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[Power Pro]

I don't think Giantbomb ever reached its true potential, even in its inception I thought Gerstmann and the gang were funnier on Gamespot. Then Ryan Davis (RIP) passed and the ship started sinking. The industry has changed a lot and gaming news is not what it use to be, it really is end of an era. I predict IGN, Gamespot, will not be here in the next 5-10years.

It really is just frustrating looking at what happened with Giant Bomb from a business perspective. The site was at it's best when it was a small crew of the original members working on the site. It was starting to get bloated when Whiskey Media wanted to turn it into this big brand of multiple websites, because then you had people just cluttering up the office with 3 or 4 sites that no one gave a shit about, and Giant Bomb trying to work in the middle of them all.

Then instead of downsizing to what works, stupid whiskey media started just selling everything off, and they ended up right back at the gamespot office. Still worked out mostly okay because of the chemistry of some of the staff, but then we started getting excuses about meetings taking up their time.

I think the biggest mistake up front was Jeff signing on with this Whiskey Media group in the first place after he was fired from gamespot. He should've looked at other options, or try to do something that he had more control and ownership of. Because ultimately, it's super depressing to think about how Giant Bomb started, and had a loyal fanbase and staff because people hated the idea of Jeff getting fired for giving an honest game review. Then years later, the very site that Jeff created...ends up getting fired from years later, and all the people who stood up with him with the creation of Giant Bomb sold out. Vinny, Alex, and Brad really have no pride these days. They've gladly been streaming and working with the idiots who took over giant bomb, no pride in the work they did to create the site, and not upset at all in how it was tarnished.

 

[hououinkyouma00]

A lot of people say Giant Bomb died when Ryan did. Could someone please elaborate on this opinion because I would like to know everyone else's thoughts. In my opinion, it died when Abby and Ben joined or when the team was physically split.

I don't think GB died with Ryan personally.

For me GB started to die when they split, and especially when Dan moved to the east coast. Say what you will about Dan now but I think Dan joining reinvigorated GB for a long time and I think he had way more rapport and worked much better with Jeff and the rest of the west coast crew. The split was terrible and really lost part of what made GB GB for me but I continued to watch for quite awhile.

Now I didn't hate Austin as much as some people did, but I did absolutely loathe Abby and Ben. Abby might possibly be one of the dumbest people I've ever met and actively ruined the annual GOTY podcasts every time she spoke.

GB died died when the original crew started to leave. Giant Bomb IS Ryan, Jeff, Brad, Vinny, Alex, Dan, and Drew.

I miss watching Giant Bomb. I used to spend so much time watching Unprofessional Fridays, Quick Looks, Demo Derby, and stuff like Metal Gear Scanlon. I still keep MG Scanlon, and their play through of Shenmue in my YT playlists. I also used to listen to the Bombast every single week without failure (Bombast, Podcast Beyond!, PS ILY, and Sacred Symbols were all must plays every single week for me and SS still is).

 

[HJuggernaut]

It really is just frustrating looking at what happened with Giant Bomb from a business perspective. The site was at it's best when it was a small crew of the original members working on the site. It was starting to get bloated when Whiskey Media wanted to turn it into this big brand of multiple websites, because then you had people just cluttering up the office with 3 or 4 sites that no one gave a shit about, and Giant Bomb trying to work in the middle of them all.

Then instead of downsizing to what works, stupid whiskey media started just selling everything off, and they ended up right back at the gamespot office. Still worked out mostly okay because of the chemistry of some of the staff, but then we started getting excuses about meetings taking up their time.

I think the biggest mistake up front was Jeff signing on with this Whiskey Media group in the first place after he was fired from gamespot. He should've looked at other options, or try to do something that he had more control and ownership of. Because ultimately, it's super depressing to think about how Giant Bomb started, and had a loyal fanbase and staff because people hated the idea of Jeff getting fired for giving an honest game review. Then years later, the very site that Jeff created...ends up getting fired from years later, and all the people who stood up with him with the creation of Giant Bomb sold out. Vinny, Alex, and Brad really have no pride these days. They've gladly been streaming and working with the idiots who took over giant bomb, no pride in the work they did to create the site, and not upset at all in how it was tarnished.

also the emphasis of turning their webpage into the wikipedia of games didn't really pan out, remember when they rolled out their forum achievements?

 

[AJUMP23]

Did it die yet?

 

[Evil Calvin]

Didn't they just pause the streaming so Fandom could reinforce the 'Fandom branding' to the crew? They really made it clear at the beginning of todays GB podcast 888.

