Anyone else disappointed in the new shows?

Where is the game content? I used to love stuff like Ranking of Fighters, This is the Run, Game Tapes, Demo Derby, Metal Gear Scanlon Even stuff as far back as T.A.N.G.

Now we have stuff like, Albummer, Bak 2 School, Reel Layers, even Armed and Rangerous feels like it doesn't fit.

Don't get me wrong there has been some cool new shows too (Grubbsnax and Guilty Treasures)

Now I know GB always has tangents like the DBZ Podcast, and even Wrestling Podcasts, but that always felt periphery to the game centric content.

Am I alone in not liking the direction the content is taking on the site?

Nope. I like a lot of them.

My thought is..."not every show has to be for me." If I like a couple then that's great.

You are not. This is a sentiment that has been expressed often since the new direction started. It’s died down here though, as I think those of us that don’t enjoy the content have stopped coming here. I pretty much come here exclusively for the forums at this point. I haven’t watched a show since the next lander departure, and I barely listen to the bomb cast anymore, although I am excited to see how it is with voidburger. I also have to give a shout out to Jan for being an amazing human being.

It's about 50-50 video game-related shows vs. not. Which yes is different from usual but I think GB has routinely had non-gaming discussions within their content for a LONG time now and breaking it out into shows to see what people are into isn't a bad thing.

Also, as been mentioned a few times in a few spots, GB will be adding editorial staff in the coming months but between the pandemic, babies, and other things it'll just be slower.

So this isn't all GB will be doing going forward, have patience, and enjoy the stuff you enjoy.

Yeah I mean I think it's cool to have one or even two shows, but lately it just feels like there are a lot of shows that have nothing to do with games. And if those are taking away from potential game centric shows than I think that's a problem on a site that is supposedly about video games.

I don't want to comment on the current slate of shows but I think it's odd that people are upset or surprised that Giant Bomb has shifted away from purely being about gaming. First of all...every major gaming site has done it. IGN has covered movies and TV for a very long time, Gamespot does some of that, and most sites I can think of have. It's just the nature of the business and there are obvious synergies.

Secondly...this site is over a decade old. Naturally there will be changes. Giant Bomb is constantly stuck in a cycle of everyone thinking that whenever they jumped on was the best time and yearning for the halcyon days of yore.

Thirdly...and most importantly...this site has ALWAYS been about personalities first and 'gaming' second. The earliest podcasts had long discussions about energy drinks and the movie Cobra starring Sylvester Stalone. Some of the most popular segments have been about food, or baseball bat vs. knife, or Vinny's home improvement stuff.

They ditched reviews as a regular thing a long time ago, they haven't tried to quick look everything big for almost as long, and even a lot of the material that was ostensibly about video games wasn't actually about video games as they spun off into digressions and craziness.

I think the biggest problem with the new shows is that they're mostly just Zoom calls (or whatever specific program they're using) and we're all sick of Zoom call content but, you know, there are reasons for that.

The only objection i ever had was that it seems very strange for GB to have some shows (ie Albummer) that feature no actual employees of the site that we've known for years. For a personality based website that seems strange. That said, albummer is one of my favorite new shows so I was clearly wrong.

Yeah, sadly. I'm all for supporting the site and hoping they find their footing again, and I'm not going to sit here and tell anyone what to do with their own creative output, but I feel like the podcast is the only thing keeping me here, and even that is starting to lose me after a decade-plus. Mostly because... all the voices that spoke to me on some level are gone, save Jan (and I'm hoping that Voidburger steps in at some point on the 'cast as I desperately want some non-over-the-hill dude voices in this—again, aside from Jan who is amazing).

I'll likely stick around and see where they go from here, but I've tried each of the new shows and just none of them have kept my attention for more than a few minutes. The vibe and comaradery of the site feels extinguished—it feels like we're in a weird pubescent period where the site has aged out of one iteration and is heading toward another, but is experimenting with some things that may or may not stick in the meantime. I have to say, though, that I'm feeling as if I'm on borrowed time here, and have gone from visiting the site every day to forgetting that it even exists until the podcast drops in my feed. And I do not relish saying that as this is the last video game site I visit with any regularity.

