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Jack Hatcher (Calamity Hatcher) | The Christian Reeve Podcast #334 · The Christian Reeve Podcast

0:00
Hello and welcome to another episode of the Christian Reeve
0:03
Podcast. Today's guest is Jack Hatcher,
0:08
Calamity Hatcher, a good friend of mine.
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He has now been on the show officially 10 times.
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This is his 10th appearance. Welcome to the show.
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How you doing? Thank you man, I'm doing well.
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How are you? I'm good, I'm good.
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I'm excited about this. Let's let's run through every
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single appearance I like. I like to have fun with this
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every time. So you were on This is episode
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334. You were on episode 4, episode
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18, episode 19, episode 74, episode 123, episode 166,
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episode 200 and 28200 and 2084. Episode 300, of course, and now
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334. There's quite an even mixing in
1:02
there. I quite like that.
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But you're also the only guest to have ever appeared in each
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and every year of the show as well.
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I mentioned last though because I kind of I try and make a habit
1:13
of that like. I like it at.
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Least twice a year I'll try and hit you up and be like, right,
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it's time. Yeah, I like that man.
1:20
It's good. Thank you for reaching now.
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Thank you to every guest who's ever reached, reached out and
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come back on the show. I appreciate it, especially now
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I've, I've really struggled to find guests lately.
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I don't know what's going on. You know, it's shows open, man.
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I'll have a conversation with anyone who wants to have a
1:39
conversation and let's see where we can take it.
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If you have a story to tell, link in description.
1:44
There you go. There you go.
1:46
But today's show is all about my good friend Jack.
1:49
There's lots to catch up on. Let's start with just kind of a
1:53
general catch up, like where you working, what you doing?
1:57
Talk to me. So I'm working in the, in the
2:00
charity sector in, in central London.
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Wow, doing IT, doing my bread and butter there.
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It's gone. Well, I've been off work for a
2:10
little while, had a little case of the blindness.
2:15
So I'm I'm gonna get damn well. We'll get to that.
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Let's start with IT for charity. That's that's got to be quite
2:25
interesting. You haven't did it for about a
2:27
year now, so it's just general office IT.
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You know, I don't know how to make it sound particularly
2:38
exciting. I've just said IT.
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Impressive. Come on.
2:46
As you're in tune, I'm just going to say words platforms at
2:51
you, and that's going to suddenly make you want to take a
2:55
job in IT laptops. Oh wow.
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Monitors. Wow.
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Docking stations. I'm just so blown away right
3:07
now. Yeah, exciting.
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No, I've been, I've been delving into like the cybersecurity side
3:14
of things as well, which is quite nice.
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It's it's a field that I've always been really interested
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in, so. Just say that a charity
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experiences a lot of at hacking or or attempts at hacking or
3:27
issues in general from an IT. I, I would, I, I don't know in,
3:36
in relative terms to other companies, but you know, from,
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you know, fishing is going on everywhere, fishing and, and
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spam, sorry, scams and things like that, like they're going on
3:51
everywhere. All businesses are a threat at
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the moment. Lists of, of emails get dumped
3:59
online through mass data collection.
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People buy them and then they're getting very smart and very
4:07
sophisticated. Now it's getting harder and
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harder to discern a real Microsoft e-mail.
4:14
So, you know, it's, it's understandable that people fall
4:19
for it, but as a result, you know, the cybersecurity
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awareness has to increase and particularly in an office
4:25
environment. So one thing I saw which is
4:28
interesting, so in emails now, in Gmail, you'll sometimes get
4:32
like the blue check mark, like this is an official e-mail.
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Yeah, I, I never, I never just take that as as word.
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I'd investigate it all fully. Like if I'm not expecting an
4:41
e-mail, I will investigate that shit like it's an episode of
4:45
Colombo. I mean, let's be real, if you
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Google search something, the first three things that come up
4:51
are sponsored. That may very well be a scam,
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and often are. Interesting though, I got one
5:00
from Alibaba, got a few from. Them.
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Oh yes, I've used them months in my life.
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Yeah, and I mean, it looked official, it had the tech check
5:11
mark and everything, but just something about it fell off.
5:14
Like it's weird when a company, a big company, goes out of their
5:20
way to contact you directly by e-mail.
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That's off I feel, unless you're subscribed in some way.
5:28
I think maybe it was, but a lot of the time now where you have
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things like companies buying companies and things like that,
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they, they just, they buy the, the database, don't they?
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They buy the the e-mail addresses and they date them on
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the hell out of it. They buy, well, they buy your
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data, don't they? Yes, they own you.
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They own a map of you, essentially.
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Exactly, people have moaned about Google doing this in
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recent times. I'm like I've been playing
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Pokémon Go for God knows how long.
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Google is known where I've been all times of the day anyway for
6:02
about a decade. Go away.
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I think, I think what's scary moving forward is, is kind of
6:06
like trying to get away from that.
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You know, I've spoken quite extensively about my fears of AI
6:14
and how people seem to just be so unaware of its effects.
6:22
They're just really happy to mess around, but they don't
6:24
understand the consequences of said facts, you know?
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And I think it'd be wrong. Like, we've been data tracked
6:29
forever. Like even before any of the
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Internet, we were always being tracked in some shape or form.
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But there was at least a way to be off grid.
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Whereas like now it's like almost impossible, you know,
6:40
like they're just phasing out money.
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They're phasing out everything. It's it's getting kind of scary.
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I mean, I think the biggest thing that I hear on AI is the
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fear that it's going to take our jobs and.
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Already is. It already is and it will
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continue to take more, but human beings want convenience.
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That is what they they care about more than anything,
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whether it be from a sitting at home perspective or money making
7:14
perspective. Companies will use generative
7:16
AI. You know it will happen.
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People will use ChatGPT at home to create or think it will, it
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will happen. And it's I, I really hope like
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particularly in the creative services industry, I really hope
7:34
that we in the midst of it don't lose the grasp of like real
7:40
creation. But this stuff would not be able
7:44
to thrive and would not provide be able to provide what it
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provides and do as well as it does if we as a society didn't
7:53
want it. So I think if you want to, if
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you want to change the habits of AI, you want it to not be the
8:02
what go the way it's going. People have to defiantly take a
8:06
stand and not use the damn products but billions are using
8:10
chat GPC every day. Yeah, it's got its uses.
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I use it for podcasting and it's been invaluable.
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But at the same time, like I don't, and I said I'll send this
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on the stream the other day that like I think the problem is, is
8:24
not AI directly. It's more people's usage of it
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and and using it to replace thinking, trying, you know, like
8:34
attempting learning. I just think people are getting
8:37
so lazy to the point where we are becoming what we've been
8:42
warned about, which is a consume.
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And I can't fucking speak today. Please give me strength, a
8:49
consumerist society to the Max, to the point where we don't
8:54
produce, we don't create, we just consume and.
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That's all. We're like 50 to 100 years of
9:01
being the people in Wall-e on the on the, on the chairs in
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this. Exactly what I was thinking
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about, yeah. We, we, we just got to figure
9:09
out how to actually not live on the planet.
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And that's, that's just going to be what we've become.
9:15
I just think that's like a travesty though.
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Do you know what I mean? We should be aiming towards that
9:21
like Star Trek kind of, I don't say lifestyle, but well, but
9:25
that's, you know, like. We we can't do that.
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If we can't if, if, if the human race has to segregate people of
9:35
the human race based on where they come from on that one
9:39
planet we're all on, how the hell are they going to get on
9:41
with aliens? We won't last two seconds in
9:45
space. We'll go out there giving it the
9:47
big and and we'll just get shot down.
9:52
Isn't it's not happening. He seems to start trying to
9:55
paint roundabouts on the side of spaceships.
9:57
No, see you later. Yeah, no way I get, I get your
10:03
point. We will not last five minutes in
10:06
space. Let's move it on back to you.
10:09
So are you still deejaying? You still doing your thing?
10:11
I am. I'm still deejaying a face down,
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which is something I'm very proud of.
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I'll see you love face down. We pull an amazing crowd every
10:26
month. When's this going out?
10:30
Question next. Week OK if this is out before
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next Friday, Friday, Friday Friday, Friday Kings Cross
10:42
Scala, the Kings Cross within the face down Stranger things
10:47
party. Oh, so come listen to some pop
10:51
punk. I'll be DJ ING.
10:53
There'll be many other DJs. It's wonderful time.
10:57
Nothing says Halloween like pop punk.
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Exactly. Nothing says terror like all in
11:04
pursuit. This is the problem because
11:06
we're the 1st Friday of the month, we always end up missing
11:09
Halloween slightly. That's on Friday now this year.
