From The Desk of Nerd³ - March 2024 Edition

Dearest Patreons,

March?! Already?! I thought this year was going to be calmer, slower. Instead it’s rushing past like a LNER train bound for Peterborough that I’ve just fallen out of. I feel like I’ve completed nothing I was supposed to, despite being on top of videos, streams, and cameos, as well as having signed over three and a half thousand prints. I’ve even had time to be unwell for the past few days, which has been lovely, apart from the unwell bit. Why do I feel like the days are rushing past me?

Oh, I know. It’s Balatro, the newly released Poker-adjacent rougelite that absorbs more time than a Weeping Angel in a maternity ward. In our house we have a codeword for games like these, ‘FTLs’. These aren’t video games, these are anti-time weapons, designed to remove us from this plane of existence for hours upon hours. “Just one more go,” I’ll say, as my hands begin to wither away, my last meal nothing more than a fleeting memory of sustenance.

Anyway, we’ve now pulled up next to the point of this sermon. (Well, maybe not next to it, but it’s certainly walking distance away. Please remember to take your luggage with you and mind the gap.) Last month I signed off with a joke about how this is the last reboot, because I’m sure of who I am now. I’ve been thinking about this and, you know what? This might actually be the last reboot, but not for the reason I joked about. I just think I finally have all the pieces in place to cover every type of game imaginable.

Let’s take Balatro for example. (See? Walking distance.) It’s a roguelite, meaning that it’s simple on the surface, yet it possesses unbelievable depth. What series, previous or otherwise, does it fit into?

Plays? Nope. Not a lot of space for jokes, and the twisting intricacies of it can be easily overrun. Visually nothing to work with and I can’t break a game that’s mechanically designed to be broken. Next!

Challenges? Nah, people unfamiliar with the game could get lost, and over explaining kills the momentum of the video.

Completes? No, I’m not Northernlion. If I released as many videos as he does I’d literally dissolve.

FW/Tests/Loves/Retro/Alpha Detective/Other Series like this that you forgot ever existed? Maybe, but short unedited first looks didn’t really work for me. I missed too much, got too muddled. Also, I never called one of this style of series First Contact, so I didn’t deserve them anyway.

Three Fab Games? Ding, ding, ding! We have a winner! A quick (although, mercifully lessquick now) hype reel where I can bang out gameplay features, show surprising footage from hours into the game, and make jokes. All bases covered, brilliant stuff!

These days, I like to think of myself as having three major spaces for games. Plays and Challenges cover the games I can be daft with, Three Fab Games covers shorter, tighter games, and livestreams let a bigger game breathe. (Plus, chat can point out when I’m being a berk.) This trinity, holy or not, might be the closest I’ve got to a system that actually works.

There’s only one problem. 14,532 games released on Steam last year. Sure, most of them are MyFirstUnityProject.bat, asset flips, or games about anime feet, but many have merit. Each week I can cover two to four games, depending on if it’s a Plays week or a Three Fab Games one, which means that each year, I can only cover roughly 130 games. That’s less than a single percent of a single storefront. To keep up with Steam, I’d need to release thirteen Three Fab Games videos a day.

Maybe that’s why I feel like time is rushing past me. It’s now impossible to keep up with the sheer amount of video games in the world, let alone books, films, TV Shows, YouTube videos, Pokémon cards and, you know, friends and family. The only relief amongst all of this is that at least the AAA side of the industry is focused on short, single player games that only take a few hours to complete, and not sprawling, repetitive live service behemoths. (Is it any wonder that, at the time of writing, Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League has just 320 players on Steam?)

But that’s for me to worry about, not you. I’ll continue to dig through the trash, pluck out the shiniest morsels, and stuff them down your chops. Content creator? Influencer? Nah. I know my role. I’m a Video Game Filter, and I’m damn proud of it. Now, with this new setup, I’ll be even more filter-y than before.

Have a spectacular March,

Daniel

xx

PS. Couple of train reference in that post. I wonder if that’s hinting at anything…?