The Crate and Crowbar

Latest Episodes:

Episode 206: Promoted To Death Sep 15, 2017

Show notes

Chris, Tom, Pip and Tom discuss Heat Signature’s impending release, FUGL, XCOM 2, Tooth and Tail, and loads of questions.

Plus: top Chris Pip tips, one-handed Final Fantasy, the problem of being both extremely fast and extremely poisoned, and bums. Again.

Find out more about Heat Signature, the game what Tom done, here.
Here’s a bit more on EVE’s space station heist.
Pip has been flapping about in FUGL and lolling around in League of Legends.
Chris is waving a flag for Tooth and Tail.
Tom’s been playing XCOM 2: War of the Chosen and maintaining a long Twitter thread full of posters.
Here’s Matt Lees’ talk from Gamescom Congress 2017.
Talking about charity in games is another excuse to link to roBurky’s Sims 3 diary, Alice and Kev.
The episode of Star Trek: Deep Space 9 that Tom is trying to remember the name of is, indeed, Whispers.
Pip’s article about neuroscience and game skill is going up later today, and will be added to these show notes when it is..

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. If you’d like to watch this episode on YouTube, you can do so here. You can also 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.

You can also follow us on Twitter:

Philippa Warr
Chris Thursten
Tom Francis
Tom Senior

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 205: An Ever Shrinking Park Sep 08, 2017

Show notes

Chris and Pip convene in a post-Tom world to discuss PUBG’s popularity, new Life is Strange, and Absolver. Also Chris says he won’t talk about Destiny 2, and then does.

We’ve skipped the questions section this week due to our (temporarily) reduced headcount – we’d like to dig into them properly when we’ve got at least one more Tom. If you’ve sent a question in the last week, don’t fret: we’ve received it.

That there Plunkbag sure has sold a lot of videogames.
Pip’s been playing Life is Strange: Before the Storm.
Chris really loves Destiny 2, guys, like, a lot a lot.
For a few more post-pod thoughts on Destiny 2’s microtransaction drama, see this Twitter thread.
Absolver has also won Chris’ heart. He’s having a big month. And writing this in the third person.
Alexis Kennedy’s Cultist Simulator has been Kickstarted up real nice.

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.

You can also follow us on Twitter:

Philippa Warr
Chris Thursten

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 204: Slug In A Hurricane Sep 02, 2017

Show notes

Notorious hobbledehoys Pip, Tom F and Tom S gather to discuss gaming matters of the day, including the plot of Half-Life 2: Episode 3, XCOM 2: War of the Chosen, Ken Follett’s The Pillars of the Earth, Destiny 2, Dead Cells and bums.

Plus! Your questions and finest game name substitutions. Show notes:

BIG NEWS OF THE WEEK. Vermintide 2.
ALSO Dontnod are doing something narrative next year.
Marc Laidlaw laid out the plot of Half-Life 2: Episode 3.
XCOM 2: War of the Chosen is hard work but great.
Here’s Pip’s review of Ken Follett’s The Pillars of the Earth (chapters 1-7)
Destiny 2 is comiiiing aaaaaah!
The Dead Cells daily challenge has some issues.
IKEA VR Pancake Kitchen is supposed to be good??
Before Quern, there was the game Tom S could not remember the name of. It’s Valley.
Games to learn controllers with: Batman: Arkham challenge rooms, Crypt of the Necrodancer (though you need to do some rebinding to get it working, details in this FAQ), Portal.

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.

You can also follow us on Twitter:

Philippa Warr
Tom Francis
Tom Senior

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 203: Off-Tanking The Teen Snake Aug 25, 2017

Show notes

Chris, Tom F and returning guest John Roberts talk Gamescom news, Technomancers, West of Loathing, snakes and Flotillas.

Here’s the Age of Empires IV trailer.
Also, Jurassic Thingy.
Overwatch’s latest short, which Chris doesn’t like, the tiresome arsehole.
Here’s that interview where EA’s Patrick Soderlund talks about the possibility of Mass Effect coming back.
John’s been playing Ian, The Technomancer.
Tom has returned to both No Man’s Sky and Shadow Tactics and possibly accidentally announced Flotilla 2, which doesn’t have a website yet?!
Chris has been playing West of Loathing.
The game for people who are blind that Chris is trying to think of is Three Monkeys, whose site appears to be down. However, it’s listed in this article about the same subject.

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.

You can also follow us on Twitter:

John Roberts
Tom Francis
Chris Thursten

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 202: Shoot Toast At My Face, Table Neighbour Aug 18, 2017

Show notes

Pip, Chris and Tom discuss No Man’s Sky’s latest update, 868-HACK’s latest expansion, and The Long Dark’s latest aurorae. Plus middle names, questions, and wat.

Here are some of those XCOM 2 propaganda posters. Snake people? Don’t fuck them.
Here’s the Prey demo.
Also, West of Loathing.
Everybody’s been playing that No Man’s Sky.
Tom’s been playing 868-HACK‘s first expansion, PLAN.B.
Pip’s got bear trouble in The Long Dark.
Blue mosquitos, via Caroline.
Let’s take a moment to revisit I Am A Mechanical Man vs. I Am A Medieval Man.
Here is Kane’s comprehensive list of games where the words ‘dark’ and ‘space’ have been replaced with ‘dork’ and ‘spice’, a fabulous use of time.

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.

