Thats what i heard of most outlets, and even GX where open about it: one of the stuff has to be in the room to upload stuff, and the stuff members switch up who has to stay in the room?
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Former GameXplain members talk about troubles with the company (heavy crunch, low pay) [New: Statements from Steve and Derrick]
- Thread starter Magic-Man
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GX has over 1.2 million subs but their views are very low. Long format channels like Arlo's notwithstanding, other Switch/Nintendo focused channels less than half their size with high volume uploads get the same amount of views on their videos, and even more on some high traffic ones.
It has always puzzled me why a channel that largely traded on Nintendo analysis videos and news would also add in PlayStation coverage. I had assumed members on staff wanted to do it and it was free clicks, but from the sounds of it, they were chasing those views too. Whoever thought it was a good idea to do that was wrong and their FF7R video review not even hitting 100k is proof of that. On a 1.2 million sub channel that's terrible conversion of viewers.
It has always puzzled me why a channel that largely traded on Nintendo analysis videos and news would also add in PlayStation coverage. I had assumed members on staff wanted to do it and it was free clicks, but from the sounds of it, they were chasing those views too. Whoever thought it was a good idea to do that was wrong and their FF7R video review not even hitting 100k is proof of that. On a 1.2 million sub channel that's terrible conversion of viewers.
The showfloor is usually so swamped you can't get an internet connection, so if you want to do live coverage, you need someone on hand to relay things. Treehouse Live and similar events also make it so there has to be someone doing live coverage.
When I went we had it so each member of staff had a different role (one person going to press meetings, another getting booth tours, etc.) and the person waiting in the wings was swapped out regularly (which made sense - walking around that showfloor is downright stressful and you'd want a breather eventually.)
Couple that with having people on hand who aren't at the event in-person and it can go relatively smoothly. Kinda depends just how broad your website is, though, and how much relevant content there is to cover. If you're part of a site that covers everything with a lot of press appointments I can see it being a lot more stressful.
I stopped watching Gamexplain during the Switch era of Nintendo, but it's really sad to hear employees were being paid 1-2 dollars an hour. That's way too little. Here's hoping the former employees are doing well with GVG, and hopefully the other members that are currently still on Gamexplain are being treated well.
GameXplain should've stuck to the odd analyses and discussion. It gave them enough of an unique identity that they didn't need to rush to be relevant. I don't think the channel even racks in enough views to justify doing the work on anything but idle free time. An 83k video isn't to to pay out enough to compensate that kind of crunch.
GameXplain has a sub count of just under 1.3 million. Yet it is very common to see their videos not even hit 50,000 views. What ever changes Andre is doing, it is not translating into an increase in viewership. In fact, I think their viewership has decreased over the past year or two.
Too many videos. When you shotgun 10 videos in a day or two not all of them will be seen by most of your subscribers, and the more subscribers skip videos the more YouTube takes that as a sign that you aren't interested and instead recommends you something else. Or at least thats what I remember about how the system works.
Ironically I'm pretty sure their old WiiU era style of having fewer but longer videos played the system better.
Yeah, the argument that Gamexplain is so big compared to others ignores that others have partially the same views with half the subs (nintendo life). And i honestly think that it would help GX to not push everything as its own video. maybe make a summary video for smaller news updates? But yeah, it was quantity over quality in a lot of cases.
Yeah, i asumed as much. Big events are an organisational chaos. It feelt wrong to count that against GX, if it was as expected (as long as it was discussed, and not just decided "you'll be in your room the whole time", then it would just be bad.
Expecting an outlet to just go to an event like that and enjoy themselves is sweet, but far from the reality. ideally it would be a balance between enjoyment and work.
Is it okay to ask for what publication you worked?
i kinda wanted to hold out to not let the new crew hanging, but if im honest i havent watches them. If there was a stream for a live event i prefered the GVG stream. Maybe i should just unsubscribe.
Yeah, same. I don't need a bunch of 90 second videos every day that act as one paragraph Kotaku news stories. I'm not sure who consumes YT like that, it's a bizarre way to structure content.
