Sarcastic Gamer
 | |
Type of site | Video Gaming Blog/Podcast |
|---|---|
| Available in | English |
| Created by | Jeromy "Doc" Adams |
| URL | http://sarcasticgamer.com |
| Commercial | No |
SarcasticGamer.com is an independent video gaming related blog and community site. Sarcastic Gamer is part of the GamerCast Network, a community of independent podcasters. Although the website focuses on parodying the latest events happening in the gaming industry, it also features reviews, news, opinions and rants. All articles, however, are written in an entertaining, casual, and "sarcastic" way[1].
The site was founded by Jeromy "Doc" Adams in early June 2007 [2], after his first parody song, "How you killed your brand", gained popularity on YouTube.[3] Due to the success, he intended to create a website to host all his future parodies.
As the popularity of the songs and videos was increasing, Adams wanted to find reliable writers who could help him satisfy the growing demand for new material. He asked Sean "Rothbart" Workman, a trusted GamerCast Network forums member, to start preparing new articles for Sarcastic Gamer. Shortly thereafter, Matt "Volkov" Schmidt offered his help with the blog. Adrian "Lono" Cherikos, who had met with Adams on Xbox Live a few months before Sarcastic Gamer was created, started writing for the site after his debut on the Sarcastic Gamer Podcast on 13th July, 2007. New writers, Alex "SupaSlick" Shaw and Anthony "Yousty" Youst with Eric "PacManPolarBear" Ross joined the staff In, respectively, September and October 2007. New members of the staff, writer Matthew "Animathias" Schramm and cartoonist Tim "MightyMutt" Hibbs joined Sarcastic Gamer in early 2008.
At first, Sarcastic Gamer was hosted by the Blogger service and consisted only of three writers; now the site is a self-hosted WordPress blog with a staff of fourteen people, including nine writers (Jeromy "Doc" Adams, David "Dave" Cothran, Sean "Rothbart" Workman, Matt "Volkov" Schmidt, Adrian "Lono" Cherikos, Alex "SupaSlick" Shaw, Anthony "Yousty" Youst, Eric "PacManPolarBear" Ross, Matthew "Animathias" Schramm), three forum moderators (Joseph "Frawlz" Frawley, Mike "Ala Douche" Sutton, Bartosz "regua" Reguła), the cartoonist, Tim "MightyMutt" Hibbs and the webmaster, Derek "Captain DDL" Langley. The site has also seen contributions from guest contributors like "Eoco".
As the site is non-commercial, rarely does the staff take part in gaming events and gatherings. The first event the Sarcastic Gamer writers participated in was QuakeCon 2007[4], the second and last one was Kane and Lynch Community Day[5].
In early December 2007, Jeromy Adams and Adrian Cherikos were invited by Microsoft to see the forthcoming device under development by the company, Microsoft Surface[6], thanks to the video parody of the device created by Adams.[7]
Features
Sarcastic Gamer Podcast
The first Sarcastic Gamer Podcast episode was released on 28th June, 2007 and was hosted by Doc, Dave - whom Jeromy Adams met in May 2007 - and Drew, who left SarcasticGamer.com eventually. As the podcast was gaining popularity, more people joined the hosts; on 13th July 2007, along with the second podcast episode, Lono joined the staff. On 24th September, 2007, as the 9th episode was aired, Alex Shaw became a co-host.
On 24th August 2007 Sarcastic Gamer joined the GamerCast Network, proving the quality of their podcast and allowing a wider audience to listen to it.
During the 30 minute long show, the hosts discuss and argue about the recent video gaming news in an entertaining and friendly way.
There have been 3 longer specials, including episodes 10, 20 (each 45-minute long) and 21 (60-minute long).
Since episode 25, Alex Shaw will not always be appearing on the show due to work issues.
The show, besides the usual podcast content, features several recurring segments and the "Sarcastic Gamer news update" in which the latest gaming news or completely untrue stories are told in a satirical way, often parodying the actual news services.
Hump-day Update
As of January 23, 2008, the Sarcastic Gamer podcast has become a twice weekly podcast. Every Wednesday a "Hump-day Update" is recorded, which is a 10-15 minute overview of the events taking place in the video game world. Doc, Dave, and Lono are usually the only hosts on these mini episodes.
Parody songs
The parody songs, including "How you killed your brand", "Halo 3 hoedown", "Hey Mr. Thompson", "This Second Life" and "Ring of fire", as well as the video parodies, namely Microsoft Surface and Wii Fit spoofs, are the elements Sarcastic Gamer mostly owes its popularity to. They have been published on many other gaming[8] and non-gaming blogs and websites[9] as well as aired on the G4TV television resulting in the parodies being downloaded and/or streamed more than 6 million times. The majority of them were written and sung by Jeromy Adams.
Broken News, Rothbart's Rants
Until recently, the so called "broken news" were only published on Fridays, during the "Fiction Friday" events. Now, they are entwined with the real news and other articles, but are visibly marked not to be mistaken for truth. They, along with the rants of one of the writers, Sean Workman, are the most usual sight one can see when they access the blog. All important gaming related news and events are covered (or parodied) in the articles, making Sarcastic Gamer a reliable game information source.
The Top 100 Gaming Moments of 2007
Throughout December 2007, Sarcastic Gamer's staff has been posting the hundred most important gaming moments of the year 2007, including game releases, important quotes, significant company mergers and breakups, and SarcasticGamer.com related events.[10]
Boycott
On March 29, 2008,[11] Sarcastic Gamer called for a boycott of the game Battlefield: Bad Company on account of the revelation that people will be invited to pay for additional weapons, which will already be contained (although initially locked) on the disc. They have speculated that this may be an attempt by EA to test public receptiveness to downloadable content of this sort and possible future use of this idea.
Many websites from around the world got involved in or mentioned the boycott[12] making it very popular among gamers and eventually reaching IGN[13] which contacted Electronic Arts, the publisher of the game, causing it to finally cease the idea of paid weapons[14].
As a result of this, on 9th April 2008 Sarcastic Gamer announced[15] that the goal of the boycott had been achieved and the boycott was lifted.
References
- ^ Various reviews, including the New Tee Vee one and the ones at Xbox 360 Fanboy, strongly support this opinion.
- ^ [1] the first SarcasticGamer.com article, written on 11th June, 2007
- ^ The fan-created video for the song has been viewed 3,518,909 times as of 9th May 2008, and won the "Top Favorites (All Time)" and "Most Discussed (All Time)" YouTube honours.
- ^ See the SarcasticGamer.com relation.
- ^ Relation and interviews on the podcast.
- ^ [2] The SarcasticGamer.com relation.
- ^ YouTube - Microsoft Surface Parody
- ^ Xbox 360 Fanboy, Kotaku, Joystiq among others.
- ^ Engadet, Gizmodo and TechCrunch among others.
- ^ The Top 100 Gaming Moments of 2007
- ^ [3]
- ^ Including Xbox 360 Fanboy, Joystiq, N4G, PS3 Fanboy, G4TV and many more.
- ^ [4]
- ^ [5]
- ^ [6]