The Crate and Crowbar

Latest Episodes:

Animal Crossing: Still Locked In At The Crate and Crowbar Apr 07, 2020

Show notes

Hello! Again! We’ve done another one of these! Chris and Pip cross the egg event horizon as they check in on island life, two weeks later.

You can find this bonus episode on YouTube, if you like. As ever, our intro music is Clambake by The Mandibles.

Some show notes!

Here’s the website that lets you prepare Animal Crossing art in a browser.
Nico directs our attention to this explanation of one aspect of AC’s tremendous localisation.
The listener towns we check out are Zed Fang’s Terror, Teamboring’s Temperance, and Chris Allen’s Ragna Rock.

Episode 317: Khaki Avengers Apr 03, 2020

Show notes

Alex, Marsh, Chris and Tom Senior discuss the most topical games of the age, including but not limited to The Room VR, Call of Duty for some reason, hunting in Red Dead 2, and Mount & Blade: Bannerlord.

We’re still getting used to this new remote recording setup, and we’ll be looking to invest in some decent desk mics to even out the sound quality in future episodes. Thank you for bearing with us!

Tom is spending his days inside PS VR, chiefly The Room VR, Blood and Truth and, for some reason, James Cameron’s Avatar.
We nosh heartily upon the monumental failings of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare.
Alex’s attempt to recreate Animal Crossing in Red Dead Redemption 2 ends in tragedy.
Chris has been whisking the hillmen in Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord.
THE LONGING and VESPER.5: games about patience and, apparently, shouting.

You can hang out with us and our community on our Discord channel. If you have a question for a future episode, send it to us at questions@crateandcrowbar.com or tweet us @crateandcrowbar. You can also listen to it on YouTube, and subscribe to our YouTube channel, if you like.

The Crate and Crowbar is kindly funded by our Patreon backers. If you’d like to know more about supporting our podcast and its spinoffs, click here.

Our intro music is by The Mandibles from their track Clambake. Many of the band members now tour as Count Bobo And The Bullion.

Episode 316: Procedural Up The Bajacksie Mar 27, 2020

Show notes

Marsh, Chris and Alex attempt our first remote pod to discuss AI-augmented game development and the various verbs of Doom Eternal.

This is a shorter pod than usual as we get used to a new way of recording – but we’re going to do our best to continue to deliver hot pods every week. We hope you’re staying well! Washyerhandseverybody.

Here’s that interview with Google’s Erin Hoffman-John about game creation using machine learning. Who will reach the end of Mike Cook’s Takeshi’s Castle with their dignity intact?
Here’s Ganbreeder (now Artbreeder), and here’s how Pascal Blanché has used it to do art.
We’ve all been running and jumpiung and shooting and finding and chainsawing and flaming and grenading and glory-killing and collecting Funkos in Doom Eternal.
Podcast recommendations!
The BBC’s Boring Talks, particularly this one about Watergate tape silence.
This American Life‘s backlog, specifically, Squirrel Cop and squid or bung.
Sophie’s Dice! Ideal for yer remote roleplaying. Chris has also been getting used to roll20.
Here’s Chris and Pip’s podcast about Animal Crossing, if you missed it.

The Crate and Crowbar is kindly funded by our Patreon backers. If you’d like to know more about supporting our podcast and its spinoffs, click here.

Our intro music is by The Mandibles from their track Clambake. Many of the band members now tour as Count Bobo And The Bullion.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons: A Lock-In At The Crate and Crowbar Mar 22, 2020

Show notes

Hello! In this special mini-pod, Pip and Chris share their experiences of Animal Crossing: New Horizons while playing Animal Crossing: New Horizons. No spoilers, unless you didn’t know about the time that Chris killed his husband and fled to an island retreat with the family silver.

Things are tough all over, and so we thought we’d record this in order to share a game that’s been a genuine source of happiness for us – and for many others – over the last couple of days. You can also listen on YouTube, and our intro music is (as ever) Clambake by The Mandibles.

