1518: New Media

I’ve been contemplating the ways that people “consume” (ugh, I hate that word, but it seems to be the one in use most frequently these days) content online, and trying to determine a way it could be applied to our currently-stalled podcast over at The Squadron of Shame.

The Squadron of Shame SquadCast certainly worked extremely well for the episodes we did it for, but it did often end up being a little more demanding on the editing time than I would have liked, particularly as we’re all amateurs making use of not-brilliant equipment that often results in things like background hum, echo and other annoying flaws that are difficult to edit out. Much of my editing time was often spent manually trimming out echoes and funny noises, and in the case of a 2-3 hour episode — which most of our episodes tended to be — it would take the majority of the day to do this.

One of the things I’m wondering right now is how relevant the podcast format still is. Obviously I know that there’s enough of a market for sites like Giant Bomb to keep making one every week, and for established podcasting personalities like Garnett Lee to be able to start a new show and have people follow him to see what he’s up to. But I’m also conscious of the rise of alternative means of “consuming” (blech) content in the last couple of years, with YouTube being one particularly disruptive influence, and live broadcasts such as Twitch streaming and Google Hangouts being another.

Awareness of these alternative forms of media has made me ponder whether the standard podcast format is absolutely the best possible thing for the SquadCast going forward, or whether it’s worth contemplating an alternative means of presentation (with an accompanying means of archiving/downloading where necessary.)

The SquadCast has always been a “book group” style of discussion surrounding a game or gaming-related topic, and it’s worked well for us in the past. But gaming is also an inherently visual medium, which makes me wonder whether some form of video presentation might be worth experimenting with, perhaps combined with live broadcasting.

Another reason I bring this up is that Skype, which we have previously used to talk to one another and record the discussions we have, has become a largely unworkable mess ever since Microsoft bought it, making it impossible for me to “archive” the complete conversation just in case someone’s individual recording fails to work properly. I haven’t needed this facility on many occasions, but on the couple where someone’s recording was destroyed by Audacity’s frequent crashes, having that backup facility was a godsend. With the way Skype works now, though — you can’t run it in more than one user account on a Mac at once, which is what I used to do — working this way is impossible without an unnecessarily convoluted setup involving more than one computer.

What I’ve been pondering is making use of something like Google Hangouts, which allows for a number of features that would seem ideal for a discussion about games. It allows participants to converse via either audio or video chat, and it also allows for the footage of the participants to be intercut with other things such as videos from YouTube and the like. For example, while discussing a particularly interesting scene in a game, making use of Google Hangouts would allow you to find that scene on YouTube and then broadcast it to the people watching the Hangout, which strikes me as an eminently good idea. Presumably it would also allow for playing footage while the conversation continues over the top, which is a little more interesting than just gazing at a bunch of talking heads for a few hours.

Google Hangouts can also be easily archived to YouTube, and then one of the many YouTube-to-MP3 converters out there can be used to archive an offline version of the discussion’s audio, which can subsequently be released as a standard podcast for those who wish to continue listening in that way. It’ll be rawer due to the lack of editing and its inherently live nature, but I’ve often felt when I edit a show that I was making the job a lot more difficult and time-consuming than it really needed to be.

Anyway. I’m just thinking out loud here. Interested to know your thoughts, though, particularly if you’ve been either a listener or a participant in the SquadCast at any point in the past. (Those who are neither, you can educate yourself thanks to our archives here.)

#oneaday Day 866: NierCast

I’ve finally beaten Logic into submission and got it up and running on my new Mac, which means I’ve finally been able to edit the most recent Squadron of Shame SquadCast. Here it is:

(Direct link for those who can’t see the inline player)

The subject of the podcast is Nier, an action RPG for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 published by Square Enix and developed by Cavia. You may recall I was enthusing about this game quite a lot back in early May, and that enthusiasm was what sparked the desire for us to do this particular podcast.

Nier is a fascinating game. Whether or not it’s actually a good one is up for debate somewhat, but it’s certainly a unique experience in the console space. In fact, to call it an “action RPG” as I did above is a gross injustice, since the game also incorporates elements of bullet hell shooters, text adventures, 2D platform games and open world quest-based “traditional” RPGs. The only games I can think of that offer a comparable experience include Space Rangers 2 and King Arthur: The Role-Playing Wargame, both for PC, and both offering wildly divergent experiences from Nier, but both taking this “kitchen sink” approach to genre blending.

