I'm a teacher in Australia currently in the 2nd week of the two week school holidays. My wife had a day in at work today, so my plans were to get some marking done, play some video games and just relax.

That changed when I woke up and logged into Facebook. The Giantbomb page had a link to what seemed unbelievable news.

The website wouldn't load.

Twitter was abuzz confirming the news.

You hear about 'celebrities' and their deaths and generally, the sense is 'wow, that's sad', but I don't really experience true sadness (Heath Ledger, James Gandolfini etc). Even when I admire someones work, it doesn't hit me.

This did.

Hearing of Ryan was like losing a friend.

I've followed GB from the beginning. I first became aware of the Hotspot in 2003, I was in Yr 11 of school and podcasts were a relatively new thing to me.

Then Jeff left and so did Ryan and they brought along Arrow Pointing Down.

Then GB started up and I followed them through.

The thing about GiantBomb is that the way the site has operated has been as personal as realistically possible. If we were to meet any one of the crew, I feel that we could talk abotu games or any assorted stupid crap.

I can never meet Ryan.

I never met Ryan, but I knew Ryan and his loss hurts, it hurts really badly.

I can't imagine the loss for Anna, Jeff, any of his colleagues, friends or family. My condolences are with them.

Ryan was Mr Charisma, a great showman, podcast host and funny funny guy. There is now a hole in the Bomb, which will likely adapt and change and 'replace' to some extent, but can never replicate or make use forget.

Cheers Ryan, you will be missed.