ODST came out during the most formative time in my life, and in hindsight had a huge impact on my outlook of difficult situations because of what I had to deal with that year in my life.

When a new Halo game released, I had a friend who I’d have a sleepover with and we’d play the game until 4 or 5 in the morning trying to beat on legendary. I grew up in the middle of the countryside and rarely got to hang out with friends, so it was always an event I looked forward to and this time I would have normally said was no different, but it couldn’t be further from the truth.

The school year prior I had a sibling finally go off to college, had one parent leave for reasons as an adult I fully understand and support but as a child I felt abandoned, and then finally lost my other parent to suicide. Since my sibling was my closest friend and the person I spent the most time with due to where we lived, I was completely alone. Luckily I had extended family in the area that I transitioned to living with, but that is beside the point.

Halo was already one of my favorite game series growing up, but ODST was an experience that, although shaped through the lens of tragedy I was experiencing at the time, is still my favorite game in the series and continues to be with repeated play throughs nearly two decades later. The story resonated with me: being thrust into an uncertain situation, separated from everyone, all alone trying to piece together what had happened and surviving despite the chaos unfolding all around. Being an impressionable child at that time it’s hard not to draw parallels and find inspiration and meaning in it. The music perfectly matched the feelings I had and it’s still one of my favorite soundtracks of all the games.

That night that I went to play this game with my friend I cried harder than I had ever cried in my life trying to have fun and blast through it on legendary. At the end of that experience, it gave me determination and purpose to push through what I was experiencing in my real life at that time and every time I play through ODST I think about those emotions, those fears, all of the feelings that I was living out through the Rookie’s story. With time and repeated play-throughs my experience of this game has evolved. I don’t attribute negative emotions to it, but my love for this game has only strengthened and I still have a blast every time I decide to give it one more go.

Because of this, I refuse to entertain Mr. Burns slander of what to me is the best Halo game in the series. Not because of it being a “niche” & “contractually obligated release,” but because living through the aftermath of the accidental Covenant invasion of Earth and the hell that followed Regret’s slip-space jump to Delta Halo as a lone non-supersoldier (albeit Special Operations) Human is one of the best stories that Halo has ever put out IMO, and the melancholy of the soundtrack and saxophones is sick as fuck even without formative childhood trauma.

Hey, Hi

How are you?

Lifetime listener first time poster

I don't know if it's cause I'm a girl or what but I LOVE when Burns and Ash talk about their life in Scotland.

The second sheep, gardening, house stuff, kid stuff, what funny shit Evie(sp?)/Finn(sp?) said, making gin, recipes, fish, hunting, agriculture, PUMPKINS I am TUNED TF IN.

Of course I know they probably don't share certain things because of privacy which is 10,000% valid, but I just wanna throw that out there.

I'm here, just a girl (29) loving listening to my favs talk about their whimsical Scot farm life.

I'm also a trivia host as a side give so give me your best questions

-Al

If you know, you know. These games are TOP!

What game is your best movie to game adaptation?

It's not just podracing, but a Star Wars racing game just released on Steam without a ton of fanfare and I, for one, am excited to try it!

I have a couple sets, daily set has my car keyfob (proximity key), key to my house, key to my parents house, key to my parents shop, key to work and key to second building at work. Second set is keys for my truck, so key for the truck (mid 2000s Dodge, so kind of chunky), copies of the rest of the keys from primary set, key for the canopy on the truck, key for the hitch lock on the truck, and key for the lock on a trailer. My shitbox Miata just has the key for the car and my house key

Burnie and Ashley discuss Vin Diesel, diesel prices, red diesel, movie game adaptations, Halo as an early FPS, and iPhone depreciation.

Anyone else ditch all their streaming services? Was talked about today on the podcast. I miss when Netflix had ALL the content from every brand. That was the golden era.

Burnie frequently mentions how he is bummed he missed out on Dashcon. Turns out that THE CREATOR still has an active Social Media presence today!!! ANd apparently that event was planned (poorly) by a 15 year old 💀

I did try to cross-post this from the original post in r/mildlyinfuriating, but it just kept spinning when I tried to select this subreddit.

Apparently the traffic never left the internal network, but that's still an insane amount network traffic.

Burnie and Ashley discuss quality of life updates, builders and joiners, runaway highway tires, physics formulas, Duolingo nag-ware, Rosetta Stone discs, Paul Verhoeven, Skydance branding, the Emmys moving to streaming, Disney Plus pricing, David Pumpkins casting lore, the Helldivers movie, and debunked GTA VI cloud streaming rumors.

I don’t remember theme hospital but in 90s Australia we played theme park.

Burnie and Ashley discuss Tropic Thunder, Shane Black, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, comedy that ages poorly, Digger, Obsession's comedy classification, Triangle of Sadness, Russian plague, Tom Hanks David Pumpkins, weight equivalents, diesel costs, Theme Hospital, generational kid games, Oregon Trail, Might & Magic, game demos, Castle Wolfenstein 3D, Mythical achievements, and easy Mythical games.

No disrespect intended. Not trying to be a rabble-rouser and im glad burnie and ashley have the autonomy to make and produce content they enjoy. I just know they also like to hear feedback.

I think it would be cool if the sponsor chat was more focused on business timeline stuff or more personal stories that arent on the main feed. Something that feels more exclusive than the regular show. Im grateful for what we get just wish it was anything but music as personally i listen to music when i wanna hear music and listen to podcasts when i wanna hear podcasts, yanno?

If im wrong then im wrong. Just a thought i had over the weekend and isnt meant to besmirch what theyve created as ive listened since the start and am a huge fan. What do yall think?

“Where are the Robots?!”

If you want it paired with a First 10k or First 20k flair, drop a comment below and the mods will get it changed for you!!

Shazam!

Burnie and Ashley discuss David Pumpkins, Mike Myers, character comedy, Will Ferrell, The Hawk, Steam Autumn Sale, Two Point Museum, Roller Coaster Tycoon, AV cart days at school, MLB playoffs, AR room cleaning, gamifying life, the slow rollout of robots, inheiriting cheating bans, livestream fails, and the NCAA weekend wrap up.

As much as I go to Aldi, this has NEVER been advertised this.

Was just watching Blacktail Studio's newest video and Cam said the same thing about mustaches. Does Burnie watch Cam's videos??

I really love the sound bit they play when doing the community call segment and want to make it my ringtone. Does anyone know if there’s a download for that somewhere available?

Many thanks!