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| This guy. You can almost hear his British accent from the screenshot. (From pcgamer.com.) |
The fact that he used to teach drama at school* does not shock me at all, as he has a camera presence that I can only wish I had. And compared to my "no accent" Midwestern accent**, Josh's has an authoritative sound that can make him instantly believable and effortlessly charming.
All that aside, Josh has spent some time putting together YouTube videos examining the MMO world --and, to a lesser extent, the gaming world in general-- and his videos are truly top notch both in quality and how he presents and defends his opinions.
Well, he's done it again with a nearly 2 hour long tour de force about MMO content creators...
Josh went out and interviewed close to a dozen MMO content creators and got their responses on a variety of topics. Josh's point is that he as well as the other content creators he interviewed really want more MMO content creators out there, but he wants people to understand what they're getting into before they make that jump.
The interviews were edited for brevity, but the edited version still clocked in at almost 2 hours.
My immediate takeaway from the interviews is that I need to watch more of these creators. Holy crap are they articulate and thoughtful. And yes, I'm including Asmongold in this, because one thing that stands out to me about Asmongold's interview is that he put a lot of thought into his responses, proving inadvertently that the "Asmongold" seen on his channel is basically a "stage version" of himself. The real Asmongold isn't like his stage self --well, not totally so, anyway-- which kind of surprised me. I mean, I should have known that he has a stage version of himself, but for some reason I thought he was so open book that what you saw was what you got out of him.
If you've got the time, you should seriously give a listen to the YouTube video. It's not only a good watch, but it also gives you a glimpse of what it's like to be an MMO content creator in today's world.
And if you happen to find this post, Josh, thanks for all the effort! I truly appreciate all the work that you put in.
#Blaugust2022
*I'm having issues finding independent verification, but I swear I heard it on one of his YouTube videos.
**That's because the Midwestern American accent is closest to "General American English", the sort of English you get out of newscasters and whatnot that doesn't really have an accent that you can place anywhere. Or, as my friends and I would put it, "The Accent that is no Accent". Only in the Midwest would you find an American accent so non-committal that it's, well, kind of boring.
EtA: Corrected a misspelling.
I saw that video too and thought it was good, though it also made me glad once again that my blogging doesn't involve financial incentives and having to worry about my audience because of that. When SWTOR shuts down one day, I'll be sad, but it won't affect my livelihood.
ReplyDeleteAsmongold is an interesting person to be honest. He can be pretty "based" as the kids say these days, but he also likes to stir shit for views sometimes, and has a very ends-justify-the-means approach in that regard, which I strongly disagree with. But after (loosely) following him for several years, I can also see that he's been growing a bit wiser with age, which is nice to see.
Yeah, I listened to the references about hooking your livelihood up to a game that might close and thought not just of MMOs, but all those people who were involved in the Heroes of the Storm league who were blind-sided by Blizz' just up and dumping the game into maintenance mode.
DeleteYeah, Asmongold does take calculated takes on things to generate views, and he admits as much in the interview as well. He said he'd put together this great video for how to mine gold or do other things, and it would get only a small fraction of the views that his "TBC Classic is better than the current expac" videos. when your livelihood is based on viewer count, it's pretty much a no brainer to chase the viewer counts. A "give the people what they want" reaction.
Josh Strife Hayes has what would once have been called a great radio voice. I don't know how important that is to younger viewers/listeners these days but it's very re-assuring to those of us who grew up pre-internet.
ReplyDeleteI know that we're roughly in the same age group, but yeah, that term still resonates with me. And to borrow from another radio quip, Josh definitely does NOT have a face for radio.
DeleteI didn't watch the entire video. The interviews were enjoyable, but I never enjoy watching someone else playing a game, unless I'm stuck in a game and want to see how someone else got past it, or I'll watch dungeons to see how the mechanics are handled.
ReplyDeletehttps://fb.watch/eGtE-UdY2I/
I love a British accent and am easily mesmerized by anything said by someone with such an accent. I thought of Bhagpuss and a recent comment about a game with "British schoolgirl accents" when watching the clip above. Which I hope plays for you.
Oops forgot the login problem. Just also wanted to mention if you sign up for Blaugust (you still can!) I could get one of the seemingly unattainable Blaugchievements :) Atheren
DeleteYes, it did play for me! And I'm going to have to show that to my son to see how accurate it is.
DeleteI love non-American accents speaking English to an inordinate degree, and I guess it's because of how different they sound to my ears. To me, the exotic --to my ears-- equals sexy.
Just don't tell my wife.
Thanks for the reminder to watch the video, it had flown past me somewhere and I forgot about it. (It's been DAYS (HOURS?), it's not my fault...)
ReplyDeleteAlso as a huge language/accent/dialect fan I'd really love to hear what you described as that Midwestern non-accent, so if you stumble over a clip or audio sample, I'm highly interested.
Also fully agreed to what Shintar said. Blogging is one of the things I'd never want to do for money, not even part-time and I think the more I depended on it the more writer's block I'd develop...
Oh, are you in luck!
DeleteWired put together a 3 part series of videos on a tour of North American accents. I've been watching them, and it's a treasure trove for accents:
Accent Expert Gives a Tour of U.S. Accents - (Part One) | WIRED
Accent Expert Gives a Tour of U.S. Accents - (Part 2) | WIRED
Accent Expert Gives a Tour of North American Accents - (Part 3) | WIRED
Cool, thanks! That's queued up for the weekend.
DeleteWatched them. Ha, I know the guy and have actually watched most of his stuff that's 2-3 years old, should've kept up :) Thanks!
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