The Community Spotlight 2019.09.07

Hello and welcome to the latest edition of the Giant Bomb Community Spotlight and I, @zombiepie, am once again honored to be your host this week. As everyone recovers from their PAX West 2019 induced hangover or cold, it was another eventful week on Giant Bomb. As many of you may have noticed, the site got some much needed UI improvements. Red and green buttons on the previous build have been improved to assist those with vision difficulties or nearsightedness. As someone with one of those disabilities I have to say I'm incredibly happy with these improvements. Nonetheless, last week was the week of PAX West 2019 and I thought I'd do many of you a favor and use the site housekeeping section to direct you all to archives and photo galleries of non-Giant Bomb hosted PAX panels that featured GianT Bomb staff members. Don't ever say I never did anything for you.

• 404 It PAX West 2019 (featuring Abby, Pat Baer, Alex Zandra, Kahlief Adams; video archive)
• The Improvised Postmortem PAX West 2019 (featuring Abby, Dave Lang, Mike Drucker, and more; video archive)
• The Great PAX Bake Off (featuring Abby as a judge; photo gallery)
• League of Heels Presents Tall Tales (featuring Abby, Dave Lang, Trin Garritano, and more; photo gallery)

Giant Bomb Galleria

Giant Bomb’s Variety Hour with Abby and Jan (By: @morehandclaps)

This year's Giant Bomb PAX West panel was a hilarious romp and, obviously, morehandclaps agrees! Check out this amazing work of art they made based on the panel, and don't forget to support artists however you can!

VRODEO (By: @humanity)

Earlier this week Giant Bomb user Humanity found an old work of art they made for Jeff's VRodeo feature they never got around to publishing. Here it is and I think we can all agree it looks awesome!

Giant Bomb User's Zaku II (By: @hampe)

Our Community Gunpla Club STILL LIVES! Here's what Giant Bomb user Hampe was able to make recently! Here's the link to join our Gunpla sub-community!

Gallery

BeastLab 2020 with Special Guest Whale Orbison and Mike +

Burgle My Evangelion +

Junji-Ito-fied Mike Mahardy (By: @jea_rum)

Over on Twitter, jea_rum went on an absolute tear this week as they made THREE amazing works of Giant Bomb fanart! Check them all out and show your support for their creative endeavors however you can!

Gallery

Clips Of The Week

Final Fantasy Two Bad: Part One (By: @thatpinguino)

Moderators ZombiePie, thatpinguino, and Giant Bomb user jeffrud recorded a podcast this week and the topic was OG Final Fantasy II. Give it a listen and watch as three grown adults slowly lose their enthusiasm for video games as they talk about this very bad video game.

Community Activities

Pokemon Go Friend Codes Thread (By: @boss_kowbel)

A lot of expansions and improvements have hit Pokémon Go over the week. As such, a lot of Giant Bomb users have been jumping back into the game! If that includes you, don't forget to post your friend code and play with fellow users!

(Un)Official Monster Hunter: World Iceborne Squad + Discord! (By: @boss_kowbel)

With the release of Monster Hunter: World Iceborne, don't forget you can join Giant Bomb's unofficial community squad and Discord for the game! Here's the link in case you needed it!

Tweets Of The Week

Best Of Blogs

1200+ Photos from PAX West 2019 (By: @marino)

Moderator Marino uploaded over 1200 images from PAX West 2019! Virtually every booth is here as well as many panels involving GB & Friends. And he's organized them into tidy folders for your convenience via the link above.

To Fear the Edge of Dawn (By: @majormitch)

MajorMitch had some lingering thoughts from their time with Fire Emblem: Three Houses, especially the game's mid-to-late game happenings. Give it a read using the link, but SPOILER WARNING!

Bucketlog August: Two Worlds II +

Indie Game of the Week 136: Songbringer

Mento's Month: August (By: @mento)

As always, Mento is back with a powerful pile of positively passionate posts! The first, discusses Two Worlds II and how it represents an era of RPG design no longer present in the game industry. Second, their latest "Indie Game of the Week" blog looks at Songbringer from Wizard Fu Games. Give it a read and find out why they straight up could not finish it. Finally, Mento provides a compilation blog annotating everything they wrote back in August. If you think you may have missed something of theirs, give it a check.

Royale with Cheese: An Outsider's Perspective on Fortnite (By: @gamer_152)

This week, moderator Gamer_152 transformed themselves into the "classic" Epic Teen Gamer, and try to find out what all that Fortnite hype is about and if there's anything more to the game than loot boxes and cursing teens.

Join The Discussion

Hitman - Better With Giant Bomb? (By: @yogevs)

Here's an interesting discussion topic I think I have seen other people mentioned before. Are the Hitman games more fun to watch Gaint Bomb to play rather than play personally? It's a weird idea, but think about it and share if you agree or disagree.

MHW Iceborne Expansion Releases Friday, September 6th (PC: January 2020) (By: @atheistpreacher)

Calling all Monster Hunter: World players! What are your early impressions of the Iceborne expansion? Do you have any fun stories or hunts so far? Join our community discussion about the game in the thread above!