I love giant bomb and will

Always support them….. I used to watch every video…. But not so much now. Been a tough ride though, so willing to stick with it

@sometingbanuble: Respect where you're coming from, but it's a little too "get off my lawn, ya damn kids!" for my taste. I'm not interested in just base knowledge—I'm interested in experiences, and different voices from different backgrounds having their say. It's why I gravitated toward Waypoint for a while, though I had to bail on that as Rob just... seemed to base his entire persona on being an educated edgelord who delights in shitting on things so much it's difficult to know if ever likes a thing—and when he's on (which is most eps), the vibe for the whole podcast changes toward the negative. With GB, I thought it was at its best during the period the cast was the largest. The east coast team gave the whole site a necessary balance, being more story heavy and experimental in their gaming choices, and their content seemed to play around and take chances a whole lot more, too. Without their voices, it -just- feels like mostly old, mostly white dudes being mostly "over" the whole video game thing. The balance is gone, as is a lot of the joy and playfulness, and the current cast is too one note for my tastes. I'm not saying I'm done, I'm just saying that I am hoping to hell any upcoming hires add youth and different experiences (BIPOC, queer, etc.) to this mix so it's not JUST what we have now.

@sometingbanuble: Also, I am over forty and would much rather speak to people in their twenties and thirties, and to hear what they have to say about this industry, so I'm not just hearing the same old shit from the same old sources. Variety and new experiences, that's what keeps me coming back to this world. But to each their own.

@sometingbanuble: Honestly the things that irk you are just... not remotely important to me, so I think it's clear we're just not on the same page here and that's fine. I'll take any amount of that lack of concrete knowledge if it means not hearing the same voices from the same perspectives until I'm old and in the ground. I just don't care that much about what is clearly for you a pretty big line in the sand—which is fine, not dismissing it, just saying we're not going to see eye to eye on this.

@edens_heel: Calling people over the hill isn't nice. You can advocate for diversity in voices without insulting people.

@bigsocrates: Didn't really think of it as an insult, more a statement of age/experience, but noted and thank you—will be more careful with my words in the future.

@edens_heel: It means past your prime and washed up. And I don't really think that's true for anyone on the site. Does Jeff Gerstmann in his mid 40s bring a different energy than Jeff Gerstmann in his early 30s? Yes. Is the site less mad cap and chaotic than it once was? Of course. But there are strengths as well, and a lot of the weaknesses come not from age but from circumstance (Giant Bomb losing its studio was a massive, massive, blow for the kind of content they create.)

There are lots of creators way older than Jeff who are putting out the best stuff of their careers. I don't think that's true of Jeff at the moment, but given the circumstances (new corporate overlords, new baby, pandemic meaning no in person content) I don't really think it could be. There's a good chance that the best is yet to come for ol' thirsty Gerstie.

And Danny O'Dwyer arguably is putting out the best stuff of his career right now.

@sometingbanuble: They might be singing in a different key than you like, or a different genre, but it's still singing all the same. I don't prize encyclopaedic knowledge the same as you do, not when we're discussing art. And Jeff is an encyclopeadia of knowledge but that just does not matter if I'm finding his analysis of a thing, from other angles (personal, cultural, social) to be lacking and narrow. And I often do. He's the origin point of this site, yes, but he is not THE site and I want infinitely more than he can give in a variety of areas. To use your metaphor, I want to hear a shitload of different songs, messy and weird and in different keys and time signatures, and not just a precise, methodical piece. Frankly we've had that, and it's fine, but it's not enough on its own. Not for me. I'm in this art and have been since I was a kid not for the gameplay but for the experience, and the experience comprises vast tracts of emotional response that have literally nothing to do with fact-based knowledge of the industry. Again, not saying you're wrong, just what you want from this site is no longer what I want, not after so many years. I don't love the new shows, but I'm still eager for more voices and experiments to play around with what we have and hopefully give GB a renewed pulse.

@bigsocrates: I know what it means, and I apologize for the flippant use of it, but I still feel what I feel about the current cast—for me, a lot of them do feel like they're coasting and not doing their best. Of course circumstances are harsh right now, not disputing that at all, but that's why I'm hopeful for new cast members/hires because who knows how long this period of uncertainty will last and it feels very much like they themselves need an injection of the new to help them find their vibe again, and to help them through this period into hopefully something new and more vibrant.

