Again?! (Now with S. Bettenhausen)

Aww, guys. Rebel FM was already good enough that I would have listened to it as long as you kept making it. You didn't have to bring the GLaDOS voice! You didn't have to tell stories about drinking (hard) with Ayami Kojima or singing duets on "Hard to Say I'm Sorry" with Koji Igarashi or terrorist fist-jabbing Hideo Kojima. But you did. You did, and I think I might have liked this week's episode even better than last week's.

So, a week—one week!—has passed since the Hearst acquisition of 1UP, and already there's another episode of Rebel FM on the online. Remember that 1UPocalypse happened last Tuesday; this episode went up yesterday. The episode was actually recorded less than a week after the acquisition! So what are you doing with your time, hmmm?

This week's show is handled by Philip Kollar together with the staff of eat-sleep-game.com, Anthony Gallegos, Arthur Gies, and Nick Suttner. Also appearing are guests Andrew Pfister and Shane Bettenhausen. Andrew Pfister, of course, needs no introduction; I trust everyone remembers Shane from his appearance in The Matrix Reloaded.

Although I've heard some complaints from people who don't know what they're talking about, the sound quality on this week's episode is greatly improved. This means that the DIY quality I praised last week is somewhat diminished, but hey, as long as you guys can include barking dogs or car alarms or gunshots or, I don't know, guys outside yelling, I'll keep listening, okay? In fact, in all sincerity, with the exception of just a few mild air-blasts, this sounds almost on par with most of the 1UP podcasts I've heard.

Contents this week include best (and a few worst) stories from everyone's EGM/1UP experiences, which are lots of fun to listen to. Since this show is hosted by 1) game industry professionals who are 2) male, taxonomy is a big thing, so everyone gives his list of the top five games of 2008. The lists are great; I'm definitely glad I got to hear these guys' top fives, and if you haven't been playing as many games as you should, you might get a few ideas.

There's also a discussion of bias that starts when the Rebels mention some of the comments they've been getting on the first episode. Apparently Chuf and Gies have been getting some accusations that they're keeping Sony down or advertising for Microsoft or something ridiculous like that. Okay, so for a while now, eat-sleep-game.com has worn a Halo 3 skin while Anthony and Arthur worked on other things. Now there's still more stuff, like, um, Rebel FM. So it did take Chuf and Gies a couple of days to update the skin to something different. But hey! Fanboys! Yeah, even if they'd left that up? A Halo 3 skin isn't a political statement. Grow up; you're making gaming look like a hobby for children.

Sorry! Like other rational gamers, I am always annoyed by the ridiculous things some people will say about one system or another. However, I also acknowledge that this is not entirely surprising given the way that game publishers treat game critics; this episode also has a discussion of a couple of the milder flaps these guys have dealt with after publishing negative reviews of games that, frankly, probably weren't particularly good. When game publishers can't act any more adult than this, I guess it's not so surprising that many consumers don't. Also, a lot of said consumers actually are, you know, 13 year olds. But look, I'm not arstechnica, so enough of this.

Anyway, this leads into a related conversation about perceived bias at 1UP and in the games industry in general. This ends up being quite interesting as well, with a few remarks on the 360/PS3 rivalry (the commercial one, not the prepubescent one). It's nice to hear these guys say what they think. Nick Suttner points out that a preference is going to be inevitable: game journalists are going to be interested in something, and they're going to write about what they're interested in. This is simply how it's going to be when what these guys are paid to write are critiques; they need to have opinions, and they need to be able to voice those. The greater discussion of bias in the media, what that is, whether there is one, what's bias and what's opinion, etc., needs to come up a few levels in terms of intelligence, but the issue of bias in gaming media is a completely different discussion, carried on by a subset of our society (several of whom take no part in that other conversation), and it's good to hear the Rebels address gaming media issues head-on, and with intelligence, too.

The show ends with a few entries from the EGM letters archives, or EGM: The Lost Letters, as I think we can all agree to call them. Some of the letters are pretty fun, including one that gives EGM a huge F for switching from number scores to letter grades for game reviews. Shane's remarks about the importance of F- and F+ are much appreciated, and his sentiments on the soap opera Passions will be passed along to the appropriate parties.

Rebel FM continues to be a great listen, with some really interesting issues coming up this week. I still can't believe the level of professionalism on the show, given that most of these guys are fresh out of the first post-layoff week. Things continue to be positive, with no slandering of 1UP or anything of the sort, and in fact, with the exception of one or two emotional moments, you'd never guess what the Rebels have been through in the past week. Again, the listener's just struck by the degree to which every one of these guys loves the industry he works in, and the level of talent everybody has for the work he does is absolutely commensurate with that enthusiasm.

So guys, I know it's tough, but what you're doing continues to be great. Keep recording Rebel FM, and I'll keep listening and covering it.

Oh, and links:

eat-sleep-game.com's entry for Rebel FM Episode 2 (also available on iTunes and Zune)

Talking Orange, Matt Chandronait's webpage and future home of the rebooted, indie version of The 1UP Show.

Pure Class

I was going to open with some stuff about former 1UP staffers, striking from their hidden base, having scored their first victory, etc., but come on! How obvious is that? Also, their base isn't all that hidden, really. It's in Oakland. Follow the car alarm. Yes, seriously.

Seriously, though, when I went to bed Wednesday night, I knew that the next morning would bring something great. Tweets were coming in from Matt Chandronait and Ryan O'Donnell announcing they were heading to the BART to ride out to Anthony Gallegos' house to record a new podcast they were calling RebelFM. Also tweeting about the new show was Nick Suttner. All of the above, together with Philip Kollar, Jade Kraus, and Anthony (AKA Chuf)'s roommate, Arthur Gies (who sounds a lot like Kevin Smith), stayed up late-late recording a humongous one hour, fifty minute podcast and then editing and distributing the thing.

I won't say too much about the podcast itself, as Bob Mackey's already done a great job discussing it over on 61FPS. What I do want to say, and I'm sort of echoing Bob here, is that it is amazing how little of the podcast is spent discussing the past two day's events. If it isn't clear why that's so surprising, let me just revisit the timeline: Tuesday the whole crew were told of the buyout by Hearst and were laid off. Tuesday night they celebrated a great (great, great) run with friends from 1UP and around the industry. Wednesday they went back to the office and cleared out their desks. Wednesday night was the podcast.

And yet they spend less than the first half hour discussing what's starting to be called the 1UPocalypse. And for the short time that they do discuss it, they don't seem the least bit angry or resentful. They acknowledge the economic realities of the situation, and it's clear that they'd prefer to have kept their jobs—1UP was obviously an incredible working environment—but they don't bear any ill will toward UGO or Hearst. Naturally, they point out that 1UP hasn't been gutted, and though the cuts that have been made are regrettable, many of 1UP's great writers are still there, and they encourage their listeners to keep using the site (as do I). In fact, the Rebels spend a good deal of what time they do devote to the 1UPocalypse discussing the more positive aspects of it, like the droves of Twitter followers they've gotten over the past day or so, or the endless expressions of support, or even the visit from the one 1UP fan who drove to 1UP's building Wednesday afternoon to deliver a box of Krispy Kreme doughnuts.

So for a podcast called RebelFM, whose logo has a subversive-looking backwards letter R (someone notify HUAC or Fox News or something!), the tone is positive and friendly. The "Rebel" in RebelFM has nothing whatsoever to do with any sort of antagonistic stance. This isn't the Avengers splitting up over the Superhuman Registration Act; there's not an evil Corporate 1UP and a benevolent but above-the-law Pirate 1UP. The name only reflects the Rebels' lack of affiliation. They're adrift, now, creating something on their own and for nothing more than their own love of the work, which is more than clear throughout the podcast. This isn't to say that they'll be doing this with whatever's left in their checking accounts. Since the first podcast went up (it's going to be a regular thing, with syndication on iTunes already in place and Zune syndication planned), they've received a good deal of funding in internet-facilitated donations. They're planning to use the funds to keep the show running as well as upgrade their equipment to produce higher-quality recordings. While this will sort of diminish the great DIY rebelness of it all, I'll acknowledge that this will probably be a necessary improvement. Matt Chandronait, one of the former producers of The 1UP Show, is also using his website, talkingorange.com, to promote a new video podcast. If you haven't gotten a chance to see The 1UP Show, it's still available on iTunes, and you should have a look; the coverage is excellent, to say nothing of the music and production on the show. Matt and Ryan's work is top-notch, and it would be great for them to be able to continue to produce an online video game show profitably or at least sustainably.

What really stands out in RebelFM is the sheer professionalism of the show. It's there in the Rebels' insistence on continuing their work in the midst of what must be a really difficult situation, and it's there in their strikingly positive way of discussing the situation. It's in their ability to stick to the business of covering games. The first episode, which no one had much time to prepare for, and which was recorded on music-recording equipment—I'm pretty sure this means Chuf and Arthur's Rock Band microphones or something like that—turned out great, for all that. I joke about the sound quality, but even that isn't anything to complain about, really. I'm looking forward to future episodes, which, with the benefit of better equipment and more preparation, should be even better. If they can bring Ryan Scott in for an appearance, well, that would be almost too good.

Thanks for all the hard work, RebelFM, and good luck. And Chuf: yes on the t-shirts.

Click here for the home of RebelFM, Episode 1

Click here for the future home of The 1UP Show's next-gen offspring

Click here for what continues to be a great site for video games coverage

Click here for great ways to start keeping tabs on 1UPpers past and present