There was no podcast last week due to a combination of deadlines and coronavirus stress. We fully intend to keep producing C&C podcasts in the coming weeks and months, but the exact hows and whens are still being figured out. Given that we can’t record together, it’s likely that we’ll do some combination of VOIP and the sorts of one-person mini-pods that we’ve produced from time to time. Thanks for bearing with us.

We hope you’re staying safe! Keep those hands clean and those takes medium.

Episode 315: Thanks, Bearnaldo Mar 13, 2020

Show notes

Chris, Marsh and a moth get drippy then descend into the underworld of Iris And The Giant, adjudicate on the latest Destiny drama and order a 14-inch stuffed-crust Warzone. The crust is stuffed with guns.

Bane of trans-pacific trade and the NBA: Geoff Keighley. Wash your hands to be spared his wrath.
Alan Hazelden has announced a new game which Pip – our very own Pip! – has written. A Monster’s Expedition (Through Human Exhibitions).
John Walker said nice things about it!
Dolorous CCG Iris And The Giant about punching demonic cats and being angry with yer dad.
Sure, go ahead. Show him the red card for eating Kevin De Bruyne. See what he does.
Destiny: “it’s a lot like Crufts”. The kids be angry at the new season, even though the beach volleyball robomancy is good.
I contend that if a footballer can be a bear, a gun can be a boss.
Doc Burford has this article on Vice all about Destiny 2’s latest travails.
Happy Meal Toy Tom Clancy: Call of Duty Warzone.
Spacestation is to gun, as gun is to video format?
Psychoghost’s video of Hunt: Showdown tips.
Berserk – a very violent manga that was at least a minor inspiration for some aspects of Dark Souls.
Lindsey Ellis’s video on JK Rowling’s incessant over-definition of the Harry Potter universe.
Hilary Mantel’s superb historical novels, Wolf Hall, Bring Up The Bodies and The Mirror And The Light.
Sadly, it turns out there is already an app called Tudr, and it’s a knowledge-sharing platform for college students and not a 16th century doomed wife solicitation sim.
The Color Out of Space: wiccan teens versus unfathomable cosmic terror! It’s good says Chris.
The Longing is a game that pointedly takes a boringly long time to play. Is that an interesting thing to do? Hmm.
“Time is interesting, man,” says Chris, so I guess the answer is yes.
Braid is a great puzzle game that exhaustively explores the use and manipulation of time.
A coda to the moth drama: as I released our friend into the uncertain night, another immediately entered, bringing the final score to Marsh 0, Insect-Tea Coalition 3

The Crate and Crowbar is kindly funded by our Patreon backers. If you’d like to know more about supporting our podcast and its spinoffs, click here.

Our intro music is by The Mandibles from their track Clambake. Many of the band members now tour as Count Bobo And The Bullion.

Episode 314: Nostalgic Roundabout Mar 06, 2020

Show notes

Chris and Alex discuss some actual games news and bury themselves kneck-deep in Dark Future and World of Horror – just in time for a special report from salty ocean correspondent Pip!

Plus: voice controls, work-life balance, the hot panic of an embarassing gaming moment, our go-to grunts, and other emanations from this bumper episode of The Shame Edition.

Bar-ney, nooo-ooo-oooo!

Do go watch Larian’s ace Baldur’s Gate 3 demo from PAX East.
Here’s the first video in Valve’s series of Half-Life: Alyx gameplay reveals. You put the hat on, and the barnacle, he eat the hat.
Valve released Dota Underlords, and it’s like, a whole game, isn’t it.
Tom’s lovely game, Tasteful Bench Lizards. Do give it a spot on your wishlist!
Alex has been changing lanes without signalling in road-based roguelike Dark Future: Blood Rate States.
The other roadlike that we couldn’t remember the name of is Convoy.
Chris is very very into World of Horror, and is sorry for turning into a such a pseud on the pod. A pseud-o-pod, if you will. This is a joke. I’m sorry. Marsh tries very hard with these show notes, and I feel the need to do the same. Is it going well? It’s not.
Here’s Emily Short’s blog post about Aaron Reed’s horror novel Subcutanean.
Pip has become a lone wanderer of the Sea of Thieves, a fisherperson nonpareil, and the victim of a sequence of leech crimes.
It’s time for Kane’s ace GOTY 2019 website, corraling as it does the aggregate good taste of the Crate & Crowbar community. Honk!
A few nights ago I had a nightmare about these shownotes. I dreamed that it was necessary to provide a timestamp and detailed explanation for every joke on the podcast. I haven’t done this. Please don’t make me do this.
press triangle to barp

The Crate and Crowbar is kindly funded by our Patreon backers. If you’d like to know more about supporting our podcast and its spinoffs, click here.