@sometingbanuble: I just don't see what you see, but I'm also not interesting in continuing this when we are clearly just coming at this from different places—just feels like we're going to be going in circles. In the end, I hope we both get what we want with GB's future.

I could not possibly care less about about Albummer. So I don't watch it.

I like some of the new stuff. I dislike (or rather, don't care about) other stuff. That's not any different from how I've always engaged with Giant Bomb. Or with anything, really.

I will say, I find it extremely funny that in years past, Jeff and the staff criticized other gaming sites for doing non-gaming stuff, and now a significant portion of the site's content is not gaming-related.

I watch some of it. I don't watch other things. If I want to watch some old style content I'll put on a UPF from 2015. No problems here.

Fyi, be respectful to one another and stay on topic. This isn't your chance to make a drive-by snide comment or to insult one another. Thanks.

Yep. The stuff I was really into is either such a slow trickle (Guilty Treasures, Hot Takeouts) or died as quick as it was born (Borne to Run, which I know is "coming back" but, y'know...this is this website after all). I like Very Online Show and Bak 2 School well enough but they're not appointment viewing. Grubbsnax seems like a winner for the audience but I personally think it just feels like watching someone read r/games speculation for an hour so I dropped it after 4 episodes. Whatever's left I can say I've not engaged with at all; Albummer merely on principle that it's such an easy concept for Giant Bomb staff to be a part of and yet they're not!

Worst of all though has been the trend of going back to solo quick looks. Initially it made sense - if you were around for the FF VII Remake saga, you know how much trouble these guys were having trying to get at home quick looks functioning similarly to the studio vibe. Well, they figured that out over a year ago, but for whatever reason they just want to make it either a Quick Look clip or a solo video with the "secondary" commentary apparently being whatever the video editor finds important to highlight for Youtube. So that's that, UPF is still fine but I just don't care about the games they're playing and the studio vibe isn't there to buffer that...

I hit these forums up multiple times a day despite them being dead as hell because I totally prefer y'alls takes on gaming to pretty much any other discussion outlet I can find, but I've just been checking the Latest Videos tab a couple times a month if that since the Red Ventures transition and I used to check that pretty much every day and make sure I watched every video I hadn't seen to completion. And I'm somebody who only plays about 8 new video games a year and mostly came here for the nostalgia content and gaming vicariously through hilarious people, I can't imagine what the GB experience is like for people who actually used this site to discover new games to play.

I understand the production issues early on in Covid, and now the production issues of "oh dang, we got no editorial staff other than Gerstmann", but yeah, I can't say the site has really been checking that box since March 2020. I know the staff obviously did play games throughout 2020 and 2021 and they get talked about on the Bombcast or GotY, but with almost no QLs in 2020 and still a lot fewer in 2021 than they used to put out, sometimes the podcast discussions are about as useful as cave drawings of the video game when there's no accompanying QL. I still find Quick Looks as a pretty cool snapshot look into a game, but the last 2 years I've definitely had to reach out more to friends, Discords, a very small number of Twitch streamers who have any idea what the fuck they're talking about, etc., to get an idea of interesting indie games to consider playing each month.

I don't mind the new shows. I assume the original content plan was:

• mixup the gaming content under the content direction of Bakalar
• mixup the nongaming content under the content direction of Gerstmann/Bakalar, more outside contributors

But I assume the Nextlander departure completely paused the gaming content plan, and they could only go ahead with the nongaming content plans while they slowly recruit full-time editorial stuff. And yeah it's been strange that instead of premium being "Ranking of Fighters/Game Tapes/etc." from West and "Blue Bombin'/Vinnyvania/Steal My Sunshine" from East, overnight it became only the side podcast stuff like "Film & 40s/All Systems Goku" but as done by outside freelancers. It does feel a bit out of balance compared to maybe whatever the original plan was. I'm not bent out of shape about it like some people in this thread, I can live with it.

I don't think they're abandoning gaming content the way some people are freaking out about, but I assume any of their gaming content plans are largely paused until they staff up more to replace some of the Nextlander folk.

Sorry mods if this is speculating too much, but I'm trying to clearly flag the assumptions in a non-malicious way.