Nier also distinguishes itself by having a mature plot that is worth following through. Sure, it’s pure fantasy, but it’s good, compelling fantasy — and the fact that the game was released as part of a much larger opus that spans several forms of media is very much apparent if you take the time to read up on it using sources such as Grimoire Nier. The game can most certainly be enjoyed in its own right without exploring any of the additional background material, but it becomes a far richer experience once you delve into the lore of the world — and, for that matter, the story of the game’s creation. It’s very much an example of a game whose world and characters are “bigger” than the game they inhabit, much like an author who plans out their characters by writing scenes for them that never appear in the book in question.

Perhaps the most interesting thing about Nier, though, is its treatment of “New Game+” — the ability to go back and replay it after you’ve beaten it once. In many role-playing games, taking on a New Game+ is simply a matter of starting again with all your awesome items, equipment and buffed-up characters from the end of your first playthrough and then romping through the game slicing off heads with gay abandon and nary a fear for your own safety. Nier certainly does this — on subsequent playthroughs, boss fights that were once challenging are an absolute joke — but it’s not the most important point.

Without getting into spoilers, Nier’s New Game+ gradually adds new layers of complexity and nuance to the plot, calling into question the actions that you undertook without even thinking in your first playthrough. The player is given additional context with which to understand exactly what is really going on — and this manages to seamlessly pull the player’s perspective around between several different characters and conflicting viewpoints while still keeping them in direct control of the titular hero. It’s a very interesting experiment in a variation on the “unreliable narrator” trope, and one which could really only be done so effectively in an interactive form of entertainment such as a video game. It also makes Nier’s New Game+ something that is actually worth doing rather than something which is just there for a bit of fun — and it’s worth noting that it makes it abundantly clear when you’ve done absolutely everything there is to do by actually deleting your save file when you’re done. In the context of the game, this somewhat dramatic action makes a great deal of sense (though you are asked to confirm whether you’re sure you’re okay with this five times) — but can you imagine what would have happened if, say, Mass Effect had pulled something similar? It would have been brilliant, but those complaining about the game’s ending would have been even more furious than they are.

The final thing worthy of note about Nier is that it takes no more than 40 hours to do absolutely everything in the whole game including three New Game+ runs (an utterly stupid real-time farming minigame aside, which can be easily gamed by dicking around with your console’s clock), making it eminently friendly to the busy lifestyles we grown-ups tend to lead these days.

So if you’ve never given Nier a shot, give it a chance. You might be pleasantly surprised. And if you have played and loved Nier — or, indeed, have no intention of ever playing it, ever — be sure to listen to our podcast for some in-depth discussion on this remarkable game.

#oneaday Day 791: Give Me More J

The Squadron of Shame recently tackled the subject of Japanese role-playing games in the first of a new format show that we’re experimenting with. You can check out the show here, or if you’re on something Flash-enabled, you can use the fancy-pants player below. (If you’re not, you’ll simply see a white space, for which I apologise.)

If I had to pick a favourite genre of interactive entertainment, it would, without doubt, be the Japanese role-playing game. I came to the genre relatively late (yes, I was one of those people who discovered RPGs in general through Final Fantasy VII) so I didn’t really have the NES-era epiphany of realising that RPGs were the only genre of games that were attempting to tell a story — for a while, at least. I also didn’t discover the earlier Final Fantasy games until much later, though I have, to date, played every one of them (except XIV) and have finished most of them. I still have V and VI outstanding. Shameful, I know.

There’s something about the JRPG genre that has resonated with me ever since I first got off that train in Midgar and that awesome music started up, though. For one, I find the sort of over-the-top wackiness and melodrama that typifies the genre to many people to be entertaining and fun to get invested in. For another, I have absolutely no objection to a bit of moe in my games, and generally find anime characters of this type very appealing despite the fact that in many ways they’re just as generic and widespread as the bald space marine with no neck. And for yet another, I enjoy the creativity frequently on display in the genre, both from an artistic and a narrative perspective.