11:13
I know, but it's a bit. But it's the last Friday of the
11:15
month. It's not the first Friday of the
11:17
month. That is the last Friday of the
11:19
month. Yeah, but we're on the 1st
11:20
Friday of the month. Boo.
11:22
Just tell them to book it. Book it, book it.
11:25
It's Halloween. They'll come.
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Yeah, but that's a big night, isn't?
11:28
It excuse to for everyone to dress up and fucking listen to
11:31
pop punk. Yeah, but we do it the next week
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and it's it's generally is one of our busiest ones.
11:36
And everyone does come dressed up.
11:38
Oh, to be fair as well. Yeah.
11:40
Like who? You spend this money on a
11:42
Halloween costume and you wear it one night a year, and then
11:45
next year you won't be seen dead in the same Halloween costumes.
11:47
Stick it on a second night, stick it through the wash.
11:51
You can be the bloke from a Squid Game for a second night,
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you know. Such a weird concept to me.
11:55
Halloween. My girlfriend's really into it.
11:57
Like, that's her Christmas. That's her night of the years.
12:00
Halloween exactly the same. My fiance.
12:02
Get it, man. Oh, fuck you, fiance.
12:05
Congratulations. I don't know if I thank you.
12:07
Was told that or not, I think. No, I didn't congratulate you.
12:10
But his. Yeah, it was a.
12:11
Year ago now. All right.
12:13
You're doing now, man you. Should have got married.
12:16
You're lazy shit. Nah, taking my time, taking my
12:20
time. Yeah, it's going to.
12:22
It's a beautiful like honeymoon period now just.
12:25
No, the honeymoon comes after you're married, dude.
12:27
That's. Yeah, I know, but that's the
12:28
honeymoon. Honeymoon.
12:29
Just making shit up now. It's it's like the Battle Pass
12:32
Premium essentially. So basically by by putting a
12:37
ring on Jess's finger, I have signed up for the lifetime
12:40
battle pass. Now you've had some.
12:42
Very nice perks, some very nice. You've made a reservation, but
12:46
the reservation don't last forever bro.
12:48
No, don't mate. It's a direct debit.
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It's fun. It's a direct debit.
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Don't let her hear you say that. It's a Fortnite club.
12:55
It's a it's a battle pass that comes out every time the battle
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pass refreshes. You fucking lost me, now have.
13:02
You not seen how Fortnite works these days?
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Yeah, you just pay out your asshole.
13:08
You buy the battle pass. This is something called
13:10
Fortnite Club. But.
13:12
This gets every battle pass. Alright, let's talk more.
13:15
They charge you for. It so I think that's the biggest
13:19
scam going like OK, I will always be old classic gamer,
13:23
retro gamer right, because I like to own the physical shit.
13:26
I like to unlock the stuff in the game.
13:28
I don't like how every game now, yeah, I sound like such an old
13:31
man, but like is just only geared towards online play.
13:35
Like you just completely ignore the single stories.
13:38
Yes, I know there are examples that are contradictory to what
13:41
I'm saying, but for the most part, taking Fortnite as an
13:44
example, now Fortnite is, as I understand it, a battle Royale
13:48
game at at its core. That's what it is, that's what
13:51
the product is. But where what bothers me is
13:55
that you buy these skins or you know, character outfits and they
14:04
to purchase that cost you close enough to what a buying a game
14:10
would cost you. Well.
14:13
Thereabouts. Depends on the skin, right?
14:15
Not really well. OK, if I want to buy like a
14:19
spider man skin, how much is that going to cost me?
14:22
So OK, let me let me do a full kind of breakdown on this.
14:25
So there are some that will cost like 2000 V bucks.
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I'm not sure how much that is in real money, but that's about 15
14:34
to 20 lbs. But then a lot of them will be
14:38
in the battle pass, which is I believe, like 900 V bucks, which
14:44
is obviously a lesser money. And by that you you grind
14:48
through the battle pass by doing missions in your games that
14:52
unlock those characters as you go.
14:55
You don't pay anything on top of that for them.
14:58
I think I I understand what you mean in terms of the free to
15:03
play model, because I think the free to play model gives us a
15:05
lot of shovel where the it's it's just there for making
15:11
money. When when the Travis Scott one?
15:14
Because that was a big one in in the last year when that came
15:17
out. That was originally worth 1500 V
15:20
bucks. How much is that in like pounds?
15:23
But that would have been some I No, I did.
15:26
Probably not that far off. I will find out for us, yes,
15:31
one. 1000. 500 V bucks in pound there go people have searched
15:37
this obviously let's see how much oh what like that can't be
15:46
right. What 1500 V Bucks or dollars?
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Worth like nothing. That can't be right.
15:54
Is it V Bucks or don't? That's what I'm trying to find
15:57
is just V bucks V bucks. Oh yeah, yeah, V bucks aren't
16:01
worth that much, I don't think. Yeah, but it it has to be a
16:05
substantial amount. It can't just be like nothing
16:08
because there was the whole point of what I'm trying to get.
16:10
OK, right, we're getting somewhere. 1500 V bucks right
16:14
now is equivalent to around, let's say about 10 lbs.
16:19
OK. Right.
16:21
That seems more agreeable to me. But like some of them, some of
16:24
them get a little bit pricey to the point where it's like, I
16:28
understand wanting to customize your game.
16:30
Great. That's always been a great thing
16:32
to do. But when it starts getting a
16:34
little bit too expensive or like for example, when you're buying
16:38
like add-ons or downloadable content, stuff like that, and it
16:42
ends up costing way more than the game is worth.
16:46
Or, or when they kind of release a game, but then to get all of
16:52
the main game, you have to buy extra.
16:54
I didn't ask bullshit. Yeah, I I sit into places with
17:03
DLC as a model. DLC.
17:05
That was the word I was looking for.
17:06
Thank. You I I sit in two places
17:07
because if you give me a fully finished product that is
17:15
brilliant as it is and then you say actually we'd like to do
17:21
something additional for it, then I'm like, OK, sure.
17:28
Like I'd be interested in going back to that world for a reduced
17:31
price. So like a 20 LB DLCI.
17:34
You know, I hear the Alden ring DLC, for example, basically
17:39
added a whole new fucking game to Alden ring.
17:45
But then, you know, you get some good faith stuff like Sonic
17:48
Frontiers had free DLC that came with it that completely rewrote
17:53
the end of the game because people weren't too keen on the
17:56
ending. So it's an alternative ending.
17:59
Yeah, an alternative ending, but it's considered the Canon ending
18:02
by by the majority of people where it's like a ridiculous
18:07
despite difficulty, the story resolves differently with boss
18:12
battles, you get a new supersonic form it all goes, but
18:16
it's a free DLC. It's cool, but it's weird.
18:19
Feedback. It is weird, but they listen to
18:21
feedback and we're like, all right, it's weird.
18:25
You want it. It's weird.
18:26
It's like, oh, we, it's not the ending we want.
18:29
Make the ending we want. Oh fuck.
18:31
No, it wasn't that. So I'll, I'll, I'll break it
18:34
down. Basically the whole premise of
18:38
Sonic Frontiers is the boss fights in which you go
18:40
supersonic and you just start whaling on these giant monsters,
18:46
just absolutely beating the living shit out of these massive
18:49
robot things. Good stuff.
18:51
And yeah, it was good fun to Kellen Quinn from Season with
18:55
sirens screaming in the background.
18:57
It's it's all of vibe. It's all of vibe.
18:59
But then they made the final boss basically Space Invaders,
19:05
and everyone was like, yo, why? And it it's because it got
19:09
rushed out by Sega because it had been in development for five
19:14
years at that point. So like, we need a return on
19:16
this. You need to put it out.
19:18
So he, the director of the game didn't have a chance to.
19:22
But what this is what you know, is is said in interviews and
19:25
things like that from people from the guy who worked on it,
19:30
you know, he didn't get the time to do it the way he wanted to do
19:32
it. And then when given the option
19:34
for the DLC, he was like, right, yeah, let's do it, let's up it
19:37
make it crazy. But you know, that's something
19:40
with DLC. Then you get games like the new
19:42
Pokémon, which is really looks like AC for effort on Nintendo's
19:51
part. But all of the Pokémon games
19:54
these days are C for effort on Nintendo's part.
19:58
And then there's DLC that you can buy at launch.
20:01
Let's explore. That for a second what?
20:03
Why is it C for effort? Why is it not good compared to
20:05
previous games previous generations?
20:08
So we'll go back to Sword and Shield, which was the release,
20:17
well, not release games for the Switch, but they were the the
20:20
Pokémon games for the Switch, the first ones.
20:23
And at this point to not include all the Pokémon is a bit
20:30
ridiculous because all the games on Nintendo, DSS and Game Boys
20:35
have been able to do it before that and now we're on this and
20:38
they and we couldn't do it all. Then they locked a load of those
20:42
Pokémon behind paid DLC like the other Kanto starters.
20:50
Squirt one Bulbasaur were locked behind the DLC.
20:55
The game felt a bit bland, especially compared to open
20:59
world titles. At the same time, and you have
21:01
to think, as much as people want to put hardware limitations on
21:04
the Nintendo Switch, you had Zelda, Breath of the Wild, Mario
21:09
Odyssey, games that had stylish, very well rendered open worlds
21:16
with lots going on. And Pokémon, the world's biggest
21:21
entertainment franchise of all time, breaking in billions,
21:26
can't put the effort in to make it the Pokémon game that we
21:31
want. A Pokémon world that feels
21:33
lifting and, you know, attacks having real animations instead
21:39
of the standard, you know, like just basic things that we have
21:43
out of so many RPGs. Why the hell don't we have our
21:47
Pokémon? I got to say, for me, it's like
21:52
one of the biggest dreams I've I've always had to have like a
21:56
Pokémon RPG akin to like Skyrim kind of vibes, you know what I
22:00
mean? It's the thing we all dreamed
22:02
about when we were kids playing. Some mountains, some dragonite.
22:07
Exactly, and I think it's within their power to do it.
22:12
Like I think what would make more sense would be if you just
22:16
kind of started from scratch and go, right?
22:19
Pokémon the game, you start with Kanto, you just master Kanto,
22:25
see how it goes, see how people react to it.
22:28
It's probably going to go down very well.
22:30
And then you build upon it and, and you you could either expand
22:34
upon the existing game and go, right now we're releasing Johto.
22:38
So like GTA Pokémon essentially we're going to a different
22:42
region. Exactly.
22:43
Yeah, Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that'd.
22:45
Be awesome. Yeah, because then you don't
22:48
have to keep building a different engine every time.
22:51
You can. Just same engine, just new
22:55
story, new everything. Use the existing games you've
22:58
made as a baseline. You can do something new with it
23:00
if you want, do the same story if you want.
23:02
There's a lot of stuff you could do with that.
23:04
Point is the the focus is on, as you say, that RPG style, the the
23:09
3D style that we've always wanted, which I know has been
23:13
captured in later games. Like I've not played since Fire
23:17
Red Leaf Green. That shows you how out of touch
23:20
I am. But I fucking love those games.
23:22
I go back and I play them all the time.
23:24
Whereas when I see the modern stuff, there's nothing really
23:27
that pulls me in and especially when I hear about how you play
23:33
the games now versus how you used to play them.
23:36
So for example, a big, I suppose thing that stood out for me that
23:41
was a positive was building a team that has strength within
23:49
its differences and and also being able to kind of pretty
23:53
much defeat any Pokémon with your built team.
23:55
There'd always be that flaw in your team, but like based on
23:58
your strategy, how you use, I don't know, potions either,
24:02
items and also how you battle was how you'd win, right?
24:05
But the key was that you could always defeat other teams based
24:10
on the strengths within your team.
24:11
I've got fire, I've got water, I've got ice, I've got ghost
24:13
Pokémon, I've got normal, like stuff like that.
24:16
Then I start hearing about these modern games, and it's not like
24:20
it wasn't the day types that can't be defeated by any other
24:26
type. They have no weakness.
24:27
Well, what's the fucking point then?
24:29
Yeah, I. There's things.
24:32
Like there's just some some weird kind of mechanics to all
24:38
now and, and, and things have some things have changed for the
24:43
better, some things have changed for the worse.
24:45
Like the Exp share thing. I really don't like Exp share.
24:51
So basically every battle you do, all your Pokémon get the
24:55
same experience. Well, that's changed.
24:58
Doesn't matter, it used to only be 1.
25:00
Yeah, the poker 1 you, the poker 1 you fought with got
25:02
experience. That's not the case anymore.
25:05
OK, so does it do that without you asking it to do that?
25:09
Yeah, I think you can turn it off.
25:13
You might be able to start off, but yeah.
25:15
Yeah 'cause like I liked the idea of of being able to like
25:19
switch between like characters during battle and then only the
25:23
characters that you played with would get the AXP.
25:27
Then you get the Exp give item later in the game which you can
25:33
then choose specifically which one other Pokémon also gets it.
25:37
But it would only ever be 1. I can see the advantages of
25:40
splitting all your Exp, but it would also mean that it's going
25:44
to take significantly longer. It doesn't split I'll.
25:49
OK. Everyone gets the exact same
25:52
amount. Yeah, that's what I mean.
25:54
So like, OK. It doesn't split the overall
25:56
Exp. It's like, oh you know, 300 XP
26:01
for killing the Pokémon and then every Pokémon in your party gets
26:04
the 300 XP. It doesn't split it between
26:06
them. Oh, what?
26:08
It's just, it's just to power level people through the game.
26:12
That's, I mean, that's too easy then that's the.
26:15
Reverse the games are too easy now.
26:17
I guess it's because it's designed for really young kids,
26:19
though. Maybe that's why.
26:21
Maybe they. Identify this.
26:22
I mean, that is the thing that we need to kind of grasp the
26:26
noise as we are middle-aged men talking about.
26:29
We're not middle-aged. What the fuck?
26:31
Well, if we live to 60, we are so.
26:34
We get to 40 or 5050 is considered middle age, isn't it?
26:39
That that is we're we're, we're young men.
26:44
Right. I know men are going to say
26:45
that. I know you're going to say.
26:46
That I still get young. Man, Christian, I certainly
26:50
don't. It depends on context.
26:53
If I'm around a bunch of 20 year olds, I feel old as shit.
26:56
If I'm around people in their 50s, I feel really young.
27:01
It really depends. See, I feel really young, but at
27:04
the same time I'm like. I know what you mean.
27:07
I'm jealous. You're going to.
27:09
You're going to go back at 7:00 and be in bed by 8.
27:14
That sounds amazing. What's on the telly this
27:18
evening? Heartbeat.
27:20
Wonderful. Let's go.
27:21
How old are you? Heartburn?
27:23
Not that we grew up in the 90s. So to give people context, when,
27:30
when we were growing up in the 90s and the 2000s, when you
27:34
would go to bed on a Sunday night, earlyish or no, no, no
27:39
heartbeat was like on at like 7:00 or 8:00 PM in, in the
27:44
night. And that was like a signal.
27:46
Oh, it's time to start winding down for bed now.
27:48
Like it's time to it's quiet quiet a time.
27:51
Now adults are going to watch. Fucking heartbeat.
27:55
Not actually that bad to be famous.
27:56
Was that a little Welsh village, wasn't it?
27:58
Was it Welsh? Don't know, maybe it's
28:00
Yorkshire. Maybe that's no offence to if we
28:05
got that wrong, I apologise. Did it offend the Welsh?
28:09
Well, I hope that that offend offend the people of Yorkshire.
28:12
I'm in Yorkshire at the moment. Yeah.
28:14
I'm in Yorkshire. We had some Yorkshire people in
28:19
recently. How did that go?
28:21
That's nice. They're nice.
28:22
Good. Good.
28:23
I thought it was going to be a Horror Story.
28:24
No, they tell the children. No.
28:30
All right, let's, let's move on, OK.
28:35
I want to keep it positive before we get into anything.
28:38
Yeah. Yeah.
28:41
So actually, well, I don't know, Actually, no.
28:43
Let's talk some miserable shit and then we'll end on maybe
28:46
something positive. Nah, that's.
28:48
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. OK.
28:50
All right, we've spoken about gaming, we've spoken about Sonic
28:55
a little bit. My boy.
28:58
Let's let's talk about, let's talk about Sega.
29:02
You wanted to talk about this. Let's give some, let's give some
29:04
context for people that might not know.
29:06
So Jack worked at Sega for around 2 1/2 years.
29:12
It was a dream job. For example, fun stuff like he
29:17
would take a picture with the massive giant Sonic statue they
29:20
had at the front of the building.
29:23
I did that religiously. Obviously, he was still
29:26
creating. He was creating Sonic content.
29:28
He had access to early games, early stuff, and to some extent
29:33
the company would sort of, you know, clue him in on certain
29:36
things or allow him to see certain things or get his
29:38
opinion even on certain things, which is awesome.
29:41
And I know that meant a lot to you and it was really cool.
29:44
It's cool to see that. So there's a few things I want
29:48
to explore. Let's start with, let's take it
29:51
back to the moment that you lost, lost your job.
29:53
So as I understand, you were made redundant.
29:58
Is that correct? Yes, that's correct.