I guess here's a rundown for me:

• Albummer: This is one of those things where I need to listen to the album. I listened to the Weezer episode without listening to the album, and it was just people dunking on things I didn't know. For Danzig, I listened to most of that album and got more out of that episode. I just don't listen to entire bad albums for funz though. I'll dip my toes into individual songs that pop up, but an album is too big of a commitment. The show seemed ok, but just not for me.
• Armed and Rangerous: This I've been really enjoying. I did watch Power Rangers growing up but apparently forgot EVERYTHING about it. So it's just been watching a goofy 90s kid's show and listening to a good podcast after the fact. I need to catch up, but I'm digging this.
• Bak 2 Skool: I think this show is hilarious. My one knock is how Bakalar may not always be prepared. Perhaps a more kind take is he's not an expert so can't handle Dan when he goes down 4 rabbit holes in a row. If there was somebody in the field guest starring on episodes, that would handle this issue more. That aside, I've liked the discussions and the editing on this show.
• Borne to Run: This is one of my favorite new show, which is kind of a bummer it got derailed by travel and Tam moving. Really looking forward to this starting up again in December though.
• GrubbSnax: This is my #1 new favorite thing on Giant Bomb. I really hope Grubb sticks around as a contributor.
• Guilty Treasures: I've been digging this show a lot. I know Danny mentioned he was short on time for the Jan episode, but the premise and Danny's editing on this has been really good so far.
• Ranking of Evil: I've only watched the first episode, which seemed ok. Not sure what the longevity of this thing is though. I don't really know who Evil Uno is and if this show is basically, "This game has fire, which is evil", I'm not sure I'll keep watching.
• Reel Layers: This will either be a disaster or amazing. The first episode was really funny to me, but I'm wondering what legs this show will have.
• The Very Online Show: I have not watched this at all. I was looking forward to Tam and Lucy being on something together for Giant Bomb, but I guess the initial pitch didn't seem interesting to me.
• VoidBurger's Hot Takeouts: The "fan booking" element of this site is frowned upon (for good reason), but privately I was hoping they would bring on VoidBurger full-time between how well these turned out, and seeing them stream on Twitch / seeing them appear on other random Giant Bomb things.

So yeah, I guess I like most everything.

I enjoy: Armed and Rangerous, Bak 2 School, Borne to Run, GrubbSnax, Guilty Treasures, and VoidBurger's Hot Takeouts.

I don't care for / haven't watched: Albummer, Ranking of Evil, and The Very Online Show

Reel Layers I'm just going to put off to the side for now.

I do wish they work on hiring new people, so we can get new gaming focused shows, a (possible) return to something like Playdates, and just more people on stuff. Like even stuff like Quick Looks work because there's 2+ people talking. The traditional QL with one person doesn't really have much appeal to me, and I end up bouncing off a lot of "I don't know, I'm just going to stream some stuff" streams.

I know they said they are going to hire more people, but this is one of those things they should have been doing gradually over time--even during covid--so they didn't end up with a skeleton crew like they did. Even with Brad, Vinny, and Alex left all of a sudden like they did, if they backfilled Dan, Abby, or Ben along the way, then you would at least have more than 3 editors on staff.

Anyways, things are definitely better now with Jess being onboarded and I'm enjoying enough of the new stuff. I don't mind Giant Bomb trying some things (in the not so distant future, there was a somewhat regular cooking show and a Dragon Ball Z podcast for god's sake), and some things, in my opinion, have worked more than others. For me, having an extra full-time person or two I think will help add a sense of normalcy to the site and will hopefully flesh out some of the gaming content.

@bladeofcreation:I also find it super funny that GB is now doing more non-gaming-related content and totally thought of their past discussions of Gamespot and their Giant Thrones podcasts skit (still a hilarious name). Regardless of their success though, I think this change proves how fucking smart Jeff actually is because it shows the guy holds his ideas for the company in good faith and changes them as he sees more compelling arguments being made. I also saw Polygon and Gamespot's cross-pollination into other media coverage as cynical click-chasing but it was a pretty damning reflection of the current state of current gaming journalism/reporting/entertainment.

It's hard to get a clear picture of the state of things and I can only speak as a naive 28-year-old who used to comb the IGN & Gamespot reviews constantly, but that kind of content just isn't engaging to me anymore and part of it is that many people don't seem to engage with it in good faith anymore. Granted - people have always been shitty about review scores, but the post-2014 discourse for gaming is so insanely toxic and ridiculous in a way that pre-Gamergate never was. People were petty and shitty, but now those fights are the news with influencers and arguments about TLOU2 have become these big Kaiju battles of ideas that're just fucking exhausting. Pre-2014, I think people went to reviews to engage with the outlet.

