a few different reasons for that. One of the reasons that we haven't talked about because of the definition that I gave. So I know it's my fault, but one thing that we haven't talked about is that not only can you like, one of the reasons you might want to emulate is because you can't. You don't want to hook up an old system. You don't have the old system. Something along those lines. But there are actually a lot more reasons to emulate games. One is just convenience. Okay. Instead of playing, instead of hooking up an old NES to an old crt, I can load up a ROM on a handheld that I have and play a game that way. So convenience is great. But also games can run better than they used to run. Like old games with slowdown, old games with graphical glitches. You can.
• 2:04:10
  Mega Man 3. I'm looking at you.
• 2:04:12
  Exactly.
• 2:04:13
  There are some people who find The Mega Man 3 and the Legacy, like people who cut their teeth on OG Mega Man 3. There are entire like forum posts about how like the, the re release of that game on modern hardware. Like so like the, in the legacy collections. They're like, this game is unplayable because it doesn't have slowdown. They're like, I, I learned how to accommodate. Like I learned how to play this game. Taking all this stuff into account. This is foundationally a different, you know, experience. And I hate it.
• 2:04:46
  Yeah. Half that game is. It runs at half speed. It's wild. Wow. Like that, it's. Oh man, that game's real good. But. But yeah, it's brutal.
• 2:04:58
  Wow. Because I played it on the, on that legacy collection. And so. Because that one's my favorite of the bunch of the originals. But even in the Wonder if I played original.
• 2:05:08
  Original sort of going back to the actual topic, though, Josh, even in the examples you're citing, this is where you obviously it's, you know, you're indicating that you own the software. So you have some semblance of a right to that. Like you have given money to the rights holder.
• 2:05:27
  Yes.
• 2:05:27
  To access this, this material.
• 2:05:30
  Yes.
• 2:05:30
  I think that is like. And again, like, I think I would just feel a lot better if like the public, like, and again, this is like a feeling thing. And again, I'm not trying to bind anybody's conscience, but I know that that me personally, like, if we had clear definitions on like public domain in video games, like, I would feel better about these things.
• 2:05:56
  Yes.
• 2:05:57
  You know, because like part of the whole thing with public domain is like, hey, anybody who. Like the way that it kind of works is like anybody who could make money off this or should make money off this probably isn't like, it's that that window has long since passed. It's time to just sort of like let these things breathe. And that in a way, people. Because I do think there is a way that people are. People are entitled to art to a certain degree. That's why we have these things. Like they're entitled to books and wisdom. You know what I'm saying? That's why we have this category of public domain. I just don't. I think that. Yeah, I don't know, man. It's weird and like, Paul, going back to what you said, though, scripturally, there aren't really clear categories for talking about some of this stuff because a lot of the, like, you know, when we look at the Old Testament, gives us hundreds of examples of theft and property damage and all sorts of outworkings and everything else. But. But it's talking specifically pretty strictly with physical goods. It was agrarian. These were an agrarian. These were Fisher people. These were, you know what I'm saying? And like, David was a songwriter, but he didn't copyright the Psalms, you know, and then so it is like there's a weird give and take here that I don't. It. It doesn't gel. None of it gels easily or well, because it's like. Yeah.
• 2:07:39
  And I do also want to make the one thing clear from what you said is that I do think it's very clear that if you're using emulation because you don't want to buy what is currently available. So I would say any like current gen or possibly even last gen video games, that if you are not purchasing them and only emulating them, I do believe that that is stealing like, that is where I would bind someone's conscience. Unless you're. Unless you're actually purchasing the game itself and you want to use emulation to maybe upscale it, maybe play it on something else. Like, okay, that's more of a gray area. And, and I, like me personally, I'm more okay with that. And that's where I was going with it. With reasons why you would emulate. Like, I've heard, you know, before Switch 2 came out, you could play Tears of the Kingdom with, you know, 120 frames on PC. And if you. So to me, if I've purchased Tears of the Kingdom myself, then I don't have an issue emulating it. But for those people that were emulating it day one, I think you are stealing. I think you are. You are attempting to. To rob Nintendo of all that they, you know, put into making that.
• 2:09:05
  And there is like. Like the thing is, like, you sort of drew a bit of a line going like two generations back. But, like, the reality is, like, there's a lot of stuff that's available now. Granted, the collection market is kind of like, it's insane. And, you know, and it's like. And a lot of these games, like, values and, you know, all that stuff kind of like. So it's not to say that there aren't difficulties, but like, there's a lot of stuff within the last three or four gens that's fairly easily accessible.
