Just a Heads Up - I MOVED!

Shiny new website! All of my new posts will go here: www.lordsevein.com

New content will be coming up soon as well!

An Open Letter to X (davidr64): "For the Money? Not So Fast!"

Last night I opened my youtube subscriptions to see that one of my favorite youtube commentators has uploaded a video ... then I see IT'S FREAKING DONKEY KONG COUNTRY! Could X really be commentating on one of my favorite (if not my favorite) video games of all time? It's even numbered - could that mean he'll even finish it?

NO WAY.

NO. F*CKING. WAY.

*Nerdstalgiagasm*

1 minute, 30 seconds into the video I suddenly realized the cake was a lie. Let me explain: 

First off I want to say that I LOVE watching you. Livestreams, youtube, it doesn't matter - I've actually watched every one of your youtube videos all the way through (albeit over a long period of time).  I love your casual outlook on gaming, your quirky sense of humor, and the fact that you don't always follow the path that is expected of you. Before you think that I mean any of this in a disparaging manner please reconsider. I have nothing but the utmost respect for what you have done and I think that this respect is further magnified because I am walking down a similar path.

Also, I'd like to say that EVERYONE who uploads any content to youtube (or anything similar) is doing so to SHARE that content. It doesn't matter if it's me uploading a Capsized episode or Seananners uploading another COD commentary, we are all doing it so that other people can watch it. Now, whether or not it is moral to have viewer and subscriber counts as your focus is up for debate but I wanted to establish this fact before I moved on.

In short, I totally agree with you David. I wholeheartedly believe that people uploading video game content should be doing so for the love of doing it. More importantly, I think that people should upload because they want to share an experience. Anyone who's uploading youtube content with the SOLE intent to make money or to simply garner "internet fame" is doing it wrong. Fortunately these people are pretty transparent and are easy to spot. I also agree that this attitude has recently become more prevalent and ultimately has a negative impact on the youtube gaming community as a whole.

But each time you get on this rant you start saying that you've never had to market your content and people who do so these days are doing it for the wrong reasons. I've heard your rant twice now and both times I have left feeling frustrated because it makes me believe that you don't understand how things have changed.

You started doing youtube at a time when the game commentary scene was relatively young. There weren't many people doing it and thus not much competing content. You produced videos that were of good audio, video, and commentary quality making it relatively easy for your content to rise to the top without any additional marketing effort. Plus the early Machinima contract, your connection with Seananners, and the fact you were one of the first to produce videos on what would become the biggest Indie games of our time didn't hurt right? ;p  Anyway, you produced quality content and everything else fell into place.

The same can't be said today. Just look at the sheer number of different Minecraft commentators there are. I mean really look. (0.o) I know what you're thinking, "But you need to do something original. Fill a void somewhere." Yeah ... good luck with that. I'm not saying that opportunities for original content don't exist (as I think I've found a few niches for myself in the last few months) but think about all the other people trying to find the same thing. Sure someone can get lucky and make a few connections with huge names or get an early start on another Minecraft and really blow up. Realistically neither of those situations are very likely. The truth is that for someone to have any sort of "youtube success" (and thus do the whole sharing experiences thing I talked about before) in any reasonable amount of time they have to have the following things:

• quality content (audio, video, editing, and commentary)

• consistency (video uploads, quality, etc.)

• original content (new or niche games, innovative ideas on the medium)

• nonabrasive marketing (participatory forum posts, social media, collaborations)

Let me give you some real world examples of this in action:

therecidivistdork
http://www.youtube.com/user/therecidivistdork

I LOVE Recidivist Dork. She and I started about the same time and with the same game. Overall, her videos have the quality you would expect from someone much more "popular". She may not have the original content but she sure does bring a lot to the table in terms of quality. Unfortunately she was forced to stop making videos due to personal reasons.
End result: 38 subscribers and 707 total upload views

verbalprocessing
http://www.youtube.com/user/verbalprocessing

Ian surprises the hell out of me on a daily basis. In the interest of full disclosure, I am a good friend of his since meeting through our youtube channels in April. Regardless, I'm sure that his many fans would agree that he produces some of the best videos on youtube. His videos have amazing quality (and editing), he consistently uploads, produces original content from new and interesting games (Terraria motion comics I'm looking at you!) and has marketed himself well through several different methods including a forum in which he is an active poster. He works hard on what he does - sometimes as much as 30-40 hours on a single one minute video. I know from conversations with him that he's doing this for all the right reasons ... he just wants his hard work to be appreciated. He realizes that in order for that to happen he needs a bit of help along the way.

