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WELCOME TO NOCLIP! We are a fortnightly, book club-styled podcast in which we attempt to go in-depth on an individual video game and figure out what makes it unique. Episodes are around an hour to an hour and a half long and primarily feature free form discussion on themes and mechanics present in each episode’s titular game. Bear in mind that we are not reviewers, so as far as we critique the games at hand, our intent is not to convince you to play any particular work. SPOILER WARNING: Give ...
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A podcast by Tom Philip and James Lewis, discussing all things that may come to mind, including television, films, music, Ellen Page and other observations. Now enhanced for your pleasure! For the MP3 version, see our website. E-mail the show at superfunhappyhour@ymail.com. Updated fortnightly.
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Welcome to cast space.Welcome back (finally!) to the podcast. Today, we’re going to be talking about Omori, a turn-based RPG with a unique art style and dark themes. Though, as we discuss in the episode, don’t think too much of Omori based on its genre, because it’s really putting its worst foot forward. Omori has rich characters, relatable themes …
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We’re old enough.Welcome back to NOCLIP, and beware, for it is Halloween! To kick off October, we’re talking about Crow Country, a throwback survival horror game that does a lot to stand out in its field. The game is set in an amusement park and has a unique polygonal graphic style that gives an oddly whimsical aesthetic. It makes good use of this …
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Happy NOCLIP day, everyone, and welcome to our celebration of nine years of doing the podcast! Nine years is such a long time to do anything, but I feel like it gets overshadowed sometimes with ten years looming around the corner. Which makes sense, so rather than argue you should be celebrating an odd numbered year like this, I’m going to reframe …
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I would recommend podcasters to rob banks instead because gambling is immoral.Welcome back to the podcast and to our very important series on games titled after women’s names that begin with the letter L. Today, we’re talking about Lorelei and the Laser Eyes a puzzle game from Simogo, developer of games like Year Walk and Sayonara Wild Hearts. Taki…
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What’s the definition of imaginary? A Podcast that only exists in your mind.Welcome back to the podcast! Our second game titled after a woman’s name that begins with the letter L is Who’s Lila, a pretty bizarre adventure game in which you control your character’s face. The object of the game, at the outset, is to sell your responses in conversation…
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The Queen of Podcasts is weak to fire.Welcome back to the podcast, and to the very special “games titled after women's names that start with the letter L” theme! To start us off, we’re going to be talking about Lorelai, a 2D side-scrolling adventure game. Lorelai is the third game in a series that began with Downfall and the Cat Lady, the latter of…
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Please consider supporting our planned podcast expansion.Welcome back to NOCLIP! Today, in our last episode of our DLC theme, we’re talking about Echoes of the Eye, Outer Wild’s expansion that adds a new explorable area into the base game. Describing it like that, you can maybe see why we had originally planned this for Pocket, but this is Outer Wi…
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I’m feeling full of beans.Welcome back to the podcast! Today, we’re talking about the DLC for Xenoblade Chronicles 3, Future Redeemed. This is an expansion type DLC which gives you a full new party of characters, starts you at level one and makes subtle but meaningful changes to the mechanics and has you set out on an entirely new story set in the …
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Oh, podcast.Welcome back to NOCLIP Pocket…for the last time! We’re interrupting our DLC theme because of the episode 100 milestone, and we’re talking about Super Mario Land. If you’ve been following for a while, you know that we started Pocket with an episode on Super Mario Land 2, so we felt it was appropriate to end it with the original Super Mar…
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I'm weak as a kitten and thick as two planks. I've always been this way. I'm proficient in podcasts. Sorry.Welcome back to the podcast! As our second episode in our run of DLCs, we’re talking about The Shadow of the Erdtree DLC for Elden Ring. And yeah, this is the release that inspired the theme in the first place. Shadow of the Erdtree released o…
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You want me to do some podcasting?Welcome back! Today, for episode 99 of pocket and for our first episode in our DLC theme, we’re going to be talking about the Rogue-lite addition to Splatoon 3, Side Order. Adding roguelike gameplay to Splatoon’s third person shooter mechanics works pretty well, giving you bonuses upon choosing rooms that are mostl…
