Tonight, the final episode of Season 6 delves into other creature character games like Pokemon, Tomogatchi, Spore and more; the black market economy of Neopets and more. We also delve a little more into Ambertail's upcoming life-sim Amber Isle - a lot of which has been covered already here, but there are a few other nuggets here too - and wholesome as a movement.

And that is Season 6 of My Favourite Game. As always, thank you so much for listening to this season and any other episode of My Favourite Game. You're all awesome.

Look after yourselves and take care. <3

Links: Play Diaries|Twitter|Facebook|Patreon
Twitter: @JohnnyCullen|@TalunsArt

As I said announcing the full guest lineup back in January, the initial inspiration about doing a season of the show based on the Irish games industry harkens back to Ambertail Games co-founder Jordan Bradley and an interview with her for a Press Play episode that year, recorded before the start of the pandemic at the pan-Irish games event Run for the Border.

“I know we have talks and networking, but what if we had mini game jams where North and South came together or workshops or even having this event more often?,” she said when I asked about potential collaborations between the games industries in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. “I know that’s a whole lot of work with organisation, but the reward is far greater, I find.

“There are many ways I can see it changing. Even just online – let’s make a Discord server where we all come together because there’s one for North, one for South. Why not have an [All-Ireland] one? That would be cool.”

Two years on from that interview in Co Dundalk that gave the idea of doing an All Ireland season of the show, Bradley wraps up Season 6 with an in-person episode in Belfast talking of Neopets as her favourite game.

In the first of a two-part finale, we talk of the duality of a person such as with Jordan and how Neopets shaped that for her, the community built up around it, how the end of service of Flash has cratered the game as it is and a lot, lot more.

Links: Play Diaries|Twitter|Facebook|Patreon
Twitter: @JohnnyCullen|@TalunsArt

This isn't My Favourite Game's first rodeo with a From Software game - you have to go back to 2016 and Season 4 with Bloodborne and ex-Naughty Dog artist and current freelance concept artist Alex Neonakis - but tonight marks the first time a Souls game has been talked of as someone's favourite game.

Tonight, in the penultimate game of Season 6, Sumo Digital associate art director Denman Rooke (note: Denman was art director at Romero Games on Empire of Sin when this was recorded) talks of the original Dark Souls as his favourite game.

Here, we talk of its art direction and influence, having to fight skeletons over several hours, its legacy in the ten years since its release, the somewhat toxic mentality of get gud the games throw up and a particular instance of his mother being aghast at seeing Goldeneye being played in a non-violent household.

Links: Play Diaries|Twitter|Facebook|Patreon
Twitter: @JohnnyCullen|@DenmanRooke

But tonight's My Favourite Game sees Whitepot Studios co-founder Vicky Potts talk of Petz as her favourite game. Among the key selling points: getting into games and finding a lot of time playing them on PC than PS2, the sense of community and being established by Petz, Maple Story (and playing it one time in a 24-hour stint) and more.

Links: Play Diaries|Twitter|Facebook|Patreon
Twitter: @JohnnyCullen|@NinjaPotts

Tonight, Shane McCafferty of Love: A Puzzle Shaped Box developer Rocketship Park talks of Burnout 2 as his favourite game. We talk of it, first getting to games as a youngin' in Waterford - he now resides in Toronto, Canada - a golden era of the arcade racing genre (especially between 2007 and 2011) and Criterion Games' output on both Burnout and Need for Speed.

We also talk of the religious experiences of Ico and Shadow of the Colossus (and they are religious experiences, frankly) and more.

Links: Play Diaries|Twitter|Facebook|Patreon
Twitter: @JohnnyCullen|@EGVroom

Tonight, in a special St Patrick’s Day episode drop to reflect the All-Ireland theme of the season, “jack of all trades” writer and designer Ellen Cunningham provides the fourth unique episode on the series – there would have been a fifth by now for what was the original Season 5 back in 2018/what became The Lost Tapes involving Ocarina of Time were it not for a hard drive failure – with 2006’s The Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess on Wii and GameCube.

We talk of the somewhat horror vibes within Ocarina that got them down the path of horror, the dark themes surrounding The Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess, ‘that Nintendo magic’ within it and other Zelda games and a lot more.

Links: Play Diaries|Twitter|Facebook|Patreon
Twitter: @JohnnyCullen|@ephemerellen

TechRadar’s Vic Hood talks of TimeSplitters Future Perfect as her favourite game and delves into the sort of humour it has, the different kinds of humour in games like it, Fable and others as well as a lot more.

We also delve into mental health depiction in games and why if you have to go to an Irish bar that isn’t in Ireland, your best bet is to go to one in Germany.

Links: Play Diaries|Twitter|Facebook|Patreon
Twitter: @JohnnyCullen|@hood_vic

Here, Colm Larkin of Cardpolcalypse and Guild of Dungeoneering developer Gambrinious talks of Baldur's Gate as his favourite game.

Here, we talk of his early days playing games on the ZX Spectrum, how he played RPGs like Baldur's Gate as a chaotic good and the characters he'd craft in them, Baldur's Gate 3 and how Larian is a perfect fit for it, why he feels the first few hours of an RPG are more meaningful to him and a lot more.

Links: Play Diaries|Twitter|Facebook|Patreon
Twitter: @JohnnyCullen|@gambrinous

Tonight, Bellular Studios (nee Coffeebox Games) art director Jess Campbell talks of Ratchet and Clank as her favourite game (if you even see her Twitter, this doesn’t come as the biggest shock in the world, but still!).

Here, we talk of the character building, writing across the series, the 2016 remake (based on the film coming out at the same time that is based on the original game), halcyon days of playing Resistance 2 co-op with her brother, Sunset Overdrive and provide a little context to the party that basically solidified what this season of My Favourite Game was going to be about plus more!

Links: Play Diaries|Twitter|Facebook|Patreon
Twitter: @JohnnyCullen|@jessanight

Tonight, we delve into The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt with Stephen Downey, founder of Outsider Games, who are putting the finishing touches to upcoming point-and-click adventure Jennifer Wilde: Unlikely Revolutionaries.

Seems like only yesterday it was the first game in the first annual Game of the Year special of My Favourite Game back in 2015.

Anyway, we talk of how Triss is a forbidden term in the Downey household, the fears of The Witcher 3 being an overwhelming game and a lot, lot more (including the Netflix TV show and, to a much less extent, Cyberpunk 2077).

Links: Play Diaries|Twitter|Facebook|Patreon
Twitter: @JohnnyCullen|@OutsiderGames

Ridge Racer Type-4 is for my money one of the best racing games ever, let alone the best game in the Ridge Racer series. So who better to talk of it as his favourite game than Michael O'Kane, game director at Level 91 Entertainment on 2020 racing game Inertial Drift.

Here, we talk of the sophistication and style of Ridge Racer Type-4 as a whole, racing in games as a whole and Ratchet and Clank (that is coming as an episode in a few weeks. And without naming names, you'll get a pretty big hint on who's fronting it in this episode too - spoilers!).

Also, yes, the mix is not a bit great, I know. I'm going to work on a better mix to upload within the next week or so (which is why no YT version for now), but I'm also in the middle of our Critical Analysis of Horizon Forbidden West and a few other trinkets so it's going to be a little hard to do that this week.

But the hope is it'll be out sometime before next week's episode on both YT, podcast platforms and Play Diaries.

Anyway, listen to O'Kane on Ridge Racer Type-4 below as well as on all good podcast services.

Links: Play Diaries|Twitter|Facebook|Patreon
Twitter: @JohnnyCullen|@FlaxenFlash

“Oh I don’t play these games to relax,” says Toadhouse Games CEO Alanna Linayre, as she talks of the 2013 Wii U game (re-released in 2020 for Nintendo Switch as Pikmin 3 Deluxe) as her favourite game.

Tonight, we delve into Pikmin 3, the series, why despite its cutesy and somewhat relaxing charm on paper is actually stressful and potentially equally as stressful as Dark Souls and a lot, lot more.

Oh, and if you’re wondering what the context is for the end bit with the ice in the tea, our fireside chat from last May will give you all the context for it.

You can find it below and on all good podcast services.

Links: Play Diaries|Twitter|Facebook|Patreon
Twitter: @JohnnyCullen|@Tybawai

Tonight, part two delves into the incredibly contentious ending of Mass Effect 3 as it approaches the tenth anniversary of the game's release and the original reaction to the ending as well as how making them is very hard plus reflecting on the brilliant Citadel - released after the ending brouhaha and the release of the Extended Cut.

Plus, we delve into last year's release of Mass Effect: Legendary Edition and what we hope to expect with the next game in the series.

And I somehow end up mixing up Hitman: Silent Assassin with Hitman: Blood Money.

And keep listening to the end to get a taste of what's to come this coming season!

Links: Play Diaries|Twitter|Facebook|Patreon
Twitter: @aoifeofriel | @JohnnyCullen

And for years, I'd been lamenting the fact the show never had this series even once as its own episode. And now, over the course of nearly a year, there's three of them.

Last May, we finally had an episode on Mass Effect 2 featuring Annapurna Interactive's Kelsey Hansen as part of Season 5. And now less than a year later, a two-parter on the finale of the Shepard trilogy.

Season 6 of My Favourite Game, the first themed season ever, kicks off with Mass Effect 3, celebrating its tenth anniversary in March. Which also means we're approaching the tenth anniversary of the brouhaha that kicked off in regards to the game's ending and how it was received. But that's for part two next week.

Until then, part one of the Season 6 premiere sees Aoife O'Friel, writer and narrative designer on Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora at Ubisoft Massive, talk of Mass Effect 3 as her favourite game as well as how the Tomb Raider series was her first love in games and more.

You can listen to it here. Part two drops next week.

Links: Play Diaries|Twitter|Facebook|Patreon
Twitter: @aoifeofriel | @JohnnyCullen

We'll see you for the two-part season premiere with Ubisoft Massive's Aofie O'Friel talking of the final chapter in The Shepard Trilogy, Mass Effect 3. Until then, here's a small slither of who to expect this season.