It’s a cliché to say that Japanese RPGs are clichéd, and a lot of people who accuse the genre of that probably haven’t played one for a while. Sure, there are certain thematic elements and tropes which many of them have in common, but all are unique in some way. I can remember pretty much every JRPG I’ve played over the years in great detail — contrast this with the fact that there are a whole bunch of shooters I struggle to distinguish from one another, and it’s pretty rare than I can even remember characters’ names from Western RPGs like The Elder Scrolls. Each JRPG has its own unique cast of characters who are (in most cases) well-developed and display plenty of growth and change over the course of the story. Sure, some of them start their journeys as unlikable arseholes (Squall from FFVIII and Neku from The World Ends With You spring immediately to mind) but having a strong emotional reaction to a character — “I really don’t like this guy” — is surely a sign that the writers have done their job well. It’s sometimes a difficult experience to play a game with a seemingly dislikable protagonist, but often this is a sign that he’s going to go through some experiences to soften that stony heart of his, and I’m a big fan of that particular narrative trope.

Leaving narrative aside, I’ve always been a fan of the often abstract, creative battle systems that populate Japanese role-playing games. This is perhaps best exemplified by the Final Fantasy series, which significantly shakes up its core mechanics with every single instalment. Don’t believe me? Here’s how the battle system and related mechanics differ from game to game:

Final Fantasy — Traditional D&D-style turn-based combat without movement. Spells split into levels, like D&D, and characters have a limited number of casts per level that increases with their character level. Characters have set classes and, later in the game, may promote these to “prestige” classes.
Final Fantasy II — Turn-based combat, but progression is tied to an Elder Scrolls-like system whereby using something makes it improve. Whack things with a sword and your sword skill will increase. Take a lot of damage and your hit points will increase. Use a lot of magic and your magic points will increase. This system proved rather divisive at the time, and predated Bethesda’s implementation of a very similar levelling system into its flagship Western RPG series by six years.
Final Fantasy III — Turn-based combat, with progression tied to a “Job” system where characters could switch classes almost at will, allowing players to dynamically build a party to fit the situation at hand.
Final Fantasy IV — The first appearance of “Active Time Battle”, the almost-real-time-but-not-quite system which has been present in most of the subsequent titles. Progression and skill unlocks were static and unique for each character.
Final Fantasy V — The Job system returns in a much more well-implemented fashion. Players may develop Jobs at will, and may also equip certain skills that they have learned from another Job to build multi-purpose characters.
Final Fantasy VI — Each character has unique special abilities but everyone has the opportunity to learn the same spells by fighting with “Espers” equipped.
Final Fantasy VII — The Materia system allowed for deep customisation of characters with a slightly puzzly element — how best to fill the available slots in a character’s weapon and armour?
Final Fantasy VIII — By drawing magic out of enemies and “junctioning” these spells to statistics, players could create powerhouses that made their character level practically irrelevant. A bizarre and abstract system that didn’t quite work.
Final Fantasy IX — Characters learned skills from their equipment. Once they had learned the skill, they could use it any time, otherwise they had to keep the equipment in question in use to perform the action.
Final Fantasy X — A brief break from the Active Time Battle system brought a clever turn-based system where certain actions could rearrange the turn order. Also saw the first appearance of a non-traditional levelling system in the form of the “Sphere Grid”
Final Fantasy X-2 — A return to the Active Time Battle system and a variation on the Job system came with X-2’s Dressphere setup, whereby each of the game’s three playable characters could equip several Jobs and switch between them mid-battle.
Final Fantasy XI — The first MMO entry in the series had another variation on the Job system whereby a single character had levels in every Job, but could only have one active at a time, with a “Sub-Job” becoming available after some progression had been made and allowing characters to use skills from this second Job.
Final Fantasy XII — Taking the combat of XI and applying it to a single-player game allowed XII to have a real-time feel while still feeling strategic, as players were able to pause the game to issue commands to characters while battling without being sent to a separate screen. Progression was split between a traditional levelling system and the “License Grid”, whereby characters had to purchase licenses to use specific pieces of equipment and abilities, then purchase the equipment and abilities separately.
Final Fantasy XIII — Active Time Battle on a separate combat screen returns, this time with players taking control of a single character in fights that focus more on carefully-timed Paradigm Shifts (effectively Job changes by another name) rather than using specific abilities. Had a distinctly unconventional levelling system whereby characters could gain levels and abilities from six different classes independently.
Final Fantasy XIII-2 — Similar to XIII, but with only two characters available. Players could catch various monsters to fill the third party slot. Characters could once again develop down the six different paths, though monsters had a fixed class which could also be developed. Unlike XIII, where you were stuck playing as the party leader, in XIII-2 you could switch between the two characters at will, and one of them getting knocked out did not mean failure.