There are so many smaller videos on their feed now that it kind of dilutes their better content. Like I end up watching nothing sometimes just because my mind just sees a bunch of random mini news vids and can’t be mithered looking for the more in-depth stuff.
I guess that would partly explain this personal anecdote. I did the Yakuza 6, Kiwami 2, and Judgment video reviews for them by way of being friends with Derrick. Payment wasn't discussed or offered, just the opportunity to cover the games (and by extension, own a digital copy of each title, naturally). Since money is a sensitive topic I want to state plainly that I absolutely could have asked about it and didn't, so I hold no ill will toward him or GX on it. I'm on friendly terms with some of the other guys involved and one of their newer hires so I hope I'm coming across kindly and respectfully as I've never spoken with Andre. But in retrospect I can see why it wasn't offered if the main crew was getting by on peanuts lol. The peak of any of the videos was around 20K views as they were a pretty strange fit for the channel, but I hope whatever they did earn went to Derrick. He's a great guy and I'm happy to know him.
Also on the topic of crunch this is a great time to shout out SEGA for sending codes on each of these titles weeks in advance. There was absolutely no pressure or rush and I could play each of them at my own leisure to construct my thoughts; pretty much the ideal scenario when it comes to early copies.
Also on the topic of crunch this is a great time to shout out SEGA for sending codes on each of these titles weeks in advance. There was absolutely no pressure or rush and I could play each of them at my own leisure to construct my thoughts; pretty much the ideal scenario when it comes to early copies.
Nintendo WIre, still work there but we're a pretty small fish in the big pond that is games coverage. That probably helped things go smoother for us, though it was still a bit bumpy and we treated it pretty seriously all the same. I figure there's inherently a lot more pressure when you're dealing with potentially millions of hits and thus things need to be locked down more concretely.
Either way though, in recent years I can't see any excuse for not having every staff member on-site get the opportunity to check out the E3 showfloor. Most of the news happens pre-E3, and even Treehouse ended after two days the last time they did it, giving two days of freedom. Hell I barely played any demos when I went because of the queues, but I at least got to experience the spectacle of it all.
I'd like to hear Andre's side personally, but he speaks too fast and has a habit of slurring his words together and frankly it was Jon/Derrick/Ash who was better suited for video narration. Old GX with Andre narrating was kind of a hard watch. At the time I was just in it for the discussion vids and the occasinal news uppdate. So It surprised me he paid them so little since the 3 of them carried the content on the site for a long time.
Always nice to read rather neutral experiences.
From a "just a gig" perspective a game code for a review sounds like a good deal if its not your job, and the channel is not big. GX is kinda in a weird spot, its big enough that work ethics are a true subject, yet it seems as if they are strugling with money.
I truly hope its not that bad for the current cast, and that maybe they and andre can correct the course and maybe get more sustainable in the long run.
Oh, never read something from there, but have heard about it. Yeah, keeping a big news organisation up and running is not a smal task. Being small keeps you flexible.
how it was: yeah. But also, it was a gradual change, and doing it the old way was probably safer for a long time.
By 2019 it probably was not reasonable anymore to do it the old way.
As an outlet i would rather have interviews and background information then just playing a gameplay demo that hundreds of people will play of games that will release in just a view months. But im also not running a media outlet, so no idea how realistic that is and how interesting for a general audience
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Ive noticed that and always found it strange . thier view count s more akin to a channel thats just over 100000 subs
Man, I'm so disappointed.
AndreGX, don't pull a Bon Appetit on us and at least give an explanation, it doesn't even have to be here.
To be fair since they started being a more generalist gaming channel with a vid on all news and reviews it was really way less interesting to watch.
If the whole point of GX is to be like Ign, I'm already not watching Ign so I won't stay.
I tended to favor their coverage for Nintendo related stuffs but I don't think I ever watch a vid of theirs on anything that wasn't Nintendo.
AndreGX, don't pull a Bon Appetit on us and at least give an explanation, it doesn't even have to be here.
To be fair since they started being a more generalist gaming channel with a vid on all news and reviews it was really way less interesting to watch.
If the whole point of GX is to be like Ign, I'm already not watching Ign so I won't stay.
