Agora Road Youtube Club (Video Production General)

Lot of good vibes in this thread guys. I'll check all your channels out later since I'm currently at work but I also have a YouTube addiction to feed.

I did 2 serious videos in the past (both 30+min), and my intention was just to get my thoughts out on topics I really wanted to talk about. The main reason I chose video is because nobody really reads anymore, so if you want to make a contribution on a topic and actually get people to engage with it, video seems to be the best option. Recently I was working on a video about AI and hyperreality, but even after writing a script, recording, putting together footage, then rewriting the script, and then rewriting the rewrite, I decided to scrap the project since it just never felt quite right

@L. Rhodes I've been meaning to tell you ever since you mentioned it, but I would totally listen to a 30+min video essay on Air, I don't care how pretentious it comes across lol. But given what I just said, I totally understand not wanting to go through with it. Maybe sharing your thoughts more casually would work better, like in a stream or something. Or we could start a VN podcast
 
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@L. Rhodes I've been meaning to tell you ever since you mentioned it, but I would totally listen to a 30+min video essay on Air, I don't care how pretentious it comes across lol. But given what I just said, I totally understand not wanting to go through with it. Maybe sharing your thoughts more casually would work better, like in a stream or something. Or we could start a VN podcast
i will consider it
 

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@CognacDefender what's you're youtube channel? I want to check it out but it never seems to be linked
 
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SomaSpice

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The grind is real bros.
>Wake up at 5am to record voicelines before work
>Finish dayjob
>Workout
>Edit video
>Leave laptop rendering 3d segment overnight (~680 frames done out of 2300)
>I have grown used to the fan's noise as I try to sleep
>Wake up
>Repeat

Those of you who're still in college and want to take this seriously, make good use of your time.
 
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Z0diacK

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Always wanted to make videos, just everything really. But my laptop is extremely bad, I am europoor. This current economy does not support my wish to get a good PC. If I did, I would make videos, and edit them. I've always wanted to just play random underrated games, with commentary. Maybe one day.
It's an honour talking to celebrities like yourself, though :JunkoLewd:
 
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Jade

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I don't have a dedicated channel but some of the stuff I upload on impulse had some decent numbers, I got 2 videos with 5,000+ views and one video with over 250k views, but unfortunately I think that one got copyright struck
 
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Deadchief1175

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Hey guys just wanted to give the thread a bump and also drop some free music.
This is just a small zip folder of 10 songs that I've made that can be used as background music in anybodies videos!
Its mostly Jungle/ambientdnb, synthwave, and one kinda lofi song I guess.
I'm about to make another batch soon.
Good luck with the videos guys! Soma's latest was really good and has got me wanting to strive to get better!
Next video should be done soon and is about weird/"disturbing" websites.

>Here is the music!
 
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SomaSpice

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I've been wondering for a while now, what makes a game video review something worthwhile to watch? I mean, for one, the viewer could just play the game instead of watching some dunce talk about it. The angle of criticism or analysis doesn't make sense to me because whatever is real or factual is immutable, so doing that doesn't add much value to the video nor does it make it stand out from the sea of other people listing out the game's attributes and calling it a day.

Covering something niche and shedding light to it is something of value, but the present day internet is so fast and interconnected that I've come to believe that for new works the labels niche and obscure don't last more than a week. Not that there's no more obscure stuff, especially relating to lost media, but to uncover something actually unknown and worthwhile you're gonna have to depend on a big serving of serendipity.

On the other hand, a focus on subjective experience seems to add a fair amount of value since one's personal experience and perspective is guaranteed to be unique, but its still largely bound by the fact most games are sequences of events and setpieces, so discounting sandbox games, most players will play through the same story and have a similar tale to tell in the end.

My solution, however contrived, has been deformation. What I mean is that rather than showing what the game is about, or even showing my experience of playing the game, I would rather show an impression of how my experience of playing the game felt. To give an example, that intro I made for Disillusion has very little to do with the game, but it is a representation of how I felt while playing it.

What do you guys think? What makes a game review worthwile to watch?
 
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I've been wondering for a while now, what makes a game video review something worthwhile to watch? I mean, for one, the viewer could just play the game instead of watching some dunce talk about it. The angle of criticism or analysis doesn't make sense to me because whatever is real or factual is immutable, so doing that doesn't add much value to the video nor does it make it stand out from the sea of other people listing out the game's attributes and calling it a day.

Covering something niche and shedding light to it is something of value, but the present day internet is so fast and interconnected that I've come to believe that for new works the labels niche and obscure don't last more than a week. Not that there's no more obscure stuff, especially relating to lost media, but to uncover something actually unknown and worthwhile you're gonna have to depend on a big serving of serendipity.

