This was awesome. Love hearing Jeff talk about games and gaming like this, always entertaining and informative in a good balance.
Jeff Gerstmann
Jeff Gerstmann is the co-founder and former Editor-in-Chief of Giant Bomb as well as a professional video game scientist and anime expert.
Jeff Gerstmann Heads to New York, Takes Questions
Cool talk, bro.
Although pretty much 95% of the questions asked have been covered by Jeff in the Jar Time series.
I feel like I've heard Jeff discuss the dissolution of the 'B-tier developers like Midway' 100 times at this point. Still made for some good viewing all the same, though. Srs bsn Jeff I always find to be fascinating to listen to; he's very good at drawing you in and keeping your attention.
Nice! I missed the first 10 minutes when I got there.
I was pretty surprised at the general not-terribleness of the questions in the Q&A part, haha
@tirion said:
I realize that the scenario is a bit different, but comparing this Q&A with the PAX panels makes a lot of the PAX panel questions so much more cringeworthy. The Q&As at PAX is still entertaining in a different way, but this was just really interesting all the way through.
Actually that goes for other panels at PAX actually. Most of the panels I've gone to at PAX are generally content specific and it's rare people ask dumb questions when it's not a general fan audience for a thing. For instance, even though it was Rich and Vinny at the Produced panel, everyone pretty much had a great question and it was on point to the topic. Since social issues are hard and inherently controversial, they're the only other type of panel where things can go a bit weird but overall it's mostly just been the Giant Bomb panel over the years that makes me dread Q&A.
I guess the positive spin is that in most other situations, Q&A is pretty decent if there's a topic focus or direction to the panel. If it's just a convening of fans, eh...
Is that Produced panel archived anywhere?
@tirion said:
I realize that the scenario is a bit different, but comparing this Q&A with the PAX panels makes a lot of the PAX panel questions so much more cringeworthy. The Q&As at PAX is still entertaining in a different way, but this was just really interesting all the way through.
Actually that goes for other panels at PAX actually. Most of the panels I've gone to at PAX are generally content specific and it's rare people ask dumb questions when it's not a general fan audience for a thing. For instance, even though it was Rich and Vinny at the Produced panel, everyone pretty much had a great question and it was on point to the topic. Since social issues are hard and inherently controversial, they're the only other type of panel where things can go a bit weird but overall it's mostly just been the Giant Bomb panel over the years that makes me dread Q&A.
I guess the positive spin is that in most other situations, Q&A is pretty decent if there's a topic focus or direction to the panel. If it's just a convening of fans, eh...
Is that Produced panel archived anywhere?
Patrick said something about an audio archive? Don't know if it'll go up on the site.
URN BREW? What the fuck?
Seriously though, speaking as a Scotchman, the secret of Irn Bru is not only is it not made from girders, it's also not that good of a drink.
@tirion said:
I realize that the scenario is a bit different, but comparing this Q&A with the PAX panels makes a lot of the PAX panel questions so much more cringeworthy. The Q&As at PAX is still entertaining in a different way, but this was just really interesting all the way through.
Actually that goes for other panels at PAX actually. Most of the panels I've gone to at PAX are generally content specific and it's rare people ask dumb questions when it's not a general fan audience for a thing. For instance, even though it was Rich and Vinny at the Produced panel, everyone pretty much had a great question and it was on point to the topic. Since social issues are hard and inherently controversial, they're the only other type of panel where things can go a bit weird but overall it's mostly just been the Giant Bomb panel over the years that makes me dread Q&A.
I guess the positive spin is that in most other situations, Q&A is pretty decent if there's a topic focus or direction to the panel. If it's just a convening of fans, eh...
Is that Produced panel archived anywhere?
Patrick said something about an audio archive? Don't know if it'll go up on the site.
Vinny packed an audio recorder for PAX, but he is on vacation and also may not have used it for his panel.
@dylanfill: Can I ask what everyone was there for if not for Jeff? I'm just curious because I thought the event was a talk with a few people, with Jeff being one of the headliners, but I suppose I have very little knowledge of the actual event surrounding the Q&A. Was it open to the public? What else was going on besides the interview and questions?
I mean, it was advertised as one talk in an ongoing series of discussions with important game biz people. But it was only ever promoted as An Evening with Jeff Gerstmann, and not like a roundtable discussion with other gaming minds. What I'm confused about is the...older people in the audience, some of which didn't seem particularly familiar with Jeff or his work. Maybe they just really dig community events.
You have a lot of that in larger cities/university towns. I live in Bloomington, IN, home to Indiana University, and I find myself going to all kinds of events that are out of my scope or knowledge or interest because I have the access to them. I may not always live here so I want to take advantage of the opportunities it provides.
It was fun and I watched the whole thing, but I've literally heard Jeff answer every one of those questions multiple times before. That probably says something more about me... but eh.
@hassun: You tend to get more well thought-out questions in environments like this one. The people attending are there mostly for the learning experience (this was an educationally facilitated talk, presumably for students only without or with limited access to outside parties), so it makes sense that they'd want to ask questions that really count.
Really happy to hear Jeff acknowledge the wiki and all, as you would otherwise suspect it was about ready to be put to pasture. However, I feel like Jeff has long aired his aspirations for the wiki and yet it's been stuck in the same state for so long now. I'd like to hope these new workings within the wiki will be implemented sooner rather than later; maybe when they at least finally hire these new staff members.
It was cool getting to ask a question about PR and Marketing's relationship with critics. The whole talk was a nice, refreshing palette cleanser for the wrasslin' carnage about to ensue at PAX.
It was cool getting to ask a question about PR and Marketing's relationship with critics. The whole talk was a nice, refreshing palette cleanser for the wrasslin' carnage about to ensue at PAX.
A perfect example of GiantBomb being half "frank inside baseball on the gaming industry" and half "insane bullshit".
That was great. Much more academic questions than most panels. Also, always nice to hear behind the scenes stories. /clap
I love it when Jeff gets semi-serious and just talks business. It's often a refreshing and interesting insight into the world of someone that's been in the industry for a long time and has some perspective. It's also a good counterbalance to all the absolutely nutty things that go on in a PAX panel or an episode of the Bombcast. Awesome!
@dylanfill: Really cool dude, I live in Brooklyn and I would have definitely gone if I knew more in advance they were doing this.
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