Nowadays, I feel many people go to reviews with an agenda which may INCLUDE the review but ultimately results in some larger discourse. Again this is stuff that's always been around, and this more-so a feeling, but I imagine if you're writing a review it's not because you want to be an actor in some larger political/ideological debate. It devalues your work because it's no longer being considered on its own merits, but as part of something you never asked it to be, giving it a voice it never intended to have. Not every review has this fate; I don't see Jeff Gerstman reviewing Forza Horizon 5 and people pulling that review into a larger discussion of illegal immigration and colonization. But the possibility of that would be enough for almost anyone to go "Nah fuck this."

This site isn't quite where I want it to be but they're aiming for something which would hypothetically be more interesting to me than reviews or Quick Looks and I'm excited to see if they nail it.

I think I’m largely coming to the conclusion that Giant Bomb is for somebody else now and that’s Fine.

@efesell: yeah…I feel ya on that.

I feel the same but trying my best to get into it and accepting some just isn't for me. I'm 100% on the side that we as a userbase have been sold to Red Ventures who want to maximise profit from our subs. What better way to do that than just subcontract work than having a fully staffed editorial staff.

What really gets me the reason Giantbombs none gaming content was so enjoyable was because it was delivered by a crew we got to know. The GOTY skits, the ranking of 80s songs wouldn't have been half as fun if it wasn't people we got to know over many time. To just have so many personalities thrust all at once feels kind of scattershot and gross. Give me the crew ranking songs rather than. The Albumeer crew, the fact they got one of those guys to come in and lord it over everyone that his knowledge of music meant that original list was wrong was just a bit shit.

The other thing that gets me so much outsourced content and yet the amount of gaming content from the GB crew is so so little when compared to Nextlander, Kinda Funny etc....it's very disheartening.

I had planned to cancel my sub but have gone monthly....if there isn't a sale soon I'll probably be letting go.

I am really liking everything! I just moved to a new state and am trying not to be a total hermit, so I don't have enough time to watch everything, but I am looking forward to catching up!

I think some of the new shows are actually quite decent, but i will say that there's quite a barrier to dig into content without GB members. Not a slight to those folk because when i do watch it, it's alright, but at the same time it often feels like i mostly decide to give it a chance out out of a feeling of solidarity with GB. I could have as well checked out millions of other youtube vids and streams of unknown people after all. Even a show with a very flimsy premise like Ranking of Evil is worth checking out for me because i am curious what obscurities Jeff & Jan will throw at Evil Uno. Counterpoint, i have a hard time caring about the real-life ARG Bryan Stills is cooking up because the internet is filled to the brim with similar content that it's hard to get excited about one more of these just because there's a Jeff B tweet attached to the project. It's not that everything has to be original , All Systems Goku was nothing new neither, but it sure helps a ton to have a built-in audience care about the people that make the thing.

At the end of the day, i ended up here because i liked to be informed & entertained by a group of people that i jived with. That aspect of the site just has changed considerably and that's pretty hard to recover from no matter the approach. Naturally content had to be generated, even on a skeleton crew. They had a ton of money to throw around so i think it was probably the right call to get some exclusive content made by others. But i do wonder whether the business works out for GB in the longterm. Will fans of 2 Minutes to Late night check out Albummer and get a GB subscription, eventhough there's no easy pathway for those people to realize that they need more J's in their life? Is the Janina sphere of influence being directed towards GB through her show? The views on youtube don't really seem to indicate that a new audience is being attracted.

What is the reason new people would want to get invested in this corner of the internet and potentitally spend money on a mini youtube of mostly rotating chairs and series, as some sort of lottery, when there's so much regular free stuff being produced by people that they can get invested in longterm?

The lack of gaming content is not something that I particularly care about. I first came to Giant Bomb for the video game content, yes (the Demon's Souls Quick Look, specifically), but I ultimately stuck around for the personalities and "hanging out with friends" vibe of everything that these guys and gals have produced. The last few GotY discussions have hammered home that GB's taste in games is completely unlike my own, when games like Devil May Cry 5 and FF7 Remake get snubbed and everyone but Gerstmann found Outer Wilds to be some life altering experience.

