I can't be more proud to be the head coach of this football team. That's right there in the second half is our identity, sir. Believe in it, practice it, preach it, demand it out of each other. We write our stories. Intercept it, fire it.  We don't panic, we don't freak out, put the next guy in there. Oh, God, Trill! Diante Foreman! If you fight like you did in the second half, I'll take you in any street fighting.  We're going to win a ton of games. One play at a time, one practice at a time, win every day, not just every game, win every day. We're going to go all the way, bro. You've got to take it, one week at a time. Let's go, baby. Hey, Titans on three. One, two, three, Titans! For minutes, we'll have a full show. Welcome, everybody, to the Titans Blitz. We are live downtown Nashville, Nissan Stadium. Where the AFC runs through, right? It goes through Nissan. Listen, what a year it's been. It's been an amazing season. It's had its ups and its downs. It's then some, but we are number one in the AFC. We got to take care of business this weekend against the Cincinnati Bengals, and we'll talk about that on the show coming up. But as you can see, I'm without a co-host. This show has been incredible for five seasons. Eddie George, the man, sat right here, hosting the show with me. It was great, but we love you, Eddie. He went off the go coach TSU, proud of him. And this year, we've had a revolving door of guest hosts. They've all been great. We love each and every one of them. This week, though, you think I'm flying solo, right? Actually, we thought we would have a special guest. We'd change it up a little bit. This time, we thought we'd bring in a, well, a college coach. What am I kidding? Ladies and gentlemen, Eddie George! It's like I couldn't string that out. I had to bring the man out. Have a seat, man. This feels right. Yeah, it does. Yeah, man. Like old times, brother, like old times. Like old times. The seat still feels nice. Had a few guys in there. CJ2K was here, Marmary, Annie, Keith, Boyle, you know, the whole gang, this one. But we missed you. I missed being here. I cannot lie, missing the smiling faces. Here in the Titan Chance, the Eddie Chance. What a wood first seat. Wow, Eddie. It was supposed to be packed this weekend in the house, so. The team's been busy. Yeah, they have. We'll get to it, but real quick.  How was it? How was it? I mean, you know. I remember you telling me about it when they offered you the job. It was right here in this seat. Right in this seat. I was like, oh man. And then you took it and your expectations going in, coming out of it.  You know what? I'm still getting my sea legs under me. Okay. But it's been fulfilling because I have a chance to pour into the lives of these young men and give back to the game that gave me so much. Yeah.  It's about those kids. So yeah, man, you did it. It was a wonderful year. A lot of highs and lows learned a lot through the losses. Yeah. I mean, to learn how to win, you have to learn how to lose. And I've learned it as a player, but now as a coach, I can't necessarily impose my physical will on anybody. I have to do, yeah, I have to... So that's a great theory. I have to explain, I have to encourage, I have to learn my players and how to motivate them individually to influence them, to do the right things. And really teaching and preaching to them to be better people. And as a byproduct of that, I will get what I want on the football field. So it's been gratifying. And it came at a time in my life where I lost both my parents last year. So it's the same, like two months apart. So I needed that more so than they needed me. So it was a true gift. Wow. We are honored and humbled by your presence back. We're glad to be back, man. Absolutely. It's good to see you. Well, for all that you've been through, all that you've been going through, have you been able to watch the Titans? I have, you know, on Saturdays after we break down, excuse me, Sundays we break down the game from Saturday. I had the game on. I'm checking them out and seeing what they're doing. And unfortunately, we lost our big dog and Derek Henry earlier this season, but the train just rolls. It did. It was amazing to watch. They put together Deontay Foreman, Don Troll Hillier. I mean, they were, you know, Jeremy Nichols there. Anybody, they kept the game plan moving and we were still putting up big numbers on the ground. Well, and that's a testament to Mike Rabel, who should be the NFL coach of the year. Yes! Sitting in a seat of it as a head coach, when you lose bodies like that, when you lose your best player, you're dealing with your best receiver coming in and out, Julio Jones was in and out. You have now have implemented a system that you can, that's tried and true.  The defense really came of age this season. How they only garnered one all pro or pro-world players beyond the AFC. Right, yeah. That's, that's ridiculous. Colk, it's seven and where are they? Watching. Yeah, watching. So, but, but I say all that to say that they've been able to establish a system that anybody can come in and do their thing in there. The number one seed, the AFC, they didn't just make the playoffs, given all the challenges with the roster. They're the number one seed in the AFC. Hadn't been helping. Took ownership of it. Remarkable job by Mike Brayboy. Absolutely, absolutely. Oh, real quick, real quick, we got the guy. We got to go to break in a second, but we got our man back. We got Derek back. You know, what do you think has been going through his head watching, knowing what he can do for this offense? I mean, what's been, what he's been going through over the last eight, nine weeks. I mean, he's been trying to get back. He went dark off of social media, just trying to get healthy. And I hadn't been in that position. You know, I know what the mind said he's been in. I'm going to say that I'm glad he's back, but let's ease him into it. Treat him like a third strength running back, give him some touches here or there. If he plays, I mean, listen, he's not in sync with the offensive line. He's not game ready. He might break off one or two big plays, but to what avail, they may win this game. They're going to win this game, but how will he respond after that the next week? You want to have him for the long term, especially next season in years to come. So let's be cautious. I will say this. Just his presence alone is going to make an impact, just like your presence alone on this show is making an impact. And he's Georgia's back. Just a little break right now. We've got one Titan's bless. Under the sides, look around. Here's some nice on. Remember, they love us. We'll be right back. Cannon Hill looks left, fires. Julio Jones, tights down. Titans finally, as Simmons had him, was going to take him to the ground. Stafford's winged it right into the arms of Long, who nearly got into the end zone. He fires that field. Bonnie to the Titans. Let's come into your live from Nissan Stadium. Lance Smith back with Eddie George, the one and only. Good to have you back, man. Glad to be back. I stole this from one of the fans. Yeah, I got that from the audience. This is sweet right there. I love it. It's nice. Isn't it too heavy? You got it? You handle it? Of course, got a big neck. You can handle it. You can handle it. Man, so you remember this segment we used to do with it? Yeah, it was like a favorite. Listen, this year, we had to mix things up with you being gone. We had CJ2K here and they made me draw against CJ2K. Really? The segment coming up, Vague Van Gogh, is, you'll see, features child artists drawing their favorite Titans players and seeing if they can guess who it is. But they made me do it in front of this crowd with CJ and CJ1. I didn't know he was an artist. Really? Yeah. He's too old to be in this segment. But right now, check out the latest edition of Vague Van Gogh. Wait, hold the phone. There's no way. There's no way. The red cleats, the red gloves, I see the muscles. There's only a couple people that have red cleats. I like the touch. I like the night design right here. Got long legs here. Looks like he's doing a stiff arm. This one gives it away right away for me. Why? Because the ball's tucked high and tight. You might think I'd be saying the stiff arm.  