(In order of appearance):

- Jess Campbell (Art Director, Bellular Gaming - The Pale Beyond)
- Shane McCafferty (Co-Founder, Rocketship Park - Love)
- Jordan Bradley (Co-Founder, Ambertail Games - Amber Isle)
- Stephen Downey (Founder, Outsider Games - Jennifer Wilde)
- Alanna Linayre (Founder, Toadhouse Games - Call Me Cera)
- Michael O'Kane (Founder, Level 91 Entertainment - Intertial Drift)
- Aoife O'Friel (Narrative Designer/Writer, Ubisoft Massive - Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora)
- Ellen Cunningham (Writer, Gambrinious - Guild of Dungeoneering/Cardpocalypse)
- Colm Larkin (Founder, Gambrinious - Guild of Dungeoneering/Cardpocalypse)
- Vicky Potts (Co-Founder, Whitepot Studios - Ho-Ho-Home Invasion/Stargazing)
- Vic Hood (Gaming Editor, TechRadar)
- Denman Rooke (Art Director, Romero Games - Empire of Sin) 

And here we are with the first Game of the Year special episode of My Favourite Game in four years. We’ve not done one of these for four years! But doing these specials, personally speaking, was immensely fun back in the day. And with Season 5 of My Favourite Game finally released near the start of this year – and Season 6 on the horizon doot doot doot – doing a GOTY episode of My Favourite Game is pretty much a no-brainer.

So we’re back again doing one of these.

In case this is your first GOTY special of My Favourite Game and you’ve not heard one of these before – here’s 2015, 2016 and 2017, if you need a catchup – guests from Seasons 1, 2, 3 and 4 as well as now Season 5 and The Lost Tapes come to talk of their favourite game of the year – in this instance, 2021.

You can find a full list of participants and games they’ll talk of below, but with 15 guests across 17 games, you’re looking at quite a chunky episode of My Favourite Game.

We’ll see you very soon for Season 6 of My Favourite Game when it premieres in the New Year (there may be some news on that front in this episode 👀).

Until then, I hope you’ve had a fantastic Christmas and that you all have a brilliant 2022. Here’s to you, friend.
Find the full guestlist and games in this GOTY special of My Favourite Game below:

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Kid A Mnesia Exhibition
Johnny Cullen (Creative Producer/Host, My Favourite Game and Editor of Play Diaries – The Last of Us (Special))

Destiny 2
Tom Bramwell (Freelance games writer, consultant and former Editor in Chief of Eurogamer – Quake (Season 1, Episode 10))

Toem
Christian Donlan (Features Editor, Eurogamer – Robotron 2084 (Season 2, Episode 9))

Disco Elysium: The Final Cut
Nels Anderson (Founder and Creative Director, Sunderlust Games – Thief: The Dark Project (The Lost Tapes, Episode 4))

Last Stop
Kaitlin Tremblay (Lead Narrative Designer, Capy Games – Shining Force (Season 2, Episode 4))

Apex Legends
Kelsey Hansen (Producer, Annapurna Interactive – Mass Effect 2 (Season 5, Episode 6))

NEO: The World Ends with You
Dan Seto (International Social Media Communications Manager, Warner Bros Games – Final Fantasy 7 (Season 3, Episode 8))

It Takes Two
Hollie Emery (Co-Founder and Production Director, Bonsai Collective – Fable (Season 5, Episode 4))

[EDITOR’S NOTE: As part of their contribution, Hollie has asked me to ask you to please consider providing a donation to Mermaids. For those who don’t know or are outside of the UK, Mermaids is a gender identity charity in the UK that helps provide support for trans and non-binary queer folks in the UK. You can find their website and donate to Mermaids here, but a donation would be greatly appreciated at this time of year.]

Dungeon Encounters
Sam Barlow (CEO and Creative Director, Half Mermaid Productions – A Mind Forever Voyaging (Season 3, Episode 10))

Unpacking
Catherine Woolley (Senior Designer, Media Molecule – Shenmue (Season 4, Episode 10 and Episode 11))
Ed Stern (Senior Narrative Designer and Writer, Splash Damage – Half-Life (Season 2, Episode 7))
Kitty Crawford (Freelance Games Producer – Undertale (Season 5, Episode 9))

Psychonauts 2
Alex Kanaris-Sotiriou (Co-Founder and Art Director, Polygon Treehouse – The Secret of Monkey Island (Season 5, Episode 5)

Inscryption
Andrew Smith (Founder and CEO, Spilt Milk Studios – The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (Season 2, Episode 2))

Resident Evil Village
Dan Pearce (Co-Founder and Director, Four Circle Interactive – Klonoa 2: Lunatea’s Veil (Season 3, Episode 2))

Against the Storm
Fernando Rizo (CEO, Modern Wolf – X-COM: Enemy Unknown (Season 5, Episode 7))

Forza Horizon 5
Dan Teasdale (Co-Founder, No Goblin – World Games (Season 4, Episode 5))

|

Links: Play Diaries|Twitter|Facebook|Patreon

And we end with a humdinger. Persona 5 Royal, in terms of release to getting its own episode, is the most recent game to get an episode of the show, but when talking of Royal, you have to factor in Persona 5's original release in 2017. And well, as I have written about before, I have some serious issues with that game thanks to its endgame and the length it takes.

But Roll7 senior UI/UX designer Anisa Sanusi loves Persona 5 Royal to the point she'd call it her favourite game. So for the next two hours, we talk of the game's immense style in its art and user interface, that boppin' soundtrack, how someone (me) has become immensely jaded with the game as time has gone on and if you could convince someone (again, me) to play Royal as someone who lost a lot of the goodwill towards the original game.

We also mention how Kingdom Hearts 2 is basically a harbinger of all of Anisa's bad decisions in her life to date.

You can listen to the full two-hour+ episode below or on all good podcast services.

(PS: Reader/Listener, I bought Persona 5 Royal last night. God help me)

With that, all that is left to be said is, as always, thanks for listening to My Favourite Game. See you later in the year.

Wan Hazmer, lead game designer of Final Fantasy 15 and co-founder and game director of No Straight Roads developer Metronomik, talks of Day of the Tentacle as his favourite game and dives into one of the genres that got him on the road to developing games.

Amid discussions of Day of the Tentacle, we also discuss the difficulties in buying games Malaysia (both logistically and financially), a realisation from yours truly that honestly makes me more of an idiot than anything and one of Hazmer's other loves in games, rhythm games (particularly the likes of Harmonix, DDR and Tetsuya Mizuguchi).

Tonight, freelance games producer Kitty Crawford talks of why Toby Fox’s game is very much meta in that it tries to kill you with kindness and why it’s a mantra she has carried throughout her life.

She also delves into the nostalgia that Undertale invoked in her while growing up that she rediscovered while playing the game, its legacy and discuss Fox’s next game Deltarune.

Oh, and because we’re unashamed nerds about it, we go hard on Oxenfree because Oxenfree is the best game (note: this was recorded before Oxenfree 2’s recent announcement).

It was while making this jump over and after finishing university that she was first introduced to a game while watching a Twitch streamer play that would subsequently become her favourite game.

In the first of a two-part arc delving into it - the first time two different guests in the same season talk of the same game - Tran talks of Undertale as her favourite game, the subversion of Undertale within its story and gameplay, its music, bullet hell shooters, flash games and more.

It's reflected in the publisher he founded in 2019 and the games Modern Wolf have put out as well as his own favourite game, UFO Enemy Unknown. Or better known retroactively as X-COM Enemy Unknown, the 1994 version Mythos Games and Microprose.

Tonight, in the game's second appearance on the show following an episode in 2015 during Season 3, Rizo talks of his (albeit, by his own admission) rose-tinted nostalgia for the game, how Jake Solomon and the team at Firaxis carried lessons from that and the Sid Meier school of design into the newer XCOM games and how he got into strategy games through his father.

Also, if you notice a change in audio quality halfway through... no you didn't.

(We had a time recording it, put it like that. Also, quick note: contrary to a comment I make in the episode, X-COM 1994 is readily available on Steam and GoG)

That is, surprisingly, until now.

Tonight, part two of Season 5 of My Favourite Game kicks off with a game (another one!) that is in my own top ten games of all time, Mass Effect 2.

Annapurna Interactive producer Kelsey Hansen talks of what is arguably BioWare’s magnum opus as we delve into its story, characters, what’s next with the upcoming next game in the franchise and more as we hit a month out from Mass Effect: Legendary Edition’s release a month today.

Listen to us both gush about Mass Effect 2 for nearly two hours below as well as on all good podcast services.

Tonight, Alex Kanaris-Sotiriou of Roki developer Polygon Treehouse talks of The Secret of Monkey Island, the first time we've had a Monkey Island game since the very first episode in October 2014 and the first time we've had a Lucasarts game since Season 1 (teaser: it won't be the last Lucasarts game this season - stay tuned).

Here, we talk of the need at the time for The Secret of Monkey Island being an attempt to break away from what was the contemporary adventure games at the time - arguably code for games released at the time by Sierra - as well as the difficulty in telling comedy in games and how Secret holds it up.

We also talk about the importance of art direction, Team Ico and more.

You can find this week's episode below and on all good podcast services.

When the Guildford-based developer was announced to be closing that day, a massive part of the UK games industry felt like it died that day.

The studio's legacy dates back to when a core component of the studio including co-founder and creative director Peter Molyneux was part of Bullfrog and its lineup of games including Syndicate, Populous, Theme Hospital and more.

Meanwhile, Lionhead were more known for games like The Movies, Black and White and, the franchise we're talking of here in tonight's episode, Fable.

Here, Emery talks of the first Fable game as their favourite game, the whimsical nature of it, its British humour, Molyneux as a sales artist (for better or worse) and more. We also talk of Kinect, Milo & Kate and Halo too. Because there isn't enough Halo love on the show.

At the end of their episode to promote their wares as is traditional at the end of each episode, Hollie mentions UK-based trans charity Mermaids, who do a lot of good to help trans and non-binary children, young people and more. I encourage everyone to donate what they can to it (I will be making a donation on behalf of Play Diaries).

