Podcasts
Opening a Discussion Portal Into ‘OXENFREE II: Lost Signals’ [Safe Room Podcast]
The concept of a standalone sequel feels like a relic of a bygone era. Sequels that co-exist within an established game world but can be enjoyed on their own. And as studios emphasize building franchises, sequels that are an immediate continuation of what came before it is almost entirely the industry’s standard approach. Color me surprised when I discovered that OXENFREE II: Lost Signals is largely a standalone sequel crafting a wholly new story that doesn’t require the original to play.
If you had played the original Oxenfree, you’d have more insight into what is happening and pick-up nods to past events, but it is absolutely not required. Rather than directly continuing Alex’s journey in the original, the player meets newcomer Riley, who has taken a summer job in her coastal hometown of Camena. OXENFREE II picking up five years after the original game’s events, the player may be surprised by how little OXENFREE II is concerned with dredging up the past.
Allowing the sequel to explore new characters and a more extensive setting allows OXENFREE II to stand on its own right rather than being a conventional sequel. And while the game’s narrative will eventually become interwoven with the originals, OXENFREE II is a game that newcomers can enjoy without feeling overly alienated.
So for this week’s episode, Neil and I discuss the inclusion of new characters, the all-new setting of Camena, and how this sequel inevitably ties into the lineage of that which came before it. – Jay Krieger
And in this week’s Horror Bytes, we solve a micro murder mystery in Raspberry Wine and head to the Arctic for research in Siren Call.
Next week sees a review roundup of recent horror games including My Friendly Neighborhood, Exoprimal, Remnant II, and Xenonauts II.
Safe Room is a weekly horror video game discussion podcast with new episodes every Monday and Thursday. For additional streaming services, Apple, Spotify, Google Podcasts, and Linktree.
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Safe Room | Neil | Jay | Horror Bytes
After kicking off July with discussions of Joe Dante’s seminal werewolf film The Howling (listen) and Ken Russell’s controversial erotic thriller Crimes of Passion (listen), we’re heading to Maine to dissect one of Stephen King‘s most misguided adaptations in Lawrence Kasdan‘s 2003 misfire Dreamcatcher!
Dreamcatcher sees friends Henry (Thomas Jane), Jonesy (Damian Lewis), Pete (Timothy Olyphant) and Beaver (Jason Lee) reunite for their annual hunting trip in Maine. Their reunion is cut short when they find themselves caught in the middle of a war between a hostile race of farty-farty aliens and an elite US military unit led by Colonel Abraham Curtis (Morgan Freeman), who has been driven mad after spending decades tracking the extraterrestrials. When Jonesy is possessed by one of the aliens, the remaining friends seek out their disabled childhood friend Duddits (Donnie Wahlberg), who they believe has powers that can save Jonesy…and the world.
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Episode 396: Dreamcatcher (2003)
Watch out for “ister gay” (oof), take some Gas-X and bite our bags because we’re talking Lawrence Kasdan’s baffling 2003 adaptation of Stephen King’s equally baffling novel Dreamcatcher.
Join us as we go all in on the farty-farty aliens populating this hilarious misfire that often feels like a bad Kevin Smith script. It’s a film filled with characters who get a single defining trait (if they’re lucky), played by respectable actors who are here for the paycheck (looking at you, Morgan Freeman).
Plus: blown-out assholes, using guns as telephones, pitying poor Donnie Wahlberg, and wondering why the hell this movie is called Dreamcatcher.
Cross out Dreamcatcher!
Coming Up Next: We’re going to be lounging around a posh Greenwich Village apartment as we check in on Jimmy Stewart and Grace Kelly in Alfred Hitchcock’s Rear Window (1954).
P.S. Subscribe to our Patreon for over 513 hours of Patreon content including this month’s new episodes on Terminator 2: Judgment Day, Forbidden Fruits, Saccharine, Evil Dead Burn, an audio commentary on Howling II: Your Sister is a Werewolf (aka Howling II: Stirba – Werewolf Bitch), and the conclusion of our coverage of AMC’s The Vampire Lestat on the Requel Tier.