As you can see, Final Fantasy is a series which has evolved significantly over the years, and yet many accuse Square Enix of letting it stagnate. Sure, they’ve arguably made a few missteps over the years — XII, XIII and XIII-2 have all proven somewhat divisive in particular (though I enjoyed all three of them) — but one thing that the Final Fantasy team really can’t be accused of is sitting on their laurels and churning out the same old thing year after year. The same is true for many other JRPG developers. It’s one of the richest, most creative genres out there.

So why has it fallen from grace? A combination of factors. With the increasingly-busy lives people lead today, a 100-hour game is no longer necessarily seen as a good thing. Budgets for high-definition games spiral out of control, making the production of an HD JRPG an impractical prospect for many studios, particularly when they can’t necessarily count on huge sales numbers to recoup their expenditure. (This is perhaps why MonolithSoft and Mistwalker chose to release the gobsmackingly brilliant Xenoblade Chronicles and The Last Story on the Wii rather than the more popular/”hardcore” Xbox 360 and PS3.) And the eye of “the average gamer”, whoever that might be, has drifted towards the West these days for the majority of their gaming fixes, rather than the East as once was.

There’s still a rich back catalogue of excellent titles out there to explore in this deep genre, however — even more so if you learn Japanese. I’m making a point to go back and revisit some titles I missed the first time around at the moment — having recently played Shadow Hearts I’m now on to its excellent sequel, for example — and I’m having a great time. For the vast majority of these games, they’re a reminder of a simpler time — no “Your friend is online!” notifications, no party chat invites, no DLC, no controversy over endings even when they sucked — and they’re great.

So while the rest of the Internet yells and screams about each other about Mass Effect 3 (still!) I’m more than happy to immerse myself in a world of HP, MP, Attack, Magic, Item, Escape.

#oneaday Day 154: Shame on You

Have I told you about The Squadron of Shame? If you’re a long-time reader, then I probably have, several times. But if you’re here by chance, you might not be familiar with our little group.

Born in the dim and distant past of 1up, before the various 1upocalypses which have hit the site since then, The Squadron of Shame came about as a result of a podcast feature dubbed “The Pile of Shame”. The concept of The Pile of Shame seems to have entered into popular consciousness in recent years, but the first time I ever heard it was on 1up Yours, when it was used to describe that ever-growing pile of shrink-wrapped games (or, these days, things in your Steam Library) that you somehow never get around to playing for one reason or another.

The 1up Yours guys agreed to play Tim Schafer’s Psychonauts, which was widely regarded as being “good” and somewhat overlooked by the masses. They lasted a week before they gave up, so a number of members of the community stepped up to the plate in an attempt to succeed where they had failed.

Putting together forum threads and a 1up Club page to discuss the game, we found a number of like-minded gamers who enjoyed coming together to discuss games at considerable length, and in a markedly more intelligent manner than many of the “lol noob”-type people out there on the Internet. Over time, we took on a wide variety of other “missions” — taking on games which the masses had passed by and delving into them to discover whether it was actually worth going back and exploring them. Sometimes it was, sometimes it wasn’t.

The turning point came when 1up merged its largely-disparate forums into just three general-purpose areas. The formerly intelligent discourse found on the 1up Radio boards was drowned out by the million voices of 12 year olds who thought Master Chief was da bomb, and our experiences were sullied by trolls coming on to our threads, criticising us for “walls of text” and completely derailing the discussion.

Before UGO took over 1up, we decided it was time to leave once and for all. We took to Twitter for a while, but we were scattered, and not everyone in our group used Twitter. It felt too “public” — although we always were a public group, there was an element of the “book club” mentality about it — a group of friends who knew each other well and enjoyed each other’s company, but were still welcoming to newcomers.