But the king also loves fundamentals and techniques. And with the fundamentals techniques, you notice that ball is high and tight with the chop or the rig as other defensive players would take it. This is an easy guess for me. I'm going to go with myself because I'm a red glove, red cleat kind of guy. Got to be Derek Henry. I got to say Derek Henry. I'm going to go with Derek Henry on this one. Tough torso, but this is going to be Derek Henry. Oh, the stiff arm. This is D-Hand. Which kind of makes sense, because this is stiff arm arm. So I think I should have got that from the jump, but. Derek Henry, which Eddie knew right away. The legs gave it away. The legs. The legs, the big torso and the stiff arm, yeah. It's better than I could do. All right, how's your trivia knowledge? Ooh, I'm a little rusty, but I'm always good to go. We've got all sorts of new segments on this. We've been mixing it up a little bit. Just changing things up a little bit. Just a little bit. All right, we've got the Titans trivia gauntlet on the other side. Do not go far. Titans Blitz will be right back to the Titans Blitz. I'm hanging out with a few new friends of mine. Dan and Taran, and it is time now to put them through the Titans trivia gauntlet. Perhaps we'll make that less spooky next year, but it's playoff time, so get serious, get scared. Dan, how you doing? All right, how are you? I'm good, you ready for this? Yes, sir. Love your Titans? I do. You better, Taran? All day. You better say it, all right. Sign up, sign up. That is the word. All right, here we go. Dan, you won the Rock, Paper, Scissor contest. To start this thing, I've got six questions, three questions apiece for each of you. Then I got a final question worth two points, and the winner gets a nice prize at the end. You ready? Here we go, Dan. First question for you. They start easy, they get harder. Which team, Dan, is not in the Titans division? Jaguars, Texans, Browns, or Colts? Browns. Browns, that is correct. Used to be. Not anymore. One point for you, Dan. Question to you, Taran. Here we go. Which team is not in the Tennessee Titans conference? Patriots, Bengals, Chiefs, or Packers? Packers. That's right. There we go. Ooh, it's all tied up. Question number three. Here you go, Dan. What is the name of the Tennessee Titans current offensive coordinator? Is that Arthur Smith, Dean Pease, Todd Downing, or Shane Bowen? Arthur Smith. Right there, going with Arthur Smith. Arthur Smith is now head coach of Atlanta. All right, Taran, a chance to take the lead here. Question number four. What team employed John Robinson immediately before he became the general manager of the Titans? Was that the Buccaneers, the Patriots, the Falcons, or the Panthers? Patriots. Patriots. The Patriots, it was actually the Buccaneers. It's all tied still, though. Next question for you, Dan. Here we go, look to the screen. Which of these Titans attended a college closest to the North Pole? Which of these Titans attended a college closest to the North Pole? Was that Jeffrey Simmons, Christian Fulton, Ryan Tannehill, or Taylor LaJuan? Taylor LaJuan? Taylor LaJuan, yes, Michigan, that is closest. Everybody else is south of the Mason-Dixon line. Okay, Taran, next up for you. Reading from the screen, here we go. Who was the Titans' opponent? When Rob Baronas set an NFL record with eight field goals in a game. Eight field goals in that game. Set a record, Rob Baronas did. Was that against the Chiefs, the Texans, the Rams, or the Dolphins? Texans? It was the Texans! He says with somewhat confidence. Next up, Dan, here we go. Final question, you each get to answer this one. Prior to Derek Henry, who was the only other Titans player to end a game with an overtime touchdown run? Prior to Derek Henry, only the Titans player to end a game with a touchdown run. Chris Brown, Eddie George, Vince Young, Chris Johnson. Let's say you. Eddie George. Eddie George, Taran, you get to answer as well for two points. You gonna change it or do you want to say somebody else? We'll go Eddie.  It's actually, you may know it, Vince Young! All right, for the tiebreaker here, Dan. Closest, here we go. You can't go over, how many passing yards does Ryan Tannell have for the season? Take it, take it, wild swing. 950. 950. Taran. 3,500. It's actually 3,500 and 3,700. He was very close. Taran is a big winner this evening. And he did a fine job, but Ryan's been slinging it a little bit more than that. How about an autographed item from one another than Eddie George?  The crowd's still very excited. Lance Smith and Eddie George back with you. Eddie, it's so great to have you back. Man, glad to be back, brother.  I forgot how fast the show goes. It goes fast, doesn't it? Yes, it does. Live TV, and the season goes fast. Man, we're here at the end of it. It was also very strange as we having the number one seed just watching people play football, knowing that you're in it. But just twiddling your thumbs. Feels good. Yeah, it feels good. Well, the game is fast approaching now, taking on these bangles. First of all, we lost to them last season. Is there any going back to that? Is there any motivation just from that loss? That's a different team, different era, different time. It's just bigger than that at this point. That was in the regular season. I think at the time, they were what, three, they had won three games or two games, something like that. So this is a completely different animal at this time. No pun intended to bangle. But they're playing with a great deal of confidence. They're balanced offensively. Joe Barrow is playing probably the best football of any quarterback right now. I mean, you can, he's the future of, but just weapons galore. Yeah, I mean, the receiving core is deadly. Chase, who's a rookie, he's having a phenomenal year. The conviction is awesome on the ground. And of course, Barrow is, again, he's playing great football. There's going to be a great test for us in our secondary and of course, they've got to make him uncomfortable in the pocket. Now see, that's just the, okay, so yeah. Jamar Chase, over 1,400 yards this season, 13 touchdowns, T. Higgins, over 1,000 yards, six touchdowns, Tyler Boyd, 828 yards, five touchdowns. It's a three-headed receiving monster. And yeah, you mentioned him as Jamar Chase is a rookie, but they have such chemistry. That's just a rookie thing happening there. They know each other. Jamar, he's just throwing it up. Joe's just throwing it up for Jamar, knowing that he's going to come down with it. Well, the key is going to be this, offensively for, or defensively for the Titans is to make them one-dimensional. If they provide balance, if Joe Mixon is ripping off four yards of pop and able to break off big runs, that sets up the pass. Now, I like our chances better when the ball is in the air because three things can happen. You can catch it, get interception or incomplete, and two of them are bad. So it'll be a good thing for us. So I like that. Offensively, we got to protect the football. And we got to play tight in football. We got to one time a possession because that means that potent offense and Joe Mixon and Joe Burrow and all those receivers, those who usually be catching dogs, are on the sidelines and we have a chance to control the ball game. You always say, and that just echoes in my head, it's one of the trenches, it's one of the trenches, it's one of the trenches. And this season, it's never been more evident and we're only rushing four most of the time.  