Els White of Retrace developer Spider Lilly Games talks of the first of the Zero Escape trilogy 999 - Nine Persons, Nine Hours, Nine Doors (you've no idea how hard it is to keep up with the order of that name) as his favourite game and how the genre in part, as well as Pokemon, influenced his start for making games and the decision to come to England from Sydney because of a lack of a games industry there at the time (save for LA Noire developer Team Bondi, which we'll get into slightly!).

We also discuss flash games, Winnie the Pooh games, our mutual love of Nier Automata, the rise of the visual novel and more.

Tonight, Xbox UK and Ireland social media and events manager as well as Xbox On and Forza Monthly host Charleyy Hodson talks of The Sims as her favourite game. Well, I say game... let's say Season 3 premiere guest Jordan Erica Webber has been redeemed.

Anyway, six years on from that episode, Charleyy talks of why The Sims has been there for her during pivotal moments in her life (and how she created stuff in the game surrounding them), the frankly crude and absurd names she and her Twitch community have come up with as part of her 100 Babies challenge, that time she sat beside a bin while Keanu Reeves was telling everyone they were breathtaking at E3 and more.

We also pick up on a topic that both me and Charleyy as well as four other panellists discussed at the end of 2019 at an EGX panel of being queer in the games industry - a panel that got its own episode of Press Play last year - and how The Sims became a massive place for queer people to find their sexuality and explore the facets around that.

Eleven guests from across many facets of the games industry. All of them around the world. And all of them talking of their favourite games ever, the stories tied to them and why games mean so much to them in various, unique and different ways.

And as returns go, what a way to do so.

Thatgamecompany’s Journey is in my own top three games of all time alongside The Last of Us and Metal Gear Solid 3. We’ve had two of the game’s main key development figures on the show before in the form of Robin Hunicke and Kellee Santiago. But a seperate, dedicated episode to Journey is what My Favourite Game is returning with in a massive way.

It’s also being discussed through a guest who I’ve wanted on the show since around Season 3 time too. Ragnar Tørnquist, former creative director on The Secret World at Funcom and now creative director at Red Thread Games on Dreamfall Chapters and the upcoming Dustborn talks of why Thatgamecompany’s 2012 opus is his favourite game ever.

In this episode, we delve into the spiritual and religious aspects of the game, narrative and stories in games and a deep dive into the TV-centered philosophy of dipping in and out of Dustborn. And for good measure too, Derry Girls.

You can listen to the premiere of Season 5 here.

We'll see you for episode one with Red Thread Games' creative director Ragnar Tørnquist talking of Thatgamecompany's Journey. Until then, here's a small slither of who to expect this season.

(In order of appearance):

- Kelsey Hansen (Producer, Annapurna Interactive)
- Ragnar Tørnquist (Creative Director, Red Thread Games)
- Hollie Emery (Co-Founder, Bonsai Games)
- Wan Hazmer (Director, Metronomik)
- Victoria Tran (Community Director, Innersloth)
- Alex Kanaris-Sotiriou (Game Director, Polygon Treehouse)
- Charleyy Hodson (Head of Social Media, Xbox UK/Ireland; Host, Xbox On)
- Els White (Director, Spider Lilly Games)
- Fernando Rizo (Co-Founder, Modern Wolf)
- Anisa Sanusi (Senior UI/UX Designer, Roll7)
- Kitty Crawford (Freelancer Producer)

And so here we are.

The final episode of The Lost Tapes mini-series of My Favourite Game is here and we end with a doozy as well as an episode that, personally speaking, was one of my favourite episodes to ever record for how fun it was.

Tonight, Edge Editor-in-Chief Jen Simpkins talks of lush first-person puzzler The Witness as her favourite game as she discusses how she will never be able to stop hearing In The Hall of the Mountain King as a result of the game’s more nefarious puzzles and more.

There’s also what feels like a half-hour long to a game that we both loved immensely at the time (and one that is also in my own top five games ever, to say the least of me talking of it in our yearly GOTY special in 2016), The Last Guardian.

With The Witness under our belts, this is the fifth and final episode of The Lost Tapes mini-series, so this is the last new My Favourite Game episode to appear until a proper Season 5 comes out. I’m looking to get our ducks in a row to start recording soon-ish, but for now, I’m aiming for a 2021 launch for the second attempt at Season 5.

Until then, we’ve got new Press Play coming and more instalments in Far Few Giants story of 2020 in In The Footsteps of Giants, so stay tuned for those. And for regular listeners who’ve listened to My Favourite Game since its inception in 2014, as always, thanks for listening.

The kicker, however, is that if it weren’t for the ilk of Looking Glass Studios working on Thief and Ion Storm working on Deus Ex, the likes of Ken Levine, Jordan Thomas and Harvey Smith arguably wouldn’t have made their stamp on the genre with the likes of BioShock or Dishonored.

Thief: The Dark Project released in 1998 amid one of the greatest years of gaming ever. And for the stealth genre it was part of, it was part of a golden trifecta alongside the original Metal Gear Solid and the original Tenchu that year.

Tonight, Sonderlust Games (nee Caledonia) founder as well as lead designer on Mark of the Ninja and game designer on Firewatch Nels Anderson talks of the original Thief as his favourite game ever and how it has gone on to define not only the stealth genre, but the immersive sim.

This is the second-to-last episode of The Lost Tapes, but you’ll see the last one drop in a few weeks time. See you then.

Alex Hutchinson, co-founder of Typhoon Studios and creative director on Journey to the Savage Planet as well as Far Cry 4 and Assassin's Creed 3 from his days at Ubisoft, talks of 1988 BBC Micro metroidvania sci-fi explorer Exile as his favourite game.

Here, he talks of the game in detail, importing games for the Amiga from the UK all the way to his homeland of Australia and that time he packed up to start a new life in the States for a new job at EA only to find that job was no longer happen (but to subsequently find his way onto the team at Maxis for the development of Spore).

It's a fun episode. And as you may have heard towards the end of the episode, we discussed our respective games of the year.

You can expect the last few episodes of this mini-season to drop over the course of the month ahead of a full-fledged Season 5 later in the year.

See you for the next one.

After two years away, My Favourite Game is back.

Speaking personally, once the first episode of what was then Season 5 was out, I was just burnt out of the whole podcasting thing. Truth be told, I thought I was ready to come back to it but I didn’t really have any purpose in doing so.

Now with Play Diaries now out in the open and its motif of telling interesting and compelling stories, I’m now more motivated to get back into My Favourite Game again as well as other bits such as Press Play.

And it starts tonight with the second of our Lost Tapes collection of episodes.

Tonight, Mediatonic’s Ed Fear, who was game director on the just-released Murder By Numbers, talks of SquareSoft’s Xenogears as his favourite game. In it, we discuss the way it depicts religion, how it helped him come to terms with his sexuality and how Nier made hard heave cry. Seriously.

You can listen to it below as well as on most of the good podcast providers (links below).

Because of how stretched I am a bit right now, The Lost Tapes won’t be a weekly endeavour like past My Favourite Game runs, but when Season 5 happens (it actually will happen, for real this time!), it will be weekly. Stay tuned. For now, the next episode will drop sometime in early April, so keep an eye out.

Hello. We’re officially back! Like actually back!

We’ve been gone for just under two years for reasons that’s already been outlined, but we’re coming back. No more delays, we’re finally here again.

We start off Season 5 with this, an episode I’ve been sitting on this for a while. This was first recorded in December of 2016, but considering what is discussed about is timeless – mostly – we can get away with keeping it as it is.

My Favourite Game’s return sees Tacoma’s director Steve Gaynor talk of Resident Evil 4 as his favourite game. We discuss how he first got into the series after renting out a PlayStation 1 from Blockbuster with Resident Evil 1, the numerous iterations of the game before it finally came out (including an originally planned version of the game to be directed by Hideki Kamiya which subsequently became the origin of Devil May Cry), the number of numerous versions of the game and more.

Yes, My Favourite Game is well and truly back after a year away. It’s one episode, but we can’t just let this year go without paying tribute to what has been an incredible year in gaming and easily one of the greatest years in gaming ever, if not the greatest (I reckon it is).

Season 5 will drop staring Early 2018 and we’re stoked for you to listen to it. But in the meantime, My Favourite Game (of 2017) will help announce some of its lineup. You’ll hear from four guests for the upcoming season alongside twelve previous guests across Seasons 1, 2, 3 and 4. And me natch (in fairness, you get me out of the way early on this year rather than waiting for the end of the show!).

As for the year in gaming overall, what a year its been. Never ever has there been a more appropriate time to celebrate gaming as a medium and form of entertainment (and fuck it, as an art form as well), especially in another shittastic year where the world has gone more to hell than it did at this time last year. In a year full of broad and diverse games from AAA, AA and indies alike, there is something for everyone to play.

In our annual special look back on the year, seventeen guests over five seasons worth of episodes talk of their favourite games of the year, some of which have managed to place within their GOAT lists, through eleven games.

With all that being said, here presents the game and guest lineup for this special – as well as part of the Season 5 lineup of My Favourite Game – in what is the longest episode of My Favourite Game ever. So sit back, relax and enjoy My Favourite Game (of 2017).

Nier Automata

Johnny Cullen (Host/Creative Producer, My Favourite Game and Editor, Play Diaries)
Dan Seto (Final Fantasy 7 – Episode Eight, Season 3)
Ed Fear (Xenogears– Episode 2, The Lost Tapes)

Assassin’s Creed: Origins

Mike Bithell (Metal Gear Solid – Episode Ten, Season 2)

What Remains of Edith Finch

Christian Donlan (Robotron 2084 – Episode Nine, Season 2)
Catherine Woolley (Shenmue – Episodes Ten and Eleven, Season 4)

Divinity: Original Sin 2

Jordan Thomas (Fantasy Grounds – Episode Nine, Season 4)
Alex Hutchinson (????? – Episode ?, The Lost Tapes)

Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus

Carli Velocci (Silent Hill 2 – Episode Six, Season 3)

Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice

Nels Anderson (????? – Episode ?, ???)