Over time, we tried to come up with a way to resurrect the Squad formula. Thus, the Squadron of Shame SquadCast was born. Beginning as a game-focused podcast in which we concentrated on a single game and discussed it at great length and morphing into the topic-led discussion show we have today, the show has always been an enjoyable thing to be part of — and to listen to. We also have a small but active community at our “temporary” home: the Squadron of Shame Squawkbox. And we’ve all remained fast friends through thick and thin, through everything life’s thrown at each one of us.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is what the Internet is all about. And you can be part of it, too — our latest episode was released today, with a discussion of game worlds. You can check it out by paying the Squawkbox a visit, and there are links to subscribe there if you so desire, too. If you have a WordPress account, too, you can join the discussions on the ‘box, too — don’t be shy. We like new people, and we also don’t mind “walls of text”. So long as you use paragraphs. So far as conditions for entry go, that’s not an unreasonable one, I don’t think.

Anyway. There you have it. They’re my favourite group of people on the Internet, and I haven’t given them a plug for a while, so there you are. Join us. Or at least listen to our new episode.

#oneaday, Day 297: Read This Or I’ll Punch You In The Balls/Face

The latest episode of The Squadron of Shame SquadCast is currently uploading. In it, we discuss the ever-present topic of video game violence. Is it really destroying our children and turning them into violent assholes?

Well, you’ll have to listen to the podcast for our group conclusions, but here’s my take on the whole thing. Video game violence has now been around for some time. In fact, it’s been around for quite a bit longer than some people realise. A couple of the guys brought up Forbidden Forest on the Commodore 64, a game which, while laughable now, was pretty shocking and gory for the time. I know that certainly five-year old me would have been freaked out by the big-ass spiders.

One side-effect of the violence issue being around for so long is that it’s now somewhat taken for granted. Whether or not this is “desensitisation” per se is a matter of opinion. But the fact is, violence in video games is very rarely shocking these days. Shoot someone in Call of Duty and it doesn’t carry much in the way of emotional impact, because you do it so much. Shoot someone in Heavy Rain, though, and it carries much more gravitas due to the context, and the fact it happens less.

But desensitisation to violence in the video games medium doesn’t mean that we as a culture are desensitised to violence as a whole. I’ve played a ton of games that involve ultra-violence, dismemberment, heads exploding, that sort of thing. One of my favourite games in recent memory was Bayonetta, which features a huge range of over-the-top violence and implements of extreme torture. But if I saw something like that happening in real life, I would be horrified and disgusted. I see a photograph of something violent and I feel sick. And anything involving eyes—even if it’s just on a TV show or a movie—ugh, count me out.

So it’s clear, then, that video games haven’t desensitised me, personally, to anything except video game violence, which is something much more akin to cartoon violence than anyone else. I doubt there’s anything that can adequately prepare you for real-world violence and gore, save being immersed in it for some time by being either a psychopath or a soldier on active duty. And neither of those things are particularly desirable.

What I have observed, though, is a knock-on effect from some of these games, and it’s not necessarily the violence itself that is to blame. Back where I used to live, a lot of kids used to play in the streets rather noisily. Nothing unusual, you might say, until you heard the language they were coming out with. It became abundantly clear to me from listening to them, and the fact I had played through Modern Warfare 2 relatively recently, that they were re-enacting something they’d seen in a video game. And the parents didn’t seem to care that their kids—aged between about 5 and 10, I’d wager—were out in the street, yelling “MOTHERFUCKER!” at each other and threatening to blow each others’ legs off.

“Kids will be kids,” is the easy response, of course. But these kids picked up on this material from somewhere, and obviously hadn’t had a discussion with their parent(s) about what was appropriate to be shouting in the street, and what wasn’t.

I don’t envy the task that parents have these days. There is so much crap out there that kids can access easily. So the challenge is not to stop them from seeing it at all—that’s an impossible mission that grows more impossible by the day—but to help them understand what is and isn’t “appropriate” in certain contexts. And some parents, it seems, just can’t be bothered to have those conversations. And, as a result, assholes beget assholes.

It’s a big topic, far more than just one blog post can cover. Want to hear more? Then check out the latest episode of the SquadCast, which will be up online very soon. Head over to the Squadron of Shame Squawkbox in the meantime to debate the issue.

