Or, dear god, this is the podcast where John and Aaron goad me into singing. I've been dreading this show's arrival all weekend.

Its really choppy and it cuts out. Please tell me that is not on purpose.

This needs to be re-edited immediately. There are minute long silent stretches peppered though out.

Looking into it now.

Sorry guys, I'm not sure what the heck happened to it. I rerendered the show, reuploaded it, and everything seems fine now. Sorry about that.

I can always go back to Final Fantasy Tactics (side note I bought the game 3 time because I love it so much. I got an original PS1 copy, the version released on the PSP and finally when they re-released it as a PS1 classic I couldn't help my self).

I've gotta say, John sold me on a subscription to GamePro. Good luck with the magazine, man.

Yeah now that Johns in charge of gamepro I'm going to be checking it out. That man has class just like Victor Sullivan. With regards to his new podcast, I don't have a clue as to what he could do differently. I have a podcast but it's more of a bi-weekly thing and is just 'more of the same', ya know three guys and a guest (if we can swing it)talking about games. Regardless I look forward to what he does, should be pretty awesome. I think if I were john I would leverage my industry contacts to get interesting guests on, beyond that I'm not too sure.

Ooh both this and next weeks eps sound awesome. The ex-gamepsot gathering will be very interesting and entertaining :D

I have two comments. First, with regards to Game Of The Year awards, to me they're incredibly uninteresting as pieces. The only interesting thing about them, as was said in the podcast, is the debate that they initiate amongst the community members. Since the debate is the only interesting part, why not focus the article on the debate that created the list? John said that he wanted to pick the games first and then give them an achievement-related award. Focusing on the debate instead of the games would be an excellent way to highlight the achievements of particular games, since that would certainly be part of the discussion. I also thought about John's question about what we would like in a podcast. I went through my podcast list and thought about what they have in common that makes me listen regularly, or not, and I think it's "fun"; the podcasters genuinely seem to enjoy what they're doing. Idle Thumbs, Giant Bombcast, Drunken Gamers - they all appear to be a few buddies getting together for some laughs, and it's very entertaining. That's going to be difficult to replicate in a corporate setting, but I think your only chance would be to let the podcasters themselves decide what they want to do instead of dictating it.

@Brent I don't think it's hard to replicate "fun" in a corporate setting. It hinges on the relationships staffers have with one another. If you find a good mix, you can have that fun. Just think about the ol' GFW and 1UP Yours/Listen Up podcasts. Those had fun, but it was in a "corporate" environment.

In response to John Davison and his new podcast: I have plenty (more than I can actually listen to) podcasts in my itunes feed that are the traditional group of guys talking about gaming news and what they are playing. But what I don't have and wish I did was a podcast that is an in-depth analysis of a game. There is lots of superficial discussion that is careful not to spoil or talk too specific. I want a podcast, lets call it The Spoilercast that talks about the endings of games and the overall themes throughout. For instance, make it very clear that for instance this episode is talking about [i]Assassin's Creed 2[/i] warn the listen, then go into a full discussion with no dancing around spoilers or limits and just talk in-depth about the game.

Movie podcasts often fall into a similar: "Dudes talking about what they just played" style. A good counterpoint to this and one I would love to see a gaming podcast take up is something stylistically equivalent to the IFC Film Podcast. Rather than directly review a new movie, they'll take an aspect of something in it (or sometimes just something that pops into their heads) and have a discussion structured around that theme. A new movie "Shrink" will be released and they'll have an episode talking about how psychiatrists have been portrayed in movies. For videogames it could be things like: - Modern Warfare 2 is released: how has the military been portrayed positively and negatively throughout videogames. - Mirrors Edge is released: how did they make it feel to vertiginous. First vs Third player perspective and what makes you feel like you are in the game. Something like this would be much easier production wise than A Life Well Wasted, but could still set you apart. - Mike

@Brent: As much as humor and the easy-going-ness of the nature of the podcast can make it more enjoyable, it can - and often times - be taken way too far to the point of annoyance. Has anyone ever listened to any of IGN's podcasts, specifically Three Red Lights? It is the most unfocused two-hour piece of garbage, filled with constant inside jokes and references to "hilarious" items that each speaker brought into the room today. It's pretty embarrassing. I really like Jordan's idea. It seems in every gaming podcast, some mention of "brief spoiler alert," or "don't say that, you'll spoil the story" comes up at least once. Most podcasts usually give a brief summary of what is the week's episode will entail, so if you see a game on there that you haven't played yet and don't what the story spoiled for you, [i]don't listen to that episode yet[/i]. I suppose the only issue here would be that all members of the podcast would also have had to have beaten the game by the time they record show, but that shouldn't be too much of an issue with a large staff. I would very much like to see more in-depth analyses of games.