Our intro music is by The Mandibles from their track Clambake. Many of the band members now tour as Count Bobo And The Bullion.

Episode 313: Stuck In The Muck Feb 28, 2020

Show notes

Alex, Chris and Marsh endure the first episode of Mythic Quest: Raven’s Banquet, but only barely, punch towers with mechadongs in Besiege, beat bad bots in resuscitated coop shooter Generation Zero and get bandy-legged in The Suicide of Rachael Foster.

“It’s a real Bront.”

We sat stony-faced through videogame-dev-set sitcom Mythic Quest: Raven’s Banquet but YMMV.
Kerbal Space Programme for Skaven: Besiege!
You can in fact pit your monstrous pneumatic dongs against one another. There’s a whole Youtube Channel set up to facilitate Robot Wars-style tournaments, as described here by PCGamer!
Pod friend / bayou-based father-figure Jim Rossignol’s review of wondrous murderswamp Hunt: Showdown.
Internalise the neutrally regulated phases of tabletop-to-digital game, Warhammer Underworlds Online.
Generation Zero! Face 1980s mech peril in a very Swedish open world. It’s snikt!
Horzong Zmeero Verm
Uncover, or not, the elegaic metaphorical power of a dental retainer in dubious walking sim The Suicide of Rachel Foster.
I’m a human wound in the psychosphere!
Pour one out for TJ’s slain spire.
Play Mordhau with friends to inure yourself to the pain of being beheaded by racists.

The Crate and Crowbar is kindly funded by our Patreon backers. If you’d like to know more about supporting our podcast and its spinoffs, click here.

Our intro music is by The Mandibles from their track Clambake. Many of the band members now tour as Count Bobo And The Bullion.

Episode 312: Don’t Spaff Your Jargs Feb 21, 2020

Show notes

Alex and Marsh grudgingly drag themselves from the swamp to chat about spry roguelike platformer ScourgeBringer, palpate the unctuous parts of The Good Time Garden and feel ways about things in plangent poke-a-story Florence.

Gentle nature-walk / insect stridulation simulator, Hunt: Showdown now has a PvE onboarding tutorial for new players. That’s nice!
Red Dead Redemption 2 has over 200 species of animal! But not enough bells, frankly.
Imagine Celeste, add a bit of Gungeon and you got yourself a crunchy ScourgeBringer.
Sordid point-and-palp game The Good Time Garden.
Poke arguments together in sweet, sad and slightly unspecific yarn Florence.
Destiny. What the fuck is that about?
Listen to Miniatures Monthly for maximum goblin nonsense.
Pointed out after the pod: Wolcen: Lords of Mayhem has some really ripe lore-wank.
Little Big Aventure‘s name remains unbrutalised in its Steam edition.
Sins of a Solar Empire aka PLANET SHUFFLE.
Tactical space shooter with a good name House of the Dying Sun
Eggs Yolk Eggs: Divine Cybermancy is a multiplayer FPS/RPG hybrid with a name that makes me hungry… for EGGS!
Here is an example of that graph I was talking about during the excruciating Homespun Wisdom section of the podcast.

The Crate and Crowbar is kindly funded by our Patreon backers. If you’d like to know more about supporting our podcast and its spinoffs, click here.

Our intro music is by The Mandibles from their track Clambake. Many of the band members now tour as Count Bobo And The Bullion.

Episode 311: Appreciate me, Hunt-Daddy! Feb 07, 2020

Show notes

Alex, Chris and Marsh bear witness to the spherical design crimes of Battlefront II, sweat bricks in formidable hell-Tetris game, Schwerkraftprojektionsgerät, and return to their happy place, the cursed murder-swamp of Hunt: Showdown.

