The Crate And Crowbar

More Animal Crossing with Pip and Chris! We talk island design, the pleasures and pitfalls of meeting your inexplicably naked heroes, put Blathers on trial for art crime, and consider the ups and downs of multiplayer island life. You can find this bonus episode on YouTube, and our intro music is, as ever, Clambake by [...]

Alex, Tom F and Graham e-gather to e-give their e-takes on the Assassin’s Creed reveal, get kicked right in the breach phase, courtesy of XCOM: Chimera Squad, and amp up the wide-men of Gears Tactics. Assassin’s Creed Valhalla has been announced. Watch the Vikings raid and pillage – but in a good way – in [...]

Tom S, Chris and Marsh evade the Gull Squad to bring you takes on the trousers of tactics spin-off XCOM: Chimera Squad, tubestation construction sim StationFlow and kraken-based illusory-victory machine Magic: The Gathering Arena. This isn’t relevant to show, but I think it’s important to say at the top of this that Tom would absolutely [...]

Tom F and Marsh are joined by the mellifluous voice of Graham Smith to have weird wives in Sigma Theory, poke fingers into Half-Life: Alyx’s fungal bird beaks and enjoy Valorant in the brief twilight that heralds our inevitable obsolescence. A new game from Firaxis comes out next week! It’s XCOM: Chimera Squad, aka Tactical [...]

Alex, Chris and both Toms (!) reach across timezones to discuss sunny getaways in Hitman 2, fraught getaways in Ori and the Will of the Wisps, and more. I’m going to be honest with you. It was very hot in my office when we recorded this episode, so I opened the window a crack. I [...]

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 [...]

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 [...]

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 [...]

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 [...]

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 [...]

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 [...]

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 [...]

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 [...]

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 [...]

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? [...]

Alex and Marsh take a jaunty journey into the depths of Hades and wander the Streets of Rogue. The RNs are very much G’d, gorillas freed and the roguelikes liked, to varying degrees. Also: patch note heresies and our favourite offal. The Half-Lifes… Half-Lives?… They’re freeeee! Some of the Half-Life: Alyx team answered questions on [...]

Tom, Chris and Marsh gather to reopen Black Mesa’s final chapters, vie to become the ultimate Tom in Slay The Spire, hoover up all the flavour text in Pillars of Eternity: Deadfire and ride the rhythm of Sayonara Wild Hearts. Let’s put this at the top: this year’s C&C Community GOTY is now online! Go [...]

It’s the end of the year! Pip, Marsh, Alex, Chris and a hologram of Tom Francis gather on a big sofa to discuss their favourite games of the year. Featuring Sekiro, Baba is You, Red Dead Redemption 2, Disco Elysium, Outer Wilds and more! This’ll be our last podcast of the year – we’ll be [...]

Alex and Chris discuss Resident Evil 3 and Twin Peaks VR before setting a course straight for the heart of men-in-helmets-land: Phoenix Point, Halo: Reach, and a little Destiny 2: Season of Dawn. Also featuring: the true pillars of any hero’s journey, the retroactive bigtown crisis, the vital importance of denying yourself the dream gnome, [...]

Tom, Marsh and two-thirds of a bottle of whiskey consider the fate of Valley of the Gods, indulge in Russo-phobic whack-a-mole in Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and ponder space, loss and buttons in Still There. Campo Santo’s Valley of the Gods is now officially on hold as its creators move onto other projects at [...]