In a sadly rather downbeat episode Jordan and Tom are joined by prolific freelancer Chris Schilling. Chris has been playing The Flame and the Flood and Far Cry Primal and goes back and forth on the pluses and minuses of both. Meanwhile Tom explain’s why Superhot’s shooting is Super Good and it’s story is Super Not Very Good At All. Thankfully Jordan’s enjoyment of Stardew Valley comes without caveats.

• Conker Hololens
• Holly Nielson on pastoral games
• The Boston molasses flood is a real, weird thing that happened
• Tom has finished Superhot now and it turns out there is a level select unlocked when you finish it.
• You can play the original Superhot prototype here
• Emily is Away

This week we’re joined by the bouffant Alice Bell of VideoGamer to tell us all about the beautiful grit of The Division, while Jordan is torn between farm life and industrialisation in Stardew Valley. Meanwhile we take a non-video game break to discuss the allure of plastic spaceships in the X-Wing Miniatures Game and Jordan’s attempt to escape the Oubliette on a first date.

• Alice’s Flame and the Flood review
• The Dark Souls Chain of Pain
• Chris Thursten explains X-Wing for Shut Up & Sit Down
• Holly Nielson on pastoral games
• Jordan’s Room Escape article, and The Oubliette Room Escape
• Tom will be at the PC Gamer Weekender, but only on the Sunday

This week we’re joined by PC Gamer’s Andy Kelly, who tries his level best to persuade us of the joys of driving through rainy motorway stations in American Truck Simulator. Also he talks a lot about Virtual Reality which is obviously far less cool and interesting than trucks. We know our listeners love trucks. Meanwhile Tom has been smashing up houses in Rainbow 6: Siege and Jordan has been dying a lot, but slightly less than Tom in Nuclear Throne.

• Convoy – The roguelike Tom mentioned
• Rami’s Nuclear Throne talk
• Other Places
• Jordan’s Jonathan Blowterview

This week we’re joined by our old friend Josh Matthews, who managed to get his hands on an early demo of Firewatch and tells us what he thinks. Meanwhile Tom is finally playing XCOM 2, and regales us with the comedy of errors that ensued on his first VIP extraction mission. Finally Jordan explains the charms of Unravel and it’s not at all demonic looking star: Yarney.

• Jordan’s Guardian games night has now sold out! Sorry!
• Jordan’s Unravel review
• The Adventure Time Game Jam
• How indie developers would make Duke Nukem
• Double Fine’s video with the makers of the Aladdin and The Lion King megadrive games. Which were made by Westwood (!?!)

With last week’s Season Two pilot out of the way we get back to your regularly scheduled programming. This week we’re joined by Maki Yamazaki, fresh from Global Game Jam to tell us about all about the jam experience. Plus more talk of the Witness, Oxenfree, Undertale and Rebel Galaxy. We also pine for XCOM 2, which wasn’t out when we recorded this. Enjoy!

• Learn more about Global Game Jam here
• Here’s the article Jake wrote about the Bristol meetup
• Here’s Jordan’s interview with Jonathan Blow
• TIS100 can be found here

Hi! We’re back! After a long hiatus, Jordan and Tom are recording again, and take the opportunity to recap their favourite games of 2015, along with a few they’re looking forward to in 2016. Plus Jordan gives us the scoop on The Witness, which was only released today! We’re so current!

• Jordan recaps her year here
• That Guardian event we talked about
• Jordan’s appearance on BBC radio
• Jordan’s Videobrains talk on Kitty Powers
• Jordan on My Favourite Game
• Jordan’s article on her Dreamcast collecting friend
• Boy Jordan was busy last year huh?
• Rami’s Videobrains talk on Nuclear Throne

This week we’re joined by freelance journalist Holly Nielson and Xbox On (Xbon) presenter Kate Gray of the Toku podcast. We chat about The Sims, Monster Hunter, I am Bread and Pillars of Eternity before seguing into a game related round of “Would you rather”. Also discussed: fashion in Deus Ex, what Captain America is like in bed and romance fiction about nuclear bombs.

• Jordan’s I am Bread and Sims 4: Get to Work reviews
• The achingly cool tumblr of Deus Ex’s art director
• Sims 4 babies are creepy
• Tusks, the Orc dating sim
• Harmonix’s April Fools joke

Step right up for the debate of the century! Jordan attempts to start a fight moderates as Tom and guest Ed Smith debate the term ‘cinematic’ and whether games can or should emulate film and television. But first off, Ed lets us know what he thinks of Battlefield: Hardline (not much), Tom explains why Homeworld has the world’s saddest space spaceships and Jordan tells that Ori and the Blind Forest is just a very good platformer and there’s nothing wrong with that.

Then we start coming up with gaming porn parody names. Sorry.

Not sorry.

• Five out of Ten issue 12, which both Tom and Ed wrote for, contains Tom’s thoughts on cinema and games.
• Ed’s alternate take is on Vice.
• Save the Date can be found here. We talked about it in Episodes 58 and 59.
• A more thorough explanation of Dogme 95. It would make for crap games.
• Jordan reviewed Ori and the Blind Forest for the Guardian.
• In case you don’t know what theatre in the round is, here’s an explanation.
• Paul Dean writing about Virginia for Eurogamer.
• Richard Cobbett writes about Womb Raider. This is not a typo.
• The World the Children Made.
• Chris Dahlen’s GDC talk.

Additional porn parody names thought up after we stopped recording:

• Quim Fandango
• Cockline Miami
• Milfenstein 3D
• Red Fucktion
• Spunky Island
• Kenfucky Route Zero

Tom and Jordan were at Rezzed recently, so today they’re joined by Ed Fenning to run down the long list of their favourite games from the show. Tom is partial to Aviary Attorney and Her Story, Jordan likes Line Wobbler and Hue, Ed enjoys Screencheat and Cloudbuilt and everyone loves Salt. The game, not the condiment.

Jordan wrote about the show for The Guardian

Here’s all the games we mentioned.

Aviary Attorney
Salt
Her Story
Guild of Dungeoneering
Screencheat
Cave Cave Deus Videt
Noct
Line Wobbler
Aerobat
Taphobos
Cloudbuilt
Tri
Soul Axiom
Hue

This week Tom and Jordan are joined by Helen Gould, fresh from talking at Videobrains. Together we talk about The Order 1886, Republique, Dragon Age, Minecraft, Evolve, Darkest Dungeon and A Good Snowman is hard to build. Plus dogs, David Bowie and dongs.

• The medieval poc tumblr
• Austin Walker on Darkest Dungeon and mental health
• Tom is a genius siege engineer
• Jordan’s Republique review

This week we’re joined by Jack De Quidt for our most phallic episode yet! Jack has been playing Besiege, which is about constructing comedy siege engines that may or may not have gigantic robo-boners. Meanwhile Jordan has been growing huge shafts of… vegetation in Grow Home, and Tom has been chatting up pidgeons in Hatoful Boyfriend. Also discussed: Thirty Flights of Loving, Kitty Powers Matchmaker, Steam and Kerbal Space Program.

• Thirty Flights of Loving
• Longest Night can be found on the Night in the Woods site.
• Tom is writing for the next Five Out of Ten, but Jordan has written for them before!
• Ed Smith on cinematic games for Vice
• Lindsey Joyce on Kentucky Route Zero for Haywire magazine
• Besiege, Gif 1, Gif 2 and Video. Watch along with the podcast!
• Jordan’s Grow Home review for PC Gamer.
• The Kerbal Space Program Gif we laugh about at the end
• The Guardian Games Writers event