End result: 4,115 subscribers and 497,487 total upload views

lordsevein
http://www.youtube.com/user/lordsevein

Of course this letter wouldn't be complete without throwing my own name into the hat. Now I started the whole youtube thing partly because I had exhausted all of the content on your channel as well as Seananners and thought, "Eh, it can't be hard amirite?" Yeah ... about that. I had no idea how difficult and time consuming it is to produce a video on youtube let alone with any consistency. I also had to learn everything from scratch and it is sometimes painfully obvious when you take a look at my earlier videos. Fast forward three months and I think that I produce videos of comparable quality to many of the "big names" (not to blow my own horn or anything).

End result: 1,207 subscribers and 122,222 total upload views

In your video you specifically mention requests collaborations and dual commentaries as a source of frustration on your end. Personally, I believe that dual commentaries are some of the best ways for new commentators to showcase talent. Take, for example, my Terraria dual commentary with Ian from verbalprocessing: The Legend of Blackbeard's Castle:

IMHO this whole series is amazing. I'm sorry. I know I'm not being too humble but really. I challenge you to find another series (other than the Totalbiscuit and Jesse Cox LP obviously) that meets the above criteria and is better quality. Each episode takes planning, hours of editing, and of course the requisite uploading - all told probably 10ish hours. Ian and I pull MAYBE 2k views per episode. Even this is a fair sight better than my average solo video views of ~500 or so.

Don't get me wrong - I'm not complaining. Really I'm not. But it all goes back to the fact that people like Ian and I are trying very hard to share experiences with the viewer. At the end of the day you should know exactly what it's like to upload a video and wonder how it's going to do. To wonder if people are going to watch it or even like it and thus share in the experience you are trying to create. You know the amount of work - the sheer number of hours it takes to create even one single video. So can you really blame the honest and genuine people for wanting to gain even a fraction of the same viewership as you enjoy yourself? Sure there are some (or these days more like many) people who seem to have the wrong motivations in mind when making videos. That's going to happen any time money - even extremely unlikely money - is involved. 

Yes - telling people that they should be worried about the quality of their content is important. Yes - some people have come to youtube with the wrong motivations and are negatively impacting the youtube community. But is marketing your content wrong? NO! In today's competitive youtube scene effective marketing is essential to getting people to see you in the first place.

Finally, I'd like to encourage you the same way that I tried to encourage Seananners before my comment was swallowed by the void that is, "MOAR MINECRAFT!" (please forgive the cliche quote - it was late):

"With great power comes great responsibility ... You are a key member of this community and as such you hold quite a bit of power in your hands. Please don't allow the negativity of the vocal minority keep you from posting videos. In a time when the youtube gaming community is balancing on the knife's edge between becoming the conduit through with gaming becomes mainstream or devolving into a cesspool of self promoting bullshit your participation is absolutely paramount. Stand as an example to every aspiring youtuber so that he might use you as an example. Failure to do so only helps ensure that the morally corrupt win out in the end."

If you read any of this, I hope you'll understand where I'm coming from and that I still have the utmost respect for what you've done. I'm still going to tune in to every possible stream, watch every video, and even squeal like a girl if you play Donkey Kong Country again. (In before MOAR DKC!) I just wanted to address this in hopes that I could convince you to go a little easier on the new guys and continue to be a positive presence in the community. I hope you continue doing what you do and I wish you all the best.

Sandy

(lord sevein)

Zelda, Capsized, and Live Streaming!

Well sorry it's been a bit since the last post - work has been keeping me pretty busy the last few weeks. With school starting again my department needs to serve a whole lot of students this year and it keeps me busy during the beginning and ends of semesters. Fortunately I've found enough time to post videos semi-regularly and I've even done a live stream or two. In case you missed it, I beat Super Mario World on the livestream!

http://www.twitch.tv/lordsevein

Its taken a few weeks and I haven't completed it 100% or anything, but was a lot of fun. I no have a few livestream regulars who come out every time I stream which is awesome. If you are one of those people, THANK YOU for the links, questions, and funny commentary. You guys are quickly making streaming one of my favorite ways of enjoying a game.