#oneaday, Day 255: The Big Pixels are Here!

Ladies and gents, it’s my great pleasure to reveal The Big Pixels to you.

You may recall some days ago that I was mourning the loss of Kombo. Kombo’s still not dead yet—feel free to drop by and support the remaining writers—but, to be frank, it’s probably only a matter of time. It’s very sad to see the end of something which has clearly had love, care and attention poured into it over the last few years, and I’m happy that I was part of the experience for a short while.

But this post isn’t about mourning the past; it’s about celebrating the future. And that future begins with today’s launch of The Big Pixels.

The Big Pixels are a group of friends first and foremost, video game writers second, and we decided to band together to produce something that we’d want to read ourselves. Intelligent, thought-provoking games writing. No flamebait. No traffic-whoring. Just the kind of thing that gets people stroking their chin and going “Hmmm”, and hopefully provoking some discussion. Those of you who follow The Squadron of Shame will undoubtedly dig what we’re doing. And those of you who are tired of the same old news stories posted everywhere day after day will surely enjoy our work, too. It’s an N4G commenter-free zone!

We’re there to have fun and build a community, not to chase page hits. So the important thing for you (yes, you!), the reader, is that you enjoy it. Read our work. Tell us what you think in the comments. Feel free to share any pieces you find particularly interesting or entertaining. And help us to build up our own unique little corner of the internet; a home away from home for those who are sick of “Top Ten Tuesdays” featuring boobies, guns or any combination thereof, or people who are sick of seeing the same picture of Michael Pachter on every article where he says something contentious and/or stupid.

Since you’re reading my blog, I’m going to draw particular attention to my own posts, of course. I am nothing if not a whore, after all. So while you’re over there, feel free to check out a “reprint” of my article on game development’s gender divide (featuring much-appreciated assistance from the very lovely Mitu Khandaker and Lauren Wainwright), a companion article to the most recent SquadCast on video game music, and a discussion of adult gaming. I hope you like them; and be sure to check out my buddies’ work while you’re over there. And don’t forget the Looney Bin, receptacle for all manner of game-related crap that we’ve encountered in our journeys around the web.

It’s been an interesting journey over the last few days, and it’s only just beginning, for sure. Stay tuned to The Big Pixels, as we’ll all be pushing out a wide variety of articles on all manner of game-related subjects every week. Follow us on Twitter and/or Facebook for the latest and to make us look popular and awesome.

Also, our review scoring system has a rainbow unicorn pixel in it. And there is absolutely no way you can say that isn’t the most amazing thing you’ve ever seen. Unless Maru is your cat.

#oneaday, Day 209: Coming Soon

Tomorrow night, The Squadron of Shame are back in action after something of a hiatus.

For those of you unfamiliar with our unique brand of discussion and podcastery, let me explain what it’s all about, and when the new podcast hits, you’ll be able to come and join the fun.

The Squadron of Shame started as a result of a feature on 1up Yours dubbed “The Pile of Shame”. The term has since spread around the Internet somewhat, and it refers to all of the things that you’ve bought and never got around to reading, listening to or playing. In the case of the original 1up feature, it referred to that pile of games you have on your shelf that are begging to be played, but somehow inevitably get left behind whenever the latest triple-A hotness makes an appearance. The first game they took on was the excellent Psychonauts.

As it happened, the feature was somewhat short-lived on the 1up podcast. But a number of community members ran with the concept on the companion forums for the 1up “radio” output. We formed a club page on 1up which is still there, though largely inactive these days. We’d pick a game which was supposed to be good (or at least interesting), play it through as a group and discuss it all together. Some fascinating discussions resulted, and it also allowed many people to expose themselves to a variety of games which they might not have done otherwise. Games like Star Control II, Freespace 2, Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth and Psi-Ops.

As time moved on, the group wanted more. The merging of all the 1up boards into one mangled mess meant that the reasoned debate of the old threads was much more difficult. Topics would get derailed and it was clear that a new approach was needed.

