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S2 Ep158: Video Game Influencers
80 Plays4 years ago
Join Dave and Jake as they talk about the biggest voices in gaming - the ones we actually listen to! Tune in as we discuss why traditional game critic institutions are having their role slowly taken in by these solo upstarts in this week's episode!
https://www.youtube.com/user/videogamedunkey
https://www.youtube.com/user/SsethTzeentach
https://www.youtube.com/user/MandaloreGaming
Thoughts? Comments? Requests for new episodes? Feel free to email them in!
SoapstonePodcast@gmail.com
Like our podcast? Like our podcast! We'll post when new episodes are uploaded!
https://www.facebook.com/SoapstonePodcast/
https://www.youtube.com/user/videogamedunkey
https://www.youtube.com/user/SsethTzeentach
https://www.youtube.com/user/MandaloreGaming
Thoughts? Comments? Requests for new episodes? Feel free to email them in!
SoapstonePodcast@gmail.com
Like our podcast? Like our podcast! We'll post when new episodes are uploaded!
https://www.facebook.com/SoapstonePodcast/
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Transcript
The Impermanence of Streaming Music
00:00:13
Speaker
the decision to stop caring about saving music locally and instead I'm just trying to appreciate the music I have access to before it's taken off of Spotify. Periodically I look back through and it's like this song is not available because it's from an OST or a publisher or something like that that they no longer have access to.
00:00:21
Speaker
What a beautiful day to make terrible content.
00:00:37
Speaker
The thing is, with that, I don't remember what song it was that was listed there. You just now said, one of the 700 songs is no longer in your library. I'm like, okay.
00:00:50
Speaker
Right. It's kind of like if you had 700 kids and then someone was like, hey, I've abducted one of your kids, you'd be like, I mean, that could matter, I guess. But like, I see mostly important ones still here where they're like, no, I got Timmy the third. You're like, oh, my gosh, that's the one I cared about. He was a shiny.
00:01:13
Speaker
It's the first two famous word mistakes.
The Impact of Small Losses
00:01:17
Speaker
It's it is literally that though, like a personal, like the less specific the loss of in your music and your music collection, at least the I think the easier it is to cope with it. If you lost something and you didn't know what you lost, maybe this is going to get depressive. But if you lost something and you didn't know what you lost, it's harder to feel more about it.
00:01:38
Speaker
Well, right, but you wouldn't find out until later and that's when you would actually care. Yeah. Like when you discover the song again, you're like, Oh my God, I used to love this song. Like meeting your long lost Timmy the third or a utensil that you misplaced or an article of clothing that you swear you left somebody's house, but I don't think it's there anymore. Yeah. Oof.
00:02:03
Speaker
I don't know if that last one was because you left something at my house or not. It sounded a little pointed. I do know there was a shirt I left at Luke's and he definitely lost that and that's on him. I'm not mad about it because it was like 10 bucks from like five years ago. But I still like the joke about it. That's like two bucks in current year's time. I know. Yeah. Everything is literally multiplied five times except for minimum wage. Anyway, and I also got like a nice shirt.
00:02:31
Speaker
That was like $30 at a store at the King of Prussia Mall. I'm like, this is a good shirt. I'm going to wear this more often. Yeah. And it was a long sleeve kind of over shirt. I'm like, yeah, this is good. Don't know where the fuck that is. And I swear I left it at somebody's house, but I don't talk to that person anymore. And it's way too late to ask. Yeah, I feel that. Like I have a bunch of stuff.
00:02:54
Speaker
that belongs to you at my house, but we never really talk anymore. So I'm just like, what's the year that I can just claim this stuff as my own? I've got like the- Literally whenever. Preacher book, a bunch of other crap, like half of my game collection of physical discs are yours. I feel like one or two things I've said like, get this back to me at some point. Other things if I haven't, I don't give a shit.
Community Etiquette and Item Sharing
00:03:21
Speaker
I think there's also like, there's an aspect of purposefully leaving things at people's house that I'm not like an anthropologist, but it's a form of community building where you're just like, Oh yeah, I mean, like I've got extra chairs, but there are Dave's and it's like, Oh yeah. And Dave's like giving me some, like some games to hold onto for a bit until I beat them and that'll never happen. So those are just at my house. Like, you know, there's the back and forth. I have no room at my place for those, those discs.
00:03:50
Speaker
Yeah, it's it's kind of like a community building sort of thing, I think, like a budget form of communalism, not communism, different thing, but communalism. But like, usually for me, if somebody says, hey, here's some food, take home with you, it's usually in their Tupperware. Right.
00:04:14
Speaker
And usually I'll be like, Oh, I've eaten that thing. I will clean it and I will set it aside and not put it back in my cabinet. I'm like, I'll get this back to this person almost neurotically. So that's fair. I mean, Tupperware is perfect for that though. Cause if you are in a situation where you can also produce food, you're just like, here's some food. And they're like, okay, I'll get the Tupperware back to you. And you're like, no, ha ha. It was yours. I have completed the contract. Right. But like I did that with Mike and they're like, Oh,
00:04:43
Speaker
We didn't even know you had that and I'm like, I literally sat on this for a year because I was so determined. But it's a very compressed now. When I was at your place, Jenny's like, Oh, do you want this picture back? And I'm like, what?
00:04:56
Speaker
She's like, this picture, it's yours. I'm like, is it? And I honestly had no recollection of like saying like, here, borrow this picture. Like, when would I give you guys a that much volume of liquid? Right. Or maybe it's just like, hey, we need a picture for this. I'm like, oh, I have an extra one. Here you go. But I don't recall at all.
00:05:15
Speaker
I wonder if that's ever been a situation where you're like, I really felt like I had a spatula or like I should have had a spatula at this point in my life, but like someone else has the spatula, so you just buy another one. You just turn into that person who's like giving all of your friends spatulas continually. We all know that guy, right? Spatula Steve.