In other news:

Minecraft: Zelda Adventure has been a blast to play through so far. I've gotten through the fourth dungeon and man am I impressed with the detail of the mod. There are times where I honestly forgot I was playing a Minecraft mod and thought I was playing Zelda. Items like the boomerang and the spritework on the boss keys and chests really make this mod something else. (Click the cool picture to get to the playlist!)

Finally, I have just posted the last episode of my Capsized LP on my channel:

It's been a fun ride and I really like how the game ended. For something that seems so simple, the game really added a lot of variety when it came to gameplay. There were so many different weapons to use (including the quantum WTF gun ...) and each seemed to have it's special uses in different situations. However, my favorite part of this game was definitely the physics. There is just something cool about playing a game in which you have some real control over your character's movement but in interesting ways. Thinks like big jumps, grappling hooks, and jetpacks make one of the most boring aspects of gameplay - travel - much more fun. How many of you have wasted more than a few minutes just jumping around Mario 64? I know that I have spent hours just doing stupid stuff with all the different types of jumps available. Anyway, I have really liked Capsized and would totally recommend it to anyone. If you can pick it up on sale I would jump on it quick.

I hope you guys are having an excellent Monday! More fun stuff to come soon ... as soon as work allows me.

P.S. I HURD U LIEK POKEMANZ ... (www.twich.tv/lordsevein)

>.>

Celebrating 1,000 Subscribers!

WTF.

0.o

No really ... WTF?

Ok, let me explain ... Sometime last week my channel passed 1,000 subscribers. I didn't even realize it when it happened - one of my subscribers had to point it out to me. This is a huge deal for me. As I've described in previous posts on this site, I never really intended to do anything like a real Let's Play channel when I first started. It was more of an experiment and to say that I'd done it. Now I get people chatting with me about my videos on League of Legends, people adding me on steam, and someone even bought me a steam game! All of this is new to me and I'm really enjoying ride. Don't get me wrong, I'm not in this just for the subscriber numbers/internet fame (although I'm not specifically opposed either ;p). However, what the numbers/comments/messages represent IS extremely important to me - they represent the support you guys have for what I do. When I see that support it really makes me feel like all the hard work I put into making the videos is worthwhile.

Anyway, I was thinking of ways to celebrate the 1,000 sub milestone and I can't decide on one cool thing to do ... so I'm going to do several things! The first is this video:

I'm also in the process of doing quite a few other things in celebration:

• LP's of Minecraft adventure maps (like the Super Hostile series)!
• A few One Shots of Terraria adventure maps.
• A contest video of some kind.
• Perhaps some collab stuff with both Ian and a couple other awesome people!

Again, I want to encourage all of you to leave me some feedback on what you want to see both here and in the comments of the videos. I may not have the time to dedicate to the creation process that some of the big names do, but I'm sure I'll be able to get to it eventually.

Thanks again for all your support guys!  Your comments and the like make my day!

<3

Streaming w/ DiggitySC: Despite Problems, VICTORY!

Hi guys! I wanted to share with you one of the cooler experiences I've had after starting this whole youtube thing. Last night I had the awesome opportunity to join Diggity in a game of League of Legends on his stream! You may have heard of Diggity (or Diggitysc on youtube) as one of the premiere Starcraft 2 commentators on the scene. If you haven't seen his work, check it out! (http://www.youtube.com/user/diggitySC) I love Diggity's ability to be really flexible when it comes to his commentary style - he can be as excitable and energetic as Husky, as analytic as Day9, and as well spoken as HD. I even hear some Artosis in there too. Not only can he switch styles depending on who he is casting (or co-commentating with) but he can do it on the fly too. He's also done something like a METRIC CRAPTON of stuff for the Starcraft community as a whole. Needless to say I have a lot of respect for the guy.

I mentioned in my League of Legends video that I recently started watching Diggity's nightly League of Legends stream. (http://www.justin.tv/diggitysc) He hosts it nightly at around 10:30PM his time and has such guest stars as LZgamer, moletrap, and X (davidr64). Unfortunately, since I'm in CST his stream usually starts around 12:30AM and can last until 3:00AM ... for someone who has to get up at 7:00AM the next day I usually need to get an after-work nap in to catch his stream. Totally worth it though!