Jeffy Simmons not make all pro is beyond me. I mean, again, I'm just... Can I just say as a fan, I'm glad he didn't because he's going to take it out on everybody that he stands across from. No question, no question. Man, yeah. And just overall, number one seed, talk to the rookies for a second. Talk to the rookies about what they're stepping on. Well, I mean, listen, number one seed really doesn't mean anything. All it means is you punched your ticket to play an extra week, you got a bye week.  So it was going to be a great game to watch. Yeah, no, it's going to be an incredible game to watch.  Also, to get you ready for it Friday 6th and Peabody, check it out on your screen right here. 6.30 to 9.00 PM, a little pep rally action. We are going to get ready for this game. Listen, number one seed, home field advantage throughout the playoffs. We got to make a statement. Make a statement. We want to win. We want to win. Because we want another one next week. Eddie George is so good to have you back, my friend.  Tighten up, everybody.


What's everyone's take down here welcome back to another comic book sale video this is going to be number five and this is going to be the last one before I announced what my total sales were so far and announce a new lot that I recently did purchase but that's going to be in another video today is just going to be about my recent comic book sales from the first lots that I did purchase back in 2021 so we're just going to dive right into it. At first we have 50 Marvel comic books that is part of my mystery boxes not sold for $80 which I tend to lower my prices little by little to get a lot of things sold. So for my mystery boxes with the new lot of 4000 comics that I did purchase I am likely not going to be doing that many mystery boxes until the end and see what's left over for now it's going to be different lots and selling individually. So this one here is going to be probably one of the last mystery boxes I do sell there is a couple more in this video I'm going to be mentioning but that is great profit 50 comics for $80. Next up is going to be 67 Avengers comics this person here did message me I think I had it listed a little bit higher than this but they sent me an offer of $100 and I took it. They told me they're purchasing it not for them but they're purchasing it to give to a friend who is a huge fan of Avengers so I love whenever people do that. Buy things and give them to people as gifts and it's just amazing so keeping the comic collecting alive they're a fan of Avengers so their friend bought them something for a birthday gift so that's pretty cool. Next is going to be X-Men volume 2 issue 1 to 12. This one here I realized immediately after I listed it I probably could have got a lot more money for it but I already had some days interested in somebody who's already going to be sending me an e-transfer I'm already committed to that buyer and I wasn't going to decline them and then raise my prices a little bit higher. Now I did sell it for $45 which to me seemed fair but I had a lot of people messaging for these right after they sold. This one here I believe had to be shipped to Montreal and I'll get to that in a second talking more about selling in Montreal and Quebec in general. But these ones here I had a ton of people messaging me a ton of people wanted them and then after I told people they sold people told me they were worth a lot more than what I sold them for. I didn't know I guess I didn't do my research I just sold them at what I thought was a fair price and they sold fairly quick. Now talking about Montreal and selling in Quebec in general I'm no longer going to be selling as much as I once was in Quebec in Montreal. There was one page called comic books Montreal or something along those lines that I was posting in since I bought my first lots and started reselling comics and I've had great success I've had a lot of people about I'd say 25% of my sales was coming from Quebec and the Montreal area and shipping was no problem. I charged fair prices for shipping fair prices for my comics and everybody that I dealt with was happy but the admin made the page more strict and you have to live in Quebec to be able to sell on the page which I live in Ottawa so that is Ontario so they wouldn't allow me to post anymore which to me sucks I don't understand it they said it was a lot more Ontario people flooding the group but whenever I went on it's a lot more people selling crappy comics that are flooding the group not necessarily somebody that's honest from Ontario but regardless most of my sales now are staying in Ontario or out west Alberta and Vancouver that's where a lot of my sales do come from as well. So we did sell those ones again I probably could have got more but $45 for 12 comics I thought was a great deal and obviously I guess they got a great deal as well. Next is going to be six Wolverine comics these ones here sold for $20 which I thought was a fair price and I was glad to see them gone. In the new lots I did buy there is a lot more Wolverine so I will have to go through and sort and list those as well but a lot more great ones to be sold there. Next is going to be 14 Aquaman and 9 Flash comics that sold for $50 which I thought was a great deal. They're more of the newer ones I think if I had to guess 2010 and up somebody just wanted them. I ended up selling them for what I thought was overpriced but to them they had a great deal and that's what they offered me so that's what I sold them for. Next is going to be another $50 comic book mystery box this one sold for $80 this one here had a lot of Marvel and DC which is pretty much what I have left of my first lots but it did have about 10 image comics as well which they did request so that was great to see that sold. Next is a $50 comic book mystery box that's sold on eBay because I do have those listed on eBay as well with the eBay fees and shipping reduced that equals out to be $66 which is what I earned from these ones so a little bit less than selling them locally because locally it's just cash or e-transfers but selling on eBay I do have the eBay fees I do have the shipping I do have the fees on top of the shipping so it's a little bit more of a struggle of course but that was still a great deal that