Sonic Mania

Alex Donaldson (Final Fantasy 9 – Episode Seven, Season 1)

Super Mario Odyssey

Dave Cook (Streets of Rage 2 – Episode Five, Season 1)

Packing Up

Steve Gaynor (Resident Evil 4 – Episode One, The Lost Tapes)

Butterfly Soup

Steve Gaynor (Resident Evil 4 – Episode One, The Lost Tapes)

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

Tom Bramwell (Quake – Episode Ten, Season 1)
Andrew Smith (The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past – Episode Two, Season 2)
Matthew Reynolds (Shenmue – Episode Five, Season 2)
Dan Teasdale (World Games – Episode Five, Season 4)

And word of warning: you’ll want to turn your audio down massively at around 2:52:10. Lest you go deaf at someone’s Zone of the Enders fanboying (sorrynotsorry).

The only thing 2016 has excelled at, however, is gaming and the varied output we’ve gotten this year as a result. Gaming can provide an amazing outlet of escapism, an outlet that is needed now more than ever.

For our second and final Christmas 2016 special, My Favourite Game takes a look back at some of the best games of the year through the eyes of guests across Seasons 1-4 of the show. And here’s a twist for you: we have a contribution from a guest who’s part of Season 5 as well.

And as well as all those, I had to make a epilogue on 2016 as a whole and how, tying back to what I said above, gaming as an escapism outlet is needed more than ever. 

With that, here’s your games and guest lineup for My Favourite Game (of 2016).

Titanfall 2

Andrew Smith (The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past – Episode Two, Season 2)
Dan Pearce (Klonoa 2: Lunatea’s Veil – Episode Two, Season 3)

Oxenfree

Kaitlin Tremblay (Shining Force – Episode Four, Season 2)

Dishonored 2

Tom Francis (Deus Ex – Episode Seven, Season 3)
Ed Stern (Half-Life – Episode Seven, Season 2)
Chris Avellone (Wasteland – Episode One, Season 4)

Budget Cuts

Christian Donlan (Robotron 2084 – Episode Nine, Season 2)

Inside

Catherine Woolley (Shenmue – Episodes Ten & Eleven, Season 4)
Matthew Reynolds (Shenmue – Episode Five, Season 2)

Dark Souls 3

Tom Bramwell (Quake – Episode Ten, Season 1)

Hitman

Dan Teasdale (World Games – Episode Five, Season 4)
Alex Donaldson (Final Fantasy 9 – Episode Seven, Season 1)

Darkest Dungeon

Jordan Thomas (Fantasy Grounds – Episode Nine, Season 4)

The Last Guardian

Johnny Cullen (Host/Creative Producer, My Favourite Game and Editor-in-Chief, Play Diaries)
Steve Gaynor (Resident Evil 4– Episode 1, The Lost Tapes)

It’s been a bit too long since we put together an episode of My Favourite Game. Right now, plans are currently in motion for Season 5 – we already have one episode down – but considering when Season 5 is currently planned to launch (sorry, you’re not finding that out today besides ‘early 2017’), I wanted to give you one or two episodes for the end of the year to help tide you over considering the long gap of silence between the end of Season 4 and when Season 5 will start.

Next week, we’re bringing back what was meant to be a one-off special last year. But considering the amount of fun had in putting that together, we’re now going to make it a regular thing. So next week, My Favourite Game (of 2016) will be a thing. You can listen to that all over the shop next coming Wednesday, December 28 from 9pm GMT/4pm US EST/1pm US PST.

But before that, I’ve put together a normal, bog standard episode of the show to help give you your fix of the show.

Who’s the guest? Umm… me. I figured I may as well get it out of the way now and especially have it done in a time where it’s not done in any season, so my episode is now out there for all to listen to as I talk at length about The Last of Us as my favourite game.

“But Johnny,” you are not crying at the screen but for the sake of this, I’m just going to pretend you are anyways, “you can’t possibly present your own episode, so who’s going to sit in the chair for you anyways?”

Dear listener, that is a very good question. I’ve enlisted the services of Season 4 finale guest Catherine Woolley of Media Molecule (she was with Creative Assembly when her two-parter was recorded) to be in my proverbial presenting chair as I talk of Naughty Dog’s magnum opus! Not only is she one of the most enthusiastic and more detailed people to come on the show, but she also has previous-podcast experience, so I figure having her in the chair will be a good thing.

Come listen to us talk of TLOU – including why Winter is the best bit in the game, why you shouldn’t exactly take Naughty Dog at face value in regards to stuff they say sometimes, why it has some of the best queer representation in a game ever and talk of Left Behind as one of the best DLCs of all time, but not Gustavo Santoialla’s amazing soundtrack (because I genuinely forgot, proper oops) – as well as the recently-announced Last of Us: Part 2 and a ton more over the course of two hours. 

The season finale of Season 4 of My Favourite Game, the second part of our two-part ender, wraps up the season with Media Molecule’s Catherine Woolley continue to talk of Shenmue as her favourite game (I was not kidding last week when I said it was a three-hour romp).

(2020 Ed note: Catherine was at Creative Assembly when this was recorded)

The final episode of Season 4 delves into the legacy of the game, how Shenmue 2 could actually be argued as her own favourite game (and how she rates each region specific version of the game she has as a top three list in terms of favourite Shenmue games – seriously), a lengthy honourable mentions section and that million dollar subject which when first talked about was a mere pipedream but now exists as a thing: an actual, real Shenmue 3.

For the second time, a returning game hits up the show, but for the first time, a two-parter episode on the same game and guest as Season 4 of My Favourite Game comes to an end.

In the first part of this two-part finale, Media Molecule designer Catherine Woolley (2020 Ed note: Catherine was at Creative Assembly when this was recorded) talks of Shenmue as her favourite game. And she goes into super lengthy detail, enough to break this into a two-part finale (THREE. HOURS. IN. TOTAL).

Catherine talks of the parallels she found with Shenmue and in her travels across Japan, her love for the series which loosely brought the creation of Shenmue about, Virtua Fighter, and Yu Suzuki’s past work.

But on top of that, there was having to pick his favourite tabletop game as Fantasy Grounds is, as mentioned, tabletop software. So for that, he picked the fifth edition of Dungeons and Dragons.

So tonight’s My Favourite Game is really about two games. But the episode is mainly about Fantasy Grounds – mainly because I hadn’t prepared D&D questions – and how it provides relative ease for those wanting to play pen-and-paper RPGs online as well as those who’ve not played a tabletop RPG ever – like yours truly – and whether you can get the same immersion playing a D&D game on Fantasy Grounds than you would playing a game in a physical space in real life.

On top of that, we talk Question’s first game as a studio The Magic Circle, ball punching dragons and how a guest from Season 3 may have a sex doll shaped upon JC Denton from Deus Ex.

Anyway, Bloodborne. What can you say of it that hasn’t been said already? An evolution of what makes Dark Souls so great. Faster gameplay, excellent design – both from a gameplay and art perspective – and a lot more. It’s also just as difficult as an actual Souls game and more frightening considering its horror tense.

Ahead of this episode, I went back and started playing more of Bloodborne, having originally been put off playing more of it because of dying over and over, admittedly a credo of the series, and still being in the same Central Yarnham part of the start of the game (that’s the main thing that put me off). It wasn’t until playing the game more and more that everything slowly started clicking. It’s all about grind.

Tonight, My Favourite Game sees Naughty Dog artist Alex Neonakis talk of Bloodborne as her favourite game as we touch upon the serious learning curve of the game – and it is a serious one – as well as dream games using the Souls-like formula, such as Ni no Kuni (damn it, Alex) or Harry Potter (damn it… me) and how the game is all about giving life lessons along the way. For real.

But S.T.A.L.K.E.R. is the one that still stands tall. Its atmosphere, the world and how it handles as a shooter. It’s why The Chinese Room co-founder and creative director Dan Pinchbeck has Shadow of Chernobyl as his favourite game. Tonight, he goes into minute detail on what makes the game – and near enough the FPS genre as a whole – tick on a mechanical and design perspective.

There’s also a bit of a postmortem for My Favourite Game (of 2015) entry Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture in there too.

In the middle of recording this episode, unfortunate news hit the wires: Microsoft was to close Fable developer Lionhead and Max: Curse of Brotherhood studio PressPlay (2020 ed note: No, we did not get the name for our podcast from the developer – circumstantial coincidence!) . You can hear the immediate reaction to that in this episode as well.

Tonight’s My Favourite Game sees ex-journo and consultant Alexa Ray Corriea sits down to talk of Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep as her favourite game.

Also discussed are the series’ ridiculous naming conventions (holy shit, it’s bad), the convoluted timeline of the series to date and how the series brought Alexa’s family together.

It’s on that last bit that Alexa wrote about this while at Polygon and is actually one of my favourite pieces of games writing ever – to be frankly honest, and I say this in the episode too, it’s the main reason why I asked her to come on. It’s such wonderful writing and I love it as a sucker of personal writing in games. So go read it whilst listening to this.

There is one Kingdom Hearts game she won’t touch ever again, though, citing it as “garbage” and “trash”.

There’s cliff diving, log rolling, sumo wrestling and even barrel jumping too. It’s the latter that has No Goblin co-founder Dan Teasdale clamoring to be an Olympic eSport to represent his homeland of Australia at. It’s doubtful it’ll ever happen. But hey, give the IOC enough money, you can make anything an event at the Olympics

Also: Dan talks of the simple pick-up-and-play concept of World Games, a realisation upon which GTA PS2 game ranks highly for him and how a near-death experience was his introduction to games. Seriously.

Of course we talked 100 ft Robot Golf. Featuring such hard-hitting questions in that segment, such as can I play it now, can I play it right now and how much Zone of the Enders influence there is (short answers: no, no, some).

Did I mention there was an entity of AIs involved that could determine the outcome of the game, depending on your choices throughout the game. Clearly the developer of this game had something up its sleeve with this game, whether you liked it or not. You can’t say it wasn’t unique anyway.