 

[small_law]

The horrible irony was that Ryan's passing was the thing that saved Giant Bomb. Jeff talked about it on his podcast a while back. It drew in all this new traffic. The site was on a downward trajectory before it happened.

I'm surprised Giant Bomb is still around in any capacity. There's been zero chatter about it for a long time. Other than reminiscing. Time proved a lot of people right about Giant Bomb's hiring decisions.

 

[Evil Calvin]

Why don't they all quit and just make a new site with Twitch and YouTube streams, a podcast and a patreon. They all have or had their own channels, so why not just tell Fandom to F-off and start over. Everyone knows these guys and they can do it. MinnMax and Nextlander do it on their own and are successful. Those with corporate bosses (Gb and Game Informer) always seems to succumb to this meddling BS and firings.

 

[Boo Who?]

I don't think GB died with Ryan personally.

For me GB started to die when they split, and especially when Dan moved to the east coast. Say what you will about Dan now but I think Dan joining reinvigorated GB for a long time and I think he had way more rapport and worked much better with Jeff and the rest of the west coast crew. The split was terrible and really lost part of what made GB GB for me but I continued to watch for quite awhile.

Now I didn't hate Austin as much as some people did, but I did absolutely loathe Abby and Ben. Abby might possibly be one of the dumbest people I've ever met and actively ruined the annual GOTY podcasts every time she spoke.

GB died died when the original crew started to leave. Giant Bomb IS Ryan, Jeff, Brad, Vinny, Alex, Dan, and Drew.

I miss watching Giant Bomb. I used to spend so much time watching Unprofessional Fridays, Quick Looks, Demo Derby, and stuff like Metal Gear Scanlon. I still keep MG Scanlon, and their play through of Shenmue in my YT playlists. I also used to listen to the Bombast every single week without failure (Bombast, Podcast Beyond!, PS ILY, and Sacred Symbols were all must plays every single week for me and SS still is).

Vinny's playthrough of Dark Souls was such a great series. The Hitman stuff was also top tier. TANG was great with Ryan, "She got a....penitentiary body".

 

[thegame983]

Interesting side note. I joined neogaf after I got banned from the Giantbomb forums for complaining about Abbey.

 

[Thabass]

I feel like they're only really relevant when they drop breaking news. You can do that on Twitter. I don't care about their opinions after the fact.

 

[mpgeist]

I hung on after Ryan died, but GB pretty much died for me when Drew left.

 

[rm082e]

A lot of people say Giant Bomb died when Ryan did. Could someone please elaborate on this opinion because I would like to know everyone else's thoughts. In my opinion, it died when Abby and Ben joined or when the team was physically split.

The Bombcast and their live shows had a chemistry to them when Ryan Davis was there. Ryan and Jeff were the comedians who would bounce jokes off each other, Vinny was the unexpected comedian who had this amazing ability to get Ryan laughing, and Brad was like the straight man. I have years of fond memories sitting in my cubicle crunching through work laughing along with them.

When Ryan passed, it was like it sucked all of the comedy out of the podcast. Aside from everyone being depressed about it, the shows just didn't feel the same. They got other personalities in like Dan and Jason (who I did like), but it wasn't the same vibe.

Ryan Davis was really a gem who couldn't be replaced. He was a critical piece of Giantbomb being as great as it was for all those early years.

I still follow Nextlander and Jeff's solo show via Patreon, but it's not the same as it used to be.

 

[calico]

I'm trainin my brain, dawg!

 

[GoldenEye98]

I'm surprised some of these more traditional internet outlets have lasted as long as they have. Sometimes you look at a Youtube channel and the view counts seem like they wouldn't sustain an individual...let alone a group of people.

IGN seems to be the only one that is sustainable and think it's because they grew their youtube channel early on and were always the most polished outlet....so they differentiate themselves from just competing with personality-driven streaming.

 

[Boo Who?]

Picture says it all about the state of game "journalism."

 

[Chuck Berry]

The GB death has been so fucking slow and drawn out. I really hope this is it and its finally put out of its misery.

Loved the Ryan days, and I actually really liked a lot of the stuff after his death. The energy was different but I thought it worked most of the time. I think all of their Patreon stuff they have going is terrible, but I've ranted enough about them in the GB thread so it's not worth the typing all over again.

Should've put a cap in this company back in '22-23. COVID and all of them going remote really sealed the deal. And I don't care how antiquated it sounds, but I think that when you aren't all in the same room, the chemistry (if there even is any) diminishes significantly.

Goodbye and fucking good riddance man.