one had a lot more of the lower end Marvel in it but some pretty decent ones X-Men issue number one for volume two which I did have a couple doubles of and a few other great ones as well so the value was there for them but it was a little bit less because it solds on eBay. Next is a $25 comic book mystery box that's sold for $40 this one here is a pretty decent box originally they wanted a $50 comic box I waited about two two and a half weeks since they messaged last so I decided to send a lot of people after a couple weeks if somebody was interested I'll send them a message some people just forgets just confirming if they're still interested they said they were but they only wanted 25 comics so I told them the price for that was $40 and they did come and take those ones from me Next is one that I did sell on eBay and it did pretty good it was a single comic and that is Pit Hulk number one which sold for $10 which to me was great I honestly didn't think it was going to ever sell it was listed for quite some time I was going to reduce it and list it locally for about $5 to see if there was any interest locally but even after fees and shipping I still got $10 profit for this item and I only paid $0.40 for this book so to me that was great Next is going to be five She-Hulk comics which again these ones here is another case of I probably should have listed them for a little bit more or did my research and seen what they were worth these five comics She-Hulk comics I sold them for $20 and this person from out of the province messaged me I think he was from Alberta if I remember correctly and he wandered them ships so he paid for the shipping plus the $20 and then I had a bunch of people messaged me after I already got the e-transfer and I already listed it as sold I still had people messaging me and I just had to tell everybody it was sold and then others told me that they were probably worth a little bit more than what I sold them for but regardless I did make a great sale that's all profit to me so I thought that was awesome Next up is going to be Bishop comics I think this was issue 1 to 14 and I think it was just missing one somewhere in the middle these ones sold for $25 which I thought was a great deal they obviously were a collector of Bishop and other X-Men characters so that was awesome to see those finally sell those were from I think the first lot that I did purchase to resell so finally those are gone and the last one here there's other ones on this video but this is the last mystery box that I did sell it's another 50 comic book mystery box and at this time this is when I started to reduce my prices so for the 50 comic book mystery box which is mostly all Marvel and a few DC sold for $70 I think I'm going to reduce my prices once again to around $60 to see if I can get some more sales of the last comics I have just to kind of liquidate them a little bit more but it is awesome to see people are still interested in my mystery boxes I even had somebody that I bought from or somebody that sold somebody that bought from me in the past mystery boxes and they asked if I was getting out of it because they wanted to get some more in the future and I said no I still have mystery boxes for now just not a lot of comics left for mystery boxes so if you want some get them while I have the comics for them because what I have left now is going to be sold separately not in mystery boxes at least not until the end so I did sell those there then we do have this is from the new lots which I wasn't going to include this video but why not 32 Punisher comics sold for $90 which to me was amazing now I did have about 60 Punisher comics and I did list them for a lot higher but I had somebody the only person that messaged for them said they only needed a few so they picked out the 32 they needed usually I don't do that but since it was a $90 sale and they were committed to buying them I decided to split up my lots and I do have to relist it but to me that was a great sale so for 32 comics $90 which is roughly $3 a piece which is where I want to be and then we also have 40 Daredevil comics that I did sell this person here at first I thought they were just a collector or something then they said they also liked Spider-Man so I told them I do have Spider-Man as well shared them the listing at first I only mentioned that I had Daredevil we agreed on the price of $140 then whenever they asked about Spider-Man I did tell them how many Spider-Man I had that I was asking a little bit more for them and I told them the price then they said they just wanted the Daredevil and it turns out to be for his kid who just likes to draw the comics so fingers crossed that he's not opening up the books putting a page down and drawing and tracing them that would be brutal but he wanted them at that price I'm going to sell them because that's what they were worth it equaled out to be roughly $3 each something like that and I thought to me that was a great price for these books even though it's not going to a collector or anything at that to me if he would have asked me for a mystery box that would have been more appropriate for if you're just going to be drawing them but he wanted Daredevil so I ended up selling them to him so these are all of the recent comic book sales that I did do and this is going to be the last comic book sales video that I'm going to be doing for a while the only reason I'm doing that is because the next video I'm going to be talking about sales is going to be the total of the first three comic book lots that I did purchase I'm going to be talking about how many comics in total I did sell possibly some of the great comics that were inside some of the more valuable comics and also talking about what my total profit was for the first three lots and talk more in depth of the new comics that I did purchase and what is inside so hope you guys enjoyed this video hope you guys enjoy this kind of series I do on the channel and I'll see you guys in the next video please take care peace


Hey everyone, today I want to do a shorter video talking about Sony's latest first-party hit Ghost of Tsushima. It's one of the rare open-world collectathons that I ended up having mostly a really good time with. It's also one of those types of games that's almost surgically designed to bore and piss me off in equal measure. Parts of this game are a 10, and then other parts of the game are a negative 6 million, and today we're going to talk it all out and see if we can arrive at a final, totally subjective score on the plenimeter. Incidentally in the background here you've seen some gameplay from West of Dead, which someone in the comments recommended to me, and also from the games Carrion and Hellpoint, which I've been playing and might make videos about. Other than that, I think I'll be returning to the best of the generations list, and I'm probably going to make a video about Shadow Warrior 3, and whether we should hope it to be more like 2 or more like 1, Ghost of Tsushima. After the logo. It's to have a hook. My most viewed video is my review of the game Rage 2, which is weird I think, and is kind of annoying because it's not even one of my good ones. In that video I talk about how I'm pretty ambivalent about open world games. I do not like the new Assassin's Creed games at all. In fact it blows me away that they review so well when they are so mediocre. I did not like Far Cry 5 that much because I think it's worse than every other Far Cry game. I didn't like Red Dead 2 because I found it boring and empty and I thought the combat was just flat out bad, but I did like Rage 2. I liked it a ton, and I loved Horizon Zero Dawn. Now Rage 2 and Horizon Zero Dawn are structurally basically identical to Far Cry and Acy Odyssey.  