Point being: I'll always stick around for the people who work here, as long as they're fun to listen to, regardless of what they're talking about in their podcasts and videos.

I have come around on the mew direction. I don’t like most of the new shows but I really like the concept. I think with time better ideas/shows will come. I also like the idea of having shows with ppl outside the site. It’s opens up lots of cool opportunities.

I think the thing I miss most (and this started as more of a pandemic problem) is that GB used to be the place I went to check in on what was happening in games in general.

I don't have the time to stay across everything anymore so it was awesome to always be able to see a QL of whatever was going on in the gaming zeitgeist within a week or so of release. Things like the new NSO N64 expansion, while shitty, still would have had a dedicated QL back in the day.

I understand that videos of this stuff can be found anywhere but I come here because I like the personality of the GB crew and respect their takes. I don't personally want guest shows from people that don't actually work here. Again I know the concept of working in "one place" has kind of been trashed since the pandemic but that's what I miss. The feeling that this was a distinct space/team that had a culture and a common ethos.

I mean I am definitely here for the personalities. That has been true since Arrow Pointing Down for me. But I ultimately came to hear those personalities talk about games. Polygon, IGN, Waypoint they all branched out and now Giant Bomb feels like it's copying rather than innovating like they have in the past.

I think there is something to be said for a site that goes deep rather than wide. I just love that there was a space that was solely centered on gaming discussion with tangential excursions into gaming adjacent discussion. It just doesn't feel that way anymore and it makes me sad.

Someone above had a brilliant suggestion of a music show through the lens of how well the medium is used in games (Guardians of the Galaxy, GTA, MGSV) it's talking about music but by way of games.... that connective tissue is there.

If you're gonna have a show about film talk about movies that inspired games. Escape From NY with MGS, Mad Max with Fallout, Aliens with.... almost every sci-fi game. It's about movies but again the connective tissue to games is there.

I just feel like the shows now are not what this site was about, and if that's the direction that Jeff wants to go so be it, I wish him and the team luck... still doesn't mean I can't be bummed out about it.

Yeah, GB has been through a lot of different phases but this is certainly the one time where I felt there wasn't much here for me personally. No disrespect to the folks working hard to create this new content and trying to find a new approach for the site. Things change, and if I never watched another Giant Bomb video again myself, I would still want the people who are a part of this site to succeed even if they're not really making stuff I'm into anymore. I got a lot of years of enjoyment and laughs from this site and I'm grateful.

My position is that, aside from just not being into the direction of some of the individual shows, I have to admit the site direction overall feels like it has become more about being a weird web show platform rather than a group of friends with a cool, funny video game site. Even for all their staff changes over the years (and even social distancing last year), I felt like that core idea was always there until now, whether they were doing their video game content or going down one of their bizarre rabbit holes on a side-podcast or something.

The best way I could describe it is that Giant Bomb used to feel like a team creating content together, and now it feels more like a channel meant to host a larger variety of content, so that content feels a little more all over the place to me.

If people like it, that's great for them, and if it's successful for the staff, even better. Like I said, I got way too much enjoyment out of this site over the years to hold it against Jeff and the rest of the crew here when they decide they need to change their approach. It's just not for me, and I think it's okay to express that.

Ah its fine- I still listen to the bombcast and im enjoying some of the new shows. You have Dan on Fire Escape Cast and i guess vinny and drew are off on their own new Gaming based streaming/podcast adventure- mentioned in the latest Fire Escape Cast which has Vinny filling in.

What you want and are used to is still there- just kinda gotta look for it. Also very pumped voidburger joined officially.

Out of…

• Albummers
• Armed & Rangerous
• Bak 2 Skool
• Borne To Run
• GrubbSnax
• Guilty Treasures
• Hot Takeouts
• Reel Layers
• Ranking of Evil
• Very Online Show

…I’ve liked Guilty Treasures, B2S and Hot Takeouts, while the rest I’m either indifferent to or don’t care about at all. So I guess there’s some disappointment, but also me just accepting it’s not for me. It’s a shame about something like Ranking of Evil, which *is* a show about gaming, but it just seems kinda…strange to me and not in an exciting way.