Tonight’s My Favourite Game sees Thatgamecompany co-founder Kellee Santiago, now head of developer relations at Pokemon Go developer Niantic (2020 ed note: she was head producer for Google’s then-VR platform Daydream at the time of recording), talk of the game that, if Omnikron hadn’t already done so, introduced Quantic Dream and David Cage to a bigger audience. There’s also talk of choice-driven gameplay and – because I’m that guy – I also gush on about Journey as one of my top three favourite games to Kellee as I did to Robin Hunicke last year (I’m so sorry for being a gushing fanboy idiot these past two seasons).

And if this – and further mentions to come in an episode later in the season – is any indicator, considering the amount of polish and magic in their games (a subject discussed tonight), it won’t be the last.

My Favourite Game tonight goes to Hell and talks of Diablo 2 with David Goldfarb, formerly of DICE & Overkill and now co-founder of The Outsiders and its upcoming title Darkborn, to talk up the amazing amount of design influence the game had on him among others (including baseball), what makes Blizzard’s games tick and why they’re just so fucking good (of note: go play Overwatch) and more.

You can find this week’s episode, our last for a few weeks, below.

Tonight, designer Nina Freeman, formerly of Fullbright and developer of Cibele and We Met in May, talks of Final Fantasy 10-2 as her favourite game. In it, she discusses how she came into the game from 10; the design influences that inspired her from the game; the core Charlie’s Angels-like chemistry of the group of Yuna, Rikku and Paine; the game’s tone and not so serious aspect (well, sometimes anyways) and a lot more.

Of course, there’s also a post-release chat on Cibele and whether there’s such a thing as a too personal story in games.

Two full seasons, two best of episodes and two special episodes plus an award nomination. All in the calendar year. Plus, celebrating our first birthday back in October. It’s been a hell of a 2015 for the show. And without going into too many details, 2016 is lined up to be a just as great year for MFG.

For now, lets kick 2015 out the door with one final special that twists the meaning of the show very slightly. My Favourite Game has been about asking folks in the industry what their favourite game ever is. For this final special episode this year, the meaning gets slightly bent a bit for a special known in the most ‘durr’ obvious way as My Favourite Game (of 2015).

Guests from across Seasons 1, 2 and 3 come on to talk of their favourite game from 2015 (one guest picked a game not from 2015 – the justification does, kinda, hold up – whilst another cheated and picked two).

16 games (15 from 2015) all selected by 17 guests who’ve been on the show before (18 if you count someone who hasn’t been a guest but is heavily involved with the show – hint: me). You can find a full list of games being discussed as well as the people talking of them below.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

Harriet Jones (Fallout 3 – Episode Three, Season 3)
Alex Donaldson (Final Fantasy IX – Episode Seven, Season 1)

Fallout 4

Molly Carroll (The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask – Episode Six, Season 2)

Grow Home

Christian Donlan (Robotron 2084 – Episode Nine, Season 2)

Metal Gear Solid (1)

Alan Williamson (Sonic 3 & Knuckles – Episode Nine, Season 1)

[This, kinda, makes sense. We promise]

Rock Band 4

Daniel Seto (Final Fantasy 7 – Episode Eight, Season 3)

Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture

Tom Bramwell (Quake – Episode Ten, Season 1)

Kitty Powers’ Matchmaker

Jordan Erica Webber (The Sims 2 – Episode One, Season 3)

Gravity Ghost

Ed Stern (Half-Life – Episode Seven, Season 2)

Rocket League

Jon Brady (Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty – Episode Three, Season 1)

Ark: Survival Evolved

Debbie Timmins (Grim Fandango – Episode Eight, Season 1)

Splatoon

Sam Barlow (A Mind Forever Voyaging – Episode Ten, Season 3)
Andrew Smith (The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past – Episode Two, Season 2)

SOMA

Carli Velocci (Silent Hill 2 – Episode Six, Season 3)

Invisible Inc.

Christian Donlan (Robotron 2084 – Episode Nine, Season 2)

Undertale

Matthew Reynolds (Shenmue – Episode Five, Season 2)

Tales from the Borderlands

Kait Tremblay (Shining Force – Episode Four, Season 2)

Life is Strange

Dan Pearce (Klonoa 2: Lunatea’s Veil – Episode Two, Season 3)
Johnny Cullen (Host/Creative Producer, My Favourite Game and Editor-in-Chief, Play Diaries)

There’s more of the show to come next year – and you still have one more episode to come this year too next week! – but before all of that, lets put a bow on Season 3 by giving you the Best of Season 3.

But before we get on that, as I do every season, I want to touch upon the three standout episodes for me. Every episode has been fantastic this season, not a bad one in the bunch (of course I say that, but I genuinely believe it moreso than any other season). But these three episodes perfectly encapsulate what My Favourite Game is and should be about.

The first pick has a personal bias to it, admittedly, but still one of the best episodes ever recorded and for me one of the funnest episodes I’ve ever done in the show’s history: Funomena’s Robin Hunicke on Katamari Damacy. But personal bias aside, Robin’s love and enthusiasm as a Katamari fan is just so heart-warming and endearing to hear. And now, she’s in a very privileged area in getting to work on her next game, Wattam, with Katamari creator Keita Takahashi.

Secondly, Warner Bros’ Daniel Seto on Final Fantasy 7. If it weren’t for that game, he wouldn’t be there right now. Or possibly even in the games industry. Dan’s story is one that shows how much a game can changed someone’s life. And as I said when his episode came out, I could attest to that. Plus, I can absolutely vouch for his absolute, genuine enthusiasm for the game first-hand. It’s the most personal episode we’ve ever done. And also another episode recorded this season I’d say is one of the best ever in the show’s history.

Finally, I’d pick Tom Francis on Deus Ex. As someone who jumped ship from games journalist to games developer, Tom can really pull apart a game – particularly a stealth game – and talk of its systems, the ins and outs of it, what makes it fun, etc. And he very much did that on a near technical level with Deus Ex. Donlan wasn’t joking last season when he said he could easily rip away at the game.

[Honourable mentions also to Jordan Erica Webber on The Sims 2,  Sam Barlow on A Mind Forever Voyaging and Carli Velocci on Silent Hill 2]

Alas, here’s the rundown for the Best of Season 3 along with notes to go with it.

—–

Looking Back on Silent Hill: Shattered Memories & What Could Have Been with Silent Hills,
by Sam Barlow (A Mind Forever Voyaging)

Six years on from its initial release, Silent Hills: Shattered Memories’ lead designer and writer Sam Barlow looks back on the game that has a cult following, a rarity for the series these days, and laments what could have been with Silent Hills following the release of P.T.

And nope, this isn’t a charade anymore: Kojima’s gone. Long gone.

The (Cover) Art of First Impressions,
by Daniel Seto (Final Fantasy 7)

Cover art can sell you on games. I am proof of that with Metal Gear Solid 2. And so is Dan Seto with Kingdom Hearts. So hear us be a bit silly and talk of how game covers, at least back in the day, can sell you on a game.

The Characters of Mass Effect (AKA: The We Hate Ashley Club),
by Carli Velocci (Silent Hill 2)

This is the third best-of special which has had an entirely dedicated Mass Effect segment. Someone needs to jump on and talk Mass Effect at some point, for Christ sake.

Anyways, the trilogy’s main vocal point, its biggest highlight, has always been and always will be its characters and how they’re written and designed. So lets have me and Carli Velocci have a talk of those characters and more, plus dedicate our love for FemShep and call Ashley a bitch.

What? She is.

A Conversation on Kitty Powers’ Matchmaker,
by Jordan Erica Webber (The Sims 2)

I’m not going to give context for this segment with Jordan Erica Webber. Instead, I’ll just give one word to instead: farts.

Alright, I’ll give one little bit of context to it through the medium of Twitter. This was taken in the middle of recording that segment (you can even hear my phone going off in the background).

Interlude: A (Brief) Conversation on BioShock & BioShock Infinite,
by Harriet Jones (Fallout 3)

A small, brief conversation with Lockwood’s Harriet Jones on BioShock 1 and BioShock Infinite.

Dishonored and Game Systems,
by Tom Francis (Deus Ex)

As I mentioned above, Tom Francis of Gunpoint and Heat Signature can really break down the systems of a game really well. Here, not only does he do it with Deus Ex, but with a more recent game in Bethesda and Arkane’s Dishonored.

A Conversation on Rainbow Six,
by Jake Tucker (X-COM: Enemy Unknown)

Rainbow Six is a shooter with a strategy game embedded within. That’s what I said to Red Bull’s Jake Tucker at the time and it’s still very much true now. Hear Jake go on at length about his R6 passion.

Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture: A Story of Love, Loss and Music,
by Sarah Wellock (Persona 3)

Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture is one of my top three games this year. It is honestly genuinely wonderful and heartfelt in equal measure. Here, me and Atlus West’s Sarah Wellock harp on about how wonderful the game is on its tale of love and loss – something we’ve both gone through as admitted in that segment in the past year – as well as talk of the importance of music in games in light of Jessica Curry’s incredible, wonderful score.

Fallout 3 and Player Agency,
by Harriet Jones (Fallout 3)

Player agency is a big thing in open-world games, especially in Bethesda open-world RPGs. Here’s Lockwood’s Harriet Jones once again on how games like Mass Effect, Skyrim and Fallout drive how she interacts with characters in those sorts of games.

How Castles in the Sky Came to Be (Or: Why Mike Bithell Might Be The Indie Games Illuminati),
by Dan Pearce (Klonoa 2: Lunatea’s Veil)

Castles in the Sky came during an intense spell of burn out for Dan Pearce. But at the same time, the game almost never made it out. So here he is talking of how he was convinced to let the game on sale. Or to look at it another way, how Volume and Thomas Was Alone creator Mike Bithell is quite possibly the head of the indie game illuminati.

Persona Super Fun Happy Time Extravaganza!!!,
by Daniel Seto (Final Fantasy 7) & Sarah Wellock (Persona 3)

PERSONA. A TON OF PERSONA.