So why is that? Why was I unable to finish Acy Odyssey, was bored most of my time with Far Cry 5 and had to push myself through Red Dead Redemption 2 to get to the end of its admittedly excellent story. While at the same time loving Rage 2 and super looking forward to playing Horizon again at 60fps and 1440p. So what's the difference? Well actually I don't think it's all that hard to explain. A few of these games have a rock solid hook that they do as well as any other game and others like Acy Odyssey are big piles of mediocre. Acy Odyssey was a tremendously huge game that didn't do anything badly, it's just that everything it did was basically okay. Well, okay isn't good enough to carry me through 70 hours. Rage 2 is a great, a great shooter. Horizon has a fantastic story, world class audio and text logs, and some of the best and most unique combat the genre has ever seen. If a game is going to demand dozens of hours, it needs to do at least one thing exceptionally well and Acy Odyssey does nothing exceptionally well except use up the 4 hours after work and before bed that I could spend better doing all the things I feel guilty about not doing. A game needs to have a hook good enough to overpower the nagging feeling that I could be spending my time more productively doing the dishes. So where did I come down on Sucker Punch's new Samurai Creed? It's complicated. Every single thing I hate about many of these open world games is in Shushima in spades. And yet, there's enough great stuff here that it was worth a video. Let's start with the good stuff. When I first saw Ghost of Sushima a couple years ago, I think I had a common reaction. It looked impressive, but I was left not really understanding what the game actually was. It had a decidedly souls like feel in that first gameplay reveal and I was hoping that's what the game would be. When we eventually learned what Sushima actually was, however, I admit I was pretty disappointed. The last thing in the world I needed was Samurai Creed. So I went into the game, not expecting too much frankly. One thing I've come to think is that these huge open world games take so much talent and effort just to craft these tremendous maps with mind blowing graphics that they almost always end up with everything else feeling like an afterthought. Well, Sushima makes a ton of compromises and cuts a shitload of corners, but at the end of the day, what's here is far more Arkham City and Horizon Zero Dawn than Acy Odyssey. And the main reason that's so is because while Sucker Punch didn't manage to create a wide variety of linear story missions or quest objectives, they did manage to create a combat and progression system that is fun to play with. Now it's not as good as Horizon because Horizon had a totally unique combat system and really great story missions, but it's the next best thing. Sushima and Arkham are very similar games. Both have beautiful and grossing maps that feel totally fresh and interesting to move around. Both feature combat that has some issues, but that's just somehow addictive enough to make killing generic mobs as fun the 2000s time as it is in the early game. Both had well told stories, it never raised the excellence that Gorilla or Rockstar managed, but it's far better than any story Ubisoft has ever told. And while most of the collectibles are more Ubisoft than Arkham City, the actual skill progression is impactful enough and fun enough to make scrounging the map for upgrades not feel like a pointless waste of time. Combat. You will spend the vast majority of your time in any of these open world games in combat, which is why it frustrates me so much when developers spend five years on a game and ship a title that has combat as its weakest link. How can Ubisoft know that I'll spend 70 hours of my time fighting things and still not manage to create a combat system that's anything more than slightly below average? This is the thing that most annoy me about Red Dead 2 as well. You're going to have me shooting things for 50 hours. Why is shooting so weak? So I'm so thankful that of all the things Tsushima does well, its best system without a doubt is its melee combat system. And that's because while it's familiar and clearly borrows from other games, ultimately it is a very unique mix. Now it's not perfect and we will get to the problems, which are pretty significant, but it's definitely not boring and that is half the battle. Tsushima is a clever mix of combat systems.  It also does a great job of bringing Neo's stance system into the mix, though it's implemented differently here. Tsushima uses stances as a kind of complex system of stamina and dodge management. You can play the entire game in low stance or high stance in Neo, it's not optimal but it can be done. Tsushima uses its stance system as a layer of rock-paper-scissors draped on top of its action melee combat. And the game borrows heavily from the Arkham series as well. While the Neo and Sekiro systems are there, the lack of stamina and lock on and the tremendous amount of enemies the game throws at you are much closer to Arkham City than to Bloodborne. Now that might sound kind of complicated and it is. It's a totally unique system that perfectly blends aspects of all of those games into something totally new. On top of that, it features a bunch of other skills and abilities like after killing seven enemies without getting hit, you can press the win button for three awesomely animated super kills. You can escape danger with smoke bombs. You can throw kunai, you can throw sticky bombs, regular bombs, you use bows and arrows. The gamepad is utterly stuffed with contextual commands and inputs to the point that it's kind of impossible to really consistently use everything. You'll end up settling on a few different things that you'll use in a few different scenarios. The game features maybe 10 or 15 boss fights that are basically Sekiro fights complete with the rock-paper-scissors unblockable attacks and a huge focus on parry and guard breaking the boss. These fights are quite difficult on hard, which is what you should play the game on by the way. They are basically when the game's combat system really shines and most of them require several attempts to beat. They're so good, it's kind of a shame that many of them are optional side missions. The upgrade system and resolve meter that's used to heal and fire off certain unblockable high damage attacks ends up being really satisfying by the end. But it also means that early on it feels like you don't have the tools to really deal with the game's enemies. And it also means that by the end you are just a ridiculously overpowered killing machine. The combat loop here is really cool once you've got the full kit unlocked, but the game's challenge can't really keep up with a tremendous variety of almost instakill abilities the player has. In fact, even on hard, there are only a few situations that offer any difficulty by the end. The game probably needs a new game plus with a harder setting. Now I want to be clear.  