On the other hand, a focus on subjective experience seems to add a fair amount of value since one's personal experience and perspective is guaranteed to be unique, but its still largely bound by the fact most games are sequences of events and setpieces, so discounting sandbox games, most players will play through the same story and have a similar tale to tell in the end.

My solution, however contrived, has been deformation. What I mean is that rather than showing what the game is about, or even showing my experience of playing the game, I would rather show an impression of how my experience of playing the game felt. To give an example, that intro I made for Disillusion has very little to do with the game, but it is a representation of how I felt while playing it.

What do you guys think? What makes a game review worthwile to watch?
I've been wondering the exact same thing. My two conclusions were that, with a video like that, you could at best accomplish either of these things:

-Cause someone to look at something in a way they wouldn't have otherwise

This is what I believe should be the goal of any 'experienced-based' review, such as the one you made for Disillusion. Think also of all of the video essays trying to convince you that something is either "overrated" or "underrated"--both terms I hate--and of course these are the videos that tend to inspire the most reproach among people as well, so I'd say they very rarely accomplish their purpose. Ultimately, if you want a video that can actually change how someone perceives something, then you're going to need the prerequisites of having both a particularly unusual and deliberated experience/opinion of something (one which the audience would never really be able to form on their own just by playing it, I guess) as well as the ability to actually communicate it.

Of course, this all comes down to how you actually experience a game, which is a thing that I suspect a lot of people lack the metacognition necessary to comprehend in the first place.

-Serve as material for people to expand their reach (? I don't know how to word this)

This is the type of video where you just showcase/talk about some aspects of a game, ideally without actually "reviewing" it. Ultimately, sometimes I just want to watch a video of a game so that I can get a general idea of what it's about so that I can keep it in the back of my mind, and maybe decide that I want to play it at some point. I don't really think that obscurity has much to do with it, though I generally prefer watching videos of games that seem like they would be obscure, since I wouldn't really be able to form an idea of what they're about otherwise. Personally, I find that the most effective videos of this kind are the long compilations of various games, usually just clips for a few seconds without commentary.

I sometimes like to just have these playing in the background while I'm doing something, and if I see a game that interests me, I make a mental note of it so as to perhaps play it later at some point (this is actually how I discovered AIR, btw)

That's not to say, of course, that this type of video only works uncommentated. I think it's best to talk about unusual aspects of a game that you may not take notice of in a usual playthrough. Like, in your Disillusion video, that you brought up the hospital area and those unsolved portals was really interesting in this regard.


Anyways, I was thinking of making a video series of 'appreciation clubs' (they're not ""reviews"" or ""video essays"", okay? Appreciation Clubs!) which try to accomplish both of these things to some extent, but honestly I'm not sure if I really understand the full extent of my own experiences to really be able to do that myself.
 

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Anyways, I was thinking of making a video series of 'appreciation clubs' (they're not ""reviews"" or ""video essays"", okay? Appreciation Clubs!) which try to accomplish both of these things to some extent, but honestly I'm not sure if I really understand the full extent of my own experiences to really be able to do that myself.
I totally understand the feeling of wanting to separate oneself from the labels of "review" and "video essay". The first implies an evaluation of whether something is good or bad. The other has aquired the connotation of being an analysis of the game within some sort of cultural context. Which usually means its a lefty talking about their political brainworms.

You want to capture the experience right? Appreciate the thing in itself, and to do so with others through video.

Having thought all that I think I could define my personal goal as wanting to create an experience based on the experience of the game... Though I don't think I'm skilled enough to do so yet:kannaSippyn:

Btw, how is work on the video going?
 
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Uh, all of 'em I guess?
AIR bonus 2 - more of just an idea in my head lol, at the moment I'm thinking of just talking about a very small aspect of the VN but I want to do so while comparing the VN to regular novels, I just haven't really picked the right example yet to show my thinking. Currently considering either The Leopard or Stoner though

Hatena De Wasshoi Music Review (Anthony Fantano parody video) -This was just a funny Idea I had while I was out on a stroll once. I think I could write a good script for it, but I don't really have the camera or living space to record something like that at the moment

Appreciation Club (Vol. TokiMemo 1999) & Appreciation Club (Vol. LTiA) - Similar situation, I think I want a camera for these ones. Maybe not though. The main problem with "appreciation clubs" is that I don't really appreciate a lot of things enough to be able to talk about them, and even when I do, my thoughts don't tend to suit a video format

Agora Iceberg - I've been staring at the doc for the script every now and then and I can't think of anything funny to say for the life of me lol. On hold I suppose

And also a bunch of unlisted videos that's mostly just me messing around in the video editor with whatever few images and sounds I have saved on my laptop lol
 

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Having thought all that I think I could define my personal goal as wanting to create an experience based on the experience of the game... Though I don't think I'm skilled enough to do so yet:kannaSippyn:
I can't speak for your other videos but the disillusioned one did great in that regard :)
 
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Deadchief1175

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I've been wondering for a while now, what makes a game video review something worthwhile to watch? I mean, for one, the viewer could just play the game instead of watching some dunce talk about it. The angle of criticism or analysis doesn't make sense to me because whatever is real or factual is immutable, so doing that doesn't add much value to the video nor does it make it stand out from the sea of other people listing out the game's attributes and calling it a day.

Covering something niche and shedding light to it is something of value, but the present day internet is so fast and interconnected that I've come to believe that for new works the labels niche and obscure don't last more than a week. Not that there's no more obscure stuff, especially relating to lost media, but to uncover something actually unknown and worthwhile you're gonna have to depend on a big serving of serendipity.

On the other hand, a focus on subjective experience seems to add a fair amount of value since one's personal experience and perspective is guaranteed to be unique, but its still largely bound by the fact most games are sequences of events and setpieces, so discounting sandbox games, most players will play through the same story and have a similar tale to tell in the end.

My solution, however contrived, has been deformation. What I mean is that rather than showing what the game is about, or even showing my experience of playing the game, I would rather show an impression of how my experience of playing the game felt. To give an example, that intro I made for Disillusion has very little to do with the game, but it is a representation of how I felt while playing it.

What do you guys think? What makes a game review worthwile to watch?

So, a lot of my early days and even now of watching YouTube was game reviews, A lot of the channels I liked back then were focused on transforming that game (usually a bad one into some kind of entertaining review. Channels like AVGN, Spoony, Doug Walker, etc. All would play the game interspersed with some kind of entertaining comedic bit or reaction. None of these are necessarily the best reviews but if there was a bad game I was aware of at the time I would always watch it. That also plays to the nature of those videos, Me as a viewer is already aware of the game and how bad it is, or how it might be infamous and in turn there is somewhat of a built in audience. However, I really feel like this style of "game review" has largely gone away.


Now a lot of the channels I follow that have game reviews are much less about entertainment, and much more about "Experience", "Appreciation" and generally they present themselves more like a friend or coworker who is really into this certain hobby and they just would love to gush about it to you in a constructed way that flows nicely and is concise. Raycevick, NakeyJakey, Super eyepatch Wolf, All these channels do rather then just go through the game and "review it" its more the experience they've had with it, maybe a piece of the background or development that is interesting and can be translated into the game somehow, or the uniqueness of some element of the game itself that might go overlooked or under appreciated.


Or...

Last but not least, and honestly @SomaSpice I feel as if your video is kinda an amalgamation of the the two review types listed above and this last one

Obscure games.
I feel like a game i've never heard about is always fascinating to watch or learn about, and I know the term obscure might be overused a bit now but i feel like anything that might be easily overlooked or not discussed as much is prime real estate for videos like this. I love finding channels that typically just discuss games you might not have heard of my favorite being Minnime. A lot of these videos and reviews tend to focus on the development and mechanics of the game, what might make it interesting or overlooked. However, its the titles or thumbnails i feel like a lot of these videos rely on to grab your attention simply because the game itself is obsucre, its hard to bring in an audience outside of the ones that are already aware of the subject.


So in conclusion thats what I find worthwhile to watch, does it fit into any of those categories for me? Now I tend to stay away from channels like the first category I listed and lean more into the other two. I feel like if someone can explain an angle about a game that has long since gone unnoticed, underappreciated, or tells me about something new completely. I'll click.

Hope everyone is doing good~ Got a bunch of scripts lined up to finish and a big video that will take me awhile for my personal channel. Excited for everyone's next video!




Channels I listed:
Funny/entertaining
AVGN

Feeling/Appreciation
Raycevick
NakeyJakey
Super Eyepatch Wolf

Obscure
Minimme
 
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jaedaen

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It's a lot of fun to do your own thing on youtube. I prefer the asynchronous nature of youtube compared to say, twitch. I have a buddy who does a POE stream and has a very small but loyal fanbase, but I'm not at all in to that game. I also am a guest on some friends' gaming discussion podcast, that's the channel featured on my channel's page.

As for me, I just make orchestral remixes and covers of old video game soundtracks. I have all of 54 subscribers. I'm not here to become rich or famous. It's just a fun hobby, and nice to share with the niche type of people that would be interested in such a thing. If you want to become famous, you'll have to listen more to what you think your audience will want. If you don't care, you can remix a popular game one day and an old dos game that 2 people in the world aside from you has heard of, and you put up a video whenever the hell you feel like it, and not feel beholden to some schedule. That's more fun in my opinion.


I've considered doing a cooking for one type channel, I have some recipes that I feel might be useful to some people. I need to get a lens for my camera for that though.

I've also considered doing a media review channel (movies, shows, books, etc...), but really need to dial in very professional sounding mic template.

Maybe one day.
 
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