Gamer Podcasts

Depending on how finances look I may allow myself Far Cry 3. I wasn't impressed with the first and have no interest in the second for some reason, but the third just gets me giddy for some reason.

My mom loaded her Kindle up and asked me about Assassin's Creed III. I told her to consider it at the top of my wish list.

I have already paid for Far Cry 3. I traded in a bunch of games at GameStop and used the money to pay for Borderlands 2 and Far Cry 3. Still have some credit too that I will probably apply to Halo 4. I really liked Far Cry 2 despite it's flaws and it sounds like they have addressed a lot of those. I just hope I can snipe in Far Cry 3 without everyone magically knowing where I am after my first shot.

I am very conflicted about Assassin's Creed 3. I really like the first two but couldn't get into Brotherhood or Revelations. I would actually be willing to completely write it off if not for the awesome looking naval battles.

ccesarano wrote:

I listened to last week's Weekend Confirmed and was like "Wow, that was a good episode". So I decided to start listening to today's and within a couple of minutes Garnett and Andrea ruined it for me and I switched over to Idle Thumbs.

I'm about two thirds in and Andrea has probably been a little less annoying than usual actually. Cannata continues to bug me, especially with his complete white wash of the whole Eurogamer affair. He spent way too long ranting about the Geoff Keighly image which for me was always just a nice attention grabber before you got into the meat of the Eurogamer article. Also he said he wishes that people put this much energy into sh*t that actually matters (rather than being concerned about the quality of games writing). I don't know how far you want to take that argument but why not volunteer in soup kitchens instead of wasting all our time gaming? Anyway, he's just been an all round douchebag for the last few months, dunno what's gotten into him.

Edit: oh, and just because I feel like I need to say something positive about the podcast... I'm continuing to enjoy Andrew Yoon, lisp and all! They should make him a regular 3rd or 4th chair.

To elaborate on the Eurogamer bit above, this summary from GAF seems to cover the meat of the issue:

- Wainwright's profile shows she is a freelancer for Square Enix. She admitted it and denied doing any reviews for Square Enix or shilling (she is wrong. She reviewed Deus Ex, Tomb Raider and did countless previews).
- All this fiasco is too much for her and she privatize her twitter account. Next thing you know, she starts deleting tweets, videos and articles, and edits her profile to remove any mention of Square Enix freelancing.
- People find some comments of her thanking someone called Korina that used to work at Ubisoft.
- Korina Abbot used to work at Ubisoft and is currently the marketing executive at...Square-Enix.

The fact that Jeff can just look past what is clearly a conflict of interest while, at the same time, bashing gamers for wanting quality games writing is pretty despicable.

I haven't listened to Weekend Confirmed since this summer, but I really loved Jeff and haven't heard him except for when he was on GWJ (I think?) recently. But as for his comments about the Eurogamer thing...yeesh. The whole thing is a big issue and shouldn't be glossed over by other games journalists/enthusiasts. I hope that he said more than just that, but I feel bad if it was relegated to hyperbole.

Yeah, I find Jeff fairly agreeable when he appears on GWJ (maybe 3 times so far?). But his Weekend Confirmed persona is getting worse and worse. The whole "loves loving things" couldn't be further from the truth these days.

I didn't even realize it was a huge ass controversy until I read this, where Jim Sterling himself is quite forgiving of it, it seems.

His stance seems to be "We're all only human, but if you try to cover up sh*t like this and get people to remove your name from articles then you're going to look sketchy as f*ck and people are going to call your credibility (and honesty) into question".

I haven't read up on what's going on, and honestly don't care to. I do not, nor have I ever, found Geoff Keighley to be a reliable source of games journalism, primarily due to the networks he works for (I believe he's mostly doing stuff for GameTrailers, which has a show on Spike TV and is owned by MTV) treating him as more of a marketing tool. Maybe I have doubts about his current job or how he got there, but it seems to me that he's basically a spokesperson for the games industry. So seeing that image doesn't at all surprise me. I don't know what it's for, but my first guess would be some network special that Spike TV has.

As for this Lauren girl, evidently she used a hashtag for something to win a PS3? I dunno. Just because she writes about games doesn't mean she isn't human. Plus, would someone who works for Car and Driver magazine trying to enter a contest to win a VW Jetta be seen as just as sketchy? (Maybe they would, I'm not as familiar)

So of what little I know of the whole situation, it seems like it's being made too big a deal of. But this is just from what little I know from the outside looking in.

Well, the spotlight was put on her. I doubt it was her decision to threaten legal action, most likely her employers, but it is what it is. Now she has been found to be reviewing games published by a company she was in the employ of. And has since frantically been trying to cover it up. If you don't find that situation more than a bit off, well I don't know what more I can say. As for Geoff, yeah, as I said above, him posing with some Mountain Dew was never the meat of the story. At least that was the way I took it. Just a good attention grabber.