...I bought Blue Stinger...

I'd like to thank Jason Wilson for bringing a bit of reality into the show when he mentioned that many people, myself included, actually wait for the price of games to come down to play them. I think the only games that are sitting on my shelf that haven't been played are the Burger King Xbox games that came out a few years ago.

@David You're welcome. I think most of the gaming media forget that people buy games at full price -- it's something we at Bitmob are painfully aware of.

Sorry, late to the party. But dug out this article anyway after listening to the podcast. About John Davidson's suggestion thing - One thing I've always thought lacking was that, we can find the opinions of plenty of game enthusiasts and reviewers. We can even find Q&A; sessions in podcast format from the likes of Tim Schafer or the two doctors at Bioware. But I've always wondered if we can have the common folk on the podcast. Not a community member from Bitmob, but like John Davidson's wife, or kids. A quick 5 minute session with children, asking them what games are hot lately, what they're up to on their NDS, what gaming related advertising appeals to them lately, that kind of stuff (I have never heard the voice of a child on any podcast period). Or friend/brother/sister/mother-in-law who don't think about gaming constantly as part of their job/hobby. I think even a short podcast as an update from the 'general populace' will do WONDERS for the gaming community. A reality check so to speak, revealing interesting data that us head-in-the-clouds people would never have seen. Long but necessary. Thank you

I love the mobcast but you guys have some serious issues with sound levels. Having my hand on the volume knob on my speakers throughout the podcast wasn't enjoyable. Maybe you should get some lessons from Arthur and Anthony at ESG or Robert Ashley....

Yeah you totally mispronounced it, but that's alright. A little late, but great podcast!

LEVELS!!! G-DAM it! could not listen in the car. Enjoyed the podcast but please spend some time and fix the mix. One guy I can't hear, the next guy is blowing out my speakers!!! Thanks guys!

I didn't notice (or at least wasn't bothered to the same extent) as some of the other listeners by the different volume levels, but a quick and easy fix is to run the audio through Levelator - http://www.conversationsnetwork.org/levelator/ Might want to give it a try.

I specifically joined to comment on this episode, but I do plan to stick about for a bit afterwards! This is mostly directed at the final question John asked; I think it's already been said here quite a bit, but the main reason I like to listen to podcasts are the people. 1Up Yours/Listen UP always had great chemistry between the hosts, as does the current Giant Bombcast and (to a lesser extent) the IGN shows. As you guys said in the show, it would be great if we could have A Life Well Wasted as a weekly show, but that's never going to happen! The fantastic thing about that show, for me, was always the fact that Ashley took a step back in his role as host, and let the people, the personalities of the guests shine through. The cosplay episode is easily my favourite (closely followed by Gotta Catch 'Em All), because I loved hearing about these people and their lives in that part of gaming culture. To give it its due, I think David Ellis' moving forward of the 1Up Podcast has a fantastic idea, with attempting to get on an 'industry insider' every week, and discuss their latest games and releases. I'd quite like to see more shows do that. Chatting with people from inside the developers community, and find out about [i]them.[/i] It may sound soppy, but it's fantastic (in my opinion) to find out how these peoples lives have been shaped and transformed by video games. Of course, there's always a problem of blasé self-promotion (or the promotion of an upcoming video game), so why not interview people from currently defunct studios, or focus on games that are 'old'? I'd love to hear about the background processes in Beneath a Steel Sky, or Mario: The Lost Levels. Ah well, that's my tuppence. Thought it was a great show this week, must listen to more!

[quote] I didn't notice (or at least wasn't bothered to the same extent) as some of the other listeners by the different volume levels, but a quick and easy fix is to run the audio through Levelator - http://www.conversationsnetwork.org/levelator/ Might want to give it a try. Michael Buckbee , December 20, 2009 [/quote] I'll try that when they start releasing the podcast in wav or aiff.