Anyway, last night I catch the stream as usual. The last couple of nights Diggity has been reserving a spot on the team for a randomly picked viewer to fill. I've signed up since the first night he started doing it but I didn't get in nor did I really expect to. Imagine my surprise when I heard my handle get called to fill the spot last night! After quite literally picking myself up off the floor I was able to get my headset and sound set up and even get into the group's skype call! I was pretty nervous as I am still really new to the game and my new favorite champion (Master Yi ... yes, yes I know ...) but I thought I could use the opportunity to record it and put it up on my channel. Little did I know that I was going to be facing a whole host of problems.

Problem #1: Apparently, in the upper levels of the game Master Yi is an AD carry that jungles throughout much of the early game. However, in the lower levels you are lucky to even have a tank on your team - junglers are almost unheard of. Naturally everyone expected me to be jungling and I haven't the slighest clue how to do it. I mean I get the general principal - kill minions in a set pattern to keep up with the levels of the laners and gank when you have an opportunity - I've just never done it. So, I totally didn't take smite ... :(

Problem #2: As soon as we get into the game my client completely crashed. This was a first for me as I typically don't have a problem with the game other than occasional freezing for a few seconds. After five minutes of frantically trying to reconnect (and several choice curse words), it finally let me back into the game. I'm playing a game of LoL with one of the people I respect most and I am now five minutes behind in levels and gold. Great first impression right? FML

Problem #3: After getting back in I try to do the whole jungle role ... the thing is I'm level one with no items and no smite. What to do? Have several fail attempts at the golems before heading to an occupied dual lane of course! With their direction (and more than one save by Matt who was playing Blitzcrank at the time) I was able to stitch together an early game that consisted of half-jungling and half-laning (read as: mooching) until I was within a level of the group. I was still behind on gold but I'll be damned if I am going to be behind on levels. :)

Despite all of these problems our team managed to D up and win all of the major team fights. That coupled with my absolute mastery of League of Legends mechanics and excellent micro ... (read as: me going, "Oh ... we are teamfighting now ... guess I better ALPHA STRIKE AND KILL STEALOLOLOL >.>) we managed to mid push right up to their base and destroy their nexus in one go. I have to say that I never expected to win that game.

You can watch the entire match here: http://www.justin.tv/diggitysc/b/289660285 (the match starts @ 11:52ish.) Be sure to watch as I flail around the jungle for the first five minutes for extra lulz.

A big thanks goes out to Diggity and his team for allowing me to play and for doing the stream each night. If you haven't seen his stream you should really check it out! I had a ton of fun as was glad to contribute to a win for the audience. Perhaps next time I can be present for the entire game ... and this time I'll have smite!

I have some more updates about the channel and my youtube doings sometime tomorrow. Hope you guys are having a great week!

Oh, here's a little preview:

Work Work ... The Next Week or So

Hi guys!

Well the past week has been pretty booked. Just as I got over the flu that I came down with last week I had to oversee the year-end inventory for my department. For those of you who have never worked in a retail environment let me put it to you this way: IT SUCKS! Basically you have a third party individually count all your merchandise and you verify it. Then you match that total with your books and then balance it all like a checkbook. Seems simple right? Well when you are working in an institution with about 5 million dollars of merchandise at COST (not even retail!) you can probably imagine how sticky that can be. Then factor in the fact that we have 9 different departments and you have a recipe for a massive week long headache! Fortunately, it's over now and went about as smooth as you could expect. Unfortunately, this also meant that I haven't had a lot of time for new videos. Well ... that and I've been playing too much League of Legends! ;p

I've been really having a blast with it so far. I've been a sucker for tower defense games since I was little. There's something that's so addictive about the sense of progression how you can customize most of the TD games. Check out, for example, Desktop Tower Defense. I absolutely LOVE this game! If this somehow came out on iOS I'd probably disappear only to be found dead in a ditch with my iPad in my hands ... >.>  Anyway, back to LoL ... I like how it's a new (or at least new to me) take on TD. Instead of building towers to defend you base against various kinds of creeps you simply play one of many VERY different mobile towers that can be customized to your style of gameplay. I love the flavor of each of the champions.  Even though many of the mechanics are the same (slows, stuns, fears, etc.) each champion feels different in both controls and abilities. Being a long time WoW player the concept of tanking, CC, and DPS (called carries in LoL) come naturally. Also, much like WoW, playing the game solo isn't a whole lot of fun ... when you submit to the random matching system you are often paired up against 1EE7 kiddies, racist pricks, and people who leave/AFK and make the match an impossible 4v5 affair. That said, playing with your friends is a lot of fun. I posted this video a couple of days ago and have since had a few of you in my games. Like the video says, hit me up on twitter with your details and we'll get some games in!

