To celebrate the fifth anniversary of our Patreon, we announced some big changes originally planned to roll out on January 1, 2020. Since revamping a whole Patreon campaign takes quite a bit of work, we're going to del...
2019-12-31 20:01:00 +0000 UTC View Post
Since the dawn of the medium, humans across the globe dreamed of wearing video game representation on their bodies—a practice that's only become commonplace in recent years. We've come a long way since the days of too-large or too-small pre-order t-shirts as the rare video game wearable, to the...
2019-12-30 08:01:00 +0000 UTC View Post
Prepare yourself for a bit of mental whiplash with this episode. The bulk of the show consists of an interesting interview with Lewis Castle, one of the cofounders of Westwood Studios and a driving force behind the Command & Conquer series. The intro, on the other hand, is rather...
2019-12-23 15:00:03 +0000 UTC View Post
It's time once again to head to the Retronauts cabin in Parts Unknown for yet another look at a video-game-adjacent Christmas thing! We've worked our way through quite a few video game cartoon Christmas specials over the past few years, so this time around we're going to switch gears and explore ...
2019-12-20 16:02:02 +0000 UTC View Post
This week, we called in some experts! But then, we usually try to do that, so this episode is really just business as usual. Handily, several experts on this particular topic—the holy grails of video game collecting—happen to be friends of the show. So it really is business as usual....
2019-12-16 15:00:03 +0000 UTC View Post
Don't worry—we're not going to put together full episodes on every single Star Wars movie ever (and related games). But, with The Rise of Skywalker arriving next week, we did want to take a look back at the (1) best and (2) second most-influential Star War of...
2019-12-09 15:00:00 +0000 UTC View Post
You may notice that this is one of those episodes that includes a few hints of having been recorded quite a while ago, given that the conversation references "upcoming" DLC that, in fact, shipped in late spring. Alas, even with Retronauts amounting to six or seven episodes each month, I ...
2019-12-06 14:46:56 +0000 UTC View Post
Two decades ago, Sega summoned into the world the mightiest of its consoles: The Dreamcast. And then, almost as quickly, it took the poor thing into the woods out back and ran it through proverbial the wood chipper. Dreamcast died too young, but its sudden demise wasn’t the end. We pick up the ...
2019-12-02 08:00:02 +0000 UTC View Post
Five years ago, we made our very first post on Patreon. A lot has happened since then—mostly, hundreds of e...
2019-11-27 18:18:37 +0000 UTC View Post
I've been going pretty deep and obscure with my episodes recently, so this week we're getting back to the basics with a detailed look at one of gaming's fundamental classics: Donkey Kong. And its sequels, I guess. (They're not as interesting.)
Given the classic appeal of this...
2019-11-25 13:00:00 +0000 UTC View Post
It’s the ultimate metroidvania showdown as we settle once and for all which was truly the greatest, the most ambitious, the most influential work of the genre: Nintendo’s Super Metroid or Konami’s Castlevania: Symphony of the Night? Strong opinions will be expressed! Harsh words may be exch...
2019-11-22 08:00:59 +0000 UTC View Post
This week's episode is a little bit of an interview segment, a little bit of a public service announcement, and a whole lot technical—but that's the nature of this particular topic, and these particular interview subjects. I recently had the honor of attending a small gathering of active tech a...
2019-11-18 13:41:45 +0000 UTC View Post
Our informal LucasArts miniseries rolls on with another episode exploring the developer's adventure game output! This time, we focus on 1991's Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge, the second entry in the Monkey Island series, and one that marked the departure of creator Ron Gilbert from LucasArts....
2019-11-11 23:19:58 +0000 UTC View Post
I stopped by the offices of Limited Run Games a couple of years ago to discuss the art of keeping physical media (that most retro of games distribution formats) alive. For my return trip, we had something even more germane to the Retronauts mission to discuss: The reissue of old games, including ...
2019-11-08 15:00:00 +0000 UTC View Post
Right, so, here we go. 2009. Under the lens of retrospection. Alarming.
This episode obviously follows on from the Years in Review Revue(s) from earlier this year, in which we chronicled years in gaming by the decade, beginning with 1969. We ended up devoting two full episodes to the topic ...
2019-11-04 13:30:52 +0000 UTC View Post
Here's another one that's been in the can a very, very long time—I edited this episode for publication back in March! But this one has been on hold for a good reason: I wanted to hang onto it until Death Stranding arrived, to make it all timely and stuff. I have no idea what to expect ...