00:05:39
Speaker
One thing, if I can have a singular wish before I die for the sake of this singular argument, I would love to be able to track down where certain possessions went. I've also misplaced a number of music CDs over the years.
00:05:54
Speaker
I don't know if it's in the bottom of my car. I don't know if I gave it to somebody or what the fuck. So I would love just to see where those things went. That's a pretty good loop because we started talking about physical music. Well, when the recording started for the podcast.
Introduction to Soapstone Podcast
00:06:13
Speaker
How's it going, everyone? Welcome to another episode of Soapstone. My name is Jake. I'm joined by my co-host is always Dave. How's it going today, Dave?
00:06:21
Speaker
That's going okay. Got a nice rainy weekend going. I haven't looked outside yet. I don't know what the weather is. Bro.
00:06:31
Speaker
It's raining, I'm pretty sure, by you two. I have very short turnaround in podcast time. I took a shower, which is like raining. I'm being in the rain, I guess. Yeah, you open the roof. So you knew the weather? Yeah, yeah, yeah. What if I was just like, oh yeah, it was raining earlier. You're like, it's bright and sunny. I took a shower. That would be a good bit. Yeah, yeah. I feel like having somebody like that would be
00:07:00
Speaker
or a relationship with someone like that would be very taxing. They're just continually operating in a separate definition of terms of reality. You're like, I went for a walk. And you're like, no, you didn't. It's like, I'm walking in the video game.
00:07:20
Speaker
Yeah, that would, that'd be a bit, I like some lightheartedness and some bullshit here and there, but if it was constant, I just, this counter being they said. Yeah. That can be, that can be tough. It can be tough to like find people whose opinions and views on reality you empathize with, um, particularly when it comes to video games.
00:07:49
Speaker
I'm not going to acknowledge it. It was just good. If you didn't say anything, I was just going to double back.
Purpose and Trust in Game Influencers
00:07:56
Speaker
I was going to enter the roundabout and then just exit the same way I came in. But yeah, today's episode is about video game influencers. Yeah. I wish we had a sound effect to play right now. We could. I mean, we won't. I think that was the tank that I did.
00:08:16
Speaker
We have used Tank already, unfortunately, although that does mean that I think I have it on the local desk somewhere so we could throw it back in there. Instead, could we do the prices, right? Come on down music. Oh, yeah. Which is the other thing I probably meant to do. All right. If we forget to put that audio by and remind us listeners. You won't coward. The price is wrong.
00:08:42
Speaker
Anyway, so when we were initially planning for this topic and it's kind of racking my brain of who some people are that would fall under this category and what exactly it means. As I always do, I kind of go down the spiral of deep dive.
00:09:01
Speaker
for like really what is the purpose for them? Why do I give a shit? And it's basically because video game marketing as a whole is biased to the game. They want to sell the game and make you interested in it. So it kind of highlights some things that they think you're interested in as the target audience.
00:09:20
Speaker
But that's really, you have to go off of just those trailers and then maybe like an IGN five minute review, right? Right, yeah. So it's really easy for people our age to not trust those people because again, they're doing it for profit.
00:09:38
Speaker
So you find yourself watching YouTube or streamers, other individuals who seem to have similar views or thoughts on games that you do. And they might find something before you do, whether it's like an early access copy or just, Hey, I'm dicked around playing this. This is something I used to play and I love it a lot. And now you have that shared with you. So it's kind of like taking other people's thoughts and opinions through word of mouth versus through marketing directly.
00:10:07
Speaker
Yeah, I think it's like, I mean, there's been entire controversies over the reliability of public game critics. And at the very least, regardless of where you land on that, and I really just don't care enough to land anywhere. It does remain a fact that it's like if you were a company, say it's IGN or like GameSpot or whatever,
00:10:30
Speaker
at the end of the day these publishers are buying ad space like on your site right and so it's like yeah we are gonna go review you know Dark Souls 15 but the
00:10:48
Speaker
like in the back of your mind or maybe in your boss's mind it's like they just gave us you know twenty thousand dollars to run ads over the next couple months like prominently featured on the site and so if we you know we just nuke this thing in reviews it's like this is a mobile game and it's got like a 10 by 10 resolution and it's a shooter you'd be like maybe not what we expect in a dark souls game um
00:11:14
Speaker
And so you have all those factors at play like there's so much baggage with i think the traditional review system. I can you know that's to say nothing of whether they get review copies at all right like if you absolutely new publishers.
00:11:30
Speaker
game and reviews, they may choose not to send you early copies for review in the future. They hold a lot of that power. What is easier for them to do as a company to improve all of their failings based on somebody's opinion, however right that may be or not?
00:11:49
Speaker
Or is it to say, hey, this person's always talking shit. Let's not give them an avenue to talk shit. Exactly. And it's within their power to do so. And you know, Cyberpunk's case, they kind of notoriously didn't send out review copies until
00:12:06
Speaker
not long before the game launched. And you could say, hey, that's because they don't want pirated copies out there in the wild. That's not why. Or it could be that they're not really confident in the game and they just want people to run through as quickly as possible, give early impressions, and then people jump in once they see the early impressions. That seems more likely.
00:12:28
Speaker
And so yeah, the traditional, the TLDR of all of that is the traditional model is complicated. And like I do still check out reviews, but I do find myself more and more relying on personalities that are playing the games or word of mouth.
00:12:44
Speaker
Yeah. Like every time I talk about getting into a game or music or anything else, it's not like, oh, I was looking for something specific and discovered it all on my own. No, it's like I saw something like that seems kind of interesting. Let me see what other friends who might be interested in that would feel about it. Right. Because I trust their opinion. We tend to like the same games. Right. So when I get feedback from them and then I kind of make a judgment call.