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Karffin’ Mofang podcast.Welcome back to the podcast! Today, as the last episode of Mystery May this year, we’re going to be talking about Obduction. This is a game in the style of Myst by Cyan, the developers of Myst, and boy did they ace the assignment. Obduction is more accessible than the originals, yes, but it does get into that same headspace …
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Podcast to the shelled ones.Welcome back to the podcast! Today we’re talking about Ecco the Dolphin, a side scrolling adventure game and a real classic of the Genesis era. Ecco is a weird game in a lot of ways, the most obvious of which is the fact that it’s a game in which you play as a dolphin and all the surprisingly fluid movement that comes wi…
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There is surprisingly little use for the podcast block.Welcome back to the podcast! Today, the dice have ordained we talk about Infinifactory. This is a game that has been on our list for many years at this point and the main reason we ended up putting it on the (now comical misnomer) Mystery May table was mostly out of fear. Fear of exposing our d…
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Podcast.Mystery(1); wait(31)Welcome back to the podcast, and to, shamefully, our first episode of Mystery May! Quadrilateral Cowboy is a part heist, part desktop simulation game in which you use a portable “deck” to hack into security systems and use gadgets to get into locations in a cyberpunk dystopia. And the thing that really sets this game apa…
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Pod bless you, Andreas.Welcome back to the podcast and somehow, despite it being the middle of the month, not our first game of Mystery May! Today, we’re going to be talking about Pentiment, an adventure game in which you play as an artist as he is thrust into the middle of murder mysteries, however unlikely that might be. In each act you collect e…
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I can’t just hide here forever and podcast.Welcome back to the podcast where this week we’re going to be talking about Pseudoregalia! This is a metroidvania platformer that was originally developed as part of a game jam. The game is set in a castle and tasks you with navigating around to discover new abilities and, eventually, keys to end the game.…
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Grand Covenant’s Fourth Law: A podcast cannot lie.Welcome back to the podcast! Lies of P is definitely a game that turned some heads when it was announced, given that it’s based around Pinnochio. Set in a city overrun by automatons, stylized as puppets, who have broken their safeguards and begun attacking people, Lies of P takes its themes and idea…
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Banished into the depths of the Great Podcast.Welcome back to the podcast! Today, we’re talking about Lunacid, a game that is in its own words, inspired by old FROMSOFTWARE titles like King’s Field and Shadow Tower. And while you can definitely feel the influence, the game does enough to stand out on its own that it’s definitely worth playing. You …
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Hold down and swipe up to podcast.Welcome back to the podcast! For our last episode in Fanbruary, well into March at this point, we’re going to be talking about Mario Hoops 3 on 3. MHTOT (lol) is a bit of an anomaly in the Mario sports game pantheon, as it is a DS game that makes heavy use of the touch screen in its control scheme. This seemed like…
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You could pod another cast.Welcome back to the podcast! Today, for our second bite at the Fanbruary apple on the main cast, we’re going to be talking about Valheim. Valheim is a survival game that largely captured the audience for this type of game when it released in early access with it’s Norse theming, boss laddering and robust base building mec…
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We are not enemies, but we are a podcast.Welcome back to Fanbruary! For our second game of the month (don’t look at the calendar, please), we’re going to be talking about Wet, a third person shooter that iterates on the mechanical innovations of games like Prince of Persia and Max Payne, and takes its title both from a shortened version of the term…
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You did not survive the podcast, Raziel.Welcome to Fanbruary! As we have for the last three years, this month we’re going to be looking at games suggested by members of our community and we’re starting today with Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver! This is an action/adventure Metroidvania title from 1999 and, especially considering the era in which this r…
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A podcast inside a podcast inside a podcast…Welcome back to the podcast! For our January episode, which we kind of did so you didn’t forget we exist before Fanbruary begins, we’re going to be talking about Cocoon. Cocoon is a puzzle game developed by Geometric Interactive, a studio formed by members of the developer Playdead, and while this game is…
