2 Player Cupboard of Shame: AndrewD

Arrggh! A Video Game Podcast from The Waffling Taylors

First of all, we'd like to thank the amazing yurricanes for working with us to create the featured image for this episode. I think you'll agree that it's an amazing piece of art, and you should definitely check out their work.

We'd also like to thank Georgie (aka ChapSketch) for working with Squidge on the episode artwork for the entire New Cupboard of Shame series. Head on over to Georgie's Etsy page to commission some work from her. You really should, as she's blooming brilliant.

Remember that you can always get in touch with us on our Facebook page, on Twitter, or with our Contact page. Don't forget to check the chapters tab in your podcatcher. This is a thing we're doing now, so keep an eye open for those.

Here's a sample of the full show notes - make sure to click through and check them out.

Content Warning

Squidge was fully in charge of hosting, producing and editing this episode. As such, he decided to leave the few swears in the episode without bleeping them. This was done for comedy reasons, as we felt that there is very little in the episode which could offend most listeners.

Please listen responsibly.

Show Notes

Squidge wanted to take a shiny new look at The Cupboard of Shame. The difference being that he wanted to invite some familiar voices onto the show, one at a time, and discuss one game that they want to jettison into the Cupboard of Shame. This being the fifth episode in the new series, he invited Andrew "Podcast Collector" Dickinson to dispatch something into the devious - and totally real cupboard - cupboard.

As a quick reminder, Squidge describes The Cupboard of Shame as:

The idea behind it is games that you have bought in your past, played it, but you don't know why you bought [them] but you did anyway.
Any complaints that you have about the game; why you want to stick it in the Cupboard of Shame. We'll talk about the good points and the bad points [of the game], and we'll share some fun facts about the game.
- Squidge

Previous Entries into the Cupboard of Shame

The Cupboard of Shame reboot has only seen two entries so far:

• Chief Problems decided that The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim needed to be stored behind the walnut doors of destiny in episode 136
• Lulu wanted to jettison Chaos Legion to the nether realms of the electronically challenged cupboard in episode 138
• Sean wanted to yeet Risk of Rain 2 into the underbelly of the cupboard in episode 139
• Ginger wished to send Final Fantasy X-2 into the depths of cheap MDF that is the cupboard in episode 140

Prior to the Cupboard of Shame reboot, Squidge had challenged both G and himself to put some titles into the Cupboard of Shame. The titles that they chose include:

• Iron Man the Movie Video Game
• WET
• Rambo: The Video Game
• Crackdown
• Final Fantasy XIII

You can hear their discussion on these games (and a few more) in episode 47: The Cupboard of Shame - here's a link to that episode. All of the "classic" Cupboard of Shame episodes - aka before Squidge's 2022 sexy reboot - can be found here.

Andrew's Chosen Game

Although Andrew has a list of games which are Cupboard of Shame worthy, one shone like a beacon when Squidge approached him to be on the show:

It didn't review particularly well, but I liked it as a guilty pleasure - and that's Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days
- AndrewD

Squidge admitted that he had never played either of the Kane & Lynch titles, because he had been blinded by the light of Borderlands. Which is quite interesting when you think about it.

Apparently, it was initially the art style which drew Andrew in:

So [Kane & Lynch :Dead Men] is like a generic looking PS3 third person shooter. It's a decent enough game - I've never played it, but from what I've seen it's a decent enough game.

But for [Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days] they completely changed it. ...it's all set in Shanghai for the majority of the time. And it's mostly at night, all neon lights and stuff... it looks amazing, and that kind of caught my eye.

And then I ended up playing it. I played it on my own, and I also played it in co-op. And it took me by surprise that a very generic third person shooter could actually be quite enjoyable. And almost film like
- AndrewD

What's So Bad About it?

Any discussion of a bad game needs to cover what’s so bad about the game. So Squidge asked, “what’s so bad about this game?” before visibly recoiling.

What's bad about this game?

Well it reviewed horrifically when it came out; it was lambasted as being this generic third person shooter that really didn't make any effort. It was almost a step back in some regards to what had come recently, like Gears of War and those kinds of third person shooters that have done things like cover mechanics.

Kane & Lynch is a straight forward third person shooter, so you just run at people at shoot them. It was super generic and came out at a time when these kinds of games were evolving. A lot of people saw it as style over substance
- AndrewD

Those are some pretty strong points, to be fair.

---

And even the story felt phoned in, apparently:

The story gets you from place to place within the game, but it's really threadbare. So you get introduced to a mob boss that you have to go meet, and you have to kill a load of people to get to. Or you have to save somebody, I think his girlfriend crops up and you have to go save her.
- AndrewD

Full Show Notes

Make sure to check out the full show notes for more discussion on the points we raise, some extra meta-analysis, and some links to related things.

What have you been playing recently? Do you agree with the anonymous review that Chief read during this episode? What would you take with you to the Thunder Plains?

Let us know on Twitter, Facebook, leave a comment on the show notes or try our brand new contact page.

Links

Here are some links to some of the things we discussed in this episode: