Valve News Network Podcast

[ekket]

I was invited a couple days ago to appear on the Valve News Network Youtube channel for a podcast the host, Tyler McVicker, set up. We talked mostly about virtual reality, Valve news and Valve games in general, then Tyler had a lot to say about the band Coldplay; I'm not sure if I was the right guest for that part. I think the podcast could have been a little more structured, but it went well enough. Also it has a surprise ending! Anyway, it's above if you want to check it out.

In the meantime, I'm mostly just trying to catch up on emails and set up some work for future videos. I hope to have another one this month, and hopefully a few for February.

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[DonRadkos]

Coldplay

 

Also known as boring and pretentious.

 

Anyways, yay more Ross talking about things \o/

I think you two work pretty well together.

[Descriptor]

I'm beginning to wonder if Valve has basically become the Willy Wonka of video game developers.

You know, this really reclusive and secretive company that has kind of a legendary reputation and manages to be really successful with a lot of off-beat ideas.

I have to wonder if one of these days they will give out 5 golden hats in TF2 crates to offer people a chance to come to their offices and see how HL3 is being made. I mean, it's legitimately not out of the realm of possibility for them.

 

Also, regarding the music discussion at the end, I too have run into the exact scenario of a band that sounds great at first, right up until the singer opens their stupid mouths and just proceeds to ruin everything. See, I'm a big progressive rock fan, especially the old stuff which isn't made anymore, which has put me into kind of a rut. I try the new stuff, but it just doesn't click for me the way the original genre did, since I guess it was just something that could only be made at that specific time and place in history and culture and stuff. But there is this one modern band called Spock's Beard (which yeah, sounds super pretentious, but whatever) that totally has the sound down perfect. Except the singer, who just makes me want to pull my hair out. It makes me really wish for them to make karaoke versions of their albums so I can enjoy the musicianship without the singing mucking it all up.

[Binky The Rabbit]

Except the singer, who just makes me want to pull my hair out.

To quote Les from 'Still Crazy', "Why do they always assume the singer is the voice of the band?"

 

I don't really get the hatin' on Coldplay, just like the hatin' on Nickleback. Or more accurately, why people feel compelled to complain about them.

[Descriptor]

Except the singer, who just makes me want to pull my hair out.

To quote Les from 'Still Crazy', "Why do they always assume the singer is the voice of the band?"

 

I don't really get the hatin' on Coldplay, just like the hatin' on Nickleback. Or more accurately, why people feel compelled to complain about them.

Oh, no, I don't mean the singer's influence on the songs was the problem. If anything, his presence was why they had the good aspects, because when he left, they changed their sound to something I didn't like at all.

I'm saying that his vocals ruined the songs for me.

[Binky The Rabbit]

That's fair enough. I was more meaning the rather common trait of the singer being a bit of a twit in the public eye. (Axl Rose comes to mind).

 

I remember someone telling me they loved Kashmir by Zeppelin, but once Robert Plant started singing they couldn't go on.

 

Just before I start derailing the thread too much, I can't say I've heard any SB - any songs you'd recommend?

[throttledan]

I enjoyed this podcast, good discussions going on, and it's been awhile since I've listened to some classic Offspring so going to go rock out to that! Hopefully we get more Rosscasts in the future!

[Katarn]

As much as i would love more Ross, specially on podcast form, i wouldn't like it to be with VNN, the sheer amount of unnecessary hype and misinformation it spreads really does not help either valve or the community. /rant

[UndeadNecro]

Coldplay

 

Also known as boring and pretentious.

 

Anyways, yay more Ross talking about things \o/

I think you two work pretty well together.

 

They're really just a case of making one arguably mediocre song and everyone assuming that they're good as a whole.

[Ross Scott]

I'm beginning to wonder if Valve has basically become the Willy Wonka of video game developers.

That might be the best analogy I've heard describing Valve.

 

As much as i would love more Ross, specially on podcast form, i wouldn't like it to be with VNN, the sheer amount of unnecessary hype and misinformation it spreads really does not help either valve or the community. /rant

Tyler seems like a good guy from talking to him, but if he's spreading misinformation, feel free to call him out on it. I know he does speculate, but that's not really misinformation, it's speculation. Afterall, while it's in slow motion, that's why I have the followup episodes to Game Dungeon, in case I really screw up on something.

[TheYeIIowDucK]

Valve News Network

An annoying clickbaiting twat with a patreon account.

ValveTime.net is superior in every way. Too bad they don't release video updates with the regularity they once used to.

[HLPrincess]

Valve News Network

An annoying clickbaiting twat with a patreon account.

ValveTime.net is superior in every way. Too bad they don't release video updates with the regularity they once used to.

Watch out for your words on this forum.

[Heliocentrical]

Valve News Network

An annoying clickbaiting twat with a patreon account.

You do realize you're not obligated to watch VNN's content right? As far as Youtubers go Tyler's alright in my book.

[Otto]

Haha, I'm glad you're always watching in case we don't, Magda.

 

I have to agree that Tyler is a great guy, I'm blown away by the sheer amount of content he puts out with such frequency. And

I'm pretty sure it's mostly just him running everything too, so throwing interviews with people like Ross into that is certainly impressive.