Listen to a 25 minute period of Persona stuff with Persona 3, Persona 4 and even Persona 5 all getting a run out from Dan Seto and Sarah Wellock, two of the biggest Persona fans possible.

Interlude: A (Brief) Conversation on Final Fantasy 8,
by Harriet Jones (Fallout 3)

A final small, brief conversation with Harriet Jones on Final Fantasy VIII.

Deus Ex: Human Revolution – Eidos Montreal’s Landfall Moment/A Conversation on Mankind Divided,
by Tom Francis (Deus Ex)

With Deus Ex being an established franchise, how would a new, upstart studio in the form of Eidos Montreal be able to handle the pressures of their debut game being a brand new game in the series? Turns out it’d do incredibly well with Human Revolution. Tom Francis goes through the ins and outs  of the game as well as look ahead to the upcoming Deus Ex: Mankind Divided.

The Legacy of Journey,
by Robin Hunicke (Katamari Damacy)

I was gutted I had to cut this out for time from the original episode, but I absolutely wanted to make up for that by having it end the Best of special.

As I say in it, Journey is one of my top three games ever, behind The Last of Us and Metal Gear Solid 3, something I recently realised a few months ago with the PS4 version after loving the ever loving hell out of it when it released first time on PS3. And having a few minutes to talk of it with its producer Robin Hunicke was not something I was going to pass up on while I had her on the show.

We talk of the legacy of Thatgamecompany’s wonder, the fan response and why it’s inspired a lot of people and even helped people through hard events.

You can listen to the episode below.

Later in the year, Steve Meretzky of Infocom would see the release of a game he helped build that was beyond any other game he had done before at the company, including A Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. A Mind Forever Voyaging would see Meretzky embrace more of a political nature with the game as a criticism towards Reagan’s presidency.

For the final episode of My Favourite Game’s third season, the second part of our season finale, Her Story and Telling Lies creator Sam Barlow goes into detail as to why A Mind Forever Voyaging is his favourite game, as well as talk of the influence of the interactive fiction genre then in 1985 and now in 2015 with the likes of Her Story, Life is Strange and Until Dawn, among others.

Of course, Her Story and its successes are also discussed at length here too in what is a mammoth two-hour episode, the longest for any episode of My Favourite Game so far outside of the Best of season specials.

Now, Europe has a lot more Katamari in its life, but it’s still missing that first piece (2020 Ed note: Not anymore thanks to Katamari Damacy Reroll on Nintendo Switch and PC). Luckily, we can have Robin Hunicke – CEO of Funomena and producer on Journey (one of my top three games ever) – talk at length of the game as her favourite game.

Also discussed in tonight’s episode, the game’s legacy, how her fangirl nature for the series – and trust me when I say this, she comes across in this episode as a super super nerdy fangirl for the series (and I say that as the best possible and sweetest compliment) – is dealt by her now co-worker Takahashi, why the game is a metaphor for being small but getting bigger and why games should be just more than just revenge and competition.

I should disclose upfront that with Robin’s involvement on Journey, this was the first opportunity I had to talk with someone who worked on one of my favourite games on the show. It was super fun to talk Journey stuff with her and it was more or less the main crux as to why I wanted her on, but even without the Journey stuff, I’d still say this is one of the best episodes of My Favourite Game ever and easily the most fun I’ve had recording any episode of the show in its short history.

To give context, I don’t allow a game to be on consecutive seasons as I like to give it a bit of breathing room and time before it’s talked about again.

So we have one of the best games ever made up on My Favourite Game again. If you want to listen to it first time, here’s Lydia Ellery’s take from Season 1 a year ago.

But not only that, this is, I feel, one of the most personal episodes of My Favourite Game ever, if not the most personal. And absolutely one of the best episodes ever, purely because it tells a wonderful story of how games can resonate with someone in the biggest possible way.

For Warner Bros’ Daniel Seto (2020 Ed note: Dan was the European community manager of Square Enix Japan at the time of recording), Final Fantasy 7 was the game that made him the person he is today, personally and professionally. And I can absolutely vouch for what he’s saying, not just in his passion for FF7 as this was evident – not only in recording his episode, but a few weeks later when catching up in London – but also how one game can potentially change your life. And that, for me, was MGS3. But I digress.

I’m not going to say anymore. I’m not even going to tease more of the episode and all that. Just listen to it below and enjoy Dan talk in quite detail why Final Fantasy 7 means so much to him. It’s just genuinely wonderful passion and enthusiasm to listen to.

Tom Francis, former PC Gamer writer and now indie game dev behind Gunpoint and Heat Signature, is a massive fan of these systems and also likes to break them down to a T.

It also sees Tom go into detail about those systems as well as the other aspects of what made the game tick for him, why the demo for Deus Ex: Invisible War got him the gig at PC Gamer and more.

You can listen to it below.

And it begins tonight by looking back at possibly one of the best horror games ever, if not the best horror game ever. Let’s be real here: Silent Hill as a series is in a state of flux. After several games of an underwhelming nature, the series seemed to spark back to life in the biggest and best possible way with P.T., which would be revealed to be a teaser for Kojima and Del Toro’s Silent Hills.

That spark has since been extinguished, however. Earlier this year, Konami removed P.T. from the PS Store and even delisted it so if players end up deleting their original copy, they could no longer download it again. That came on the heels of confirmation that Silent Hills was canned amidst growing turmoil between publisher (Konami) and its biggest name (Kojima). Although not official as yet, reports suggest Kojima left Konami in October, though the latter insist right now he is taking a holiday.

But with P.T.’s growing legacy as not only a short demo but perhaps a game in its own right, it’s perhaps a little easier nowadays to remember Silent Hill’s glory days. Especially in the era of Silent Hill 2 and Silent Hill 3.

Tonight, My Favourite Game returns with a look back on Silent Hill 2 with Mobile Nations editor Carli Velocci. Discussed at length, James Sutherland as a protagonist and his mental well-being through the game as well as perverse ambitions, the tone and nature of the game, the relationship between James & fellow central character Maria and how Pyramid Head may have ended up helped the player instead of being the game’s primary antagonist.

You can listen to it below.

It’s clear that the game’s inspirations from the original more than helped the game than hindered it whilst adding something new to the series. That can be attributed, in part at least, to project lead Jake Solomon and the love he has for the original game as his favourite game.

But it’s another Jake who also has a big love for the game for which he ascertains as his favourite game, Red Bull Gaming’s Jake Tucker. Tonight’s My Favourite Game sees Jake (Tucker, not Solomon) delve into the systems of X-COM: Enemy Unknown (the 1993 one led by Julian Gollop) and why he has such a like for strategic games – not just necessarily strategy games as a whole.

You can listen to it below.

At last, someone talks Persona! Been waiting for someone to come on to talk of the series and I’m super happy we have Persona 3 as one of the main games for the sea—hey, wait, come back!

I know it isn’t Persona 4 (and Persona 4 is amazing – in fact, we were super close to getting a Persona 4 episode this season, without saying much more), but Persona 3 is just as equally great in its own unique way.

So let Atlus West EU PR manager Sarah Wellock (2020 ed note: At the time of recording in 2015, Wellock was Bethesda’s UK community manager) be the advocate of Atlus’ 2006 PS2 gem, the calm before the storm that was Persona 4, and also tell why games meant so much to her growing up and why she related to P3 in the struggles of belonging somewhere.

Oh and there’s Persona 5 stuff too. Because of course there has to be P5 stuff.

You can listen to it below.

But ahead of that, tonight’s My Favourite Game looks back at its predecessor, which has gone on to become one of the best western-made RPGs of all time, represented a massive groundshift for the series and cemented for sure – if Oblivion or even beforehand Morrowind hadn’t already done it – Bethesda Game Studios and Todd Howard as a team capable of crafting amazing open-world RPGs.

Lockwood’s Harriet Jones jumps on to talk of the impact the game made on her as well as ongoing tales of how she got on starting out with the game that followed Fallout 3 five years ago, Obsidian’s Fallout: New Vegas.

You can listen to it below.

“FINALLY…yes please,” replied 10 Second Ninja and Castles in the Sky developer Dan Pearce, knowing as if it was his life’s work to appear on this podcast. Or at least wait for his turn.

Anyways, tonight’s My Favourite Game – earlier than usual this week due to me being in London at the Games Media Awards for the show from tomorrow – takes a look back at a series that perhaps should have had a bit more legs than it got, if Dan has anything to say about it. Released in 2001, Klonoa 2: Lunatea’s Veil is a 2.5D platform game that came out for the PlayStation 2, the first game launching in 1998 for the original PlayStation.

In this episode, we discuss the kind of influence Klonoa 2 has had on Dan’s development career, why he thinks playing the game has perhaps a newer meaning to it now than playing it as a kid and more.

It’ll be a year tomorrow (technically, 52 Wednesdays ago, but whatevs) when My Favourite Game first began with The Curse of Monkey Island. A year later, My Favourite Game has gone from a pet project to become a big part of my work. As already written about, we’re also up for the Best Independent Podcast at the Games Media Awards next week. Fingers crossed, eh. But we’re not here to talk about that. We’re back and back in a big way with Season 3. But before that, I just want to say thanks to everyone who’s listened to the show, who’s come on to the show and said all the kind things about the show in the past year. Thanks for your awesome support, it really means a lot.

Anyway, we return with a game – or rather, a series – that I felt I’d be out of my depth trying to talk about. Certainly when I’ve not had a great deal of experience in said series since The Sims 3 on Xbox 360, and even then, that was an hour or two (though I did play a ton of The Sims on PS2 in my youth). Thankfully, when you have an expert on The Sims like freelance writer Jordan Erica Webber, who is easily the most qualified person in the world to talk about The Sims than you or I (like so and like so), you’ll be fine. Because gosh golly, she sure knows a lot about The Sims.

I had to force her to pick a particular game in the series, so she picked The Sims 2. But it’s worth bearing in mind that most of what we talk about regarding The Sims 2 can be applied to the rest of the series as well.