In other news, Ian and I released episodes 3 and 4 of The Legend of Blackbeard's Castle. Be sure to give it a thumb and spread the word! Being honest (and a little biased) I think it's one of the better Terraria multiplayer LP's out there. I'd love to see it get some more attention!

Now, I've got a lot of content coming for the next week or so. I actually have a four day weekend (YAY DAYS OFF!) and I plan to use it to develop at least a week's worth of videos if not more. I think that it's easier and me and better for you guys if I'm working ahead of schedule rather than scrambling to post a video every day or so. That being said please let me know what you want to see in the future so I can get it into the rotation! If I end up working ahead it may take me a bit to get to some requests but I will definitely try to get to them in time.

Anyway, I hope everyone is having a good week and you enjoy your July 4th holiday!

This Week: The Legend of Blackbeard's Castle, One Shots: Duels of the Planeswalkers, and L4D2

It's been good to finally not be sick and get back into the swing of things! Since I updated my copy of Sony Vegas I haven't been having to deal with the frustrating issues that had been slowing me down since I started all this. I'm especially grateful for the reduced loading times (importing video to the timeline is now instant rather than taking 20+ minutes) and I seemed to have fixed the black screen and audio sync errors that plague videos that would otherwise be amazing ... (here's looking at you One Shots: Assassin's Creed and Multiplayer Magicka)

Late Saturday night Ian and I uploaded the first two episodes of The Legend of Blackbeard's Castle. You can find them along with the trailer in my playlist:

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?p=PL92D773B06DF6215C

Here's an embedded playlist for convenience:

I've gotta say, from the music and credits to the commentary, this series is some of the highest quality work I've done so far. I think that, man-crush aside, Ian work well together on screen: he brings some needed humor, spontaneity, and excitement to the table. Likewise, I bring a bit of focus and structure and act as a kind of sounding board to Ian's jokes. If you've ever seen WWF wrestling when The King and JR were the commentators it's a lot like that. Ian is definitely the color commentator (The King) and I am the straight man (JR) and it works really well. Your response has been overwhelmingly positive which really helps to justify the sheer amount of time Ian and I worked on these. We really really appreciate it! We are expecting the next two episode to come out Friday or Saturday of this week. Please leave us some feedback in the comments of the videos!

Next up, I posted a One Shot of Magic the Gathering: Duels of the Planeswakers 2012 and it went over pretty well.

I love Magic the Gathering. I love how the complexity and depth can be scaled depending on how deep you and your opponent want to go. I'm glad to see that Wizards of the Coast have begun to realize that their MTGO isn't going to appeal to anyone but the hardcore Magic players and have begun to release more casual games for the rest of us. I mean, have you seen MTGO? I'm not knocking anyone who likes it or anything, but I spent about two weeks trying to break into it and all I lost was my patience, 20 hours of time, and like $150 in wasted ticket money. These Duels of the Planeswalkers games are fairly cheap (~$10) and can be played in both single and multiplayer mode. I hope that, in the future, Wizards continues to expand the cardpool available to the player instead of locking them into set decks with limited upgrades ... but I can understand why they probably won't. They've got to hook you somehow don't they? Well I can dream ..

Finally, I wanted to highlight a mini series that I just finished uploading today. In my opinion it has some of the funniest commentary on my channel yet. The funniest episode is probably the fifth:

About the 12 minute mark Ian begins to rage about his mouse: hilarity ensues. Honestly, this is probably my favorite stuff on the channel so far so be sure to check it out if you haven't. I may end up posting a pseudo-vlog highlighting what I think is the best content on my channel. I think it would be helpful for new subscribers to get their barrings as the amount of my content grows.

Anyway, that is about it for this week. Perhaps I'll have some more information about next week's content in a couple of days. I hope all of you are having a great week!