bluntmcgee

For Vinny, Brad and Alex: They are now free to do anything. They are experts in their field with a huge following that will support them in whatever they want to do. While it is a sad occasion, these guys will continue having awesome careers. Even if they choose to never appear publicly again and pursue some more traditional careers, I am sure they will be just fine.

For GiantBomb as a whole, though: I agree with the original post. I think now would be a good time for Jeff to step back and manage the site from the background. I faintly remember him talking about this idea in the context of new hires and their career development chances at Giantbomb. People like Abby, Ben or Dan just couldn't grow with their workplace because there was no room (and probably no budget). With three of the four senior members of the site gone there would be more niches to fill. I imagine this also frees up a bit of the budget, too.

Considering they want to use the month of may to start the new Giantbomb project I don't think there will be any new hires any time soon. I bet the new project will start relatively soon. With two video producers, customer support and Jeff at the helm they are not really equipped to create themselves, but they could curate other creators beneath the Giantbomb banner. For example get MinnMax to create a podcast, get NoClip to make an exclusive feature or get Abby for some community streams under this banner and find new voices to highlight. If they can work that out financially (and that's a big if) Giantbomb could be a neat M U L T I M E D I A network of dope content creators.

End of an era, for sure. But good luck, Jeff. Hope your new vision will be succesful!

OK, here's my take on the quality of podcasts and recap issue this year. I try to be constructive or at least give my two cents as respectfully as possible. Obviously they can do whatever they want and I don't think the new format itself is bad. In theory it's a good idea to shine the spotlight on as many games as possible as a sort of celebration of the games of the year. But it really highlights the lack of diversity in the group's taste and a lack of willingness to dive deep into discussions about videogames as a medium.

I originally subscribed to Giantbomb many years ago for mature and informed discussions about the industry by very experienced members of said industry. We still get that during the E3 Nite shows and (nowadays) rarely on the two podcasts. In general, though, I feel like there has been a shift towards a more surface level, videogame-adjacent entertainment. Compared to e.g. The Game Informer Show, Easy Allies' coverage and just recently MinnMax, Giantbomb does not offer Book-Club-like discussions of videogames (anymore) and is worse of for it, I think. Drew and Austin used to be great at drawing out those type of discussions, but things change in life and here we are.

Most of their video content throughout the year is still good and fun, because they seem like a bunch of good and fun people. But where's the celebration of videogames in 2019 if (e.g.) Yooka Laylee is talked about for a minute and nobody played a significant amount of it. Or mentioning FF14 music if nobody has any attachment to neither the game not the franchise or the type of music in general, I guess. Or why mention Far Cry New Dawn, Crackdown 3 or Left Alive at all if you just want to vent your disappointment again? I thought the point was to get rid of negativity.

My point is, stick to what you know and care about. The discussion about Outer Wilds or Death Stranding was good for the most part, as more than one or two people were engaged in it. I feel like mentioning a hundred or so games and not being able to talk about for more than 5 minutes actually does them a disservice and accomplishes the opposite of a celebration. It just leads to glossing over a Fire Emblem or Ace Combat in a (unintentional) dismissive way.

They could really cut their huge list to maybe 20 games and go deep on those. Because the way the do it now adds nothing of value to the discourse of a game. Maybe find a way to resurface Quick Looks if you want to recap the whole year of games? Or use your super talented video producers to make a supercut of those lesser talked about games (huge timesink, I know).

So all in all, less may be more im the future? Recaps are fine, but make it a little more interesting by using your knowledge and passion and not just acknowlegde things on a list for 10 or so hours.

This GOTY is what pushed me to finally unsubscribe from premium after many years. I wanna support MinnMax now, as their format appeals to me more at the moment, but I'll still follow you, I suppose.

As side note: I haven't watched all the short individual videos because they seem really strange? Like they have a very different tone than anything else. Especially looking at Vinny's videos you sort of can tell that he uses his radio/presenter voice. Like overly smiling and stuff. Or am I seeing and interpreting things. These videos feel like CBS snippets in a way.

Anyway, Outer Wilds as GOTY is a good choice. Peace!

I recently refunded Ashen on the Epic Games Store. It required some back and forth with customer service via e-mail, but in general it wasn't much of a hassle. The money was refunded back to my PayPal account relatively fast.

Just now I logged into my account and noticed that Ashen is still in my library. And I can still totally play it. I get that Epic Games Store is a new store and they're still building a lot of features. But this seems like such a huge oversight. I can only hope for them, that this was an individual error.

I already contacted customer service again, because keeping the game seems very dishonest.

Anybody with a similar experience?

@ik2k3: From what I gathered the fine is usually 10 - 50k and Rockstar is on the upper end of the spectrum. 1,5 Mil seemed like a whole lot.

Anyway, I bought it digitally and have to wait until midnight. But have fun!

@ik2k3: Are you sure about the numbers? I heard from a Gamestop employee in Germany that the fine for RDR2 ist more like 50k Euros.

And Media Markt broke the date and started selling today.

Ok, some late-night feedback from Germany, hope my english is understandable.

I have watched about 30 minutes of the review video and have to say that between the discussion on the Bombcast and the Quick Look, I kinda already knew what their opinions were and don't see the point to actually finish it. The review repeats a lot of the same arguments made in other places. So for me, the input delivered in the review isn't of much much value. A spoilercast on the other hand would be more interesting to me, as more than one person has actually finished the game. Then they can look back and actually re-view the game together. I guess if you don't consume any other content from Giant Bomb then a separate review video makes sense? But then, why not break out the Bombcast discussion into its own video so that part is easily accessible for people who want to skip right to it. You probably won't be able to formally call it a review, but that discussion was plenty long and in-depth for people to form an opinion. Furthermore, are people who don't watch Giant Bomb content regularily and just stumble upon this video review really that interested in an in-depth discussion video where no actual gameplay is being shown? I don't know..