In the Season Premiere of Season 3, Jordan also talks of her start playing games, how Spore reminds her of Gran Turismo (seriously) and how she ended up missing an entire console generation before one game (hint: it’s a game we’re actually gonna have as an episode on later in the series – here’s an additional clue) brought her back in. Oh, and how she more or less invented The Sims before Will Wright did. I still maintain she should have sued for all the money in the world for it.

You can listen to the first episode of My Favourite Game’s third season below.

The Best of Season 2 takes a look back at some of the best bits of Season 2 as well as bits that unfortunately made the cutting room floor but now reappear here in this special, lasting over an hour-and-a-half.

Before that, I want to take the time to point out, as I did during the Best of Season One special, the three episodes that eptimised what My Favourite Game is about – sharing stories of playing games, the personal meaning and attachment to them and just talking of our love for them. All ten episodes are all great, but these three are my personal picks if someone held a gun to my head and asked me to name the three episodes that showed what My Favourite Game was about.

The first one is without question the most personal episode of My Favourite Game done in the short time its been going on. Julie Horup on The Binding of Issac on how games were part of her upbringing and various parallels between it and the game, how any particular game can help you through the most challenging of times in life and how they can be an outlet for someone making a game, like Ed McMillen with Issac.

The second being Ria Jenkins on Bayonetta. Putting aside the fact that there was a fun chat had with Ria on all things Bayonetta, there was a related chat in the episode on sex in games I felt was excellent and one not talked about a lot too much, at least on a games podcast. There’s a part of it I had to cut due to time restrictions from the episode, but it’s been added back in for this. There’s more details below.

Finally, Splash Damage’s Ed Stern on Half-Life and just the sheer amount of detail he went into in regards to that game, not to mention the inspiration its had on him in making games at the London-based studio.

[Special mention too to Molly Carroll’s episode on The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask just for how fun it was]

Tied with The Legend of Zelda in terms of most appearances so far on My Favourite Game, Metal Gear Solid 1 is the third time the series has headlined an episode of the show since it started last year, with Jon Brady discussing 2 last season and Leigh Alexander kicking off this season in March with 3 on its European tenth anniversary.

Tonight, it’s time to conveniently wrap Season 2 in a pretty bow and call it done. Who better to do such a thing than someone who’s been massively inspired by Metal Gear Solid to the point he’s making a stealth game based on his experience from it: Thomas Was Alone and Volume creator Mike Bithell.

Tune in for the next 90+ minutes on how his experience playing the game first time might have differed from most of us, why it has left such a defining legacy after all this time and we ponder if Hideo Kojima could also be a marketing brand so to speak (this was recorded before the story of Kojima’s impending departure broke, but in light of his name being taken off Kojima Productions and his games, this discussion is perhaps a lot more significant in light of the ongoing situation between him and Konami).

There’s also some decent Volume chatter in there too as well as talk of future stuff.

Released in 1982, Eugene Jarvis and Larry DeMar’s Robotron 2084 was one of the first of the twinstick shooter genre, coming out in a golden era of the genre alongside the likes of other Jarvis games Smash TV and Defender.

But it wouldn’t be the early 2000s before Eurogamer’s Christian Donlan, easily the nicest man in the games industry bar none and one of its best writers (if not THE best), would come across it.

On the penultimate episode of Season 2, Chris takes a look back at the game he calls his favourite, as well as talk about his break from games for a while in the mid-90s and talk of his other loves for Spelunky and XCOM, both of which formed the basis of what is Donlan’s greatest ever article – and my favourite article ever – on how games help you prepare for tough times.

Whether they be fun for the sake of fun or tell a story that’s deep, mature and impactful that resonates with us in a big way, games are amazing.

Whether we feel sad, frustrated, angry, happy or whatever, it shows how amazing games are to be able to provoke such responses.

Tonight, in what is perhaps the most personal My Favourite Game I’ve ever put together, freelance Danish games journalist Julie Horup talks of her favourite game The Binding of Isaac as well as how games can be an outlet not just for the people writing about them – I’ve already done so a month or so ago for Official PlayStation Magazine UK – but also for the people making them, as evident in Issac and its ties to Edmund McMillen’s upbringing.

Personally speaking, this wasn’t just one of my favourite episodes of Season 2 to record, but one of my favourite episodes of My Favourite Game ever to put together. It’s personal, but insightful and fun at the same time. So I do hope you check it out as this is why My Favourite Game was created, for episodes like these.

For me, my Half-Life experience more or less consists solely of The Orange Box on Xbox 360 and all three Half-Life 2 games, from coming into City 17 on the train in the main game to that cliffhanger ending in Episode Two, that has been my time with the series to date. Besides playing the opening of remake Black Mesa, I’ve not actually played Half-Life.

But one man who has to the point he will call it his favourite game is Splash Damage writer and designer Ed Stern, who – as you’ll discover over this next near hour-and-a-half – will talk your ear off about the game. There’s also some (second-hand) insight on the making of the game from Valve, so you know, go nuts. We also talk Splash Damage’s next big thing Dirty Bomb too.

“…As someone who has been in charge of the dungeons [on Ocarina of Time], I just couldn’t get that excited over making a flip-side [Ocarina of Time: Master Quest] for them. I couldn’t see it turning into a new Legend of Zelda, either. But we’d been told to make The Legend of Zelda. It isn’t as though we could just say, “I don’t want to”, and end it there. At that point, [Shigeru] Miyamoto-san gave us a tradeoff: he said, if we could make a new Legend of Zelda game in one year, then it wouldn’t have to be a “flip-side”.

“At first, we had absolutely no idea what sort of thing we were supposed to make, and we just kept expanding our plans… At that point, the “Three-Day System”, the idea of a compact world to be played over and over again, came down from Miyamoto-san and one other director, [Yoshiaki] Koizumi-san. We added that to the mix, and then, finally, we saw the full substance of a Legend of Zelda game we could make in one year.”

And what it managed to turn out in a year was what could be argued as one of the best Zelda games ever, among the likes of Ocarina and Wind Waker.

Tonight, My Favourite Game explores The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask in detail with Valve’s Molly Carroll, who claims it as her most cherished game. But not before perhaps a contest between it and another game, eventually an honourable mention, which she’s put hundreds of hours into.

It’s a game that has given quite a bit to the games industry at large, most particularly the introduction of QTEs in games. Yu Suzuki has been the creator of many games throughout his career, including Outrun and Virtua Fighter, but it’s fair to say that Shenmue can be argued as his masterpiece.

Eurogamer guides editor Matthew Reynolds cites it as his favourite game. For nearly an hour-and-a-half, let him tell you why the first installment in what should’ve been a trilogy is something he holds dear. And there’s Sonic The Hedgehog toothpaste mentioned too.

Shining Force is one of the games that would define the Mega Drive, made by a key figure of Dragon Quest’s early days in Hiroyuk Takahashi and perhaps inspired by some of its peers alike, including Nintendo’s Fire Emblem series, of which its newest instalment was just announced recently.

Takahashi now heads up Camelot Software, who are well known for the Golden Sun series, but for Takahashi, his legacy may well be defined by Shining Force.

For Ubisoft Toronto narrative designer Kaitlin Tremblay, she pegs it as her favourite game. Listen for the next hour as she goes at length as to how much the game means to her. that would define the Mega Drive, made by a key figure of Dragon Quest’s early days in Hiroyuk Takahashi and perhaps inspired by some of its peers alike, including Nintendo’s Fire Emblem series, of which its […]

It was one of the first two games to ever be announced from the upstart Platinum Games, founded by Hideki Kamiya, Atsushi Inaba and Shinji Mikami in the wake of Clover Studios’ closure from Capcom higher ups in late 2006.

And yet, helmed under the watchful eye of one of the finest action game directors going in the games industry in Kamiya – who after all brought us Devil May Cry – Bayonetta went on to become not only one of the best action games of 2010, but also one of the finest action games perhaps ever made.

And after talk of a rosy future for the series from publisher Sega, nothing. Until, like a phoenix, Bayonetta 2 rose out of the ashes from Nintendo for Wii U last year. And we are ever so grateful for its existence (I am anyways).

But to keep the focus on the original, Ria Jenkins talks at length about why Bayo 1 is her favourite game for the next hour.

An influential game of its time that still stands tall today as one of the finest games ever, The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past is easily in most people’s, if not all, top ten Zelda list.

For Spilt Milk Studios’ Andrew Smith, currently beavering away on PC action game Tango Fiesta (which may also be coming to consoles – listen to the episode, yo), it stands tall as his favourite game ever. But not before forcing to make a Sophie’s Choice decision between it and a game that would turn out to be an honourable mention.

And seven other games.

That’s how long its been since Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater made landfall in Europe, just four months after its US and Japanese launch.

It is a matter of opinion on what is considered the best game in the Metal Gear series, but it may also be a matter of debate as to what is considered to be Hideo Kojima’s magnum opus, his masterpiece: MGS3 or the original MGS back in 1998/1999 (depending where you were in the world that time).

For one long period – eight years, in fact- it was my own favourite game. But even now with another game sitting atop as my favourite game, MGS3 is still a massively special game to me and always forever will be until the day I go to my grave.

I’ve already written at length today as to how much this game means to me even after a decade, so I’ll stop there.

For one of the finest writers and critics in our sector, Leigh Alexander, it remains her favourite game ever after all this time.

Leigh has already written at length about Metal Gear Solid 3 and why it means so much to her for Vice towards the tail-end of last year at the game’s US 10th anniversary, as well as a post-mortem back in 2012 for Gamasutra.

So there’s no better way to celebrate than begin the second season of My Favourite Game with a look back at what me and Leigh can personally say is one of our favourite games ever and perhaps one of the best ever.

But for now, the plan is My Favourite Game’s second season will start sometime in the Summer.

I just want to say thank you so much to those who’ve listened and subscribed to the podcast’s various feeds in its first season and I hope you enjoyed them as much as I did putting them together. And thank you to all ten folk from the UK games industry I asked to come on for this first season. It was fantastic to record each of them in their own unique way, but I hope the rest of the folks I asked on won’t mind if I specifically point out Holly Nielsen, Alan Williamson and Tom Bramwell.