 

[rkofan87]

It really is just frustrating looking at what happened with Giant Bomb from a business perspective. The site was at it's best when it was a small crew of the original members working on the site. It was starting to get bloated when Whiskey Media wanted to turn it into this big brand of multiple websites, because then you had people just cluttering up the office with 3 or 4 sites that no one gave a shit about, and Giant Bomb trying to work in the middle of them all.

Then instead of downsizing to what works, stupid whiskey media started just selling everything off, and they ended up right back at the gamespot office. Still worked out mostly okay because of the chemistry of some of the staff, but then we started getting excuses about meetings taking up their time.

I think the biggest mistake up front was Jeff signing on with this Whiskey Media group in the first place after he was fired from gamespot. He should've looked at other options, or try to do something that he had more control and ownership of. Because ultimately, it's super depressing to think about how Giant Bomb started, and had a loyal fanbase and staff because people hated the idea of Jeff getting fired for giving an honest game review. Then years later, the very site that Jeff created...ends up getting fired from years later, and all the people who stood up with him with the creation of Giant Bomb sold out. Vinny, Alex, and Brad really have no pride these days. They've gladly been streaming and working with the idiots who took over giant bomb, no pride in the work they did to create the site, and not upset at all in how it was tarnished.

b v and a went woke jeff has tds but he is not as wole as the others imo.

 

[rkofan87]

I don't think GB died with Ryan personally.

For me GB started to die when they split, and especially when Dan moved to the east coast. Say what you will about Dan now but I think Dan joining reinvigorated GB for a long time and I think he had way more rapport and worked much better with Jeff and the rest of the west coast crew. The split was terrible and really lost part of what made GB GB for me but I continued to watch for quite awhile.

Now I didn't hate Austin as much as some people did, but I did absolutely loathe Abby and Ben. Abby might possibly be one of the dumbest people I've ever met and actively ruined the annual GOTY podcasts every time she spoke.

GB died died when the original crew started to leave. Giant Bomb IS Ryan, Jeff, Brad, Vinny, Alex, Dan, and Drew.

I miss watching Giant Bomb. I used to spend so much time watching Unprofessional Fridays, Quick Looks, Demo Derby, and stuff like Metal Gear Scanlon. I still keep MG Scanlon, and their play through of Shenmue in my YT playlists. I also used to listen to the Bombast every single week without failure (Bombast, Podcast Beyond!, PS ILY, and Sacred Symbols were all must plays every single week for me and SS still is).

aw did not show his woke side until he got to vice.

 

[rkofan87]

Why don't they all quit and just make a new site with Twitch and YouTube streams, a podcast and a patreon. They all have or had their own channels, so why not just tell Fandom to F-off and start over. Everyone knows these guys and they can do it. MinnMax and Nextlander do it on their own and are successful. Those with corporate bosses (Gb and Game Informer) always seems to succumb to this meddling BS and firings.

this

 

[Badlucktroll]

 

[rkofan87]

I hung on after Ryan died, but GB pretty much died for me when Drew left.

same it think when drew left is when abby and ben come in so that fits.

 

[small_law]

Picture says it all about the state of game "journalism."

I don't think I ever heard Ryan call himself a journalist. Even if he did, he was the only one of them that knew he was in entertainment first.

And I like how people here still like to reminisce about the good old days of GB. RIP Ryan Davis, you're still missed.

 

[Honey Bunny]

I want to know what the fuck went down between jeff and the other OGs that caused them to deliberately ignore eachother completely since the split.

I also want to call out the weirdo fucking groupthink that occurs at the gb subreddit (why does every subreddit become like this? such a cursed site) where they insist nothing is wrong and upvote hilarious cope like 'theyre focused on building their own brands' and downvote people who point out the bleeding obvious.

Picture says it all about the state of game "journalism."

We used to actually need people to describe and critique these games. Now you can watch unlimited gameplay day of release. These guys were ahead of the curve transitioning from journalists to entertainers. Good for them.

 

[Evil Calvin]

Interesting side note. I joined neogaf after I got banned from the Giantbomb forums for complaining about Abbey.

She was (and is) terrible. She wasn't a gamer. She only really played Nancy Drew and The Sims. Never understood why she was there. In 2017 she actually whined enough to get Dream Daddy Simulator on Giant Bomb's top 10 GOTY list. I was done with her after that.

 

[Chuck Berry]

She was (and is) terrible. She wasn't a gamer. She only really played Nancy Drew and The Sims. Never understood why she was there. In 2017 she actually whined enough to get Dream Daddy Simulator on Giant Bomb's top 10 GOTY list. I was done with her after that.

Don't forget letting her do the Quick Look for Disco Elysium. What the fuck. Great idea there.