Very nice episode.  But I have to comment on the chapters.  THERE'S TOO MANY OF THEM!

26 chapters for a 1 hr. 44 min. show?  That's an average of a new chapter every 4 minutes.  Which doesn't sound too outrageous until you factor in that about a dozen of those chapters are under 2 minutes each.  Next time there's a barrage of news--likely E3--try a segment break for every platform (i.e. Wii, DS, WiiWare, DSiWare) instead of every game.

Also, I want to say I really appreciate that Andy switched editing software from Audacity to Garageband--for purely selfish reasons.  :)  For some reasons podcasts edited in Audacity don't show up on my iPod when viewed through iTunes.  Every time I want to delete an RFN episode from my iPod I have to reset my iPod (and delete everything).  It used to be the same way for Newscast but the past few episodes show up in iTunes so I can delete them without any hassle after I'm done listening.  Very nice!

LOL...  I love chapter stops that make it easy to skip around an episode, but this was a little bit too much of a good thing.  ;D


Oh, and the original Endless Ocean did have several different types of sharks to discover - including huge Great White Sharks if you know where to find them.  It's just that sharks didn't have any effect on the game other than looking scary when they swim by unexpectedly.  In the sequel they actually affect gameplay (which is what you meant anyway, I think).

Ha, sorry for the excessive chapters.  I honestly didn't think anyone would have a problem with it.  I had some problems with Garageband on this week's episodes, but one thing Garageband does really well is make it easy to add Chapter breaks, so I thought since we had so much content, I'd spice it up with as much art as I could.

Just out of curiosity, what is it about excessive chapters that makes it inconvenient?  Does it just make it hard to actually skip around the episode because there's too much clutter?

Garageband is definitely growing on me, but I haven't worked out the kinks yet.  Thanks again for the feedback!

Maybe it depends on how people listen to the podcast.

I prefer listening to 10-20 minute segments, and being able to easily skip back and forth between those larger sections works extremely well for me.  Having smaller chapters just means I have to change my expectations and/or habits slightly.  (It would be interesting to hear if anyone particularly likes small chapter stops - because other people might find them even more useful than the larger breaks I am used to.)

By the way, I did really like the extra artwork included.  It's not a big selling point, because most of the time I'm listening and not looking at the screen - but still a nice touch.  Using short chapters to allow people to skip over potential spoilers or quickly identify content about a specific game could be a huge benefit too.  So I don't think there is any hard-and-fast rule about what is best.

I realized I alluded to the incorrect date for the DSi in the DSi XL segment. For some reason I feel like the DSi came out on April 1 instead of April 5. *shrugs* My bad.

And also, ejamer, that's what I get for not owning the original Endless Ocean. I knew there was no clear and present danger, but I was unaware that there were docile sharks.

Well, there may be a way to add art without necessarily doing a chapter break.  I'll continue to play around with garageband and see what my options are.  I'm still sort of trying to make the podcast the same way I did with Audacity, and as I continue to learn Garageband, I think it will change the way I physically assemble the show. 

Garageband was being particularly buggy this week, unfortunately.  I'm glad I was able to get the show out by Friday afternoon, because I was out of town all weekend and it would have had to have waited until Sunday otherwise. 

Chapter breaks should come when the topic of discussion changes, and so, if you cover a lot of topics, you should have a lot of chapters.

My only complaint is that I was a little disappointed when the show just ended, as I've come to expect an RFN-style stinger at the end. I realize that the material for that isn't always there, but you should try to include something like that. 

Was the part where I compared Spotto! to Beat-'em and Eat-'em in the podcast? Because if it was, there's your stinger...as a part of the show.

I think RFN's stingers also come out of Greg's harder editing. I know with Newscast, we generally don't cut as much.

Yeah, the Beat 'em and Eat 'em sequence would have been the stinger if this had been RFN. I guess it makes sense that you can't really do it if you don't cut much out of the discussion.

I did stingers for some of the first ones I edited.  Around episode 6 or 7 or so I stopped finding ideal material for it, and after that I just got out of the habit.  I was in a bit of a hurry to get this one done before I left for the weekend.  In the future, I'll definitely try to put something on the end.

When I add new files to my iPod it loses its place in the current song and starts from the beginning.  Not a big deal if it's a 5 minute song, but if it's a 2 hour podcast it can be tricky finding out where I left off.  So I really like chapters because then I just have to remember I'm halfway through chapter 4 or whatever.  But when there are 26 chapters it can be difficult to find the right one and annoying because if I try to skip to the next chapter within the first two seconds of any given chapters it just restarts that chapter rather than moving to the next one.

Right on, I can get behind that.  I'll keep that in mind next time around, Vudu. 

I'm just happy that people appreciate the enhanced version of the podcast, so I will definitely do what I can to make them appreciate it in the best possible way. 

Also, you might notice that this week I took a break from the jokey chapter titles and just stuck to the cold, hard facts.  Is there any preference there?  Do you prefer chapter titles that lay the info out, or should I continue to try too hard to be funny? :)

The big sharks were very well hidden in the first Endless Ocean - I'm pretty sure you could finish the game without ever seeing them.  You have to stow away in the open hull of a drifiting ghost ship, which carries you to an off-map location with sunken ships to explore and what looked like crashed WW2 aircraft.  There were some great whites, an orca that you could tame and train, and some artifacts to discover.  The trick is finding the ghost ship: I think there were parts to a pirate's compass or something that you had to uncover first?  Hopefully the sequel has neat things and hidden areas to find also.

Oh, great discussion about Shiren on Wii too.  I've been wondering about picking that game up (I'm generally a fan of rogue-likes) but think I'm going to stick with Chocobo's Dungeon for now instead.

ejamer, the sequel has SO MUCH to do. I found only one of the many legendary creatures. I think there's 10 of them in total, probably more.

I'll echo appreciation for the Shiren talk. It was very interesting and once again pushed me towards trying one of these, especially as I seem to have more patience for difficult games (like Blaster Master: Overdrive).

Have you managed to avoid Mystery Dungeon games completely? Damn...

I think it is the kind of game that people have to try before they chastise the genre. It seems like Andy is getting into the spirit of the genre, but James and I detested it.

I've mentioned this on the show, but I was interested in this game when I saw it at a WebEX demo in January. If I were to ever try the genre again, this game would be it.

Glad to hear Shiren's getting some love. I just want to add that the revival herbs explicitly tell you that they're a passive item that triggers on death: just check the item description. I'm somewhat alarmed to hear that you don't get more of them though, since I've already gone through two and I'm only on the second guardian.

Perhaps I missed that in the item description.  Thanks for the notice. 

And I'm sure more revival herbs exist in the game, I just haven't found any, which tells me that they're pretty rare.

On the subject of Retro Game Challenge, I think this video sums up my thoughts perfectly.

http://www.wired.com/video/retro-game-challenge/13389089001

You call Metroid Other M a sequel to Super Metroid, if that was true I'd love it but I'm worried that it will be more of a prequel to Metroid Fusion. I hated Fusion as a Metroid game and Sakamoto is already talking about Other M being a lot like Fusion in terms of structure. I'm not worried about giant boobs or atrocious stories, I'm worried about losing the structure of Metroid that is the defining feature of the series for me. Without that it's just a regular action game in Metroid clothing.

I'm worried that she WON'T have giant boobs. LOL