• 2:09:38
  You're right.
• 2:09:39
  You're right. If I can purchase a game in such a way that it. I'm paying the rights holders because, and I've said this on previous episodes, like buying a game secondhand while I do that, and I don't have any problem with that, that does not benefit the rights holder.
• 2:09:56
  No, but that's a transfer of the license, right? I don't know. So it's like at that point in time, the rights holders have already gotten their initial sort of return on investment at that point in time. What you're doing though, is like, you're obtaining a right to the license. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know.
• 2:10:18
  If I were to purchase, I don't know, just any Switch game, whatever. Just off the top of my. If I were. Because I don't have Breath of the Wild on Switch, okay, If I were to go to a Facebook marketplace and pick up Breath of the Wild off someone who lives across town from me, okay, I would play Breath of the Wild on my Switch, I would not even have a second thought about it. However, I think in cases of older games, like a Super Nintendo cartridge to me, because Super Nintendo games, by and large, okay, they're exceptions. They're collections. There are things like that, and I'll get to that in just a second. But a Super Nintendo game that is no longer available, Illusion of Gaia. Okay, I'll throw that one out there, because that's not currently available anywhere. Quintet's gone dead and gone. Rights holders are not putting out Illusion of Gaia anywhere else. If I were to pick up that card, like, basically, if I'm staring at a 25, someone who wants 25 bucks for it on eBay, I am one just based on where I am now, I would shrug my shoulders and say, do I really need another piece of plastic?
• 2:11:28
  Right.
• 2:11:28
  I'm fine to just emulate this, and it's not going to hurt my conscience if. Yeah, now I. I will. And that's where I am. And that's why I wanted to just explain. Hey, this. This is my, you know, my evolving views on emulation. Now, would I recommend that anyone else do that? No, not necessarily. I agree with what you said, Paul. Like, because these. These things change and. And yeah, I could. I could get in hot water for that. I would. Also. This is just a total side note. You're talking about the dangers of. Of downloading viruses and things. I will just say there are actually some very reliable places that are archived on the Internet where you can acquire some of these things that I have found, have not had any issues. But that's. That's all. I. I don't. I do not want to recommend any specific places for anyone.
• 2:12:24
  I was. I. I was gonna. I was gonna say that Nate. Nate, during all of that, just sounded like my youth pastor talking to us about premarital sex. Oh, no. There are viruses and. Oh, my God, they're all over the place.
• 2:12:39
  Well, like, that. There used to be sites that. That Hostess. Oh, dude. And pop ups are crazy. Yes. But there are also places that. That it's not so difficult.
• 2:12:51
  I bricked 10 years ago, maybe a little bit longer. I bricked a laptop because I. Speaking of mother 3, I downloaded a mother 3 ROM and I had no problems with that laptop prior to that. And after that, I had to reinstall everything and eventually, like, it bricked. So, yeah, I'm just saying, like, like, there. These things do. And that's a fairly. Like, that was like, again, that's a fairly safe ROM in a lot of ways. Like, it's. It's not one that Nintendo goes after. It's like but yeah, that ever was a. It didn't. It introduced something to that, that laptop that destroyed it.
• 2:13:42
  So I've, I've got two more.
• 2:13:44
  You don't know where those roms have been.
• 2:13:48
  That's true. And that one's got to get.
• 2:13:50
  If that ROM had been on somebody else's system and that that system had two other rom.
• 2:13:55
  That ROM is the rose.
• 2:13:58
  Oh no.
• 2:13:59
  Do you want this rom? Okay, sorry, I'm not gonna go that well, already went there.
• 2:14:06
  There will be some people who get that reference and there will be many who do not.
• 2:14:10
  And I apologize that you get that reference.
• 2:14:13
  I do not.