00:13:11
Speaker
Cause like I've definitely had games that have been recommended to me that I'm like, that's not my jam. But if something is my jam and that person knows it's my jam or we're on the same page, I'm much more likely to check it out off of that. What you were saying that I thought like if it's my jam and it's their jam and we're on the same and my brain was like toast, say toast. But yeah, page makes more sense.
00:13:36
Speaker
Have you ever had a jam jam sandwich? I like grape, but I'd love to get some strawberry in there, you know? They really differentiate the flavors in a single bite. Yeah. I think that's, I agree. Like I agree, obviously we have the same similar sort of friend group in this. And, you know, there's sometimes like Ian, a friend of the show and guest of the show many times as listeners will know.
00:14:06
Speaker
hasn't played a game in a while. And he's just like, hey, here's the survival game. He just drops it there. Everybody picked this up and play it. And we're just kind of like, yeah, maybe kind of. But then sometimes, you know, everybody jumps in and that kind of like the flash mob of video games is how we had experiences like all getting together to play Seven Days to Die.
00:14:33
Speaker
It's like that can have some unique experiences and it's more community influenced in that case. So there's two aspects of this. There's like the local influence and then there's kind of the macro kind of global sort of influence that some of the personalities we're going to talk about has, I think. But they both, I feel, hold more weight to me than the traditional review structure does at this point.
00:15:00
Speaker
Yeah. I, if somebody says something to me out of the blue, regardless of context, I'm like, I don't know who the fuck you are. So multiple grains of salt on that one. Yeah. I don't, I won't take it to face value though. If you or a YouTuber, I know and respect. I also know and respect you, but I'm just saying you're not a YouTuber. I'm trying to make that distinction. YouTuber. He's such a, he's such a tuber.
00:15:29
Speaker
But I mean, like, obviously with YouTubers or Twitch streamers, they're not people who I know personally. Yeah. So it's really off of their past reviews, how they do their content, how they interact with the community that it's all kind of based off of to build up that level of trust versus Jake and I grew up together. Right. That's true. It's like it's kind of the way I think about it is there are some
00:15:57
Speaker
There's actually some public reviewers that will work for different companies, GameSpot, Giant Bomb, whatever. I know I like their opinions on games, but I also know that they don't have the same agency that these YouTube reviewers have. If you're a person and optionally an editor that helps you out with videos,
00:16:19
Speaker
I know for the most part, I hope that your opinion is your own. And, you know, I know YouTube's like they've gotten a little bit more strict about disclaiming actual sponsorships, things like that. Like we know no one actually plays Raid Shadow Legends, right? It's genshin impact now. Right. Yeah. I feel like some people may actually play that. I don't I don't know why to, you know, just call some people out. But, you know, it's right there. That's fine. I haven't tried it.
00:16:50
Speaker
But you can say whatever you want. In a YouTube review, you don't have to have an editor come in and say, hey, you really shouldn't call out League of Legends like that. They're patented on a fourth hit. Some effect happens, has been working for years. How dare you drag their name through the mud? Completely unaffiliated. With the company, there's this oddly defensive guy about one specific mechanic.
00:17:18
Speaker
But I think having that freedom and that agency to say what you really feel about a game and not worrying about how it's going to impact your relationship with the publisher, because you probably didn't get a review copy anyways, it can really, for me at least, it improves the quality of the information you're getting. You're like, let's just sit down, coffee shop environment, tell me why this game sucks. Yeah.
00:17:47
Speaker
There have been times where I've heard reviews from people who I know and like where we will disagree on a
Influencers vs. Traditional Critics
00:17:54
Speaker
thing. It doesn't make me not follow that person anymore and no longer listen to their advice or respect their opinions on a given game. It's just for that one, I'm like, okay, we disagree on that. That's perfectly fine. Metal Gear Rising Reventions. There you go. The most divisive game that I've mentioned in the long list.
00:18:16
Speaker
Or as I think I mentioned previously, I wasn't really into what I saw of Resident Evil 8. But a lot of people who do enjoy that have been giving a lot of praise. And it's awesome. And I'm glad that they like it. But that's, again, talking about me coming from a different place. And I can still respect and appreciate it. But I all know that it's not for me, even if it's given praise by people who I respect their opinion.
00:18:44
Speaker
Right. But some of that's like a genre difference thing. Like you're just like, if I see a bullet hell game and someone's like, this is the best bullet hell game to ever be made. Like this blows everything else out of the water. There will never be a better bullet hell game in the genre. Oh, that's cool. I'll just keep going. Cause I just don't care. Right. Like it's not, it's not that there's anything wrong with it. It's just not my cup, a cup of bullet hell, cup of hell.
00:19:12
Speaker
That would be a really interesting beverage name. Something spicy. I mean, they have liquid death as a water brand. So it's just pepper coffee.
00:19:30
Speaker
I can't stop pooping. I can't imagine that would go well. That would be so bad. But yeah, I think that's probably enough preamble for some of the personalities you could introduce. Who would you like to start with on this list? I figure we can start with things that we have determined to talk about and then branch out into the creative space.
00:19:58
Speaker
I'm scared. I'm going to pick Dunkey. That's fair. So video game Dunkey, friendly, doesn't know, has been a YouTuber for over a decade. Did lots of League of Legends content and like clips and rage videos with it. Yeah. And I liked him back then because that was my sense of comedy back then. And then I didn't follow him for a bit. And then within more recent years, probably
00:20:25
Speaker
I should have checked him out again. And he still does good content. It's not League of Legends based. It's not screamy. He explicitly ended League of Legends as a game. Oh yeah. As soon as he stopped doing content for him. It definitely went downhill.
00:20:46
Speaker
But I've always liked his style of stuff. And when he does reviews, they're actually good, critical reviews. These are all fucking good and valid points. And he is somebody who's always said he's not a JRPG fan or any type of RPG. It's not really his thing. He likes Mario games.
