Hey Duders,

Here is the latest Deep Look! Deep Looks are largely gameplay and commentary like a Giantbomb quicklook; however, I try to cover games that have been out for a while and I intend to use the videos to highlight moments and mechanics that I found particularly worthy of highlighting and exploring. Also I aim to keep the videos under 20 minutes.

In this Deep Look I check out how Grim Fandango uses and reuses the same locations to convey its film noir tone. I show off how the town of Rubacava is used to show the criminal decent of the land of the dead. The changes between Rubacava in year one and the same city in year two do a great job of showing how organized crime and vice are seeping into the land of the dead. Come check out one of the best transitions in all of gaming!

P.S. I should have used the word setting in here somewhere and it really bothers me that it slipped my mind. I'm talking about setting even if I don't say setting!

Keep up the great work on these... I've been subscribed on YouTube since the FFVIII Deep Looks and think you do a great job. Another cool and interesting look at a game that I really enjoyed.

@jbg4: Thanks! I really enjoy making these videos and I've learned a lot along the way. I think they are a nice companion to my written work.

I don't know how to get these videos a bit more out there though. Like a lot of people seem to watch them and like them, but not many subscribe. Do the "like and subscribe" buttons and calls to action at the end of videos actually matter or something?

I'm pretty sure they do.

Marketing 101 is you gotta "ask for the sale" so to speak. Even if only a small % bothers to do this (say like 0.5%) it adds up.

A lot of the top youtubers also tend to promote their work across as many channels (twitter, twitch, tumblr, vine etc) as they can and don't do anything without throwing in a mention of their yt channel if they can.

but even then the guys who make it big usually have some video that goes viral first for whatever reason.

oh and I liked the video a lot! I wish more games used their gameworlds this way (the way Final Fantasy Vi did it remains one of my favorite uses of this concept), but I suspect in today's world given how expensive asset creation is that's a perhaps financially prohibitive.

@slag: Yeah but asking for subscriptions feels weird even if it works.

I would think that changing the assets you already would be cheaper than creating a bunch of new ones for every part of the game. Like Grim Fandango has maybe 35 character models tops and it gets away with this low number because it reuses assets like crazy and justifies that reuse.

The FFVI example is another great one though, it really conveys just how bad the world has gotten. FFVIII and IX attempt to use the same sort of world transformation, but I don't think they are as successful as VI. Though its hard to beat the sea turning to lava.

I certainly understand why you feel that way and I'm not terribly good at it myself , but that's the nature of the beast when trying to promote something whether that be yourself in some capacity or pitching a product/service etc. The Squeaky Wheel gets the grease.

You know what? You're right I had that completely backward, it should be cheaper to alter existing than to create wholesale new environs. It is kinda weird I suppose we haven't seen many games do that then.

The most prominent ones I can think of that used recycled assets are Final Fantasy x-2 and Xiii-2 as well of course Majora's Mask (and some garbage ones like Arc the Lad: End of Darkness).

But I can't think of any game that does it better than Grim Fandango as you demonstrated. It took a concept that often feels cheap and made it feel integral. Pretty impressive really when you think about how recycled stuff normally feels.

@slag: I think the FF series started recycling assets once the cost per asset spiked in the PS2 era. Suddenly every background needed a bunch of 3D items that had to be modeled instead of a single pre-rendered image. You went from needing maybe 200-500 pre-rendered images to needing thousands of individually modeled items. Once you're making that kind of investment you need to recycle. Also the number of unique enemies dropped after the PS2 era. The FF series and other rpgs moved towards using a few base models with base animations and then used palette swaps and slight model changes yo create a variety of enemies. Pre-PS2 the FF games rarely reused character models while the post PS2 games reuse enemies like crazy.

I think Grim was right on the cusp of the spike in asset production costs and they likely made their decisions based both on story and cost. I'm sure glad they did what they did though.

Sorry it took me so long to respond... so many things going on, haha.

The calls to action do matter according to some research that I have done, I do not have capture gear yet but I do plan to get some within the next couple of months so I can start turning my written blogs here on GB into a video series on YouTube and I am already preparing myself to pander a bit at the end. I'm like you in that I think it feels strange to ask but in the videos of all of the major YouTubers that I watch nearly every single one will ask for those very things at the end of all their videos.

I'm already subscribed to you and try to like all of your vids when I can remember it, which is where the calls to action would come into play... by doing those I would probably just hear you say like and go do it without thinking.

Keep it up though, you do a great job and it's very informative.

@jbg4: Yeah I'm gonna try adding a like and subscribe statement at the end of my next video before I sign off just to see how much it matters.

If you are trying do do capture stuff I strongly recommend trying OBS and giving that a shot. I found it very user friendly and the number of tutorials made it simple to set up. Also OBS can handle capture boxes like the El Gato, so you don't have to worry about learning a new software when you upgrade your capture setup.

I downloaded OBS a bit ago and streamed for the first time to Twitch just as a test last week and it worked, okay... I've been reading more and more guides on how to set everything up so maybe one day I can figure it out.

I have a pretty noticeable southern accent being from Kentucky so I wonder how that will affect everything, my dialect courses helped a bit in college so maybe I'm worried about nothing. Maybe we can collaborate one day and do a North and South type thing, haha... thanks for the advice though, I need all that anyone is willing to share.