• 2:14:15
  I apologize for nothing. I had, I had two more quiz, quick points and I'm trying to remember what they were. Oh, that was one of them and I'd said that before. Ah, but, but I know there was one more point just in my, Again, my, my kind of evolving view on, on emulation on ROMs. I've shared most of it so far. That's what it is. Okay. I'm at the point in my life right now where previous in life I would be more concerned with the amount of money that I'm spending on video games. Whether that then that was a combination of not making, not having as much play money, but also not having a huge backlog. Okay. Whereas nowadays I have more money to dedicate towards hobbies and things like that. So it's not as big of a deal to me. I don't feel the pressure of needing to emulate things if I really want to. And also I just don't want to have a ton of stuff too. And so emulation can help with that. So there are, I recognize there are a number of factors and I recognize I don't have as much of a temptation at this point in my life to just accumulate more games for the sake of accumulating games. I want to be more curated in the games that I play. And so if that means, you know, picking up a game and spending money on it that I know I'm going to enjoy, like I'm okay to do that. I'm more inclined to do that than I have been than in previous years where it would be more of a temptation of, oh, am I doing this just to, you know, am I, am I emulating it just so that I don't have to pay for the game? Well, no, I mean, part of me likes collectibles, part of me doesn't want, you know, a ton of crap around, so. But if it's good, you know, I might want to pick it up. So, so there's that. And then the last thing that I said. I know, I know I had said this on the previous bite size is that one thing that I have found is that this actually makes want to support compilations of games more and really releases of games even more. So even towards the end of last year, I picked up a bunch of fighting game compilations right here behind me. I've got the Capcom Fighting collection too. I got the Final Fantasy Pixel remasters for my birthday. You know, Live Alive is obviously that's kind of a remake, but it's, you know, things like that, I appreciate them more because now I can legally own a copy in the way that I want to play it. And so I would encourage anyone listening that if you are kind of wrestling with the question of emulation to also support compilations when they come out as well.
• 2:17:02
  Support the devs.
• 2:17:03
  Yeah, yeah. Hey, and a lot of the time they have some cool extras and things too. Yeah. So anyways, that's my two.
• 2:17:13
  Well, and this is, this is part of the, you know, itunes kind of solving the file sharing, the MP3 file sharing thing. Look, you know, Right now, you know, besides certain titles I, I don't like, I have zero temptation to. To emulate a lot of, you know, like old Nintendo titles from the Super Nintendo and stuff because they're all on my Switch, you know.
• 2:17:49
  Yeah, yeah.
• 2:17:52
  Hey, make this stuff available and, and that, that solves a lot of the problems.
• 2:18:00
  Official emulation.
• 2:18:02
  Right. I wish I remembered. There have been some cases where like, you know, like the official company releases like a, you know, a digital version of an old game and they pull it apart and they realize that they stole the emulated version that such as so and so made.
• 2:18:23
  Yeah. Wasn't that the first batch of games on the, the Wii?
• 2:18:27
  I think so, yeah. I think, I think it was on the Wii.
• 2:18:30
  Yeah.
• 2:18:30
  It was like the Super Mario Brothers ROM was downloaded. Like Nintendo went to the Internet and downloaded it.
• 2:18:36
  Yeah, because they lost the masters or something like that. Like they, they lost the, the master, like the, like the source code. Source code? Yes, they lost the source code. They lost track of it and they were like.
• 2:18:52
  Well, just.
• 2:18:54
  It's like.
• 2:18:55
  That reminds me another of another weird IP story and I'm blanking on the guy's name, but the. Another Sierra Online alum made the Leisure Shoot Larry Games and he found his old floppies with the original source code that he wrote and he put them up for auction. He's like, hey, we'll give this money to charity or something. And, and I, I believe it's Activision came down. I was like, no, you can't do that. That's ours. Right. I don't think they made them give back the floppies, but just said, no, you can't release that code. We own that code.
• 2:19:42
  Gotcha. Yeah.
• 2:19:43
  And which is it again? Weird quirks of IP law, but, Well,
• 2:19:51
  I remember being told at previous jobs that anything, any intellectual thing that you come up with while you're on the clock is owned by the company. Right. Like, like that's just a part of weird IP law of like, whether you write it down. Like, if you just come up with an idea while you're on the clock, while you're working, that belongs to our company. That's not your, like, prove it. Well, yeah, there's certainly that, but it's, it's just weird. Yeah.
• 2:20:23
  Work for hire stuff in general is just a whole other hornet's nest that, like, sure, I'm about to walk into because, you know, part of this Kickstarter thing is to get money to commission artwork for my, for my stuff, which is just gonna be work for hire stuff, really. So, yeah, I gotta figure all that garbage out.
• 2:20:47
  But
• 2:20:50
  I, I, I already brought up that, like, like doing, doing a review show, like the Retro Zoo super show. I, I, I thought, I, I felt was, you know, a legitimate use of, of emulators. I'll give you like, a worse example of that. Where I was when I was reviewing tabletop role playing games for a website, I was sent, I was sent actually a full book. I'm gonna grab it because it's right here, this whole very nice hardcover, okay, adventure book that Sandy Peterson's company made, and it's part of their Cthulhu mythos sagas. So Sandy Peterson wrote Call of Cthulhu, but then later he developed a Cthulhu system for D D. And this is what this is. And so they sent me this whole book, this massive book to play and, and review for them. And I, I opened it up and I started reading. I immediately realized it's like, like, okay, I need the Cthulhu mythos rule book to understand this.