First Trailer of New Switch Experience, Full Reveal On 9/12 (By: @haz)

A new peripheral for the Nintendo Switch has been announced, and it looks like a springy circle thing. So, uh, what do you think it will do or bring to the table? Is it just going to be a peripheral for an obvious Switch Fit game?

What To Think About Deadly Premonition 2 (By: @vincentvendetta)

As to be expected, there are a lot of emotions running through the Giant Bomb community following the announcement of Deadly Premonition 2: A Blessing in Disguise! Join the HYPE using the link!

Control Ending/Spoiler Discussion Thread (By: @sharkcopter)

To everyone who has played Control to completion, if you are interested in participating in a community SPOILER discussion about the game's story, here's a link to a thread which does just that! Again, SPOILERS AHEAD!

Gears 5 Multiplayer Discussion Thread (By: @alistercat)

Some BIG changes have been announced for Gears 5's multiplayer! Read what they are and discuss if you think the attempts to make the multiplayer balanced and more accessible are for the better.

Thoughts On Gears 5 Going More Open? (By: @gleasonryan)

Speaking of Gears 5, the community is still debating the campaign going more open-world. How do you feel about this change? Do your sentiments match that of Jeff's pensive skepticism? Use the link above to join our discussion!

Remnant: From the Ashes Boss Discussion Thread (By: @bakoomerang)

To anyone playing Remnant: From the Ashes, what are your impressions of the bosses in the game? Our community discussion about their design and difficulty is largely divided, so, feel free to join our discussion!

PS4 Pro... Worth It At 1080p? (By: @machofantastico)

Calling all PlayStation owners! We have a Giant Bomb user who is interested in making the investment for a PS4 Pro, but there's a catch. The user in question will only be able to play games at 1080p. Is that a deal breaker? Help them out if you can!

Lovable Lists

First Game I Beat For Each Console I Owned (By: @not_a_bumblebee)

Here's an interesting list from Giant Bomb user not_a_bumblebee! In this list, they annotate the first game they beat on every console they have owned.

Weird And Obscure Games For Fun People (By: @vincentbrooks)

VincentBrooks made a list annotating their favorite "weird" and obscure games still worth playing. Check it out and think about creating a list of your own when you are done.

Useful User Reviews

• @nateandrews picked up a copy of the new Blair Witch game and reviews how it shares a few interesting moments in a largely mediocre package.
• @riostarwind continues their classic video game reviews with an examination of Spider-Man and the X-Men: Arcade's Revenge! Give it a read and discover why annoying game design ruined their trip down memory lane.
• @borealum uses their review of Hitman 2 to justify why they think it is one of the best games of the current generation.

This community truly has some amazing artists in it. Kudos to everyone!

Over on Reddit I made a follow-up to jea_rum's burgling with my own Burgle My Evangelion image:

thanks for featuring my artworks! cheers!

Meanwhile, at Beastlab 2021:

Captain Vinny Caravella: "Oh, it's you, Luchadeer. What's for breakfast today? Ah, Mango Reinhardt, the Thinkin' Man's Pop!"

Amazing portrait!

That Abby/Jan art is amazing!

Another video for the "Jeff's Really Not That Jaded" archive.

Alex: Alright, Dan. What time is it?

Dan: Sunshine Time!

Alex: Damnit, Dan! What time is it?!

Dan: <hits Alex with a shine> I said it was Sunshine Time. Bitch.

That Pax Artwork is fantastic.

Every time I saw the Abby and Jan PAX art, it brings a smile to my face. It's so good.

@durman667 oh my god. Thank you for this.

I went to PAX; it was my first time despite living only around 30 minutes away. I have to be honest, I thought it was kind of boring. It being packed wasn't that big an issue to me, but there were pretty big lines, and they were lines to games I had no desire to play there because they were either old games (I mean, RE5/RE6 remasters?), games that just came out in which I have already played or could play at home, games that will come out in a month or two or games that just don't pique my interest. I was hoping there'd be something cool to buy too, but there wasn't and any of the stuff I thought looked cool probably costed more than I would want to pay so a lot of the time was just walking through the same areas looking at stuff for a few hours.

None of the panels really grabbed us either (there was one about composers but we didn't go to it) and while I probably wouldn't have gone to the Giant Bomb one, it wouldn't have mattered since it was happening around eight-ish, which was way later than we planned on staying there. The most interesting thing to me was seeing Greg Kasavin which was neat (he's taller than I thought), and I also (weirdly I might add) saw IGN's Andrew Goldfarb in the bathroom at the restaurant across the street when I went in to wash my hands (he was shorter than I thought). I'm glad I went just so I know what it was like, but I don't feel any desire to go back and can't imagine going for two days. I just don't think PAX is for me.

PAX seems more like a place you gather at least five of your friends to go with and don't mind standing in lines as you converse with one another to pass the time. I just went with my two brothers, and the one friend I knew that was going I didn't see, unfortunately. Oh, I played FFVIII remaster for about four minutes since there were no lines, ha ha.

Great Work, great reads! Thanks for putting it all together!