Fandom has bought Giant Bomb

Anyone else „worried“ (maybe a little too much of a word but I’m from Germany and my English isn’t perfect, sorry) about the numbers of comments and views going waaaay down? You think Fandom looks at that and thinks “that’s enough engagement” when some stuff has maybe one comment and some YT videos only have like few 100 views? Don’t know how that all works exactly but I would think that would be the thing they’re looking at.

@deepressed: the numbers are difficult to have informed conversations about- especially because we don't know what kind of business unit/model fandom is using for gamespot v. giant bomb v. their other properties; how subs and this site's engagement factors in, etc. the health of the business kinda depends on how expensive it is to run vs. what kind of rev it's pulling down, or if it has value beyond money generation. no external viewpoint is going to have complete information there.

i'd agree that when you compare giant bomb's content on some of the big platforms (namely youtube)- placed next to some of the native channels- it looks like they're not getting the same general attention. however i've been surprised before about the sustainability of channels being pretty removed from viewcounts and comments, so those numbers aren't the whole story.

tl;dr- nah i'm not that worried or concerned. maybe that's a false sense of security- but this crew is talented enough that they'd land of their feet, come what may.

You can't look purely at YouTube numbers for this type of thing. Giant Bomb's video views are split across YouTube, the site player, and Twitch (Twitch's VOD system has caught on quite a bit in the last couple years since videos show up on it quickly and it now tracks your progress just as well as YouTube. I use Twitch instead of YouTube now for Nextlander and Waypoint VODs because of the delays they have for YouTube uploads. Twitch's VOD system is quickly catching up to and sometimes passing YouTube in terms of viewership numbers). A large chunk of GB's content is now livestreamed as well rather than it just being a couple premium streams a week like in the past, which impacts VOD viewership (I imagine not a ton of people go back and rewatch things they just caught live). Another chunk of GB's video content also exists in podcast form (Bombcast, Dump Truck, Game Mess Mornings, etc.), which again takes away from VOD viewership since most people listening to podcast content don't watch VODs.

For me, slightly yes. After the "mass exodus", live UPF, Bombcast, etc. when I check in, numbers seemed to have halved. But then again, my own viewing habits have changed too, use to watch everything live but not anymore. I watch the archive for just about everything now.

Rewatching all the 2012 content -- I do mean all of it -- and so shocking to see the amount of comments back then. I think they took the community for granted and that's hard to gain back.

Fandom bought this website or they are just collaborating?

@okujme: Fandom currently owns Giantbomb. That is why the copyright at the bottom of the page names Fandom.

I think the fact that in 2012 Giant Bomb was one of a few, whereas now they are one of hundreds, if not thousands, has far more to do with it than some nebulous notion of "them not appreciating their community."

Giant Bomb has always been a personality-driven site, and that's something that's always rubbed some people the wrong way. But there has never been a moment where they've "taken us for granted."

I mean, we can look at google trends, engagement in the forums here, youtube views, comments here on the site, engagement in the giantbomb subreddit, viewers on live content on twitch, viewers on the site's player. As far as I've seen, from any of those metrics, the numbers have decreased pretty drastically over the past 2-3 years.

I just mean how they used to engage with fans: TNT, mailbags, actively reading questions, directly replying to comments on videos, hosting meetups b/w fans and staff, etc

Of course Covid recently made some of this difficult but all of these things started vanishing over time long before 2020. These are things the best streamers are now very good at. GB took fans for granted. That may sound harsh but it's true. Mailbags? Too much effort. Fans in comments -- let's start banning them and discouraging any direct feedback. TNT? Long gone. Engaging with fans during streams -- literally streamers bread-and-butter on Twitch now -- a rare occasion.

I ride hard for MinnMax because they do all these things very well now and feel like the original spirit of GB I miss.

@lonelyspacepanda: I'd say a lot of that has been replaced with chat engagement, and it was slowly done over the course of Twitch-like programming taking over large swaths of online watching. And mailbags definitely got a little weird after that would-be mass-shooter sent them a bunch of tat, so I'm not surprised they curtailed "accepting packages from randos from the site," since it turns out not all the community members of perfect little angels.

And bans were long overdue, people can talk about how much fewer engagement and comments there are on videos, but going back to some of those earlier ones, it's sooooooooo much needless whining about everything from the skill of play to "SJW POLITICS!!!111" that, frankly, I'll take the smaller more focused stuff.

And I simply disagree about engaging during streams: they read out plenty and frankly I love the fact that we're not innundated with thoughts being interrupted to read paid shout-outs, that we don't get interrupted by sound effects and wacky shit that isn't planned or intended, that people can actually have observations and conversations, and that most of them have their own Twitch streams where the kind of stuff you seem to be pining for CAN happen.

Giant Bomb is serving a different audience, as it always has been, and I see nothing wrong with it.

Agreeing with @undeadpool about mailbags, just would like to add that it would also be more difficult because people haven't been in a shared office...

@undeadpool: It is inarguable that the community has largely dropped off. This is not just a case of many more Giant Bomb adjacent sites popping up as this really isn't the case. Giant Bomb was always very unique in how they presented themselves and their content. For better and worse they had actively stayed away from YouTube and Twitch streaming for years until just recently. There was a huge dropoff in users actively participating in the site after all the Game Gate shenanigans and it mostly had to do with site moderation. Then came the many acquisitions and then core staff leaving and the community is all but gone. They are serving a different audience because a vast majority of the original audience simply moved on. This is not all due to content or onscreen personalities either. It's mostly down to how little traffic the forums get. Some people are happy with shouting into the void but a lot of us want to actually interact with other members. Making a thread about a current game and barely getting 10 replies is just bad. I held out as long as I could but eventually writing up threads about games I was playing - current mainstream games and not some niche Itch.io indies - and getting barely any responses is disheartening. A lot of folks moved into the Discord permanently and others moved to sites like ResetEra where you have thriving game threads with a lot of folks to discuss stuff with.

Did they take the community for granted at it's peak? I don't know if I would put it that harshly but when Giant Bomb was thriving there was a sense that they actively avoided the forums. I can only say this from someone who posted a whole lot in the past and barely saw Jeff or Brad or anyone in here. It was not uncommon to hear Brad mention about some conversation he was part of on NeoGaf but you hardly ever saw him on the GB boards. I had begged and begged for some sort of updates on whats going on with the site and eventually Vinny started that thread where he would post weekly updates which was great but that quickly fell behind and stopped entirely until Vinny and the guys just left.

So I would say they are definitely serving a different audience as the staff turnover is nearly 100% and the vibe is very different as a result. Folks have moved on to Nextlander and the likes and some still keep up with the site. But the forums have been bleeding for many years now and that has nothing to do with any of the recent acquisitions or staff changes.