I tended to favor their coverage for Nintendo related stuffs but I don't think I ever watch a vid of theirs on anything that wasn't Nintendo.
True. There is a lot wrong here, but we should try to not start a lynch mob just because people want one. GX has some bad management and practices, but none of the old stuff semed as if they had a problem with andre on a personal note.
To be honest I always assumed the majority of the gamexplain people had day jobs (at least when I first subbed). The only time I really tuned in were for discussion/reaction videos, so I assumed it was Andre, Derrick, & Ash being the main dudes & anyone else being part time/freelance stuff. Never really seemed plausible for all of them to make a living off that one channel.
Hopefully all involved parties are in better places now, and hopefully Andre is able to fairly compensate all of the creators he now employs. Unfortunate to hear about some of these issues for sure.
Hopefully all involved parties are in better places now, and hopefully Andre is able to fairly compensate all of the creators he now employs. Unfortunate to hear about some of these issues for sure.
Im still subbed to em, but I find this a big problem. I hardly watch anything they post. I also have a problem with how they upload trailers without any of their own content, it’s dumb.
yeah explain yourself or something, because that's not something to throw lightly.
Damn, $1-2 is nothing. Can't blame them. And fuck anyone saying their partners "manipulated" them to leave, wtf is that shit.
I actually find Andre talks very clearly. I thought they all did a good job tbh in that regard.
If I remember correctly he also mentioned it multiple times in the GX podcast, dating back to as far as a few years ago. I used to listen to it a lot back when I was in high school.
When he gets excited he speaks really fast. It's a personal thing, and IMHO some people are just better suited voices for video narration.
Yeah, all the negative accounts seem to be directed at the work and not Andre personally. Until shown otherwise I'm willing to give the benefit of the doubt and assume he probably gave into industry pressure and doesn't know how to properly manage the channel / content flow. There is a difference between not paying because you are greedy scum and not paying because there is no money
what band?
Yeah. he even sponsored i think the first 2 episodes on GVG. Being bad at something is not the same as being a bad person.
Not that he cant also be a bed person, but we dont have a sign for that, so why asume it.
To be fair, and this is if it really was Andre who did it, locking the gamexplain subreddit for bringing this to light is not a good look at all.
A lynch mob is too far though I agree with that.
already missed that. but theres no evidence andre, as far as we know it could have been a different member of the team.
Still, with how comunity driven they are, they should maybe respond to the whole situatione somehow.
https://metalinjection.net/metal-crimes/iced-earths-jon-schaffer-now-listed-on-fbis-most-wanted
Also made me find out about his Rants last year i had not heard of yet as i do not often follow media means cannot support the band period. Dude threw a 30 year Career down the pisser for a bunch of idiots as i am sure Hansi Kursch of Blind Guardian will not want to work with again after this either.
You do? What is it? If it's NateDrake I'll just blame myself for not looking
Ow. Lucky for me, not a fan, but still, thats bad. (With metal bands you never know, they can be on every point on the political spectrum)
You do? What is it? If it's NateDrake I'll just blame myself for not looking
This one, am i right?
To be fair the reduction of classic media hype for games and releases for long stretches was not easy for any outlet.
But yeah, nintendo focused ones had it worse. It would have been THE year for restructuring how they want to work the channel,...but it feels they doubled down on news snippets.
Yeah the sudden massive exodus made me suspcious that something had to have happened but I wanted to give the benefit of the doubt after Andre came here to claim it was amicable.
There is some evidence, pretty much all recent activity has been on the Disneyland and ring fit Adventure subs. All pretty much Andre hangouts.
But, again, the account has been shared before so who really knows until we hear it from themselves.
Yeah, I’ve seen some amazing videos, that clearly had a lot of time and effort, that only get about 1k views.
Man, hats off to Steve for juggling fatherhood, a regular job and putting all these hours into GX for pennies. So glad to hear him and the others doing much better now.
Yup, that's exactly what happened I think. The humble Wii U days were definitely the better times for them.
Truly unfortunate =/
For reviews, SwitchUp is a small but quality channel. They focus on a lot of third party and smaller titles as well, which is nice.