You can also follow us on Twitter:

Philippa Warr
Tom Francis
Chris Thursten

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 201: The Seven Gun And Knife People You’ll Meet In Heaven Aug 11, 2017

Show notes

Chris, Tom and Tom discuss Artifact, the Dota 2 International, Hellblade, Shadow Tactics, The Shrouded Isle, Lawbreakers and more.

Please note: we discuss the recent Hellblade debate, including some mechanical spoilers, from around the 28 minute mark to the 49 minute mark. After that, there’s a less-potentially-spoilery chat about the game itself.

Here’s the announcement trailer for Artifact.
…and this is the reaction it got. Contrast with this trailer for a patch number from last year.
Here’s the other side of Valve, as represented by the International 2017 intro.
Ninja Theory’s Hellblade has much to recommend it, including a brave willingness to play with your expectations.
‘neil degrasse tyson watches a movie’ by ProZD.
Tom S has been playing All Walls Must Fall, a pre-nuclear tactics game set in Berlin clubs in 2089.
Tom F has been playing Shadow Tactics.
Chris has been playing The Shrouded Isle and Lawbreakers.
Here are links to our last two Christmas episodes: 2015 and 2016.

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.

You can also follow us on Twitter:

Tom Francis
Chris Thursten
Tom Senior

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 200: You Think I’m A Lake, But I’m Just A Bunch More Sand Aug 04, 2017

Show notes

Pip, Chris, Tom and Tom celebrate 200 episodes the only way they know how: by doing another episode. Featuring The Long Dark, Tacoma, ducks, rum and time.

Plus: looking forward to Guild Wars 2’s next expansion, the future of esports and VR and dancing and stuff as experienced at ChinaJoy, hastily abandoned segue ambitions, meditations upon the nature of change, meditations upon the nature of Captain Morgan’s, Pyre, Blernsball, ducks, the price of Tom Francis, Tom Francis’ strangest noise, Shepard’s gummiest rusks, and Babe: Pip In The City.

It’s a long one, folks. It’s also rather a drunk one. Thank you for supporting us for 200 episodes! Sorry that you had to support us for 200 episodes.

Let’s remember episode 1, particularly all the names for this podcast we didn’t use.
Dota 2’s International 2017 begins this week. Here’s the official feed. Valve say they’re doing new newbie-friendly stuff, but it doesn’t look like it’s available yet.
Telling Lies is Sam Barlow’s spiritual successor to Her Story.
Pip’s still plorting away at Slime Rancher.
The Long Dark left Early Access this week.
Tacoma is the game of the moment.
Chris sent a smaller Chris to ChinaJoy: here’s a Twitter thread with some of his pictures.
Guild Wars 2’s new expansion is Path of Fire.
And thus, Blernsball.

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.

You can also follow us on Twitter:

Tom Francis
Pip Warr
Chris Thursten
Tom Senior

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 199: The Sum of Everything is Quern Jul 29, 2017

Show notes

Two Toms and a Pip gather to discuss the death of everything, Unity’s rep, Pyre, Walden, and QUERN.

Also, mad clunking noises! We had to record on a table with the old mic this week, so apologies for the dip in sound quality. Normal services will resume shortly.

Show notes:

Contrary to what we thought on the podcast this week, MS Paint lives! MS are just moving it to their store as a free app.
Flash is well dead though. Or soon to be.
Desktop Tower Defense will still destroy your spare time.
There is pleasant puzzling to be had in Quern: Undying Thoughts.
The New York Times Popcast about streaming services.
Music for Alarm Apps.
Walden, a game! Pip made a video about it on RPS.
The beautiful, bemusing Pyre.
Here is the Steam Microtrailers feed that Tom F mentioned.
Good Souls vids. Why, the Crate and Crowbar plays Dark Souls, of course!
VaatiVidya’s lore series is also good.

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. Watch this episode on YouTube right here. You can also 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.

You can also follow us on Twitter:

Pip Warr
Tom Senior
Tom Francis

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 198: Crying On The Shoulder Of A Ryan Jul 21, 2017

Show notes

Chris and Tom S are joined by PC Gamer editor-in-chief Samuel Roberts to discuss The Sexy Brutale, GTA Online and open world co-op. Then, suddenly, Pip!

Plus: CBeebies on fire near the Sennheiser Gate, pulling out of Everything, old Dota grudges, the mysteries of the Sweaty Brutale, and an encounter with Kelvin in The David Cage.

Play Hitman backwards in The Sexy Brutale.
Tom and Sam have been on a long journey with GTA Online.
Pip has specific problems with Walden, a game.
Is this the egg that Pip is talking about? Who can say.
Here’s Cool Ghosts’ video about Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.
Here’s Chris reacting to Pip explaining Everything, the game that Sam pulled out of.

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.

You can also follow us on Twitter:

Samuel Roberts
Pip Warr
Chris Thursten
Tom Senior

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 197: Turd Act Plort Twist Jul 14, 2017

Show notes

Pip, Tom and Chris discuss VR, Hollow Knight, Slime Rancher, a little PUBG, esports, whether or not we should have more wine, and puns.

Plus: quadges from quadges, bodily censure, the 7/10 fallacy, and loads more. Be summoned by the hot takes bell, be repelled by the heady tang of fresh plort.

when you go dark souls with your best mates in VR perhaps???
Tom’s been playing the lovely Hollow Knight.
Pip’s true monstrosity has been revealed via Slime Rancher.
Chris is still plunkin’ away at that PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds and has dipped into that Zombie Night Terror.
BUYING THE WARDS, BUYING THE WARDS

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.

You can also follow us:

Pip Warr
Chris Thursten
Tom Senior

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

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