UltimAXE

The cast of characters has never been entirely to everyone's liking, but I think that Giant Bomb's biggest issue right now is the lack of consistency. Nextlander and Gerstmann's Patreons adhere to a very reliable schedule. I feel like Giant Bomb posts shit at complete random, and is really does feel rather scant compared to those two smaller operations. I guess that Ryckert has been in the process of moving over the last few months, so that might have something to do with it. I'm hoping that things will pick up a bit once he gets settled.

And you think that GB's traffic is bad? I still frequent GameFAQs because I just want to talk to people about video games and that place is a fucking ghost town.

I have no idea what this site is expected to be when the personalities that drive the site and make people want to visit it keep getting fired/laid off/encouraged to leave of their own volition. It's really strange.

I'll stick around to support the remaining staff, but, jeez, man. Upper management sure is making it difficult to want to do so.

Hmm . . . Dissidia NT comes to mind.

They released a demo/beta/whatever on PS4 and I was hooked on it for the entire duration . . . until the last day, that is. Once the novelty of HD-online-Dissidia wore off, I realized that stripping away so many mechanics from the PSP games to get it to work in the first place actually DID bother me. I went from planning on getting the game at launch to souring on it completely. Fast forward a year or so. The game hits 15 bucks on Amazon and I decide to give it a legitimate shot by taking it for what it is and not for what I wanted it to be. Dissidia NT is not Dissidia 3 (013?), but it is a pretty fun 3v3 deathmatch thing where cool characters fight in cool arenas while cool shit is happening around them while cool music plays. The game was limping along by that point and the match queues were getting bananas (we're talking 5-30 minutes) but I did manage to do a 180 on the game and wring quite a bit of fun out of it before it truly died.

For me, I don't think that anything will ever top Raiden hurling a Metal Gear Ray into the air only to leap up after it and slice off its blade arm. There is dumber/cooler stuff than that even in Rising, but something about that specific sequence is just . . . so rad.

@retris: Yes. And Gerstmann could have lost a dance off for the fate of the website, for all we know. I just don't like it when people who have no idea of what the fuck happened try to insert a villain into their personal narrative of what they think happened. "Oh, this person hated that person so this person left and that's why this happened!" It's like, dude, you're not a detective and your ability to read people sucks. Just . . . shut the fuck up. It's unpleasant.

Pure speculation, but the sequence of events seems obvious:

Red Ventures lays out some plans, Brad, Vinny, and Alex say "Nah" and bounce. Jeff is also like "Nah" but decides to remain hopeful and see where it goes. Months pass. Jeff is like "Nah, for real this time," and is getting ready to leave, but Red Ventures preemptively fires him. Just out of pure curiosity, I would love to know exactly what those plans and discussions were, but we're unlikely to ever get specifics. It probably doesn't really matter anyway. Everyone landed on their feet and is, hopefully, enjoying where they're at/what they're doing now. I, personally, love having all of these additional podcasts come out of it.

I was a DARE kid and it totally worked on me. Think of that what you will, but I've never "experimented" and I think that alcohol tastes like shit and I certainly don't feel like my life is less-than because of that. The weed talk is annoying (that goes for back when Abby and Bakalar would go on about it, too) but I quickly realized that it isn't any different from people talking about how drunk they get and how much they love alcohol, so it's like, whatever, man. It's not hurting anybody.

I would say that there is a general "content overload." I find it easy enough to consume the podcasts that I care about (Bombcast, Nextlander, and Gerstmann) in chunks throughout the week. It also super helps that I can smuggle them in to work and listen to them there. There are, however, a ton of other podcasts, video game related and otherwise, that I'd love to listen to (like Albummer here) but it's just not something that I feel like taking on. When it comes to videos, I have long since given up even attempting to watch everything. I'll toss something on when I'm doing the dishes but if I have the free time to sit and watch someone play a game for 3 hour straight, odds are that I'd much rather play a game myself.

You really have to break yourself away from turning it into a damn job. Like, if I miss a Game Mess Morning, oh fucking well. Be okay with missing a week's episode, falling behind a bit on the news, and try to pick only the topics that actually interest you.

A collective group of video game players (and I call them that because I have no idea what the job title is anymore) just doesn't make sense in an age where any schmuck with a camera and microphone can put up a stream for anyone to watch. I kind of bite my fingernails over Giant Bomb these days. Not because of anything that the team is or isn't doing, but just because the business model of video game coverage by a large entity seems to be failing.

Man, I can see this from so many different angles, but it ultimately sounds like Taylor has fallen on hard times and really needed/wanted more than 4,000 bucks and feels that she is entitled to more money because the game will, theoretically, make millions and millions of dollars. Does she deserve more than a programmer, background artist, or composer? Everyone's going to have to answer that for themselves, but I'd lean towards "no." Bayo's voice actress just isn't that important to me. You could get any middle aged woman with a British accent and she will do just fine, I'm sure.

It sucks that that happened to her, but it also sucks for Platinum if what they offered is the going rate for the job, and it sucks for Hale, who I've always loved, to get roped into it just for taking a job offer.

Well, I guess that the movie will look phenomenal, at the very least. Funny that it is literally impossible to walk to Peach's castle.

Seems like the movie is gonna play things pretty straight as far as just being about Mario going on an adventure, or whatever. I was really hoping that it was going the super meta and self-aware route, like the Chip and Dale movie. The voice cast just screams "We are video game characters and we are completely aware of that fact" to me.