• 2:22:13
  Okay?
• 2:22:14
  Now I got zero money for like, this was, this was my wage to do this review was this book, which I was happy about.
• 2:22:22
  Yeah.
• 2:22:22
  But at the same time, I am not spending 50 bucks on, on that Mythos thing if they, you know, they wanted me. And so I, you know, I found it, I downloaded it in so I could read it. And, and it's part of that reviewing thing and I, I, I, you know, I think that case was even more clear than me deciding, you know, that, you know, hey, I want to do a little Samson episode or the argument could be, or you could do a different game, which is true. But I, I, I was thinking about another use of emulators that I really like and I have no problems with people doing okay. Is a different, Well, a ton of these games have like different randomizers or different stuff like that. My personal one, I like the Dragon Warrior randomizer. I think that's a ton of fun. I've played through that multiple, you know, different, different, different maps multiple times. And you've got to have, you got to have the, the ROM for that because so they, they, you know, the, they can't keep it on their website to give away, you know, so they'll say we'll modify your rom, but you got to give it to us first. And so you upload it to them and they, and they send it back to you, you know, through the computer. They don't physically do, you know, do anything, but they don't mail you a rom. But, but that, you know, there's, there's all sorts of those type of, of different ROM hacks, different, you know, just, just general. What were those called? Like the Kaizu or something Different Mario games and stuff. Yeah, that, that people have, have developed off of, you know, just that you need to modify your ROM for. And now I, now I own Dragon Warrior. And so it kind of falls into that category of what we've been talking about. I bought it, I bought it back in the 90s last century for 75 cents. But you know, but it, but it is one of those things that like, there isn't an added advantage to having this technology and this ability to do things that can, you know, can take a game that you love and twerk it a little bit so that you don't know where all the secrets are or you don't know, you know, how the level's gonna go.
• 2:25:11
  Yeah, yeah, well, and I think that that kind of like, yeah, that, that, that kind of like. Yeah, well, even like fair use laws and stuff like that where it's like, and again, these are weird test cases, but it's like, like something like that orig, like the Dragon Warrior remix or mixers or whatever, like if somebody remixes an album, like, or remixes a song depending on it's, yeah, it's, it gets a little weird. But yeah, it's, we, we consider that fair use to a certain degree, you know,
• 2:25:51
  Yeah, I think if you get into music, then no using the originals, you're gonna have to pay. Right?
• 2:25:57
  Yeah.
• 2:25:57
  If you sample it all, well, you're
• 2:25:59
  paying a license and even then you might get sued. Their switch Symphony was, was that case.
• 2:26:08
  So. But I mean, there's use cases there though, where it's like people can. Yeah,
• 2:26:15
  right There, there are fan cuts of movies that are not, you know, like, so long as they're not trying to make money. Because that's. Well, yeah, yeah. So long as you're not trying to make money, you can modify, you know, and, and release or distribute.
• 2:26:32
  Yeah, well, I mean, in those cases, they, it's just. They look the other way a lot.
• 2:26:36
  That's great.
• 2:26:37
  Or, or, you know.
• 2:26:38
  Right. Yes.
• 2:26:39
  I wouldn't stake, you know, if I got a cease and desist on one of those things, I'd pull it down in, in. Yeah, about three seconds flat. But yeah, but there's a lot like, like I, I, you know, Star wars theory on YouTube wanted to make a Star wars short and he did it the full right way and went to Lucasfilm, got written permission, you know, did. Did everything by the book. It took him forever. He wasn't allowed to, to crowdfund for it. You know, he wasn't allowed to advertise on it. There's all these, you know, lists. Meanwhile, other people are making Star wars fan things on, on YouTube and.
• 2:27:25
  Right.
• 2:27:25
  But he wanted to do it right, because he had a lot to lose with his channel at all. They still copyright struck him, which was hilarious. He got it fixed real quick. But that, that was, that was pretty funny, you know, but you know, it, it's the case of he, he, he jumped through all the hoops because he wanted to do that. But there, there's a lot of people who aren't that they're looking the other way or pretending not to see it or whatever the case may be.