30:00
OK. Do you can you talk about the
30:03
reasons why that was the case? Was it just that they just
30:07
happened to be cut in costs? Or maybe your job wasn't as
30:11
needed as it was before? Like what could you talk about
30:14
that bit tricky so. I don't know if it's tricky
30:18
because it's all public information.
30:19
OK. Let's.
30:23
Anything that you can't talk about legally, we can move past.
30:26
We should talk about hyenas, so. Hyenas.
30:30
Hyenas was a game being developed by Creative Assembly,
30:34
who won the studios underneath Sake of Europe.
30:37
OK. And this game had a reported
30:43
very high budget and that's coming from games reporting
30:47
websites. I don't know what that is.
30:49
I wasn't Privy to that information.
30:51
It's just speculation. It's not that, yes.
30:55
I played the beta of the game. I streamed it on my channel.
31:02
This is while you were working for sale.
31:04
While I was working there, I was given a code by the marketing
31:09
manager for the game, and I was given a few additional ones to
31:13
get out to people and watch the stream.
31:16
Not many people watch the stream.
31:18
It wasn't particularly successful.
31:21
It wasn't it. I had my fun playing the game,
31:28
but I couldn't envision some sort of feature where I boot up
31:32
my PC every night to play hyenas.
31:36
That's just the way it was. Is there any particular reason
31:39
for that or was it just just didn't interest?
31:42
I feel it was just a bit bland in my opinion.
31:47
It flashed a lot of vibrant colours in its presentation.
31:52
It's marketing, but I felt it was just 0 A0 gravity shooter
31:59
that wasn't particularly fast-paced.
32:04
I would maybe attribute it maybe a bit more to the stylings of
32:10
like a Team Fortress 2 or something like that.
32:13
But I I wasn't a game that I was going to boot up every day.
32:19
That game, after, you know, a long development time, a lot of
32:23
money put into it, was completely cancelled because
32:27
that beta did not go very well. I see it was never officially
32:30
released then. It was never released.
32:32
The trailers were released that you know, I went to events where
32:37
we were displaying the trailer for Hyenas, but it was never
32:42
officially released. It's a shame.
32:45
I mean, it is a in my personal opinion, I think there was a lot
32:55
of misguided attempts with that game.
33:01
I think that game, again, in my opinion, wasn't, was too far
33:08
behind its time. Oh, I think it's it's the kind
33:13
of game that potentially would have done very well around the
33:19
original Fortnite Pub G kind of launch era.
33:26
They're playing devil's advocate for a second.
33:28
There's a lot of games that are being released by indie studios
33:31
right now that are trying to recapture beloved times.
33:35
Like for example, there's a lot of games out now that resemble
33:37
that kind of early Resident Evil style.
33:40
Like graphically they actually look like that.
33:42
And you could make the argument, oh, why would someone want to
33:45
play this? But then people love playing it.
33:47
Now, granted, maybe it's because it's capturing an, A sort of a,
33:52
some nostalgia for people, but given that context, why do you
33:57
think a game like Hyenas couldn't kind of recapture a bit
34:01
of that nostalgia of what would that have been the early 2010's
34:05
when when Team Fortress 2 came out or late 2000s?
34:09
Something like that. But I I think because it was
34:12
like it was just more live service.
34:15
Live service. Yes, and you know the the gaming
34:18
community has spoken out at length now that people have had
34:22
it with live service games, these games where you always
34:25
need to be connected to the Internet to play the game and
34:28
you buy the new battle pass every month and you buy your
34:33
skins. What we were talking about
34:35
earlier and that's what hyenas was with those slightly I I
34:40
feel, in my opinion, slightly outdated mechanics.
34:45
It had its own like cast of characters that they'd invented,
34:50
and none of them were particularly striking to me,
34:56
except the one who was a Sonic cosplayer.
35:03
A hyperactive Sonic cosplayer in a motorcycle helmet that had
35:09
Sonic stuff attached to it. Which almost kind of kind of
35:15
seemed like it was taking the Mick out of the fans a little
35:18
bit, but I was like, OK, I'll play that character.
35:21
There's a shadow variant for it, you know, cool.
35:27
But outside of that, there just wasn't much to it really.
35:30
That kind of brings me on to an interesting question.
35:33
In this day and age, how do you think Sega regards its fans?
35:39
Like how does it work with its fans in your opinion?
35:44
Like what you know? I, I don't think it's possible
35:49
to say to ask that question is about Segre as an organization,
35:55
OK, Because when you look at game development, the these
36:01
products come from the development studios.
36:07
So Sports Interactive, for example, they produce the
36:11
Football Manager games. Could you, you know, say how do
36:15
they treat they their fans? Well, let's look at what
36:20
happened with Football Manager last year.
36:23
It didn't launch, it didn't come out.
36:27
They didn't feel that it was a good enough quality because they
36:31
were transitioning engine, I believe to Unity that they
36:37
wanted to release it. Now, in one breath you can say
36:40
that's that's not good for the fans.
36:43
They're not getting the release they want.
36:45
But on the other hand, I would personally say that's quite good
36:50
for the fans. They don't want to sell you
36:52
something that they don't think is acceptable.
36:56
This is not up to their standard.
36:58
So I would say that's a good one.
37:02
You know, I, I think Sonic Team are tremendous with their fans
37:11
and that's something I really have to kind of keep going over
37:14
in my head and readjusting with is like, no one at Sonic Team
37:20
wronged me. I, you know, the head of Sonic
37:24
Team sent me one of well, sent me the best e-mail I've ever had
37:28
in my life, a very supportive e-mail.
37:31
Lovely man named Takashi Izuka Jane always been a hero of mine
37:36
and I reached out to him for guidance when I was feeling a
37:40
bit lost while working there and he came back and just gave me
37:43
exactly what did she like a father patting you on the back
37:47
with an e-mail. Daddy Zook as as he's known to
37:50
the Sonic community. So, you know, it's important to
37:54
kind of distinct that, even though I struggle with that
37:58
quite a lot at the moment. Well, let me throw a question
38:00
that will tie into that because I was going to ask about your
38:04
experience, but let's just talk about in relation to your
38:09
feelings about Sonic and Sega etcetera.
38:12
Has your experience working with Sega affected your love of Sonic
38:16
the Hedgehog, the franchise, and or other Sega properties?
38:21
Massively. OK, why?
38:27
I think. Because I'll, I'll, I'll say
38:29
before you answer, I'll say this.
38:30
In your previous answer, just before then, you made a real
38:34
interesting point about Sega, the organization and then the
38:39
games developers working under them, which is a very good
38:41
point. Sega is a corporate entity.
38:45
When we think of Sega, I think you and I, we tend to think of
38:48
like, Oh yeah, like back in the day, you know, Sega, your
38:52
Dreamcast and the Mega Drive Sonic, and that's what W Warrior
38:56
Head is AT. But and all of that is Sega, and
39:00
that's their properties. But they're no longer, yeah,
39:03
they're no longer that small little company anymore.
39:05
Now they're this huge conglomerate.
39:08
Yeah. But yeah, going back to your
39:10
your experience, this this. I mean, I definitely think I
39:14
definitely think it's changed things.
39:16
It's it's made it more difficult to produce content, for example.
39:24
In fact, there's there's a few. So let me let me break those
39:28
down. But I think content creation has
39:31
been really difficult. You know, we've just had the
39:35
launch of Sonic Racing Cross Worlds, which I absolutely love,
39:41
but I stated very openly outright I am not buying this
39:46
game. I'm not.
39:47
I'm because I'm not giving Sega 70 lbs of my money for a racing
39:51
game it. Kind of reminds me.
39:53
By a friend. So after that was done, I, I've
39:56
played the hell out of it, but I, I will.
39:59
Say this speaks to what I was saying earlier about how games
40:02
are just getting far too expensive now for what they are.
40:05
That my housemate said that my previous housemate.
40:09
He owns a Switch and he loves like the Mario games, but there
40:12
was like a new Mario Kart or something coming out, same
40:16
thing, £7080 and he's like, I just can't justify spending that
40:19
much money for just a race, small racing game.
40:23
You know what it is, everyone knows what it is.
40:25
It's just too much. It's ridiculous.
40:28
I mean, Sonic Racing has come in, I think £10 cheaper than
40:33
that racing game. And but if you not, to be fair,
40:37
I've got to give it out to again.
40:38
Daddy Zook, he he turned up at the Tokyo gate, not the Tokyo
40:42
Game Show, the game. I think it was the game awards.
40:45
It was summer game fest or something like that.
40:47
Turned up with a new trailer for Sonic racing crosswords and just
40:50
got on stage and said, and unlike another Kart racer, ours
40:54
is completely cross-platform. And the whole crowd went wild
40:57
and they did a trailer where they put like they put some
41:02
picture of some in one of the trailers for crossroads.