00:21:04
Speaker
I'm on the opposite side of it. I'm more of an RPG type person than a Mario person. Yeah. But even so, like every single point that he's made, whether it be criticizing Last of Us 2 or other games that are coming out, I feel have all been well-based at
Review Styles: Dunkey, Seth, and Mandalore
00:21:21
Speaker
least. Yeah.
00:21:23
Speaker
He also has a really good, I think Dunkey's tone and level of seriousness is, the part I really appreciate about his, I don't know if I should call them reviews or content about videos or what have you, some of them definitely are approaching. Well, he literally gives a score, it's a review. But maintain a facade of sarcasm,
00:21:47
Speaker
and like, uh, joyfulness or whimsy or whatever, like across the whole thing. You're just like, Oh, you're just cracking jokes the whole time. It's probably the way to put it. But then you're just like, and then in the middle of all of that, have an underlying theme of I'm ultimately disappointed in this game, or this is like something that I think is being overlooked or something like that. And
00:22:12
Speaker
It kind of just hits you. Usually like midway through the video, like he'll, he'll throw in like one really smart remark. That's just like legitimate, just straight criticism and like a tirade of jokes. And you're like, Oh, Oh, right. This game is garbage, isn't it? You know, like, and that's kind of a take, I don't think, um, comes up a lot in content review, like four games, things like that. Uh, where the whole tone is meant to be very entertaining.
00:22:42
Speaker
There's a step, like a moment of, and here is how it actually is. And you can like watch it and be entertained, but also have a takeaway at the end.
00:22:53
Speaker
Yeah. Typically, reviews are more so, again, from a more triple-A type standpoint, meant to be reviews. They're not meant to be entertaining, but Dunkey as a YouTuber keeps it entertaining. Yes. Whether it's just him enjoying something silly in a game, whether it's him having an obvious air of sarcasm about something,
00:23:17
Speaker
or my favorite when he uses the video games own marketing in the video and it kind of highlights, hey, this wasn't met or this is some straight up bullshit or doesn't match. It really drives it home more because you know, at the end of the day, he is just a gamer who does these because obviously it's his job now, but he started doing it because he likes video games. He likes making videos that are entertaining.
00:23:46
Speaker
Yeah. So like, you know, his reasoning behind all of it is valid. So when he has a give and take on something, you're like, okay, it's coming from a sound place. He did do research. He actually played through the whole game. Yeah. Which is another thing that apparently comes up.
00:24:03
Speaker
Yeah, sometimes it's important to, you know, get through the entire content. It does help if you don't get the copy three days before, but you know. That's true. That's again an issue with kind of how video game timeline is published.
00:24:20
Speaker
But I do appreciate his videos. I will say that his early, so I didn't come in like ground floor like you guys did, like the people who were playing League, I should say. You guys, let me define the group. So I'm just saying you guys. But his earlier like super kind of juvenile sort of humor doesn't land as much for me necessarily now. But here's an example of an individual that it's like,
00:24:49
Speaker
has at least stayed engaging and completely switched platforms. If you're known for one thing, he wasn't a professional player, but if you're an esports player for a game and you can switch games and maintain a community, that's a big accomplishment. And Dunkey was literally basically only League and then switched off to Variety and then ultimately some of this review stuff. And I feel like
00:25:17
Speaker
He's even bigger now than he ever really was. Like if he posts a video, it goes to like top five and trending night instantly. Yeah. Like his past, let's say two months of videos. I'd be surprised if any of them was under 5 million views. Honestly.
00:25:33
Speaker
Like even when he had that that week of like, hey, guys, I'm done making good videos. Those videos still fucking crushed. And they were like three minutes long. Yeah. Because he was again, like taking the medium of YouTube and what was being posted and or like Twitch clips and whatever and kind of memeing on it from a not a bashing way.
00:25:57
Speaker
But again, kind of just like turning the mirror a little bit with a little bit of commentary, and it's still entertaining. So like, regardless of what he's talking about, unless he has an insane fucking take, I'm always going to be checking out his videos and content.
00:26:14
Speaker
not specifically for his opinion, but he might be aware of something before I am. Like, Oh, here's this new game. It was really fun. I was playing with my wife. Okay, cool. Maybe that'd be for me. Yeah. Cause he's showing some footage and showing what he enjoyed about the game or conversely why something sucks if it sucks. Yeah.
00:26:36
Speaker
No, I think you mentioned that. Have you picked up any games that he explicitly covered? I actually can think of one if you can't think of one that I know you picked up. I don't know if you saw his coverage of it before or after. The one thing I think I'm thinking of is there's something from one of the best of videos, which I think was Monolith.
00:26:56
Speaker
that I did pick up. I don't know if that's directly from him, but probably that video would showed some gameplay and music. And then on top of that, my friend or our friend, Mike's recommendation of it and it's me getting the game. Yeah. Yeah. I can think of a fall guys. He did a video on and then the other one was, um, that like smash clone, not the most recent one, but the one earlier.
00:27:23
Speaker
All right. All right. That's fair. I can't remember the name of that one, but. Slap City. Slap City. Thank you. Yeah. Yes. That was definitely something that I made you play. Yeah. I mean, we actually.
00:27:37
Speaker
I mean, we didn't put nearly the amount of time as actual smash, but it was enjoyable. It was entertaining. It's just in the back of my mind, it's just like this could be smash. Why is this not balanced? Why can you spam this move when I can't escape? But yeah.
00:27:54
Speaker
I think on our list, I don't think it would be controversial to say that Dunkey is by far the most popular. And some other people on the list might have some similar takes, but it might be a little bit different. So I have Seth on here. It's like Seth Zunich or whatever, Zinc from... Seth Ziantek. It's one of the gods from Warhammer.