Like top of the line, totally fresh, arm severing goodness. It's animated so well, it sounds great and it's just viscerally excellent. When it's at its best, it is one of the finest melee combat systems you will get outside of an actual Soulsborne game like Neo or the Surge 2 or Souls itself. And it's at its best pretty damn often. The vast majority of the time you'll be playing Tsushima will be taken up with the two things the game does best, riding around a really beautiful map looking cool and killing enemies while also looking cool. This fact sets the floor on Ghost of Tsushima pretty high. Just on the strength of those two things alone, the game is worth purchasing. But it's also true that the game falls short of greatness because of the other things the game does not so well and even some issues with the combat itself. The other side. Now just because this is one of the best melee combat systems ever in one of these kind of games doesn't mean it's perfect. In fact it has some serious issues. Let's start with something that's kind of baked into the experience that players like me might find difficult to get used to. There is such a heavy Souls influence here that as a player you can't help but try and get into that flow. Now I don't know about you, but when I play Souls I get extremely angry any time I take damage. I feel like I should be able to never get hit when I'm playing well and when things are going well here in Tsushima you can get into that same flow. But unlike a Souls game, Tsushima will present you with a ton of places where damage is simply impossible to avoid because of the game's other main influence. It really does have the Shadow of Mordor Arkham influence which means tons of enemies with overlapping attacks. This is easier to manage in Arkham and Mordor because you always have a guaranteed counter move that you can use whenever an attack is coming from behind you. You don't have that here, so you will constantly be getting hit from behind.  So the game totally lacks a lock-on mechanic. I find this like totally inconceivable man. Now yes there are tons of multi-enemy fights, but you get that in Souls as well. On top of the no lock-on the camera speed is like almost impossibly slow. I don't think I've ever seen a game with a camera this slow and I simply don't understand why this is the case. Then it's got a really serious problem with auto-targeting on attacks. Souls 2 also has this problem and it contributes to that game feeling so shitty to play sometimes. Tsushima has the same issue where you'll simply miss attacks or you'll attack in the opposite direction or you'll be right in front of someone in the middle of a combo and the game will suddenly decide to swing you around 180 degrees and have you attack the air behind yourself. Finally, the game lacks polish in many ways. Now I know that's weird to say with how great the game looks but it's true. You will constantly get stuck on geometry or you'll take damage you shouldn't have. Or the totally crazy way the game maps its dodge and dodge roll on the same button means that dodge rolling will often take you like 20 feet from your target so you can't counter-attack. Dodges won't register, blocking doesn't work sometimes. And most frustrating of all is this. Like Neo, this game relies heavily on the stance switching mechanic. In fact, it relies more heavily on it than Neo does, in that certain stances just make some enemies incapable of hurting you. After a few unlocked, spear dudes straight up cannot damage you anymore. You just automatically parry all of their attacks.  So you would hope that this stance switching was as smooth as it is in Neo, but it isn't. The game has a really annoying habit of not switching stances unless you very carefully and deliberately make certain it worked. I cannot tell you how many times I tried to switch stances like three or four times before it clicked. The combat here isn't slow and deliberate man it's fast paced and requires you to switch constantly and quickly so it's kinda crazy that this ever happens. I honestly cannot remember even one time through both Neo games where I ever failed to switch stances when I wanted to. Literally not once do I ever recall that happening. It happens in almost every fight in Ghost of Tsushima. Now, it rarely leads to death, although it did a couple of times. But either way, it's just a consistent annoyance and over time things like that add up.  Tsushima feels like that pretty often. For instance, Sakai has like tank controls when it comes to turning in a circle or getting off a ledge or sinking up to a ladder. Those little frustrations are just constantly running in the background. Now I suspect that for most people this won't be a big enough deal to even register, but this kind of stuff really sticks out to me. The very best games manage to never have these issues. In Bloodborne, my Hunter does what I want him to do instantly at all times. In Doom Eternal, I feel I have full control of my character at all times. That's what a polished game feels like to me.   Games that have these problems can still be good and this is an example of that, that kind of shit still matters.  Listen, developers, I want you to ask yourselves a serious question. Does your game absolutely need a knockdown mechanic? I get that all games need to have a stagger or interrupt, otherwise you'd just be able to mash buttons. But does your game need to have me thrown five feet away and have to watch an animation as my dude picks himself up? Why?  But at least there, it's a huge monster that's throwing me. And almost every enemy that does it is being fought one-on-one. And a game that relies entirely on groups of enemies and constant target switching. Why is it possible for a guy behind me and off camera to send my dude flying across the map? Is anything honestly, honestly added to the combat experience by that? Would the game be worse if it wasn't in there? If the answer to that question is no, then don't put a knockdown mechanic in your game. Like, at what point in development did someone say, hey, this is awesome, but we need a mechanic where you totally lose control of your character because a dude off-screen hit you with a big stick. We need something that stops combat and makes you watch a little animation for a couple of seconds. It's just another one of those small things that makes me set the controller in my lap and sigh. Tsushima happens to have a pretty good pile of things that make me do that. And not just in the combat system. Now, these aren't constant issues, but they are common enough to keep the combat from being perfect. Neo, The Surge 2, Bloodborne, Souls, these games all have nearly flawless combat. All of them aren't necessarily perfect games, but they have rock solid, super tight combat mechanics. Tsushima, at its best, feels as good as any game, but it's got just enough problems and lacks that tiny extra sheen of polish to make it a true classic. Still, while all those problems and a few more keep the combat from perfection, the things the game does well are more than good enough to make the combat one of the best parts of the title. You spend a lot of time decapitating Mongols here, and it only works because the game is deep and subtle and varied enough that it doesn't get old. The game requires some skill to master, and the game is at its best when it's pushing you to the edge of your ability. It's just a shame that the difficulty couldn't really be set any higher because it's just kind of a little bit sloppy.  