• 2:27:55
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, I think at the end of the day, like, we've sort of. And I think this is probably a good place to maybe sort of like wind down a little bit for sure. But I think there are, I guess I would say, like, I think the guiding principle is like, hey, you need to wrestle with, like, you probably need to wrestle with this a little bit. You need to think your way through it. And, and as weird as it sounds, if it does feel bad, don't do it like, without asking yourself why, because, you know, and, and so, and maybe that'll give you something to like, you know, I'm not Saying that like, because we, we live in a fallen world, you can't always trust your conscience. But at the very least, like, there are questions to be wrestled with. And, and yeah, I don't know, like I said, I know that like, even here on the show, we, we end up landing in different spaces a little bit. They're not completely opposed or anything, but it's like, where it's like, Josh is like, hey, I don't have a problem with X, Y and Z. And I kind of like, I get a little squishy. Like, you know, like, I, I don't like. And I think that it's like, you know, Rick Hogue from Virtual Legality says that reasonable minds can differ. Okay. And I think we've laid out a pretty good case as to why. Like, there can be a variety of, of kind of differing opinions. There are, there are some very clear cut things. Like, I, I, yeah, I, I think all of us would stand here and say, like, listen, if you are emulating simply to not have to buy new games, that is theft, you probably ought to stop. Like, and if you don't, you know, you might end up like that, that dude on YouTube who ended up paying like, I think it was like $40,000 or something. It was like a pretty paltry number, you know. You know, but like Nintendo basically looked at him and said, no, no, we're gonna. And I, I bet you like, as far as like damages go, like, they probably could have hit him for millions, but they were like, yeah, just enough to be like, no, we're just gonna kind of like, it's gonna suck to be you for a while. So. Yeah, I, you know, I think like, you know, I think framing it as a wisdom issue is not a bad thing. Just like, at the very least it's like, you know, if you're listening to the show for the most part, you probably need more games to play. Like, you need holes in your head, which is like, probably not at all. So I don't know. But yeah, that's kind of where I'm landing, I think is like, as far as general principles, like, hey, we've laid out a bunch of stuff here for you to like, wrestle with and walk through and navigate. And I think we've all kind of said like, it's not as clear cut as we'd like it to be. We'd like it to be a little more defined. Like, we'd like somebody to do some heavy lifting here and really like thread that needle for us. But until then, I think you do need to just sort of, you know, again, as a general rule, obey the letter. Like obey the law of the land and obey your conscience. And I think if you do those things, you'll probably be fine.
• 2:31:25
  Probably, yeah. In my utopia, you know, there would be a place that you could go to where it's like, hey, five bucks a rom, you know, like, for any game ever created. You know, like, that would be. That would be amazing if that were the case. But because it's not, we have these conversations.
• 2:31:51
  So anything, Any. Any other closing statements? Paul, you got anything that.
• 2:31:57
  Yeah, I. Besides, you know, so I would agree with every word you just said, except I wouldn't use theft. I would use unwise. But, yeah, like, yeah, we're landing about the same place. No, no matter. No matter how we're using it. And so,
• 2:32:17
  yeah, yeah, as a general rule, don't do. There's a strong chance that it will end poorly for you.
• 2:32:28
  Right, exactly. And if you are downloading ROMs for games you own, I still don't, you know, I wouldn't be making videos on it in general.
• 2:32:43
  Don't.
• 2:32:43
  And don't go to the websites. The dirty websites. Stay out of the dirty websites. Yeah.
• 2:32:50
  Practice Internet hygiene. I don't know.
• 2:32:54
  Oh,
• 2:32:57
  yeah.
• 2:32:58
  Oh, boy.
• 2:32:58
  Awesome. Well, this. This has been a fun little emulation strikes back redux episode, or whatever you want to call it on emulation. Hopefully we've. We've given some, at least some good nuggets of thoughts and advice for you that you can engage with the medium of video games wisely and well before we take off for the morning, evening, whatever time it is, we do have one final form. This is our final form, and that's just some shout outs. If we have any shout outs for anyone in the community, I have a shout out to Dorian in our discord. He's been doing this thing where on Sunday afternoons he asks, hey, guys, what did your pastor preach on this morning? And then he gives a little synopsis of his own. And that has been. Even though I haven't participated every week, because sometimes I'm just not on my phone. Excuse me, not in discord on my phone on Sunday afternoons. But anyways, I have participated a couple times and it's just a blessing to hear what everyone else is going through as well. So thank you, Dorian, for doing that. You're awesome. My shout out goes to you. You guys have any shout outs?