Thus began the SquadCast, the Squadron of Shame’s official podcast. Starting with independent rabbinical adventure game The Shivah, select members of the group banded together to do what they did best: play through a game together, then put their heads together and have a discussion about it. Ably hosted by the fine Mr Chris Whittington and edited/produced in a sort-of OKish manner by my good self, the show is now 29 episodes strong and has covered subjects as diverse as the Commodore 64, Russian FPS-adventure depress ’em up Pathologic and charming indie puzzler Machinarium.

Following circumstances beyond their control (mostly beyond my control, I admit) there’s been something of a gap since our last episode. So we’ve thought that now is the time to take a break, consider how to make the show better and come back stronger than ever with some brand new output in a whole new format.

So, tomorrow we’re recording. And next week we’ll be proudly presenting The Squadron of Shame SquadCast, Season Two. Taking some of the advice we got from Jeff Green, Shawn Elliott, Ken Levine and some others who I’ve forgotten speaking on the Podcasting for PR panel at PAX East, we’ve made some changes.

The show’s going to be bi-weekly. This means that rather than have variable gaps as everyone clamours to complete a “mission” before we talk about it, some regularity will allow us to build up a more, well, regular listenership.

Next up, it’s going to have a static cast of host Chris Whittington, Mark Whiting, Jeff Parsons and myself with occasional guest spots available where appropriate. Jeff is in the process of composing us a brand new theme tune, too, so it’s going to be a complete sonic reboot.

Most importantly, though, each episode is no longer going to be focused on a specific game. Instead, the focus will be on particular “topics”, with occasional traditional “mission” podcasts interspersed as appropriate. This means that people will hopefully be more inclined to tune in regularly and hear what we have to say, rather than skipping episodes about games they have no interest in. As part of this, the official Squawkbox of the Squad will be playing a more prominent role, with community questions and discussions a regular occurrence. If you already have a WordPress account, you can head right over and start chatting with us. If not, it’s simple to sign up. Everyone who’s interested in discussing video games and who isn’t afraid of the odd (all right, frequent) wall of text is very welcome to pay us a visit.

Besides the changes, it’ll be our same wordy, intellectual, chin-stroking discussion about video games, representing one of the most unique podcasts on the Internet. We’d love it if you could join us for our relaunch. Visit the Squawkbox, follow us on Twitter, become a Fan… sorry, Like us on Facebook and find our past episodes and those of our sister podcast The Exploding Barrel Podcast here.

2010 is going to be a great year for the Squad. We hope you’ll come along for the ride.

#oneaday, Day 78: It Never Rains But It Podcasts…

It’s 3 in the morning and I’ve just finished recording the latest SquadCast on the subject of David Cage’s Heavy Rain.

Featuring me, Chris Whittington, Mark Whiting and Jeff Parsons, we certainly all have plenty to say on the subject of the game. It should be a good episode, and I’ll keep you all posted as to when it’s up online and available to download.

For any of you reading this through the One A Day project, or stumbling across this blog for non-games reasons, the Squadron of Shame are a group of gamers who have come together with the express purpose of digging up overlooked underdogs and giving them a damn good (and often lengthy) critiquing. We podcast on a semi-regular basis about these games and tell you why you should play them… or not, in some cases.

For more information, if this sounds like something you might be interested in, check out our official (work-in-progress) site here or follow us on Twitter. You can also become a Fan on Facebook. Just search for our Page. I’d post the link but I’m on my iPhone right now. I’m sure you can find it. You’re big boys and girls.

Gratuitous self-promotion now over, it’s time for bed. Yes, that’s it for today. It is 3am, after all.

SquadCast: Persona 3

It’s the first of our irregular special side-mission podcasts today as we explore the world of teenagers pointing guns at their heads, the tarot and giant penises riding chariots. Yes, you read that correctly. Persona 3 is an incredibly long game – too long, perhaps, for a Squad main mission, so those of us who have played, finished (or “almost” finished) it decided to get together for a chat and a chin-stroke.

This podcast also features Beige and Pishu’s report from PAX 08, our regular Personal Piles of Shame section and selections from the soundtrack of the game.

Featuring: Chris “RocGaude” Whittington, Mark “Beige” Whiting, Chris “Papapishu” Person and Pete “Angry_Jedi” Davison.

Subscribe using one of the links below:

M4A Enhanced version via iTunes
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MP3 Standard version via iTunes
MP3 Standard version via RSS