It's not the mechanics or a slow camera or a broken lock-on that kills you. It's the fact that the game is just really hard. On hard, Tsushima is challenging and satisfying, but it manages to fall short of the best of the skill-based action combat games because it's just missing the polish those games need to have. And that leaves out the stealth part of the combat, which is total garbage, but we'll get to that in the next section. Ninja Creed. So, Tsushima is a melee combat narrative action game, and it's a pretty damn good one. Unfortunately, it's also an open-world game TM and a pretty bog-standard one of those. All the stuff you'd expect, like collectibles, bandit camps, et cetera.  Things like escort quests, eavesdropping missions, mandatory insta-fail stealth missions, and single-button stealth kills, et cetera. And I don't mean that like once in a blue moon it has these things. I mean, it's built around these things for a reason I can't possibly understand. Let's start with eavesdropping missions.  Occasionally, a game can get away with them if it's used smartly. Black Flag has several that are tolerable because you're literally getting story exposition. They're almost hidden interactive story cutscenes, but Tsushima uses this mechanic to just have you slowly trail a dot for five minutes because I don't know, actually. I honestly don't.  The game has easily 15 missions that require you to stealth kill enemies because there are hostages that will be killed if you go in fighting.  Why? These are literally the very worst parts of the AC games. It's the lack of this crap that makes Horizon one of the very best of the open world action games. And Tsushima, unlike Assassin's Creed, actually has a really good melee combat system. So why?  In fact, I like them, but if you're going to make a stealth game, it has to have actual mechanics. Levels need to be designed to make navigating them feel like you're being clever. You absolutely need to be able to hide bodies, which even AC has always let you do. Assassin's Creed kept this reasonably fresh because the parkour was tight and pretty fun and you could get lost in crowds and all that. Tsushima has you sneaking around yurts. You need a ton of different tools and abilities to keep stealth fresh. And Tsushima just doesn't have that stuff.  You've got a rock and one button insta-kill knife and then some tall grass. It doesn't even really have alarms to disable. I think it has one, one time that happens. In fact, the game clearly knows its stealth as garbage because it eventually gives you an armor set that negates it. You get armor and charms that allow you to just like walk past dudes. Then you get another one near the end of the game that literally lets you dress as a Mongol and walk around. It's like the game slowly apologizes to you. Yes, we know this is total garbage but we already made the missions. Tell you what, here's a suit so you can just walk through. All right?    It just doesn't work. It's sloppy, it's derivative and it's not even executed well. I have no problems with the ghost angle of the story but just keep it to poison and ninja stuff or have only one or two missions like that. All I can say is this. If you like this kind of simple barely gameplay at all stealth stuff, that is fine. But this game doesn't even do it as well as Assassin's Creed and it's certainly not Deus Ex or Dishonored.  If this is the last game that asks me to hide in tall grass and follow an NPC, I will be extremely pleased. Samurai Simulator. The other open world stuff fares a bit better. Now it's not groundbreaking but it's at least reasonably well done. Horizon succeeded at this stuff because it managed to actually nail all of it.  The apocalypse hologram logs were amazingly well written and some of the audio logs were actually moving and powerful. Then you've got AC Origins which literally had collectibles that when you open them up in the menu said collectible. That's not a joke, it really had those.  The dialogue with the Khan text logs do a decent job giving you Kotankan's motivations but it's also got a bunch of ones that are just totally pointless, man. Then there are like the mountain of things that don't matter.  Pointless.  Now these are worthwhile in gameplay but annoying to actually get. Is following a fox actually fun? No, it is not. In fact, sometimes it's infuriating because he'll get lost in the tall grass or he'll glitch and disappear.  Problem is, I'm the kind of guy who's gonna go to every waypoint because that's just how I play games. Developers must know this so why even bother with all the crap?  You literally can't even see them, man. As far as the map itself, things are a bit mixed.    Sushima does this but there's always a way down very close so while I got pissed off, it only lasted a few seconds. Annoying but only minorly annoying.  There's no other way around it. The UI is one of the very best you will ever see in an open world game. We live in a world where this is considered a reasonable UI that was developed by professionals in the last couple of years. So this is a massive improvement and something to praise loudly. The follow the wins mechanic is one of the very, very finest examples of game navigation ever designed. It is right up there with Dead Space. Whoever came up with this should be considered a star. You will rarely need to open your map once you've decided where you're going. In many games you find yourself constantly opening and closing the map to figure out where to go or you'll be constantly looking up at the minimap in the corner of the screen. Sushima has you open the map once, set your waypoints and then literally follow the blowing wind and grass. It is genius and every other open world game ever should totally steal it and implement it. I should never need to look at a minimap again. This should be something we look back at in 10 years and say, remember when you followed a yellow line on a minimap? Why was everyone so stupid? Now it's not all good. A shocking number of missions require you to investigate the area. Listen, this can work in some games.   It's cool because Garrett will be all like, huh, monster semen. Oh, look, gouging wounds in this dude's face. Ah, he's had eggs laid in his chest cavity. Also, and this is key, both of those games use the video game-y system where what you're looking for glows. Is this realistic? Nope. Is it easy? Yep. Is that a problem? No. In its search for realism, the game thinks it's okay for one dude to murder thousands of the greatest warriors the world has ever known, but not okay to have clues glow. If the game was actually concerned with you figuring out a mystery, this would be cool, but it is not. There are no actual clues. This devolves to running in circles until you get a prompt. Sometimes, they literally don't load until you run away. Other times, they'll be inseamingly random spots and unlike in The Witcher, you need to find all of them to move on. And worst of all, everyone, every single one, eventually leads to tracks appearing on the ground to follow. And let me make clear, those tracks often don't appear until you find the other clues. Eventually, I was like, okay, where are the tracks? We've done this a hundred times.  