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The awards show least likely to be compared to Dark SoulsWhat a year it has been! We played some comical old PC games, overrepresented horror, had some unnecessary and frankly inscrutable themed months and most of the good games we played came as suggestions from you guys. Okay, so maybe it was exactly the same as every other year, but it’s all abo…
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This early in the game, I doubt you have the podcast to back that up.Welcome back to NOCLIP Pocket, and the final episode of the year! We decided to try to do holiday themes this year and based on our success rate, I doubt we’ll go for it again. Cthulhu Saves Christmas is a novelty follow up to another comedy RPG by this developer, Cthulhu Saves th…
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I will podcast unfulfilled!Happy holidays! To celebrate the season, we’re talking about a game that has at least one time on the internet been compared to Home Alone, and that game is Trapt! Trapt is a game in which you prepare and trigger traps within a 3D environment to attack and kill your enemies. Unlike what you are probably imagining, the gam…
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My intentions are podcast.Welcome back to the podcast! Today, we’re going to be talking about The Fall. Despite being almost ten years old, I’d consider this to be part of the new wave of adventure games, ones that seek to capture some of the elements of the classic games but without the more obtuse elements. The Fall mostly manages this, using a 2…
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I’ve got some oomph in my bloom.Welcome back to the podcast! Today, we’re talking about Super Mario Bros. Wonder, a new 2D Mario platformer, which in a weird way kind of feels like part of a trend of Nintendo making more nostalgic releases, like Pikmin or Metroid Dread and remaking Link’s Awakening and Mario RPG. Mario Wonder is a classic 2D Mario …
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The podcast is watching.Welcome back to the podcast! Today, we’re going to be talking about Rollerdrome, a game that mixes the extreme sports of Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater with the extreme crime of gun violence. In Rollerdrome, you are tasked with eliminating all the enemies that spawn in waves within a level while performing tricks to reload your guns…
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Use the Holy Pod to follow the Golden CastWelcome back to the podcast! Today, we’re talking about Tunic, a game styled very much after the classic 2D Zelda titles, but with some other influences that will become apparent as you play through the game. Tunic is a colorful, cute game, with a fox wearing a shirt as a protagonist and bushes that squish …
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I’m just podcasting my Wares.Welcome back to NOCLIP Pocket! Today, we’re talking about Anodyne, a Zelda-like indie game from ten years ago, which, boy does that just feel like forever these days. Anodyne doesn’t so much have a shtick as it just tries to be a solid action adventure game while exploring its mechanics and themes, and realistically tha…
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I’m as podcast as you are.Welcome back! For our final episode of Halloween, we’re talking about Dredge, the fishing game that takes its aesthetic inspiration from cosmic horror, and of course, H.P. Lovecraft. In Dredge you play as a fisherman and you catch fish to pay for upgrades to your ship, repairs, etc., all while working toward the goal of co…
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Welcome home.Welcome back to the podcast! Today, we’re talking about Midnight Manor, a late entry suggestion for Pocket this Halloween that ended up probably saving our schedule. Midnight Manor is a short horror-themed platformer from a solo developer that encourages players to play the game multiple times in different ways to see all the narrative…
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Dismember their podcast.Welcome back to NOCLIP! Today, we’re going to be talking about our first horror title for the Halloween season with Dead Space. Specifically, we’re talking about the 2023 remake of the game with only a limited understanding of the original. That said, this is a game that makes a pretty brutal impression very quickly, so we d…
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I’m sorry. I couldn’t keep my podcast.Welcome to Halloween! Our favorite month of year for being our birthday month, it’s also time for us to play just so many, many horror games, starting today with Signalis. Signalis is an indie survival horror game, set in a dystopian sci-fi world in which you play as a “Replika,” a robotic servant, assigned to …
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We are celebrating our eighth birthday here at NOCLIP, but I can’t help but feel like something is off. In computer memory, there are eight bits in a byte, and memory is necessary to run video games. Video games are like stories, but the players can do things. They have verbs. Eight represents the verb in the classic joke about how seven ate nine. …