I do also have like 3-4 UPFs to watch in the backlog, which might be partly because of lesser interest towards the site. But there’s still some good stuff and Extra Life shenanigans with Rorie & Jan (and Nextlander) was great! And I still have my sub going until 2023, so I’ll be here more or less until then at least.

At this point I'm just here for the bombcast and the rare quick look that isn't solo. I appreciate wanting to try new things but it's not for me

If you want classic GB shows, Nextlander is doing exact copies of old features. I think a lot of that was already getting stale when the guys left but at least I can go there when I need some Hitman and FMV. Plus Dan is still being Dan on Twitch!

All the new shows are high quality, but just not for me… The GB podcast is really the only thing I still interact with in the site (and any Jan+Rory videos). Not enough to keep my premium sub, but they could win it back with some fresh games content.

Are the new shows doing well? It would be great if it brought some new subs and I hope they find an audience.

I'm just running down the clock on my sub now. I understand that they had to pivot into something new given how many people have left over the last couple of years, but this direction really isn't for me. Honestly I don't know what they could've done differently so I'm not bitter about it or anything. Just time to move on.

I was pretty sour on a lot of the new content a few months back when this was a pretty heated discussion. But at this point I've at least checked out a little bit of each new feature (except the Power Rangers show, probably because of my age). And I mostly warmed up to the things I was sour on. I still don't quite understand why Albummer needs to live on Giant Bomb but other than that everything has been mostly fine.

That being said, I haven't been engaging in any of the new content. Not because of some kind of protest or whatever, it's just that, as it turns out, I don't really care and none of it feels essential. I've just moved on to other things. I will say that I'm glad Voidburger has joined the staff though, I think she's great. But the one thing I think needs to change is just too much Bakalar. I think the only person that ever popped up on more GB content than him was Jeff Gerstmann, which is understandable because this is kind of his deal. But Bakalar is on everything, everywhere, all of the time. Constantly. And it's not that I hate Jeff Bakalar, but it's more like-When I was much younger, I had a good friend that had this other friend that was fine, but was definitely his friend and not mine. And it got to the point where every time my actual good friend and I hung out, his other friend was with him, tagging along, whether I wanted him there or not. Even when my friend and I had plans to do things just the two of us, somehow his other friend always seemed to be there. At one point I may have uttered a phrase like "___ is fine, but does he have to do EVERYTHING with us?" And that's sort of how I feel about all the Bakalar everywhere to the point where if it isn't something that feels absolutely unmissable, if he's there (and he is), I just skip it.

Are the new shows for me? Definitely not. But having thought about it for awhile, I don't really know if that's the problem. I think that, even if I really liked all the new content, I might be letting my subscription lapse regardless.

To me, it all comes back to a quote from Jeff - "You're competing with free . . . you need to win over free."

I feel like, in the past, Giantbomb could win over free. To start with, Quick Looks were essentially let's plays before let's plays were a ubiquitous thing. It was content that literally only existed on Giantbomb, so it was worth a subscription. Even after that style of content got big and you could find it in a million other places, the site still had that "secret sauce" of the interaction between staff members, which you really couldn't get anywhere else.

Now? I'm not really sure that's the case. One of things that moving to a show-based model has done is make people acutely aware of what exactly they are spending their subscription money on. I think that's a big problem, because even if the new shows were the type of thing that I was really into, none of them are addressing topics that I can't find done as good or better on YouTube, for free. Adding to that problem is the fact that each show exists as its own little weird walled garden that never interacts with anything else. The Albummer people have their little clique, Jeff Grubb is apparently trapped alone in a room, Reel Layers might be written by an AI, etc. The end result is that, not only is the content something I can find plenty of other places, it also lacks the "secret sauce" that would get me to pick it over something else.

Honestly, the current era of content doesn’t speak to me as much. But I also don’t agree with the notion that this site has to necessarily be focused on games forever. That said, while I have the privilege of doing so, I’m just going to keep my subscription intact because I believe in the people behind Giantbomb and I want to see them succeed. I of course don’t expect this reasoning to be adequate basis for everyone to want to renew their sub, but it works for me.

Also, I’ve followed Giantbomb since the beginning and there have always been “phases” when I haven’t felt the need to be fully tuned in. I guess I mostly support the site as proof that something like this can continue to adapt and evolve over the long term. Ups and downs included.