I highlight these three not just for particular episode-specific reasons, but personal reasons behind them.

Holly’s story on how she got into gaming through her brother was endearing, and our fantastic 20 minute conversation we had on female representation in gaming, that I unfortunately partly cut from the show (hang on, there’s a reason for this post yet…), was wonderful to have. It really was such a mind-opener that if it weren’t in part for that conversation, I don’t think I would have ended up writing this about the female character treatment as of late in the Metal Gear Solid series back in September.

Which brings me to Tom Bramwell. I’ve gone on at length at how much the man has meant to me professionally enough times on my blog (and during his episode). He in part also inspired me to write that Metal Gear piece linked up top thanks to his ‘I’m sexist’ piece on Eurogamer. But more than that, recording his episode a little under a month ago and soon after one of the worst periods of my life culminated in the worst possible way was a stress reliever, as was our off the record chat afterwards. But his episode was a wonderful look back on his gaming life to date and one I personally enjoyed putting together at a time where I needed the escape.

Finally, Alan Williamson. His love for Sonic 3 & Knuckles went to stupid technical detail that was enlightening, engaging and fun to talk about. But it’s one of his honorable mentions later in the episode, Shenmue II, that sticks out for the reasons he gives. In fact, I’ll quote it for you.

“Shenmue II is quite a personal game to me because I played it around the time of my parents’ septation. There was a lot of feelings going on when I finished that game, but also because it really was the last great Sega game before they stopped manufacturing consoles. To me, Shenmue represents the death of childhood. I was sixteen and it kind of felt like everything I knew was falling apart at the time…”

Although this was recorded just before what happened with my mum, that quote resonates with me quite greatly now, albeit in the loosest terms as I wasn’t a child when this was happening (I turn 24 on Friday and I was 23 when it happened) nor were my parents divorcing. though, this did involve one of my parents. To me, to tell a long story short, I felt something similar with Metal Gear Solid 3 when my mum was in hospital at a time when my life felt massively in limbo. I’ll perhaps go into detail one day in one such episode.

But my main point is I enjoyed, even loved, the massively personal tales that people gave on My Favourite Game this first season and particularly those given by Holly, Alan and to a lesser extent, Jon Brady and his tale in getting into games. And I hope to hear more of these stories next season.

But not before one final hurrah. In a special two-hour episode, we take a look back on Season 1 with some of its best bits, bits that never made it in to the show or extended cuts of conversations from the series (such as me and Holly’s talk on female characters in games in full).

Just under four months ago, this project plopped into view as I sat thinking about the concept of talking to someone about their favourite game and how they ended up getting into games. Throughout the past two months, however, it’s become more than just talking about the game that’s dear to them than any other.

There’s been stories of how games have helped through a personal period in someone’s life (just listen to last night’s episode with Alan Williamson and honourable mention Shenmue II), how they’ve helped create a deep love for a series after an absence from gaming (Louise Blain, Assassin’s Creed II) or how they’ve developed a sibling relationship (Holly Nielsen, The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker), to name a few.

Of course, we still talked about them because we just straight up love games. But as making this series wore on, I realised that I enjoyed the more personal stories about them, like those mentioned up top or in other episode across the season. For Season 2 of My Favourite Game (yes, I can tell you there will be a second season), I want to find more of these stories.

Not to mention, developing this under the backdrop of GamerGate was rough personally speaking, but coincidental timing nonetheless. That said, if it could help relate to those listening out there in its wake, then it was gravy.

Plus, in the middle of putting it together, I had to go through a really rough personal period of my own, the hardest period of my life, of which games have helped with. Maybe I’ll tell that story in full one day (in fact, I make reference of what happened near the end of the episode).

My Favourite Game was set up to show in some way how people feel about games and the special connections people have with them: me, the people I’ve been talking to for the past four months and hopefully – somehow – you. So to those who’ve listened over the past few two months, thank you so much.

That said, while I have talked a few of my own likes, loves and hates of games through these past eight weeks, I’ve never too gotten personal in them.

Until tonight. Because the Season 1 finale is with someone who I not only consider to be a good friend, but my biggest hero in the industry, something I touch upon in great detail towards the end of the episode: now ex-Eurogamer Editor-in-Chief Tom Bramwell and his favourite game, Quake. The last new IP from id Software before 2011’s RAGE, the first-person shooter helped in part to establish the mighty behemoth that Tom has spent the best part of nearly 15 years writing for thanks to the LAN days spent by founders Nick and Rupert Loman.

Join us for the next hour-and-a-half as he also talks of those early Eurogamer days (including a confession on how a 17-year old rabbid Metal Gear fanboy called “blasphemy” among a certain 8/10), his foray into gaming and what next for ‘The Great One’ of UK games journalism (he’ll hate me as a Liverpool fan for calling him that – I think). He also has the best epic putdown ever for Quake 4 that you just have to listen to. It’s brilliant.

If this episode sounds a lot more recent than most episodes, that was because it was: this was recorded two weeks ago, a week after Tom left Eurogamer (Tom was the first person I went to on my list of people to go to back in August, just before he announced his departure from EG – first to enter, last to leave, innit).

For Five Out Of Ten editor-in-chief Alan Willliamson, Sonic 3 and Knuckles means so much to him that he’s willing to talk about it as his favourite game ever.

In the second episode this week, the penultimate episode of Season 1 of My Favourite Game, we go into detail on old & modern Sonic, how an honourable mention heralded the last great Sega game as well as “the death of childhood” and how I’ve wasted my life to date not playing the Metroid Prime trilogy. We’re also both Northern Irishmen, so it will get Irish at times (and I don’t mean that in the ‘We’re Irish, we swear a lot,’ department). You’ve been warned.

But it’s a game that still has a massive legacy to its project lead, Tim Schafer, in what would be his final project whilst working at LucasArts before departing to found Double Fine. It is of course Grim Fandango.

In the first of three episodes to wrap up Season 1 of My Favourite Game this week, The Average Gamer editor-in-chief Debbie Timmins talks of her love for the game, how she was accustomed to PC gaming whilst growing up in Singapore as well as explore the hand-holding aspect of games between back then and now.

As I’ve mentioned a couple of times  – and in part in Louise Blain’s episode this series – I got into the Final Fantasy series with Final Fantasy 13 and not the earlier installments like 7, 8, etc. Despite all the hype for it – and that’s just for me – it turned out to be a big sodding disappointment, with 13-2 being a minor improvement, but not by much.

VG247 writer and RPG Site co-founder Alex Donaldson, however, got on the train around the same time as everyone else back in the hayday just after 7 with 8, but it would be 9 that would go on to be a much more meaningful game in more ways than one. It’s, therefore, with that in mind he talks of Final Fantasy 9 as his favourite game.

Join us for the next hour-ish as he goes in depth on the game (seriously, he went on at one point for twenty minutes without interruption on the game!), comparisons between my dev hero Hideo Kojima & Alex’s dev hero Hiroyuki Ito and the future for the series in the wake of September’s news that Final Fantasy 15 has had an internal shake-up with Nomura out, Tabata in.

Now though, 12 years after its release, The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker is arguably among the likes of Ocarina of Time, Majora’s Mask and A Link in Time – to name a few – in the series’ upper echelon. And just last year, Wii U owners got to experience it again, or – if you’re me post-Mario Kart 8 this year – for the first time.

But for games historian and freelance writer Holly Nielsen, it’s long been her favourite game ever. For the next hour, we speak on her love for the game, the series and how a sibling relationship managed to get her into gaming in the first place.

Dave Cook my successor at VG247 who’s since left games writing, is one of the most knowledgeable fighting game fans I’ve come across, along with someone else who’ll be appearing on MFG in a few weeks, who holds Streets of Rage 2 in high regard as his favourite game.

In this next hour(ish), me and Dave talk of his start in games – personally and professionally – as well as Streets of Rage 2 plus a big tangent on fighting games as a whole plus hack-and-slash games, as well as his honourable mentions (for those who know Dave: you’ll be shocked to learn Dark Souls makes a presence – I know, I was surprised too).

Lydia ‘SquidGaming’ Ellery is one such person who ranks it at the top of her list. Let her for the next hour tell you why she loves it so. Plus, chatter on Sonic, how Metal Gear Solid 3 is a masterpiece (it is) and more.

It’s a shorter edition of MFG than usual because Garageband decided to switch itself off and not record the final fifteen minutes. And I probably should have caught that. Great job, Gar(b)ageband. Great job.

But to Jon Brady, it means more. It’s his favourite game ever.

Join us for the next hour as we talk over the things we love about this amazing game (Warning: it could become a fanboyfest), how Jon got into games, his passion for racing games and more.

It’s a good thing its predecessor, Assassin’s Creed 2, was not. Not that II was without its flaws, but it built upon a decently laid foundation from the 2007 original. It provided one of the best protagonists of the last generation in Ezio, an epic world to explore in Venice and thensome.

For me, even talking about it makes me want to go back and play it. For Louise Blain, Assassin’s Creed 2 is not only her favourite game, it’s the game that sent her down a rabbit hole of Assassin’s Creed fandom after a few years out from playing games.

Listen for the next hour as we go through Assassin’s Creed 2, tear into Assassin’s Creed 3 and look back a bit too on Silent Hill. We may also get a bit geeky on trailers and soundtracks too.

You can listen to the episode below

We begin tonight with an installment in one of the most-beloved point-&-click series’ ever, if not the most beloved. Released in 1997 in what turned out to be the final installment in the franchise from creators Tim Schafer and Ron Gilbert, The Curse of Monkey Island came at the tail-end of a golden era of point-&-click genre.

For StickTwiddlers co-founder Ben Cordell, it became his favourite game ever. Join us for the next hour as we talk about his love for point-&-click, why he became so enamored with Monkey Island as a whole and more. We also talk of how StickTwiddlers came to be, along with the website’s very popular Eurogamer Expo/EGX party (which was put on hiatus for this year’s show unfortunately), as well as his honorable mentions, including a debate on how the Mass Effect series is ranked (Spoiler: it’s 2 > 3 > 1).