00:28:22
Speaker
Yes, uh-huh. And I've always pronounced it like Zinsh, but I don't know exactly how it's supposed to be pronounced. It's really, it's a weird god, but the god of excess and pleasure and all of that. Anyways, one of the Chaos Gods. Don't follow them, they're evil. But Seth is
00:28:42
Speaker
I guess he's also very prolific because for a while there he had his full Patreon list like running through at the end of videos and I was like why is this video an extra three minutes long like once the review was done and it's because his like merchants guild has so many people in it.
00:29:03
Speaker
But his his form of content is very much more, I would say, irreverent and not politically correct. And it's pretty sure. Yeah, sometimes offensive. It's a lot of.
00:29:20
Speaker
Yeah, it's very offensive, sometimes unnecessarily so. Yeah. So many types of games, right? Like old games, janky games, porn games, he's done everything. A lot of it more so is type of old RPGs as kind of a broad stroke. He's definitely done some other things as well, but his style is typically
00:29:43
Speaker
he will show some gameplay and talk about his experience with it, but then also kind of delve into this narrative. Yes. That's just entertaining of like. He's a storyteller. Yeah, he weaves it into a story and it's usually some bullshit about the game, but he's like taking it down like this winding path of some chaos. Yeah.
00:30:07
Speaker
He'll be talking about an RTS or something like that, and then talk through a play through and describe his... It's honestly just like the art of storytelling. I think this is as a side thing. It's just a really good skill to develop, but basically take something that's not interesting at all, just like an event, and figure out how to draw it out, but then also inject interesting descriptions and the whole thing.
00:30:36
Speaker
And that's literally what he does for reviews. Not that the base content would be necessarily boring, but you can tell that there's an obsessive amount in the script. To your point, Heroes of Might and Magic, the gameplay for that always looks like shit. It's the oldest fucking thing and it just looks like hot garbage from what he shows. But he always talks about running into bugs and how to get around them and how to force cheese something to raise a demon army. There's always this
00:31:05
Speaker
narrative or woven storyline into make it interesting. I don't give a fuck about Heroes of Might and Magic, but I will watch every goddamn Seth video from here on out because of it. So good. It's also just an unhealthy like obsessive take on games sometimes where like any rational person would have just stopped playing.
00:31:26
Speaker
but instead it's just like, oh no, we're gonna align these 15 mirrors to the exact perfect angle so we can continue this puzzle even though if any of them are out of place, the game will just tell you that they're not in place and you won't know which mirror's wrong. It's like actual insane levels of playing through the game and clearing it. Like a child, right, that has a single game and they're just like, no, I'm playing the video game.
00:31:55
Speaker
But he's got a huge list of games to go through and a bunch of people that are, you know, paying him on Patreon to do it. I think it's either...
00:32:05
Speaker
I mean, I'm sure he actually is probably insane in that way where when he says he spent like 100 hours on a given game, I believe him because that's at least how he portrays it. You don't ever get the feeling of like, hey, I checked this game for 20 minutes. Here's my thoughts. I obsessively did this one thing and here is me giving you the tome, the Bible about that experience.
00:32:29
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. It's kind of like a glimpse into an experience that I'll never really have with some of these games. So to contrast with Dunkey, Dunkey oftentimes covers either AAA or sometimes just playable games.
00:32:49
Speaker
doesn't always do that. Sometimes it's just like this game is text based and it doesn't use conventional controls. And you have to get these mods to make it even like playable, like Space Station 13. Like great video, super entertaining. Literally the storytelling comes through a ton. Would I ever play that game? I don't think so. Probably not. You know, but
00:33:16
Speaker
At the same time, there have been games that, uh, that he's covered and I immediately kind of just went and, you know, threw it on my wish list. Um, I can think of two. Yeah. I was going to go with the ones you could think of while I tried to actually remember what I said. Okay. So one video that caught my interest and then I think myself, Jake and Mike picked up was synthetic. Yes. Which is kind of a,
00:33:43
Speaker
isometric slash top down shooter.
00:33:49
Speaker
You're an Android, you have guns. I think we had an episode on it. We did, yeah. But it was just an all-around good time, but I wouldn't know if that game's existence, if it wasn't for that video. And I wouldn't have been on board unless he sold it in the way that he did. Yes. Mm-hmm. And another one that I don't think I got because of Seth, but definitely made me go back and play, was Path of Exile. Oh, yeah. I still love that video.
00:34:15
Speaker
Actually, I don't know if I've seen his Path of Exile video that had to has to be one of the older ones, right? Old ish, maybe. Hmm. Hmm.
00:34:25
Speaker
Yeah, it's kind of contrasting to the AAA space. A lot of games that like Seth would cover are things that are either they would have possibly been popular within the genre, but like before I was born, or like some stuff people have never really heard about. So like, I think Solaris is the name of the one I was thinking of.
00:34:51
Speaker
I thought I added a shortcut on Steam, which I was going to use to search for it, but I don't believe I did. I'm going to validate it just because I think that the game's freaking great and I don't want to mention some other game instead, something I just made up.
00:35:12
Speaker
Star Sector is the one I was thinking of. And it's just like indie game, not sold on Steam, not sold on websites that aren't the company's website. That's like old payment method system. Really, really cool.
00:35:32
Speaker
like top down sort of like not isometric but top down like space spaceship game like battle simulator trading colony management all of that it looks really freaking good and like i love these games as a kid they've almost like died out as a genre like outside of these youtube personalities nobody's covering these games right why would you talk about a game that doesn't even come out on steam or you know consoles um
00:36:01
Speaker
And there's not really another way for me to like get notified of these like kind of fringe games of genres that I still really enjoy. Um, well, I think there's always going to be a need for somebody to kind of champion, but there was more niche sectors to use that word again. Like for the star star stars above. Cause yeah, like let's say,
00:36:32
Speaker
If somebody was really into all of the Lego game franchise, right? Like, Oh my God, they're adding a new mechanic that involves the type of block or whatever the fuck that would be. It's awesome to have that small community who's like very diehard about it. Yeah. In the same way. RTS has been a weirdly shaky genre for what direction it's going. Apparently remastered. Um, but there's still tons of fucking people who love that. Yeah.