41:06
They took the piss out of Mario Kart by putting this broken down
41:10
trailer on the side of like a desert Rd.
41:13
They. Want to be careful with that.
41:15
Every tweet that all posted Nintendo made about Mario Kart
41:19
World, the comments were just filled with pictures of that
41:22
thing of that like busted trailer.
41:27
And then what was it in the end, Nintendo got thing about oh,
41:32
getting that Nintendo did kind of try and put it into it and
41:35
we're like, yes, all these great Son of the hedgehog games that
41:39
you can play now on Nintendo Switch one and two.
41:42
That's like, yeah, I say grain got a console no more have they?
41:46
Fair enough, but. Yeah, I just clocked.
41:50
Yeah, that's pretty brutal, isn't?
41:52
It but it's too far. I think the Internet trolled us
41:55
completely with it. But yeah, I think £78 for a
41:58
racing game is silly. I, I, I think it speaks to
42:02
another thing as well about modern gaming, because we grew
42:05
up in a time where games typically were around the £40
42:08
price mark. Sometimes it'd be more if it was
42:11
a special release, but that was kind of what it was.
42:15
Gaming is just more expensive now.
42:17
Maybe that's the only price point, but it does beg the
42:20
question how much is too much? Because people will accept the
42:26
incremental price increases. We've now reached the point
42:29
where £78 is considered normal. I think it's insane, but I get
42:33
it right. But then, then I'm a lapsed fan.
42:36
I'm not clocked in, tapped into modern gaming.
42:39
If I had been, I'd probably just look at that and go, well yes,
42:42
it's more expensive, but this is where we are right now.
42:45
How much is too expensive? I mean, I don't know because I'm
42:49
not an accountant and as much. As I fuck all that dudes as a
42:54
fan as a. Gamer, as someone who worked in
42:58
the gaming industry, but didn't, wasn't that in depth into that
43:01
side of things, right? I mean, the perfect example I
43:08
think is I look at Microsoft. So you have Xbox?
43:15
Yes. Xbox own Activision Blizzard,
43:19
every Call of Duty game costs about 400 to $700 million to
43:23
make Game Pass means that not as many people are buying that.
43:29
But then I'd I'd be like, OK, that makes sense.
43:32
You know that that makes complete sense.
43:34
But then Microsoft is still making record fucking profits
43:37
every year and they're still laying off like staff left right
43:41
and centre. Sega.
43:43
So you're, funny enough, bought Rovio just before I left the
43:47
company. And on the Rovio, other guys own
43:52
Angry Birds. They created Angry Birds.
43:55
They they own the property. They've been working on Sonic
43:58
Rumble for like a year. Again, I, I think, don't quote
44:05
me on that. It might be longer, maybe
44:06
slightly shorter. They've been working on that for
44:08
God knows how long. They announced the release date
44:11
the same day they announced. They're laying off 30 people
44:13
from Rovio, the studio they just bought.
44:16
They're making record profits right now.
44:19
Like Sonic Racing, Crosswords is making them sheep of money right
44:22
now. I think that's I've seen that in
44:26
so many companies. That's not that's not just a
44:28
Sega specific. No, it's not.
44:29
It's a gate. But in the gaming industry, it's
44:32
rife. Yeah, but it's just companies in
44:35
general, even outside of the gaming industry, it's it's cut
44:37
in your bottom line because. You're focusing.
44:40
Self where? But there does seem to be an
44:43
unprecedented wave in the the gaming in the entertainment
44:47
sphere that does seem disproportionate to, you know,
44:53
your general office worker, maybe a worker, I don't know,
44:58
Dunder Mifflin Paper Company. You know, it's it like for all
45:04
the layoffs you hear about in the office, the the gaming
45:09
industry has one of those, one of those like, each day at some
45:12
gaming company. It's ridiculous.
45:14
And it's a time when the gaming industry is making more money
45:17
than ever before. It just keeps going up.
45:20
More people are into gaming, but there's never been a better time
45:23
to be a gamer. And I know you're going to be
45:25
like, oh, I don't know. We had it pretty good as kids.
45:27
Yeah, we did. But in terms of access to
45:32
gaming, we've never had it better than than we did now than
45:36
we do now. Like great.
45:38
Back in the day, you know, we had our maybe you were a a
45:42
Nintendo, maybe you were a Sega Mega Drive then.
45:44
Maybe you were APS one an N64. Maybe you were a Dreamcast kid,
45:50
a GameCube, wherever you went to PS2PS3 or any of that.
45:54
We're now at the point where we can play a lot of those games
45:59
that we, a lot of us have got access to APC that can play a
46:03
lot of those games from our childhood and current games,
46:05
depending on on what you've got really and truly like.
46:09
We're in a time where accessibility for games has
46:12
never been better. You don't own those games, you
46:14
own a code. In a box and you have to have an
46:18
Internet access to play them. I can go play my Xbox, Xbox One
46:22
without any fucking Internet access and enjoy all those great
46:25
games. Yeah, I've been, you know.
46:28
It depends what you buy on. PlayStation SO.
46:30
I'm APS five guy at the moment. I generally find that most are
46:37
on code on disk and PlayStation Xbox.
46:42
Have been quite good for. That with the exception of some
46:46
Ubisoft games, I I. Haven't bought a Nintendo Switch
46:51
too. And I'll be honest, you know,
46:52
there was no release title for me.
46:54
I looked at it and I was like, OK, I don't care about Mario
46:57
Kart because Sonic Racing is coming out and that was
47:01
announced beforehand and obviously that's going to take
47:03
my vote in that one. I don't really care about Donkey
47:08
Kong Bonanza. I care.
47:11
The air riders, I care. About But I'm not buying a
47:14
nearly £500 system for Kirby Air Riders.
47:18
I sat there. I sat there through.
47:20
That whole direct. Christian sitting there.
47:23
Smash Bros, Smash Bros, Smash. I saw those guys.
47:27
There was Smash Bros, there was no Smash Bros, and there ain't
47:31
going to be a Smash. Bros because daddy.
47:33
Zacharias had enough. He said enough of this Nintendo
47:36
shit. You know the Titties 90 joke in
47:38
Deadpool Wolverine. Yeah, that's Daddy Zacharias
47:41
working on fucking Smash Bros till he's 90 and he's Japanese
47:47
and he looks like he's 10 years old now when he's in his 40s.
47:50
So he's probably going to live to like 200 and they're just
47:53
going to keep milking him for Smash Bros.
47:57
So I haven't brought a Switch tape because I'm not doing it.
47:59
I get it. I'm not doing it.
48:02
I don't own. Any of my games.
48:03
Even if I buy a fucking physical cartridge.
48:05
He's stupid. But that's, you know, that's the
48:08
big one. If we're talking about all this,
48:12
how are we? Talking about Nintendo because.
48:14
Because Christian doesn't want to get sued, OK?
48:18
Because you you sue. Us for anything.
48:21
No. You, you brought it up.
48:23
You brought it up, No? No, no, hang on hand, I don't
48:24
want to get. I was worried Nintendo either.
48:26
I was worried about, I was worried about Sega.
48:28
Suing us. That was what I was worried
48:30
about. Listen, me too.
48:33
To be fair, I've been threatened to be sued.
48:35
On the show. At least twice now, once by a
48:39
newspaper company, once by who was it, You know, the people
48:45
that run that alleged Colt Twin Flames universe, whatever was.
48:51
Oh, yeah, they threatened to sue me.
48:53
So I have to take down because it was argued as defamatory.
48:57
And this is what I mean about defamation is a tricky one
49:00
because, I mean, OK, that was a bit different.
49:02
That was a person talking about her experiences in a twin flame
49:08
relationship and then kind of commenting on the Twin Flames
49:12
universe and everything. But I don't know.
49:14
I mean, it kind of raises a question.
49:16
You should be able to offer opinions about something and it
49:19
not be considered defamation. If we talk about Sega and your
49:26
experiences at Sega, that in of itself is not defamation because
49:32
you're just talking about your experience.
49:34
That's that shouldn't be defamation because it's, it's
49:36
yeah. But this whole legal system is.
49:38
Catered toward the little guy, it favours the corporation.
49:45
Sorry. Catered against the little guy?
49:47
Yeah, it favours the corporation.
49:50
I mean. Even even if.
49:52
Even if you're right and you know, let's say you go into a
49:56
lawsuit with a big company like that and you're right and you've
50:00
got a case, if you don't have the money to fight against
50:04
fight, yeah, yeah, you just lose on that.
50:06
Ground because you just can't. Afford court fees, yeah, you
50:09
know, and that's more my concern is, is just the affordability of
50:13
taking taking a case like that, you know, All right, OK, we'll
50:17
don't try a lot of this. I don't like the way that
50:20
Nintendo is perceived to behave in media that has been broadcast
50:25
by other people and is in no way affiliated with myself, Calamity
50:29
Hacher or the Christian Reed podcast.
