Hello and welcome to the latest edition of the Giant Bomb Community Spotlight and I, @zombiepie, am honored to be your host once again. Hopefully everyone has recovered from the shock of Giant Bomb East serving Giant Bomb Proper a cold dish of revenge at the latest Us vs. Them stream. Now let's move onto the Giant Bomb housekeeping:
The Giant Bomb PAX Prime pre-panel meet and greet is all set for August 28th! It is an all subscriber event that you must RSVP. Please be aware that you must be 21 years of age or older in order to attend this event.
The BeyondPod app has been fixed for now and plans to block the app have been halted. However now it appears that an issue with the PocketCasts app has been reported. Giant Bomb engineer wcarle is on the case and is attempting to contact PocketCasts to resolve the issue.
For those that don't know, Austin Walker hosts a table-top gaming podcast called "Friends at the Table," and the latest episode of the podcast went live this week.
Finally... things got increasingly META regarding Contradiction and Giant Bomb East.
Clip of the Week
- Giant Bomb Nine Nine (By: @somestickguy_) - Somestickguy_ combined two things that are near and dear to his heart: the Brooklyn Nine Nine and the Giant Bomb staff. Here's the AMAZING result of that match made in heaven.
The Giant Bomb Weekly Gallery of Art
- BANNER - Giant Bomb Rocket League: Us vs. Them Round 2 Banner (By: @aurahack) What else is there to say other than that aurahack has killed it with this banner? Maybe that this proves that aurahack should not waste his time dabbling in the dark arts of animated .gifs? Well yeah, maybe that too.
- Anime Editor - Austin Walker (By: @fobwashed) - With his extensive knowledge of Dragon Ball and Gundam well established Austin is on track to wrestle away Brad's status as the "Anime Editor" of Giant Bomb.
- Us vs. Them: Rocket League: REMATCH - Tribute Sketch! (By: @kurlburl) - KurlBurl has created an AWESOME tribute to commemorate Giant Bomb East revenge rematch against Giant Bomb proper in Rocket League.
- A New and "Improved" Giant Bomb Premium Webpage (By: ChumMarchbanks) - In an effort to assist Giant Bomb in selling premium subscriptions, ChumMarchbanks from Twitter has designed a "better" version of the Giant Bomb Premium page.
- Creeper Cam Animated .gif (By: bluthton) - Oh no...the animated .gifs of last week's return of the Giant Bomb "Creeper Cam" have already started to crop up. Someone needs to call Jeff's parole officer!
- Giant Bomb Logo Sprite (By: Keith_Limon) - Just a fun little pixel sprite of the Giant Bomb logo from Twitter user Keith_Limon
Gallery
Community Activities
- Rising Thunder Alpha Code Sharing Thread - If you Have a Spare Alpha Code, or Want to Pick One Up, Feel Free to Drop on By This Thread!
- The iRacing 24 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps! August 1st! - Learn how to Watch the Stream and How to Join Future Events with the Giant Bomb iRancing Community Here!
- Terraria 1.3 Private GB Community Server ➟ (New IP Address) - The Giant Bomb Terraria 1.3 Community Server has CHANGED ITS IP ADDRESS! If you Have Enjoyed it Before Get the New Address Here!
Best of Blogs
- Trilogies in Games Why None of Them Have Gotten it Right for Me (By: @jesus_phish) - Jesus_Phish discusses why he thinks video games have never done the trilogy format justice, and what they should do instead, on his latest blog here.
- Directing and Acting in your Video Game Experiences (By: @morecowbell24) - morecowbell24 articulates the importance of games having a save anywhere feature and how it empowers his play style.
- Lost in the Pajamas: Part 2- Top 8 Things About Pajama Sam 1andLost in the Pajamas: Part 3- The Top 7 Things About Pajama Sam 2 (By: @thatpinguino) - thatpinguino finished the first two Pajama Sam games, and lists the top eight and seven reasons, respectively, why they are still completely awesome games worth playing here.
- GTA Online: When Good Heists Go Bad (By: @perfidioussinn) - PerfidiousSinn recently tried out some of the heist missions in GTA Online and discusses the good and bad of them on this extensive blog.
- My Issue With 'Emotional Experiences', by Your Now Sober Pal From Scotland, Hambo (By: @gianthamish) - gianthamish comments on the issue that he has with recent attempts to convey emotions in video games over here. I also want to say that the first couple of comments on this blog are just amazing, though they have nothing to do with the blog topic.