00:37:01
Speaker
So it's it's good to see people who still care about it and have those content creators. Yeah, I know. I feel like it's hard to stay on the hype train about something if nothing's come out about it for like new games, new content, new anything. But if you have a community built up around it and they're still making videos, it keeps the hype alive. Yeah. You know how many song memes I still see on YouTube here and there? A bit.
00:37:29
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, yeah, we'll we have to pick that up. It's freaking holiday. It's so good. Team Cherry, please don't fail.
00:37:42
Speaker
Yeah, no, I agree completely. It's good to have somebody repping the underdogs in this case. And that actually touches on something else I wanted to mention, which was obviously people who have a large following, like Seth in this case, they can put out a video on a game and basically single-handedly save the developers, the publishers,
00:38:08
Speaker
It's not actually hyperbole to say like Seth puts out a video on a game and then tails through that game, like go through the roof. All of like the reviews on Steam are hey, hey people and like all this other stuff because it's just a massive surge of a community who literally just follows him and then makes the determination, am I interested in this game or not? And then runs out and picks it up if it's like a relatively cheap indie game. And on the flip side,
00:38:36
Speaker
Like sometimes, so Seth and Mandalore, who's the other person we're going to talk about, like they cover a game and they're like, and now it's on sale as of the time that this video came out. And that's when it kind of gets like, it's good. Right. Are you questioning if it's like motivated by something else? Right. I mean,
00:39:02
Speaker
I guess it's fine as long as there's no back dealings, but it's definitely a connection between the developer and the reviewer that's even more explicit than what we were complaining about earlier with
00:39:17
Speaker
AAA reviewers, right? Because in this case, it's like, could you could you imagine if IGN was like, new Call of Duty game came out, here's the review, we gave it an eight out of 10. And if you read this review, as soon as it came out, it's on sale by here, right? Like, it's actually kind of the same thing. It's just we're making the assumption that there's nothing else behind the scenes. I mean, I guess I get where that's coming from. I guess my assumption has always been more of that.
00:39:49
Speaker
They're like, hey, I'm doing a review on this game. Um, there's probably some degree of negotiation for, would you guys mind putting this on sale or like, if that's what they advertise it, can I get like a cut of something or whatever? But I will say for at least more so Mandalore because he's very even keel, um, for all of these individuals.
00:40:13
Speaker
He will talk shit on the things that he doesn't like. Yes. He doesn't bash it in any way. But what I like about, do you want to keep talking about stuff? Anything else? Or do you transition? No, I'm good to switch off.
00:40:27
Speaker
Check out anybody we mentioned if they sound interesting because they each have their own wealth content. Yeah. Seth, check it out from a personal PC. Yeah. Go incognito maybe for that. For Mandalore's stuff, one thing I've always noticed that I never would have thought about before
00:40:45
Speaker
is he talks about sound design in games and like some much more nuanced things as far as like graphical interactions where I'm just kind of like oh it's either good and believable or it's not but he will actually give you like scenes like here's his battle here's some ambiance music and it really seems to fit yeah and he shuts up for some of those like yeah he literally has a clip of just the music
00:41:08
Speaker
But he talks about his experience very fairly in the mechanics and he will have a lot of RTS type games or just war type games, but he gets very specific about what things he likes that have been good in the genre and he will nitpick things that he thinks can be approved upon.
00:41:31
Speaker
Yeah, I love his his thoroughness. He still has some of the same dedication to playing through games, even if they're bad that Seth has. But it's not like tinged with an edge of insanity. It's just. So I guess the difference, as I imagine like Seth kind of like jumping all over trees, like ripping stuff apart and like throwing it down is always entertaining. You're always watching what he's doing.
00:41:55
Speaker
And Mandalore's got glasses and a notepad. And he's just slowly walking through all of the scenery jotting down things. He's just like, hmm.
00:42:04
Speaker
And then like what we get at the end of that is the presentation he makes given all of the notes he took moving through this experience. Yes. What is interesting though is that they're actually friends. Yes. Like a YouTuber standpoint. What they've been in each other's videos before. Oh my gosh. And it's cool to see that type of cross pollination because I'm like, I like respect this person. I also like respect that person. That's cool that they know each other.
00:42:30
Speaker
Yeah, there's been several times they have like a clip that shows both of them like in the same Discord channel or like Mandalore was doing a review of like a spaceship game and there's just this little cameo where he's talking about how like all of the different stations have voices for when you're like approaching and you're gonna engage in like an auto docking procedure. This might've been like elite.
00:42:56
Speaker
dangerous or what have you. And then he was just like approaching a station and you just hear this robotic voice. It's like, you now have permission to come inside me. And I was like, that was sad. That was 100% sad. Make your way to landing pad one, three. Permission granted to come inside me. Okay, commander, your shot at landing pad is number three. It's modulated, but it's just right there. And it's, I love it. I love it.
00:43:25
Speaker
Yeah, that's kind of highlighting the differences between the two.
00:43:30
Speaker
He plays it straight. Mandalore plays it straight and Seth kind of does whatever. Yeah. Mandalore still has some jokes here and there, but it's more like ride chuckles that you'll get. But I think most recently, Jake and I grew up together, playing some like a thief games, or at least to say have some vague fond memories about them. But Mandalore was covering them like Thief Dark Age, Thief 3, whatever the fuck that title was. Right.