50:31
But as he said, commented on by everyone.
50:33
Although Nintendo's lawyers will still probably find a way to
50:37
find this. So please, we do not insult the
50:40
God Mario and do not wish to suffer his evil plumber wrath.
50:44
Thank you. You can you can criticize
50:47
Nintendo. They're.
50:47
Not going to sue. You can't criticize Nintendo.
50:51
It's like Taylor Swift. No, because no one's going to
50:53
sue you. The fans will just.
50:54
Come after you. Yeah, that's what I mean.
50:56
You're going to get you're. Going to have your day in court
50:58
and die, but you're going to have your day on Twitter and
51:01
die. I I don't know where you're
51:03
getting this. Switch to.
51:06
Listen. I don't care as long as I don't.
51:09
Get sued, all right. I don't.
51:10
Know I don't, I don't what your beef with Nintendo is, but like,
51:14
but this is nothing to do with me.
51:15
It's Nintendo. Lawyers, they're not going to.
51:18
They're not going to sue. You for just saying?
51:20
Oh, I don't. Like Nintendo, that's not,
51:21
they're not going to sue you for that.
51:22
That's sue him Powwowed. For all their.
51:27
Stuff for saying. That you can't catch monsters in
51:30
a bowl anymore and then what are you on about?
51:35
Do you not hear about this? I don't know what you're talking
51:37
about because. What I'm you heard of what I'm
51:40
in power world? What I'm trying?
51:41
To say here is. Just criticizing a games company
51:47
is not enough for grounds for defamation.
51:50
People do that on the on on on the Internet every day.
51:53
I'm sure there's about a million videos I can find on YouTube now
51:56
of people criticizing like the latest Mario game or whatever.
52:00
All right, that's fine. I'm going to believe you.
52:02
But if Kobe knocks on my door in a suit, I'm sending them to
52:06
yours. OK, you can.
52:08
You can. Review a game you can.
52:10
Criticize a game, fine, OK. Where the defamation side comes
52:15
into play is more like, I mean, you're we were going to talk
52:19
about Sega and your experience working at Sega.
52:22
Now that obviously gets into some, some, some legislation
52:27
issues because a, you worked there, you had a contract there.
52:31
I'm sure as I said to you off camera with that contract when
52:35
you left the company, you're still liable for everything that
52:40
you learned and were Privy to during that time.
52:43
And then also just in general, not speaking like disparagingly
52:48
about the company, like you can criticize them.
52:50
You know, there's no reason you can't criticize them, but you
52:54
can't talk about specific stuff that you were Privy to or, you
53:01
know, anything. I mean, what is it they call it?
53:05
You probably just signed a non disclosure agreement, I imagine,
53:08
right? Yeah.
53:09
And with that, I don't know if you paid attention.
53:12
Did it last just for your employment or is it like
53:16
indefinite? I can't, I can't even remember
53:18
now. I'm going.
53:19
To I'm going to wager it's indefinite.
53:21
Because they want to protect their properties, protect their
53:25
company, and that's fine. Yeah, yeah.
53:29
And as I understand. Your issues with them are more
53:32
to do with your actual employment rather than, you
53:36
know, the way company, the way the company is run, the way the
53:38
company is run is the way the company is run.
53:41
It's an organization. And as you rightly put it,
53:44
you're a fan of of Sonic and the whole Sonic community and what
53:49
they do there. Maybe you're just not a fan of
53:51
the corporate Sega structure and the way things are, OK.
53:57
So as we get. Into this next section, it's
54:00
it's opinion and I'm going to, I'm going to make sure I'm going
54:03
to be the devil's advocate and call you out on any bullshit.
54:06
So Sega, if you're listening, I'm doing your work for you,
54:14
right? You worked there.
54:16
For two years you were let go. As part of redundancies.
54:20
That's that's pretty cut and dry.
54:23
You were gutted when that happened.
54:25
I remember it was like your dream job.
54:27
It sucked. It was what it was.
54:29
You made a series of videos, I recall where you're kind of
54:32
testing the waters as far as mentioning them.
54:36
But it was like, oh, X Sega employee has opinion on XYZ.
54:41
Yeah. Let's talk about that for a
54:42
second. Did you ever get cease and
54:45
desist or did? You ever get told you couldn't?
54:47
Do that. OK, no.
54:50
So I. I had a friend who's.
54:54
Still at the. Company someone that I
54:56
absolutely love there and that's one thing we probably should
54:59
quickly preface is I still know and absolutely adore a massive
55:06
chunk of the people that were there.
55:08
So you know, no throw in no shade.
55:12
They said to me, they're probably not going to like it,
55:17
probably not as far as it went. But if anything, you know, as I
55:20
would often say at the beginning of the videos, you know, as
55:22
someone that's worked in that environment and someone that
55:25
very much knows the intricacies of how these things work, maybe
55:28
I can offer a different perspective to those that you
55:32
may go and watch. Because, you know, I always
55:35
found it quite a funny contrast of watching Sonic Jeebus talk
55:41
about game, you know, leaks and all of that kind of thing.
55:46
And then when I started working there and then I started
55:49
listening to all these videos, I was there to be like, ha, OK,
55:57
OK, I see how this works now. You're either you're full of
56:02
shit, completely full of shit, or you think it works that way.
56:09
And I understand why these signs would tell you that things don't
56:14
work that way. OK.
56:16
So I speaking to that then I couldn't give you specifics.
56:19
But because I can't actually. Think of any but but was there
56:22
any creators either? Sonic tubers or just people
56:26
talking about Sega stuff that had either correctly predicted
56:29
things or just knew like a little too much and you were
56:34
like, you need to you must have some inside information.
56:36
How do you know that? Sonic Frontiers, OK.
56:40
That. All the early.
56:42
Leaks of what? Of what We got on Summit
56:45
Frontiers. And bear in mind, these leaks
56:46
came out before I worked at Sega, so someone who was working
56:50
there leaked some. Yes, someone who was working
56:53
there. Had leaked that and when I was
56:57
the third person in Europe to play that game I would still
57:01
fucking hold that as my third person in Europe to play that
57:05
game and I it was before it was even named some frontiers.
57:10
It was before it was even named that.
57:12
And I knew it was named that because of the e-mail I got that
57:15
was sent to my boss, asked him for IT assistance, help set up
57:19
the demo, set up the test environment for someone to play
57:23
it. And I said, would you mind if I
57:25
played it after I've set it up? And they were like, no, that's
57:28
very cool. That's.
57:30
Pretty so it's mental, but then when I played that.
57:33
Game I was like what the? And when as we've.
57:37
Heard more since leaving about the development story of Sonic
57:42
Frontiers and how it took five years, how the game was kind of
57:45
like changed multiple times. I absolutely.
57:49
Believe those first. Leaks were the early build of
57:52
it. I don't know that definitively.
57:55
I can't say that as an absolute matter of fact.
57:58
But when I look at them now, I'm like, yeah.
58:02
But there was a leak that said you'll you will get the chaos.
58:04
Emeralds at the end of every island you will collect the
58:07
Chaos Emeralds over the course of the island.
58:09
You'll fight the boss the end of the island, and then you'll lead
58:12
the Chaos Emeralds. It's exactly what happens in the
58:14
game you do every time. That there are things that.
58:18
Were just like, OK, yeah, there was an early.
58:21
Build of this game out there that.
58:24
Someone had put notes on and also I don't want to just
58:26
quickly say to the point of like when we're saying that the
58:29
creators, I'm going to say this like.
58:33
Doing my bit as as. The Sonic YouTube is when I have
58:37
covered leaks and I haven't covered leaks and I've been
58:40
donkeys years now. I don't really cover them
58:42
anymore because she used to get so much shit flooding me for it.
58:48
While you're a Sega. No, no, no, no, no.
58:52
No, no, no. Before that, my leaks videos
58:55
were getting me probably more numbers than anything else
59:00
because we don't have the leaks. People have their blogs and
59:06
their and their Reddit subreddits and things like that
59:09
and that's where these leaks would come from that then the
59:12
Sonic tubers see and they bring to you in a video.
59:16
Don't give the Sonic tubers all the shit because they're
59:20
reporting on what someone else has written.
59:23
They're allowed to have an opinion of whether they think it
59:27
could be true or not. Like sure, if someone's like,
59:30
I've seen this leak and I know 100% it's got to be real.
59:34
Oh my God, yes. And and it's not, then they have
59:37
a bit of an egg on their face, granted, but like, stop shooting
59:40
hater. Then they don't come up with
59:42
this shit out of nowhere. Right?