Here is a post that someone started about the whole shin dig http://www.gamerswithjobs.com/node/113513. As for Geoff Keighley and tying it back into Gamer Podcasts, Geoff seems like an okay guy trying to do honest work. He was on the E3 Bombcast special podcasts for a teeny tiny bit one day and he seemed generally cool in that casual environment. It is true that all these people are human and are more than just the face they put on in their chosen profession. But when you're in a place that is kind of tied to your chosen profession (Twitter) you kind of have to be a little more guarded when you're in the profession of enthusiast/professional gaming press/PR/whatever other weird niche role that is tied to gaming.

But Yay! Podcasts!

Also, again about Jeff Cannata, love the guy! But man, I sincerely think that Garnett is just a drag and is bringing Jeff down with him. I really hope to see more of Jeff in places that I have turned to for gaming news (like here!).

I like Geoff Keighley, primarily seeing him on GameTrailers shows like Bonus Round, E3 coverage, etc. As an interview host, I think he asks smart questions and isn't afraid to hold people's feet to the fire. For example, his tense love/hate relationship with Reggie Fils-Aime (NoA) is a riot.

Anyway, I sometimes question what we expect from an enthusiast press covering topics they're passionate about, often for slave wages. I enjoy it for the most part and have individuals that I lean towards more than others, but I guess I just don't expect hard-hitting, vetted coverage as found in other forms of news medial like Frontline, The Economist, etc.

It's more like entertainment media to me. And while I do enjoy more thoughtful takes on the hobby (GWJ, RPS, Idle Thumbs, etc.), I personally find myself largely indifferent to controversy as noted above, or rather indifferent in the anger/outrage sense. I still find all sorts of gaming news interesting.

Mr GT Chris wrote:

Well, the spotlight was put on her. I doubt it was her decision to threaten legal action, most likely her employers, but it is what it is. Now she has been found to be reviewing games published by a company she was in the employ of. And has since frantically been trying to cover it up. If you don't find that situation more than a bit off, well I don't know what more I can say. As for Geoff, yeah, as I said above, him posing with some Mountain Dew was never the meat of the story. At least that was the way I took it. Just a good attention grabber.

I'm annoyed with how people are demonizing Wainwright. Unlike Keighley, who is actually a high profile games media personality, Wainwright is essentially a nobody - just a young woman who likes games and is happy to get paid to do anything related to them (and the capacity in which she does so is essentially marketing (nobody would ever mistake her for a "journalist")). She wasn't even involved in the tweet-for-a-PS3 thing except to defend it as "OK" - a position that's informed by the way the games media operates in general.

I think mentioning her by name was a miscalculation on Rab Florence's part, and I understand why Eurogamer redacted it. Wainwright is just a footnote, one of many, and an example of the way people in this industry feel and behave - who she is specifically does not matter, and if Florence had just substituted "a video games media personality" in place of her name we wouldn't be here right now. Naming her just ensured some vicious nasty Internet drama was going to happen in response.

I have no issue with Florence pointing out what's happening here, but let's get real: this is just the way every entertainment industry works. Look at, say, MTV - are they doing hard core investigative journalism over there? What about, I don't know, Entertainment Tonight? When it comes to entertainment media coverage, the media is primarily either enthusiasts talking about things they like, or a direct extension of industry PR.

Video games are no different. There are people who do real journalism and thoughtful critique, but they're a tiny minority of what's going on. It's strange to hold a PR mouthpiece to the same "journalistic standards" of somebody writing for an actual news outlet.

The absolute best commentary on this entire mess has, from my perspective, come from John Walker (of RPS) on his personal site. He has several articles which do a very good job of exploring the situation.

I'm with gore on the whole notion of what really IS journalism for games. I mean, look at film journalism. I don't get deep into the nitty gritty of it, but most of it is talking about what producers, directors, actors, etc. are attached, trying to figure out who is doing what with a script, etc. or people just finding gossip about the stars. There's hardly any real "journalism", and the fact of the matter is no one cares what members of the gaming media is banging who or any of that junk.

There's not a lot of stuff to really go off of, which is why games journalism is really weird. It is easy to chastise it for being free PR, but at the same time what can these people really report on? Especially if they want access to these games for review.

It's a weird industry.

Also, I don't fault Geoff Keighley for anything. At this point I don't really hold any disrespect to anyone working for IGN, even if I think that's the worst site to get any information from. Everyone is human, and chances are everyone is a little bit likeable.

That's why I was careful to say games writing. Just because it's not "journalism" doesn't mean I want my games writers to be in the pay of the company whose products they are supposed to be impartially reviewing. I would feel the same about any media, not just games.

ccesarano wrote:

Also, I don't fault Geoff Keighley for anything. At this point I don't really hold any disrespect to anyone working for IGN, even if I think that's the worst site to get any information from. Everyone is human, and chances are everyone is a little bit likeable.