00:44:00
Speaker
They had a three in it. No, no, I'm thinking of fear. Deadly Shadows was three. Yeah. But it was cool to get that nostalgia trip. And then he will actually talk about the game and level design. He talks about every aspect of it pretty much. Yeah. How things feel to play, how it looks, how it sounds. And it gives you a good holistic view. I don't think for any of Mandalore's games that I've actually checked out, I think I've wish listed one or two.
00:44:30
Speaker
Because they seemed interesting. I think I picked some of them up. I definitely picked some of them up, actually. He covers, it's kind of funny, because Seth's name comes from Warhammer, like one of the Chaos Gods. And Mandalore's comes from like Star Wars. But Mandalore covers a lot of Warhammer games. And so I've at least played a lot of them, definitely.
00:44:59
Speaker
Warhammer 40K Mechanicus was one of the more recent ones, I think, under rail, some other space games, things like that. He also plays like really esoteric games, much like Seth does that I would not really go back and play or not really get into. But he also plays some of those niche genre games I am interested in.
00:45:24
Speaker
Let's do the thing. It's nice to have somebody to kind of quote the nostalgia critic for them to remember so that we don't have to. Do I want to go back and play like a 20 hour game from the 80s? No. Do I want somebody to cover for 20 minutes and I'll watch that? Sure. Give me that kind of guided experience, if you will.
00:45:46
Speaker
Yeah, it's kind of like, I don't know if this is a thing anymore, but like grandparents, you like sit down with a snack, a sandwich, you know, maybe the PB and J. We alluded to earlier. And Jake, there's PB in that? Oh, no, it was J and J. Sorry.
00:46:08
Speaker
Does that work? BJJ? That doesn't work. No, that's the protagonist of Wolfenstern. BJ Blazkowicz.
00:46:21
Speaker
Man, I really threw myself off track there. A little bit, a little bit. But the, like, grandparent regaling a story, right? You're like, what were the before times like? It's like, well, in Heroes of Might and Magic 7, you know, you just go into it. You're like, as a kid, we're not going to the before times. I was 30 year old in this case. Not going to the before times, but
00:46:46
Speaker
It still can be interesting to hear those stories, especially from people who can look at it and have, in a way, those rose-tended glasses for this is a game I played when I was younger.
00:47:01
Speaker
It's nice to have those snapshots. Like internet historians, another good example of that. I don't need to go back and re-experience everything, but if somebody can like kind of summarize it into a nice compartmentalized thing and then feed it to me. Hello, hello. Hello, thank you. Yeah.
00:47:20
Speaker
I think the the other aspect for this that we haven't really touched on too much is that you know it's just an individual here and so it can kind of be more of a personal take right they're not representing a greater voice behind them they don't have any editorial integrity you're just like man like Seth just went off the rails on this game or like Mandalorian he never really goes off the rails but you know whatever
00:47:47
Speaker
I think that I disagree with them on this one. Just like, you know, watch it for entertainment. Go to the next. But on the opposite side, if it's something that they really, really care about, that can come through in the review and the way that it can't in a professional kind of like, not objective review, but like a professional tone review.
00:48:09
Speaker
And it's like, who would you want to wing man for you? Yeah, somebody who cares about you, or somebody who you pay $50 off the street, which is what his name is reads card, Dave. He's incredibly handsome. He's just an all around great guy. And other things, right? It just feels like the reading literally through a script versus what you would say, which is
00:48:40
Speaker
Oh, was I supposed to say something there? That would have been a great time for you to have ad-libbed anything. No, that's fair. That's like, uh, Dave's great. Say the same thing, but with more enthusiasm. Jake, I gotta start paying you more. That's obvious to me now. Um, no, that's very, um, are there any other people outside of YouTubers who you follow for this type of stuff at all? Uh, no. Oh, okay.
00:49:05
Speaker
No, I mean, let's say outside of YouTubers. YouTube's definitely the main space for this. The other big space I was kind of thinking of is Twitch, because obviously a lot of people will be playing through a given game and kind of giving their feedback on it. Big streamers like Jacksepticeye, PewDiePie, Game Grumps even.
00:49:30
Speaker
they definitely i don't know if i'm as involved in that space but we have entered an age of twitch can completely launch games right like we've talked about among us and fall guys and all all of that but like what really spread
00:49:46
Speaker
Among Us wasn't marketing. It wasn't reviews. The game had literally already been out for a long time. It was literally just the platform Twitch. Yes. Picked it up. And then everyone made content on it to this day. It's still going. Jesus fuck. Yes. Hit and roll as it turns out. Have an episode on it. Check it out.
00:50:08
Speaker
This is a sad thing but we've reached the age of maturity with the podcast where it's like we bring up a topic and we're just like please go to the appendix and see like episode 25 where we talked about this topic in detail. That came up like four times this episode which is hilarious. I like how Jake's comparing us to The Simpsons. Yeah, Simstone did it. That's episode 234? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah.
00:50:35
Speaker
I don't personally, I usually watch like friend twitches. Is that the word for twitches? Yeah, I watch it when my friends twitch. But otherwise, I don't engage that much, but it is massive in the industry.
00:50:52
Speaker
I will say I don't really have a lot of video game Twitch streamers that I'll follow. It's more so some of the YouTubers who I follow will have Twitch streams on occasion. Yeah. And maybe I'll check that out briefly. But still, I much prefer the curated content. Then I'll wait four hours for something to happen. Right. That's just not my thing.
00:51:17
Speaker
Yeah, it is a lot largely what we've described. Everything up to this point have taken advantage of the fact that like like Seth Mandel or everyone like that, like if you're going to be doing a review or like a video on YouTube, it's very, very common to just like cut out all the breaks and what you say. And so you're speaking more rapidly. You're like you're speaking at the same pace, but there's not pauses between what you say and.