59:44
Let's let's talk. About you leaving the company.
59:47
So you know, we we mentioned that you were made redundant and
59:51
there was always that kind of feeling that you wanted to go
59:56
back if there. Was an opportunity to go.
59:58
Back, I'll say now, do you do? You still want to go back if
1:00:01
there? Was an offer made now?
1:00:02
Would you go back? I don't think back doing what I
1:00:05
did. Now, so you'd want to do
1:00:07
something else, yes. I think at.
1:00:10
This point, they've burnt their bridges with me.
1:00:15
What makes you say that? Obviously I don't really want to
1:00:19
go. Into it in loads of detail.
1:00:21
Do you want to tell say what you said to me?
1:00:23
Off camera or not going to say all of it.
1:00:25
I'm going to say parts of it. So I, I basically I, I'm going
1:00:30
to, I'm going to generalize. So I have been made to feel
1:00:38
since leaving that and this is my opinion.
1:00:43
That my. Talents there are not worthwhile
1:00:47
bringing back. OK.
1:00:50
And it's it's a very difficult one because like everyone.
1:00:56
Thinks they work hard, right? Everyone thinks they do well
1:01:00
like I. I know I woke.
1:01:03
Up every. Morning doing what I did because
1:01:07
if I fix something for someone that could have an impact on the
1:01:12
Sonic series in whatever small little.
1:01:16
Way that had it. And that was my driving
1:01:18
motivation for getting out of bed in the morning.
1:01:20
And other people have seen me work at like, you know, people
1:01:25
that worked this acre in the office that saw me running
1:01:27
between two floors all day fixing IT problems.
1:01:30
Or people saw me working at game shows.
1:01:32
You know, people in my personal life would see me at game shows.
1:01:37
I worked my fucking. Arse off.
1:01:41
I worked my. Absolute arse off with that.
1:01:43
Job I gave everything I had I kept going till I bled in a lot
1:01:47
of instances like it was just insane the levels I I went to to
1:01:54
get things done. You know whether it be pulling
1:01:57
an all nighter in Amsterdam, not for the fun reason guys, but
1:02:00
because you haven't got the game code because the SSDs were lost
1:02:04
on the flight and you're downloading it over a fucking 10
1:02:08
megabyte Internet connection, whatever it may be.
1:02:11
I put everything into that and I just, I feel like, and I don't
1:02:17
know if it's just a meeting, although I, I have no reasons to
1:02:21
believe it's not just a meeting. I I don't feel like Sega won't
1:02:26
want anyone back that they got rid of.
1:02:31
I feel in my honest opinion that it was a case of they're gone.
1:02:37
You know, we got rid of 30% of our staff and we move forward.
1:02:44
But unfortunately I, and This is why I don't know this, but I
1:02:48
feel like this is their opinion. It's like, you know, we move
1:02:50
forward now. We don't look to the past, we
1:02:52
look to the future, which I can understand from a business
1:02:55
perspective, but you lost an awful lot of talent in doing
1:03:01
that. A lot of people that had been
1:03:03
there for a very long time that were very dedicated to the
1:03:06
company and I think that's definitely the case with me as
1:03:08
well. You know, I loved it and I loved
1:03:11
the company and now after. You know this whole.
1:03:17
Saga I don't have a very good view of the company.
1:03:24
I don't admire them. I viewed them as some maybe even
1:03:27
holier than now than now, you know, sorry, you know, it's not
1:03:31
something you should do for a company.
1:03:33
And a lot of people have always told me that.
1:03:35
And I think that's something that you kind of have to realize
1:03:37
later in life. And it it takes something like
1:03:40
this to make you realize it is that like stay the only person
1:03:46
you should be that committed to is yourself or your partner in
1:03:49
life. Putting your all.
1:03:52
Your faith in a. Company because you think it's
1:03:55
the greatest thing ever. It's just companies are
1:03:59
ruthless. The job market is.
1:04:02
Ruthless. You know, it's I'd never have
1:04:07
thought. Sailor would.
1:04:09
Do what they did to me and so many people that I worked with
1:04:17
whether and that's both people that also lost their jobs and
1:04:21
people that stayed because you know, you can imagine if you do
1:04:24
stay percent of your staff. Well, guess what?
1:04:28
The workload. 'S about to.
1:04:29
Increase for those that are still there, you know I.
1:04:38
I think they did a lot of damage.
1:04:40
I think they really. Did and I know that certainly on
1:04:44
my perspective and you know, I can't prove.
1:04:48
This as. An absolute matter of fact, but
1:04:52
I was told multiple times like, you know, you have to keep.
1:04:57
Your head down. We know you're upset about it,
1:04:59
but you have to keep your head down or they or you won't be
1:05:02
able to come back. And I almost feel.
1:05:05
Like it was a bit of a. A carrot.
1:05:09
On a stick. You know, like, but there was
1:05:12
never going to get to me. I think as.
1:05:17
Far as the upper management of Cigar are concerned, it's that
1:05:22
was dead weight. We move forward again, don't
1:05:25
know that, but that's kind of how the impression I'm getting.
1:05:30
Would you say then that? They don't necessarily.
1:05:32
Value people such as yourself who are fans, like fans first
1:05:40
and foremost and do put that kind of extra effort in because
1:05:43
they're invested. Because I imagine for a lot of
1:05:45
people that work for Sega, it's a job just like any other job,
1:05:48
you know, it just happens to be Sega.
1:05:50
But for you it was, it was like a dream job.
1:05:52
It was an investment. You know, you're still invested.
1:05:56
I mean, it, it seems strange to me that that wouldn't be valued.
1:06:02
I mean, there were, certainly. People that in my opinion.
1:06:06
Took advantage of. That with me to give him.
1:06:11
More yes. OK.
1:06:13
Knowing that like there was there was a particular instance
1:06:17
and this person was fired before.
1:06:23
I left the. Company.
1:06:25
So I'll I'll, I'll kind of talk about it.
1:06:27
I'm not about why he was fired, but I'll talk about the
1:06:29
scenario. Are you sure you can talk about
1:06:32
that? I I think to some degree.
1:06:35
So he was in charge of setting something up to do with an
1:06:42
online gaming platform. Sure doesn't take. 2 seconds to
1:06:48
figure. Out what that is, it's APC
1:06:50
platform to coincide a sale. It was always then run as a
1:06:59
stream by me and I would stream directly to that web pages
1:07:07
storefront about the sale with this thing that we had put up.
1:07:13
The guy didn't give me the. Correct stuff this.
1:07:15
Guy was someone I, I'd always had a problem with this guy
1:07:18
because he was just useless. He was useless.
1:07:22
Made a lot of money again. He he he's long gone.
1:07:24
He got he got fired for some not very nice stuff I think in the
1:07:28
end. So wasn't part of the layoffs.
1:07:31
It was before all that went down.
1:07:34
Yeah, yes. Not.
1:07:36
Professional at all? And he left me with it, not
1:07:40
giving me the correct information.
1:07:42
Friday comes around, I go to set it up.
1:07:44
Friday is a working day. He's not responding or barely
1:07:48
responding on Teams when he's supposed to be working.
1:07:51
I'm like, you haven't give me the correct stuff.
1:07:52
I need this, I need this. I worked through the night.
1:07:55
I basically pulled an all nighter and I had the Sonic
1:07:58
Symphony the next day, which was the Sonic Live concert in
1:08:04
London, which I go to every time it comes to London.
1:08:06
I absolutely love it. And, and you know, he knew that
1:08:09
I would just keep trying with it.
1:08:13
Oh yeah. Well, he should be able to
1:08:14
figure it out because it's him. But then he got a lovely message
1:08:18
in a group chat that I'd created with all the managers that
1:08:22
received. Well, no, I hadn't created it.
1:08:24
I was put into this group chat, I think, but it was everyone on
1:08:26
this project and was just like, I suggest you get your ass to
1:08:29
the office, plug in APC and get it done yourself because I'm
1:08:32
going to the Sonic Symphony. I've had enough of picking up
1:08:35
your dead weight. I've spent all night trying to
1:08:37
fix it, and you can't give me the correct information.
1:08:39
You have one job. Yeah.
1:08:41
How did he react to that Silence?
1:08:44
Really didn't do anything. Like.
1:08:46
Oh, he was, I'll tell you. Now this guy, this guy thought
1:08:52
he was tough or like dressed like he was a tough man, but
1:08:57
more looks like he's just come out of a Limp Bizkit video.
1:09:00
OK, do you know what I mean? That's.
1:09:02
A very specific image. Yes, yeah.
1:09:05
I was like this. I'm not a particularly built
1:09:08
guy. I'm quite skinny, but he he made
1:09:11
me look I was Ian and I'm just like, maybe see you like wow.
