'Big Walk,' 'Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls,' and 'Beast of Reincarnation' Reactions. Plus, the Greatest Gaming Glow-Ups. | Button Mash
The Ringer-VerseShow Notes
Fresh off their exhilarating cooperative playthrough of 'Big Walk,' Ben, Matt James, and Steve Ahlman hit the highlights of a busy week in gaming. (Is there any other kind?) First, a slightly self-loathing Ben comes clean about his purchase of a PS5 Pro. Then they share their impressions and reviews of 'Big Walk,' a co-op puzzler and potential Game of the Year candidate, as well as the long-awaited return of 2D tag-team Marvel fighting in 'Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls' and Pokémon maker Game Freak's new action-RPG, 'Beast of Reincarnation.' Finally, in honor of the 10th anniversary of 'No Man's Sky,' they share their all-time top five games that made major improvements after release, as well as the five games they wish had gotten glow-ups but never did.
Intro (0:00)'Big Walk' (9:00)'Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls' (37:39'Beast of Reincarnation' reactions (57:31)Greatest gaming glow-ups (1:13:51)Outro (1:45:27)
Host: Ben LindberghGuests: Matt James and Steve AhlmanProducer: Devon RenaldoAdditional Production Support: Arjuna Ramgopowell Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
More from The Ringer-Verse
Ben and Matt James break down the good, bad, and ugly of gaming’s recent reckoning with AI-driven development, decompilation, and cloning, and assess whether it will fundamentally reshape the medium’s economic and creative model. Then they provide their impressions of the newly released ‘Final Fantasy Resonance’ and ‘Nintendo Switch Sports Resort’ and react in real time to the dissolution of storied studio Bioware. Finally, Ben sets the scene for 'GTA VI' by bringing on The Atlantic’s Jeremy Gordon to reminisce about the October 2001 release of ‘Grand Theft Auto III’ and discuss how it altered the trajectory of open-world gaming and created the ‘GTA’ juggernaut.
The Boys are back and they’re jumping into the next two episodes of ‘VisionQuest’. They discuss the Vision we knew from ‘Avengers’ versus the Vision we see in this show, rate the kid-pluck level so far, and have a lively debate about the MCU character ethics.
To live is to pod; to pod is to live! First, Ben, Steve Ahlman, and Matt James react to the latest 'GTA VI' and 'Ocarina of Time' trailers and talk about Ben's hands-on session with the 'Ocarina' remake. Then, they share recommendations for a few recently released games that fit a Halloween theme. After that, they honor the 40th anniversaries of 'Castlevania' and 'Metroid' and the release of 'Castlevania: Belmont's Curse' by bringing on GameSpot's Steve Watts to discuss what "Metroidvania" means, debate whether it's a good name for the genre, review 'Belmont's Curse,' advise a listener on when to look up game solutions, and do a draft of the greatest Metroidvanias across several categories. Finally, Ben and Daniel Chin share their spoiler-free reviews of the big-screen 'Street Fighter' reboot.(00:00) Intro(00:13) 'GTA'/'Ocarina of Time'/spooky-season games(27:42) The Metroidvania Draft(1:54:49) Daniel Chin joins for 'Street Fighter'Host: Ben LindberghGuests: Matt James, Steve Ahlman, Steve Watts, and Daniel ChinSenior Producer: Steve AhlmanSenior Production Supervision: Arjuna Ramgopowell Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
The Boys are back and they’re returning to the MCU! They give you all of their thoughts on the first two episodes of ‘VisionQuest,’ diving into the new ensemble cast of Marvel AIs, the return of Ultron, and some of the Marvel Easter eggs we’ve seen so far.
The Boys are back and they are coming to you from New York City! They give you their thoughts on what they’ve seen so far at NYCC 2026, including news from 'Daredevil: Born Again,' 'X-Men '97,' and the DC-Skydance merger.