Personally, I probably won't be interested in review videos in the future if the Bombcast discussions stay as in-depth as they are. But I recognize that I probably feel that way, because I watch a lot of Giant Bomb videos and listen to all the Podcasts. I already got to know their opinions through different sources. Perhaps the timeline for this format was just weird. In my head it should work out like this: Quick Look for the first impressions, Bombcast for a check-in and a review for summarized thoughts or discussion between at least two editors. With Spider-Man, though, Ben had already finished the game while they recorded all three of those videos and neither Jeff nor Brad made any progress between QL, Bombcast and Review. As a result, the discussions felt very same-y. Just the core mechanics of the game have been explained thoroughly by now and are uninteresting to hear.

What I would wish for this format:

I love when the Giant Bomb guys get really in-depth with a game, their experience in the industry really shines through in those types of discussion. Like, don't just interview Ben about his experience with the game (he can lay that out more poignantly in a written form, if neccessary), but actually engage in discussion with each other, challenge each others views and pick apart the game. Why do some parts of the game work for Ben but not for Jeff or Brad? That's the stuff I would be interested in. I get that this is difficult to schedule as reviews should be out during the launch window and a discussion like that can only work when everybody is around the same level in the game. So yea.. I don't know how viable this would be with Giant Bombs loosey-goosey style. Maybe a little more structure and stricter scheduling would be good for the site? Or maybe that's just the German in me speaking.

The relevance of reviews is a difficult problem to solve. I don't think they nailed it yet, but if anyone can it's Giant Bomb. So keep going!

I dislike Spider-Man and most of the Marvel movies, I soured on the Batman: Arkham-Style Combat ever since Shadow of War and I have never liked a game Insomniac has put out.

BUT: I liked swinging around in the PS2 Spider-Man game and their trailers so far just look expensive. So I don't know what to think about this game. I really want to like it. Between this, Dragon Quest XI and the new Tomb Raider, this should be the game that suits my taste the most. But something about it just doesn't grab me (so far). I hope I can be conviced when it comes out.

@sombre: 2) Yeah, I had the same impression. Something with the level scaling and difficulty balance is really weird. I played through the last postgame dungeon recently at level 68. The "secret" last boss was level 100 and while it was somewhat challenging compared to the rest of the game, I still beat him and have now run out of meaningful content. I thought I had to grind more to defeat him, but nope: 30 level difference doesn't seem to matter when you have good equipment.

3) Do them while they are still challenging. I waited until the postgame and I stomped through them. Only a couple of them are difficult after you have beaten the game.

4) The kingdom building and meeting all the different people was the hook for me in the game. I enjoyed the building even if it is pretty simple. If you don't find it interesting at this point, you won't find it any more interesting later on. It doesn't evolve beyond what you already know. There are 100 citiziens total in the game and some of them are locked behind story progress. So you can't grind them all out at the beginning. Use the "Tokens of Gratitude" for citiziens asap. This is the easiest method of gaining citiziens, as you don't have to complete a quest after acquiring them for tokens (just talk to them after the purchase). But like I said, the building and meeting your citiziens seems to be the core of the game and the part where you spend the most time in.

5) Don't have any advice for you. I tried figuring out a deeper strategy so hard, but failed. For the whole game I just ran into the enemies and hoped for the best. Very little thinking going on, besides a little meter management. Agreed, the weakest part of the game by far. I won't spoil it here, but they rely on that part at a very crucial time during the story. And it was horribly boring when it was supposed to be exciting.

Your other post:

All the items you get are used for different upgrades and item building in your kingdom (and sometimes for sidequests). Especially the outfitter and blacksmith are worth investing in, as you will get very powerful weapons. Careful though, progress in your kingdom is gated by story progress. So no point in grinding out currency for too long. And don't dwell on sidequests too long if you don't have a specific item. You will find it eventually. You can sell your old weapons if you want and need money, I did so regularily. But doesn't really matter what you do with them. You can't break them down, so you will end up with quite a large stockpile.

If you have any more questions, ask away. I finished the game with all sidequests completed and a fully upgraded kingdom after around 60 hours (58 to be exact).

Just played through it together with my brother. It's a real fun coop game with a bunch of flaws in writing and some slightly disappointing gameplay aspects.

Gameplay-wise I wish there was a bit more to the coop aspect. It's a lot of opening doors that can only be opened with two people. A few more interactions that felt more impactful than a door would have been nice. That being said, the ending was pretty good (if a little bit forced). Yea, the writing is cheesy and the whole game expects you to suspend your disbelief quite a bit, but what you do at the end of the game feels impactful enough to really elevate the coop experience.

Vague spoilers incoming:

I wish they foreshadowed Vincents arc a bit better, as I (as Vincent) felt more sympathetic towards Leo at the end. It was hard to parse what I had to to in just a couple of minutes.

In general though, the visual direction of the scenes and the narrative focused coop experience make the game unique enough to where I have no issues recommending it to people. Just expect some cheese.

Some people from Germany here playing Vermintide?

My brother and I currently play on Veteran (lvl 20 Elf & lvl 20 Kruber) but I would like a full group of chill people for the higher difficulties eventually.