1:09:17
OK, that's a. Knob.
1:09:18
So yeah, I. Think there were.
1:09:19
There were definitely. People that were taking
1:09:21
advantage of that, I mean, and I would definitely say throughout
1:09:25
all this, in my opinion, if you are a Sonic Die hard and I have
1:09:29
said multiple times, it's like a dream come true.
1:09:34
I would say don't do it because. Eventually it's likely to end in
1:09:39
heartbreak unless we see substantial changes come from
1:09:44
this highly volatile, unstable industry everyday people's jobs.
1:09:50
Are at risk. And it makes it so difficult
1:09:56
when it's your turn. It made it that much harder
1:09:59
because I am the Sonic Mega fan. I've always been.
1:10:02
So am I saying don't go out there and apply for Sega?
1:10:05
Absolutely not. That's not what I'm saying.
1:10:09
But I'm saying it's something you need to think about because
1:10:14
if your. Time comes and you'll.
1:10:17
Always think, oh, it's not going to be me.
1:10:19
Even when I knew it, even when I was convinced it was going to be
1:10:22
me, there's still a part of you in your head that's like, it
1:10:26
might not be me, you know? And it's like when it's your
1:10:30
time, it's going to destroy. You so all.
1:10:35
Right. More than that, it's difficult.
1:10:38
Let's move on. I want to talk about something.
1:10:44
It's not a heavy topic unfortunately, but it's, I said
1:10:46
at the at the beginning that we would, we would cover it and
1:10:49
we'd circle back to it. So here we are circling back is
1:10:53
your experience with blindness. So I understood that you got
1:10:58
some laser eye surgery in the last year, more than that two
1:11:04
years ago, no. No, it was more than laser.
1:11:07
Oh, far more than laser. Just eye.
1:11:10
Correction in. General.
1:11:12
What so? So I have one.
1:11:14
In March, which was the same surgery I then got two weeks ago
1:11:20
again, which is called a vitroretinal surgery.
1:11:27
Sounds delightful. Are you squeamish?
1:11:30
I can be. But I warn, warn the listeners,
1:11:33
Yeah, viewers of the Christian Ree podcast, please.
1:11:36
A virtual ears as we talk about this.
1:11:40
I mean, you're not going to see it, are you?
1:11:41
Unless you put some picture up from Google Images, but I don't
1:11:45
know if he does that, then also picture here.
1:11:49
So basically it's where the blood vessels behind the eyes
1:11:53
burst and the eyes filled with blood so you can't see out of
1:11:57
them. So the vitro.
1:12:00
Retinal surgery. Is where they cut the eye.
1:12:04
Put a needle into the eye and suck the blood out and then they
1:12:08
laser it after they've done that.
1:12:11
So I had that on. My right eye.
1:12:13
In March and. Things are going well.
1:12:18
And then about four or five months ago, both eyes went on
1:12:24
the same day. Just broke.
1:12:26
Oh. I'm fully blind.
1:12:29
And then it's. It's because.
1:12:33
This eye. Has had surgery on it
1:12:35
previously. It heals rather quickly, so
1:12:39
that's been. Healing fully.
1:12:41
And having little bleeds and then healing fully again.
1:12:43
At the moment I can't see a lot of detail out of it, but like
1:12:47
I'm not really walking into walls looking at that eye.
1:12:50
It's not great. I can't no chance of seeing the
1:12:52
screen right now, but I can see. Well, no, I can't see, but I can
1:12:57
kind of see this one, the one that I've just had surgery and
1:13:01
is basically like nearly perfect vision.
1:13:04
So you can see how that's normal.
1:13:06
But yeah, if you've got diabetes, look after yourselves
1:13:09
people, because it's not fun challenge for sure it is.
1:13:15
Right. So on that I can see my Murdoch.
1:13:21
Dare level. Period is over.
1:13:23
You can see, you can see it, Liz, it's we're.
1:13:25
Headed in a positive direction. Oh God.
1:13:29
Yeah, no, Are we? Yeah, let's go, let's go.
1:13:32
I mean, yeah. Oh, I thought you meant the next
1:13:35
topic. Yeah, I I feel like we are yeah,
1:13:37
we're definitely on the mend and going back to work next week,
1:13:42
which I'm really looking forward to.
1:13:43
It's good. Yeah.
1:13:45
So definitely, definitely on the.
1:13:47
Well, it's been great catching up with you Jack, as we.
1:13:51
Round things off today. Is there anything you want to
1:13:54
leave us with? What do I want to leave you
1:13:57
with? I feel like this is where I
1:14:00
should. Impart some words of.
1:14:01
Wisdom can do if you like. Let it be.
1:14:05
Let it be. No, do you know what?
1:14:07
Do you know what actually right? I'm going to take this moment to
1:14:10
to so here we go right. This won't be out in type of
1:14:16
Sonic con. I'm at Sonic Con this Saturday.
1:14:18
If you manage to figure out time travel, you want to see me at
1:14:20
Sonic Con at Sonic Con on Saturday, right?
1:14:24
So this man, right? I call him the Blight.
1:14:29
Of my shorts. Feed at the moment because I'll
1:14:32
be there. Listening to.
1:14:34
Stand up comedians and then I know the songs.
1:14:39
I know the songs. The second I hear that chord
1:14:41
about, oh, it's Christian that put a like on that one.
1:14:45
Give it a scope. This man is trying to get you to
1:14:47
listen to his damn music. We're on day 300 something.
1:14:52
Just listen to the fucking music.
1:14:54
It's on Spotify, it's on Apple Music, It's on YouTube.
1:14:59
It's on YouTube. Yeah, it's on fucking YouTube.
1:15:03
You're already. On the platform, just go and
1:15:05
give it a click. For the love of gods.
1:15:09
It feels like it's just. Existing out here.
1:15:11
That was the plug. I like that song.
1:15:13
That's my favorite one of the lot.
1:15:14
Go and listen to fucking music. Gods.
1:15:18
I should I should add Actually I don't.
1:15:20
Know if I've spoken about it on the podcast, but I set myself a
1:15:24
goal of because I'd never done the whole TikTok promotion
1:15:29
thing, but like also on the other social media like YouTube
1:15:32
shorts and everywhere right and I went all out with this album
1:15:36
and I'll talk about this in a future show so I won't go on
1:15:38
about it too much. But what I will say is I set
1:15:41
myself a goal of promoting my music every day for a year.
1:15:46
So next month will on November 10th will mark I believe it's
1:15:52
yeah will mark 365 days of me promoting my music since the
1:15:59
release of my first single bad times.
1:16:02
And I don't know I talked about it in a stream the other day.
1:16:06
I've gotten people around the world to listen to the music.
1:16:09
That's cool. I I don't have like loads of
1:16:13
monthly listeners. I don't have thousands of
1:16:15
streams or anything. I have thousands in the sense
1:16:18
that collectively across all platforms, but not like I'm not
1:16:23
like an artist popping off I'm you're not going to see me like
1:16:26
suddenly like blow up. You never know.
1:16:28
But but I've tried and I tried to do like different types of
1:16:34
things with it. Like I tried to just do silly
1:16:38
stuff. I tried to do like use my voices
1:16:40
and and play with it that way. I also just had clips, you know,
1:16:45
I did like play alongs. I've literally tried everything.
1:16:50
Now go on. Yeah, right, guys, let's do
1:16:54
this. 3 billion likes on this video, and we'll get Ariana
1:16:59
Grande to do a feature. 3 billion Like is it even possible
1:17:03
to get 3? Billion if you get 3 billion,
1:17:05
like surely Ariana Grande. Might be like, OK, maybe we
1:17:07
actually we will do a feature. Sure.
1:17:09
OK. Yeah, 3 billion. 3 billion likes
1:17:13
Gangnam Style have like 2 billion views.
1:17:15
So to get that in likes you know you're making, make sure you
1:17:21
like you smash that like button. Guys smash that like button.
1:17:25
Logan Paul's going. To come in and get make a prime
1:17:28
bottle for it. Crazy.
1:17:31
Well, God bless you man. Thank you, but more importantly,
1:17:36
thank you so much for appearing on the show.
1:17:37
It's always a pleasure having you on the 10th time, no less.
1:17:41
And it's a magic number. 10's the magic number.
1:17:44
Thank you so much, Jack Be. Safe.
1:17:45
Be well, I'll see you very soon, buddy.
1:17:48
And to all the listeners of the Christian Reed podcast, I hope
1:17:50
you enjoyed this show as much as I did.
1:17:53
Be safe, be well, and I'll see you and project to you in in the
1:17:59
listener sphere. I'll see you in the next one.
1:18:02
I'll see you in the next one.