- The Comic Commish: Syberiaand Wiki Project: Summer Games Wiki'd Quick 2015 (Cont.) and ST-urday #005: Prophecy 1: The Viking Child (By: @mento) - Giant Bomb Moderator Mento has decided to start a playthrough of the classic PC adventure game, Syberia. Check out his early impressions of the game, and see if he's in for the long haul, over here. Mento also spent a good deal of time ensuring that all games that took the stage at Summer Games Done Quick 2015 got detailed wiki pages, and you can read all about his effort on his second blog. Finally, Mento continue his retrospective on the Atari ST with a blog about Prophecy 1: The Viking Child.
- Let's You and Me Fight: Nostalgia Strikes Back (By: @ford_dent) - Ford_Dent confesses his love for the anime fighter, Melty Blood Actress Again, and his overall relationship with anime fighters on his latest blog over here.
- Dynamic Theme Reviews 02: In Which Spoonman Realizes his Horrible Mistake (By: @spoonman671) - On the second blog where he reviews dynamic PS4 themes Spoonman671 suffers an existential crisis, and realizes why this blog series was a terrible idea.
Join the Discussion
- Windows 10 Impressions Thread (By: @xanadu) - The biggest release this week wasn't a video game, but the latest version of Microsoft Windows. If you have made the switch to Windows 10 feel free to share your impressions of the OS with the GB community here.
- Rising Thunder Alpha Discussion Thread (By: @memonk) - If you have been able to tinker around with Rising Thunder this week, how has it been treating you? Share your opinions related to the alpha over here!
- Rocket League DLC Discussion Thread (By: @jesus_phish) - What is YOUR gut reaction to the new DLC announced for Rocket League? Share if you think it's cruel or cool over here.
- The International 2015 Official Discussion Thread (By: ZOMBFRUITBUNNIES) - Are there any Dota 2 fans out there excited for The International 2015? Join our official discussion thread here and enjoy your boring game.
- Life is Strange Episode 4 Discussion Thread (By: @clairvoyantvibrations) - The fourth episode of Life is Strange has been incredibly decisive among its audience, so feel free to join the community discussion about it over here!
- Do you Ever Take (Paper or Digital) Notes While Playing? (By: @pezen) - Here's an odd but incredibly interesting topic. Have you ever taken handwritten notes while playing a video game? If your answer to that question is "yes" then share the game(s) and reason for doing so here.
Lovable Lists
- Rap Game (By: @xymox) - Xymox is working on a list of every single game referenced in rap or hip-hop! Help him make it the most complete list possible over here.
- Favorite Point-n-Click Games (By: @psykhophear) - With the return of King's Quest Psykhophear went and listed his all time favorite point and click adventure game.
- Future Vehicular Ballsports (By: @fisk0) - fisk0 is working on a list of every single "Future Vehicular Ballsport" in video game history! Help him make it complete with more examples by dropping a comment here.
- Give Me Cute - DS Edition (By: @ladyhobbit) - LadyHobbit has taken a shot at creating a list of the cutest, most "awwww" inducing games you can play on the Nintendo DS here.
Wonderful Wikis
- Stretch Panic - This weekend marks the end of SGDQ 2015, so enjoy this last batch of wiki pages for the games that made for some of the most exciting/interesting speedruns this Summer (make sure to check the official SGDQ 2015 discussion thread for YouTube archive links). Stretch Panic is one of Treasure's odder games, and that's saying something when we're talking about the developer of Dynamite Headdy.
- Prince of Persia: Sands of Time - Polygon video editor (and one-time talking dog) Griffin McElroy wrote about how the trouble-fraught speedrun of the 2004 acrobatic reboot was his favorite this year. Track down that video and read up on the game here.
- F.E.A.R. - The terrifying FPS saw a very glitch-exploitative speedrun this year, undermining a lot of its scares. Still a great run though. You'll never look at a ladder the same way again.
- Shovel Knight - Yacht Club Games' universally acclaimed 2014 throwback filled with shovelrous knights and dastardly blackguards had an interesting speedrun this year as the runner eschewed all relics and health upgrades. Dig into the game's nuances via its detailed wiki page. Plus: Look out for some free DLC coming soon!
- Roundabout - Finally, the speedrun of Dave Lang's Turnover deserves special mention this year for the kind shout-out to the Giant Bomb community after the runner passed by the special in-game monument of a sombrero'd Ryan Davis. It's always Tuesday when you're a groovy rotating limousine driver.
Useful User Reviews
- @arbitrarywater explains why he found The Evil Within to be an incredibly interesting, albeit flawed, horror game.
- @jaypb08's review discusses why he thinks Xenoblade Chronicles is the "best Final Fantasy game" of the past decade.