There's another problem with this system. Now, this is a beautiful game, like as good as any game can look on the PS4, but it's also a dark game. I swear to God, the game's day-night cycle is fucked. It's as if Japan has 19 hours of night and five hours of daylight, so you will follow totally unhighlighted footprints that are barely visible in the pitch black dark. It is absurdly dark, dude. I get the idea is that there's only natural lighting and they're again going for realism, but like, again, why realism here in lighting, but not in, you know, like Mongols? An entire quest revolves around someone teaching the Mongols archery. This is hilarious. The Mongols are the greatest archers in world history. They literally conquered the known world on the basis of their impossible archery skills. Mongol boys and girls learn to shoot from horseback at age three.  Things like fall damage, lighting, and pointless investigations. Do these issues make it a bad game? No, this is a good game, but they make me ask why? Why can't you just have the investigation things marked? Why don't the footprints just use the wind mechanic? Why is looking at the ground for three minutes fun?  None of these investigations lead to really cool stories. Arkham and Witcher's investigations lead to interesting tales that are fun to learn about. Tsushima has one investigation. Oh, these people were killed by Mongols. Follow footprints to said Mongols and decapitate them. Obviously, there are only two possible solutions to these issues. Either spend a ton more effort making these quests interesting and unique, or just pull them out and replace them with more Mongol gutting. As it stands, they are unfortunate black marks. Things that have to be balanced against the things this game does either well or excellently. They don't ruin it, but they do hurt it, often quite a bit. Story. Wanna know why I was excited for this game? Because I love history. I am a history nerd. And on top of that, I love the Mongols. I read a bunch of books about Genghis and his descendants. And the story of the failed Mongol invasions of Japan are so insane and unlikely that it's a great setting. For those of you who don't know, the Mongols by this time had basically conquered everything. They conquered all of the Middle East, like all of it. All of China, they conquered all of Russia and Poland and Hungary by mistake. 15,000 men went scouting to see what was up there and accidentally completely wiped out the whole noble class of the area and then conquered it all. They were on their way to conquering all of Europe, but then the Khan died and they had to turn around and go vote for a new Khan. 30 years later, things were changing for the Mongols. They'd settled down and become kind of wealthy Chinese. Kublai decided to conquer Korea and he did. Then he went to conquer Japan. The Japanese were overwhelmed. Their whole solo combat and honor thing didn't work at all because the Mongols, they weren't about solo combat. They were military geniuses about siege warfare and winning at all costs. The Japanese both times gamely fought and were losing. But again, both times, the Mongol invasion fleet was sunk by tsunamis. This is where the word kamikaze comes from, the divine win of the gods that protected Japan. So the setting for the game is great and it ends up being a really cool alternate history. The game implies that in actuality, it was you who destroyed the Mongol fleet, but the Lords created the divine win story because you did it dishonorably and had become an outcast. When it comes to story however, this is not a historically accurate game at all. Its Mongols aren't accurate at all. And the game seems to believe that the average samurai was a noble gentleman who the people loved and who selflessly gave his life for his peasants. When in reality, the samurai were horrible, basically the same as European Lords. Peasants could be beheaded on the spot for failing to bow or for making eye contact or for anything, really.  So that's odd and disappointing. I expect it from Japanese developers because this is like their national mythology, like how we think the founding fathers were gods or something. But I find it weird that this worshipful depiction of feudal Japan came from a Western developer. Anyway, that's neither here nor there. Believe it at understanding that this is not a game that has any kind of real historical accuracy or anything to say about Japan or the samurai beyond cliches. Totally wrong cliches, basically. The actual story is pretty much what you'd expect, but it is told very well. This isn't a game about all the things I kinda wanted it to be about. It's a game about a few really interesting characters and their fight. It works really well because it's acted well and because it doesn't try to be more than it is. It's just a well done action adventure story filled with fun or interesting people. It's got some twists and turns and it's set in a wonderful and interesting and beautiful setting. Japanese culture is amazing, dude. I find it totally fascinating how it's so very similar to medieval Europe while also being totally different. The story, like the combat, is good enough to justify the purchase. All I'm saying is don't expect anything too deep. Horizon's story was so great because it's a really well thought out sci-fi tale that works deep down below the surface and gives you a bunch of stuff to ponder just like all good sci-fi does. Tsushima isn't that. It's just a great action movie. It works well, but what you see is what you get. You won't think about this story afterward, but you'll be enjoying it all the way through and that's all one really can expect from a game, to be honest with you. Wrapping up. So then, what do we have here?   And a story that is entertaining and really well done but never tries for anything more than that. I generally don't score games because most of my videos aren't strictly reviews. Most of the time my videos are more like, hey, look at this game or, hey, look at this one thing about this game. But I'll score this because I think the most interesting thing about this game is how to score it. I don't have some special system. I score games like a teacher scores a paper. I score the totality of my reaction. On my usual one to 100 high school English paper scoring system, this game is an 84.   And the story is good, but not great. And the combat is great but has too many issues to be perfect. It's almost the definition of a solid B. It's good enough that I finished almost everything on the map aside from pointless trash but the existence of so much pointless trash means hours of my time was spent pointlessly.  But the missions that led me to bad-ass armor sets that actually looked great and significantly changed my gameplay, that stuff was awesome. In the end, I enjoyed this game. I recommend it but I'm also left a little bit disappointed because it had everything it needed to be one of the three or four bests of these type of games. It could have been, like Horizon, one of the very bests of the open world action genre.  All right, thanks for coming. I'll see you next time. Bye.