At the same time, I also agree with Katarn and YeIIowDucK. I would say that with the amount of work, research and quality that ValveTime puts out in comparison, it absolutely deserves more views than it gets; especially for its exclusive content recently on Episode 4 and The Crossing, that stuff was great. This isn't a complaint to Ross at all, they don't even do interviews like VNN does, but I was thinking about this topic recently and thought I might share my views...

 

 

VT's episodes cover a broad range of Valve and Source news that are incredibly thorough, detailed, and with every source referenced accurately and even linked conveniently with timestamps in the description. They get a few thousand views on average, their website is far less active now, they release less often, they do some giveaways, but otherwise no streams, podcasts or interviews.

 

VNN has quadruple followers, gets hundreds of thousands of views for its, arguably misleading, popular videos, and has otherwise over triple that of VT's average. It used to have a lot of "sensational" headlines, at least for the more subjective rants, it seems to over proportionally cover TF2 updates, the footage always comprising of frag videos and usually nothing to do with the topic at hand, far less sources are used or linked, and though this is a personal taste, I'm put off by every opening "HEYWHAT'SHAPPENINGGUYS,THIS IS TYLER!" on his videos with that news-voice. I like how VT always has an actual description, sometimes starting with "Topics Discussed this Week:" and underlines every subject with sources. VNN, on the other hand, always starts with:

Patreon :

Watch my Streams :

Steam Group :

 

I don't want to offend anyone, Tyler is awesome and does a ton of research himself. He's far more active than VT, I don't even know how he finds the time to post frequent news, let alone his LPs, reviews, interviews and videos of his girlfriend playing and dancing with him. But in terms of style, his music, tone, fast-paced editing, action-footage and video titles, I personally find that VT puts a bit more thought, time and objectivity in their videos by comparison, but then again they do different things.

 

It's really about preference of style, of course, there's no need for me to get all technical. They are different channels with differing goals. And hey, VT released a video over the holidays making a subtle criticism about misinformation on YouTube, and Tyler actually responded with a desire to work together and do their best with presentation. Tyler actually changes VNN based on feedback, he asks people how to make it better and I like the sound of him far better than I used to. Unlike FunHaus, TheKnow or whatever those Machinima guys are called, I wouldn't quite call him destructive to the community. But seriously, I don't think those guys even care about their audience.

 

 

Sorry this is so off-topic. Thanks for doing the great podcast, I've really enjoyed it so far.

[joseph_skiles]

Ross man i seriously love the vids you do ( no one on channelawesome makes me laugh like you), but please never compare NIN to coldplay again lol ( and yes I know you were joking). I can respect the fact that not everyone shares the same taste in music i have but listening to NiN and basically anything Maynard James Keenan is connected with is about the equivalent of a religious experience for me.

[spletter]

You really got me hyped with that "suprise ending". So here i am patently waiting for maybe a movie announcment or maybe just maybe even freemans mind

well either way great podcast still, cant wait for the next game dungeon

[Fric]

Regarding all these valve fuckups, including stiching together the source engine and HL3 rumors of being halted/frozen/call it whatever (from what I have read, it used to had loads of people working on it, and now its maybe 10 people doing "something" with it) - my guess is that valve lacks 2 things 1) skilled workers; and 2) capital investments.

 

1) HL3 should be a AAA title, my guess is that they don't have enough high level skilled workers, that could get it done properly;

2) here's a comparission of other sectors - e.g. you are running a manufacturing plant of some products, the plant it self is old, and haven't had much capital investment (although owners have profited "quite a bit" over the years), it is slowly degrading, the actual machines, conveyers etc are getting old, outdated and maybe even not competitive anymore. A company in this situation usually needs a lot of capital investment, to upgrade their facilities, manufacturing capabilities etc. to be able to stay in the business or even to put out new products. So think of the source engine as this aging manufacturing plant and its machines... The source engine problem also goes together with the potential staff issue (aka valve staff aren't capable to make a top notch engine atm) - my bet is that they have serious problems with the engine and thus they have stalled HL3, hoping to get done with the engine first, but its a real pain in the ass.

[BTGBullseye]

One thing that definitely gave me a huge headache during podcast that was the video... Why do people sit there and constantly switch their weapons dozens of times for no apparent reason? It just gives me a headache when someone does that, and then gets 1st place, mainly because I'm usually the only ones killing those people when I play, and I always seem to kill them while they're switching weapons. (and yet they always seem to be able to slaughter everyone else)

[RandomGuy]

Ross's hyping up of VR is making me suspect that he's a secret employee of Oculus or HTC. Normally I wouldn't care about "VR" and dismiss it as another gimmick (especially since I'd need an upgrade or a new PC to run the Rift), but Ross does sound like a true believer of the hype... and I've never even tried 3D gaming, so.

[BTGBullseye]

Ross's hyping up of VR is making me suspect that he's a secret employee of Oculus or HTC. Normally I wouldn't care about "VR" and dismiss it as another gimmick (especially since I'd need an upgrade or a new PC to run the Rift), but Ross does sound like a true believer of the hype... and I've never even tried 3D gaming, so.

I can tell you right now, 3D is definitely the future. Even the VirtualBoy (the one a lot of people claimed gave them headaches) was amazing, even if it was only low-rez red wireframe graphics. These headsets are like strapping a pair of 1080p monitors to your face, and adding headtracking. (in short, totally awesome)