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Oooh, banana.Welcome back to the podcast! Today, for Simian September, we’re going to be talking about Donkey Kong 64, the only 3D Donkey Kong collectathon platformer that’s fit to print. This game certainly has a reputation, it’s almost infamous, so we thought it would be interesting to see if that reputation is warranted coming back to it after a…
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That’s the stupidest podcast I’ve ever heard!Welcome back to NOCLIP Pocket! Today, we’re going to be talking about one of the all time classic point and click adventure games, The Secret of Monkey Island as our pocket episode for Simian September, the month that’s like Ape-ril, but in September. Monkey Island is notable for a number of reasons, but…
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A scattered dream that’s like a far off podcast.Welcome back to the podcast this week! Today we’re doing an episode that was a long time coming and talking about Kingdom Hearts II. The only numbered entry in the series we hadn’t talked about yet and probably the simultaneously most loved and most controversial Kingdom Hearts game. KH2 is an action …
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Podcast go, Sora go, go!Welcome back to NOCLIP Epilogue! Today we’re going back to one of our first ten episodes and talking about Kingdom Hearts. Kingdom Hearts is an action RPG with a dash of platforming on the side, as exploring the different worlds is a big part of both the goal of the game’s design and the appeal. That being said, the real not…
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A Warg is hunting the podcast for food!Welcome back to the podcast! Today, we’re going to be talking about Rimworld, a colony sim strategy game. Rimworld is one of those games that you probably either already love or have never heard of, which is to say, it is exactly what its audience wants it to be, but appears absolutely inscrutable from the out…
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Oh no! They podcasted the building down!Welcome back to the podcast! Today, we’re going to be talking about Chop Goblins, a surprising-in-many-ways FPS by David Szymanski. Chop Goblins is short, with only five levels and five weapons, and can be beaten for the first time in two hours or less, but because of this it never overstays its welcome and k…
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Next time we meet, I’ll have lived a good full podcast.Welcome back to the finale of Spooktember in July! Today, we’re going to be talking about Ghostwire: Tokyo, a first person shooter game from Tango Gameworks, the developer of The Evil Within. Ghostwire is a sort of a horror game, but with an emphasis on magical first-person combat and Japanese …
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If this is podcast, we never should have climbed down from the trees.Welcome back to Spooktember in July, the month where we barely even know what’s going on anymore. Today, we’re talking about Ghostrunner, a first person platformer action game where you have to execute difficult platforming while avoiding bullets and doing cool cyberpunk sword tri…
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How dare you talk about saving your podcast when you’ve murdered mine?Welcome back to the podcast, and to our delightfully themed Spooktember in July. We’re concluding our first set of games with Resident Evil: Village, currently the latest main series, non-remake Resident Evil game, and one that received a lot of hype prior to release thanks to a …
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“Fun” rhymes with “podcast” for a reason, stranger.Welcome back to the podcast! Today, we’re going to be talking about the Resident Evil 4 Remake that was released this year. Why are we talking about this game on Pocket? Well, we wanted to squeeze it in closer to its release date and the focus of the episode is mainly going to be on the way the rem…
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Expand-a-band-band, podcast stash!Welcome back to the podcast! We took a bit of an extra long time with this one, but if you’ve played this game, I imagine you’ll understand why. The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom is a massive open world game and the sequel to Breath of the Wild, the game that some people said redefined what open world games…
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One whiff of this and you’ll have your throat slit over the last tin of podcasts.Welcome back to NOCLIP Pocket! Today, we’re going to be talking about The Bunker, an FMV adventure game with a surprising level of production value. We chose to cover this game partly because we had played it before, and there are several other things coming up that ar…
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It is decreed that one shall pound the podcast.Welcome to the 150th episode of NOCLIP! Today, we’re celebrating, in a way, by finally talking about Super Mario 64, one of the single most defining video games of all time. Platformers, and probably games generally, were changed forever following the success of Mario 64, and that influence is impossib…
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