2019-10-28 14:00:44 +0000 UTC View Post
Over two years ago, we sat down to gush about The Legend of Zelda's underappreciated Game Boy installment, Link's Awakening. And once again, time has made fools of us all, as the Switch remake of this classic game stands as one of Nintendo's biggest fall titles—so it's safe to say Link's Awaken...
2019-10-25 18:11:19 +0000 UTC View Post
I, uh, just realized that this Castlevania-themed episode will go out on the public feed a few days before Halloween. That's so perfect I wish I could say I planned it, but once again, the guiding hand of Retro Fate has led our spirits to a place better than we could have imagined for ourselves. ...
2019-10-21 14:22:21 +0000 UTC View Post
I realize posting this now that we basically have two Monday episodes in a row doing the "talk about a modern successor to a legacy franchise" thing when we try to space topics like this further apart. Whoops! But this one is long overdue and keeps getting pushed back in favor of other topics. An...
2019-10-14 13:53:27 +0000 UTC View Post
This week's bonus episode is... very lengthy. Honestly, I probably could have posted this as two separate episodes, but the thing is that we have so many podcasts in the can that we need to make room for more material to go up. So double-length it is!
These two segments were recorded live i...
2019-10-11 13:40:33 +0000 UTC View Post
We're coming back to the Portland Retro Gaming Expo this year for another live appearance!
When: Saturday, October 19 at 9:00pm
Where: Auditorium A at the Portland Retro Gaming Expo
What: Our latest live panel, "When Celebrities...
2019-10-08 23:30:01 +0000 UTC View Post
For a little over a decade, Castlevania keeper Koji Igarashi cut his own path with the famous side-scrolling series by backing away from its traditional hardcore action and platforming, and leaning more towards RPG elements and exploration. The result was what we now know as the "Metroidvania," a...
2019-10-08 20:56:28 +0000 UTC View PostHey all,
Just a quick note/apology that today's episode about Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night will be hitting the Patreon tomorrow in the early afternoon (PT). It's a good one, and it'll also include a special announcement you'll all be excited to hear! Thanks once again for your patience...
2019-10-07 16:40:37 +0000 UTC View Post
Ah yes, it's another one of those "not actually about video games, except actually kind of" episodes in which we critically dissect a piece of non-games media, then touch on its related games and game influences. In this case, the movie itself is kind of a wreck that holds up pretty poorly in the...
2019-09-30 14:00:00 +0000 UTC View Post
As Lucasfilm Games began to refine their philosophy of fairness, designer Brian Moriarty doubled down on this concept with his idea of a video game expressly designed to be completed. This would eventually take the form of Loom, an adventure game far different than anything that would come before...
2019-09-27 15:01:00 +0000 UTC View Post
Finally! We bring our multi-part patron-requested roguelikes series to a conclusion. Including, yes, a segment on Konami's Azure Dreams. This episode covers latter-day console roguelike games, which eventually mutated into roguelites, as epitomized by Spelunky.
2019-09-23 13:31:00 +0000 UTC View Post
I had the occasion to meet and interview Contra overlord Nobuya Nakazato at Tokyo Game Show a few days ago, which was a treat. Sadly, though, it came a little too late for him to provide any useful insights for this particular episode, which was recorded a couple of months ago. Oh well! ...
2019-09-16 21:56:02 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey all, I apologize for the late post. I'm currently overseas for Tokyo Game Show and had intended to upload the podcast this morning (my time, which would have been late Friday U.S. time)... but I stupidly left my computer's AC adapter at the hotel I checked out of yesterday and ran out of batt...
2019-09-14 13:37:20 +0000 UTC View Post
In the past decade, developer From Software went from making poorly reviewed oddities to being one of the most important developers in our modern era. And it all started with Demon's Souls, a humble, slightly janky game that challenged the new standard of frictionless gameplay in the HD era, and ...
2019-09-09 23:32:23 +0000 UTC View Post
This week's episode may be shorter than most, but it's packed with life-giving nutrients. It was a real pleasure for me to create this one—I have a lot of fond memories of Lemmings, so having the opportunity to chat with one of its designers was a rare treat. This is another Game Developers Con...
2019-09-02 14:00:03 +0000 UTC View Post