Cup of Jones - February 7, 2022

Brandon, I started RDR2 last week, copped the Game Pass sale of 23.99 or whatever. Just an hour in, though. Own it now so blazing through my month of 'free' games, first. Actually, I bought a few games from the sale worth it. I'm enjoying Game Pass, but I don't see myself as a subscriber with its rotations and the "good" games being completed. Future 1st-Party launch games are cool. Which means... Can anyone essentially just subscribe for 1 month, rent the new game for $10, rinse & repeat? Perhaps take advantage of any sale? If everyone just binges games, how much do you think MS is netting and do you think 3rd-Party devs/pubs are happy with their cut & importantly the spotlight they're given?

Hylian Ticipated

Heya Jones, Mm-hmm. Yeah, no, I get that. It really stinks when that happens. But if EZA were to choose a date for a romantically-themed holiday, would they be most concerned if their figure was less than Greek, if their mouth was a little weak, or if they're smart?

Asbo Zappruder

Hey Jones, It got mentioned again recently I think but I just wanted to express my personal desire to eventually see the Allies play Jackbox 8. Job Job and The Poll Mine are two really fun games that I’m desperate to see played on stream. So yeah, as soon as a Group Stream looks empty enough, would really appreciate seeing it slotted in. Cheers, Harrison

Harrison Holt-McHale

Hi Mr. Jones, In the easy allies podcast episode #52 while talking about trailers, you said that if you guys were ever to do a trailer feature again, any trailer for a game that has not yet released should be automatically disqualified, as the anticipation of an upcoming game could potentially affect the general favorability of the game's trailers. Do you still hold on to this belief? Has this ever been considered when preparing for gotys and deciding the best trailer nominees? Or has your years of watching and expertly evaluating trailers prevent bias from clouding your judgement? L&R P.S. I really love listening to you talk about trailers. I feel like I always learn something valuable every time such discussions take place.

This is probably too late since you had your team meeting already, but I would love it if you guys would consider doing a Playstation podcast. It can alternate between Frametrap to be every other week. I think Brad for example could be a great host for it. If this was brought up before was was addressed and I missed it, I apologize.

Randika

I think the main point we're trying to get across is that it doesn't make sense for us to try to avoid spoilers for the sake of people trying to catch up on the lengthy deliberations recording. That's not something we expect people to have to do or that they should necessarily be waiting on pins and needles for 7-9 hours to learn the results. The "main show" is the 30 minute awards video that goes up that night, and just like any other awards show / game announcement / news story. The expectation is for those results to be shouted from the rooftops, spread far and wide, and hopefully get the attention of new folks who might be curious and check out the channel for the first time. That's where we put our presentation and production efforts and build up the hype. The deliberations is the raw behind-the-scenes backstory on how we arrived at those results, and really only ever got recorded because our fans wanted to be a fly on the wall during those proceedings. We need to release them close together though, because, again once the news starts spreading, we want publishers to see the succinct, well-written video that's easy to digest. It doesn't make sense for the general audience to have to wait a day or two to see those results in a clear, organized fashion. -Bloodworth

Easy Allies

Hi Jones, I want to address you comment about waiting 2 days to watch GotY deliberations being weird. It's a 6-9 hour long stream, which means the YouTube archive is that long as well. I don't watch EZA on Twitch, so I have to wait for the upload, which is at least a day later. Plus, a lot of us work and like/need spread out such a long video over multiple days. I think that the idea of releasing it a couple days early isn't such a bad idea, trying to accommodate as many people as possible. And, since you said that most people don't watch the deliberations, so I think the chances of being spoiled are drastically reduced, to the orginal commenter's concern. Does this change your mind at all? L&R!

Joseph La Russa

Omicron. -Bloodworth

Easy Allies

It's not so much that the reactions have been negative, it's that people are so used to the template that when we change it to something that isn't just text on a background, people tend not to see it and scroll right by. We haven't done A/B testing, honestly. Might need to dig around to figure out how that works again. -Bloodworth

Easy Allies

Downloaded a lot of the mobile games you mentioned! Thanks for the thorough answer.

Badalight

EDIT: Once again, Mr. Bloodworth is on point with another answer (and this time, it's only a single word). While the answer is serious and one I whole-heartedly agree with by saying out loud, "DUH," when I read it and feeling stupid for asking this question in the first place, the fact a question is able to be answered with a single word I find hilarious for some reason. Anyway, once again, please skip as necessary and I'll try another question next week. Have a good one! Hey Mr. Jones! Now that enough time has passed, I’ve noticed how Mysterious Monsters has had mysterious timing. After a two episode return, it was December (Winter Break) and January (GOTY Season) without an episode. Will the show be making a return soon because of the hiatus or has there been some other reason the show is put on hold? I know it’s perhaps the most production intensive thing EZA does, but for as popular and unique as it is, its absence is always noticeable. Anyway, thanks for reading and have a wonderful rest of your day! Cheers! QUESTION: With a two month hiatus of a Winter Break and GOTY season, will Mysterious Monsters making a return anytime soon?

Brandon K Gann

Hey Jones, Happy Monday! Last week, you talked about viewer reactions always being negative whenever changing the style of thumbnails for the podcast. Have the Allies ever tried using AB testing software to get some hard data on whether thumbnail changes have an impact on click through? I wanted to bring it up just in case it hasn't been tried before, I know other creators have been surprised at the hard data on what actually performs better. Thanks for all your hard work!

Brittany Fuller

Hey Jones, I had a fun idea for a funding goal goal that I think Huber would enjoy for your next fundraising stream. The idea is a dashboard cam video of Huber safely racing on a real-world track. Given his mysterious street racing background, this seems like something both Huber and the viewers would love.

Garrett Hulfish