00:51:46
Speaker
they still, you know, have their own pace, but it allows the video to be much more curated than like the Twitch stream where they might have been playing the game initially and sharing initial impressions. And it's just like, would you rather watch a video before or after they like hit the cutting room floor, right, where they took out everything that, you know,
00:52:10
Speaker
didn't actually end up making it in. I only have so much time and it doesn't matter that much, but YouTube's better. Yeah, I agree with that. But for review purposes, I've definitely become my interest has been peaked from some friends playing games. Yes, whether it's on Discord or Twitch, like, Oh, okay. I see the appeal of that.
00:52:35
Speaker
Yeah, I definitely saw, like you said, Resident Evil 8. I was watching Dan play Resident Evil 8, like, mercenaries mode. And I was like, this mode looks pretty, pretty sweet. I can understand why they continue to add it to Resident Evil. And I would be lying if I was saying, like, that doesn't have an impact on my purchasing decisions, right? Like 100% it does. I mean, I feel like it should.
00:53:06
Speaker
A lot of things that I'll check out, whether it's video games, food, music. It's from friends saying, hey, I enjoy this thing. I think you'll probably enjoy this thing too. Check it out. Right. Right. What did you wonder under your breath? I said people. The next thing you said actually hilarious. I enjoy this person. You should check them out. They're so hot. Yeah. But yeah, I think that to
00:53:37
Speaker
conclude my thoughts on it, at least. I feel like this is really the future of where true video game influence goes. And I know that sounds bad for GameSpot, IGN, these giant bomb places that their entire organization is setting up reviews. Those will continue to exist.
00:53:57
Speaker
This kind of, the word I guess is like parasocial relationship, like between people and streamers.
Future of Game Reviews: Influencers' Role
00:54:06
Speaker
Those relationships extend like perfectly into this space where it's just like, oh, I really trust this person's take on something. I trust this individual. And those bonds are way stronger when it's a personality instead of like a publication. And so I do think that's just going to continue to take off
00:54:28
Speaker
I mean, yeah. That's my take. Disagree name? Yes, counterpoint. I agree. Yeah. So when I had a brief stint in
00:54:43
Speaker
I don't know if we call it a pyramid scheme, but definitely multi-level marketing because I had like a summer where I did cut code knives. Um, but basically one of the reasons that they do that kind of door to door is you're getting customers who you know, they're like friends or family that you're like, Hey, I'm doing this thing. Could you hang out for an hour and listen to my sales pitch? And they're like, yes.
00:55:07
Speaker
But it's because that level of trust is there. They have some idea of who you are and what you're literally going to bring to the table versus some stranger in their home who they wouldn't necessarily trust. There was an old marketing statistic of you might need to hear an ad like seven times before you actually like it kind of clicks like, Oh, that's what that is. Yeah. Versus if somebody says, Hey, there's this product, you go, Oh, okay.
00:55:34
Speaker
Yeah. So how many people, how many times have you heard, Hey, Hey people, Seth here though. So that's the counterpoint. You're being conditioned, Dave. I'm going to do that at the next party. Hey, Hey people. So are we influencers, Drake? Oh, that's a tough question. I mean, categorically, we cover a lot of games. We give our opinions on them. Have we ever, have we ever, I guess the question would be, have we ever influenced someone to purchase a game?
00:56:07
Speaker
probably at some point. I can tell one or two people who checked out something and cited, oh, I really liked your episode on that. It sounded cool. So I checked it out and picked it up. Okay. Yeah. I mean, that counts. It's a handful of cases, but, um,
00:56:24
Speaker
Yeah. Also, I don't know why they didn't reach out to me when I've offered to buy probably half of these games. I was going to say, you know, you can, you know, you can trust our opinions on games, not because we're qualified. We're definitely not, but because we don't make any money doing anything. That's true. Anyway, check out my Patreon. Right. I think, I think, I think we could be.
00:56:52
Speaker
In a loose sense. I would argue that perhaps our reach is, this is a hot take, but less than video game donkeys. Yeah, we're basically a 14 year old who just got their TikTok account. That's the level we're at right now, you know? Oh yeah, TikTok's a thing. Oof. Didn't consider that one.
00:57:14
Speaker
Our next episode will be up on TikTok. Right. Do they allow one hour audio only posting? I imagine not. I imagine not. Do I have an account? Not sure. Yeah.
00:57:30
Speaker
I don't know. I suppose we are. If you could be now, should I say that question? Now we'll do it. Like, if you could be, would you want to do more of this? Would you would you step into the shoes of one of these video game influencers and make a career out of it? It's an interesting it's a path that I guess, like, you know, not many people actually can take, obviously, but
00:57:59
Speaker
The idea sounds interesting, but just knowing how I operate and how I don't like to engage with strangers all that much, I don't think it would be ideal for me, but I think it would be a fun thing to experiment it with.
00:58:14
Speaker
I like playing games and I like talking about them as a hobby. But if I had to play a game within a week and then I had to have a review video out once a week and edit it and then have some degree of engagement, I'd be like, fuck. Yeah, that would drain. If it was the only thing I had to do for a job, I don't think it'd be that bad.
00:58:37
Speaker
But it would definitely remove some of my enjoyment from it because, for me, video game is still, yeah, it's a pastime versus an obligation. Yeah. That's fair.
00:58:49
Speaker
But I think that's why our podcast format is well suited to us. And if you have ideas that we could suggest a game that may be well suited to us, or even not, we don't get that many of those. You can send those in to us at soapstonepodcast.gmail.com.
00:59:10
Speaker
Or you could join the discussion on Facebook where people are always talking about how much we influence their purchasing decisions and how we've changed their lives episode by episode with our endless positivity. It's freaking great. Um, at facebook.com slash up some podcast. And as always, we'll see you in the next one. I apologize for deleting those comments. Have a good night.
00:59:37
Speaker
Hey hey people, Seth here. I just want you to know that I'm doing this of my own free will and I'm in no way shape or form being blackmailed by the 14k triad syndicate in Hong Kong.