No one needs to own this many maglites.

GeForce Now game streaming thing is out… now! But what is it and why is it? The most definitively nonplussed takes abound.
It’s a bit like Stadia, which is Google’s similar attempt to answer a question that maybe no one is actually asking.
A voice echoing from a distant age of game industry folly: Cliffy B opines on the reasons for Lawbreaker’s failure, revealing himself to be a soul of an almost plangent innocence, and also completely and very obviously wrong.
Dan Houser has left Rockstar and will now ride off into the sunset, pursued by a bear.
“I like the noises and sounds” – the highest of praise for the canonically cavalier Battlefront II.
Stephen Lavelle’s multi-directional Tetris game: Schwerkraftprojektionsgerät. It sounds too hard for me, but apparently it gets Alex’s pendulum swinging.
Hunt: Showdown – has any surplus disemboweled horse asset been recycled into a more perfect form? No.
Homoerotic death-by-misadventure-during-a-stag-weekend simulators: Mordhau and Escape from Tarkov.
Golly, what a silly joystick.
Alex done books! Britsoft and Japansoft!
The interviewer with the name we dare not mangle: John Szczepaniak
Consume Chris’s paeon to Roombas in text-based multiplayer simulator hackmud.
You should not, and blessedly cannot, consume Chris’s horny AVP mods.
Third mage lucky: the correct name of the Eagles’ song, used for the theme-tune to the BBC’s Hitchhiker’ Guide to the Galaxy, is Journey of the Sorceror
Pour one out for A Year of Rain, Daedalic’s unloved RTS.
I don’t even know what point I was trying to make during this conversation. The falldown juice had begun to take hold.
CRAYYK A BOOBA, SOLO

The Crate and Crowbar is kindly funded by our Patreon backers. If you’d like to know more about supporting our podcast and its spinoffs, click here.

Our intro music is by The Mandibles from their track Clambake. Many of the band members now tour as Count Bobo And The Bullion.

Episode 310: Always The Ball, Never The Paddle Jan 31, 2020

Show notes

Tom S, Chris and Marsh seek the Creature in the Well, guiltily juggle men in Dynasty Warriors 8, revisit the roots of the RTS in Warcraft 3: Reforged, crave decapitation in Mordau and assess the early access jank of Warhammer Underworlds: Online.

“Stay off the tracks.”

What’s that emerging from the frigid tundra of January? Is it…? Could it be… news? Holy fuck!
Torchlight Frontiers has morphed into Torchlight 3, shedding its F2P plans along the way.
Innocent children’s entertainment: Thomas The Tank Engine
Henry: Portrait of a Se-RAIL Killer
He’ll put you in a sleeper hold!
He’ll cut you deeper than Dr Beeching!
Beware the bogie-man.
Mind the gap… between your head and your body!
Miss your stop and he’ll stop you… DEAD!
*discordant musicbox rendition of Coming Round The Mountain plays*
Some trains terminate at Ashford International… This train will terminate YOU!
Yep, that’s it. That’s all I have.
Meanwhile, in Wales: Psh-ti-cuff, psh-ti-cuff, psh-ti-cuff
Kentucky Route Zero is out, all the way out, and it’s STILL about America. Sorry?
Duelyst has fallen upon its sword. Ow!
Allergens of Room Temperature is more memorable than this game‘s actual name.
Atari are making hotels now: a generous bequest to the instagram accounts of urban explorers ten years from now.
I am too weak for 60% of the Creature in the Well
Dynasty Warriors 8: don’t do gravity.
Back to where so many things began: Warcraft 3: Reforged
Mordhau: be dismembered by the worst people on the internet.
Behold the somersaulting mega-dogs of Warhammer Underworlds: Online.

Ivorrrrrr!

The Crate and Crowbar is kindly funded by our Patreon backers. If you’d like to know more about supporting our podcast and its spinoffs, click here.

Our intro music is by The Mandibles from their track Clambake. Many of the band members now tour as Count Bobo And The Bullion.

Our TOPPODCAST Picks

Follow Us

Stay Connected

Related Podcasts

Links

Stay Connected