• 2:34:16
  I'm gonna shout out Paul. All right. Hey, Paul. And it's. It's easy because he's here you know, you know, guys, One, his willingness to jump on here and do this with us, like, he was, like, he was down for it. But. I don't, I don't know if, if there's a, like a better in some ways, I don't know if there's a better co. Belligerent in many ways to some of this stuff. You know, it's like I talk a lot of smack on them, like, and, you know, there's a lot of like, not you, Paul's, or, you know, I'm looking at you, Paul, you know, kind of, kind of commentary. But, like, you know, I think even tonight, like, sort of bringing sort of a lot of like, this stuff. And again, we, you know, and I even go back to the, the original episode that sort of was the impetus for this. And I'm, I'm like, I'm like, dude, like, yeah, dude, I just, I want to thank you for being, you know, part of this, part of this podcast and part of this community for as long as you have and sort of being like, you know, yeah, you, it's, it's, you know, I, I bust your, I bust your balls a good bit, but, you know, you're a good dude. And I think I, I, now this will be what we are recording, and this will be one of the only times I say this publicly.
• 2:35:49
  So thank you.
• 2:35:52
  I have a reputation to maintain, like, you know, but no, I, I, you know, I wanted to thank you for your time tonight and, and again, sort of like the, the sort of weighing in and waiting, waiting through this with us because, like, it, I think, I think it is important to just sort of clarify like, that maybe it's not like we, we want to make it cut and dry and I don't know that it is, it's easier if it's cut and dry or at least, at the very least, it's easier if, like, these things are clearly defined and. Yeah. Yeah.
• 2:36:26
  So awesome.
• 2:36:28
  Yeah. So that's my shout out. But not you, Josh.
• 2:36:33
  That's okay.
• 2:36:34
  Like, I appreciate Paul, but not you.
• 2:36:36
  Oh, okay. Gotcha. Gotcha. Okay, See you next week, Paul. Well, you have an opportunity. Do you want to shout out anyone? You don't have to take the opportunity. Don't worry.
• 2:36:50
  Okay. I, I, I, you know, I was, I was, I was telling the boys here when, when we were not recording that I, I, I don't have any friends here. And so I like, I bombard, I bombard all of the pony with all sorts of crap all day long. So thanks, thanks all of you, all of y', all, for putting up with it. I. I cannot imagine because Wes and I will often talk with Josh about movies and stuff, and Josh appears on Discord every blue moon. I cannot imagine how many notifications he has from the two of us. Once he logs in, probably just clears those off and it's like, all right, but
• 2:37:47
  Star Trek.
• 2:37:48
  I love being part of this group. Group, and, and thank you all for having me. It's. It's awesome. It's. It's so much fun for me and lets me get to kind of break out and talk about. Talk about some. Some cool stuff, you know, it was always a good times. Thank you.
• 2:38:08
  Nice.
• 2:38:08
  Yeah.
• 2:38:09
  Nice.
• 2:38:09
  Yeah, man.
• 2:38:10
  No matter how much sleep you lose.
• 2:38:12
  Except for you guys. Except for. Not you, Josh.
• 2:38:16
  Okay.
• 2:38:19
  Love this place so much.
• 2:38:20
  Except for Josh. Not him.
• 2:38:24
  Not him.
• 2:38:27
  Get out. All right, well, thanks for listening, guys. If you want to join in the conversation, if you have some. Some perspective, some esoteric perspective that we have not touched on that has to do with emulation. I say esoteric, but. No, I. I was being facetious. But seriously, if. If there's maybe you have some conviction in this area or maybe you have a different take or perspective, we'd love to hear it. Reach out to us. You can do that in a bunch of different ways just by going to our link tree and you can find whatever kind of social media or email, however you want to reach out to us and let us know. That's linktree.com the backlog breakdown. But. All right, guys, it is very early in the morning, my time.
• 2:39:17
  Very late at night.
• 2:39:18
  Very late at night. And so this plane needs to get landed. Hopefully it wasn't made by BO.
• 2:39:25
  Let's wrap things up.
• 2:39:26
  We won't crash and burn.
• 2:39:29
  Land the plane, Josh.
• 2:39:30
  Just do it.
• 2:39:32
  Quit stalling out here. Land the plane.
• 2:39:34
  Oh, nice. I like it. That was a good one. Okay, well, thank you, Paul, for joining us. And till next time, guys, keep eating down your backlogs and we'll keep breaking down the benefits.