I've always been conflicted on Keighley. It's clear the guy loves games to death and he is capable of doing real journalism and great writing (see his Final Hours Of... pieces) but he's also the guy behind the horrendous Spike VGAs and the gods awful GTTV program. Content like that is what gives the bullsh*t mainstream perception of hardcore gamers that persists to this day and it does nothing to help the medium or the community. Given how many exclusive trailer reveals happen at the VGAs, I think it's fair to claim a large portion of that show is bought and paid for and Keighley is Executive Producer on that.

gore wrote:

The absolute best commentary on this entire mess has, from my perspective, come from John Walker (of RPS) on his personal site. He has several articles which do a very good job of exploring the situation.

Good piece- thanks for linking.

ccesarano wrote:

I mean, look at film journalism. I don't get deep into the nitty gritty of it, but most of it is talking about what producers, directors, actors, etc. are attached, trying to figure out who is doing what with a script, etc. or people just finding gossip about the stars. There's hardly any real "journalism", and the fact of the matter is no one cares what members of the gaming media is banging who or any of that junk.

Cahiers disent "bonjour"

My new favourite, Andrew Yoon, was back on this week along with Spicer who is really quite good, I've decided, when he's not trying to be funny all the time. Meanwhile, there was quite a mea culpa from Garnett who admitted that prior to the previous week's show he had not even read the entirety of the Florence article that fuelled that discussion, thus the inordinate amount of focus given to just the Keighly image. Apparently he got roasted on the Neogafs etc. over it. Cannata backed away a bit from his previous position that gamers are idiots for wanting quality games writing but still seems to be bugged by some hate mail he's been getting. I guess you can't keep everyone happy. AC3 and Halo 4 were the main focus and Spicer has been putting in some Vita time so he had some brief impressions on AC3:L and NFS. Overall, not a bad show.

Mr GT Chris wrote:

My new favourite, Andrew Yoon, was back on this week along with Spicer who is really quite good, I've decided, when he's not trying to be funny all the time. Meanwhile, there was quite a mea culpa from Garnett who admitted that prior to the previous week's show he had not even read the entirety of the Florence article that fuelled that discussion, thus the inordinate amount of focus given to just the Keighly image. Apparently he got roasted on the Neogafs etc. over it. Cannata backed away a bit from his previous position that gamers are idiots for wanting quality games writing but still seems to be bugged by some hate mail he's been getting. I guess you can't keep everyone happy. AC3 and Halo 4 were the main focus and Spicer has been putting in some Vita time so he had some brief impressions on AC3:L and NFS. Overall, not a bad show.

Spicer has also really managed to grow on me now that he's not always trying to be funny. He has a different perspective than the other guys (he doesn't feel like he's so much of an inside baseball guy, especially when they're talking about e.g. game media) and seems to play games nobody else does.

Oddly, I guess Spicer quit his career to become a comedian? Maybe he should go back to being a lawyer or whatever

I'm glad Garnett went back to Florence's article and has come away with a more coherent response to it. Last week it seemed like he was doing a lot of hand waving, and I guess now we know why (since apparently he hadn't actually read the article). He seems to have a pretty reasonable perspective on it now.

I have mixed feelings about how Cannata is responding to this all, though. I can understand his point of view, because he clearly wants to defend the work he does, but he comes across as a bit dismissive about the conversation as a whole. I don't know that I disagree with the substance of what he's saying, but I think he needs to show a little more respect for the people who are raising these questions rather than expressing incredulity that anybody would even be asking them. Andrea was the same way when she was on.

Yeah, you described my own feelings about Cannata better than I could. I think he doesn't want to be seen to be speaking out against his peers. But, as someone with such strong personal ethics, he should absolutely feel free to do so.

I'd be happy to have Spicer as a permanent 3rd/4th chair at this point. Especially since he leans towards portable gaming which is more in line with my tastes these days.

I liked this week's Jumping the Shark. Bill Abner mentioned being at Penguincon, though it was a bit amusing. He referred to it as roughly "sixty people that all know each other", yet there was no hint that he was aware it was a part of International GamersWithJobs Day. I don't know if he's familiar with this corner of the Internet or not, but it was still amusing to hear.

Other than that, the podcast has convinced me more so that I will eventually need to get Mice & Mystics, though who knows when considering holidays, finances and all the games I already have unplayed, and that I should have waited and gotten a Surface tablet. I've been so disappointed with Android as a consumer/user, and the more I look at the Windows phone and Windows 8 as a tablet OS the more I'm convinced that's what I really want.

Did he? That's nice. I told him it was a GWJ thing and it isn't like the JtS crew isn't aware of us.

/shrug

Just glad he had a good time. I made him let us play test the newest Conquistador Game, Tomorrow. It was interesting but completely and totally broken (super early in development). Critiquing that with a bunch of goodjers may actually have been the most fun I had that weekend =)

Eh, I'm the opposite. Both Andrew Yoon and Christian Spicer make those episodes practically unlistenable. Also, I'm on Jeff Cannata's side. The only opinion I have of that entire debacle is that Robert Florence continues to be a belligerent asshole who isn't very smart, and the "controversy" is almost non-existent.

oilypenguin wrote:

Did he? That's nice. I told him it was a GWJ thing and it isn't like the JtS crew isn't aware of us.

/shrug

Just glad he had a good time. I made him let us play test the newest Conquistador Game, Tomorrow. It was interesting but completely and totally broken (super early in development). Critiquing that with a bunch of goodjers may actually have been the most fun I had that weekend =)

It could be they didn't want to assume listeners knew who GWJ is. When he said "Penguincon" host #3 I can't remember (not Bill and not Brandon) sounded like he sat right up asking "Oh really? How was that?"

Bill also spoke of the critique in a positive manner, stating that the play testing made it very clear a lot of the mechanics weren't working. So I think it was good all around.

I hope I can make it to the next Pencon.

I also continue to enjoy Radio Radar. Somehow a list article is more entertaining in Podcast form.

oilypenguin wrote:

Did he? That's nice. I told him it was a GWJ thing and it isn't like the JtS crew isn't aware of us.

/shrug

Just glad he had a good time. I made him let us play test the newest Conquistador Game, Tomorrow. It was interesting but completely and totally broken (super early in development). Critiquing that with a bunch of goodjers may actually have been the most fun I had that weekend =)

Or like this?
Need to listen to that episode of JtS.

tboon wrote:
oilypenguin wrote:

Did he? That's nice. I told him it was a GWJ thing and it isn't like the JtS crew isn't aware of us.

/shrug

Just glad he had a good time. I made him let us play test the newest Conquistador Game, Tomorrow. It was interesting but completely and totally broken (super early in development). Critiquing that with a bunch of goodjers may actually have been the most fun I had that weekend =)

Or like this?
Need to listen to that episode of JtS.

Me too. I guess Bill talks about Tomorrow in both 149 and 150, I'll check out both.

So I randomly went out and grabbed a few podcasts on the Zune marketplace, and while I haven't listened to them all yet I've listened to two episodes of a not-video-game-themed Podcast called Now Playing.

The production call isn't as nice as the Conference Call, but they have that same enthusiastic energy. I actually realized the ConfCall and this podcast remind me of listening to sports commentators and analysts, who always sound excited about whatever it is they're discussing. That energy really helps.

They're doing a Bond series right now, with a couple of asides here and there, in anticipation of Skyfall and it's just entertaining to listen to.

Anyone who likes the fact that Three Moves Ahead is largely a game design podcast should be interested in Jon Shafer's new podcast. And an iTunes link. I haven't listened to it yet, but it's something I'll definitely be checking out sometime in the next few days here.

Hey, my cousin and I started a gaming podcast, we have two recorded and one live. Our presentation is kind of low right now, but we're working on our own website and logo and stuff. But for now there are some links on my blog http://nickludo.wordpress.com.

We would love feedback and just basically let us know if we're worth listening too. Neither of us are professionals (although I do talk about my QA time at Treyarch a little in the first episode) in the industry or anything, but I think it's pretty good.

The more feedback the better!

Nicktock wrote:

Hey, my cousin and I started a gaming podcast, we have two recorded and one live. Our presentation is kind of low right now, but we're working on our own website and logo and stuff. But for now there are some links on my blog http://nickludo.wordpress.com.

We would love feedback and just basically let us know if we're worth listening too. Neither of us are professionals (although I do talk about my QA time at Treyarch a little in the first episode) in the industry or anything, but I think it's pretty good.

The more feedback the better!

Good energy, good patter. Good start overall! You simply have to get a better mic, though. That's a make or break thing for any show.

Check out the Snowball, it's only $65 on Amazon and does a good job. Allen Cook uses one on our show. Good luck with future eps!

I'll have to give it a listen later, but I'm working on trying to get a podcast together as well. I've done a few episodes, but nothing has stuck. The big issue is getting a good time where the place is quiet and people interested in doing it regularly.

However, I'm doing a casual approach. I want to basically just record a good conversation with friends, sometimes following a theme, and edit it as much as it needs before posting it for people to listen to.

Oddly enough, my mic sounds different in Audacity than it does in Skype. It sounds fuzzier in Skype, but while it is more clear in Audacity there's a lot of static in the background.